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India and the USA are expect-ed to significantly ramp up

bilateral relations, especiallyin the defence and strategic ties,during US President DonaldTrump’s two-day India visitstarting Monday.

Just before he emplaned forIndia on Sunday, Trump calledPrime Minister Narendra Modihis “friend” and said he hadcommitted to this visit longtime back and he was lookingforward to be with the peopleof India.

Trump is accompanied byFirst Lady Melania, daughterIvanka, son-in-law JaredKushner and the top brass ofhis Administration.

Trump will arrive atAhemdabad around 11.30 am,attend a roadshow, briefly visitSabarmati Ashram, and alsowatch cultural performances.Prime Minister Modi is expect-ed to receive him at the airport.

Modi will accompanyTrump to the Ashram, which isclosely associated withMahatma Gandhi and India’sfreedom struggle, in the midstof their joint roadshow fromthe international airport.

Earlier, confusion prevailedover Trump’s visit to theAshram. Gujarat ChiefMinister Vijay Rupani onFriday said the White House will take a call on suchvisit.

“Trump will arrive at theAhmedabad International

Airport at around 11:30 amtomorrow (February 24). Itwas already announced thatTrump will land here directlyhere from Washington. At theairport, he will be given theguard of honour,” Ahmedabadcity Police CommissionerAshish Bhatia said whileaddressing reporters. He saidTrump would embark on aroadshow after attending acultural programme.

“Trump will then proceedfor the Sabarmati Ashramwhich he would be visiting fora very short time. From the

Ashram, Trump will resumethe roadshow, and reach theMotera stadium via Indirabridge,” the PoliceCommissioner said.

Modi and Trump arescheduled to address the“Namaste Trump” event at theMotera cricket stadium.

Just before his departure,Trump said he had committedto visit India long time backand he is looking forward to bewith the people of India. “I lookforward to being with the peo-ple of India. We are going tohave many millions and mil-

lions of people. It’s a long trip.I get along very well withPrime Minister Modi. He is afriend of mine,” Trump toldreporters outside the WhiteHouse.

“I had committed to thistrip long time ago. I look for-ward to it. I hear it’s going to bea big event... The biggest eventthey ever had in India. That’swhat the Prime Minister toldme. It’s the biggest event theyever had. It’s going to be veryexciting. I am going to bethere for one night,” said the USPresident in response to a

question.The maiden visit to India

is expected to significantlyramp up bilateral defence andstrategic ties but unlikely toproduce tangible outcome inresolving thorny issues liketrade tariffs.

The nearly 36-hour-longvisit by Trump is also set to sendacross a clear message of grow-ing congruence of interests onmajor geopolitical develop-ments in the region and beyond,particularly when China hasbeen expanding its militarymight and economic clout.

Trump, who is seeking re-election in the US presidentialelections in November, willget a rousing welcome.

“Namaste Trump” will besimilar to the landmark“Howdy, Modi!” event hostedby the Indian-American com-munity in honour of Modiduring his visit to Houston inSeptember 2019.

From Ahmedabad, the USPresident will travel to Agra tohave a glimpse of the iconic TajMahal. The Trump family willspend about an hour at the TajMahal before sunset. Thenthey will leave for Delhi for themain leg of the visit.

On the morning ofFebruary 25, Trump and theFirst Lady would be accordeda ceremonial welcome at theforecourt of the RashtrapatiBhavan. From there, theywould go to Raj Ghat to payhomage at the “samadhi” ofMahatma Gandhi.

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Politicians may be infamousfor squatting on

Government accommodationsin Delhi, but it’s theGovernment employees —mostly retired — who beat thenetas hands down when itcomes to illegal occupation ofofficial quarters. As many as575 Government employees,from bureaucrats to beldars,continue to illegally occupyGovernment quarters.

The highest outstandingdues of �95 lakh for such ille-gal occupation of Governmentquarters is in the name of abureaucrat VP Rao.

Interestingly, even relativesof the babus have been foundto be squatting on such premis-es. There are over 100 houses,where families or relatives ofbabus continued to occupyGovernment quarters evenafter the death of the originalallottees. Some of these peoplehave been over-staying for overtwo decade. The oldest being a

1998 occupant.According to the Ministry

of Housing and Urban Affairs,a sum of �30-40 crore is due onthese illegal occupants as theyhave not paid rent so far. As faras 11 former MPs are con-cerned, many of them havevacated their bungalows exceptformer MP Udit Raj. There area number of babus who retiredin 2000 have not vacated theirquarters. Of the 565 quarters,244 are ‘type-II accommoda-tions, while the rest are typesVII, VI, V, IV and III categories.

As per the list, the familymembers of one Bale Ram, abeldar who died in 1998, havenot vacated the Governmentquarter. They have also notpaid any rent since 1998. Theallotment of Bale Ram’s quar-ter was cancelled after hisdeath in 1998.

SS Ramarao retired in2000, but he has not vacated histype IV quarter so far. He hasnot paid rent since 2000 and hisoutstanding due is �67 lakh.Commandant (retired) RK

Swamy was allotted Type IVquarter in Vikaspuri. He retiredin May, 2001 but not vacatedhis house so far. His outstand-ing rent is over �74.38 lakh.Safai Karamchari Vijay Kumarretired in June 2003 but he hasnot vacated his quarter tilldate.

RK Sharma died in 2003.But his family is still staying atthe Government quarter in RKPuram. They neither vacatedthe quarter nor paid any rentsince 2003. The total due rent isover �31 lakh. Pawan Kumar, asenior engineer, retired in 2003,

but he has not vacated his type4 house in Munirka. The totalamount of rent is due of �67.44lakh. PS Athmia retired in 2012b u tstill occupying his accommo-dation illegally without paying rent.

SP Singh still occupied TypeV house in Vinay Marg and hisrent amount rose to 34 lakh.

Navneet Kumar Saxena’scase is unique. He took volun-tary retirement in 2009 but notvacated his quarter. The rentamount of �57 lakh is pendingon him. Indra Mohan Rawat, a

havildar, retired in 2018, but notvacated his quarter in VasantVihar.

Darneshwar Rai, a retiredpump operator, has also notvacated his flat since Septemberlast year despite severalreminders. In another case, thekins of Assistant Field Officerlate RK Sharma have not vacat-ed accommodations at RKPuram since 2005.

A total of 454 houses of typeI, II and type III category, areoccupied by class III and IVgrade employees illegally with-out paying rent. As per the min-istry data, over two dozen casesare related to Kashmirimigrants.

The Delhi High Court haspulled up the Ministry for fail-ing to vacate about the illegallyoccupied Government accom-modations in the city. “Itappears that there is connivancefrom the officers of the Ministryof Housing and Urban Affairs.Connivance over such a longtime amounts to conspiracyunder the Indian Penal Code.

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Several people sustainedminor injuries following a

clash between pro and anti-Citizenship (Amendment) Actprotesters near northeastDelhi’s Jaffarabad area onSunday. The police lobbed teargas shells and resorted to mildlathi-charge to bring the situ-ation under control. Later inthe evening, the police took outa flag march to maintain lawand order in the area.

The clash took place atabout 4 pm when the twogroups started throwing stonesat each other. All this happenedin presence of heavy policedeployment in the area.Witnesses said 500-odd people,mostly women, had gathered toprotest against the new citi-zenship law. The protestershad also gathered in the area onSaturday night demanding thatthe new law be repealed.

As the anti-CAA groupwas shouting slogans againstthe new citizenship law, somepeople turned up shouting “JaiSri Ram” slogans. “Suddenly,some people came and startedthrowing stones on the peoplegathered in the area,” an eye-witness told this newspaper.Soon, both the groupsindulged in stone throwing,forcing the police to resort tolathi-charge. The police alsolobbed teargas shells to dispersethe crowd.

The trouble escalated fur-ther after BJP leader KapilMishra also decided to hold arally in favour of the new citi-zenship law. Mishra, whoarrived near the Jaffrabad

Metro Station at about 3 pm,demanded that the anti-CAAprotesters be removed fromthe road. An hour later, somepeople came from a nearbystreet and started peltingstones.

Tension prevailed in thearea as the protesters hadblocked the road near theJaffrabad metro station con-necting Seelampur withMaujpur and Yamuna Vihar.

This was the second daywhen the anti-CAA protestershad hit the streets, promptingDelhi Metro authorities to

close the entry and exit gates ofthe Jaffarabad station. Later inthe day, the Delhi Metro RailCorporation (DMRC) alsoclosed the entry and exit gatesto the Maujpur-Babarpur sta-tion.

A woman, who identifiedherself as Bushra, had saidthat till the time the CAA is notrevoked, the protesters wouldnot leave the site. Social activistFaheem Baig said there isresentment among people overthe way the Government ishandling the issue.

Continued on Page 4

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Huge billboards on streetsnear the city airport and

public squares in the vicinity ofthe Taj Mahal greeting the USPresident have come up aheadof his visit to Agra.

The billboards have addedto the air of excitement in Agrathat is eagerly expecting thearrival of Trump, who will bein the city for a couple of hours

on Monday evening. Trump’sconvoy route to the Taj Mahalis about 13 km and along theway thousands of artistes willwelcome him with special per-formances. On the famousMall Road, which falls on theroute, one hoarding reads ‘HisExcellency Donald J Trump,President of the United Statesof America, Heartiest Welcometo the Land of Krishna’.

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Former Chief InformationCommissioner Wajahat

Habibullah has told theSupreme Court that the protestat Shaheen Bagh here againstthe Citizenship AmendmentAct (CAA) is peaceful andinconvenience being caused tocommuters was due to barri-cades “unnecessarily” put bypolice on roads far away fromthe site.

The same stand has beentaken by social activist SyedBahadur Abbas Naqvi andBhim Army chief ChandraShekhar Azad in their jointaffidavit filed in the apex courtin the matter. Habibullah,Azad and Naqvi have jointlyfiled an intervention applica-tion in the apex court which isseized of the matter.

Habibullah had visited theprotest site at Shaheen Baghpursuant to the direction by aBench of Justices S K Kaul andK M Joseph. The Bench isscheduled to hear the matteron Monday.

The top court is hearingpleas seeking removal of pro-testors from Shaheen Baghand ensuring smooth trafficflow in the area.

The apex court had earli-er said though people have afundamental right to protest“peacefully and lawfully”, it wastroubled by the blocking of apublic road at Shaheen Bagh asit might lead to a “chaotic sit-uation”.

In his affidavit filed in thetop court, Habibullah has con-tended that “Shaheen Baghstands tall as a firm example ofpeaceful dignified dissent,more so in the face of variousinstances of state-sponsoredviolence on similar dissentsacross India.

“We have been sad andmute witnesses to police bru-tality and negative typecastingof a particular communityacross the country. Crushingdissent instead of enteringinto a dialogue is the newnorm, but it is alien to ourConstitution,” he has claimed.

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On the eve of US PresidentDonald Trump’s India

visit, Prime Minister NarendraModi said on Sunday thatIndia looks forward to wel-coming the US President, whois to commence his “historicprogramme” from Gujarat.

The US President will beon a two-day visit to India andtogether with Modi is to par-ticipate in a roadshow inAhmedabad after landing

there.“India looks forward to

welcoming @POTUS@realDonaldTrump. It is anhonour that he will be with ustomorrow, starting with thehistoric programme inAhmedabad,” Modi wrote onTwitter.

He was responding to atweet by Gujarat ChiefMinister Vijay Rupani thatsaid “entire Gujarat speaks inone voice- #NamasteTrump”.

Detailed report on P5

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Clashes broke out betweenanti-CAA protesters and

police in Uparkot Kotwali areaof Uttar Pradesh’s Aligarh herefollowing incidents of arsonand stone pelting on lateSunday afternoon.

Protesters set afire a por-tion of a shop in the area, van-dalised a police vehicle injur-ing some police officers.

Following the clashes,mobile internet has been sus-pended for a six-hour periodstarting 6 pm. A Rapid ActionForce (RAF) of UP Police hasbeen deployed.

Continued on Page 4

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Washington: US PresidentDonald Trump on Saturdaysaid he was looking forward tobeing with his “great friends” inIndia next week as he retweet-ed a short video in which hisface was superimposed on thehit movie-character Bahubali,showing the President as agreat saviour bringing peace tohis kingdom.

Trump appears as a greatsaviour, in the short animatedclip, riding on a chariot withFirst Lady Melania.

A few stills later, Trump isseen riding a horse carrying onhis soldiers his son DonaldJunior and daughter Ivanka.

Later, he is welcomed byPrime Minister Narendra Modiin a village setting.

Continued on Page 4

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The Budget session ofthe Chhattisgarh

Assembly which beginsfrom Monday, is all set tobe stormy as theOpposition BJP hasplanned to grill the rulingCongress on several issuesmainly on paddy procurementissue.

The session will commencewith the address of GovernorAnusuiya Uikey at 11.00 am.The House will pay tributes tothe departed leaders. The ses-sion is scheduled to concludeon April 1.

Chhattisgarh ChiefMinister Bhupesh Baghel whoalso holds finance portfolio,will present budget for the fis-cal year 2020-21 during the ses-sion. The budget size is esti-

mated to be more than 1 lakhcrore.

The Chief Minister willchair the cabinet meeting onFebruary 29 at scenic Satrengain Korba district. Satregna hasbeen developed as a pic-turesque site which is close toa catchment area of famousBango dam.

As per details, around atotal of 2347, starred andunstarred questions have beenregistered to be raised by themembers in the assembly dur-ing the entire Budget session.

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Urging for conservation andpreservation of biodiver-

sity, Prime Minister NarendraModi on Sunday said biodi-versity of India is unique trea-sure for the entire mankind.Addressing his monthly 'Mannki Baat' radio address, Modireferred to Tamil poetessAvvaiyar to drive home hispoint. “What we know is just ahandful of sand. What we donot know is like a universe initself,” he said quoting her.Similar is the case with the bio-diversity of this country, saidModi.

“The more you know, themore you realise the magnitudeof what you do not know. Ourbiodiversity too is a uniquetreasure for the entire humankind. We have to preserve it,conserve it and explore further,”he said. The Prime Ministersaid the traditions and thelegacy we have inherited teach-

es us compassion toward all liv-ing beings and boundless lovefor nature.

Modi pointed out thatmore than 500 bird speciesacross the world land in Indiaevery year.

He informed that recently,biologists discovered a newspecies of fish whose habitat iswithin the caves of Meghalaya.It is believed that this fish is thelargest among aquatic speciesfound under the surface ofcaves. "It a matter of joy that

India, and especiallyMeghalaya, is home to a rarespecies. It lends a new facet toIndia's biodiversity. We aresurrounded by many such mys-teries, which are still undis-covered. To discover such aphenomenal enigma calls forfierce detective passion," hesaid.

In his address, the PrimeMinister also referred to the'Hunar Haat' organised by theMinistry of Minority Affairs atthe Rajpath. Last week Modi

made a surprise visit to theHaat where he interacted

with people, had litti-chokha for lunch and enjoyeda hot kulhad of tea. He said theHaat is a fine example of India'sdiverse expanse, cultures, tra-ditions, cuisines and thewarmth of emotions.

"It is a venue where it isimpossible to overlook thecountry's diversity. Besideshandicrafts, it displays thediversity of India's varied cui-sine too. In a single row, one

could savour the sight of idli-dosa, chhole-bhature, daal-baati, khaman-khandvi ...," hesaid, urging people to visitsuch haats to be a part of thecountry's art-culture canvas."You will also contribute in theprogress and prosperity ofhardworking craft persons,especially women," he said.

PM also hailed the use ofa mixture of 10 per centindigenously produced bio-jetfuel to fly an Indian Air Forcetransport aircraft, saying suchefforts will not only help bringdown carbon emissions, butalso reduce the country'sdependence on importedcrude oil. "This was the firsttime that this mix was used inboth engines. Not just that,the airport from which thisplane took off from Leh is notonly one of the highest alti-tude airports in India butalso in the world," he said,referring the Indian AirForce's AN-32 aircraft took offfrom Leh's Kushok BakulaRimpoche airport using amixture of 10 per cent Indianbio-jet fuel.

