P rime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday raised the issue of cross-border ter- rorism emanating from Pakistan during his talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping here and said India expects “concrete action” by Islamabad to create an atmosphere free of terror for the resumption of dialogue. Modi met Xi on the side- lines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit here and dis- cussed the full spectrum of bilateral relations. This is the first meeting between the two leaders after Modi’s re-election following the stunning victory of the BJP in the general elec- tions last month. The meeting also comes a month after the 1267 Al Qaeda Sanctions Committee of the powerful UN Security Council designated Pakistan-based ter- ror group Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azhar as a glob- al terrorist after China, Pakistan’s closest ally, lifted its technical hold on the propos- al to blacklist him. After the delegation-level talks with Xi, Modi tweeted, “Had an extremely fruitful meeting with President Xi Jinping. Our talks included the full spectrum of India- China relations. We shall con- tinue working together to improve economic and cultur- al ties between our nations.” The Modi-Xi meeting began with President Xi con- gratulating the Indian Prime Minister over his election vic- tory. “After the election results in India, I got your message, and today again you wish me on the victory, I am very grate- ful to you for this,” Modi replied. Briefing the reporters after the meeting, Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale said that there was a brief discussion on Pakistan during the talks between the two leaders. He said India has a consistent position with respect to Pakistan that it wants peaceful relations with Islamabad. Gokhale said Modi told Xi that he has made efforts to improve ties with Islamabad but these efforts have been “derailed”. “Pakistan needs to create an atmosphere free of terror, but at this stage we do not see it happening. We expect Islamabad to take concrete action” to resume talks, Gokhale quoted the PM as telling President Xi. Modi’s comments came ahead of President Xi’s meeting with Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan, who is also here in the Kyrgyz capital to attend the SCO summit. Khan has twice written to Modi, seeking resumption of dialogue on all issues, including Kashmir. Responding to Khan’s over- tures, Modi told his Pakistani counterpart that creating trust and an environment free of vio- lence and terrorism was essen- tial for fostering peace and prosperity in the region. India has not been engaging with Pakistan since an attack on the Air Force base at Pathankot in January of 2016 by a Pakistan- based terror group, maintain- ing that talks and terror cannot go together. Early this year, tensions flared up between India and Pakistan after a suicide bomber of Pakistan-based Jaish-e- Muhammed (JeM) killed 40 CRPF personnel in Kashmir’s Pulwama district. Amid mounting outrage, the Indian Air Force (IAF) carried out a counter-terror operation, hitting the biggest JeM training camp in Balakot in Pakistan on February 26. The next day, Pakistan Air Force retaliated and downed a MiG-21 in an aerial combat and captured an IAF pilot, who was later handed over to India. China played a role in easing tensions between New Delhi and Islamabad. The 2018 Wuhan summit between Prime Minister Modi and President Xi was largely credited to have turned around the bilateral relations soured by the 73-day Doklam standoff, triggered by Chinese troops attempts to build a road close to Indian border in an area also claimed by Bhutan in 2017. After the Wuhan summit, both the countries stepped up efforts to improve relations on differ- ent spheres including the mil- itary-to-military ties. The two leaders have met more than 10 times in the last five years, including thrice after their informal summit in Wuhan -- - first at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit held in June last in China’s Qingdao, the second time at the BRICS summit in South Africa’s Johannesburg in July and third time in December last on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Argentina. Ahead of the meeting, China hinted that President Xi would highlight the need to forge a united front against US President Donald Trump’s poli- cies of trade protectionism and unilateralism using tariffs as a weapon. China and the US have been in an escalating conflict over trade for the past year. The scope of the battle has expanded in recent months as Washington has tightened trade restrictions on Chinese telecom giant Huawei. Modi also met Russian President Vladimir Putin here and the two leaders reviewed all aspects of bilateral rela- tions to further strengthen the strategic relationship. A ll the 13 Air Force person- nel on board the AN-32 plane that crashed in Arunachal Pradesh on June 3 are confirmed dead. The search and rescue team that landed near the crash site on Thursday found no survivors but recov- ered the flight data recorder or black box. This retrieval will help the IAF to ascertain the cause of the accident. “Eight members of the res- cue team reached the crash site today morning. IAF is sad to inform that there are no sur- vivors from the crash of AN- 32,” the IAF said in a tweet. The 13 personnel onboard were identified as Wing Commander GM Charles, Squadron Leader H Vinod, Flight Lieutenants R Thapa, A Tanwar, S Mohanty and MK Garg, Warrant Officer KK Mishra, Sgt Anoop Kumar, Cpl Sherin, Leading Aircraft Men (LAC) SK Singh, Pankaj, Non Combatant Enrolled NC(E) Putali and Rajesh Kumar. The families of the per- sonnel have also been informed, officials said. For a week, relatives of the 13 personnel were positioned at a Jorhat base camp waiting for news about their loved ones. On Wednesday, the first team of mountaineers of the IAF reached the crash site after getting airdropped but could not get close due to rain. On reaching the exact spot on Thursday, the unit did not find any survivors. Efforts are now on to secure the remains of the deceased and deliver the black box safely to the IAF author- ities for examination, sources said. Meanwhile, ground troops of the Army and Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) will reach the site in day or two for salvaging the parts of the plane and other related activ- ities. A JSU party leader and Jugsalai MLA Ramchandra Sahis was today sworn in as the 11th Minister in Raghubar Das Cabinet. Governor Droupadi Murmu administered oath of office and secrecy to the legis- lator in the presence of Chief Minister Raghubar Das, his Cabinet colleagues, leaders of different political parties along- with senior government offi- cials. After the swearing in cer- emony at Raj Bhawan on Thursday evening Sahis said that although there was little time for him (six months), he will try his best to work in tan- dem with the government. “The government works like a team and I will also work with team spirit. My priorities are the same as devised by the gov- ernment. I have to use this opportunity for public wel- fare,” he said. On being asked as to what’s in store for his party in the upcoming State Assembly elec- tions, Sahis said that people’s wish is paramount in a democ- racy and it is they who take the right decision at the right time. AJSU Party chief Sudesh Mahato congratulated Sahis on the occasion and said, “Sahis’ identity is like a fighter in his political life and I believe that whatever responsibilities will be given to him, he will dis- charge them with full com- mitment. He has never com- promised with people’s aspira- tions while being a legislator and now after becoming a minister too he will do his best to complete the works under him.” Newly elected MP from Giridih and party senior CP Chaudhary said that Sahis’ responsibilities have increased but they have full faith that the new Minister will be able to discharge his duties diligently. Chaudhary said that AJSU party and the government have many aspirations with Sahis, who is young and enthusiastic. This will certainly benefit the young minister, said he. The decision to elevate Sahis as Minister came after former Water resources Minister in the government CP Chaudhary resigned from his post after becoming MP from Giridih constituency. Sahis (44), a two time legislator from Jugsalai seat in Kolhan region of the State, is the second MLA to be made minister in the Raghubar Das Cabinet. He started his political life from the grassroot level and won Assembly election from Juglsalai in 2009 and 2014. Notably, Jharkhand has a limit of 12 ministers in the Cabinet including the Chief Minister. Before resignation of CP Chaudhary the State Cabinet had 11 ministers and one minister’s post was vacant. Sahis filled in the quota of AJSU Party, which is an ally of the BJP with four MLAs in the Assembly. I ndia is planning to launch its own space station, ISRO chief K Sivan announced on Thursday about this ambitious project which will enable the agency to send more humans to space when executed. He also said India will not join the International Space Station (ISS). After Chandrayaan Mission 2, also known as Moon Mission 2, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will launch another mission to the Sun by launching Aditya-L1 in the first half of 2020, Sivan said. Another interplanetary mission to Venus will be launched in the next 2-3 years, Sivan, who is also the Secretary, Department of Space, said. Elucidating on the space station project, Sivan said the mission will also be an extension of the Gaganyaan project. “We have to sustain the Gaganyaan programme. So, subsequently, as a long- term plan, we are planning to have the space station in India. We are going to join the international community in manned missions to moon, asteroids. We have a clear plan for the space pro- gramme,” Sivan said. U nion AYUSH Minister Shripad Naik on Thursday said that his department is committed to reach Yoga at every household so that people gets benefitted with ancient Indian tradition. Naik, on the sidelines of International Yoga Day celebration to be held in Ranchi on June 21 said that Ayush Ministry in coordina- tion with different government departments is working hard in promotion and propagation of Yoga. The Minister said that with the efforts of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the entire world is observing Yoga Day on June 21. In 2015, the Prime Minister Narendra Modi moot- ed the idea of International Yoga Day and since then vari- ous cities across the country has been observing main func- tion of International Yoga day. The first International Yoga day was observed on June 21, 2015, in which around 40,000 people along with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and dignitaries from 84 nations performed 21 asanas for more than 35 min- utes at Rajpath in Delhi. Since then the function has been held at Chandigarh, Lucknow and Dehradun. Ranchi, which is hosting this year Yoga Day cel- ebration is fifth city to host the grand function. The Ayush ministry, which is nodal department for Yoga day every year chooses a theme for function. Naik said, “This year theme of International Yoga day is ‘Yoga for heart’. As Yoga leads to healthy mind and body, practicing Yoga daily can become preventive mea- sures in controlling heart dis- eases.” The minister claimed that in its endeavour to pro- mote Yoga so that it reaches each and every household, the Ayush ministry is encouraging every individual and institu- tions like educational institu- tions, business firms, industries and cultural organizations in making Yoga a mass move- ment. With an aim to promote Yoga among mainstream pop- ulation, the Ayush ministry every year gives ‘Pradhan Mantri Yoga Puraskar’ for peo- ple in outstanding contribution in promotion and develop- ment of Yoga. The minister said, “Four awards are given in two categories and this year at least 200 applications have been received.” The minister on this occa- sion also urged people to par- ticipate at Yoga day in large numbers making the function the grand affair. As PM is to attend the function, the Ayush ministry and State Government has issued a protocol under which only trained Yoga pro- fessional can participate with PM at Yoga day. The State Government has already claimed that as the Yoga day is exercise and not a rally, trained persons or those having exper- tise can attend Yoga day main function with the PM.
the issue of cross-border ter-rorism emanating fromPakistan during his talks withChinese President Xi Jinpinghere and said India expects“concrete action” by Islamabadto create an atmosphere free ofterror for the resumption ofdialogue.
Modi met Xi on the side-lines of the ShanghaiCooperation Organisation(SCO) Summit here and dis-cussed the full spectrum ofbilateral relations. This is thefirst meeting between the twoleaders after Modi’s re-electionfollowing the stunning victoryof the BJP in the general elec-tions last month.
The meeting also comes amonth after the 1267 Al QaedaSanctions Committee of thepowerful UN Security Councildesignated Pakistan-based ter-ror group Jaish-e-Mohammedchief Masood Azhar as a glob-al terrorist after China,Pakistan’s closest ally, lifted itstechnical hold on the propos-al to blacklist him.
After the delegation-leveltalks with Xi, Modi tweeted,“Had an extremely fruitfulmeeting with President XiJinping. Our talks includedthe full spectrum of India-China relations. We shall con-tinue working together toimprove economic and cultur-al ties between our nations.”
The Modi-Xi meeting
began with President Xi con-gratulating the Indian PrimeMinister over his election vic-tory. “After the election resultsin India, I got your message,and today again you wish meon the victory, I am very grate-ful to you for this,” Modireplied.
Briefing the reporters afterthe meeting, Foreign SecretaryVijay Gokhale said that therewas a brief discussion onPakistan during the talksbetween the two leaders. He
said India has a consistentposition with respect toPakistan that it wants peacefulrelations with Islamabad.Gokhale said Modi told Xithat he has made efforts toimprove ties with Islamabadbut these efforts have been“derailed”.
“Pakistan needs to createan atmosphere free of terror,but at this stage we do not seeit happening. We expectIslamabad to take concreteaction” to resume talks,
Gokhale quoted the PM astelling President Xi.
Modi’s comments cameahead of President Xi’s meetingwith Pakistan Prime MinisterImran Khan, who is also herein the Kyrgyz capital to attendthe SCO summit. Khan hastwice written to Modi, seekingresumption of dialogue on allissues, including Kashmir.
Responding to Khan’s over-tures, Modi told his Pakistanicounterpart that creating trustand an environment free of vio-
lence and terrorism was essen-tial for fostering peace andprosperity in the region. Indiahas not been engaging withPakistan since an attack on theAir Force base at Pathankot inJanuary of 2016 by a Pakistan-based terror group, maintain-ing that talks and terror cannotgo together.
Early this year, tensionsflared up between India andPakistan after a suicide bomberof Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Muhammed (JeM) killed 40CRPF personnel in Kashmir’sPulwama district.
Amid mounting outrage,the Indian Air Force (IAF)carried out a counter-terroroperation, hitting the biggestJeM training camp in Balakotin Pakistan on February 26.The next day, Pakistan AirForce retaliated and downed aMiG-21 in an aerial combatand captured an IAF pilot,who was later handed over toIndia. China played a role ineasing tensions between NewDelhi and Islamabad.
The 2018 Wuhan summitbetween Prime Minister Modiand President Xi was largelycredited to have turned around
the bilateral relations soured bythe 73-day Doklam standoff,triggered by Chinese troopsattempts to build a road closeto Indian border in an area alsoclaimed by Bhutan in 2017.After the Wuhan summit, boththe countries stepped up effortsto improve relations on differ-ent spheres including the mil-itary-to-military ties. The twoleaders have met more than 10times in the last five years,including thrice after theirinformal summit in Wuhan --- first at the ShanghaiCooperation Organisation(SCO) summit held in June lastin China’s Qingdao, the secondtime at the BRICS summit inSouth Africa’s Johannesburgin July and third time inDecember last on the sidelinesof the G-20 summit inArgentina.
Ahead of the meeting,China hinted that President Xiwould highlight the need toforge a united front against USPresident Donald Trump’s poli-cies of trade protectionism andunilateralism using tariffs as aweapon. China and the UShave been in an escalatingconflict over trade for the pastyear. The scope of the battle hasexpanded in recent months asWashington has tightenedtrade restrictions on Chinesetelecom giant Huawei.
Modi also met RussianPresident Vladimir Putin hereand the two leaders reviewedall aspects of bilateral rela-tions to further strengthen thestrategic relationship.
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All the 13 Air Force person-nel on board the AN-32
plane that crashed inArunachal Pradesh on June 3are confirmed dead. The searchand rescue team that landednear the crash site on Thursdayfound no survivors but recov-ered the flight data recorder orblack box. This retrieval willhelp the IAF to ascertain thecause of the accident.
“Eight members of the res-cue team reached the crash sitetoday morning. IAF is sad toinform that there are no sur-vivors from the crash of AN-32,” the IAF said in a tweet.
The 13 personnel onboardwere identified as WingCommander GM Charles,Squadron Leader H Vinod,Flight Lieutenants R Thapa, ATanwar, S Mohanty and MKGarg, Warrant Officer KKMishra, Sgt Anoop Kumar,Cpl Sherin, Leading AircraftMen (LAC) SK Singh, Pankaj,Non Combatant EnrolledNC(E) Putali and RajeshKumar.
The families of the per-sonnel have also beeninformed, officials said.
For a week, relatives of the
13 personnel were positionedat a Jorhat base camp waitingfor news about their lovedones.
On Wednesday, the firstteam of mountaineers of theIAF reached the crash siteafter getting airdropped butcould not get close due to rain.On reaching the exact spot onThursday, the unit did not findany survivors. Efforts are nowon to secure the remains of thedeceased and deliver the blackbox safely to the IAF author-ities for examination, sourcessaid.
Meanwhile, ground troopsof the Army and Indo-TibetanBorder Police (ITBP) willreach the site in day or two forsalvaging the parts of theplane and other related activ-ities.
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AJSU party leader andJugsalai MLA Ramchandra
Sahis was today sworn in as the11th Minister in Raghubar DasCabinet. Governor DroupadiMurmu administered oath ofoffice and secrecy to the legis-lator in the presence of ChiefMinister Raghubar Das, hisCabinet colleagues, leaders ofdifferent political parties along-with senior government offi-cials.
After the swearing in cer-emony at Raj Bhawan onThursday evening Sahis saidthat although there was littletime for him (six months), hewill try his best to work in tan-dem with the government.“The government works like ateam and I will also work withteam spirit. My priorities arethe same as devised by the gov-ernment. I have to use thisopportunity for public wel-fare,” he said.
On being asked as to what’sin store for his party in theupcoming State Assembly elec-tions, Sahis said that people’swish is paramount in a democ-racy and it is they who take theright decision at the right time.
AJSU Party chief SudeshMahato congratulated Sahison the occasion and said,“Sahis’ identity is like a fighterin his political life and I believe
that whatever responsibilitieswill be given to him, he will dis-charge them with full com-mitment. He has never com-promised with people’s aspira-tions while being a legislatorand now after becoming aminister too he will do his bestto complete the works underhim.”
Newly elected MP fromGiridih and party senior CPChaudhary said that Sahis’responsibilities have increasedbut they have full faith that thenew Minister will be able todischarge his duties diligently.Chaudhary said that AJSUparty and the government havemany aspirations with Sahis,who is young and enthusiastic.This will certainly benefit theyoung minister, said he.
The decision to elevateSahis as Minister came afterformer Water resourcesMinister in the government CPChaudhary resigned from hispost after becoming MP fromGiridih constituency. Sahis(44), a two time legislator fromJugsalai seat in Kolhan regionof the State, is the second MLAto be made minister in theRaghubar Das Cabinet. Hestarted his political life from thegrassroot level and wonAssembly election fromJuglsalai in 2009 and 2014.
Notably, Jharkhand has alimit of 12 ministers in theCabinet including the ChiefMinister. Before resignation ofCP Chaudhary the StateCabinet had 11 ministers andone minister’s post was vacant.Sahis filled in the quota ofAJSU Party, which is an ally ofthe BJP with four MLAs in theAssembly.
� ��� 546.4,2&
India is planning to launch itsown space station, ISRO
chief K Sivan announced onThursday about this ambitiousproject which will enable theagency to send more humansto space when executed.
He also said India will notjoin the International SpaceStation (ISS). AfterChandrayaan Mission 2, alsoknown as Moon Mission 2, theIndian Space ResearchOrganisation (ISRO) willlaunch another mission to theSun by launching Aditya-L1 inthe first half of 2020, Sivan said.
Another interplanetarymission to Venus will belaunched in the next 2-3 years,Sivan, who is also the Secretary,Department of Space, said.
Elucidating on the spacestation project, Sivan saidthe mission will also be anextension of the Gaganyaan
project. “We have to sustainthe Gaganyaan programme.So, subsequently, as a long-term plan, we are planning tohave the space station inIndia. We are going to jointhe international communityin manned missions to moon,asteroids. We have a clearplan for the space pro-gramme,” Sivan said.
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Union AYUSH MinisterShripad Naik on Thursday
said that his department iscommitted to reach Yoga atevery household so that peoplegets benefitted with ancientIndian tradition. Naik, on thesidelines of International YogaDay celebration to be held inRanchi on June 21 said thatAyush Ministry in coordina-tion with different governmentdepartments is working hard inpromotion and propagation ofYoga.
The Minister said that withthe efforts of Prime MinisterNarendra Modi, the entireworld is observing Yoga Day onJune 21. In 2015, the PrimeMinister Narendra Modi moot-ed the idea of InternationalYoga Day and since then vari-ous cities across the countryhas been observing main func-tion of International Yoga day.The first International Yoga daywas observed on June 21, 2015,in which around 40,000 people
along with Prime MinisterNarendra Modi and dignitariesfrom 84 nations performed 21asanas for more than 35 min-utes at Rajpath in Delhi. Sincethen the function has been heldat Chandigarh, Lucknow andDehradun. Ranchi, which ishosting this year Yoga Day cel-ebration is fifth city to host thegrand function.
The Ayush ministry, whichis nodal department for Yogaday every year chooses a themefor function. Naik said, “This
year theme of InternationalYoga day is ‘Yoga for heart’. AsYoga leads to healthy mind andbody, practicing Yoga dailycan become preventive mea-sures in controlling heart dis-eases.” The minister claimedthat in its endeavour to pro-mote Yoga so that it reacheseach and every household, theAyush ministry is encouragingevery individual and institu-tions like educational institu-tions, business firms, industriesand cultural organizations in
making Yoga a mass move-ment.
With an aim to promoteYoga among mainstream pop-ulation, the Ayush ministryevery year gives ‘PradhanMantri Yoga Puraskar’ for peo-ple in outstanding contributionin promotion and develop-ment of Yoga. The ministersaid, “Four awards are given intwo categories and this year atleast 200 applications havebeen received.”
The minister on this occa-sion also urged people to par-ticipate at Yoga day in largenumbers making the functionthe grand affair. As PM is toattend the function, the Ayushministry and State Governmenthas issued a protocol underwhich only trained Yoga pro-fessional can participate withPM at Yoga day. The StateGovernment has alreadyclaimed that as the Yoga day isexercise and not a rally, trainedpersons or those having exper-tise can attend Yoga day mainfunction with the PM.
matches being played inEngland, not only are cricketfanatics from the city buthotels and restaurants too aregetting into gear for the occa-sion. From making bartenderswear jerseys of Team India togiving great offers on food andbeverages, the hotels andmajor eating joints have comeup with unique ideas.