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Rajya Sabha Chairman MVenkaiah Naidu has direct-

ed the Secretariat to preparereports on the participation ofall the members under variouswindows to inform them at theend of each session of theHouse.

In its study, the RajyaSabha secretariat has revealedthat different parties got theirdue share of opportunities ofparticipation under variouswindows during the first partof the Budget session that con-cluded on the 11th of thismonth. The study was done toknow if the parties were gettingequitable opportunities in theCouncil confirmed fair andproportional share for differentparties with the oppositiongetting slightly more in the total1,460 opportunities.

According to sources, thestudy reveals that BJP with 82members accounting for 34percent of the strength of 239of the House got 480 opportu-

nities amounting to 33 percentof the total. Congress with 46members constituting 19 per-cent of the strength got 345opportunities which comes to24 percent share of the total.

"The 10 recognised partiesin the House with five mem-bers and above each with atotal of 190 members account-ing for 80 percent of thestrength of the Council gotabout 81 percent of the totalopportunities.

Others including region-al parties and independentsamounting to 20 percent of themembership of the House got19 percent share of participa-tion indicating broad corre-spondence between thestrength and share of oppor-tunities," it said.

The eight non-NDA par-ties, featuring among the 10recognised parties together gota higher share of opportunitiesin proportion to their strength.Besides BJP that got 1 percentlesser share, JDU could avail0.55 percent of total chances of

participation as against it'sstrength of 2.51 percent in theHouse, primarily due to noneof it's members getting anyUnstarred Questions listed dur-ing the session.

Among the opposition andnon-NDA parties, Congress,TMC, AIADMK got propor-tionally higher opportunitieswhile BJD, DMK, TRS andCPM got their due share. OnlySP got a lesser share.

During the session, 107members participated in theQuestion Hour, 100 took partin the two debates on theMotion of Thanks to thePresident and the GeneralBudget, 76 Zero Hour and 33Special Mentions were made,24 participated in the lone dis-cussion on a Private Member'sBill besides 1,120 UnstarredQuestions of 118 membersreplied in writing. This makesthe zone of opportunities ofparticipation as 1,460. Equity ofparticipation was analysedagainst this window of totalopportunities of participation.

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Pakistan is mobilising itsassets including terror affil-

iate Lashkar-e-Tayyeba (LeT)jehadis to Afghan-Pak borderin order to destabiliseAfghanistan following pro-posed withdrawal of US troops.Pakistan army is training theLashkar ultras to damage infra-structure built by India inAfghanistan besides hittingsecurity forces there and aid theTaliban regain more areasunder its control in a post-withdrawal scenario.

Amid talks of withdrawalof US forces, the PakistanArmy-ISI complex has startedharbouring sinister designs totopple the Afghan Governmentand replace it with Taliban forits long-term agenda in theregion, sources here said.

Apprehending enhancedatrocities on the people in theBalochistan region, Balochgroups have stepped up vio-lence against the Pakistan armyand Lashkar men in the area.In the wee hours on

Wednesday, the Baloch groupskilled 16 Pakistan armymenand abducted about 50 soldiers.This was the third such attackby Balochs against Pak Armythis month.

The spurt in ambushes bythe Baloch groups against Pakarmy has come in the backdropof apprehensions that moreand camps of LeT will be set upand lead to enhancement ofatrocities against the commu-nity.

Pakistan Army had beenconducting search and cor-don operations against the

Baloch freedom fighters inconcert with the Lashkarjehadis, Both Pakistan armyand the Lashkar are known toloot ration from the Balochpeople due to lack of authen-ticated logistics managementfor the armed forces.

The Pakistan Army-ISIcombine has begun trainingsessions for the Lashkar men inSibbi and Bolan in Balochistan.The LeT operatives are beingtrained in sabotage andambush. The trained Lashkarmen will seek to hit infra-structure projects backed and

funded by India. An estimated 500-1000

LeT men are being trained bythe Pakistan Army-ISI combinein view of the latter's changedpriorities and preferences fromthe tactical perspective in viewof the proposed withdrawal ofthe US forces fromAfghanistan.

LeT men being trained byPak army to aid Taliban in gain-ing more control on the groundpost-withdrawal of US troops.In a duplicitous move to hood-wink the international com-munity ahead of the FATF ple-nary in Paris, the Pakistaniagencies have lodged LeT chiefHafiz Sayeed in Lahore's KotLakhpat jail where a number ofHaqqani Network for elaborateplanning to carry out hits inAfghanistan.

Former Chief of InterServices Public Relations(ISPR) Asif Ghafoor has beenmade the chief of a Pak armydivision to provide security tothe US forces when the withdrawal from Afghanistanis worked out, sourcessaid. Pakistan army has been

known to enact abduction ofits personnel by its terror

affiliates and seek ransomfrom the US for their so calledrelease from captivity, theyadded.

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The Embassy of China inIndia on Sunday urged that

New Delhi to review the epi-demic situation in China in thewake of coronavirus outbreakand resume normal personnelexchanges and trade betweenboth the nations.

The remarks by ChineseEmbassy Spokesperson Ji Rongcame following claims byChinese charity organisationsand certain medical institutesthat New Delhi has restrictedexport of medical products toChina following the coron-avirus epidemic in that coun-try.

Ji added that the WorldHealth Organisation hasrepeatedly opposed any traveland trade restrictions on Chinafollowing the coronavirus out-break and that all partiesshould follow the recommen-dations by the global body.

It added that recommen-

dations of WHO should be fol-lowed by all parties. "It's hopedthat Indian side could reviewthe epidemic situation in anobjective, rational & calm man-ner, handle with China's much-needed items in a cooperativeand constructive way andresume normal personnelexchanges and trade betweenus as soon as possible", theChinese embassy added.

Moreover, according to lat-est updates by Chinese healthofficials, the death toll in Chinadue to coronavirus outbreakhas reached 2,442 and 76,936confirmed cases of novel coro-navirus infection have beenreported in 31 provincial-levelregions.

Among the 40,127 hospi-talised patients, 8,583 werestill in severe condition andanother 1,845 in critical con-dition.

There was no immediatereaction from the government.Last week, Chinese

Ambassador Sun Weidongurged India to review restric-tions on trade and movementof people. Almost all Indianairlines have stopped flights toChina while the governmenthas cancelled all e-visas as wellas normal visas issued toChinese citizens.

On Saturday, governmentsources said that China was"deliberately delaying" permis-sion for an Indian Air Forceplane to coronavirus-hitWuhan to supply relief mate-rials and bring back moreIndians from the city. Theysaid though flights from Japan,Ukraine and France wereallowed to operate fromWuhan, India's request wasnot heeded to so far.

India has already evacuat-ed around 640 Indians fromWuhan, the epicentre of thecoronavirus outbreak, in twoseparate flights. According toestimates, over 100 Indians arestill stuck in Wuhan.

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National HighwaysAuthority of India (NHAI)

on Sunday said it has collect-ed �20 crore from 18 lakhdefaulters who entered theFASTag lanes at electronic tollplazas on National Highwayswithout the tag.

Rolling out the electronictoll collection programmeacross India in December, theMinistry of Road Transportand Highways had said thatdouble toll charge would becollected from the vehiclesentering FASTag lanes withoutthe tag.

In order to give primeimportance to existing FASTagusers, dissuade defaulters andfurther encourage adoption of

FASTags by national highwayscommuters, vehicles withoutFASTags entering the FASTaglane are being charged doublethe toll fee, NHAI said in astatement.

"Till now, a total number of18 lakh vehicles defaulted byencroaching FASTag lanesacross India has resulted in adouble charge cash toll accu-mulation of about �20 crore,"

it said. RFID based FASTag, anelectronic toll collection systemimplemented by the NHAI,has proved to be instrumentalin easing the lives of com-muters on national highwayswithin two months of itsnationwide implementation, itsaid. Over 1.55 crore FASTagshave been issued through mul-tiple Point of Sale (PoS) loca-tions.

NHAI has been observingincreased sale rate of FASTagswhich is a clear indication ofthis digital system being accept-ed well, the statement said. Asa result, FASTag transaction hascrossed a landmark count of 4million per day, it added.

The statement said FASTagresulted in smooth and hassle-free movement of FASTag users

on highways. The implemen-tation of FASTags across thecountry has met with thedesired response so far, it saidadding the adoption ofFASTags also means that it hasbrought in the much-neededtransparency in collection attoll booths.

In order to furtherincrease digital collection ofuser fee via FASTag at nation-al highways fee plazas, NHAIhas recently waived off theFASTag cost of Rs 100 forNHAI FASTag from February15, 2020 to February 29, 2020.

Any road users can visitany authorised physical point-of-sale locations with a validRegistration Certificate (RC) ofthe vehicle and get a NHAIFASTag free of cost.

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President Ram Nath Kovindsaid that the role of the judi-

ciary is bound to be pivotalamid dramatic transformationsin the coming days.

In his address at theInternational JudicialConference being organisedby the Supreme Court onSunday, Kovind said that issueslike gender justice, contempo-rary perspectives on protectionof constitutional values,dynamic interpretations of theConstitution in a changingworld, harmonisation of envi-ronment protection vis-a-vissustainable development andprotection of the right to pri-vacy in the Internet age areissues that influence everymember of the global commu-nity.

These five distinctlydefined topics cover the matrixof challenges faced by the judi-

ciary across the world, he said.The President praised the

Supreme Court for carrying out"radical reforms" which, hesaid, made justice more acces-sible to common people. Hecited landmark judgementspassed by the apex court whichhave strengthened the legaland constitutional frameworkof India.

"Its bench and bar areknown for their legal scholar-ship and intellectual wisdom.What it has achieved is noth-ing less than a silent revolutionin diagnosing and correctingthe afflictions that adverselyaffected the justice deliverysystem," he said, as per a pressnote.The President particular-ly mentioned the role ofSupreme Court in making thehigher courts' judgments avail-able in regional languages,terming it "an extraordinaryachievement given the linguis-tic diversity of India".

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Pakistan Government isset observe February 27 as

National Surprise Day tocommemorate the captureof Indian Air Force WingCommander AbhinandanVarthaman who downed aUS-made F 16 fighter jetwith a Russian make MiG 21aircraft last year following theIndian air strike at a Jaish-e-Mohammad suicide bombertraining facility in Balakot.

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On the eve of US PresidentDonald Trump's India

visit, Prime Minister NarendraModi said on Sunday thatIndia looks forward to wel-coming the US President, whois to commence his "historicprogramme" from Gujarat.

The US president will beon a two-day visit to India andtogether with Modi is to par-ticipate in a roadshow inAhmedabad after landingthere.

"India looks forward towelcoming @POTUS@realDonaldTrump. It is anhonour that he will be with ustomorrow, starting with the his-toric programme inAhmedabad," Modi wrote onTwitter.

He was responding to a

tweet by Gujarat Chief MinisterVijay Rupani that said "entireGujarat speaks in one voice-#NamasteTrump".

On Monday, PresidentTrump and Prime MinisterModi will take part in a 22-kmroadshow from theAhmedabad international air-port. Then they will proceedfor the 'Namaste Trump' eventat the newly built Sardar PatelStadium in the city's Moteraarea, where over one lakh peo-ple are expected to be present.

The US President will visitSabarmati Ashram inAhmedabad on Monday beforeheading towards a cricket sta-dium where he will addressover 1,00,000 people.

Sabarmati Ashram was akey base of Mahatma Gandhiduring the freedom struggle.He lived there between 1917and 1930. The US presidentwill later fly down to Agra tovisit Taj Mahal and thereafterfly to Delhi for the officialengagements where "majortrade deals" are expected to besigned by the two sides.

On the morning ofFebruary 25, the US president

and first lady Melania Trumpwill be accorded a ceremonialwelcome at the forecourt of the'Rashtrapati Bhavan'. Fromthere, they will go to Raj Ghatto pay homage at the 'samad-hi' of Mahatma Gandhi. It willbe followed by restricted anddelegation-level talks betweenTrump and Modi at HyderabadHouse. 'Namaste Trump' willbe similar to the landmark'Howdy, Modi!' event hosted bythe Indian-American commu-nity in honour of PrimeMinister Modi during his visitto Houston in September 2019,said an official. Trump, accom-panied by wife Melania, daugh-ter Ivanka and son-in-law JaredKushner, will arrive inAhmedabad around noon onMonday for a little less than 36-

hour-long trip to India.Other members of the US

president's delegation includeTreasury Secretary StevenMnuchin, Commerce SecretaryWilbur Ross, National SecurityAdviser Robert O'Brien andEnergy Secretary DanBroulliette.

From Ahmedabad, the USPresident is to fly to Agrawhere huge billboards onstreets near the city airport andpublic squares in the vicinity ofthe Taj Mahal greeting himhave come up ahead of his visit.

Trump's convoy route fromthe airport to the Taj Mahal isabout 13 km and along the waythousands of artistes will wel-come him with special perfor-mances.

On the famous Mall Road,which falls on the route, onehoarding reads 'His ExcellencyDonald J Trump, President ofthe United States of America,Heartiest Welcome to the Landof Krishna'. It is accompaniedwith an image of Trump stand-ing next to Prime MinisterNarendra Modi. Trump is toreach Agra in the Mondayevening.

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Ahead of the US President'stwo-day visit to India, for-

mer Union Minister andCongress leader AnandSharma on Sunday maintainedthat the high-profile interac-tion is unlikely to achieve anymajor breakthrough in thebilateral agreements.

Sharma, however, went onto say that the visit was impor-tant in relation to the fact thatthe US was a major power, butthat is all, Sharma said.

"So far I do not have anypositive indication of anymajor outcome. It will be acontinuation of defence andsecurity cooperation, and areaffirmation of our coopera-tion in space and nuclear sci-ences. It is ongoing and it willnot be a new thing," Sharmatold news agency PTI.

SM Krishna, who was

external affairs minister duringthe UPA and is now in the BJP,felt though Trump's visitcomes in the US presidentialelection year and a sizeableIndian expatriate populationwill vote, but "it should not belooked at from the narrowprism of US President's elec-tion".

"It needs to be looked at alarger perspective as to what ishappening in the region," hetold the news agency.

Krishna said China will beclosely monitoring the visit andthe nature of talks that takeplace."It is a very importantvisit. The US and India have avery close and fruitful rela-tionship especially after theNuclear Accord. We havemoved strategically close toeach other and it is importantfor us to nourish and maintainthe relationship further," hesaid.

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RAIPUR | MONDAY | FEBRUARY 24, 2020chhattisgarh 03

Hailstorm hit Surguja region on Sunday causing considerable damage to standing crops. Metrological department haspredicted rains for the entire state over the next 24-48 hours. Pioneer Photo

STAFF REPORTER nRAIPUR

Chief Minister BhupeshBaghel on Sunday said

that keeping in view surplusrice production which hascreated an imbalancebetween demand and supplyequation, setting up a bio-ethanol plant is the need ofthe hour in Chhattisgarh.

Baghel was addressingan inaugural function of athree-day long NationalAgriculture Fair at Tulsi-Baradera village in Raipurdistrict.

Citing that there wassurplus production of food-grains in the country, he said“there is enough food-grainstored in the country whichcould feed countrymen forthree years. This has resultedin increased supply against

the demand and the farmersare compelled to sell theirpaddy produce at throw-away price in the open

market’’.``Although, the agricul-

ture now has been turningout to be a profitable busi-

ness in Chhattisgarh as thestate government is provid-ing farmers very handsomeprice of Rs 2500 per quintal

for their paddy, somethinghad to be done for utiliza-tion of the surplus stock,’’Baghel remarked before a

huge gathering of farmers.He further said, ``initi-

ating production of bio-ethanol from rice could be aprofitable alternative as thegovernment of India isimporting the fossil fuel athigher price from foreigncountry’’.

``The bio-ethanol pro-duction will not only saveforeign money but will alsorevive the agrarian sector inthe country’’, he opined.