City’s leading Hotel SouthPark has presented ‘Fanzone ‘to make visitors enjoy food ,drinks with cricket. The visi-tors are also getting chance towin World Cup Gold & SilverDiscount Card on food validfor one year. The hotel has cre-ated a unique ambience to getthe cricket fans into the moodfor the big matches.
“The interiors have beengiven a tri-colour look. To givea feeling of being present atthe stadium watching livecricket, special arrangementshave been made at the hotel.We want our guests to enjoythe game while they watch it.The main reason for usputting up this decour is suchthat each person visiting thehotel gets a feel of the game,"said Ravi Verma, generalmanager, Hotel South Park.
From Virat chicken tikasto Rohit kebab to Dhawanrice, all will be on the platterfor the cricket crazy fans of the
city.Hotel Sonnet and Sky 180
are also providing mouthwa-tering stuff named after crick-eting icons with fans singingand dancing on every ball ofthe match.
And that's not all! A fewhotels are looking at havingdinner buffets too. "We plan toput up a projector in the ban-quet hall where the WorldCup match will be screened."If all goes well, we will bemore than happy to have abuffet meal too, so that peo-ple have a scrumptious mealwhile enjoying the match.Starters and other munchieswill be given all through thematch,” said an official.
“We have planned to servethe lunch and dinner menuwith stuff named after crick-eting icons and discount pack-ages for the day are also on theoffer,” said an official of HotelSonnet.
Meanwhile, VivekanandaMilan Sangh in Pramathnagar,at Parsudih, has put up a20x8 canvas screen at Durga
Puja maidan to watch thematches.
“We believe in sports andcelebrate cricket and footballWorld Cups in similar fashionevery four years. We havealready arranged a projector.Preparations are almost com-plete,” said Rana Dey, presi-dent of the club. He added thatspecial arrangements arebeing made for the India-Pakistan clash on June 16,”Dey informed.
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The Central Institute ofPlastics Engineering &
Technology (CIPET), Ranchiwill begin two diploma pro-grammes for the academic year2019-20. The two three-yeardiplomas, Diploma in PlasticsTechnology (DPT) andDiploma in Plastics MouldTechnology (DPMT), areaimed at creating skilled labourfor the plastics and allied indus-tries in the State.
Talking to media personshere on Thursday, Director &Head CIPET, Ranchi AKRao,—Skill Development,Technology, Academic andResearch—framework in ourinstitutes. Skill training,designing, tooling, process-ing, testing and quality control,all things are done at our insti-tute, which is a great exposurefor our students. Till now, wehad skill development coursesspanning from 3 to 6 months,but the new diploma courseswill boost plastics industryemployment in the State” hesaid.
The national institute,which has 37 centres across thecountry, will be conducting AllIndia CIPNETJEE 2019 onJuly 7 for admission to the twocourses. The Ranchi centrehas 120 seats each for both thecourses, of which 80 percent
will be reserved for in-Statestudents. The applicants needto be standard Xth pass inMaths, Science, and English tobe eligible for the courses.Thedeadline for application sub-mission is June 30. The appli-cation fee is �750 for Generaland Backward Caste students,and �300 for ST/SC students.The fees for the courses are�20-22,000 per semester, withextra fee for hostel accommo-dation. The academic sessionwill commence from August 1.
Talking about job oppor-tunities in the sector, Raoclaimed CIPET students areplaced in various plastic man-ufacturing companies acrossthe country. “27 out of our 30students were placed in facto-ries of MNCs in Noida andGujarat. After completing thediploma course, our studentscan earn a minimum of�15,000 per month,” he
claimed, at a time when unem-ployment rate in the country isbreaking all records.
Upon being asked aboutthe about the low packageplacements for a course thatwill cost around �1.5 lakh,making it unaffordable for alot of students, Rao said thatit will just be the initial pack-age, and that there is a lot ofscope in the industry rightnow, despite its environmen-tal and implementation chal-lenges. “There are manyavenues open for the studentsto explore after graduation.And I feel it is better that theyouth is employed in whatev-er capacity, rather than unem-ployed. Unemployment resultsin crime and nuisance in thecity.”
announced a change in lead-ership. After completion of hissecond term, Father EAbraham handed over the reinsto Father P Christie, as the newdirector of the country’s lead-ing management institute.
Christie has taken over theresponsibilities as the newDirector of XLRI with imme-diate effect. His predecessor, Fr.E. Abraham, has been thelongest serving director ofXLRI. His total tenure as direc-tor spanned for over 16 yearsacross two terms. He himself isalso an alumnus of XLRI.
Prior to joining XLRI, Fr.Christie has been serving as thedirector of Loyola Institute ofBusiness Administration(LIBA), Chennai for 11 years.His association with LIBA goesback to 1999, where he startedas an Assistant Professor ofDecision Sciences and laterbecame the Dean before takingup the responsibility of theDirector. Fr. Christie holds anMBA and a Ph.D. in BusinessAdministration from St. LouisUniversity, St. Louis, USA withMajor in Decision Sciences. Healso holds a master’s degree instatistics from MadrasChristian College, Chennai.With his vast experience inevaluations and strategic plan-ning, he has undertaken severalconsulting assignments andstrategic planning of programsand organisations in India andabroad.
Speaking on his appoint-ment, Christie said, “It is
indeed a privilege to be a partof XLRI and it is a huge respon-sibility to help shepherd XLRIat this exciting juncture. XLRI’smission-led growth over sevendecades has been guided byfour important hallmarks ofJesuit education — ‘Excellence’,‘Integrity and Ethics’, ‘HolisticGrowth of an Individual’ and‘Social Consciousness’.Excellence and Ethics areimportant elements of XLRI’sDNA and is passed on to everystudent of the institution. Oneof the goals of XLRI is to nur-ture responsible leaders whoare conscious and sensitivetowards the needs of lesserprivileged sections of the soci-ety and work for inclusive andsustainable growth of Indiaand we will continue to placea strong emphasis on ourethos.”
While reflecting on theleadership change, Abrahamsaid, “I congratulate Fr. Christieand wish him the very best inhis new role. I am confidentthat he would successfullyspearhead XLRI to be an insti-tution of excellence and man-agement-centric research whilenurturing responsible globalleaders for the greater commongood and a sustainable future.”
one was injured on Wednesdaynight after a trailer lost controland rammed into them inBengabad-Madhupur road areain Giridih, said Officer-inCharge Arun Panday.
The trailer which washeaded to Madhupur townfrom Bengabad lost controland hit the motorcycle, killingthe three on the spot.
Meanwhile, in the sameincident, one Payal Kumari,wasseriously injured.
The deceased have beenidentified as Surendra Rana, hiswife Parwati Devi,son SureshRana.
The daughter PayalKumari was seriously injured inthe incident. Police said that thefour of a family on their bikewere goning to home atKaramjori village fromBengabad,when their twowheeler was hit by the trailer at9 pm on Wednesday due towhich they died on the spot.Later, the girl was admitted toGiridih hospital from whereshe was referred to other hos-pital.
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Tata Group has played avital role in the area of
healthcare and education.Interestingly, every TataGroup of company has ablood donation centre insidethe premises, which includesTata Steel and Tata Motorsetc. Jharkhand State has ablood bank, which is operat-ed by Tata Steel in associationwith Red Cross Society. TataMotors has recorded the high-est amount of blood donationfor decades and the city haswitnessed donors for genera-tion after generation.
As per the JamshedpurBlood Bank records, thereare 37 centurions inJamshedpur (Jharkhand). Outof these 37 Centurions, 18centurions blood donors arefrom Tata MotorsJamshedpur. The companyhas received several recogni-tion across the county andState for its tremendous con-tribution towards blood dona-tion. Like Best CorporateAward from Jamshedpurblood bank & Red CrossSociety, volunteer blooddonors associat ion,
Jharkhand State aids controlsociety in the area of blooddonation.
It managed to collectaround six thousand threehundred and seventy fourunits of blood, which makesit the leading blood donatingorganisation in Jamshedpur,and the leading blood donat-ing organisation in the State.
With a blood bank insidethe Tata Motors premises inJamshedpur, the employeesare not only given the day off
for donating a bottle of blood,but can also avail an extraleave within 7 days of donat-ing their blood. During aninterview with Ratan Tatawhen pointed out that peopletake undue advantage of thispolicy and the company losesseveral man hours due tothis, he smiled and answeredcalmly,” Encouragement issomething I do not need toteach you. Only a few peopledonate blood because theywant to.
Talking about man-hours,we may be losing some manhours doing that, but haveyou ever thought of the num-ber of man-hours that getsadded to the person’s lifewho receives that blood innecessity? I am ready to sac-rifice some of our man-hoursfor the better good of human-ity.”
On World Blood DonorsDay Tata Motors Jamshedpuris organising its blood dona-tion camp on June 14.
field visit to Pakhar panchayatof Kisko block on Thursday.Dumarpath, Banglapath,Pokhrapath and other villageswere covered during the visit.The DC also inspected thePanchayat Bhawan in Pakhar.
The people of Pakhar com-plained to the DC about theissues with ration card and old-age pension in the block. TheDC ordered that the problemswill be solved at a special campon June 15.
The DC also instructedthat the Panchayat Bhawan inPakhar be repaired. She alsoordered a Common ServiceCentre to be started in thebuilding. Three dysfunctional
water towers in the panchayatwill also be repaired.Appointment of ANM for theAarogyam Bhawan along withrepair of Aanganbadi was also
ordered.The DC also instructed
officials to provide electricityconnections for houses in manyareas of the block.
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Proving his mettle, Bokaroboy Prajnapan Basu made
his mark by securing AIR 144in the coveted All IndiaInstitute of Medical Science(AIIMS).
Another boy Ankan Sadhuhas secured AIR 426 as perinformation received so far.
Notably, Prajnapan Basuhas also secured AIR 4 in JIP-MER and AIR 72 in NEET ear-lier this year. Both are the stu-dents of DPS Bokaro.
Congratulating Basu onhis incredible accomplishment,A.S. Gangwar, Principal of theschool said, “The destiny ofhard work is always success andPrajnapan have made us believeit time and again.”
The price of success is said
to be diligence, determinationand an unremitting devotion tothe things you want to see hap-pen, he said.
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State BJP general Secretary-cum-headquar ters- in-
charge Deepak Prakash todaysaid that the State BJP unitwants to make the InternationalYoga Day programme grandand attractive by increasing theparticipation of the people.Holding a press conferencehere on Thursday, Prakashsaid that Yoga is the culture ofIndia and a spiritual heritage.
“Five years ago on the ini-tiative of Prime MinisterNarendra Modi, the UnitedNations on June 21 declaredinternational yoga day. 194countries of the world gavevalidity to the tradition andculture of India. Today, peo-ple of the world are beingbenefitted by yoga and areleading a healthy and diseasefree life,” he said.
Prakash further said thatin addition to the State gov-ernment, BJP workers areengaged with social and cul-tural organizations to connectpeople with the Yoga Day pro-gramme ensure that they getregistered through online and
offline modes. “BJP workersof Ranchi Mahanagar andrural workers of Ranchi dis-trict will also perform yogawith Prime MinisterNarendra Modi at PrabhatTara Ground in Ranchi, whilein other districts people willtake part in programmes atPanchayats, Mandals and dis-trict level. Meetings were heldtoday at State BJP office ofparty’s Women Cell ,Backward Cell, Youth Celletc and forms for offline reg-istration were distributed
there,” he said.Prakash said that the
Prime Minister will reachRanchi on the evening ofJune 20 and will attend theYoga Day programme orga-nized by the Government inthe morning of June 21 atPrabhat Tara Maidan inDhurwa area of the CapitalCity.
State BJP SpokespersonDeendayal Barnwal and andMedia In-charge Shiv PujanPathak were also present inthe press conference.
in removing mental and phys-ical illness. The Governor saidYoga is base of life and every-body should make it habit topractise Yoga daily. Murmu,while attending the rehearsal ofInternational Yoga Day cele-bration to be held on June 21in Ranchi’s Prabhat Taraground and to be attended byPrime Minister NarendraModi, urged more and moreyouths to adopt Yoga in theirlife style.
The Governor also statedthat Yoga a pride for nation.The Yoga rehearsal functionwas held at Raj Bhavan andapart from Governor the func-tion was attended by ChiefMinister Raghubar Das, StateHealth Minister RamchandraChandravanshi, newly electedRanchi MP Sanjay Seth, MayorAsha Lakra and others.
The CM attending thefunction said, “The govern-ment is committed to makeYoga a revolution so that largenumbers of people adopt Yoga.Daily practice of Yoga makes anindividual healthy. If people ofthe State are healthy and ener-getic they can contribute in the
growth and development of theState.” Das also asked the peo-ple especially the youngsters toadopt Yoga in their daily lifestyle and for this people shouldtake an oath.
As the Yoga practice ses-sion was held at 6 am, enthu-siasts for attending the Yogapractice session where in queuefrom early morning. Everyonewas much enthusiastic to par-ticipate at the training sessionalong with Chief Minister andGovernor. The Thursday’straining session was rehearsalsof June 21 main function as all
the protocols were followed inthe practice session.
Some of the protocols setby Ayush ministry for practic-ing Yoga includes Yogic exer-cises should be done in neatand clean environment. Yogicpractice should be done on anempty stomach or light stom-ach. A mattress, Yoga mat,durrie or folded blanket shouldbe used for the practice. Lightand comfortable cotton clothesare preferred to facilitate easymovement of the body. Yogashould not be performed instate of exhaustion, illness, in
a hurry or in acute stress con-ditions.
The Chief Minister on theoccasion also met the childrenand youngsters attending Yogasession at Raj Bhavan. TheCM invited children andyoungsters to attend the YogaDay main function at PrabhatTara ground. The children par-ticipating at the function werehappy after meeting CM andGovernor.
Ayushi Gupta, a resident ofUpper Bazar who participated
at the Yoga Day celebrationsaid, “It was great feeling topractice Yoga along with CMand Governor. The expertsguiding the Yoga enthusiastsbriefed about the variousAshnas of Yoga.”
In order to meet the challengeposed by pollution, Green
House Gases and preserve theserene environment gifted to usmother nature, we need towork with changed mindsetand a more balanced approach,said Chairman and ManagingDirector, Central CoalfieldLimited, Gopal Singh.
Singh said this as Guest ofHonour while addressing theinaugural session of conferenceon “Air Pollution in MiningAreas of Jharkhand” organisedby Ministry of EnvironmentForest and Climate Change,Regional Office, Ranchi onWednesday at Research andDevelopment Centre for Ironand Steel, at Steel Authority ofIndia Limited (SAIL) campus.
Congratulating the organ-ising team Singh that it isindeed an irony that thoughnature has endowed Jharkhandwith abundant mineralresources but in the process ofmining we disturb this delicatebalance, which is a harsh real-
ity that every mining companyhas to face. However, withchange mindset and holisticapproach we can meet thischallenge together as a team, headded further.
Elaborating on the persis-tent effort of CCL, for the suc-cess of this mission to curb pol-lution and preserve environ-ment, Singh informed the gath-ering that CCL has deployedstate of the art technology likesurface miner, silos, rapid load-ing system, and others. Inaddition to this water sprin-klers, land reclamation, eco-parks are being establishedacross CCL command areas.
Singh also told about thehistoric Memorandum ofUnderstanding signed withState Government to supply the
abundant water in the minesfor drinking purpose afterproper treatment. Alreadydrinking water is provided to74 villages. He furtherappraised the gathering aboutthe CCL’s success in achievingzero discharge of the slurryfrom the washeries in
Damodar and other localrivulets. But a lot has to be doneas these are small milestone inour journey to accomplish sus-tainable and eco-friendly min-ing, which can be achievedwith the cooperation of eachand every one.
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In a good news for the bud-ding fast bowlers of the State,
Jharkhand State CricketAssociation (JSCA) is organiz-ing a two day workshop forpace bowlers under the expertguidance of one of the mostsuccessful fast of bowlers of theworld Australian pacer, GlennMcGrath at the JSCAInternational Cricket Stadiumcomplex in association withMRF Pace Foundation which isa renowned coaching clinic fortraining fast bowlers from allover the world.
Member JSCA JaikumarSinha said that the two daytraining camp will start on June17. Around 20 selected fastbowlers from across the Statewill learn bowling acumen bythe legendry McGrath.
Glenn McGrath played allformats of the internationalgame for 14 years and formedseveral records.
He was a fast-medium pacebowler and is considered oneof the greatest bowlers of alltime, and a leading contributorto Australia's domination ofworld cricket from the mid-
1990s to the mid 2000s.“In this first ever workshop
in the state designed exclu-sively for the pace bowlers,scheduled on the 17th and18th of June, the seniorTeam,U-23 Team and U-19Team's fast bowlers as well thecoaches will participate.
Training session will befollowed by video analysis andan interactive session withplayers and coaches,” saidSinha.
Glenn McGrath will inter-act with Media on the 17th ofJune at JSCA InternationalStadium Complex.
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Following the UrbanDevelopment and Housing
Development Secretary’sinstruction to intensify effortsin providing housing for theslum dwellers in Ranchi andother districts of the Stateunder the PradhanmantriAawaas Yojana, MunicipalAdministrative DirectorateDirector Rajeev Ranjan sentteams to slums in various areason Thursday.
The Ranchi team visitedthe Pahadi Tola slum in Ward29 on Thursday. AssistantDirector Sanjay Kumar pro-posed the plan to providepucca houses to more than 200families in the slum. The slumdwellers readily agreed to giveup their slums in favour of theproject.
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Residents of the city are allset and pulling up their
socks to attend the grand eventon International Yoga Day toperform ‘asanas’ with PMNarendra Modi on June 21.Their words reflect their eager-ness for being a part of it. FromJune 15, a weeklong event willstart with 'Run for Yoga', thatwould culminate on June 21with International Yoga Day.
“Yoga is all about findingthe ease in your body so youcan connectto your inner self.While working all day longIfeel stressed and tired but,Icarve out some quiet time ona busy working hours to per-form simpleasanas. Over andabove I am very excited aboutthe upcoming event to be heldon International Yoga Daybecause PM Narendra Modiwill be performing yoga withus”, said Deepak Lal aSurveyor/ Loss Assessor &Valuer.
An aspiringPhysiotherapist, Anha Ali said,“I am eagerly waiting for theYoga event to happen and Ibelieve that practising yogaon regular basis can bring rev-olutionary changes in one’s
body and it also reduces com-plications such as obesity, dia-betes, hypertension, etc.”
S. N. Agarwal, a resident ofthe capital city, who practicesyoga from the last one decadesaid, “Yoga has great potentialto improve important physicaland psychological outcomesin older adults. I am healthyand fit and I can do variousyoga asanas easily and I willactively participate in theevent.”
“I enjoy doing yoga everyday. Earlier, I was sufferingfrom severe migraine andhypertension, but then prac-tising yoga helped me a lot totackle with these issues.Earlier I had to take a lot ofmedicines but then perform-ing yoga from last 4-5 years,gradually reduced the intakeof dosage. Moreover, I amvery curious about the Yoga
event and I am well preparedfor performing yoga.” saidRanjana lal a resident of RatuRoad.
Vishal Gupta, a resident ofPiska More said, “I do Yogaevery day but will go to seeModi Ji for sure.”
Rohit Kacchap, whileassisting other people to getthem registered for the megaevent at Nucleus Mall said, “I have started collecting reg-istration forms by 11am andtill now too many people hasgot themselves registered andI will end up collecting formstill 17th of June.”
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Kanke Dam Park is one ofthe prime tourist attrac-
tions in the city. Sandwichedbetween the huge dark boul-ders of the Gonda Hills and theserene waters of the Dam, thepark is a sweet spot to have funwith friends and family. Amidstthis beauty lies a little-knownattraction, an open-airamphitheater.
A large number of people
from all over the city visit thepark on a daily basis. SaraswatiBarla, one of the visitors to thepark, when asked about theamphitheater replied, “I havevisited the park lot many times,but I have never witnessedanything going on in theamphitheater”.
There are indeed boardsinstalled at Kanke Dam Parkdisplaying the whereabouts ofthe amphitheater. But nobodybothers to look at them due toinactivity enveloping that place.
The area designated to thisfacility looks all abandonedand deserted.
“The number of ticketsbought by people determinesthe presentation of light andsound shows in here. Thecapacity of the amphitheateris 200 persons and is ticketedat �50. We present aPowerPoint presentation onthe life of Birsa Munda whoserun time is 45 minutes. Thelast show was conducted 15days back and the number of
tickets bought were 40,” saidRaja Babu, caretaker of theamphitheater.
Lack of awarenessamongst the people and pre-sentation a monotonous typeof content has taken the kickoff this effort made by theJharkhand TourismDevelopment Corporation bysetting up of this amphitheaterin Kanke Dam Park.
On being asked about theamphitheatre, Director,Tourism, Sanjeev Kumar
Besra and other senior offi-cials did not find any concretereply on the issue. Besra
though asked the Pioneer to e-mail queries regarding thesame to him.
Avisual story telling work-shop is being organised in
Ranchi by the JharkhandiBhasha Sahitya Sanskriti Akhrafrom June 23 to June 30. Theworkshop is aimed to providetheoretical and practicalknowledge of the basic aspectsof film making. Ranjit Oraonfrom Film and TelevisionInstitute of India (FTII) and awell known film maker will bethe director of the workshop.Renowned journalists, storytellers, film makers and writ-ers will be a part of the semi-nar.
“This is the first timeAkhra is organizing such aworkshop. In today’s digitaleverybody has a smart phoneand is abreast with the latesttechnology. In Jharkhand alsolots of people are involved infilm making be it in a big orsmall way either for themselvesor professionally. The localfilm makers are not encour-aged and given adequateopportunities. They lack thetechnique of writing, visualaesthetics and editing. Throughthis workshop, we want toprovide a platform to them tohone their skills,” said VandanaTete, general secretaryJharkhandi Bhasha SahityaSanskriti Akhra.
According to Oraon, thereis no dearth of talent, storiesand locations in Jharkhand.The youth here are making alot of movies in the local lan-guages but they lack financialsupport, technique and theunderstanding of art and cin-ema. It is our effort that
through this workshop, wecan overcome this shortcom-ing.
First Hindi film makerfrom the State- Vinod Kumar,notable documentary film-maker Poonam Kerketta,renowned media person andBBC Hindi journalist- RaviPrakash, award winning doc-umentary filmmaker- BijuToppo, state head of VidoVolunteer and prominent visu-al story teller- Deepak Bara,well known story teller andfilmmaker Ashwini KumarPankaj will be taking classesduring the workshop.
Aspirants aged 18 to 40 canapply online for the workshopby registering and paying a nonrefundable fee of Rs. 100. Theworkshop will cover topicsrelated to script writing, aes-thetics of camera and its move-ments, visuals and framingsequence, editing and screen-ing. The last date for registra-tion is June 21. Online appli-cation can be done here -w w w.khar ia . in/vstwork-shop.html.
Three children drowned in apond at Jamua Fatwa village
under Hirodih police station onWednesday evening. Accordingto police, Ahshan Raza (8),Sahnawaz Ansari (6) and ArifAnsari (7) drowned while tak-ing bath in the pond. Other chil-dren present at the pond raisedan alarm, following which peo-ple rushed the trio to a hospitalwhere doctors declared themdead upon arrival. The parentsof the children are labourers andlive in own accommodations inthe village.
After the incident, villagersstaged a protest, demandingcompensation from the victims’families. Officer-in Charge ofHirodih police station said thebodies were handed over to thefamilies after panchanama as thevictims’ kin refused postmortemof the bodies.
The officer said he had sentthe report to the higher author-
ities, adding that the familieswould get ex-gratia paymentsfrom the State Government.
According official sources,all three children went out toenjoy swimming as it was a hol-iday. But they were trapped inthe muddy undergrowth in a pitdug up in the pond during lastseason for taking out soil.
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Up in arms against the atti-tude of Bokaro Steel Plant’s
(BSL) management, its retiredemployees today came out onthe road and held strongprotests under the banner ofRashtravadi Ispat MajdoorSangh (RIMS).
Protesting against the man-agement’s decision of 10 percent hike in rent after every 11months irked retired employ-ees demonstrated against theauthority and demandedimmediate rollback of thisdecision.
Alleging that BSL man-agement is psychologicallyexploiting its retired employees,they threatened to go for a stirin front of BSL CEO’s resi-dence.
Randhir Singh GeneralSecretary of RIMS alleged thatthe situation of the city isworsening day-by-day onlydue to management’s wrongattitude and decisions. “Wewill hold a strong protested if
BSL management did not payany heed over our demand innext 15 days,” he added.
Singh said that theirdemands include, an immedi-ate rollback of the decision ofhike in rent on every elevenmonths, to extend OPD (med-ical facility) facility undermediclaim at Bokaro GeneralHospital (BGH), immediaterelease of the premium amountto the Insurance company,immediate maintenance ofdamaged quarters of each andevery sector of the township,repairing of road from BGH toBasanti More and arrange-ment of the street light on theroad, ground floor houses tothe ill retired employees.
Apart from others, USGupta, Ramji Saw, MP Singh,Ramayan Sharma, SD Mandal,Tulsi Mistri, R Giri, B Prasad,BB Singh, M Prasad, RN Ojhawere present there.
Meanwhile, demandingjobs at Bokaro Steel Plant hun-dreds of dependents of thedead employees of BSL held ameeting at the two-tank gar-
den. They also threatened tohold a strong protest if themanagement denied to pro-vided them permanent jobs atthe plant, Neeraj Kumar amember of their organization.
“Our parents died whileserving the plant. We are help-less now; management cannotturn a blind eye,” said Rajesh.
Although 428 were pro-vided jobs before 1995, butafter 95, management wasselective in providing jobs tothe dependents and very fewwere got the job, allegedBashidhar.
“We will step up ourprotest till our demand met,” headded.
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Police and forest departmentseized 282 sacks of illegal
kendu leaves stored in barn atmost naxal-infested villageBarkhand and Nagnaha underBhandariya police station onThursday.
According to SDPO ManojKumar Mahato, a joint team ofdistrict police and forestdepartment, led by ASP SadanKumar, today, raided two sep-arated villages and seized 282bags of illegal kendu leavesfrom the Barn.
The kendu leaf barn was
running with the collaborationof Maoists.
It was running with thesupport of sub zonal com-mander Mrityunjay Bhuiyan.
In exchange for this, a lotof money was given to theMaoists, said the SDPO.
An FIR was lodged inBhandariya police stationagainst five people includingsub zonal commanderMrityunjay Bhuiyan, SubodhGupta, Sanjay Keshari, JawahirSingh and Ajay Sao under sec-tions of 414/406/420/120 IPC,33 Forest Act and 12 MMRDAct.
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Giridih police here has arrest-ed one hardcore rebels of
CPI (Maoist) at Dumari areaunder the same police station onThursday. Police have alsorecovered few mobile sets fromhim. The arrested youth hasbeen identified as Sanjhalu(38), a resident of Khejadikhalkvillage of the Giridih district. Hehas been working for AjayMahto since 2012. He waswanted for the last seven yearsby the Giridih police.
SDPO Niraj Kumar saidthat the arrested Maoist hasadmitted that he was involvedin a dozen cases related withnaxal activities in and aroundGiridih and Bokaro.
Giving details of the arrest-
ed rebel’s modus operandi,Kymar said the former used tocall several road constructioncompanies for levy. OnThursday, he came toKhejakdihKhalk village to meethis family member.
Kumar added that theDumari police Inspector swunginto action immediately andstarted monitoring his mobilefrom which he has called com-pany officials. After reachingthe spot , police arrested him onThrusday afternoon from thespot within the jurisdiction ofthe same police station.TheSDPO also said that duringinterrogation, the arrested youthdisclosed their modus operan-di and revealed the names ofsome people they had duped inthe recent past.
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Six houses were gutted in afire that broke out at
Khadiya colony close to theDanda block, here onWednesday.
The fire broke out around8 p.m. and after the efforts ofthe villagers, the fire could beovercome after two hours ofhard work.
Otherwise, the flames ofthe fire could also have reachedthe nearby houses. Those whohave a fire in their houseinclude the names of BaliChoudhary, ShivnarayanChaudhary, LakhanChaudhary, Lalon Chaudhary
and Vansi Chaudhary. Thecause of the fire was notknown.
After receiving informa-tion about the incident, MPVishnudayal Ram and formerMLA Girinath Singh reachedthe spot and gave comfort tothe people. With the MP, otheroffice bearers includingDanda's Block DevelopmentOfficer Kamalender KumarSinha were present.
The MP asked the BDO tocompensate the victims withdisaster management and toensure the availability of foodgrains and ration to ensure thevictims' families get immediatesupplies from the public dis-tribution shop.
elections to the Rajya Sabhaseats falling vacant fromGujarat due to the resignationsof BJP leaders Amit Shah andSmriti Irani following theirwins in the Lok Sabha pollswill be held separately toensure the ruling dispensation’svictory on both the seats. Theparty demanded elections tothe two Rajya Sabha seats beheld together.
Congress spokespersonAbhishek Manu Singhvi saidthey came to know that therecould be a bid to hold the elec-tions for the two seats sepa-rately. “This would be a mock-ery of our constitutional ethos.It would be completely con-trary to conventions.Whenever there are two seatsof a State going vacant, you
have elections together. It isobvious to everybody that thepurpose of that is to ensurethere is a fair exercise of fran-chise of each MLA,” Singhvisaid at the AICC press briefing.
“If you have one electiontoday and one after two weeks,four weeks, six weeks then youwill enable the ruling partyMLAs (lawmakers) to simplycross 51 per cent in the assem-bly of Gujarat and elect him inthe first round and him in thesecond round which is heldafter weeks,” he said.
The BJP has 99 legislators
in the Gujarat Assembly andthe Congress 77. If the electionto each seat is held on differ-ent days, the BJP is expected towin both, while if the voting isheld on the same day, theCongress could win one of theseats.
Any such “games” shouldbe throttled at the inceptionbecause they are “unconstitu-tional games”, the Congressspokesperson said. “We willdemand from the ElectionCommission complete vigi-lance to ensure that wheneveryou want to have elec-tions...They have to be heldtogether. You cannot use atechnicality to hold them sep-arately,” Singhvi said.
He said the party willapproach the ElectionCommission with its demandof holding of the elections ofthe two Rajya Sabha seats inGujarat together.
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The CBI has booked formerSamajwadi Party MP Ateeq
Ahmed and others for alleged-ly orchestrating the abductionof a Lucknow-based business-man Mohit Jaiswal from DeoriaJail to extort money from himand take over his business.The case was initially registeredby the Uttar Pradesh Police,and the CBI took over theprobe on Wednesday followinga directive from the SupremeCourt.
The CBI has bookedAhmed on the charges of crim-inal conspiracy, extortion,cheating, forgery, robbery andcriminal intimidation amongothers.
Real estate dealer Jaiswalwas allegedly abducted fromLucknow and taken to DeoriaJail, where he was assaulted byAhmed and his aides, whowere lodged there, and forcedto transfer his business tothem, sources said.
Jaiswal, whose real estatebusiness is based at the poshGomti Nagar area in Lucknow,
had alleged in his complaintthat Ahmed was threateninghim for extortion for the lasttwo years.
Jaiswal had said he hadmade some payments toAhmed, after which thedemands for money hadstopped for a while, but Ahmedagain started asking for moneyfrom him in 2018.
He had alleged thatAhmed’s goons had taken overhis business forcibly by obtain-ing his and his sister’s digitalsignatures.
Jaiswal further alleged thaton December 26, 2018, he wastaken in his own sports utilityvehicle (SUV) by one ofAhmed’s goons to Deoria Jail,where the former MP waslodged.
Ahmed’s son Umar and 10-12 other gang members werealso present in the jail, who beathim up, causing serious injuriesto him, Jaiswal had alleged.
Four of his companies,including MJ Infra HousingPrivate Limited, were trans-ferred in the name of Farooqand Zaki Ahmad, both goons
of Ahmed who had beenthreatening him, he hadalleged.
The combined assets ofthe firms were worth �45 crore,according to the FIR.
They had also taken hissignatures on his company let-terhead in the jail, Jaiswal hadclaimed.
The businessman had alsoalleged that Ahmed threat-ened him, saying he could notbe killed inside the jail andhence, he was being allowed togo. But the politician hadforcibly kept his SUV in the jail,Jaiswal had alleged.
The matter was handedover to the CBI by the SupremeCourt, which had also orderedAhmed’s transfer to a jail inGujarat.
During the hearing in theSupreme Court, the UttarPradesh government had con-firmed the incident and saidthe CCTV cameras in the jailcomplex were tampered with atthe time of Jaiswal’s abductionand forcible visit to Deoria jail.
As many as eight casespending investigation were reg-
istered against Ahmed between2015 and 2019, of which twowere murder cases.
Ahmed was an SP MP inthe 14th Lok Sabha fromPhulpur in Uttar Pradesh from
2004 to 2009 and a five-timeMLA. He has been in jail sinceFebruary 11, 2017. In the past,he was also associated with theApna Dal (Sonelal).
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The CBI has filed a chargesheet against fugitive self-
styled ‘godman’ Virendra DevDixit for allegedly raping aminor at his ashrams in UttarPradesh and Delhi in 1999.
In its chargesheet filed inthe Rouse Avenue special courthere, the CBI has pressedstringent charges of rape andcriminal intimidation on Dixit,who is absconding. The hasannounced a reward of �5lakh for any information lead-ing to his arrest.
The agency had registeredthe case on January 3, 2018 on
a directive of the Delhi HighCourt.
The CBI has alleged thatDixit, as the head of AdhyatmikVishwa Vidyalaya, which isnow renamed AdhyatmikVidyalaya, and spiritual leader,was in a position to control anddominate over the complainant,a minor girl at that time, andraped her repeatedly in May-June 1999 at his ashrams inKampil, Uttar Pradesh, andVijay Vihar in Delhi.
The accused had alleged-ly threatened to “cause injuryto her reputation” and alsoissued “life threats” to herfamily, according to the FIR.
In a major relief to lakhs ofpeople of Gujarat, the
cyclonic storm ‘Vayu’ did notmake its scheduled land fall onThursday as it changed itscourse and drifted towardsOman. The IndiaMeteorological Department(IMD) said that the storm hasmade a small deviation, skirt-ed the Gujarat coast.
“It is moving over north-east and adjoining east centralArabian Sea. Heavy rains whichlashed the coastal areas werelikely to continue,” the IMDsaid. According to privateforecaster Skymet Weather, thecyclone which at present isCategory 2 storm may weakeninto a Category 1 storm.However, strong winds andrough seas are expected tocontinue and may cause dam-age. The cyclone may impactthe arrival of monsoon in Goa.
For his part, DefenceMinister Rajnath Singhreviewed the Navy’s prepared-
ness along the Maharashtraand Gujarat coast in view ofVayu. “Senior Navy officialsbriefed Singh at a meeting innaval headquarters duringwhich he was apprised aboutvarious measures being takenby the force to deal with pos-sible scenarios,” officials said.The railways has cancelled 86trains and short terminated 37others as a precaution eventhough the cyclone changed itscourse and is unlikely to makelandfall in Gujarat.
“The cyclone is likely tomove north-northwestwardsfor some time and then north-westwards, skirting theSaurashtra coast (and) affect-ing Gir Somnath, Diu,Junagarh, Porbandar andDevbhoomi Dwarka with windspeed of 90-100 kmph gustingto 110 kmph during the next12 hours,” the IMD said in arelease.
Pankaj Kumar, AdditionalChief Secretary, Gujarat, saidthat although the IMD has
informed that the cyclone haschanged its course, “it may stillcause heavy winds and rains,and so we are still on stand-bymode”.
“Cyclone Vayu is 110 kilo-metres from Veraval to thesouth-west and 150 kilometresfrom Porbandar to the south.The cyclone is moving towardsthe north and was crossing overSaurashtra,” he said.
The Chief Minister’s Officein Gujarat said Prime MinisterNarendra Modi spoke to ChiefMinister Vijay Rupani imme-diately after reaching Bishkekfor the SCO Summit andinquired about the cyclonepreparedness and assured allassistance and support fromCentre to mitigate the effects ofthe storm.
Skymet Weather had earli-er stated that the ‘Very SevereCyclone’ might weaken into aCategory 1 Cyclonic Stormfrom Category 2, though thewind speed will be 135-145kms per hour gusting up to 175kms per hour.
Gujarat has, meanwhile,already evacuated over 3.1 lakhpeople and the Union Territoryof Diu that touches theSaurashtra coast has movedover 10,000 people to safety.
The Coast Guard has stat-ed that the cyclone would takeup to Saturday before it com-pletely moves over into the seaat Dwarka.
Besides taking help of thearmed forces and the CoastGuard, the state governmenthas deployed 33 teams of theNational Disaster ResponseForce (NDRF) (each having 90to 100 personnel) and nineteams of the State DisasterResponse Force (SDRF) in 10coastal districts of the state, hesaid.
In addition, 11 columns ofthe army (each having nearly70 personnel), two companiesof the Border Security Force, 14companies of the State ReservePolice and 300 commandos aredeployed at different locationsin the Kutch and Saurashtraareas.
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Bihar cadre IAS officer Kundan Kumar willbe Private Secretary to Defence Minister
Rajnath Singh. As per an order ofDepartment of Personnel and Training,Kumar, a 2004 batch officer, will have atenure up to February 3, 2020.
Navneet Mohan Kothari will be PrivateSecretary to Agriculture and FarmersWelfare, Rural Development and PanchayatiRaj Minister Narendra Singh Tomar. Kothariis a 2001 batch IAS officer of MadhyaPradesh cadre.
IAS officer Sachin Shinde has beenappointed PS to Youth Affairs and SportsMinister Kiren Rijiju. Rijiju is also theMinister of State for Minority Affairs.
Manoj Kumar Singh will be PrivateSecretary to Power, and New and RenewableEnergy Minister Raj Kumar Singh. ManojKumar Singh is a 2009 batch IAS officer ofBihar cadre.
IRS officer Raj Kumar Digvijay has beenappointed PS to Animal Husbandry,Dairying and Fisheries Minister GirirajSingh.
People in rural areas will soon beable to access Aadhaar-related
services at the common service cen-tres (CSC) following the UIDAI’sauthorisation to these centres toresume such services. The CSC hadearlier stopped providing Aadhaar-related services after the UniqueIdentification Authority of India(UIDAI) withdrew authorisationfrom them following debates arounddata security of the 12-digit uniqueidentifier.
“UIDAI has authorised CSCs tostart printing of Aadhaar cards. Userswill be charged standard fees as pre-scribed by UIDAI. This work isexpected to start in a week,” CSC e-Governance Services CEO DineshTyagi said. There are 3.9 lakh villagelevel entrepreneurs (VLE) that arerunning common service centres inrural areas across the country.
VLEs provide Government ser-vices like train ticket booking, pass-
port application, birth certificate,registration for Ayushman Bharatscheme etc. “CSCs will also be able toupdate demographic details ofAadhaar users like address, photo etc.This work is expected to start by theend of this month,” Tyagi said.
Apart from CSCs, people canaccess Aadhaar-related services atbank branches, post offices andUIDAI authorised centres located ingovernment premises. Earlier, CSCswere also allowed to process Aadhaarenrollment as well but it stopped inSeptember 2017 after privacy anddata security-related debates in thecountry.
VLEs had threatened to protestagainst the government if they are notallowed to conduct Aadhaar-relatedwork. IT Minister Ravi ShankarPrasad had assured them that theywill soon be allowed to do Aadhaarrelated processes. “We are graduallystarting Aadhaar related works. I amhopeful more projects will come toCSC,” Tyagi said.
Noida: The I&B Ministry hasissued a notice to the owners ofNation Live, the news channelthat aired content allegedlydefaming UP Chief Minister YogiAdityanath, for operating underthat name without Governmentapproval, officials said.
The Information andBroadcasting Ministry issued theshowcause notice on June 10 tothe managing director ofUttarakhand-based Bharat HydelProjects Private Limited, whichowns the TV channel.
Three senior journalists ofthe Noida-based TV channelhave been arrested in recent daysfor allegedly airing defamatoryremarks against Adityanath andalso charged with fraud andforgery.
The I&B Ministry has soughtresponse from the channel own-ers within seven days, failingwhich it said ex parte proceedingswill be initiated against them.
The company has been askedas to why action should not beinitiated against them as perrules.
Nation Live owners could notbe reached for comments.
The Ministry also informedthe Uttar Pradesh Governmentthat the company was given per-mission to operate under thename of “Network 10” in 2011,officials in the state said.
The district administrationhad last week written to the I &BMinistry to apprise it about thesituation.
“It has been ascertained thatthe said news channel is beingrun by Bharat Hydel Projects PvtLtd, which was given permissionin February 2011 touplink/downlink news and cur-rent affairs by the name ofNetwork 10,” the ministry said ina letter to UP Chief SecretaryAnup Chandra Pandey on June11.
The ministry said it had notgiven “any approval” to the com-pany for the use of the name“Nation Live”.
“The company by using thename and logo of Nation Live hascontravened the provisions of theuplinking/downlinking guidelinesof 2011,” it added in the letter.
Earlier, two separate FIRswere registered against NationLive.
One of the FIRs includedcharges like promoting enmitybetween different groups andcirculating rumours, officialssaid.
The second complaint overthe illegal operation of the chan-nel was made by the district addi-tional director, information, at theNoida Phase 3 police station fol-lowing which an FIR underSections 420 (fraud), 467 (forgeryof documents) of the IPC andrelated offences was registered,police said.
New Delhi: A PIL was filed inthe Supreme Court onThursday seeking urgent stepsto protect forests, wildlife andbirds from wildfires inUttarakhand, saying forestblazes have increased over theyears causing huge loss to theenvironment.
The petition sought direc-tions to the Centre, theUttarakhand Government andthe principal chief conservatorof forests in the state to makepre-fire arrangements andframe policy to prevent forestfires.
The plea, filed by advocateRituparn Uniyal, also soughtinvestigation into the matter byan independent agency anddirections to declare the animalkingdom as legal entities hav-ing a distinct persona with cor-
responding rights, duties andliabilities of a living person.
“Forest fires inUttarakhand have been regularand historic feature. Every yearforest fires in Uttarakhandcauses great loss to the forestecosystem, diversity of floraand fauna and economicwealth. Forest fire is one of themajor disasters in the forests ofUttarakhand.