BJP legislator and for-mer minister BrijmohanAgrawal who was also pres-ent in the function as a spe-cial guest demanded fromthe chief minister Baghel toextend the paddy procure-ment for next 15 days inorder to allow the farmerswho were left out from sell-ing their crop in the allottedtime period.

Bio-ethanol productionneed of the hour: Baghel

STAFF REPORTER nRAIPUR

Chief General ManagerN T P C - S i p a t

Padmakumar Rajasekharanhighlighted how the 2980mega watt plant of the powergiant is fulfilling the energyneed of country as well asenriching the society with itsCSR activities and environ-ment protection steps.

Addressing a press confer-ence on Saturday Rajasekharansaid country’s first advancedultra super critical technology800 mega watt power plant isgoing to be installed at SipatSuper Thermal Power Station ofpublic power utility NTPCLimited.

All the approvalsrequired for setting up thisplant is underway, publichearing of this work is

expected soon and expendi-ture proposal is about to beapproved, he added.

“After completion of allthe formalities we can expectfor commencement of con-struction work. The newplant will come inside theexisting plant, no extra landwill be required for this newplant. Theefficiency of thisplant will be 5 percent morein comparison to the supercritical technology,” addedRajasekharan.

In this financial year till21st February 2020 SipatSuper Thermal PowerStation has generated19717.51 million units ofpower with 84.83 percentplant load factor. RecentlyNTPC Sipat has been con-ferred with NTPC’s champi-on of Business Excellenceaward, Swarn Shakti Award,

Greentech Safety andEnvironment award etc.

Replying to queries, theCGM informed that till dateNTPC has recruited 427land oustees. Due to lack ofsufficient number of

Schedule caste (ST) candi-date there is a backlog of 154ST posts, he said, adding,“We are expecting that verysoon we can complete therecruitment process.”

On Corporate Social

Responsibility andCommunity Developmentactivities, he said GirlEmpowerment Mission wasorganised for 120 girls ofGovt School in the age groupof 10-12 years.

“Nineteen health campsorganised for the villagers.RO water plants have beeninstalled in four villages,Integrated Live StockDevelopment Centre andFodder Multiplication cen-tre is working for the farm-ers. ITI centre has been con-

structed by NTPC at villageBaloda in Mahuda Block ofJanjgir-Champa district,” hetold the press conference.

Environment conserva-tion has been the primefocus of Sipat plant, theCGM stated. In this contexthe pointed out that inHariyar-Chhattisgarh pro-gramme NTPC has con-tributed more than 12 crorefor plantation of 7,15,847saplings. Till date NTPCSipat has planted 10,94, 333saplings, he said.

STAFF REPORTER n RAIPUR

Bharat State-IV vehicleswill not be registered after

April 1, 2020, officialsinformed here on Saturday.

As per official informa-tion, TransportCommissioner DrKamalpreet Singh has direct-ed regional, additional anddistrict transport officers togive written instructions tovehicle dealers in their regionfor submitting all registrationapproval cases of BS-IV vehi-cles by February 29. So that itsregistration could be complet-ed within time and the buyermay get all legal documents inprescribed time frame.

The commissioner fur-ther stated that it has beennoted that many a time cus-tomer wait till last momenthoping for discounts, so if thedealer wishes to provide dis-count over the vehicles then

they must declared it at theearliest and should not waitfor expiring of the deadline.

The commissioner askedall registration officers toinform dealers about it andavail information about theavailable stock of BS-IV vehi-cles by February 25.

Meanwhile, officialsinformed that after April 1,2020, BS-IV vehicles will notbe registered. So, this maycause rush for the registrationof BS-IV vehicles which coulddelay the registration process.

NTPC-Sipat enriching society, protecting environment: CGMq 427 landoustee got direct recruitmentq Generated 19717.51 MW with 84.83% PLFq GEM programme is for development of Girl childq 800 MW AUSC plant to come soonq Till date 1094333 saplings planted

No registrationof BS-IV vehicleafter April 1

It has been noted thatmany a time customer waittill last moment hoping fordiscounts, so if the dealerwishes to provide discountover the vehicles then theymust declared it at theearliest and should notwait for expiring of thedeadline.


Women cell of the PradeshCongress Committee (PCC)

on Sunday staged a daylong sit-inagainst steep hike in price of LPGcylinder by the BJP-led centralgovernment.

The demonstration staged atGandhi Maidan was led by statepresident of the cell, PhulodeviNetam. Food Minister AmarjeetBhagat, PHE Minister Guru RudraKumar and School EducationMinister Premsai Singh were pres-ent on this occasion.

Citing that the hike of Rs 150in the price of LPG cylinder was aburden to the housewives and haddisrupted the budget of common

people, the Congress cadres alsoraised slogans against NarendraModi government and demanded

to roll back the hike.Phulodevi Netam while

addressing the protesters said that

she would step up protest in com-ing up weeks if hike was not rolledback.


Chhattisgarh Chief MinisterBhupesh will be the chief

guest at a mass marriage cere-

mony to be held on February 25from 12.30 pm at ScienceCollege ground, in Raipurunder Mukhyamantri KanyaVivah Yojna (MKVY).

Chhattisgarh AssemblySpeaker Dr Charandas Mahant,Women and ChildDevelopment minister AnilaBhedia and others will also bepresent on the occasion.

A total of 550 couples havebeen registered for the event,four couple are each fromChristian and MuslimCommunity. The event will con-

tinue till 4.00 pm. Hindu com-munity couples ceremony willbe conducted by Gayatri Parivarwhile Christian and Muslimcouple ceremony will be basedon their respective religiousmarriage rituals.

Under the scheme, stategovernment has hiked the percouple amount to Rs 25,000.They would be given materialsworth Rs 20,000 and Rs 5,000for marriage function.

The Health department willconduct free anemia check of allbrides during the function.

Raipur to host massmarriage ceremonyA total of 550 coupleshave been registeredfor the event, fourcouple are each fromChristian and MuslimCommunity

Cong stages sit-in against LPG price hike


Health and FamilyWelfare, Medical

Education Minister T. S.Singhdeo launched the state-level Deworming drive onSunday. He administeredanthelmintic (Deworming)medicine to school-goingchildren at the GovernmentGirls School premises,Ambikapur.

Health and family wel-fare, women and child devel-opment, social welfare, highereducation, and school educa-tion departments are jointlyorganizing the drive fromFebruary 24 as 10th phase ofNational Deworming Day.

The drive will cover state’sall the 28 districts and thebasic purpose of the drive isto administer albendazoletablet to 1.13 crore children,

adolescent boys and girlsaged from 1-19 years. Thegovernment has planned toreach out in 56384 schoolsand 52474 anganbadi centresunder the drive.

The infant would beadministered the medicine on

February 28.Addressing the gathering,

Singhdeo said, ``healthy chil-dren have stronger minds andhigher capabilities.

So for healthier future,one has to remain healthy.It is state government’s

duty to ensure children areprotected from diseases forwhich deworming is a partof it’’.

He added that privateschools and drop out childrenwould also be covered underthe drive.

Singhdeo launches statewidedeworming drive in Ambikapur


Presiding over the RedCross district secretaries

meeting, Indian Red CrossSociety chairman SonmoniBorah directed them to hikethe present blood collectioncapacity of 12,000 units to25,000 units in the state.

The NCC, NSS and stu-dents should be motivated todonate blood and also spreadthe message among massesfor blood donation, Borahsaid.

Borah also directed theofficials to ensure medicinesare sold at minimum price onno-profit-loss basis keeping inmind the need of the poorpatients. The chairman said ineach district two and in eachblock one Red Cross Society

medical shops should bestarted. At present there are33 shops which should beincreased to 100, he said.

He also laid emphasis onfirst-aid training to each per-son. He said district collector,different district level officers,NCC and NSS like othersocial organisations andyouth can be trained in pro-viding first aid so that in caseof any emergency, trained vol-unteers are available for RedCross. He directed officials toprepare a training model andimplement it.

He said on May 8, the RedCross will complete 100 years,on which at district and statelevel programmes would beorganised by holding compe-titions in 10 categories.

Set blood collection targetto 25,000 units: Borah

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Mumbai: Police have arresteda man for Allegedly raping a25-year-old mentally-chal-lenged woman in Govandihere, an official said on Sunday.

The incident occurred onThursday and the 22-year-oldaccused was arrested lateSaturday night by the ShivajiNagar Police.

According to police, theaccused knew the woman asshe is the younger sister of hisfriend. The victim lives withher mother, who is a cancerpatient, her younger brother

and grandmother, police said.“On the day of the incident

on February 20, the victims'mother and grandmother hadgone to a hospital for treat-ment. On spotting the victimalone, the accused entered thehouse and raped her,” the offi-cial said. “Some time later, theaccused hurried out of thebuilding and was spotted by thevictim's two neighbours. Whenher mother and grandmotherreturned home some time later,they tried to ask the victimwhat was wrong with her as she

was crying. Her neighbourstold them that they had seenthe accused in the house intheir absence,” he added.

Her grandmother laterlodged a complaint against theaccused, following which hewas arrested. He has beenbooked under IPC sections376 (rape), 452 (house-trespassafter preparation for hurt,assault or wrongful restraint).

The accused was producedbefore a local court on Sunday,which remanded him to policecustody till February 29. PTI

Indore: While the Congresshas called the CitizenshipAmendment Act divisive, itsMLA from Madhya Pradeshhas asked the party to acceptthe legislation since it did nothave a majority in Parliamentto bring about changes.

Laxman Singh, youngerbrother of senior Congressmanand former MP Chief MinisterDigvijaya Singh, said there hasbeen enough “discussions andagitations” on the CAA.

Laxman Singh is theCongress MLA from Chachodaseat in Guna district of MadhyaPradesh.

“There has been enoughdiscussions, agitations andprotests in the country regard-ing the CAA, which has nowbecome a law. It needs a major-ity in Parliament to make anychange in the law. But (theopposition) doesn't have amajority. In my view, it will befair to accept this law.”

He said Parliament did notbelong to any one party, addingthat the Congress too changedlaws “when we had aGovernment at the Centre”.

“How would we(Congress) have felt if anystate government had opposed

it (legislations),” he asked.Queried on CAA in

Congress-ruled MP, Singh saidthe law will have to be imple-mented in every state since thecountry worked under a par-liamentary system.

Singh also demanded achange in the venue of IIFAawards ceremony to be held inlate March in Daly Collegehere.

“Organising the IIFAawards ceremony in MadhyaPradesh is a good because itwill give recognition to the stateand increase employmentopportunities. But, it is notappropriate to hold this func-tion in Daly College duringexaminations as it will affectstudents.”

Singh is also the chairmanof the select committee set upto discuss the “Madhya PradeshGowansh Vadh Pratishedh(Sanshodhan) Adhiniyam2019”, a law to ban cow slaugh-ter, presented in the LegislativeAssembly.

“People in many countrieshave reduced or stopped eatingbeef for environmental reasons.When people can do this inter-nationally, then we can alsochange here,” he said. PTI

Lucknow: Buoyed by its deci-sive victory in Delhi, the AamAadmi Party has decided toturn its focus on Uttar Pradeshas it outlined its plans onSunday to recruit 25-lakhmembers in the politically-crucial State and contest thepanchayat polls later this year.

AAP spokesperson SanjaySingh said party workers wouldvisit 1.07-lakh villages in thestate during the next threemonths, and gather publicopinion and information onissues that affect people.

“The entire feedback willbe submitted to Kejriwal afterthree months,” Singh toldreporters.

The Rajya Sabha membersaid the Arvind Kejriwal-ledparty planned to make 25-lakh members in the state and,within a month, 5,000 posters

of the party would be put up inevery assembly constituency.

The membership drivewill be held from Monday tillMarch 22 in over 12,000 wardsin various cities across thestate. “AAP will contest thepanchayat elections (likely inOctober-November) in UP,”he announced.

However, Deputy ChiefMinister Dinesh Sharma dis-missed the claims made by theAAP, saying the party hadtalked about expanding itself inthe past as well.The renewedfocus to diversify the AAPacross the country comes near-ly two weeks after the party,founded in 2012, registered adecisive win in the Delhiassembly elections for a thirdconsecutive term.

After its win in Delhi fiveyears ago, the AAP had made

moves to expand, but did notfind much base.

For Uttar Pradesh, theAAP spokesperson said, fiveministers with origins in thestate have been made Ministersin Delhi Government.

“They will play a key rolein various campaigns by theparty,” he added.

Hitting out at theAdtiyanath Government, Singhclaimed that law and order hadceased to exist in Uttar Pradeshand the youth was disappoint-ed with the BJP Government.

Chief Minister YogiAdityanath had campaignedfor the Bharatiya Janata Partyahead of the Delhi Assemblyelection. “The statements madeby Adityanath and the actionon CAA protesters are a signof an unsuccessful chief min-ister,” Singh said. PTI

Jammu: Ceasefire violationsby Pakistan has increased man-ifold to push armed terroristsinto Jammu & Kashmir andsabotage peace, DGP DilbagSingh said on Sunday, assertingthat the security grid is strongto foil the neighbouringnation's designs.

The Union Territory'sdirector general of police(DGP) also said a few success-ful infiltration bids were madeby terrorists but they wereneutralised in the KashmirValley during counter-insur-gency operations.

“The ceasefire violations byPakistan has increased mani-fold with an aim to push asmany terrorists into this side tosabotage the peaceful atmos-phere.

“Despite increased cease-fire violations, we are alert tothe challenge and have alreadyfoiled a number of infiltration

attempts,” Singh told reportersafter inaugurating the 9thPolice Martyr's Memorial InterClub T-20 CricketChampionship in Kathua dis-trict.

The security grid alongthe Line of Control (LoC) andthe International Border (IB) isstrong to scuttle Pakistan'sdesigns and ensure furtherimprovement in the overallsecurity situation in the com-ing months, he said.

Referring to the Nagrotaencounter along the Jammu-Srinagar national highway nearhere on January 31, the DGPsaid the three Jaish-e-Mohammad terrorists wereneutralized hours after theymanaged to sneak into theIndian side.

“Our security grid is verystrong and we are prepared tofoil Pakistani attempts to pushterrorists into this side,” Singh

said. The DGP expressed satis-

faction over the drop in num-ber of local youths joining ter-rorist ranks.

“The inclination of localyouth to join terrorism in theValley is on the decline,” hesaid.

Asked whether a rehabili-tation policy for them is underconsideration, Singh said thegovernment is already workingon different plans for youthengagement and their devel-opment.

“There are skill develop-ment programmes. Sport activ-ities are getting a big boost withproper infrastructure and train-ing,” he said. Singh lauded thepeople for their timely inputsregarding terrorist activitiesand said they will continuetheir support to the forces towipe out terrorism fromJammu & Kashmir. PTI

Srinagar: Schools in Kashmirare scheduled to reopen onMonday after remaining shutfor nearly seven months fol-lowing the abrogation of Article370.

Officials of the Jammu &Kashmir education departmentsaid all arrangements had beenput in place for the students toattend schools after the insti-tutions remained shut formonths since August afterscrapping of its special statusand due to winter break.

The Government hadmade several efforts last year toreopen the schools in a phasedmanner, but it failed to bear anyfruit as the parents kept theirwards at home due to appre-hensions about their safety.

Towards the end of theyear, few schools opened, butstudents were asked to attendclasses without wearing school

uniforms.Kashmir School Education

Director Mohammad YounisMalik said all arrangementshad been put in place and thetiming for the schools fallingwithin Srinagar's municipallimits will be 10am-3pm, whilein the rest of Kashmir division,the timing will be 10.30am-3.30pm.

The director urged theteachers to work with dedica-tion for building capacities ofthe students for their betterfuture. “It's our responsibilityto extend our support to themand redouble efforts to gettheir syllabus completed well intime,” the director said.

He instructed the fieldofficers to visit schools regu-larly to monitor the follow upof academic planner for time-ly accomplishment of the settargets. PTI

Coimbatore: One person wasgored to death While 17 oth-ers were injured, one of themseriously, during jallikattu(bull-taming) here on Sunday.