“Despite a consistent his-tory of forest fires the igno-rance, inactiveness, negligenceand unreadiness of the respon-dents (Centre, StateGovernment and chief conser-vator of forests) have rendereda great loss to forests, wildlifeand birds in Uttarakhand andthus caused ecological imbal-ance,” it said.
The plea claimed one of the
prominent forest research cen-tres was at Uttarakhand but theauthorities have not consultedthe institution for remedies totackle wildfires.
“Uttarakhand has one ofthe prominent forest researchcentres, that is, Forest ResearchInstitute Deemed to beUniversity, Dehradun.Surprisingly, the respondentshave never consulted the insti-tution for the reasons and solu-tions of devastating forest firesin the State. This clearly showsa lackadaisical approach of therespondents in tackling theforest fires,” it said.
The plea further said for-est and wildlife were the mostimportant natural resourcesand played significant role inthe human life and environ-ment. PTI
New Delhi: The SupremeCourt on Thursday agreed tohear on June 14 a plea ofMaharashtra MLC DhananjayMunde against the BombayHigh Court order directingregistration of a case againsthim in an alleged illegal pur-chase of Government land case.
A vacation bench of justicesIndira Banerjee and AjayRastogi said it will hear the pleaon Friday in which the NCPleader has sought stay of thehigh court order which direct-ed police to file a case againsthim for allegedly purchasing aland at Pus village in Ambajogaitehsil of Beed district.
The high court’s order waspassed on Tuesday by a divisionbench on a plea filed by oneRajabhau Phad, who alleged
that the land which belonged tothe Government was purchasedand given to the BelkhandiMath in Beed as gift.
As per the law, the landcannot be transferred withoutthe Government’s permission,the initial petition had said.
Heirs of Ranit WyankaGiri, the mahant of theBelkhandi Math when the landwas given as a gift, transferredit in their names and claimedthat they were its owners andthe Government was notinformed about it.
The land was then laterbought by Munde on the basisof a general power of attorneyin 2012. Munde applied fornon-agricultural status (NA) ofthe land and got it, the petitionhad alleged. PTI
�(2���������������������)*3��(������ ���4������5*��������� New Delhi: The Supreme
Court agreed on Thursday tohear tomorrow a plea of med-ical aspirants, who claimed thatthe answer key of five questionsasked in NEET(UG)-2019exam was wrong and the paperneeds to be quashed.
A vacation bench of JusticesIndira Banerjee and AjayRastogi agreed to hear the pleafiled by four students whoappeared for the exam.
The petition filed by fourHyderabad-based students —Kayathi Mohan Reddy andthree others through advocateMahfooz Nazki, said thatNational Testing Agency (NTA)which conducted the examissued wrong answer keys andtherefore jeopardised the careerprospects of the aspirants whosat for the exam.
The exam was conducted
on May 5 and the officialanswer key was issued on May29 to the questions asked in theexamination. “Upon perusal ofthe key, the petitioners wereshocked to note that answers toa number of questions weredemonstrably wrong,” the pleasaid.
The students said they gavethe representation about theerrors in the official answer keyon May 30 and subsequently onJune 5, a revised answer key waspublished.
“Pertinently, no option wasgiven to the candidates to fileany objections. To the shockand chagrin of the petitioners,not only did the key continueto have errors, some answersthat had been correctly notifiedearlier, stood changed to awrong answer,” the petitionsaid. PTI
New Delhi: Mountaineers ofthe ITBP on Thursdaylaunched an over a week-longexpedition from Pithoragarh inUttarakhand to retrieve themortal remains of at least eightclimbers who were killed lastmonth in an avalanche near anunscaled peak adjoiningNanda Devi East.
“A team of 11 speciallychosen personnel of the force,many of whom have con-quered the Mount Everest andother peaks, today began theiroperation to retrieve the mor-tal remains of the climbers,”Indo-Tibetan Border Police(ITPBP) spokesperson VivekKumar Pandey said.
“The personnel, led by oursecond-in-command rank offi-cer Ratan Singh Sonal, will beaided by other ground teamsand will trek over a 100 kilo-metres to finally reach the sitewhere the bodies of theclimbers were last spotted,” hesaid.
Pandey said the team ofthe ITBP, a border guardingforce tasked to guard the Chinaborder, is expected to reach thebase camp in a week and afterrequired acclimatisation, it willattempt to retrieve the bodies.
“It will be a very challeng-ing mission as the site is locat-ed at about 20,000 feet inbetween glaciers and othersnow hazard prone areas. Airsupport will also be taken forlogistics in the course of theoperation,” he said.
Eight mountaineers, includ-ing from the US, the UK andAustralia, were reported miss-ing after they left Munsiyari onMay 13 to scale the 7,434 metretall peak, but did not return tothe base camp on the scheduleddate of May 25.
The team was led byBritish mountaineer MartinMoran.
It was a 12-member groupout of which four were rescued.
Indian Air Force heli-copters had spotted five bod-ies on June 3 after multiple sor-ties to trace them.
The missing mountaineerscomprised seven from the UK,the US and Australia, and aliaison officer from Delhi’sIndian MountaineeringFoundation.
The route to the peakbegins from Munsiyari, about132 km from Pithoragarh dis-trict headquarters. The districtis about 456 km from state cap-ital Dehradun. PTI
Afew days ago, a fight broke outin the city of Ranchi whichresulted in the stabbing of atleast six people. The brawl wasnot about an alleged theft or
some form of disagreement that escalatedquickly or any other incident commonlyassociated with a serious fight in broad day-light. Instead, it was over water.
Jharkhand, as also the rest of India, issuffering from an acute water crisis in thehigh heat of summer. This is why it was notsurprising that while residents in a partic-ular locality in Ranchi were standing in linepatiently for hours to draw water, a fightbroke out when an individual allegedly filledwater in large quantities, leaving little tospare for other residents. While fortunate-ly no one died in the incident, such waterriots will only rise unless we tackle this seri-ous problem with the sincerity and commit-ment it demands.
Benjamin Franklin had once said,“When the well is dry, we’ll know the worthof water.” While he meant to use this phraseas a metaphor, this quotation is now truerthan ever in its literal sense. Water is anessential component of our lives. Justimagine a single part of your day withoutit. From the moment we wake up and washour faces before having a cup of tea till thetime we sit down for dinner: Water makeseach of these activities possible.
However, today, we stand at a crucialcrossroad: To survive using judiciousnessor perish due to ignorance and recklessness.Villagers from all over the country havebeen forced to evacuate their homes insearch of newer water sources and habitats.The current water crisis, which has onlybeen aggravated due to this year’s unrelent-ing summer, has forced a number of peo-ple to leave their homes and abandon theircattle and sheep since they do not havewater to provide for them. It is no surprisethat food production, too, has been severe-ly hit.
In Chennai, IT companies are askingtheir employees to work from home becausethey do not have enough water to sustainoperations. In other firms, employees arebeing asked to bring their own drinkingwater since employers cannot guaranteedrinking water during work. It is, therefore,obvious that a lack of water will soonenough stop our daily lives as we current-ly know it.
Let me give some other worrying sta-tistics, which I hope, will jolt one into actionjust as it has affected me. By the end of May,it was reported that 43 per cent of India wasexperiencing drought conditions.Furthermore, the country has witnessed adrought every year since 2015 (other than2017). In many parts of the country, peo-ple are falling ill and are being admitted tohospitals, sometimes at huge expenses,because they are being forced to drinkuntreated water.
In terms of groundwater,the situation is even more grim.Ground water, which serves 40per cent of India’s needs, isbeing depleted at a frightening-ly unsustainable rate. The NITIAayog, a Government think-tank, has said in its report in2018 that 21 Indian cities,including Delhi, Bengaluru,Chennai and Hyderabad, willrun out of ground water by2020 and that 40 per cent ofIndia’s population will have noaccess to drinking water by2030. The year 2030 is less than11 years away. This means thatin a little more than a decade,more than one in three peoplein the country will not haveaccess to drinking water.
To bring this point closerhome, if you are a family of fouror five, it is likely that only twoor three of you will essentiallyhave access to drinking water by2030. I must apologise forsounding apocalyptic but thetime for sugar-coating is over.India is facing a ticking time-bomb and all of us, includingour future generations, willface a disastrous scenario unlesswe get our acts together andstart taking hard decisions.
A good start has alreadybeen made by the Government.The BJP has decided to inte-grate all Ministries dealing withwater-related issues into one
Ministry — the ‘Jal ShaktiMinistry’ — and has promisedto provide clean drinking waterto all households in the coun-try. Unlike other promises madeby the Government like ‘SmartCities’ or ‘Make in India’, thispromise cannot afford to fail.
Even though I am from anopposing party, I sincerely hopethat it does not turn out to beanother jumla, reserved only forrallies of the Prime Minister.The Government, however, hasnot started out on the right foot.Asked about water scarcity,Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, theJal Shakti Minister, respondedby saying, “Water crisis is not asbad as the hype created by themedia.” This comment was allthe more surprising becauseonly last month the BJPGovernment had issued adrought advisory to six Statessince water storage levels indams had dropped to a “critical”level.
Irrespective of whetherShekhawat thinks this is all“media hype” or not, it will nottake much to figure out that weare suffering from a water cri-sis. Just look around. Our wellsare drying up, getting drinkablewater is becoming more andmore expensive, we often endup standing in long queues forwater. Are these not obvioussigns of a crisis? Therefore, I
urge you to take charge yourself.There is no doubt that Indianeeds a comprehensive andwell-thought out policy to tack-le this issue. The Governmentneeds to adopt a multi-facetedapproach which examines thekind of crops we should grow,the kind of resources we needto set aside and invest amongother things.
However, merely ignoringthe problem because it seemstoo big can be disastrous. I urgeeveryone as a concerned citizenof India to take full responsibil-ity to help avert this water cri-sis. There is enough of animpact you can create if youcare enough about the situation.
For example, at home,where we often leave the tapsrunning or consume morewater than is necessary, wemust encourage family mem-bers and helps to use water judi-ciously. We can adopt water-saving techniques that are eas-ily available online. At theoffice, too, you can ask youremployers to use more water-efficient toilet stalls and hostawareness sessions for fellowemployees. All of these stepsmay eventually help us win cru-cial battles and ultimately winthe war against drought.
(The author is president ofJharkhand Pradesh CongressCommittee)
Sir — This refers to the editorial,“Lessons from Kathua” (June 12).While the family of the Kathuarape case has got justice, over onelakh daughters still await closurein our courts. It is time to stopchild rape through strong legaldeterrent and social action. Oneonly hopes that stringent andeffective punishment would offerdeterrence for ever-increasingcrimes against children. I alsothink it’s imperative that lenien-cy is not offered to perpetratorsand more so on sociological argu-ments on the identity of the crim-inal, centered on their caste,minority status or economic back-ground, ie ‘sole bread earner’ et al.
Those who file mercy peti-tions for the perpetrators ofheinous crimes or push thehuman rights rhetoric of lesserpunishment for some of them,should take a backseat. A societythat cannot safeguard its childrenhas no right to talk about therights of the perpetrators, espe-cially under the garb of a politi-cal correctness which could verywell sent us to doom.
Padmini Raghavendra Secunderabad
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Sir — This refers to the editor-ial, “Lessons from Kathua” (June12). Rape victims deserve nomercy. They need to be severe-
ly punished and the Kathuarape case was no exception.
That justice has finally beenserved is welcome. The verdictis a triumph of the justice deliv-ery system. It was only due toeffective investigation, diligent
prosecution and judicial sensi-tivity that this case could get aspeedy closure. This case shouldinspire people’s confidence in thejustice system.
However, it is also a matterof concern that the country has
been a witness to a spate ofheinous crimes against minorgirls. One rape case is reportedevery 15 minutes. Even as theKathua verdict is being hailed,the gruesome murder of a three-year-old in Aligarh has shockedthe society. There are manycases that are pending for yearstogether awaiting a judgement.All such long-pending casesmust be fast-tracked so thatjustice is not delayed.
Sravana RamachandranChennai
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Sir — This refers to the article,“Searing hot conditions the newnormal” (June 13) by Kota Sriraj.With the country witnessingunprecedented heat wave condi-tions, the problem has been exac-erbated by an acute water crisis.Poor water management plan isat the root of urban nightmares.A comprehensive water policythat focusses on reusing wastewater is the need of the hour.
It’s great to see so many Indian and Americanbusiness people coming together to talk abouthow to draw our two nations closer together,
and to talk about big ideas. That project has beenin the forefront of my mind too, in preparation formy upcoming trip. I want to give you a sneak pre-view of my mission, and tell you why I truly believethat our two nations have an incredibly uniqueopportunity to move forward together, for the goodof both of our peoples, the Indo-Pacific region, andindeed the entire world.
The idea of a US-India partnership franklystretches back a long way. When the Indian peo-ple first courageously won their independence over70 years ago, a strong relationship between ourcountries was something people talked about. Ourtwo democracies and a close relationship seemedinevitable, a matter of “when” not “if.” But for toolong — indeed, for decades — we found ourselveson different trajectories. The US was fighting theCold War. And India was asserting itself, its new-found, cherished independence through its non-aligned movement, trying not to take sides. Wecooperated when we could, but frankly I think mostwould agree that we mostly fell short of our poten-tial.
We couldn’t trade much because India had aclosed economy. The Licence Raj kept businessesand innovators out of the black and covered in redtape. Five-year plans became the received wisdom,something like our 2 per cent growth here in thelast administration became sort of a new normal.We focussed our attention on other Asian tradingpartners, and what were once cubs grew up to betrue tigers in the region. But all that changed in1991, when India opened its doors to the world.Prime Minister Rao said that at the time his gov-ernment would “sweep the cobwebs of the past andusher in change.” India’s free-market reformsunleashed the innovation, the entrepreneurship, thesheer drive of its own people to do remarkablethings. First, we’ve had a seven per cent growth inIndia from 1997 to 2017, year-on-year. Millionsof Indians have been lifted out of poverty. Indiabecame a world leader in IT — IT services, engi-neering, pharmaceuticals, and so many more thingsthat you all know so well. The US-India bilateraltrade reached $142 billion just last year, a seven-fold increase since 2001. Additionally, more than500 American companies now successfully oper-ate in India. And of course, the US is a market forroughly 20 per cent of India’s exports in both goodsand services. Indian-Americans, too, have con-tributed mightily to things that happened here inthe US. We’ve watched Indians reach the heightsof industry, and academia, and government.People like Microsoft’s CEO and the FCC chair-man Ajit Pai, a great Kansan, have done remark-able things all around the world.
US Presidents of both parties have seized theopportunity for closer ties. President Clinton’s visitin 2000 set a real marker, he set the table for clos-er cooperation between the two countries, and thenPresident Bush inked a historic civil nuclear deal.More recently, President Obama granted India“Major Defence Partner” status and supportedIndia’s quest for a permanent seat on the UNSecurity Council — a position that the US contin-ues to support. And under President Trump, we’vetaken our defence cooperation to new heights, solid-
ified our common vision for the Indo-Pacific andtaken a far tougher stand on Pakistan’s unaccept-able support for terrorism in the region.
Just a few weeks ago, in a truly historic elec-tion, 600 million Indians voted in the largest exer-cise of the franchise in history. And they gave MrModi a huge mandate. Not since 1971 has an IndianPrime Minister been returned to office with a sin-gle-party majority, and — to borrow a phrase – heenjoyed an awful lot of winning. Many observerswere surprised by the result, but, frankly, I wasn’t.I’ve been watching closely. And we knew that thePrime Minister was a new kind of leader for theworld’s most populous democracy. He is the sonof a tea seller who worked his way up to govern-ing a state for 13 years and now leads one of theworld’s truly emerging powers. He’s made econom-ic development for the poorest Indians a priority.And indeed, millions who once went without lightbulbs now have electricity. And millions who lackedcook stoves now have them. It’s interesting thatyoung Indians constituted one of the PrimeMinister’s largest voting blocks, one of his biggestgroups of support in this most recent election. Ithink that tells you something.
For my part, as the Secretary of State, I knowI have a strong partner, a new, great counterpartin Minister Jaishankar — a former Ambassador tothe US. First, we have to build ever-stronger rela-tionships. In fact, we’ve sent some of our finestminds to New Delhi, thinkers like Daniel PatrickMoynihan and our current ambassador, Ken Juster.But forging stronger ties is more than that. It meansformalising these individual friendships, buildingout a diplomatic framework for our two countries.I think we’ve done that but there’s more to do. Lastyear we kicked off a 2+2 dialogue and I went toattend it alongside the Secretary of Defence. Wealso reinvigorated the Quad Dialogue among theUnited States, Japan, and Australia — all like-mind-ed democracies in the Indo-Pacific.
But I want to talk about a couple other thingsI believe we can do together. We must embracethat strategic framework that works for both ofour nations. We respect India as a truly sover-eign, important country, with its own unique pol-itics and its own unique strategic challenges. Weget it. We realise it’s different to deal with thelikes of China and Pakistan from across the oceanthan it is when they are on your borders. That’swhy in this room, not so many months ago, Ielaborated on President Trump’s vision for a Free
and Open Indo-Pacific. It starts from the premisethat we share a common set of values — the val-ues of democracy and freedom and a core beliefin the ingenuity of the human spirit.
We also have to make sure that we have eco-nomic openness. We have to have a central themebeing the idea that we have liberty and sovereign-ty in each of our two nations, and build on thoseideas. These need to be places in which econom-ic growth reinforces our democratic values, and notdictatorship. It needs to be a place where our part-nership is one of true equals, not of domination.Based on my conversations in New Delhi last year,and in subsequent phone calls and meetings, Ibelieve this is a deeply shared vision.
Third, we have to deliver. We have to execute.The Trump administration has already enabledAmerican companies to export more high-techitems to India. This includes cutting-edge defenceplatforms like armed UAVs and ballistic missiledefence systems. We’ve already launched theAsia-EDGE programme to help India raise privatecapital to meet its energy and security needs foryears to come. These are solid achievements butwe want to do so much more.
We clearly have overlapping interests: defence,energy, space. The list goes on. The first batch ofApache helicopters is coming off Boeing’s produc-tion line in Arizona even as we speak. LockheedMartin’s F-21 and Boeing’s F/A-18 are state-of-the-art fighters that could give India the capabilities itneeds to become a full-fledged security providerthroughout the Indo-Pacific.
On energy, we want to complete theWestinghouse civil nuclear project and delivermore LNG and crude. These steps will giveIndians reliable, affordable, diversified energyindependence. So they will no longer have to relyon difficult regimes like those in Venezuela andin Iran. On space, NASA is already working withthe Indian Space Research Organisation on theworld’s most advanced earth-observation satel-lite and India’s second lunar mission. I mean,how cool is that?
Now, I’m sure we’ll broach some tough topicstoo. But as we democracies have come to know, thatwe work out our disagreements. We bring themto the table honestly and fairly. And we’ll proba-bly discuss the recent decision on the GSP pro-gramme. I do hope, and remain open – and weremain open to dialogue, and hope that our friendsin India will drop their trade barriers and trust in
the competitiveness of their own companies,their own businesses, their own people, and pri-vate sector companies. We’ll also push for free flowof data across borders, not just to help Americancompanies, but to protect data and secure con-sumers’ privacy. And speaking of privacy, we areeager to help India establish secure communica-tions networks – including 5G networks as well.
I know that these conversations that we willcontinue with the new government in India thathas so much promise for its people, for our rela-tionship, and for the world – I hope together, wewill finally fulfill the great promise of cooperationthat was present at India’s birth and which remainsevident today.
I did business in India when I — before I lostmy mind and ran for Congress — ran a small busi-ness that made machine parts for the aerospaceindustry. And I spent a fair amount of time inBangalore and in Chennai working with HAL. I’lltell you what. It was tough. India was still open-ing up, it was still figuring its way through, but therewas a real value proposition there and we did well.When I think about that, when I think about whatbusinesses need when they go to invest in eachother’s countries, they need stability, they need aset of rules that they can understand, they need tomake sure that the efforts that we put forwardtogether from the US have sufficient bipartisanship,that they won’t be whipsawed as we have electionshere. That is, when you invest, your ROI oftenextends beyond any particular congress or any par-ticular administration.
It’s already happening in technology andengineers. I know all of the amazing, brilliantIndian students that come to study in our schoolsat Wichita State University in my hometown, lotsof amazing people doing amazing things wantto come work in places where they can go makemoney and be successful. They don’t care somuch if it’s with an Indian company or anAmerican company. They want to go out anduse their skill set. If we can, at the StateDepartment, lay the foundation for that, then I’mconfident the folks in this room will knock it outof the park. They’ll take risk, they’ll invest cap-ital, they’ll invest capital here and in India, andwe’ll grow both sides of the relationship.
(Excerpted from the remarks of the US Secretaryof State Michael R. Pompeo at the India Ideas Summitand 44th Annual Meeting of the US-India BusinessCouncil)
India was witness to a massiveelection exercise in the pasttwo months. We had an elec-
torate of 900 million — the turnoutin this general election was thehighest ever at 67.11 per cent — andthe mandate for the winning party,the BJP, was decisive. NarendraModi has once again been electedas the country’s Prime Minister andpolitical pundits are still busy find-ing whether it was a wave, anunder-current or a “tsunami” thatled to the party’s victory.
The factors that led to the mas-sive victory of the BJP will be dis-cussed and debated for a long timeto come but everyone seems toagree that the electoral campaign
was centered around the theme of“national security.” The PrimeMinister did touch upon this issueduring his campaigns but at thesame time, he focussed on develop-mental works. After all, there can’tbe a strong economy without secureborders.
Developmental activities in theborder areas of the country, especial-ly Jammu & Kashmir and the North-East, have been a lesser talked aspectof the Modi Government. Theseregions have historically beenignored. But prioritising them hasyielded rich dividends for the NDA,with its candidates winning 25 of the32 seats in these two regions. The BJPspecifically made deep inroads withthe electorate. This was also reflect-ed in the party’s performance in theAssembly elections held simultane-ously in Arunachal Pradesh with thegeneral elections (along with threeother States).
Arunachal Pradesh shares inter-national borders with three countries— Bhutan, Myanmar and TibetAutonomous Region of China. Areawise, it is the largest State in the entire
North-East with a population ofapproximately 14 lakh. Populationdensity of the State is around 12 peo-ple per sq km. The State boasts of 26major tribes and over 100 sub-tribes. Each tribe has a unique cul-ture and a language distinct from theother. “Arunachali Hindi” is the lin-gua franca and “Jai Hind” the pop-ular slogan. The BJP has, for the firsttime, formed an elected Governmenton its own in this important borderState under the leadership of Pema
Khandu. The party won in 41 out ofthe 60 Assembly constituencies. Itincreased its vote share from 31 percent in 2014 to 51 per cent in 2019and saw three of its candidates win-ning as uncontested even before thefirst votes were cast on April 11.
For those who did not notice,Arunachal Pradesh was the first togive an indication of this huge BJPwin and rout of the Congress. Anational party like the Congresscould manage to field only 46 can-
didates in the 60 Assembly seats.Sixteen of its candidates had a voteshare of 10 per cent or less withsome getting as low as 54 votes.Such poor statistics of a nationalparty, whose vote share only fiveyears ago was 49.5 per cent, isalarming and calls for attention.Leaving the media aside, the ironyis that even the Indian NationalCongress isn’t taking note of it.
Apathy towards the North-Eastin general and Arunachal Pradesh inparticular is to be blamed for thesame. Only incidents of violence orinsurgency get noticed. Itanagar, thecapital of Arunachal Pradesh, sawviolence for over three days inFebruary. This was hardly even cov-ered. To think that an innovativeGovernment initiative will be cov-ered is, perhaps, asking too much.
Still, Arunachal Pradesh did aunique experiment. Hundred youthfrom all across the State were select-ed for a boot camp. They worked on10 most relevant sustainable devel-opment issues for the State andmade a presentation of challengesand opportunities before
Government officials, Ministers andthe Chief Minister. It was called theArunachal Transformation andAspirational Leadership (ATAL)Conclave. Delegates were in the agegroup of 18-30 and for many of them,this was their first visit outside theirhome districts. The conclave saw par-ticipation of three Union Ministersand the response from the youth wasoverwhelming. Khandu sat throughthe entire conclave, taking notes. Isit too much of a stretch to co-relatethat the State elected the youngestChief Minister of India?
The BJP in Arunachal has shat-tered all stereotypes and promised tomake the State the “happiest.” It iseasier to overlook the hard work putin by political leaders towards devel-opmental activities and convenient-ly argue that the North-East votesonly for cash. That Prime MinisterModi won on the “national securi-ty” plank is another such manifesta-tion of arm-chair journalism. Thevoter today is aspirational and notmerely voting for slogans.
The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT)Thursday adjourned the hearing on Jet Airways
insolvency case to June 20.By asking the two operational creditors — Shaman
Wheels and Gaggar Enterprises — who have taken JetAirways to NCLT, to again serve legal notices to thegrounded airline, the tribunal is yet to admit the bank-ruptcy pleas.
These two companied had on June 10 dragged theairline to the NCLT seeking bankruptcy proceedings.The airline, which was grounded on April 17, owes �8.74crore to Shaman Wheels and �53 lakh to GaggarEnterprises.
Jet Airways owes more than �8,000 crore to a con-sortium of banks led by the State Bank of India, whichnow run the airline, while it has a much larger debt pileby way of accumulated losses to the tune of �13,000crore and vendor dues of over �10,000 crore and salarydues of over �3,000 crore.
The banks have appointed SBI Capital Markets asthe investment banker to find an investor to scoutinvestors.
Bankers, after taking over the airline late March hadinvited bids on April 8 to sell up to 75 percent stake inthe crippled carrier that formally stopped operationson April 17.
Though it had received initial bids from parties-Ethihad Airways, private equity players TPG Capital andIndigo Partners, and the sovereign wealth fund NIIF,none of them chose to submit the final bids.
Currently bankers are trying to stave off bankruptcyeven as media reports said Etihad Airways, whichalready owns 24 percent in the airline, has teamed upwith the Hindujas to buy the airline.
The Jet Airways counter plunged close to 17 per-cent to �91.95 on the BSE after the exchanges put manyrestrictions on trading in the stock last evening.
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Shares of Jet Airways on Thursdaycracked nearly 18 per cent after stock
exchanges decided to impose restrictionson its stock trading from June 28.
The scrip plunged 16.71 per cent toclose at �91.95 on the BSE. During theday, it dropped 23.18 per cent to �84.80— its multi-year low.
On the NSE, shares tumbled 17.72per cent to close at �90.75.
In terms of traded volume, 35.05lakh shares were traded on the BSE andover three crore shares changed handson the NSE during the day.
Led by the sharp fall in the scrip, itsmarket valuation fell by �209.47 crore to�1,044.53 crore on the BSE.
Jet Airways shares have been falling forninth consecutive days, tumbling 39 percent on the BSE. Stock exchanges willimpose restrictions on trading in JetAirways shares from June 28 as part of pre-ventive surveillance measures to curbexcessive volatility, according to a circular.
The cash-starved company suspend-ed operations in April and lenders areworking on ways for revival of the airline.
Foreign Direct Investment(FDI) to India grew by 6 per
cent to $42 billion in 2018, withstrong inflows in the manufac-turing, communication andfinancial services sectors, andcross-border merger and acqui-sition activities, according to aUN report that ranked Indiaamong the top 20 host economiesfor FDI inflows in 2017-18.
The World InvestmentReport 2019, released by theUN Conference on Trade andDevelopment (UNCTAD)Wednesday, said global FDIflows slid by 13 per cent in 2018to $1.3 trillion from $1.5 trillionthe previous year — the thirdconsecutive annual decline.
However, FDI inflows todeveloping countries in Asiarose by 3.9 per cent to $512 bil-lion in 2018, with growth occur-ring mainly in China, HongKong, Singapore, Indonesia andother ASEAN countries, as wellas India and Turkey. The Asianregion remained the world’slargest FDI recipient, absorbing39 per cent of global inflows in2018, up from 33 per cent in2017. FDI inflows to South Asiaincreased by 3.5 per cent to $54billion.
“Investment in India - thesubregion’s largest recipient -rose by 6 per cent to $42 billionwith strong inflows in manufac-
turing, communication, financialservices and cross-border merg-er and acquisition (M&A) activ-ities,” the report said.
The report added that Indiahas historically accounted for 70to 80 per cent of inflows to thesubregion. Further, the growthin cross-border M&As for Indiafrom $23 billion in 2017 to $33billion in 2018 was primarily dueto transactions in retail trade($16 billion), which includes e-commerce, and telecommuni-cation ($13 billion).
It said that notablemegadeals included the acqui-sition of Flipkart, India’s biggeste-commerce platform, byAmerican giant Walmart. Inaddition, telecommunicationdeals involving Vodafone (UK)and American Tower (US)amounted to $2 billion.
The report added thatIndia and the UAE, not tradi-tionally in the top 20 outwardinvestor countries, were alsoconsidered as among the top 10most important sources of FDIfor the 2019 to 2021 period.
Further, prospects for FDIinflows into South Asia arelargely determined by expecta-tions of growing investment intoIndia. Announced greenfieldinvestment in the country dou-bled to $56 billion in 2018, withprojects in a number of manu-facturing industries, includingautomotive, the report said.
ginally lower after a see-sawsession Thursday as lack ofbuying triggers kept tradingsentiment at a low ebb.
A depreciating rupee andweak global cues also weighedon the markets, traders said.
After plunging over 300points intra-day, the BSE gaugepared most losses to settle15.45 points, or 0.04 per cent,lower at 39,741.36.
However, the broader NSENifty inched up 7.85 points, or0.07 per cent, to close at11,914.05.
Yes Bank was the biggestloser in the Sensex pack for thesecond consecutive session,plummeting 12.96 per cent,after Moody’s placed the privatesector lender’s ratings underreview for a possible down-grade.
IndusInd Bank, Infosys,Maruti, Vedanta, HeroMotoCorp, Tata Motors,ONGC and RIL too fell up to4.96 per cent.
Top gainers includedPowerGrid, M&M, KotakBank, Bajaj Finance, BhartiAirtel and HDFC twins, risingup to 1.54 per cent.
According to experts, mar-ket mood was subdued amidrising uncertainty over tradetalks between the US andChina. Oil prices soared fol-lowing conflicting reports of
attacks on two oil tankers in theGulf of Oman and the Strait ofHormuz.
However, losses werecapped as investors took posi-tive cues from factory outputnumbers, released after markethours on Wednesday.
India’s industrial outputgrew to a six-month high of 3.4per cent in April mainly onaccount of improvement inmining and power generation,while retail inflation spiked toa seven-month high of 3.05 percent in May, though remainingwithin the RBI’s comfort level.
“Benchmark indices endedon a flat note amid weak glob-al cues. After opening negative,Nifty reversed its trend andclosed positive above 11,900levels. However, investorsremained cautious on Niftyand Bank Nifty weekly expiryday.
“Post election euphoria,markets to shift focus on earn-ings visibility, onset of mon-soon and various economicreforms and policies by wayUnion Budget. On global front,US-China trade wars alongwith oil price volatility willdetermine further trend,” saidHemang Jani, Head —Advisory, Sharekhan by BNPParibas.
Sectorally, BSE teck, auto,energy and healthcare indicesended up to 0.57 per centlower. Realty, power, finance,consumer durables and utilitiesgained up to 0.62 per cent.
dived 16 paise to close at69.50 against the US dollarThursday amid a sharp rise incrude oil prices.
Brent crude futures, theglobal oil benchmark, soared3.84 per cent to $62.27 perbarrel after attacks on two oiltankers in the Gulf of Omantriggered fears of supply dis-ruptions.
The rupee opened at69.33 per dollar and fell fur-ther to touch a low of 69.56 atthe interbank foreignexchange market.
The local unit finally set-tled at 69.50, down by 16paise over its previous close.The rupee Wednesday closedat 69.34 against the US dollar.
The 10-year Governmentbond yield was at 7.01 percent on Thursday.
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The drought situation, farm distress and secu-rity concerns of Naxal-affected districts will
be among the issues to be discussed at the fifthmeeting of Niti Aayog’s Governing Council tobe chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modihere on Saturday.
The agenda for the meeting also includesrain-water harvesting, aspirational districtsprogramme and structural reforms in the agri-culture sector, an official statement said.
The meeting, to be held at Rashtrapati
Bhavan, will be attended by chief ministers, lieu-tenant governors of union territories, severalunion ministers and senior government officials.
This will be the first governing councilmeeting under the new Modi government.
West Bengal Chief Minister MamataBanerjee, however, has refused to attend themeeting, saying it is “fruitless” as Niti Aayog hasno financial powers to support state plans.
Headed by the Prime Minister, theGoverning Council includes ministers ofFinance, Home, Defence, Agriculture,Commerce and Rural Development, besides
state chief ministers and Niti Aayog vice chair-man, CEO and members.
According to the statement, the GoverningCouncil reviews the action taken on the agen-da items of the previous meeting and delib-erates upon the future developmental priori-ties.
So far, four meetings of the GoverningCouncil have been held under the chairman-ship of the Prime Minister.
The first meeting the Governing Councilwas held on February 8, 2015, at which thePrime Minister laid down the key mandatesof Niti Aayog such as fostering cooperative fed-eralism and addressing national issues throughactive participation of the states.
The second meeting on July 15, 2015reviewed the progress made by the three sub-groups of chief ministers and the two task forces.
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Markets watchdog Sebi onThursday came out with
a strict disclosure frameworkfor credit rating agencieswherein they will be requiredto provide the probability ofdefault for various rated instru-ments.
The regulator’s move comesagainst the backdrop of risinginstances of debt defaults andconcerns over the role of cred-it rating agencies in assessing thepossible risks. Credit ratingagencies have also come underthe scanner in the IL&FS case.
“...CRAs (credit ratingagencies), in consultation withSebi, shall prepare and disclosestandardized and uniformprobability of default (PD)benchmarks for each rating cat-egory on their website, forone-year, two-year and three-year cumulative default rates,both for short-run and long-run,” the circular said.
Issuing guidelines forenhanced disclosures by CRAs,the watchdog has called for
having a uniform StandardOperating Procedure (SOP) inrespect of tracking and timelyrecognition of default. Thesame has to be disclosed on thewebsite of each CRA.
Sebi has also mandated aspecific section on ‘rating sen-sitivity’ in the press releasesfrom the agencies to indicatepossible trigger for an upwardor downward rating change ina simple language rather thanlike a general risk factor.
Besides, the regulatorexpect the rating agencies tomake meaningful disclosuresabout liquidity conditions byusing simple terms like supe-rior or strong, adequate,stretched or poor, with properexplanations to help the endusers understand them better.
Also, the CRAs will have todevise a model to track devia-tions in bond spreads, Sebi said.
Additionally, CRAs shallnow assign the suffix ‘CE’(Credit Enhancement) to rat-ing of instruments havingexplicit credit enhancement, itadded.
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India detected at least 22 vio-lations of auditing standards
by Deloitte Haskins & Sells anda KPMG affiliate while inves-tigating a fraud at a financialcompany, leading it to seek afive-year ban on the auditors,according to government legalfilings seen by Reuters.
The failures were detectedas part of a wide-ranging probeinto alleged fraud and mis-management at InfrastructureLeasing & Financial Services(IL&FS), which defaulted on itsdebt obligations last year andsparked fears of financial con-tagion.
Both auditors have deniedwrongdoing.
After the government tookover IL&FS, government inves-tigators began looking intoone of its key financial units,IFIN, which was audited byDeloitte between 2008/09 and2017/18, and by a KPMG affil-iate, BSR & Associates, from2017/18.
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The Government on Thursdayannounced a cut in contri-
butions made by employers andemployees toward the healthinsurance scheme of Employees’State Insurance Corporation(ESIC) to 4 per cent from theexisting 6.5 per cent, a movewhich would lead to an esti-mated annual saving of around�5,000 crore for firms.
The reduced rates will beeffective from July 1, 2019, theLabour Ministry said in arelease. This would benefit 3.6crore employees and 12.85 lakhemployers.
“The government has takena historic decision to reduce therate of contribution under theEmployees’ State Insurance Actfrom 6.5 per cent to 4 per cent(employers’ contribution beingreduced from 4.75 per cent to3.25 per cent and employees’contribution being reducedfrom 1.75 per cent to 0.75 percent),” the ministry said.
As many as 12.85 lakhemployers and 3.6 croreemployees contributed �22,279crore towards the ESI scheme
in 2018-19. Back of the envelop calcu-
lations suggest that reduction inthe contribution rate foremployers would results inannual savings of over �5,000crore to these firms.
The ministry said that thereduced rate of contributionwill bring about a substantialrelief to workers and facilitatefurther enrollment of workersunder the Employees’ StateInsurance (ESIC) scheme andbring more and more work-force into the formal sector.
Similarly, reduction in theshare of contribution ofemployers will reduce the finan-cial liability of the establish-ments leading to improved via-bility of these establishments.This shall also lead to enhancedEase of Doing Business.
It is also expected thatreduction in rate of ESI con-tribution shall lead to improvedcompliance of law. TheEmployees’ State Insurance Act1948 (the ESI Act) provides formedical, cash, maternity, dis-ability and dependent benefitsto the Insured Persons underthe Act.
Swords are out in Tamil NaduBJP following the failure of
the party to win at least one LokSabha seat in the State in therecently held Lok Sabha elec-tions. While a senior leader ofthe party has written to PrimeMinister Narendra Modi askingfor an urgent overhaul of theparty in the State, another seniorleader blamed the ineffectivenessof the leaders in countering theDMK-led Opposition’s anti-Modi campaign.
“In Tamil Nadu there was astrong anti-Modi campaignunleashed and fanned by theDMK and other Tamil outfits.They were united in harping forthe past four years that Modi ispro-corporate and anti farmer,"said Kaattumannarkoil Kannan,leader, Kisan Morchha, in a let-ter to the Prime Minister, a copyof which was accessed by ThePioneer.
The essence of Kannan’sletter us that the present lead-ership of the BJP has provedtheir incapacity and inefficien-cy in winning any election. Hestates that though the BJP-ledGovernment at the Centrebrought in a number of pro-poor programmes and pro-farmer policies, the BJP’s TamilNadu leaders failed miserably inexplaining it to the people of theState.
Kannan says in his letter thatthe BJP should not have alignedwith either of the the dravidanparties viz, the DMK andAIADMK. "Both the parties aretainted and tarnished. These twoparties have been looting TamilNadu for the past 50 years. Ifyou make raids against bothparty leaders you can unearthhuge money," says Kannan whowas recently in the news forauthoring the book “RiverCauvery , The Most Battled”.
He points out that theintegrity of the Tamil Nadu BJP
took a beating for the worse fol-lowing the seizure of three con-tainers packed with currencynotes worth Rs 570 crore duringthe 2016 assembly election.“Some connected houses wereraided but after that there was noaction,” he says.
According to Kannan, thecentral leadership of the BJPshould take into confidence thefarming community in the Stateas TN is an agricultural econo-my. “Not a single farmer hasvoted for the BJP this time,” hesaid when asked about the rea-son behind the failure of the BJP.
Kannan also wanted thecentral leadership to order athorough overhaul and revampof the party in the State andappoint a farmer as the Stateparty chief. The words ofKannan were echoed by ArjunSampath, leader of the HinduMakkal Katchi. “The presentand past leaders of Tamil NaduBJP should make way for newfaces as they had proved their
incapability. The party whihcould poll 19 per cent votes inthe 2014 parliament election hadto content with just 3.5 per cent.Tamilissai Sounderarajan, theState BJP president was trouncedby a margin of 3,47,209 votes,while former Union MinisterPon Radhakrishnan lost by2,60,000 votes. H Raja, thnational secretary , lost by 3,32,244 votes to tainted KartiChidambaram of the Congress.The BJP should introspect whythese leaders were defeated bysuch huge margins,” said ArjunSampath. He said he had spokento the national leadership aboutthe state of affairs in TamilNadu BJP.
Interestingly, the ire of theparty cadre has also been direct-ed against the high profile PMuraleedhar Rao , the secretaryin charge of the State. “Please doan audit about his contributionstowards the BJP .That will revealthe whole story,” said a second-rung leader based in Chennai.
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In a major relief to NanaPatekar, the Oshiwara police
on Thursday filed a closurereport in a local court atAndheri in north-westMumbai, stating that they hadno evidence to prosecute thesenior actor in the alleged sex-ual harassment case filedagainst him by actressTanushree Dutta.
Confirming the develop-ment, Deputy Commissionerof Police and Mumbai policespokesperson ManjunathShinge said: “Yes. We havefiled a B-summary reportbefore a MetropolitanMagistrate at Andheri (west)”.
The investigators file a B-Summary report in a courtwhen they do not find any evi-dence against the accused per-son to file a charge-sheetagainst him and seek a trial.
Reacting to the develop-ment, Tanushtree's lawyer,Nitin Satpute said that hewould challenge the B-sum-mary report in a court. “The Bor C-summary report filed bythe police is not final. We willchallenge the B-Summaryreport. After a hearing, if thecourt – if satisfied -- can againdirect the police re-investigatethe case,” Satpute said.
Demanding to know as towhat was urgency for the policeto file B-Summary report inthe case of Patekar, Tanushree
contested the “clean chIt” givento the senior actor, by alleging:“A corrupt police force andlegal system giving a clean chitto an even more corrupt per-son Nana who has beenaccused even in the past of bul-lying, intimidation and harass-ment by several women in thefilm Industry”
“Our witnesses have beensilenced by intimidation andfake witnesses have been putforth to weaken the case. Whatwas the rush to file a B-sum-mary report when all of mywitnesses have not even record-ed their statements yet?,”Tanushree asked.
“I'm neither shocked norsurprised being a woman inIndia this is something we allhave got used to. I mean if rapeaccused Alok Nath got a cleanchit and returned to moviesthen surely it was not going tobe difficult for harassmentaccused Nana Patekar to gethimself or shall we say buyhimself a clean chit to contin-ue to bully hapless youngwomen,” the actress alleged.
It may be recalled that act-
ing on a complaint filed byTanushree on October 6, 2018,the Oshiwara police had regis-tered a First InformationReport (FIR) against senioractor Nana Patekar and threeothers four days later.