Subash Chandra Bose (24)of Pudukkottai died after thehorn of a bull went to his chestwhile another Murugan (37) ofMadurai district got criticallyhurt when another bull goredhim in his throat. About 1,000bulls and 820 tamers took partin the event flagged off byTamil Nadu Minister ofMunicipal Administration S PVelumani. PTI

Ayodhya: Uttar Pradesh ChiefMinister Yogi Aadityanath onSunday described the country'spresent generation as a ‘lucky’one for being part of the strug-gle for having a Lord Ram tem-ple in Ayodhya and being wit-ness to its construction.

The Chief Minister madethe remark during his firstvisit to the temple town afterthe September 9 verdict of theSupreme Court last year on theAyodhya dispute that resolvedthe centuries-old tangle andsubsequent setting up of atrust by the centralGovernment to oversee theconstruction of the temple.

The Chief Minister washere to inaugurate a health fair,Mukhya Mantri Aarogya Mela,at Suraj Kund in DarshanNagar area of Faizabad.

Addressing a gathering of

Hindu seers after inauguratingthe Health Fair, Aditynath said,“Many generations perishedin the struggle for the RamJanambhoomi in last 500 years,but our generation is lucky aswe have been the part of theRam Janambhoomi struggleand we will see the RamMandir coming up.”

Commenting on the apexcourt's verdict over theAyodhya dispute, the chiefminister said, “The SupremeCourt has shown its judicialpower to the world by its ver-dict over the issue of RamMandir.”

The Chief Minister alsohailed Prime MinisterNarendra Modi and his gov-ernment “for delivering whathe promised” including nulli-fication of Article 370 andrevocation of Jammu &Kashmir's special status.

“I always told saints ofAyodhya to have trust in PrimeMinister Modi as under hisleadership, we will achieve ourgoal of having a Ram Mandirin Ayodhya.”

“Under Prime MinisterModi's leadership, India isemerging as a power in theworld. The prime minister

abrogated Article 370 and pro-hibited the practice of tripletalaq,” he said.

“He also amended theCitizenship law to create acompletely transparent systemof giving shelter to the suffer-ing humanity of the world, andunder his strong leadership, away has been paved for the

construction of grand temple ofBhagvan Shri Ram inAyodhya,” the chief ministeradded.

In Ayodhya, Adityanathalso visited the residence of aDalit community man,Mahaveer, with whom he hadlunch when he had come to thetemple town during 2019 LokSabha elections after beingbanned by the ElectionCommission from election-eering.

“When I was banned bythe Election commission, Icame to visit HanumangarhiTemple in Ayodhya, whereMahaveer invited me to hishouse.”

“Mahaveer showed mehis four-room pucca housebuilt under Pradhan MantriAawaas Yojna, before this hehad a Kuccha house,” he said. PTI

��

Lucknow: The Uttar PradeshSunni Central Waqf Board islikely to take a decision in itsmeeting on Monday regardingthe land given by the StateGovernment for constructionof a mosque.

“We have already saidabout honouring the SupremeCourt verdict on the Ayodhyaissue,” board chairman ZufarFarooqui told PTI on Sunday.

“The meeting of the boardwill deliberate upon the docu-ments pertaining to allotmentof land by the government. Adecision will also be taken as towhat should be built on thatpiece of land,” Farooqui said.

Asked about Deputy Chief

Minister Dinesh Sharma's offerregarding formation of a trustfor construction of a mosque,Farooqui said: “The govern-ment formed the trust for theconstruction of Ram Temple inAyodhya on the directives ofthe Supreme Court. No suchinstructions were issued for themosque. This offer will be dis-cussed in the board's meeting.”On Friday, the board had saidthat it did not have the optionto reject the alternative piece ofland given to it under theSupreme Court's Ayodhya ver-dict, but would decide how touse it when it meets onMonday.

In a historic verdict in

November on theRamjanmabhoomi-BabriMasjid dispute, the SupremeCourt ruled in favour of con-struction of a temple. It alsoruled that an alternative five-acre plot must be found for amosque within Ayodhya.

Soon after the verdict,there were suggestions thatthe board should not accept theland.

“Following the SupremeCourt verdict, the Sunni WaqfBoard does not have the choiceof rejecting the five-acre alter-native land for the constructionof a mosque in Ayodhya as itwould amount to contempt ofcourt,” Farooqui had said. PTI

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From Page 1Naqvi and Azad, in their

joint affidavit, have alleged that“the present ruling dispensation,at the behest of its political mas-ters, had devised a strategy ofextinguishing these protests byfalsely attributing violence andacts of vandalism to peacefulprotestors”.

They have also said thatpolice has “unnecessarily” bar-ricaded numerous roads that“have no connection with theprotest” and are at a great dis-tance from the site, thereby,“abdicating their responsibilitiesand duties and wrongly layingthe blame on the protest”.

“It is these barricading ofunconnected roads that has ledto a chaotic situation,”Habibullah has claimed andadded that if the barricades areremoved from the 10 points hehas mentioned in the affidavit,“the chaos complained of in thepetition would cease”.

In a separate affidavit,Naqvi and Azad have claimedthe issue of inconvenience to

commuters has been “deliber-ately orchestrated by the police”by blocking all the surroundingroads as well as the arterial roadsconnecting Delhi, Noida andFaridabad. They have furtheralleged that one of the petitionshas been filed by lawyer AmitShani, who is an active memberand supporter of BJP posing asa concerned citizen, as his placeof residence, office and directroute of daily commute arenowhere near Shaheen Bagh.

Habibullah, in his affidavit,has also stated that the protes-tors have asked him to conveyto the apex court that their dis-sent “was out of desperation andcompulsion” as they see theCAA, National PopulationRegister (NPR) and NationalRegister of Citizens (NRC) as a“death knell” for their and futuregenerations’ survival and exis-tence.The other concerns voicedby the protestors were thatCAA and the intention behindit, as publicly voiced by those inpower, “has struck a deep fearinto the hearts of many poor

and under-privileged citizens ofIndia”.

He has said, “The assemblyis peaceful. The question of theirsecurity is also crucial. Anyattempt to forcibly shift themfrom the present site wouldcompromise their safety.”

Restrictions have beenimposed on the Kalindi Kunj-Shaheen Bagh stretch and theOkhla underpass, which wereclosed on December 15 last yeardue to protests against CAA andNRC.The apex court was hear-ing an appeal filed by Sahni,who had first approached theDelhi High Court seeking direc-tions to Delhi Police to ensuresmooth traffic flow on theKalindi Kunj-Shaheen Baghstretch, which was blocked byanti-CAA protesters onDecember 15 last year.

Separately, former BJPMLA Nand Kishore Garg hasfiled a plea in the apex courtseeking directions to authoritiesto remove protestors fromShaheen Bagh.

�� "��"�� From Page 1

It would be followed byrestricted and delegation-leveltalks between Trump and Modiat Hyderabad House. PrimeMinister Modi would host alunch for the US president fol-lowing the bilateral talks.

In the afternoon, Trump isexpected to attend certain pri-vate events at the US Embassy,including a roundtable withindustry representatives. In theevening, the US president willmeet President Ram NathKovind at the RashtrapatiBhavan.

A banquet will be hosted byKovind. President Trump woulddepart from India later thatevening.

In their talks on Tuesday,Trump and Prime MinisterModi are likely to focus on awide variety of bilateral andregional issues including tradeand investment, defence andsecurity, counter-terrorism,energy security, religious free-dom, proposed peace deal withTaliban in Afghanistan and sit-uation in the Indo-Pacific,

according to Indian and US offi-cials.

Trump’s visit to India comesat a time when the country hasbeen witnessing widespreadprotests against a new citizen-ship law and strain in NewDelhi’s ties with Islamabad overthe Kashmir issue.

The visiting American del-egation includes CommerceSecretary Wilbur Ross, EnergySecretary Dan Brouillette,Acting Chief of Staff MickMulvaney and National SecurityAdviser Robert O’ Brien.

Senior advisers to thePresident Stephen Miller, DanScavino, Chief of Staff to theFirst Lady Lindsay Reynolds,Assistant to the President andSpecial Representative forI n t e r n a t i o n a lTelecommunication Policy andSenior Adviser to the Chief ofStaff Robert Blair, and WhiteHouse Press Secretary StephanieGrisham are the other membersof the delegation.

United States Ambassadorto India Ken Juster is also partof the delegation.

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From Page 1It is accompanied with an

image of Trump standing nextto Prime Minister NarendraModi.

Another billboard featuresthe two leaders shaking handswith the message ‘Welcome tothe Land of Holy RiversYamuna and Ganga’.

Yet another one on theroute says ‘Welcome to theLand of Rich Heritage of Artand Craft’.

Trump is slated to arrive inAgra on Monday evening afterjointly attending with Modi themega ‘Namaste Trump’ event atthe newly built Motera cricketstadium in Ahmedabad earli-er in the day.

The event has been named‘Namaste Trump’ on the linesof the ‘Howdy, Modi’ pro-gramme organised in the USlast year.

The administration is allgeared up for the big day andpreparations are in full swingto present “best face of Agra”.

Another billboard showsTrump and Modi shakinghands with the message ‘Twogreat nations. One great friend-ship’, ‘Namaste Trump,February 24’.

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From Page 1“This protest is against CAA, NRC and also

seeking reservation for Dalits. The movementis primarily led by the women, while the menare only supporting them,” a protester namedShadab said. “We have blocked the road and wewill not move from the site till the Centre revokesthe draconian law,” he said. In the evening AlokKumar, Joint Commissioner of Police (EasternRange) said stones were also pelted at the police.“The situation has been brought under control.Adequate personnel have been deployed and areconducting flag marches.”

Taking to twitter, Mishra said, “We havegiven a three-day ultimatum to the DelhiPolice to get the road cleared. Get the Jafrabad

and Chandbagh road cleared”.In a video tweeted by him where he can be

seen addressing the gathering, Mishra said,“They (protestors) want to create trouble inDelhi. That’s why they have closed the roads.That’s why they have created a riot-like situa-tion here. We have not pelted any stone.

“Till US President is in India, we are leav-ing the area peacefully. After that we won’t lis-ten to you (police) if the roads are not vacatedby then,” he told the gathering.

The fresh sit-in protest comes at a time whenefforts are being made to negotiate with the pro-testers at Shaheen Bagh whose agitation hasresulted in traffic snarls along the Delhi-Noidaroute. A small stretch of the road closed for overtwo months was “opened” by a group ofdemonstrators on Saturday, though police bar-ricades continued on one side.

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From Page 1Hundreds and thousands of

people are seen welcomingTrump in the video. “Look soforward to being with my greatfriends inIA!” Trump said in atweet. The president, whoarrived at the White House fol-lowing four days of hectic polit-ical campaigning in the westernparts of the country, had no pub-lic engagements on Saturday.

Trump did not go for around of golf, which is normal-ly the case for him on a brightsunny weekend day inWashington.

Along with the tweet,Trump retweeted an 81-secondvideo by a Twitter account iden-tified as “Sol” with the handleSolmemes1. “To celebrateTrump’s visit to India I wantedto make a video to show how inmy warped mind it will go...USA and India united!” thehandle Solmemes1 tweeted inthe original post with thevideo.Trump appears as a greatsaviour, in the short animatedclip, riding on a chariot withFirst Lady Melania. A few stillslater, Trump is seen riding ahorse carrying on his soldiers hisson Donald Junior and daugh-ter Ivanka. PNS

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In a noble act, familymembers of a deceased

person donated eyes oftheir dead kin to theMKCG Medical CollegeHospital for transplanta-tion in needy patients infuture.

Tangudu IswarPrasad (62), a resident ofChandrashekhar Mandir Sahi,died at the MKCG Hospitalearly on Saturday morning.Getting consent of Prasad’sfamily members through theBrahmapur Friends’ HelpingClub, a team of ophthalmolo-gists from the MKCG MedicalCollege comprising ProfSuchitra Mishra, Dr SamirDash and Dr G Naina went tothe deceased’s house and took

out his two eyeballs at around8 am.

Prasad’s wife P SandhyaBhali, son P Hari Nath anddaughter Kushuna Kumari saidthat they fulfilled his wish ofdonating eyes for others. Clubmembers Jamula Suresh, JMohan Rao, K Ram Gopal, EBadrinarayan, P Lingaraj, KArabinda Subudhi and BabulJagdish coordinated.

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Washington: US SenatorBernie Sanders on Sundaysecured a convincing victory inthe crucial Nevada caucus, giv-ing a big boost to his campaignfor the 2020 White House bidas the race to Democraticparty's nomination gathersmomentum over the next fewmonths.

Multiple American mediaoutlets declared Sanders as thewinner of the Nevada Caucusfor the Democratic Party's pres-idential primary.

The 78-year-old senatorfrom Vermont had 54 per centof the county delegates availablewhen several national newsnetworks, including Fox newsand MSNBC, called the racewith only four per cent ofprecincts reporting.

When last reports came in,Sanders had garnered morethan half of the votes, with for-mer vice president Joe Bidentrailing at 19 per cent.

"Breaking: We wonNevada! We are building anunprecedented grassrootsmovement, and together, thereis nothing we cannot accom-plish," Sanders tweeted.

Sanders, who lost to formersecretary of state HillaryClinton in the 2016 presidentialprimaries in New Hampshire,had won the New Hampshireprimary recently and was in avirtual tie with underdog PeteButtigieg in Iowa.

Trump congratulatedSanders in a tweet.

"Looks like Crazy Bernie isdoing well in the Great State ofNevada. Biden and the rest lookweak, and no way Mini Mikecan restart his campaign afterthe worst debate performancein the history of Presidentialdebates," the president tweeted.

"Congratulations Bernie,and don't let them take it awayfrom you!" Trump tweeted.

"We did it! We won theNevada caucus, and we wonBIG!" said Faiz Shakir, the cam-paign manager for Sanders.

"This win is our win, inlarge part because of the recordnumber of donations and vol-unteer enthusiasm for Bernie inthe state," he said.

Nevada is the first statewith a diverse population tohold a nominating contest.

"In Nevada, and in NewHampshire and in Iowa - whatwe showed is that our volun-teers are prepared to knock on

hundreds and hundreds ofthousands of doors," Sanderswas quoted as saying by CNNin San Antonio.

"That no campaign has agrassroots movement like wedo, which is another reason whywe're going to win this election."

"Trump and his friendsthink they are going to win thiselection," Sanders continued."They think they're going to winthis election by dividing ourpeople up, based on the colourof their skin, or where they wereborn, or their religion or theirsexual orientation. We are goingto win because we are doingexactly the opposite. We'rebringing our people together."

Ahead of the USPresidential election later thisyear, White House hopefulsare contesting for their party'snomination in primary elec-tions, known as primaries,across the country. PTI

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Beijing/Wuhan: President XiJinping on Sunday said thecoronavirus epidemic isChina's "largest public healthemergency" as the death tollfrom the deadly virus climbedto 2,442 and the number ofinfections hit almost 77,000 inthe country.

President Xi, who attend-ed a meeting here to doubleefforts in coordinating the pre-vention and control of theCOVID-19 outbreak, said theepidemic "has the fastest trans-mission, widest range of infec-tion and has been the most dif-ficult to prevent and control".

In comments reported bystate broadcaster CCTV, Xisaid, "This is a crisis for us andit is a big test." He called theepidemic China's "largest pub-lic health emergency".

The meeting, in the form oftele-conference, was presidedover by Chinese Premier LiKeqiang.

Xi acknowledged that theepidemic will "inevitably havea large impact on the economyand society", but he said theeffects will be "short-term" andcontrollable.

Chinese health officials inworst-hit coronavirus hitWuhan city ordered 14 days'quarantine for all recoveredpatients following reports thatsome of them tested positive forthe virus after recovery.

Ninety-seven more peo-ple died in China due to coro-navirus, taking the death toll to2,442, officials said on Sunday,

as a team of WHO experts vis-ited the worst-affected Wuhancity in Hubei province.

By the end of Saturday,76,936 confirmed cases ofnovel coronavirus infectionhad been reported in 31provincial-level regions,China's National HealthCommission (NHC) said in itsdaily update on Sunday.

Ninety-six deaths werereported from Hubei provincefor which Wuhan is the provin-cial capital and one fromGuangdong province onSaturday besides 648 new con-

firmed cases of coronavirusinfections, it said.

Hubei province, where thevirus first emerged inDecember last, reported 630new confirmed cases, takingthe total confirmed cases in thehard-hit province to 64,084,state-run Xinhua news agencyreported.

Officials in Wuhan orderedthat all patients who haverecovered and discharged fromhospitals be sent to designatedplaces for two weeks of quar-antine and medical observa-tion.

So far 15,299 people whowere cured of the virus havebeen discharged from the hos-pitals in Wuhan. But they wereall asked to go for two-weekquarantine after some of themtested positive after being dis-charged from hospitals, HongKong-based South ChinaMorning Post reported. PTI

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Beijing: A 29-year-old femaledoctor died on Sunday after con-tracting the coronavirus whiletreating patients at a hospital inChina's worst-hit Wuhan city,taking the death toll of the med-ical staff to 10, according to amedia report.

Xia Sisi, a gastroenterologyphysician got infected whileworking at the Union JiangbeiHospital of Wuhan in Hubeiprovince, the epicentre of thevirus. She was hospitalised onJanuary 19 and later transferredto Zhongnan Hospital of WuhanUniversity on February 7 afterher condition worsened. Shedied on Sunday, state-runXinhua news agency reported.

The Union Jiangbei Hospitalmourned the death of Xia and

expressed condolences for herfamily.

The Chinese medical staff,who are on the frontline fightingthe COVID-19, are paying aheavy price in treating the surg-ing number of cases.

China's National HealthCommission earlier said that atotal of 1,716 medical workershad contracted the infection asof February 11. Xia's death takesthe death toll among the medicalstaff to 10. On February 20, PengYinhua (29), who postponedhis wedding to treat patientsinfected with the coronavirus,died. Earlier, Li Wenliang, a 34-year-old doctor, who was one ofthe first people to sound thealarm about the new outbreakdied on February 7. PTI

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Seoul: South Korea is raisingits alert on the new coron-avirus to the "highest level",President Moon Jae-in said onSunday, as the country report-ed 123 new infections.

South Korea has seen arapid surge in the number ofcoronavirus cases in recentdays after a cluster of infec-tions emerged from a religioussect in the southern city ofDaegu last week.

The national toll of 556cases is now the highest out-side China, apart from theDiamond Princess cruise shipin Japan. AFP

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navirus cases in Italy hasjumped to over 100, the pres-ident of the Lombardy regionsaid on Sunday, as northerntowns struggle to containrising infections.

"More than 100 cases"have now been reportedthroughout the country,Attilio Fontana told SkyTG24television, with 89 of those inLombardy, centred aroundthe small town of Codogno,about 70 kilometres (43miles) southeast of Milan.

Responding to a risingnumber of new cases, PrimeMinister Giuseppe Conte onSaturday announced that 11towns in Italy's north would

be placed under quarantine,affecting about 50,000 people.

Two people have alreadydied from the so-calledCOVID-19 epidemic in Italy,which was the first country toban direct flights to and fromChina in January.

First to contract the viruswere two Chinese touristswho were placed under quar-antine in Rome and remainthere. Another man, whowas also held at the samehospital in Rome, has sincerecovered and been released,authorities said.

The number of thoseinfected also includes peopleliving in four other regions ofItaly. AFP

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Tokyo: A third person whobecame ill on board a coron-avirus-stricken cruise shipquarantined off the coast ofJapan has died, the country'shealth ministry said on Sunday.

In a statement, the ministryidentified the victim as aJapanese man in his 80s whowas removed from theDiamond Princess and taken toa local hospital after suffering"symptoms."

The ministry did not con-firm whether the man hadtested positive for COVID-19,saying it could only disclose theinformation that the family ofthe man had consented tomake public. It gave the man'scause of death as pneumonia.

The death comes after twoother elderly passengers, alsoboth Japanese and in their 80s,died on Thursday after con-tracting the virus.

Despite a quarantineimposed on the DiamondPrincess, more than 600 peo-ple on board tested positive forthe virus, with several dozen inserious condition.

In total, Japan has so farrecorded four deaths linked tothe new coronavirus outbreak,which has infected more than130 people excluding thoselinked to the DiamondPrincess. AFP

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Ankara: Nine people were killedin Turkey in a magnitude 5.7earthquake that struck westernIran early on Sunday morning,Turkish Health MinisterFahrettin Koca said.

The quake centered west ofthe Iranian city of Khoy andaffected villages in the Turkishprovince of Van.

Turkish Interior MinisterSuleyman Soylu told a newsconference that three childrenand four adults were killed in

Turkey's Baskule district. Koca later updated the

number of fatalities to nine andwrote on Twitter that 37 peoplewere injured, including nine ina critical but not life-threateningcondition.

Emergency teams have beensent to the remote mountainousregion. Iran's official IRNA newsagency said the earthquakeaffected 43 villages in the moun-tainous Qotour area.

It later added that at least 75

people had been injured, six ofwhom were hospitalised.According to the EuropeanMediterranean SeismologicalCenter (EMSC), the quake,which happened at 9:22am localtime (0552GMT), had a depthof 5 kilometers (3 miles).

The region has a history ofpowerful earthquakes.

Last month a quake cen-tered on the eastern Turkish cityof Elazig killed more than 40people. AP

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Colombo: The Sri LankanGovernment on Sundayappointed a six-member teamto help police collect authenticinformation and expedite anongoing presidential probe intothe devastating Easter Sundayterror attack that killed over250 people.

President GotabayaRajapaksa decided to hastenthe probe into the April 21attack which had proved cru-cial in his decisive electoral vic-tory last November. Rajapaksaused the Easter Sunday terror-ist attack to portray himself asthe leader who could stop ter-rorism.

The voters gave him a bigmandate and elected him asPresident in November lastyear. Rajapaksa stormed tovictory, trouncing his nearestrival Sajith Premadasa by amargin of over 13 lakh votes -

52.25 per cent of votes polledagainst 41.99 per cent.

The 6-member task forcehas been appointed to helppolice's CID to "speed up theongoing investigations" andwill submit weekly reports tothe defense ministry on theprogress of investigation,according to a statement.

"The CID investigationinto these attacks was not con-ducted in an effective way bythe last regime," defense min-istry secretary KamalGunaratne was quoted as say-

ing in the statement.The team has been tasked

to "collect authentic informa-tion and evidence to take legalaction against all those involvedin supporting the extremists".

Nine suicide bombersbelonging to local Islamistextremist group NationalThawheed Jamaat (NTJ) linkedto ISIS carried out a series ofdevastating blasts that torethrough three churches andthree luxury hotels on theEaster Sunday, killing 258 peo-ple, including 11 Indians. PTI

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Colombo: Sri Lankan ForeignMinister Dinesh Gunawardenawill officially announceColombo's withdrawal fromco-sponsoring a 2015 UNHuman Rights Council reso-lution on accountability forwar crimes during his addressat the council's session onWednesday, according to hisoffice.

Sri Lanka co-sponsoredthe resolution along with 11other countries, including theUS and Britain, calling for aninvestigation into allegedhuman rights violations duringthe island nation's civil war,which ended in 2009.

Gunawardena will makethe announcement onWednesday during his addressat the 43rd Session of theHuman Rights Council (HRC)in Geneva.

Ahead of the Session,Foreign Secretary RavinathaAryasinha briefed the Presidentof the UNHRC ElisabethTichy-Fisslberger in Genevaon Lanka's decision to with-draw from the resolution, theforeign ministry said Saturday.

Gunawardena will alsorespond to the oral update on

Sri Lanka by the UN HumanRights High Commissionerand is scheduled to meet theHigh Commissioner forHuman Rights MichelleBachelet in Geneva.

Sri Lanka decided to with-draw from co-sponsoring theresolution after the US imposedtravel restrictions on Armychief Lt Gen Shavendra Silvaand his immediate familymembers over alleged grossviolations of human rights dur-ing the final phase of the islandnation's Civil War in 2009.

The resolution 30/1 onpromotion on reconciliation inSri Lanka was co-sponsored in2015 by the Lankan govern-ment headed by then PresidentMaithripala Sirisena.

Sri Lanka's ruling andopposition parties have strong-ly opposed the US move toimpose the travel ban on Lt GenSilva, saying America's decisionwas based on independentlyunverified information.

Foreign MinisterGunawardena earlier said thatLt Gen Silva was only con-ducting a war against a desig-nated terrorist group which wasthe LTTE. PTI

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Samy Magdy (Egypt): Egypt'schief prosecutor Saturdayreferred a physician to crimi-nal trial for allegedly mutilat-ing the genitals of a 12-year-oldgirl, leading to her death, hisoffice said.

The girl bled to death lastmonth in the southernprovince of Assiut following a30-minute surgery. Her deathsparked a nationwide outcry.

Despite battling the prac-tice for decades, Egypt hasone of the highest rates offemale genital mutilation, alsoknown as female circumci-sion, in the world.

Many families fear that anuncircumcised daughter will beunable to marry.

Public prosecutor Hamadael-Sawy also referred the girl'sparents to trial, according to a

statement from his office. Nodate has been set for their tri-als.

The doctor, Ali Abdel-Fadeel, told investigators hewas performing cosmeticsurgery on the girl, accordingto the prosecutor's statement.

But that claim was refutedfollowing an examination of thegirl's body by forensic experts.

The state-run NationalPopulation Council said in2019 that 82 per cent of girlsunder age 17 in Egypt haveundergone the procedure.

The practice generallyinvolves removing all or part ofthe clitoris and sometimes thelabia.

It is performed on bothMuslims and Christians and ismisguidedly believed to controlthe girl's sexual desires. AP

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Bamako: At least three Mali sol-diers were killed and five wound-ed Sunday in a suspected jihadistattack on an army camp in thefar north of the country, theMalian military said.

The outpost in BambaraMaoude, about 100 kilometres(60 miles) south of the city ofTimbuktu "was the object atabout 0500 GMT of a terroristattack," the military said onTwitter.

"During this attack, weregret to report a provisionaltoll of three dead, five wound-ed, together with material dam-age," it said.

"The wounded were air-lifted to Sevare... The outpostremains under the control of

the armed forces." "Three of our men fell

Sunday during a jihadist attackin Bambara Maoude," a mili-tary official told AFP fromTimbuktu earlier.

A local official confirmedthe toll of three soldiers deadand said two more were miss-ing. According to another localofficial, "the terrorists left, tak-ing vehicles and military equip-ment with them... Togetherwith the bodies of two of theircomrades."

The attack is the latest in along series of deadly incidentsin Mali's north, where Frenchforces said Friday they hadkilled about 50 jihadists so farthis month. AFP

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Washington: The Taliban inAfghanistan are tired of fight-ing and want to make a peacedeal with the US, PresidentDonald Trump said on Sundayas he left for his maiden visit toIndia during which the twocountries will significantlyramp up the defence and strate-gic ties.

Just before his departurefor India, Trump told reportersat the White House that thetime had to come for the UStroops to "come home".

The President said hewould sign a peace deal withthe Taliban if it worked outover the next week.

"I want to see how thisperiod of a week works out. Ifit works out over the next less-than-a-week, I would put myname on it," he said.

"Time to come home. TheTaliban want to make a dealtoo. They're tired of fighting,"he said.

Trump's remarks came a

day after the US and theAfghan Taliban started a seven-day partial truce ahead of apossible peace deal to endmore than 18-year-long war,raising hopes for a resolution toAmerica's longest war.

The agreement struck dur-ing negotiations between theUS and the Taliban, if main-tained, may secure a peacedeal that would lead to a with-drawal of American troops

from Afghanistan.In November, Trump

announced the resumption ofpeace talks with the Taliban,but refused to give a timelinefor the drawdown of the UStroops from Afghanistan, as hemade an unannounced visit toAmerican soldiers stationedin the war-torn country.

After nine rounds of nego-tiations with the Taliban,Trump announced in

September that he was callingthe peace talks off after a USservice member was killed in asuicide attack in Afghanistan'scapital, Kabul.

The US currently has lessthan 14,000 troops inAfghanistan, but military offi-cials would not confirm theexact number.

Trump is accompanied byFirst Lady Melania, daughterIvanka, son-in-law JaredKushner and the top brass ofhis administration on his maid-en visit to India.

During his visit, the twocountries are expect to signif-icantly ramp up bilateraldefence and strategic ties.

The nearly 36-hour-longvisit by Trump is also set to sendacross a clear message of grow-ing congruence of interests onmajor geopolitical developmentsin the region and beyond, par-ticularly when China has beenexpanding its military might andeconomic clout. PTI

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Walls” and the US PresidentDonald Trump seem tohave some sticky fixationthat goes beyond the con-tentious Mexico-US border

“wall”, the cost of building which would beabout $25 billion. The recent case is the muchhumbler 400-metre-long and seven-feethigh wall in Ahmedabad. Trump’s visit to thiscity has led to an estimated drain of �100crore. The said amount will be spent onresurfacing and constructing new roads, onsecurity imperatives, for transport andrefreshments of over 1,00,000 guests in the“world’s largest stadium”, transplanting trees,flower arrangements, cultural extravaganzaas also the “contentious” wall-column thatseems to have caught public attention for itsostensible purpose.

Clearly, this wall-column hides a slumcluster of some 800 families that dot theunavoidable road stretch — from the airportto the main venue. It does have some secu-rity angle, given the heavy population den-sity along the road, which typically neces-sitates a smooth passage for the presidentialentourage. But it is essentially a “beautifica-tion” move that is neither unique to Indianor necessarily unwarranted in the contextof sprucing any location in preparation ofsuch events. It is certainly a sad reflection ofthe reality that besets any urban dwelling.However, the efforts towards putting fortha “picture-perfect” view is par for course inany civic engagement.

The Government cannot be faulted forprojecting a certain ambience and opera-tional flawlessness, especially as the event isaimed to enhance “magnificence” of anemerging India (with the inauguration of the“world”s largest stadium). Putting the bestfoot forward in terms of visuals is the norm,not the exception. But it certainly is tanta-mount to glossing over some reality thatalways lurks in the midst of any city, be itAhmedabad, New Delhi or evenWashington, DC. State visits are necessari-ly and deliberately over-sanitised andbedecked from all aspects of the diverse real-ity that always exists in proximity. The majes-tic drive from the Rashtrapati Bhawan to thesplendorous Janpath, all the way up to theIndia Gate, or even to other parts of LutyensDelhi, does not reflect the socio-economicdiversity, reality and depravity of some otherparts of the capital that is spared the caval-cade of such dignitaries.

The recent phenomenon initiated by theModi Government of showcasing differentcities across the country (beyond Delhi) isnovel as it willy-nilly facilitates a modicumof development therein. Many cities havebenefitted from the spotlight — be itVaranasi during Japanese Prime MinisterShinzo Abe’s visit or Chennai, which host-ed Chinese Premier Xi Jinping. Ahmedabad,which had previously hosted Xi and is againprepping for the next high-profile foreignvisit, may be benefitting disproportionate-

ly from such visits along with thePrime Minister’s political con-stituency of Varanasi. But again,as the son-of-soil of Gujarat andthe “people’s representative” ofVaranasi, he thought he is enti-tled to that bias.

Similar “walls” had come upat various places in Beijing dur-ing the 2008 Olympics. Chinahad strategically used this occa-sion to announce its “arrival” onthe global scale. At that time, theChinese had spent over $130million to just restore and painttheir building-temple complex-es that dotted the five-mile axison the main Olympic zone.Much later, Rio de Janeiro hadto face much criticism for its“walls of shame” that sprung upto divide the shiny new Olympiccity in 2016 from the typical Riode Janeiro shanties that populat-ed the city. A five mile long high-way from the airport was cov-ered with a 10 feet “wall” thatwas painted with welcomingmurals. Everyone knew that itcovered the inequities that besetthe Brazilian reality.