After she recordedTanushree’s statement on thenight of October 10 last year,the Oshiwara police formallyregistered an FIR againstPatekar and three others undersections 354 (Assault or crim-inal force to women with intentto outrage her modesty), 354-A (Assault or use of criminalforce with intent to disrobe her)and section 509 (word, gestureor act intended to insult themodesty o a woman) of IndianPenal Code.
In her complaint lodgedwith the police on October 6,Tanushree had alleged that theincident took place on March 26,2008 during the shooting of asong in the film “Horn OkPleaseee”. The entire was to bepicturised on the actress, whilePatekar had only line in the song.She said that before the shoot,she had made it clear to the pro-ducer and director that shewould not enact or perform anylewd, vulgar or uncomfortablesteps in the particular song.
“On the 4th day of theshoot, 26th March 2008, whileshooting was going on, NanaPatekar’s behaviour was inap-propriate towards me. He wason the set despite his work in
the song being over and he wasgrabbing me by the arms andpushing me around on thepretext of teaching me how todance. When he was teachingindecently and unnecessarily,then I felt very uncomfortablebecause of his behaviour and Ifelt he has outraged my mod-esty,” Tanushree alleged.
“He (Patekar) told thechoreographer and other juniorartists to back away so that hecould teach me the dance stepsthrough he was not a choreo-grapher and he was notrequired during the choreog-raphy as per my previousrehearsals,” the actress added.
“After the incident, I wasunder tremendous shock, Isuffered psychological trauma,was unable to take up work,suffered huge monetary lossesin crores and therefore I decid-ed to take action through filmindustry by lodging a writtencomplaint with the Cine andTV Artistes Association. TheAssociation decided the matterand passed the order withoutconsidering my complaint forapology,” Tanushree stated inher police complaint.
In her complaint,Tanushreee had also namedchoreographer GaneshAcharya, producer SameeSiddiqui, director RakeshSarang and some MNS work-ers who allegedly damaged hercar and pulled her out of hercar, as co-accused.
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Muzaffarnagar: Four railwaypolicemen, including a stationhouse officer, were booked forallegedly beating up a journal-ist in Uttar Pradesh's Shamli dis-trict, an official said onThursday.
In a purported video of theincident, which went viral onsocial media late Tuesday night,the accused GovernmentRailway Police (GRP) personnel,dressed in plain clothes, can beseen repeatedly slapping andpunching television journalistAmit Sharma.
Subsequently, the scribe wasdetained by the railway police-men.
Police registered a caseagainst the four personnel,including Station HouseOfficer Rakesh Kumar, onWednesday under sections ofthe Indian Penal Code (IPC)pertaining to causing hurt,insult, robbery and wrongfulconfinement, GRPSuperintendent of Police
Subhash Chand Dubey said.Of the four GRP officers,
Kumar and Constable SanjayPawar were suspended onWednesday.
A case has been registeredunder the IPC sections 323(causing hurt), 504 (intention-al insult), 506 (criminal intimi-dation), 364 (abduction), 392(punishment for robbery) and342 (wrongful confinement),according to police.
The incident took placeafter the policemen entered intoan argument with Sharma whenhe was covering the derailmentof a goods train in Shamli
Sharma has alleged that hewas thrashed by the GRP per-sonnel and put in a lock up.
"They forced me to take myclothes off and urinated on me,"the scribe said. However, thischarge was denied by the GRP.
The policemen were bookedafter an agitation by journalistsover incident.They staged a sit-in in Shamli on Wednesday. PTI
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The Western Railway onThursday chose not to take
any chances in view of the alertover the Cyclone Vayu , as it can-celled fully the operation of 88mainline trains, while it short-terminated/ short-orginated 40other mainline trains as a pre-cautionary measure.
With Thursday’s cancella-tions and short-terminations,the total number of long-dis-tance trains affected by thecyclone Vayu-triggeredinclement weather condition-sm the total number trainsaffected since Wednesday wentup 128.
The Western Railway con-tinued to take precautionarymeasures on the second con-secutive day on Thursday, evenas Cyclone Vayu spared Gujarat.
Till Wednesday, 77 main-line trains had been cancelledwhile 33 were short terminat-
ed by Western Railway in viewof cyclone. On Thursday, 11more trains were cancelledwhile seven more trains werescheduled to be short termi-nated/short originated withpartial cancellation, as a pre-cautionary measure in thecyclone prone areas. “Varioussafety and security precautionsare also being taken by WR fortrain passengers of thesecyclone prone areas under thejurisdiction of WR i.e. Veraval,Okha, Porbandar, Bhavnagar,Bhuj and Gandhidham, etc,” theWR spokesperson said. Twospecial trains from Okha wererun to evacuate affected peoplein coastal area, while eight spe-cial coaching rakes were kept inreadiness at Ghandhidham,Bhuj, Khambalia, Adri, Botad,Ranavav, Wansjaliya &Bhavnagar stations on WesternRailway to evacuate peopleaffected with VAYU in thecoastal area.
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The National InvestigationAgency in a surprise move
on Wednesday took into cus-tody six persons fromCoimbatore who were plan-ning to stage massive suicideattacks in South India on thepattern of the Easter Sundaybombings at Colombo whichhad claimed more than 250lives.
Mohammed Azharudheen,a 32-year-old youth, who hasbeen taken into custody by theNIA team, is said to be a closeassociate of Zahran Hashim,the master brain behind theEaster Sunday blasts atColombo staged by theThowheed Jamat of Sri Lanka. “Mohammed Azharudheenwas a Facebook friend ofZahran Hashim and they wereexchanging information aboutthe setting up of Islamic State(IS) modules in Tamil Naduand Kerala,” said a senior NIAofficial who did not want hisname to be quoted. The NIA isin the process of unravellingwhether Azharudheen had per-
sonal contacts with Hashim inaddition to the exchange ofinformation through the socialmedia sites.
The six persons who havebeen taken into custody besidesAzharudheen are AkramSindhaa (26), ShiekHdayatullah (38), MAbubacker (29), SadhaamHussein (26) and Shahin Shah@Ibrahim (28). All those whohave been taken into custodyare residents of Coimbatoredistrict, a known hub ofIslamic extremism.
The NIA team has foundthat the Facebook page KHI-LAFAH GFX was being usedby Azharudheen and others topropagate the Islamic State ide-ology and to recruit youngstersfor terrorist attacks in Keralaand Tamil Nadu. The NIAaction comes immediately afterits sleuths visited Colomborecently where it held discus-sions with their counterpartsin Sri Lanka. The Indian intel-ligence agencies had warnedtheir Sri Lankan counterpartsabout possible terrorist strikesin the island nation weeksbefore the Easter Sunday blasts.
Chennai: The PMK, an ally of the BJP inTamil Nadu, on Thursday urged GovernorBanwarilal Purohit to order the release ofseven Rajiv Gandhi assasination case con-victs without any further delay.
Pointing out that the Tamil NaduGovernment had recommended theirrelease on September 9 last year, PMKfounder leader S Ramadoss, in a letter tothe Governor, said "it is sad that no deci-sion has been taken yet on the recom-mendation till today, even after 276 days."
There were no legal restrictions torelease the convicts and the Governor has"independent powers" on the matter, the
PMK leader noted.Also, Supreme Court judgments in this
respect showed that the Governor "hascomplete authority" under the Constitutionto release convicts, he said.
While life imprisonment "in practice"was confined to 14 years, Ramadoss saidthe convicts have been in prison for 29years since 1991.
Nearly 1,500 people were released aftercompletion of 10 years of imprisonment onthe birth centenary celebrations of the lateChief Minister M G Ramachandran, he said.
"...In many cases life imprisonmentprisoners have been released much before
completion of their sentence period on thegrounds of good conduct."
A similar privilege should have beengranted to all the seven Tamils imprisonedfor life in the Rajiv case on a humanitar-ian basis, he said.
"Therefore, I kindly urge and requestyour excellency to grant an order for theimmediate release" of the seven convictsbased on the state government recom-mendation "without any further delay."
Perarivalan, Murugan, Shanthan,Nalini, Robert Payas, Ravichandran andJayakumar are the seven Rajiv case con-victs now in prison. PTI
Madurai: The Tamil Nadupolice on Thursday informedthe Madras High Court that itwould not arrest film directorPa Ranjith against whom acase has been registered inconnection with his reported"derogatory" remarks against a10th century Chola emperor.
When the anticipatory bailplea of Ranjith came up beforeJustice P Rajamanickam, theGovernment prosecutor
informed that police wouldnot arrest him.
Recording the submission,the court posted the matter forhearing to June 19.
The judge also directedthe police to file a counter tothe director's plea against thecase registered byTirupanandal police inThanjavur district.
The case was registeredunder IPC sections 153
(provocation to cause riot)and 153 (A) (1)(promotinghatred etc) following a com-plaint lodged by a HinduMakkal Katchi functionaryalleging that the director'sspeech was aimed at creatingdivisions among people of dif-ferent castes.
Ranjith had made thealleged remarks at a publicmeeting organised by a Dalitoutfit in that district. PTI
Guwahati: Two NRC officialswere arrested here on Thursdayfor allegedly accepting bribefrom a woman to enter her namein the citizenship list, policesaid.
Field Level Officer of Dispur,National Register of CitizensSewa Kendra, Syed Shahjahanwas caught red handed by ateam of Anti-Corruption Bureauwhile accepting a bribe of�10,000 from a woman, identi-fied as Kajari Ghosh Dutta, thepolice said.
Dutta, a resident of AnandaNagar area of the city, had filedanother FIR against the AssistantLocal Registrar of CitizenRegistration (LRCR) RahulParashar of the same NRC SewaKendra who was also arrested forhis alleged complicity with theother official, they said. PTI
agility and brain develop-ment. But then we alsoknow that we are not awareof what this most cerebral oforgans is capable of. Andsometimes it takes art tofurther this understanding.
Lu Yang, who wasselected unanimously as thewinner from a shortlist ofthree artists as the nextBMW Art Journey’s“Human Machine ReverseMotion Capture Project,”has shown how the humanbody can be trained to over-come its physical limita-tions. Her research willexplore the deployment ofthe human body in histori-cal and present-day cul-tures, looking at tradition-al and contemporary dancespractised in Indonesia,India, and Japan.
Steeped in the latestdigital technologies, LuYang will employ sophisti-cated motion capturedevices to record thedancers’ gestures, includ-ing facial, finger-and eye-capture techniques that cancollect and analyse the sub-tlest body movements, andwill mimic these usingrobotic technologies. Herworks were exhibited in theDiscoveries sector at thisyear’s Art Basel show inHong Kong. Yang is repre-sented by the gallery Sociétéin Berlin.
She has demonstratedhow in Legong, a tradition-al Balinese dance, for exam-ple, movement is controlledto such a degree thatdancers are able to manip-ulate their finger joints indi-vidually. The facial and eyemovements of India’sKathakali dancers resemblethe workings of sensors andmotors in advancedhumanoid robots. A similarrobotic precision isexpressed in the Japanese
pop dances. Thus, Lu Yang’sArt Journey links tradition-al and modern culturalforms to radically transfor-mative contemporary tech-nologies. In a larger sense,it will look into how wenegotiate our evolving rela-tionship with machines thatmay ultimately surpass ourhuman limitations.
“This gives a great start-ing point for long-termresearch projects. This is notjust an art journey. It will bea wonderful start for me toopen a new chapter of mycreation,” says Lu Yang.
The international juryconsisted of Claire Hsu,
Director, Asia Art Archive,Hong Kong; MatthiasMühling, Director,Städtische Galerie imLenbachhaus undKunstbau, Munich; PatriziaSandretto Re Rebaudengo,President FondazioneSandretto Re Rebaudengo,Turin; Philip Tinari,Director Ullens Center forContemporary Art(UCCA), Beijing; andSamson Young, artist andwinner of the first BMWArt Journey.
“What we found excitingabout Lu Yang’s proposaland work,” the jury noted inits statement, “is the way she
draws connections acrosstime, space, and geography— traversing different realms— from Kathakali andLegong dance to Japanesepop with our potential futurerobotic selves. She demon-strates that humanity’s searchfor an answer to why we arehere is continuous – it justtakes different forms.” Theproposed BMW Art Journeyevokes urgent dilemmas intoday’s society, the jurynoted. “We appreciated theidea that the vocabularywithin the database used forrobotic human expressionswould be expanded toinclude the expressionsfound in multiple traditions— a much needed expansionof reference points in today’sworld.”
Art Basel and BMW willcollaborate with the artist todocument the journey andshare it with a broader pub-lic. In addition to Lu Yang,the shortlisted artists fromthe Discoveries sector foremerging artists at Art Baselin Hong Kong were: ClarissaTossin (represented byCommonwealth andCouncil, Los Angeles) andShen Xin (represented byMadeln Gallery, Shanghai).
Launched in 2015, theArt Journey is a collabora-tion between Art Basel andBMW, created to recogniseand support emerging artistsworldwide. The uniqueaward is open to artists whoare exhibiting in theDiscoveries sector duringArt Basel in Hong Kong. Ajudging panel comprised ofinternationally renownedexperts meet first to select ashortlist three artists fromthe sector, who are theninvited to submit proposalsfor a journey aimed to fur-ther develop their ideas andartistic work. The juryreconvenes to choose a win-ner from the three propos-als.
Imagine entering a school whereyou can touch and feel thenumbers and alphabets, sense
their character and simply discov-er the world around by runningyour fingers over the walls.Aradhana Agarwal, head of prod-uct development and CSR (corpo-rate social responsibility) at aresearch lab in New Delhi, who hasconceived digitally-printed tilesas a tool of learning in governmentschools, was inspired by normalchildren’s behaviour. She observedhow kids, while walking aroundthe corridors, normally rub theirhands against the walls and bul-letins which in turn damaged thepaint and the chart papers on theboards. This became the basis of EkAcha Bhavishya, where she decid-ed that, “Instead of using electron-ic boards or simple tiles around,why not fill the tiles with content?Usually, the kids at governmentschools do not find the rightatmosphere in their surroundingsor at home to learn. In some cases,even in schools, they might notfind the right exposure,” she said.
It was at a primary school at TilBegampur, Sikandrabad, UttarPradesh, that the first set of thesetiles were installed in the premis-es. These make for informative andinteractive visuals all around thewalls and floors of the school build-ing. There are also revamped class-room set-ups with educative yetaesthetically attractive digitally-printed tiles with numbers, dia-grams, alphabets and maps plas-tered across the school. If that is notenough, washrooms are coveredwith patented germ-free tiles toensure hygiene.
Recalling her own time inschool, Aradhana said that thereused to be bulletin boards acrossthe classrooms and corridors,which were decorated with chart
papers and cut-outs of differentdiagrams. However, they stayedonly for a limited time span andneeded a lot of time and new ideasto be re-decorated. “Also, childrenscrapped or tore off bits of thosecharts on the board. This is wherethe idea of creating and usinginformative tiles birthed from,” shesaid.
Aradhana, who had beenteaching in primary schools for 10years, started with Class I tounderstand the kind of content thatshould be printed. She said, “Wereferred to textbooks. We tried todig out the things students normal-ly wouldn’t want to read themselvesfrom their books but would feelattracted to when they saw themprojected on the walls. It wouldmake them want to learn that. Sowe charted out what goes forwhich class. This way it kept ongrowing to higher classes.”
There could also be audio-visual teaching aids such as videosand guest lectures or 3D modelslike abacus and shape models inmathematics, alphabets models inEnglish and interactive globes forSocial Science.
However, the advantage ofthese tiles is that they last long andcannot be easily tampered with bystudents and thus are highly con-venient teaching tools, which con-sume less time to convey informa-tion to the students. RavindraKumar, principal of the Til
Begampur school, said, “Earlier, theteacher used to enter the class,draw the diagram or the map orwrite the tables on the board andthe process would be time-con-suming. Now, they can simply takeforward the lessons. It enables aquick revision of topics and activevisual learning while on the move.”
Another observation made byhim was that during recesses, stu-dents would idle away their timein corridors. “Now, since the tilesattract them, they are much moreinvolved. I have observed themmoving around those tile charts intheir spare time. They challengeeach other to find out Rome inItaly’s map or other stuff like that.It has resulted in an increasedretention of complex conceptsand subjects,” he said.
Apart from the Til Begampurschool, the tiles have been installedat five other centres in India, withconstant efforts of making it reach-able to as many governmentschools as possible. These arePrathamik Vidyalaya, PisanhariaPratham in Varanasi; PrimarySchool, Jokhababad, Bulandshahar;Rajkiya Madhyamik Vidhyalaya,Panchayawala in Jaipur; ShankarDham Campus in Ahmedabad;and Nirmal Primary School,Connaught Place.
Looking at the data specifica-tions from these schools, after theinstallation of these scribble-prooftiles, there has been a 36 per centrise in enrollment of children intwo years. While absenteeism hasreduced by 31 per cent (from 52per cent to 12 per cent), an
improvement in results has alsobeen observed.
However, since there is adearth of proper infrastructure,competitive and committed teach-ers as well as quality education,especially in rural schools, onemight question about how canthese tiles be affordable whenbasic infrastructure is not in place?Moreover, massive installation andimplementation of such initia-tives is an uphill task in a poorcountry like India with a vast pop-ulation.
Alok Agarwal, chief marketingofficer of the project, said that it isa mammoth task to ensure thereachability of the tiles in as manyschools as possible. He added,“However, we have been givingpresentations to the government
about how we can introduce andmanufacture ‘Tiles That Educate’for low-budget schools, since theyare designed keeping their afford-ability for rural schools in focus asprivate schools already haveenough resources and budget.”
Talking about the costs, he toldus that a set of tiles with a worldmap would cost around �1,600 anda set of tiles for all the classes wouldbe around �40,000 to �50,000.“However, low-budget schools canavail them at �20,000,” he says.
While there have beennumerous discussions about howeducation can promote sustain-able development among futureleaders, how often have therebeen conversations around howeducation methods need to besustainable?
Classical music that was zesty and foot-tapping wafted through the air at the
Russian Embassy as it geared up to cele-brate Russia Day. The occasion commem-orates the adoption of the Declaration ofState Sovereignty of the Russian SovietFederative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) onJune 12, 1990. Given the long-standingrelationship that India shares with thecountry, the embassy in Chanakyapuri wasabuzz with guests from all walks of life.
Foreign Secretary V K Gokhale was thechief guest while Najma Heptulla,Governor of Manipur, was the guest ofhonour. Heptulla was also presented withthe Russian State award called the Orderof Friendship.
The food at the do was catered by theLaLit Group of Hotels. The highlight of theevening was the ensemble, STRADI-VALENKI, which comprised four virtuosoviolin, accordion, piano and double-bassplayers and played numbers that had theguests shaking their heads.
Nikolay Kudashev, Ambassador ofRussia to India, while addressing theguests, reiterated that Russia highly valuedand respected India’s rich history, cultureand traditions. “We are very proud to notethat one of the first major international ini-tiatives taken by new Russia was the sign-ing of the Treaty on Friendship andCooperation with India on January 28,1993 which reaffirmed the continuity ofour unique relationship,” he said. He fur-ther elaborated that the Declaration ofStrategic Partnership of 2000 laid thefoundation of the modern relationship,which since 2010 has enjoyed the status of
Special and Privileged Strategic Partnershipthat is immune to any changes in domes-tic affairs or vagaries.
He went on to add, “In 2018 our lead-ers, Russian President Vladimir Putin andIndian Prime Minister Narendra Modi,met twice for bilateral summits bothinformal and the full-fledged one and sev-eral times on the sidelines of various inter-national fora.”
The ambassador also highlighted thatRussia and India are time-tested partnersin the military and military-technicalspheres and recent years have seen a hostof deals being signed for production of mil-itary equipment under the Make in Indiaprogramme. “Economic cooperation is alsoone of the top priorities of our relations.The 2018 October summit in New Delhiresulted in a new series of important agree-ments and MoUs, introducing a new plat-form for aspiring entrepreneurs — Russia-India Business Summit, which showedeagerness and ability of our companies toenhance trade, economic and investmentpartnership.”
He was pleased to note that the rela-tionship was not confined to the two gov-ernments as “it is gratifying and inspiringthat people-to-people contacts and mutu-al affinity are the key drivers of theRussian-Indian friendship giving newimpetus to the ever-expanding areas of ourcooperation. This is the reason why weproudly declare that the amity betweenRussia and India has become a deep-root-ed popular tradition in both countries.”
The evening ended on a high note forthe guests and the delegates.
Of late, Sector 29 market inGurugram has developed a repu-tation of sorts among people of
two kinds — those looking to grab a quickbite and those looking to party the week-end away. The area has evolved as a one-stop shop for all your hunger needs, sim-ply because of the range of cuisines anddishes at various restaurants. While theguest is spoilt for choice, it has alsoensured that the competition amongrestaurants is tough.