Later, activists derided suchmoves as Potemkin displaysand used the facade afforded bysuch “walls” to post expressionsof cynicism and revolt againstthe Government. But then, thealternative of leaving the realityin its naked sores is, perhaps,equally untenable and unhelp-ful, considering the larger stakes

and ambitions involved in host-ing such events.

The CommonwealthGames (CWG) in Delhi in 2010had led to thick bamboo “cur-tains” being planted aroundsqualid clusters. Beyond thepolitical blame-game, the eventselectively and successfully high-lighted New Delhi’s gleamingnew airport, swanky metro,wide roads with streetlights —an important infrastructuralchange that did alter the face andperception of the city.

In India, outside Delhi, thearchitectural development andapproach of the city centre fromthe airport is such that it wouldentail many improvisations,sprucing up and even theinevitable “walls” from an aes-thetic, practical and securityperspective. A lot of publicemotions is unnecessarily rakedwith debates on such “walls”,which could be more meaning-fully directed at the more sub-stantive part of the visit ie, theagreements, compromises andexchanges that take place, whichhave a long-term impact inaffecting people’s lives.

While there can never be auniversally-agreed formula todetermine how much is “toomuch” on such “walls,” commonsense suggests that an element ofbeautification and relatedrequirements does require asemblance of “cover-up.” On

the contrary, the public eye onthe ball should remain focussedof the inked papers, determi-nants and agreements (withTrump, even disagreements)that fructify or don’t, pursuantto this visit. Puerile debate andpassion on “walls” have a ten-dency to hijack the larger nar-rative at stake.

It is, perhaps, more perti-nent to criticise the waste-of-moment captured in the famoustea ceremony on the swings onthe banks of Sabarmati inAhmedabad when PrimeMinister Narendra Modi host-ed Xi, when at that verymoment, the People LiberationArmy (PLA) was involved in aface-off with the Indian armedforces at the border. Charmoffensives have limited “utility”and the classical Atithi DevoBhava (Guest is God) has verylimited resonance with hard-nosed businessmen like Trumpor Xi.

Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai (Indiaand China are brothers) of the1950s is a lesson not to be for-gotten as is the memory of theUS Naval fleet sailing into theBay of Bengal in the 1971 Indo-Pak war. The minor “walls” in2020, though not very elegant,ought not to be the substantiveconcern of the day.

(The writer, a military veter-an, is a former Lt Governor ofAndaman & Nicobar Islands)

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Sir — It is untenable that China hasraised objections to Union HomeMinister Amit Shah’s visit toArunachal Pradesh, claiming thatit is in violation of its territorial sov-ereignty and sabotaged mutualtrust with India. New Delhi hasdone well to stand its ground,pointing out that ArunachalPradesh is an “integral and inalien-able” part of India and Indianleaders routinely travel to the Stateas they do to any other State.

It has become a habit forBeijing to make unwarranted nois-es when anyone visits the eastern-most part of the country. It did soeven when the Prime Minister wasthere to lay the foundation stonefor a tunnel under the critical Selamountain pass. But why does itkeep raising objections to it? Beinga totalitarian regime, it neverallows “personal freedom” to flour-ish. But unlike China, India is ademocratic country and individ-ual freedom, culture, religions andso on are always protected here.This is why India has always takenrecourse to “polite diplomacy” tomake its point.

The Chinese outburst islinked to its frustration. One of

the major concerns for China isthe ongoing infrastructural pro-jects undertaken by our countryover there. Beijing maintains thatuntil a settlement on the borderissue is achieved, no one can visit

Arunachal. But do we have to payheed to it? We are a sovereignrepublic and none can tell uswhere Indians can travel.

TK NandananChennai

��

Sir — This refers to the editori-al, “Message of Shaheen Bagh”(February 19). The protest at

Shaheen Bagh is the longestagainst the CitizenshipAmendment Act (CAA). TheSupreme Court has done well toappoint mediators to open theroad blockade. The Government,too, has made it clear that it isready to negotiate. But it is dis-heartening that it took the initia-tive to end the logjam only aftera long wait, when the court inter-vened. Further, the Government’ssole interest is to get the roadvacated. Shaheen Bagh became amajor challenge for it with itspeaceful and civil character. Whatabout finding a solution to theconcerns raised by the women?

NiharikaVia email

��

Sir — Indeed, protests are meantto serve a wake-up call fordemocracy. But it is important forShaheen Bagh protesters to con-sider the disruption they havecaused. They must abide by theSupreme Court’s orders.

AshokVia email

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As US President Donald Trump visitsAhmedabad-Agra-Delhi today, the spec-trum of expectations remains variegated.

Although the agenda of the bilateral meetseems holistic, with a 12-member delegationaccompanying Trump during his two-day visitto India, apprehensions remain regarding thedeliverables coming out of the trip.

Besides, there have been quite a few changesin Trump’s itinerary and agenda, signalling last-minute negotiations, disagreements and possi-bly discontent on either side, on the key issuesof trade. The US has adopted a hard negotiat-ing position vis-a-vis India and has signalled itsunwillingness to retract from that stance. Amongother things, the US has been reluctant to rein-state India’s Generalised System of Preferences(GSP) status and has continued to seek marketaccess for its dairy products.

New Delhi has held out till now, but it isgoing to be difficult to predict the course of nego-tiations in the coming future. If nothing concretecomes out of bilateral trade talks in the fewmonths following Trump’s visit to the country,he could further harden negotiating grounds forthe US, as was the case with China.

Even though many have held that the cen-trepiece of this visit, a substantive/mini-trade dealbetween the US and India, may have collapsed,the political signalling of Trump’s visit is strongfor both the countries. For India, it means a con-tinuation of the growth in strength of Indo-USties with each successive President.

The short, 36-hour stay of Trump is beingutilised in the most effective way, in so far as sig-nalling is concerned. The Ahmedabad “NamasteTrump” event, Agra’s Taj Mahal stopover and thecritically-decisive talks between Prime MinisterNarendra Modi and Trump along with the visitto the Raj Ghat, tie concrete deliverables with cul-tural symbolism.

For the US, as the domestic primaries areheating up, running up to the presidential elec-tions at the end of the year, the timing and thetargetted constituency of the Indian-Americansas vote bank, could draw significant advantagesfor the Republican Party and the Trump admin-istration.

Trump’s tweet that, “We’re not treated verywell by India”, but that he happens to “like PrimeMinister Modi a lot” underscores the comfort-able-uncomfortability of this visit. Both leadersrealise the value of each other’s partnership intimes when China is not the same option for part-nership for either country as they are for eachother.

Trump’s declaration that he is “saving the bigdeal” with India for later and he “does not know”if it will be done before the presidential electionin November, signals two things: First, that theongoing negotiations on trade are a hard bargainfor either side and that neither party is willingto give concessions or cede positions. Second,both sides have desisted from earmarking a dead-line for the finalisation of these negotiations,which speaks of the complex nature of the con-sultations involved.

In the end, the lack of availability of animmediate trade deal to sign for Trump may notbe a pressing irritant. India’s trade surplus withthe US has significantly come down in the last

few years owing to energy imports fromit, which is the sixth-largest source ofcrude oil imports for the country cur-rently. Besides, the US continues to beIndia’s largest trading partner, withbilateral trade expected to cross $150billion for the first time this year.

In the absence of any mega tradedeals, both sides will tether the projec-tion of successful US-India bilateralrelations to defence deals, securitycooperation and a commonly-visu-alised regional order in the Indo-Pacific. As such, defence deals are like-ly to be the highlight of the visit. In par-ticular, the $2.6 billion deal to buy 24Seahawk helicopters from Americandefence manufacturer Lockheed MartinCorporation is going to capture head-lines.

The Cabinet Committee onSecurity headed by Modi recentlycleared the purchase of the 24 heli-copters and the deal is going to bene-fit India as these platforms are expect-ed to boost the Navy’s anti-submarinewarfare operations — an emerging areaof maritime cooperation with the USand a critical component of the Indo-Pacific security resolve. At the level ofthe regional order in Asia, two issueswill be very critical during this visit. TheTrump administration could nudgeNew Delhi to play a larger and strongerregional role in the Indo-Pacific region.

First, the role that New Delhiwould play in the Indo-Pacific regionis of utmost importance to Washington.For a long time, the US and other part-ners of the Quadrilateral securitygrouping view India as a “dithering”member. The US views itself as havingtaken quite a few steps in the Indo-Pacific that haven’t been well recipro-

cated through actions by India. Amongthem, the renaming of the Indo-PacificCommand to pragmatically engageIndia directly in all matters relating tothe Indo-Pacific. Washington viewsNew Delhi as a key player in the US’strategy in the Indo-Pacific.

The Raisina Dialogue held inJanuary in New Delhi witnessed animportant development regarding theIndo-US joint vision in the Indo-Pacific. The US moved to correct apotential disconnection in the Indo-UScommon view by declaring that its ownvision in the Indo-Pacific now includesthe Gulf region, which the US’ Indo-Pacific Strategy Report excluded initial-ly. This small but significant changebuilds a common platform to advancecooperation in the Indo-Pacific regionfor both the countries. However, evenas both countries try to find commonground in the Indo-Pacific to workwith, New Delhi should try to empha-sise certain uncompromising positionsof geopolitics in this vast region. India’sown relation with Iran has to beworked up, despite pressures fromWashington and significant cuts in oilimports from Tehran.

India should deftly employ strate-gic hedging to work with both Iran andthe US. While New Delhi knows thatfor a middle power like it, balancingbetween two major players — the USand China — is going to be much eas-ier than balancing between a majorforce and a regionally-strong yet sub-middle power like Iran. The real chal-lenge of diplomacy for India lies in itsability to navigate successfully withoutcreating hostilities, especially in timeswhen partisan geopolitics has threat-ened to become a diplomatic norm,

beckoning the polarisation that char-acterised half a century before the cur-rent one.

In the continental dimensions ofthe Indo-Pacific, Afghanistan is goingto be a critically-important factor giventhe timing of domestic politics in thatcountry, China’s increasing role inKabul and the US withdrawal lined up.Trump is a known pusher for India’sgreater role in Afghanistan and this visitcould see a diplomatic nudge to NewDelhi to change its role in Afghanistan,if not increase it. President Ghani’sreturn to power in Afghanistan, the US’deal with Taliban to be signed onFebruary 29 and its subsequent with-drawal could be used as diplomatictropes for India to increase its securi-ty role in Afghanistan.

India should be wary that it doesnot cede ground in dealings with thehard negotiators accompanying Trumpand end up doing what doesn’t suit itsnational interests — an Iran yet again.Even if nothing much comes out of theupcoming Trump visit, India shouldprepare for uncompromising negotia-tions. sYet, the visit has the potential tocatapult bilateral ties to a new level andset new grounds for engagements in thefuture. If Modi has initiated the cultureof “informal talks” with China, with theUS it is the “grand events” that mark adistinct note in bilateral relations. Assuch, the Ahmedabad event in thecricket stadium further pushes theidea of a large gathering to welcome vis-iting Heads of State towards a concretediplomatic norm.

(The writer is Deputy Director,Kalinga Institute of Indo-Pacific Studies,Bhubaneswar and Research Fellow,ICWA, New Delhi)

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In 1992, while working as a reporterfor an English-language weekly inKarachi, I was assigned a feature on

certain books that were part of the cur-riculum in schools operating in twolow-income areas of the city.

These were not Governmentschools. They were largely run andfunded by “charity organisations”, twoof which were eventually banned by theGovernment in 2003. I managed toacquire two Urdu textbooks that werebeing taught to students between theages of eight and 12. In simple Urdu,the books had chapters on jihad, infi-dels, obscenity and so on. When I askedan active member of one of the chari-ty organisations about the books, hetold me the tomes were not originallypublished in Pakistan. To my astonish-ment, the books were actually reprints

of textbooks that were first authoredand printed in the US in the early andmid-1980s. They were then shipped toPakistan, where they were distributedto various schools and madrasas coun-trywide and to madrasas and schoolsin the villages of Afghanistan near thePak-Afghan border. This was done dur-ing the anti-Soviet insurgency inAfghanistan between 1980 and 1988.Afghan and Arab insurgents were sta-tioned in Pakistan and sustained byfinancial aid and support from the USand Saudi Arabia.

In the March 23, 2002 issue of TheWashington Post, Joe Stephens andDavid Ottaway write that, during theinsurgency, Ronald Reagan’sGovernment spent millions on theprinting of textbooks (in Pashto, Dariand Urdu) “filled with violent imagesand militant teachings, as part ofcovert attempts to spur resistance to theSoviet occupation.” These books weresent to Pakistan with the billions of dol-lars’ worth of “aid” that Pakistanreceived from the US to facilitate theinsurgency.

Stephens and Ottaway add that thebooks “were filled with talk of holy warand featured drawings of guns, bullets,soldiers and mines.” After the Soviet

forces left the region, in the late 1980s,these books became part of the Afghanschool system’s core curriculum.Stephen and Ottaway write that thesame books were also used by the vio-lent Taliban regime that came to powerin Kabul in 1996.

In 2002, just months after the USforces ousted the Taliban from power,an American foreign aid official statedthat a major “scrubbing operation” inPakistan and Afghanistan had beenlaunched “to purge from the books allreferences to killing.” This was brieflycovered by a 2002 issue of Daily News,the now defunct Pakistani Englishnewspaper. The reporter had addedthat, before “scrubbing” the books thatit had circulated, the US was the firstnon-Muslim power to have propagat-ed “holy war” among Muslims toundermine a “common enemy”. This isnot correct.

The first to do so was Germany. OnOctober 14, 1914, a senior cleric inIstanbul — which at the time was thecapital of the Ottoman Empire —declared a “holy war” against Britain,France, Russia and Serbia. He did thiswith the approval of the OttomanSultan and on the behest of Germany.

The bankrupt empire had decided

to become an ally of Germany duringWorld War-I. The Sultan accepted ahefty payment from Germany to bol-ster the ailing Ottoman economy. Healso saw the alliance as an opportuni-ty for the empire to regain the regionsthat it had lost in the 19th century andonwards.

In the April 2011 issue of the jour-nal War in History, historian MustafaAksakal writes that, to anti-Germanforces, the Ottoman jihad proclamationwas understood as “a linchpin of theGerman scheme to revolutioniseMuslim populations in territories ofGermany’s enemies.”

According to Aksakal, the Germanlawyer, historian and archeologist Maxvon Oppenheim was one of the mainarchitects of the “scheme.” A propagan-da organisation, the Nachrichtenstellefür den Orient (The Intelligence Bureaufor the East), headquartered in Berlin,produced and then circulated jihadistliterature among the Muslims of Asianand African territories held by theBritish. The two most prominent textsin this context were a booklet byJewish scholar and founder of ModernIslamic Studies in Germany, EugenMittwoch and a 1915 brochure by theMuslim scholar Salih Ash-Sharif Al-

Tunisi. According to Samuel Krug, inhis essay for the research projectMaking War, Mapping Europe, thebooklet contextualised jihad accordingto contemporary politics, whereasTunisi’s brochure explained it as a bind-ing theological concept. Both texts werepublished in Berlin by the GermanSociety of Islamic Studies.

The fallouts of the two schemes,one by Germany and the other by theUS, were completely different. Due tothe fact that Germany and theOttomans badly lost the war, secularMuslim nationalism and hybrid Leftistideas completely sidelined the jihadistfervour roused by German propagan-da. German and Ottoman defeatsstrengthened secular nationalist narra-tives in Muslim countries and discard-ed theocratic ideas.

On the other hand, as Britishauthor Jonathan Steele demonstrates inhis 2011 book, Ghosts of Afghanistan,even though it was the collapsingSoviet economy that forced Sovietforces to leave Afghanistan and then thestopping of aid to the Government thatit left behind in Kabul, the US andPakistan spun the Soviet departure tomean a “victory of faith against com-munism.” It was this perception that saw

militant propaganda devised by the USto linger in the region. No wonder then,when the US forces invaded Kabul totopple the Taliban regime in 2001, theyfound madrasas still using textbooksthat the US had circulated in the1980s. What’s more, according to aDecember 2014 report in TheWashington Post, despite the fact that,ever since 2002 ,Unicef in Afghanistandestroyed almost half a million of thesebooks, many were still being taught tochildren in areas under the control ofTaliban insurgents.

In 2015, Pakistani soldiers foundsimilar textbooks in seminaries andschools in areas that were once domi-nated by extremist groups. Thesegroups were ousted through a militaryoperation. In other words, until 2015,textbooks authored and published inthe US in the 1980s to glorify “holy war”in the minds of young Muslims werestill being used in various seminariesand schools of the region.

Some commentators suspect manyof these tomes are still out there. Andthey are expected to make a full come-back if (and/or when) the Taliban man-age to return to power after the immi-nent departure of US forces.

(Courtesy Dawn)

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Coimbatore: A 90-year-old mastertailor from nearby Pollachi has a sur-prise gift for US President DonaldTrump during his two- day visit toIndia — a white khadi shirt stitched byhim.

VS Vishwanathan hit upon the ideaafter seeing Trump on television manytimes and in photographs and hasexpressed confidence that the USPresident would accept it and appre-ciate his gesture, family memberssaid.

The shirt has been sent to thePrime Minister’s Office in Delhi,marked to the US Embassy, they said.

Vishwanathan had gifted suchshirts to various political leaders,including former Tamil Nadu ChiefMinisters, the late K Kamaraj and CNAnnadurai and also former PresidentR Venkataraman, his family said.

He once ran a tailoring shop butdoes not do so now due to old age.]

At present, he trains budding tai-lors free of cost, they said. PTI

Darbhanga/Sasaram: Seven people,including three of a family, were killedand 15 others were injured in two roadaccidents in Bihar's Darbhanga andRohtas districts on Sunday.

In the first incident, three personswere killed and three others wereinjured when their car collided with aroad divider on NH 57 and overturnednear Kakarghati village in Darbhangadistrict, Deputy Superintendent ofPolice (DSP), Darbhanga, Anoj Kumarsaid.

Of the six persons, five were of thesame family, while one was a familyfriend.

Three of them died on the spot, theofficial said, adding the three injuredhave been admitted to the DarbhangaMedical College and Hospital.

The deceased have been identifiedas Raju Jha (45), his mother Rekha Devi(75) and sister Madhu Kumari (22), theDSP said.

Jha's wife, his three-year-old sonand a family friend were injured in theincident.

The family was going to theirnative village in Saharsa fromMuzaffarpur to celebrate the boy'sbirthday, police said.

In another incident, four persons,

including a woman, were killed, whilea dozen other passengers were injuredwhen the bus carrying them collidedhead-on with an orange-laden trucknear Auwa village on NH 2.

The incident happened under thejurisdiction of Shivsagar police stationin Rohtas district, police said.

“The deceased have been identifiedas Vikram Pal (65), Reshma Khatoon(55), Mukhtar Khan (42), Ajit Kumar(38),” Satyendra Satyarthi, SHO,Shivsagar police station said.

Both the vehicles overturned afterthe collision, he said, adding the privatebus was on its way to Sasaram fromBhabhua, while the truck was movingin the opposite direction.

Sasaram civil surgeon JanardanSharma said four bodies have beenbrought to Sadar hospital for post-mortem. PTI

Jammu: Accusing the Jammu& Kashmir administration offailure to address the basicissues of the people, NationalPanthers Party (NPP) onSunday said the public werefatigued with the ‘bureaucrat-ic and proxy’ rule and called forearly restoration of democracyin the Union Territory.

NPP chairman and formerminister Harsh Dev Singh saidelected representatives alonecould appreciate the concernsof the public as against the “out-side bureaucrats” who hardlyhave any accountability to thepeople.

“The general masses werefatigued with the bureaucraticrule. There is a need to end theproxy rule (of BJP) and earlyrestoration of democracy in the

erstwhile State,” he saidaddressing a public meeting inDomana and Gho Manhasanhere.

He said the advisors toLieutenant Governor G CMurmu and secretaries wereorganising 'public hearing'campaigns but these had “failedto inspire the people in view oftheir lack of productivity”.

“The cosmetic public hear-ing exercise by the advisors andsecretaries and the sojourns ofcentral ministers had failed toinspire the masses who missedthe much needed delivery onthe ground,” Singh said.

He appealed the LtGovernor to put on the officialwebsite of various departments,the details of representationsreceived in various public inter-

action programmes, issues discussed therein andaction taken in pursuancethereof so as to make the 'pub-lic hearings' relevant and mean-ingful.

Claiming that bureaucrat-ic rule in the erstwhile state hadproved a “flop show”, Singhclaimed people were fast losingfaith in the present dispensa-

tion which had failed to addresseven their basic concerns.

“With people across thenew UT protesting on a day-to-day basis for uninterruptedpower and adequate water sup-ply, restoration of roads andother essential services, theredid not appear to be any tak-ers for their shrill cries,” he said.

The NPP leader said thepublic interaction campaigns ofadvisors and secretaries hadalso proved to be “exercises infutility”, like the two successive'Back to Village' programmesearlier.

Decrying the withdrawalof election notification forvacant panchayat seats afterhaving announced the polldates, Singh said there wereseveral other instances to showthat the present regime wasmoving in fits and startsaccompanied by reverses.

“People were repeatedlyassured of domicile law for J&Kin public meetings by helms-men and BJP leaders only to betold in the Parliament that theCentre had no proposal in thisregard,” he said. PTI

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Jaisalmer: Three dalit youths wereassaulted after being accused of steal-ing donkeys in Jaisalmer district, thethird such incident to come to light inRajsthan in recent days.

Five persons have been arrested andthree detained after a video of the inci-dent surfaced, police said on Sunday.

The incident occurred on February15 in Rama village of Fatehgarh tehsilof the district.

The youths were thrashed withsticks and kicked by nearly a dozen peo-ple for stealing donkeys. They were laterhanded over to Sangarh police.

“Five persons have been arrestedand three minors have been detainedso far. A case has been registered in thematter under sections of SC/ST Act andfurther investigation in the matter ison,” Station House Officer (SHO) ofSangarh police station Ugam Raj Sonisaid.

Similar incidents had come tolight in Nagaur and Barmer

A chilling video of a man beingbeaten up brutally in Barmer alleged-ly for committed a theft had gone viralhere, prompting the police to arrest aman and detain another on Friday fortheir alleged roles in the crime.

The video surfaced on Thursdayclose on the heels of brutal assault ontwo Dalit youths on similar allegation

of theft in Nagaur.The Barmer incident occurred on

January 29.Police have arrested at least seven

persons in connection with the Nagaurcase which occurred on February 16.

The Dalit men were beaten up,stripped and tortured by staffers of amotorcycle service agency in Karanuvillage after accusing them of com-mitting theft.

In the video, a group of men is seenthrashing two persons with rubberbelts. They later dipped a piece of clothwrapped on a screwdriver in petrol andinserted it in the private parts of one ofthe victims.

The incidents have triggered apolitical storm in Rajasthan with theBJP attacking the ruling Congress.

Union minister Arjun RamMeghwal has alleged that the AshokGehlot-led Congress government isunable to rein in crime in Rajasthan.Meghwal, who is an MP from Bikaner,had accused the police of manipulat-ing the Nagaur case. PTI

Ahmedabad: India's culturaldiversity along with rich tradi-tions of Gujarat will be on fulldisplay during the roadshow ofUS President Donald Trumpand Prime Minister NarendraModi in Ahmedabad and theirjoint address at a cricket stadi-um here on Monday.

Replicas of historic places inGujarat are also being placed atstrategic locations along theroadshow route.

Dance groups and singersfrom different parts of the coun-try, including Gujarat, will stageperformances on the roadshowroute as well as the newly-builtcricket stadium in Motera areaof the city, officials said onSunday.

Performers from 28 Stateshave been allotted stages erect-ed along the roadshow route,where the two leaders will begreeted by people on both sidesof the road.

There will also be a 'Garba'performance, the traditionalGujarati dance, on one of the

stages, they said.The performances will pro-

vide a glimpse of the country'scultural diversity, the officialssaid.

Besides, folk and Bollywoodsingers will also perform on astage set up at the Motera stadi-um for the 'Namaste Trump'event, where Trump and Modiwill address a gathering of overone lakh people.

Bollywood singers KailashKher and Parthiv Gohil, andGujarati folk singers likeKirtidan Gadhvi, Gita Rabari,

Purushottam Upadhyay andSairam Dave will perform at thestadium, officials of the GujaratCricket Associationsaid.

Students of variousGovernment and private schoolshave also been roped-in to per-form at the cultural events. Theywere asked to practice for theevent over a week in advance, anofficial said.

Replicas of historic placesfrom Gujarat are being placed atstrategic locations along theroute of the roadshow. PTI

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Aday before US PresidentDonald Trump's visit to

Ahmedabad, a makeshift VVIPentry gate erected outside thenewly-built cricket stadium inMotera area here collapsed dueto gusty winds on Sunday morn-ing, an official said.

The entire incident wasrecorded by a bystander andaired on local television chan-nels.

The makeshift entry gatewas made of welded steel rodsand covered in flex banners.

After sometime, a portion ofanother makeshift gate structureat the stadium's main entrancealso collapsed due to the windyweather, another officialsaid.

No one was injured in boththe incidents and work wasunderway to put the structures

back in place, he said.“The (VVIP) entry gate col-

lapsed when fabrication workwas going on. It was not a majorincident. No one was injured inthe incident,” said special com-missioner of police, CrimeBranch, Ajay Tomarsaid.

President Trump and PrimeMinister Narendra Modi willparticipate in a roadshow hereon Monday and later address the'Namaste Trump' event at theSardar Patel Stadium in Moteraarea where over one lakh peopleare expected to bepresent.

The stadium has alreadyreceived 'Building Use' permis-sion from the AhmedabadMunicipal Corporation, an offi-cial earlier said.

It is the world's largest sta-dium with a capacity to accom-modate 1.10 lakh spectators.

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Tamil Nadu Chief MinisterK Palaniswami on Sunday

ordered �2 lakh as assistance to a class IX girl stu-dent, a space enthusiast, forsuccessfully qualifying in anonline test to visit America'sspace agency NASA and par-ticipate in an internationalconference.

The student V Abinayastudying in Namakkal districtgot through the exam held byfirms here and in America, theChief Minister, in a statement,said adding the opportunity tovisit NASA and take part in aglobal space science sympo-sium is a “victory for her tal-ent.”

Wishing her many moresuccesses in space science, Palaniswami laudedher for the “achievement and toencourage younger generation, I have ordered �2lakh assistance from the ChiefMinister's Public ReliefFund.”

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Over 10,000 policemen fromdifferent parts of Gujarat

have been deployed at strategiclocations in Ahmedabad aspart of the elaborate securityarrangements for US PresidentDonald Trump's visit here onMonday, officials said.

The massive police deploy-ment is in addition to officialsof the United States SecretService, and India's eliteNational Security Guards(NSG) and Special ProtectionGroup who would also beguarding the US president'svisit.

The Secret Service agentsalong with other US securitypersonnel have already arrivedwith their equipment and vehi-cles in at least four cargo planesduring the last oneweek.

Trump and Prime MinisterNarendra Modi will take part

in a 22-km roadshow from theAhmedabad international air-port and then proceed for the'Namaste Trump' event at thenewly— built Sardar PatelStadium in the city's Moteraarea, where over one lakh peo-ple are expected to be present.

Police will be using theanti-drone technology to neu-tralise any suspicious drone onthe route, officials said, addingthat an anti-sniper team of theNSG will also be stationedalong the roadshow route,starting from the airport till theMotera stadium via Indirabridge.

With the help of sophisti-cated hand-held devices, theentire route has been scannedseveral times by the BombDetection and Disposal Squad.

Police and other securityagencies have also conducted arehearsal on the entire road-show route using over 100

vehicles, they said.Along with police person-

nel, who will be led by 25 IPSofficers, teams of the RapidAction Force, State ReservePolice, Chetak Commando andAnti-Terrorist Squad are alsodeployed at strategic locations.

Before the US president'sarrival, at least four C17Globemaster cargo planes ofthe US Air Force have landedat the Ahmedabad interna-tional airport with securityand communication equip-ment, Trumps' official heli-copter 'Marine One' and amammoth SUV-like vehicle.

The giant SUV, whichwould be part of Trump's cav-alcade during his 22-km longroadshow on February 24, isknown as WHCA Roadrunner.WHCA stands for WhiteHouse CommunicationsAgency.

Agra (UP): Walls are being adorned with paintingsreflecting the Brij culture and architectural heritageof Agra, victorian-style lamp posts installed and thelawns of the iconic Taj Mahal bedecked with colour-ful blooms as the historic city gears up to welcomeUS President Donald Trump.

Trump is slated to arrive in Agra on Mondayevening after attending the mega 'Namaste Trump'event at the newly built Motera cricket stadium inAhmedabad.

The city administration is all geared up for thebig day and preparations are in full swing to pre-sent the “best face of Agra”.

“We are fully prepared, and we wish to presentthe best of Agra to the US President and his dele-gation. At the Kheria airport, upon his arrival,expected at about 4:30 pm, hundreds of artists willwelcome him with 'mayur nritya',” Agra's DivisionalCommissioner Anil Kumar told PTI.

Security has been stepped up in the city aheadof Trump's visit, his first to India. His daughterIvanka, son-in-law Jared Kushner and a galaxy oftop US officials will be part of the high-level dele-gation accompanying him during his visit to Indiaon February 24 and 25.

In Agra, the Trump family will spend about anhour at the Taj Mahal before sunset. They will thenleave for Delhi. PTI

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US President Donald Trump will be wel-comed by Uttar Pradesh Governor

Anandiben Patel and Chief Minister YogiAdityanath on his arrival at the airport in Agrawhere hundreds of artistes will perform, a topofficial said on Sunday.

The city has been decked up to welcomethe American president who will visit India onFebruary 24-25. He will visit the Taj Mahal inthe evening after arriving here on Monday fromAhmedabad, before leaving for Delhi.

“The UP governor and chief minister willwelcome US President Trump at the Kheria air-port. However, they will not accompany himto the Taj Mahal. The governor and the chiefminister would also be at the airport to sendhim off,” Agra District Magistrate (DM)Prabhu N Singh told PTI.

Trump's convoy route from the airport tothe Taj Mahal is about 13 km, and along theway thousands of artistes will welcome himwith special performances. “At the airport,about 250 artistes will do special perfor-mances reflecting the beauty and culture ofUttar Pradesh.

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Jamui (Bihar): A top Maoistcarrying a total reward of �11lakh on his head died in thecustody of Bihar police hoursafter he was brought fromJharkhand, a senior officer saidon Sunday.

Siddhu Koda, a 40-year-oldCPI (Maoist) zonal comman-der, died at a hospital where hewas admitted late Saturdaynight after he complained ofpain in chest and abdomen,Deputy Inspector General ofPolice Manu Maharaj said.

Koda, who hailed fromChakai block of Jamui dis-trict, was arrested Saturdaymorning from a railway stationin Jharkhand's Dumka by anSTF team comprising police-men from Patna andJamui.

He was wanted in about 70serious cases including murder,robbery, kidnapping and extor-tion, Maharaj said.

After being brought here,Koda was interrogated, theDIG said. Based on the infor-mation he provided, raids were

conducted in various parts ofnaxal-affected Munger districtleading to the seizure of alarge number of arms andammunition, Maharaj said.

The Maoist, who carried areward of �1 lakh in Bihar and�10 lakh in Jharkhand, com-plained of severe pain in chestand abdomen around 11 pm onSaturday.

He was taken to JamuiSadar Hospital where he died.Since he died in police custody,the post-mortem examinationwas conducted in presence ofa magistrate as per rules, theDIG said.

Maharaj did not divulgethe details of the post-mortemreport.

He said Koda's family hasbeen informed of his death andhis body “may be disposed ofin accordance with law” by thepolice if nobody comes forwardto claim his mortal remains.