Now if you were to head there on aweekend, to hang out with friends,Decode Air Bar can certainly be oneoption that will attract your attention. Thesprawling restaurant covers two floorswith an indoor seating arrangement onthe first floor and an al fresco one on theterrace. While its walls are done inshades of black and brown, an arc madeof exposed bricks in the centre of the din-ing area on the first floor offers a contrastwhile transporting you to the World WarII era. The restaurant is decorated withvintage paraphernalia like transistors,globes, hard-bound books, retro tele-phones and more with an entire wall cov-ered with a green board which has aseemingly detailed war plan. Low lightsand retro-styled furniture add to theambience. The roof, on the other hand,is built in the European style whichimparts a modern touch to the place.Events like live music and DJ perfor-mances make the restaurant a perfectplace to spend some time with friends andfamily
Coming down to what I was here for— food — I decided to begin with theThai styled chicken tikka. Served in an ovalblack tray, the presentation was appeal-ing as the bright colour of the dish wasin stark contrast with the backgroundwhich made it visually attractive. At thefirst bite it was obvious that the chickenwas cooked to perfection. The dash ofcoconut flavour added a sweetness whichwas perfectly balanced with the spices.The banana chips were like a cherry onthe cake as they imparted a crunch to thedish.
Next, I travelled all the way to SouthIndia, gastronomically of course, byordering a dish named Idli my style.
Though the description made my mouthwater, I regretted my decision as soon asthe dish made its way to the table. Thepresentation of the dish was not up to themark, nor was the taste. The idli wasbaked which made it fluffy but when Idug my fork into it, the sphere started tofall apart. The dish lacked spice as well astanginess that is characteristic of rasamand the overall plain taste was far fromwhat I expected.
On the chef ’s recommendation, Iordered Cream cheese chicken tikka next.Although served on a basic round plate,the presentation of the dish was excellentas it had various colourful elements thatwere visually delightful. The marinationof yogurt and cream imparted a tangyflavour to the chicken that was perfectlybalanced by Indian spices. The flavour ofperi peri dip served alongside the dishbound all the elements together into a
perfect bite. The fourth dish was Pav bhajicones, which was a nice twist to the muchloved street food dish. It had a soft rollcone filled with provencal style bhajitopped with onions, tomatoes and whitebutter. While the presentation was real-ly innovative, the flavours of the dishremained true to the original — a sort ofbest of both worlds.
The Chermoula marinated chickenskewers were next in line. The dishscored high on presentation. The chick-en and pita bread were threaded on to theskewers and a bowl of hummus wasplaced below. The chicken was marinat-ed in a flavourful spice mix, with a nicetouch of paprika, and was really moist andjuicy. The pita bread served alongside wasthin and nicely toasted, while the hum-
mus imparted a creamy texture to
the dish. To accompany my food, I decided to
get something to drink but I wasn’tquite sure about what I wanted to order.I vaguely instructed the bartender that Iwould prefer one with fruit punch. To mysurprise, he actually responded to myrequest and prepared something that wasnot on the menu and was customised tomy taste. The drink was a perfect blendof flavours of different fruits.
While I wasn’t done savouring it, theLamb rogan puff made its way to my plate.Served with salsa and sour mayo, the puffsarrived with a filling of lamb keema inthem. The filling was well-cooked inIndian spices that blended perfectly withsalsa and sour mayo.
Finally it was time for desserts and Iordered their speciality, the Wishing tree.
This was practically art on a plate. Theplatter looked like a garden, with a treeat one end which had a chocolate barkand instead of leaves, had orange-flavoured candy floss. At the foot of thetree was some chocolate soil along withedible flowers. The rest of the plate hadcoconut ice cream with jaggery sauce,chocolate ganache, paan chutney gel andmango micro-sponge. The entire dessertwas a melange of flavours and texturesand all the elements came together andcreated an organic whole.
While the food scores full marks hereas it is extraordinary, what needs someimprovement is its service as the journeyof a dish from the chef ’s kitchen to thetable seems quite long. The staff needs tobe better trained and professional. But thisplace certainly warrants a visit.
Israeli warplanes bombedbunkers at a Hamas base in
Gaza early on Thursday fol-lowing the first rocket firefrom the territory since earlyMay, the military said.
Israeli aircraft targeted“underground infrastructure” atthe base in the southern GazaStrip, it said in a statement.
The strike came after Israeliair defences intercepted a rock-et launched from the territory,the first since hundreds werefired in early May in a two-dayflare-up which killed fourIsraelis and 25 Palestinians.
On Wednesday evening,Israel announced it had bannedall fishing off Gaza in retaliationfor the launch of more incen-diary balloons from the enclave.
“Due to the continuous
launching of incendiary bal-loons and kites from the GazaStrip towards Israel, it has beendecided tonight (Wednesday)not to allow access to Gaza’smaritime space until furthernotice,” the Israeli defence min-istry department responsible
for Palestinian civil affairs,COGAT, said. The move cameafter COGAT said on Tuesdayit had reduced the extent of thefishing zone to six nautical milesoffshore from 10 nautical miles,having downscaled it from 15nautical miles a week ago.
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The Israeli military says it istaking the rare step of clos-
ing the Gaza Strip’s offshorewaters to Palestinian fishermenuntil further notice in responseto incendiaries launched intoIsrael in recent days.
COGAT, the IsraeliDefense Ministry body con-trolling the crossings with thecoastal enclave, announced onWednesday that “due to thecontinuous launching of incen-diary balloons and kites from
the Gaza Strip towards Israel,”Israel would bar Gazans fromusing the territory’s coastalwaters.
Israel often restricts the off-shore fishing zone in responseto cross-border violence. Israeland Egypt have maintained ablockade of the Gaza Stripsince the Islamist militantgroup Hamas took power in2007.
A cease-fire struck by Israeland Hamas in May to end theworst round of fighting since2014 has largely held.
Two oil tankers near thestrategic Strait of Hormuz
were reportedly attacked onThursday, an assault that leftone ablaze and adrift as sailorswere evacuated from both ves-sels and the US Navy rushed toassist amid heightened ten-sions between Washington andTehran.
Japan’s Trade Ministry saidthe two vessels had “Japan-related cargo” as PrimeMinister Shinzo Abe was wrap-ping up a high-stakes visit inTehran that sought to easetensions between Iran and theUnited States.
Benchmark Brent crudespiked at one point by as much4 per cent in trading followingthe reported attack, to overUSD 62 a barrel, highlightinghow crucial the area remains toglobal energy supplies.
A third of all oil traded bysea passes through the strait,which is the narrow mouth ofthe Persian Gulf.
The latest incident comesafter the US alleged that Iranused mines to attack four oiltankers off the nearby Emiratiport of Fujairah last month.Iran has denied being involved,but it comes as Iranian-backedrebels in Yemen also havelaunched missile and droneattacks on Saudi Arabia.
Cmdr. Joshua Frey, a 5thFleet spokesman, said the U.S.Navy was assisting the two ves-sels that he described as beinghit in a “reported attack.” Hedid not say how the ships wereattacked or who was suspected of being behindthe assault.
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Tehran: Iranian ForeignMinister Mohammad JavadZarif said on Thursday thatreported attacks on two tankersoff the Iranian coast just asJapan’s prime minister heldTehran talks was more thansuspicious.
“Reported attacks onJapan-related tankers occurredwhile PM @AbeShinzo wasmeeting with Ayatollah@khamenei_ir for extensiveand friendly talks. Suspiciousdoesn’t begin to describe whatlikely transpired this morning,”Zarif tweeted.
Japan PM Shinzo Abe metIran’s supreme leader AyatollahAli Khamenei on Thursdaymorning, seeking to ease soaring tensionsbetween Tehran andWashington. AFP
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Iran’s navy rescued 44 crewmembers from two oil
tankers which caught fire afteran “accident” in the Sea ofOman on Thursday, officialnews agency IRNA reported.
“Forty-four sailors fromthe two foreign oil tankerswhich had an accident thismorning in the Sea of Omanwere saved from the water bythe (navy) rescue unit ofHormozgan province andtransferred to the port ofBandar-e-Jask,” IRNA quoted an “informed source” assaying.
The news agency said thefirst accident occurred at 8:50(0420 GMT) 25 nautical milesoff Bandar-e-Jask in southernIran.
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Agroup of Muslims, whohave been residing in the
Kathmandu Valley for cen-turies, have joined hands withthe members of local Newarcommunity in their demandfor protection of SanatanHindu culture after the gov-ernment moved a bill aimed atnationalising public and privatetrusts.
Newar Muslim Society, alocal Muslim group, carryingplacards, took part in a rally onMonday in the heart ofKathmandu city demandingprotection of the SanatanHindu religion and culture.
“Sanatan Hindu religioncould be jeopardised if theBill, tabled by the Communist
Party government inParliament, gets endorsed,” thegroup said.
Guthis are socio-econom-ic institutions (trusts), bothpublic and private, that fundtheir obligations from incomesfrom cultivated or leased landassets. Depending on theirobligations, guthis fulfil reli-gious, public service or socialroles and could either involvemembers from a common lin-eage, or several.
The K P Sharma Oli-ledCommunist Party governmenthas tabled a Bill in Parliamentto amend the Guthi Act andnationalise both public andprivate guthis and regulate allreligious sites under a power-ful commission.
Expressing concerns over
the controversial provisions ofthe Bill, the members of theNewar community and trusteesof major guthis staged protestson Monday and Tuesday andalleged the government’s moveis designed to erase the histo-ry by wiping out the institu-tional memory of variousindigenous communities.
“By nationalising outguthis, the state intends tosuppress our fundamentalrights and exploit guthis forcommercial purposes. The billis a direct attack on all out tan-gible and intangible heritageand does not say a word aboutour religion, heritage, culture ortradition,” Satya NarayanDangol of the Nardevi ShwetKali Ajima Guthi was quoted assaying in the Kathmandu Post.
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Boris Johnson on Thursdaysecured his position as the
frontrunner in the race to suc-ceed Theresa May as BritishPrime Minister as he won thehighest number of votes in thefirst round of the leadership poll.
The former Cabinet min-ister received 114 votes in thefirst round of a secret ballot ofTory MPs held in the House ofCommons, followed by UKforeign secretary Jeremy Huntin second place with 43 andenvironment secretary MichaelGove third with 37 votes.
Three contenders — MarkHarper, Andrea Leadsom andEsther McVey — were knockedout of the race after failing tosecure the minimum require-ment of 17 votes.
It leaves seven candidatesin the fray for the secondround of voting next week,including former Brexit secre-tary Dominic Raab in fourthplace with 27 votes, home sec-
retary Sajid Javid fifth with 23,health secretary Matt Hancocksixth with 20 and internation-al development secretary RoryStewart in last place with 19.
The two most popular MPsfrom among the seven will beput to the wider Tory partymembers in a final vote laterthis month, with the winner ofthe contest to succeed May inDowning Street expected to beannounced in the week of July.
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Hong Kong protest leadersannounced plans for
another mass rally on Sunday,escalating their campaignagainst a China extraditionbill a day after police clearedthem from the streets usingvolleys of tear gas and rubberbullets.
The move sets up a freshconfrontation with the city’sleaders who have refused towithdraw the proposed lawand have the staunch backing of Beijing, whichdescribed the protests as “riots”.
The international financehub was rocked by the worstpolitical violence since its 1997handover to China onWednesday as tens of thou-sands of protesters who hadsurrounded the city’s parlia-ment were dispersed in chaot-ic scenes.
Sporadic demonstrations
broke out again on Thursday,with occasional scuffles withpolice, but crowds were muchsmaller and there was no repeatof the running battles of the daybefore.
The Government hasindefinitely postponed a par-liamentary debate on the Bill
which had been scheduled forWednesday and was the triggerfor Wednesday’s violence.
But demonstrators havevowed no let up in their cam-paign until the law is aban-doned entirely, calling for arally on Sunday and a city-widestrike on Monday.
Kathmandu: The large num-ber of deaths of climbers on theMount Everest this season isnot solely due to the “trafficjam” on the world’s highestpeak, the Nepal governmentclaimed Thursday, citing fac-tors like high altitude sickness,other health reasons andadverse weather.
The number of deaths onMt Everest was put at 11 by theinternational media, making itthe deadliest season since 2015.However, the Nepal tourismministry maintained the deathtoll at 8 and one missing.
According to tourism offi-cials altogether 16 climbersdied and one went missing inthe Himalayas this season.PTI
The India-New Zealand tieat the Trent Bridge stadi-um was abandoned late
on Thursday as the rain tookNottingham to the cleaners lit-erally and the players, alongwith a motely crowd in thestands and the media contin-gent in the Press box, waited forsunshine Godot to break out ofthe laden skies, quite unsuccess-fully.
The washed-out scenariomeans India has lost one pointand come to a tally of just 5from three games as opposed tothe Kiwis who will continue tobe on the top with seven pointsfrom four games, having won allthe three matches they playedbefore India.
This would be the fourthmatch in the tournament to beabandoned, with the ICC turn-
ing down requests for reservedays in the preliminary roundon grounds of logistics issuesand prolonging an alreadystretched tournament. Theother teams to have suffered onthe points tally because ofweather conditions are Pakistan,South Africa, Bangladesh, WestIndies and Sri Lanka. Washoutshave particularly upset theapplecart Pakistan which isnow staring an early ouster if itloses the match against India inManchester on June 16.
Incidentally, Manchester,too, is showing up on the riskyweather chart on the block-buster Sunday with intermittentshower and sunshine forecastfor match day. So, the morealarming thing now for not justthe ICC but also India andPakistan is the precipitationgathering around Manchesterwhere the humidity will be 70per cent and chances of rain
mounting to 53 per cent around2 pm, impacting the marqueeevent and giving India morethan Pakistan reason to worryabout a compromised pointstable in case rain manages toplay spoilsport, or the matchgets slashed in overs or theDuckworth-Lewis tenet comesinto play. Abandonment is astricky as a shortened or D/L hitmatch for either team. Losingyet another point to weatherwill mean India will have a nar-rower window for a bad day atwork.
However, as India fieldingcoach Sreedhar said, “the out-field at Trent Bridge resembleda skating rink so there was noquestion of risking injuries,”even though he admitted thatthe momentum gets upset withsuch breaks. “To be waiting inthe dressing room, to switchdown but not switch off, is high-ly frustrating for the players,” he
added.Not that New Zealand, who
are table toppers for now, hav-ing started early in the tourna-ment, are any less upset with thebreak in playing schedules. “Wewould have loved to have playedIndia. They're obviously goinghot and we feel as though we'replaying reasonably well as well,so it would have been a nicematch-up. Having said that,It's quite ironic that our last fourtrainings have all been indoors.It's just what we have to dealwith and we try to pride our-selves on our adaptability. Thefirst thing we're going to do ishave a couple of days off. Wedon't play again for about sixdays now, and it's importantthat we manage the break,”Kiwi coach Gary Stead said.
The rain rules of the tour-nament allow the match to becut to a minimum of 20 overs.The umpires have the discretion
of extending extra time to up to75 minutes beyond the sched-uled play time and to another 75minutes conditions permitting.
Earlier in the day, in theirbid to save the match somehow,the umpires kept on theirinspection rounds till 3 pmlocal time before announcingthat that the match had beenabandoned. There was notmuch activity in the groundother than the umpires inspect-ing the ground four times andthen anointing yet another timefor yet another inspection andthe ground staff working outtheir muscles with the heavycovers pulling them off and onwhile airing the pitch and drain-ing the outfield. Even the extrasuper-soppers ordered in onWednesday stood haplesslyacross the afternoon with thedrizzle in no mood to relent andthe sun peeping in just for a fewminutes.
India fielding coach Sridharsaid India are on the top of their
game where fielding is con-cerned though direct throws is anarea one needs to work on.
"It is something which Ihave my eye on and we practicea lot for that. I would say convert-ing, whether it's a run-out or not,converting one in three or fourthrows is a good conversion rate.In my opinion, picking up oneout of four, you're doing a goodjob as a direct unit. But we failedto do that in the last game. Wehad over 10 strikes and hit onlyonce. On some days we hit threeout of five. It's a practice thing butthat is one area we work hard onin every session," he said.
Talking about criticismaround modern fielders throwingunnecessarily, he said if there isan opportunity, a fielder isencouraged to go for the stumps."We believe that his teammatewill be backing up. We encour-age fielders to create an opportu-nity where none exists. Weencourage them to try and con-vert an opportunity which theyhave created. So that is a rule wewould like to take as a fieldingunit, to be more on the aggres-sive side. We all know where itcomes from. It comes from thecaptain himself," he said.
That, he asserted, was thekind of cricket India want to play."There is a brand of cricket wewant to play as a fielding unit, sowe encourage that. In the bargain,we lose one here or there, it does-n't matter because on a good daywe pull off two or three brilliantrun-outs. Also, if you keep throw-ing at the stumps, it keeps yourshoulder warm in conditions
like this".Speaking about managing
players like Bumrah, Chahal andKedar in the outfield, Sridhar saidthey have been working hard onit, especially Bumrah who hasshown a marked improvement inhis fitness levels. "Bumrah is oneof the hardest workers as far asfielding goes. From when hejoined the team in 2016 to whathe is now, he's a massive improve-ment, although still a work inprogress, but a massive improve-ment," Sridhar said, adding thatwhat is needed is the right mind-set of the players combined withthe increased levels of fitness."Then we can chip in with thetechnical aspect of fielding likeawareness and anticipation."
So how does it go to practicein such cold weather wherecatches are being dropped by allteams? "Hand warmers is obvi-ously the first option to keephands warm. Also, if you're run-ning around in the groundbetween overs or between fieldpositions and throwing the ballaround to the players, that keepsyou warm between overs anddoesn't allow your body to cooldown. We also practice in thesame weather, so that also givesus a heads up," he said.
On training an injuredShikhar Dhawan, Sridhar said:"It's his bottom hand while bat-ting, if I'm not mistaken. It's not
even his dominant hand becausehe's a right-hander. Throwingwon't be a problem, but definite-ly the impact while fielding andcatching, especially as he's a slipfielder in the initial phase of theinnings. That can be an issue.We'll test him out with lighterballs first and gradually move onto the cricket ball and see how itgoes from there. But yes, it willbe a challenge," he added.
Sridhar is happy with thekind of resources he has. "Wehave a terrific slip catcher and asafe catcher in Rohit, and we havetwo guys, Virat and Jadhav, whoare very intimidating in the field.They can intimidate any bats-man, and they are prowling in the30-yard range. To complementthat, we have a player in HardikPandya, who can really helpwhen needed. We are safe catch-ers. We're not fast bowlers. Theseare all the usual suspects, but wesaw Chahal and Bumrah crack itup in the last game, diving afterbowling long spells. We were inthe penalty minute ball of theinning, diving and stopping runs.So that all goes well," the coachsaid.
The biggest thing for Sridharhas been the attitude of the field-ers, where they put the teamahead of themselves, qualitieswhich you need when you wantto go out and win champi-onships.
Pace spearhead Mohammad Amir soaked up the adu-lation from Pakistan fans as he roared to the top of
the World Cup bowling charts with career-best figuresagainst Australia on Wednesday.
Amir was back in Taunton, in southwest England,where he made his return to first-class cricket three yearsago following a ban for spot-fixing.
The 27-year-old was a rising star in world cricketwhen his career came to a stunning halt in 2010 afterboth he and new-ball partner Mohammad Asif werecaught bowling no-balls on the orders of then Pakistancaptain Salman Butt as part of a newspaper sting.
The trio all received five-year bans from cricket andjail terms, taking a huge chunk out of the left-arm pace-man’s career.
The intervening years have not been easy for Amirand he almost missed what is his first World Cup aftertaking just five wickets in 14 matches before a recentone-day international series inEngland.
He did not bowl in the rain-ruined first match of that bilateralseries against England and missedthe last four games with chickenpox. England won the series4-0.
Now he is back with abang, taking five for 30 inhis 10 overs on Wednesdayto improve on his previousbest figures of 4-28 againstSri Lanka a decade ago.
With the crowdchanting “Amir, Amir,Shabash” (come on)from the stands inTaunton, he deliveredtwo maiden overs in hisfirst spell as Australiaopeners Aaron Finchand David Warnerplayed and missed.
Amir conceded just 11 runsoff his opening four overs andthen returned to snare Australiacaptain Finch before taking thewickets of Usman Khawaja,Shaun Marsh, Alex Carey andMitchell Starc.
His efforts helped pegAustralia back to 307 but thatultimately proved too much forPakistan, who lost wicketsconsistently during their replyto slip to a 41-run loss — theirsecond defeat of the World Cup.
Australia century-maker Warner hailed Amir,describing his second spell as ‘fantastic’.
Amir’s haul against Australia took him to 10 wick-ets for the tournament after three matches at an aver-age of 12.30 and an impressive economy rate of 4.73.
Last week Amir said how he was thankful he wasfor the backing of Pakistan’s passionate supporters
“It’s really amazing, I mean the crowd support,” Amirsaid. “We have so many Pakistani fans at all Englandgrounds and when they shout my name it pumps meup.”
He was left out of Pakistan’s preliminary squad forthe World Cup but he made it into the final 15 and hasproved his worth from the start of the tournament.
His WC debut was a rare Pak highlight after theyslumped to 105 all out against the WI, with Amir tak-ing 3-26 in a seven-wicket loss.
Australia aren’t playing attheir best but they are win-ning matches — that’s the
way I saw the win over Pakistan.They hung in there, rode out
some pressure and came out withthe victory.
The bottom line is there’s roomfor improvement from JustinLanger’s team, and that’s a goodthing that will only worry everyother side in this World Cup.
Australia were 126 withoutloss from 22 overs in Taunton, sothey will have been disappointedto only post 307. It’s a very goodscore, but they should have gotmore.
You can’t knock the inningsDavid Warner played. A few peo-ple have been saying he’s scoringtoo slowly, but the ball was doinga bit and there was a little bit ofswing and seam.
He was typically belligerentand upped the scoring rate. AaronFinch was his usual aggressiveself, hitting the ball here, there andeverywhere.
In the middle overs, Australianeed to be a bit smarter. When youget a flying start, like they did atTaunton, you’re desperate to keepthat momentum going and it’shard to do.
Someone has to be prepared tojust knock the ball around for a fewovers but Pakistan didn't really letthem do that. Mohammad Amirbowled beautifully and gave histeam a chance.
I’ve got no problem with bat-ting Glenn Maxwell at four, given
the start Australia had. He’s so dan-gerous.
He might not stick around, likeSteve Smith, Usman Khawaja orShaun Marsh, but he can take thegame away from you and I think
his team understand that a bitmore than they did in the past.
The bowlers did the job upfront. Pat Cummins bowled fantas-tically well and that's a good sign,that him and Mitchell Starc are car-
rying the fight at the top.Pakistan had their tails up at
one stage with Sarfaraz and Wahabat the crease and it was when Finchhad to bowl either himself orMaxwell that you saw a sign of
weakness.The fifth, and even the fourth,
bowling option is looking like aslight concern for them.
Nathan Coulter-Nile bowledpretty well and got the big wicketof Babar, while Kane Richardsonwas a bit expensive.
Finch’s low full-toss did the jobin the end, but I think they shouldlook at Steve Smith having a bowl,I really do.
Leg spin takes wickets andwhether it's Adam Zampa comingback in or Smith trying a bit of hisspin, that should improve theattack dramatically.
All sides are working towardsputting in that perfect, 100-overperformance.
In the early stages of the WorldCup, you want to be right amongstthe pacesetters after four roundsand Australia very much are.
They’re building nicely and all10 teams will feel the total packageis still in them.
Australia play Sri Lanka onSaturday and they won’t want torelax at all.
They’ll talk about being relent-less and consistent in their teammeetings and they can createmomentum for some of the bigteams they still have to play.
You want to be building con-fidence, not dropping your bundleagainst any team.
Sri Lanka are dangerous butAustralia will be confident they canget across the line at The Oval.
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David Warner said wife Candicehad been his “rock” and the
driving force behind his return toAustralia duty after the openerscored his first international cen-tury since a ball-tampering banduring a 41-runs win overPakistan.
The opener made 107, hisfirst hundred in Australia colourssince an Ashes century againstEngland during the 2017 BoxingDay Test at Melbourne.
Both Warner and former cap-tain Steve Smith were given 12-month bans by Cricket Australiafollowing their roles in a ball-tam-pering scandal in South Africa.
“I was always coming back tointernational cricket if selected,”Warner told reporters after stumpsin his first major press conferencesince his suspension expired.
“The thing that kept me goingwas my wife and kids. My wife isjust, she’s just my rock. She’s unbe-lievable. She’s determined, disci-plined, selfless,” the 32-year-oldleft-hander added.
“She’s a strong woman. Andshe got me out of bed a lot in thosesort of first 12 weeks, and got meback running and training hard as
I could... She really nailed that intome.”
Candice Warner, who is preg-nant with the couple’s third child,is now in England.
Australia, whose next match isagainst Sri Lanka at the Oval onSaturday, now have an officialperiod of ‘family time’ today whenplayers can see their wives andfamilies.
“We’re fortunate enough tohave our families away with uswhich is great and obviously we’regoing to be here for a while in theUK,” said Warner, set for a long staygiven Australia remain in Englandfor an Ashes series after the WorldCup.
While Smith and CameronBancroft, who received a nine-month ban for applying sandpaperto the ball during a Test at CapeTown, gave interviews during theirsuspensions, Warner maintainedhis silence following an emotion-al press conference at SydneyAirport after he was sent homefrom the tour.
“I didn't need to say any-thing,” explained Warner, report-ed to be the instigator of the ball-tampering incident. What wassaid was said back in those Pressconferences. And now it’s about
looking forward.”Warner’s century was also his third fifty
in four innings this World Cup after scoresof 89 not out against Afghanistan and anuncharacteristically slow 56 off 84 balls ina defeat by India last time out.
“Personally, it’s a great thing,” saidWarner of his hundred. “It was a long timecoming. Against Afghanistan I felt like I hadno rhythm.
“And still last game they (India) bowledreally straight to me. But to come out here,play the way I know I can play was awe-some,” explained Warner, who faced just111 balls at Taunton.
Warner and Australia captain AaronFinch (82) shared an opening stand of 146— the highest partnership for any wicketof this World Cup so far.
But they had to see off a testing open-ing spell from Pakistan left-arm quickMohammad Amir, who finished withcareer-best figures of 5-30.
“He’s a world-class bowler,” said Warner.“When he's swinging it, it’s very difficult totry to get on top of him. I tried my best tosee him off but still try and rotate the strike.”
Pakistan fans in Taunton largely heed-ed a pre-match plea from captain SarfarazAhmed not to ‘boo’ Smith and Warner —indeed many of them cheered and clappedWarner after he was out.
This was in marked contrast to thecrowd taunts that had come Warner’s wayin previous World Cup games, with furtherjeers expected during the Ashes.
“The boos, we don’t really hear thatwhen we’re out there... It’s water off a duck’sback,” Warner insisted. “I’ve heard it mywhole career.
“Actually it eggs us on a lot and makesus knuckle down and try to score more runsif anything.”
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Emphasising on the impor-tance of dot balls in limit-
ed overs cricket, Australiapacer Pat Cummins is delight-ed that the hard work he hasput in to become accurate isstarting to pay off.
Cummins is increasinglylooking like the workhorse ofthis Australian team, plug-ging away with the wicketswhile others hog the head-lines. The 26-year-old lookedin great rhythm againstPakistan, taking 3 for 33 toderail their chase.
The right-arm pacer hasbowled the most number ofdot balls in the ongoingWorld Cup and the twobowlers that follow him arealso from Australia —Mitchell Starc and NathanCoulter-Nile.
“That’s the big improve-ment in my game in the lastcouple of years, the ability tohold a length and make it dif-ficult to get runs,” Cumminssaid after Australia’s 41-runagainst Pakistan onWednesday.
“If you give away easysingles then 300 becomesquite an achievable score.Cutting out the singles ishuge, it means if you give
away a boundary it might not be thatbig over of ten or 11, it may just bea five or a six,” Cummins added.
After they were set 308 for win,Pakistan scored steadily butAustralia held their nerve and tookwickets at regular intervals.
An eighth-wicket stand betweenSarfaraz and Wahab Riaz, whoscored 45 from just 39 balls, madeit nervy for the defending champi-ons until the last three wickets fellfor just two runs — securing a thirdvictory.
“It goes to show that everyonecan bat these days. It was a bit clos-er than we would have liked, so it wasgood to get those couple of wicketsand finish it off. We gave them a bittoo much width and suddenly theywere back in the game, it’s a good les-son to learn,” Cummins said.
Cummins and his strike partnerStarc have 18 wickets between themin the tournament while the rest ofthe team have a combined 12.
Meanwhile, Australian seamerKane Richardson is determined toseize every chance that comes his wayat the ICC Men’s World Cup.
Richardson was a late call upwhen namesake Jhye was ruled outwith a dislocated shoulder, capping adramatic change in fortunes for the28-year old South Australian.
On the eve of the tournament cap-tain Aaron Finch admitted he thoughtRichardson’s international career wasover after a run of disappointing per-
formances.But some attention-grabbing per-
formances in the Big Bash forMelbourne Renegades earned his slotfor the defending champions.
With the Taunton track favouringpace, he was picked ahead of JasonBehrendorff to replace spinner AdamZampa, as Australia claimed 41-runwin over Pakistan at Taunton.
And he took two wickets to stakehis claim for another shot whenAustralia take on Sri Lanka at the Ovalthis weekend.
“Anytime someone questions yourbottle its tough but I was pretty dis-appointed in my performances at thetime and knew something had tochange,” he said.
“I knew he (Aaron) thought thatbecause I remembered sitting downwith him and talking about it.
“I remember going on a tour toZimbabwe and not playing a game,you learn pretty quickly that you areoutside the pecking order.
“I’ve tried to stop caring aboutselection and just focussed on doingmy best and playing cricket.Throughout the summer I took somewickets and a few blokes fell down andI’m the next man in.
“There was no point crying aboutit. I just thought I’ll do everything Ican, if I do end up not playing againthen so be it.
“It’s good to know the guys thinkI’ve made progress and have confi-dence in me.”
England and West Indies will carrytheir intense rivalry from theCaribbean into the Rose Bowl
today with Barbados-born pace sensationJofra Archer adding spice to the WorldCup contest.
Both teams ended at 2-2 in theirhigh-scoring five-match ODI series inFebruary with one game being a washout.The series, which took place in theCaribbean islands, saw sensational per-formances from Chris Gayle, whosmashed as many 39 sixes and amassed424 runs in four innings.
The ‘Universe Boss’ will be backinghimself for an encore against Englandwhose bowling attack has become morepotent with Archer’s addition. He hasbowled with fire and venom so far in thecompetition and his face-off with Gayleis the one to watch out for.
Archer, who has played his juniorcricket in the Caribbean and qualified toplay for England only in April, is a famil-iar figure for the West Indies camp andit knows what the 24-year-old is capableof.
“To be honest, we knew Jofra for along time. He is from Barbados, wherewe are from. We knew him from theU15s, U17s, U19s so he is not new to us.Yes, he’s bowling quickly, but there’s noth-ing that we are not accustomed to. We arelooking forward to the challenge. So wewill see how it goes today,” said WestIndies coach Floyd Reifer ahead of thegame.
West Indies too boast of express pacein their arsenal, adding to the excitementof what promises to be a mouthwateringbattle. The Jason Holder-led side wouldbe itching to take the field after awashout against South Africa at the samevenue on Monday. All-rounder AndreRussell, who has had chronic knee issues,was not named in the playing 11 againstthe Proteas. It remains to be seen if heregains full fitness for the England clash.
England too had their fitness issueswith key player Jos Buttler hurting hisright hip against Bangladesh but coachTrevor Bayliss said he is expected to befit for Friday's game. The fickle Englishweather has been a constant concern inthis World Cup but rain is predicted tostay away for the majority of the game.
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England: Eoin Morgan (captain),Moeen Ali, Jofra Archer, Jonny Bairstow,Jos Buttler (wicket keeper), TomCurran, Liam Dawson, Liam Plunkett,Adil Rashid, Joe Root, Jason Roy, BenStokes,James Vince, Chris Woakes,Mark Wood. West Indies: Jason Holder (captain),Fabian Allen, Carlos Brathwaite, DarrenBravo, Sheldon Cottrell, ShannonGabriel, Chris Gayle,Shimron Hetmyer,Shai Hope, Evin Lewis, Ashley Nurse,Nicholas Pooran, Kemar Roach, AndreRussell, Oshane Thomas.
� Is Jos Buttler fully fit?Yes. Mark Wood is going to have a fit-
ness test. Nothing too serious. He pulledup a little bit sore — his ankle is a little bitsore — from the game in Cardiff so he isthe only concern at the moment.�Moeen Ali comes back in?
Yes, great news obviously. Mo’s wifegave birth to a baby girl, all healthy and wellso it’s great to see him back.�What is the decision you have got tomake in terms of the seamer?
Whether we feel we might go with four,like we did in Cardiff, or two spinnersmight be more effective. The decisionbehind what seamers is always a balanceto be good enough to win the gameagainst the West Indies.�Rains are a big impact on this tourna-ment. Is there any concern for you?
I don’t think the rain will be the rea-son we don’t make the semifinals. Yesterdaywas probably the last of the significant rainfor the next few days. I know the last threedays I think haven’t been great for sides try-ing to get games in. But at some stage dur-ing the tournament we will be hit by a smallbit of rain. It’s great that it’s not too muchand, hopefully, it doesn’t impact one teammore than twice.�What is your feeling on the fact thereare no reserve days? Is it fair?
Yes, I do think it is fair. The tournamentis quite a long tournament as it is. To havereserve days in the group stages is toomuch. I do think later in the tournamentthey are necessary, but for group stagegames it’s part and parcel of being anywherein the world t that it might rain at somestage.�How do you rate this West Indies side?
They are a strong outfit. We expect thesame today. They are explosive with the bat.And a different challenge with the ball. Alot of their seamers are quite tall and lookto hit the wicket and obviously the major-ity of the time they only play one spinner,so that is going to be the challenge here.� Is this the perfect opportunity forArcher to show them what they missed?
No, that sort of opportunity has beengone for some time now. Jofra’s been veryconsistent over a long period of time sincehe came to Sussex. It is great that he’s in anEngland shirt at the moment.�Has anything you have seen from theWI changed your view of how to playagainst them?
Yes, it’s still the same. Right from thefirst game that they have played in this tour-nament. Even when you go back to gamesthat we played in the winter, big games, thebig contributions all had to do with the fastbowlers.�Are you expecting a slightly differentkind of game than the ones we saw in theCaribbean?
I’d be surprised if the wicket is as good.The parameters of the ground here are alot bigger than the West Indies as well.Given the wicket has been under cover forthe last 24 hours, I don’t think it will be asgood.� Is it frustrating that WI is the only teamyou have failed to beat in recent series?
It is not frustration because we learnta huge amount about growing our game outin the West Indies. The fact that we are notgetting carried away about some of the suc-cess we have had. It’s important to have dayswhere you are beaten or can’t beat a sidebecause you then look even more into areasof improvement as opposed to beating sidesconvincingly, or even getting over the lineshowing good character and playing well. �Have you gone back over the way ChisGayle has had a great sucees?
We’ve looked at previous series wherewe have played at home and plans that haveworked and also when we’ve played on likerecently in the Caribbean on very flat wick-ets where he is hard to contain. We’ve alsoplanned for that as well.
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APakistan fanwas trolled on
social media afterthe team failed tobeat Australia, evenafter getting thechance to be on thedriver's seat, intheir World Cupclash onWednesday. Eventhe InternationalCricket Council(ICC), used theperson's dejectedlook, turning hisface away from theaction at the ground,as a GIF to depict the grim picture duringthe match. There were many other memeswhich flooded Twitter as fans brought tothe fore a familiar picture where Pakistancome so close to winning but, more oftenthan not, stumble at the final hurdle. PacerMohammed Amir returned with career-best figures of 5/30 to bowl out Australiafor 307 in 49 overs, with David Warner(107) starring with a hundred while skip-per Aaron Finch scored 82. Despite losingwickets at regular intervals, Pakistan werein the hunt till the end with captainSarfaraz Ahmed (40) and Wahab Riaz (45)sharing a 64-run eighth wicket partnership.But Mitchell Starc got Wahab out and it wasdownhill from there on as Pakistan lost by41 runs. %*��
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West Indies captain Jason Holder sayshis resurgent side are using their
brains as well as brawn ahead of a WorldCup clash with hosts England on Friday.
The West Indies have already shownwhat they are capable of, bowling Pakistanout for just 105 thanks to a barrage ofbouncers on the way to a seven-wicket winin their opening game.
The two-time World Cup championslost narrowly to Australia after beingwell-placed to beat the reigning title-holders, before rain wrecked their matchagainst South Africa, with the sides takinga point each.
But they will enter their match againstEngland in Southampton with confidenceas the only team at the World Cup not tohave lost their previous one-day interna-tional series to Eoin Morgan’s men, draw-ing 2-2 in the Caribbean earlier this year.
With pace in abundance from the likesof Oshane Thomas, Andre Russell, SheldonCottrell, as well as Holder himself, the WestIndies have an attack to worry everyteam.
But Holder believes it is their ability tooutfox batsmen in the middle overs that hassparked an upturn in form since the 2015
World Cup — a four-year period in whichthey did not win an ODI series.
“We have always got wickets with thenew ball,” he said in his pre-match Pressconference on Thursday. But previously wehaven't been able to get wickets in the mid-dle overs.
“And it’s been the talking point over thelast couple of months in one-day cricketand now in this tournament we have beenable to get wickets in the middle overs,which has definitely broken the back ofmost teams.”
Following the South Africa no result,the England game has taken on evengreater importance for the West Indies.
But Holder is not worried yet and, withall-rounder Russell likely to be fit follow-ing a knee injury, he expects his side tothrow all they have at the hosts.
“I think the brand of cricket we havebeen playing so far in this World Cup, youknow what to expect of West Indies now,”he said.
“For us, we are not going to back downfrom the challenge. Most of our guys arealways up for the challenge and it is just amatter for us to be smart.
“And I don’t think there is anything elseto be said, just be smart and play the brandof cricket we want to play,” he added.
When Pakistan playIndia it’s always ahuge game, but
their meeting on Sunday isshaping up to be more cru-cial than ever.
It’s simple — if Pakistanwant to stay in the tourna-ment, they have to bring an‘A plus’ performance andwin that game.
The match has alwaysmeant so much to bothcountries. There will be bil-lions watching the game.
Pakistan’s track record isvery mixed, but that’s allgone. That’s all history. It’s anew game, a new day.
Pakistan have got totake positives out of whatthey did to India in the finalof the ICC ChampionsTrophy a couple of yearsago. They must think posi-tively going into this game.
I hope they have gottheir best game in the lock-er for India, who showedagainst Australia that theyare a very fine side.
What I have seen inthis World Cup so far is thatif you don’t pick up earlywickets, you’re in trouble.The new ball is so crucialand openers are being morecareful in the first ten oversthis year.
They’re not really goingfull throttle, they are beinga bit more watchful. Onceyou don’t lose any wicketsearly on, it becomes easierbecause the ball doesn’tswing and batting becomeseasier.
It was with the new ball,in both batting and bowling,that I felt Pakistan missed atrick in their entertainingdefeat to Australia atTaunton.
Early on, we were notreally sharp enough and
Sarfaraz Ahmed was noton his toes. MohammadAmir didn’t get any supportfrom the other end.
No-one really saw thecomeback coming and forthat, you have to take yourhat off to Amir. Full marksto him for the way hebowled.
Even with the new ball,I thought he bowled quitenicely. He could havepicked up more than fivewickets in the end. He wasunfortunate with a coupleof nicks early on.
Pakistan pulled it backvery nicely. They weresharp after 25 overs andstarted picking up wickets.They found the r ightlengths.
Amir bowled superbly.He showed us all his cut-ters, variations and shortpitched deliveries.
I think we all knowAmir is mentally very, verystrong. He showed onceagain that class is perma-nent — he is no doubt amatch-winner.
Dealing with short
bowling again proved anissue for the batsmen. It’sbeen a real problem forthem on this tour.
I felt they managed itwell against England butnot against West Indies,only to get exposed againby Australia. They haven’tquite figured it out yet.
The batsmen are suchgood players, they justneed to avoid playing intothe hands of the oppositionwith some of the shotsthey play.
It may be that MickeyArthur looks at changingthe team for Sunday. Ispoke to Mickey inTaunton and he is thinkingin terms of horses forcourses, and I agree withhim to an extent.
The pitch there wasgood for pacers and herightly went with four ofthem. The issue was notthe nature of the plan, butthe execution.
Shadab is the key manin this side and I think theywill look to bring him backin against India. Theymight go for five bowlers,use four pacers and Shadaband drop someone likeShoaib Malik.
It depends a lot onwhat conditions are like inManchester, up to a fewhours before the game.
Going from a defeat toplaying the old rivalryagainst India isn’t going tobe easy. India probablywatched the Australia gamevery closely and know whatneeds to be done.
Pakistan need to liftthemselves up and I hopethey bring their best onSunday.
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Pakistan skipper Sarfaraz Ahmed haswarned his teammates to raise their field-ing standards ahead of the crucial gameagainst India following the side's sloppy dis-play on the field against Australia.
"We made too many mistakes in alldepartments. I'm very disappointed withour fielding, it is not up to the mark or stan-dard expected. We will have to work hardto improve on this before we play India,there can be no excuse," Sarfaraz said afterthe loss on Wednesday.
Pakistan had upset tournamentfavourites England last week largely becauseEoin Morgan's side produced a poor displayin the field. But roles were reversed againstAustralia, as dropped catches, mis-fields andoverthrows made a big difference inPakistan's loss.
Asif Ali dropped opener Aaron Finchon 33 and then saw him go on to add anoth-er 49 runs to his score, in an ultimately deci-sive first wicket partnership with Warner.Asif 's day didn't get any better when he alsodropped Warner later on.
But there are some positives for PakistanSarfaraz to take into this weekend's clashwith India. Mohammad Amir produced abrilliant display of swing and seam bowl-ing to bank career best figures of 5/30 asAustralia lost their last seven wickets for just86 runs.
Sarfaraz was lavish in his praise of Amir,who was originally left out of the World Cupteam but now the leading wicket taker at thetournament after his first-ever five wickethaul.
"If you take a positive from this matchit is how Mohammad is bowling for us, thatis a big thing to take into our next match-es."
"He's a world-class bowler. When he'sswinging it, it's very difficult to try to geton top of him. Then when it's seaming andswinging, it's even harder," Sarfaraz said.
Sarfaraz and Wahab Riaz put on arecord eighth wicket stand for Pakistan atthe World Cup.
"I'm very disappointed. We lost threewickets in 15 balls and that's why we lost.We conceded too many runs in the first 20overs, we came back and restricted themwell but it was a 270-280 pitch.