Two automatic rifles — anAK 47 and an INSAS — havebeen seized from Koda at thetime of his arrest. PTI

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Mumbai: BJP leader DevendraFadnavis on Sunday allegedthat NCP chief Sharad Pawarwas trying to implicate‘Hindutvawadis’ (Hindutvasupporters) in the KoregaonBhima violence case despite theabsence of any concrete evi-dence.

Fadnavis made the allega-tion while talking to reportersa day before the Budget sessionof the Maharashtra legislaturecommences.

“During my tenure, thestate home department hadcarried out a thorough probeinto the Koregaon Bhima vio-lence case,” the former chiefminister, who also held thehome portfolio then, said.

“NCP chief Sharad Pawar’sfirst reaction on the violencewas that Hindutvawadis werebehind it. But police did notfind any evidence to back uphis claims,” he said.

“The entire investigationand its progress has not beenobjected either by the BombayHigh Court or by the SupremeCourt. Still by setting up a sep-arate SIT, Pawar wants to impli-cate Hindutvawadis in theKoregaon Bhima violence inci-dent,” Fadnavis alleged.

According to Pune police,the Elgar Parishad conclaveheld in Pune on December 31,2017, was supported by Maoistsand inflammatory speechesmade at the event led to casteviolence at Koregaon Bhimawar memorial in the district thenext day.

Right wing leaders MilindEkbote and Sambhaji Bhide areaccused in Koregaon Bhimacase.

The Pune Police havearrested Left-leaning activistsSudhir Dhawale, Rona Wilson,

Surendra Gadling, MaheshRaut, Shoma Sen, ArunFerreira, Vernon Gonsalves,Sudha Bharadwaj and VaravaraRao in the Elgar Parishad casefor their alleged Maoist links.

Pawar had earlier termedthe arrest of activists in theElgar Parishad case as “wrong”and “vengeful”, and demandedthat a Special InvestigationTeam (SIT) be set up to probethe action taken by the Punepolice. Replying to a queryover it, Fadnavis said, “TheMaharashtra police have founda strong evidence that urbanNaxal issue is not restricted toMaharashtra alone. It hasspread in other parts of thecountry as well. Hence hand-ing over its probe to the NIA isa welcome move ofMaharashtra Chief MinisterUddhav Thackeray.” PTI

Mumbai: Senior BJP leader DevendraFadnavis on Sunday attacked NCPchief Sharad Pawar over his demandfor creation of a trust for constructionof a mosque in Ayodhya on the linesof a similar body for Ram temple.

Speaking to reporters here on theeve of the Budget session of theMaharashtra legislature, Fadnavisasked why Pawar wanted to build amosque in the name of a invader likeBabar.

“Babar (the first emperor ofMughal dynasty in Indian sub-conti-nent) was an invader. Why on theearth did NCP chief Sharad Pawarwant to erect a new mosque in thename of Babar? If Muslims want aplace for prayer, they should have onebut why in the name of Babar?” askedFadnavis, the Leader of Opposition inthe Maharashtra Legislative Assembly.

Speaking in Lucknow onFebruary 20, Pawar demanded theCentral Government to form a trustfor building a mosque in Ayodhyasimilar to the trust to oversee the con-struction of Ram temple.

“I also wonder why Pawardemanded a trust for a mosque when

he knows that a Waqf has to beformed for the same,” Fadnavis said.

A five-judge bench of theSupreme Court in November 2019ruled unanimously in favor of Ramtemple in Ayodhya. The court hadsaid the whole disputed land spreadover 2.7-acre will be handed over toa trust formed by the government,which will examine the constructionof Ram temple at the place.

Prime Minister Narendra Modiannounced on February 5 the for-mation of ‘Shri Ram JanambhoomiTirath Kshetra’ trust which wouldoversee the construction of RamTemple. PTI

Malda (WB): WBPCC presi-dent Somen Mitra on Sundaysaid the Congress will have aseat-sharing arrangement withthe Left Front for the WestBengal civic polls but will notform an alliance with it.

Going by the formula, theCongress and the Left Frontconstituents will field theircandidates from their respec-tive strongholds, Mitra toldreporters here.

Reacting to Mitra’sremarks, CPI(M) legislatureparty leader Sujan Chakrabortytold PTI in Kolkata, “We havealways called for putting up ajoint fight to defeat both theBJP and the TrinamoolCongress in West Bengal.”

Mentioning that the StateElection Commission (SEC)should ensure that civic elec-tions are held in a free and fairmanner, Mitra said, theCongress is in favour of usingelectronic voting machines and

not ballot papers for the civicpolls.

The grand old party has noproblems about the timing ofthe polls, the WBPCC presi-dent said.

However, the dates shouldbe fixed with due considerationabout the schedule of differentboard exams, he said.

“We have conveyed ourstand to the SEC,” Mitra said.The state secondary boardexam which started onFebruary 18 will end onFebruary 27. The higher sec-ondary examination will beheld between March 12 toMarch 27.

Restrictions are in place onthe use of loudspeakers due tothe examinations. The stateBJP had urged the state electioncommissioner to be given“ample time” to campaign forthe municipal polls as the stateboard exams will continue tillthe end of March. PTI

Gorakhpur (UP): The mater-nal uncle of Dr Kafeel Khan,who was recently arrested forallegedly making inflammato-ry statements during anti-CAAprotests, was shot dead in frontof his house at Bankatichak inRajghat area here, police saidon Sunday.

Dr Nusratullah Warsi akaDada (55), a property dealer,was shot dead on Saturdaynight at about 10:45 pm and anFIR against two people wasfiled in this connection on awritten complaint of his fami-ly members.

According to police, itappears to be a case of murderdue to monetary and propertydispute and they are searching for both theaccused.

Dr Kafeel Khan, suspend-ed doctor of Gorakhpur BRDMedical College, was last

month arrested under chargesof giving a provocative speechduring a protest against theCAA and NRC at AligarhMuslim University and waslater charged with the NationalSecurity Act.

Warsi on Saturday eveninghad gone to his lawyer SirajTariq’s house, a few metresaway from his own house, andwas returning home on footwhen a man shot him in hishead, killing him on the spot.

“On the written complaintof family members, case ofmurder against oneImammuddin and Anil Sonkarhas been registered and policehas initiated probe and issearching for both the accused.Police met the women in theirhouse and is interrogatingthem,” Circle Officer VP Singh said. PTI

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The MaharashtraGovernment on Sunday

said that 81 out of 83 peopleadmitted in isolation wards forsuspected exposure to the novelcoronavirus have tested nega-tive.

While 80 of them havebeen discharged, three otherscontinue to be hospitalised.

The outbreak of the virus,officially called Covid-19, wasfirst detected in Wuhan inChina in December and hassince affected thousands ofpeople across the globe.

“Out of the 83 persons, 81have tested negative for thecoronavirus infection. Of these80 have been discharged.

Three persons are underobservation in Mumbai’sKasturba Hospital,” a statehealth department official saidon Sunday.

People coming from noti-fied nations including China,Hong Kong, Thailand,Singapore, Japan, Malaysia,South Korea, Nepal, Indonesiaand Vietnam are being moni-tored as part of the protocol inplace to tackle the outbreak, headded. Since the outbreak of thevirus in China and its spreadacross the globe through trav-ellers, the Maharashtra gov-ernment, acting on the guide-lines issued by the Centre, hasbeen placing people in isolationwards and screening thosearriving at the Mumbai international airport fromplaces affected by the outbreak.

Since January 18, a total of48,295 passengers have beenscreen at Mumbai airport.

Officials said a 14-day fol-low-up of 207 of 291 peoplewho arrived in the state fromcovid-19 affected areas hadbeen completed.

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With the municipal electionsknocking at the door, the

Bengal Government has decided toeffect a fat hike to the pension ofretired school teachers.

The new pension rate will applyto the teachers who have retiredbefore January 2016 and the orderwill apply to the family pensionersand teachers of Government-aidedschools who have already been get-ting pension post December 2015.

According to sources in the StateEducation Department, the neworder will imply about 20 percent risein the pension of those who are in theage group of 80-85 years. Those whoare above 85 years and less than 90years will get a hike of 30 percentsources said.

In any case the Government haseffected a minimum revised basicpension at �8,500, sources quotingnotification said adding the neworder will be effective from April 1,this year.

“Bengal Government is facinggreat financial hardship … but stillChief Minister Mamata Banerjeehas been pleased to allow a hike inpension of retired school teachers,”State Education Minister ParthaChatterjee said adding “no other Statehave shown such genuine concern forthe retired teachers the way we havedone, despite the limited financialcapacity.”

Incidentally, Chief Minister haswritten to the Narendra ModiGovernment to clear dues worth�50,000 crore.

She wrote to the Centre abouthow there has been a “steady reduc-tion” in the central funds apart frominordinate delays in the release ofsuch funds. “I write to you with deepconcern regarding steady reductionof central funds to the state and alsoinordinate delay in release of fundsto us from the Government of India,”Banerjee wrote reminding how theCentre was yet to release a grant ofRs 50,000 crore to the State.

This “extraordinary situation” iscreating major difficulties in meeting

obligations for the welfare of the state,she said.

Reminding that the delay inrelease of central funds which weredue to the State was creating hardshipin implementing the schemes thatwere essential for a welfare the lettersaid, “you will, no doubt, appreciatethat both the central and the StateGovernments are expected to fulfillthe constitutional obligations and thecommitments to the people, so thatrespective Governments run smooth-ly … However West Bengal is beingdeprived of the huge outstandingdues.”

Bengal BJP president DilipGhosh on Sunday reacted to the StateGovernment’s repeated grudgeagainst non-payment of its dues bythe Centre saying that “the ChiefMinister will only write letters andnot visit Delhi personally as she willhave to provide the accounts of theamount received and spent over theyears He termed Banerjee’s letter tothe Centre a “political ploy to befoolpeople” ahead of civic polls in theSstate.

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A16-year study conduct-ed by the researchers of

Indian Institute ofTechnology, Kharagpur,have made a frighteningrevelation that rampantdeforestation and construc-tion have made Kolkata anextremely heated zone —the“hottest island” of the coun-try.

The study says that rapidurbanisation and deforestation havemade the City of Joy the “hottest of allthe urban heated islands.” While anextended spell of winter has still keptthe Kolkatans away from the “burningreality” a sweltering and harsh summeris awaiting the people of the citywhich till a couple of decades agowould not see the summer temperatureclimb beyond 36-37 degrees.

Unregulated urbanisation has letKolkata’s temperature climb more than2 degrees in the past three decades,experts say. A study conducted by IIT-k researchers between 2001 and 2017have revealed that while day and nighttemperature of the urban centresincluding Kolkata has gone up remark-

ably the difference between day andnight temperatures has decreasedimplying a rise in mean temperature,experts said.

This is a trend in 44 big cities of thecountry including Delhi, Mumbai,Chennai, Bengaluru, Pune, Guwahatietc the study has said. While averagetemperature of the other cities haverisen by about 2 degrees in the past 30years that of Kolkata has gone up evenmore than that the study conducted byIIT’s Centre for Oceans Reverse,Atmosphere and Land Science said.

The problem is going to rise andmultiply the experts have cautioned, ifnecessary measures are not taken withimmediate effect.

Mumbai: Hours after the BJP criticisedThe Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA)dispensation over the law and order sit-uation, Chief Minister UddhavThackeray hit back at the party sayingthat those targeting his Governmentshould first see what is happeningunder their watch.

He asked why no “terrorist”(assailant) involved in the attack onstudents at the Jawaharlal NehruUniversity (JNU) last month has beenarrested so far by the BJP-ruled Centre.

Thackeray was talking to reporterson the eve of the Budget session of theMaharashtra legislature.

Earlier in the day, the State BJP crit-icised his government over the recent inci-dents of crime against women.

When asked about the BJP’s allega-tions, Thackeray said, “Every crimeagainst women is condemnable and nota single such incident should occuragain.”

“While targeting us, the BJP shouldalso see what is happening in the Statesruled by it. Especially in the centrally-ruled New Delhi, where terrorists stormed

the JNU and beat the students,” he said.“I am going to call those assailants as

terrorists. Despite so many days, not a sin-gle assailant has been arrested so far,” hesaid.

“Those targeting us on unjustifiedgrounds should first see what is happen-ing under their watch and then commentabout us,” Thackeray added.Thirty-fourpeople, including students and faculty,were injured on January 5 when a maskedmob entered the JNU campus andattacked them with rods and sledgeham-mers. PTI

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As the Budget session of theMaharashtra Legislature

gets underway on Monday, theMaha Vikas Aghadi (MVA)Government will put its bestfoot forward on the first day byreleasing the first list of farmloan waiver beneficiaries, evenas the Opposition BJP will goall out to drive a wedgebetween the ruling Shiv Senaand its alliance partners —NCP and Congress — over thecontentious issues like theCAA, NPR and VeerSavarkar.

Addressing a news confer-ence after the Opposition BJPboycotted the customary teahosted by him on the eve of theLegislature session, ChiefMinister Uddhav Thackeraysaid that as part of the first listof farm loan waiver, the StateGovernment will write offloans up to �2 lakh each takenby farmers across the State.

“Tomorrow, we willannounce the first list of list offarm loan waiver beneficiaries

with dues up to �2 lakh each.Unlike the previous BJP-ledGovernment (of which myparty was a part) which hadmade farm loan waiver withouthome work and did not executeits announcement, we haveplanned the loan waiverscheme well. We will completethe execution of the entireloan waiver process withinthree months,” Uddhav said.

Dismissing the criticismof his Government by theOpposition BJP on variouscounts, Uddhav said: “I do notthink it is necessary for me torespond to the issues raised bythe Opposition. Just because itcriticises the Government doesnot make it a good opposition.At a time when the governmentis doing good work, it isimproper on the Opposition’spart to say that theGovernment is not doing any-thing.”

Charging that theOpposition BJP could notstomach the fact the rulingMVA was providing a stablegovernment in the state,

Uddhav said: “Our is not a gov-ernment that is counting days.

The BJP is unable to stom-ach the fact that ours is a sta-ble government. We have notjust made promises, but we areimplementing out promises.The people in the state thinkthat it is their Government”.

“We are implementing apeople-friendly initiate likeShiv Bhojan Yojana ( �10 ameal scheme). Still theOpposition is criticising us.Here is a party (BJP) that didnot did anything good for thepeople when it was in power.We are getting good responsefor the Shiv Bhojan Yojana. Weare planning to enlarge thescope ofthis scheme in thecoming days,” the ChiefMinister said.

Among other things,Uddhav said that the stategovernment was planning tocome out with a legislationalong the lines of the the

Andhra Pradesh Criminal LawAmendment Act 2019 – betterknown as the Andhra PradeshDisha law, which stipulatesdeath sentences to convicts inrape cases within 21 days. “Wehave set a five-member officialcommittee to study the AndhraPradesh law and come outwith a report on the proposedlegislation that we intend out tointroduce in the StateLegislature,” he said.

Informed sources in theOpposition BJP said that itsleaders would go out all the wayto corner the Shiv Sena-NCP-Congress front Governmentover contentious likeCitizenship Amendment Act(CAA), National PopulationRegister (NPR) and VeerSavarkar.

Talking to media personsafter boycotting the session-evehosted by the Chief Minister,leader of the Opposition in theAssembly and senior BJP leaderDevendra Fadnavis — in an

apparent effort to exploit thedifferences among the rulingMVA partners on contentiousissues – dared Uddhav to movea resolution on the floor of theState Legislature to hail the con-tributions of Veer Savarkar onthe occasion of the latter’sdeath anniversary on February26”.

Slamming the UddhavThackeray dispensation for notbeing able to come grips withthe challenges facing his gov-ernment, Fadnavis said: “Threemonths have passed but theMVA Government is still in astate of confusion. It has notimplemented the promises itmade in the run-up to theAssembly elections. Though itannounced it would waive theloans of farmers. But, it has notbegun implementation of farmloan waiver scheme”.

“The Government has lostits control over the increasingatrocities against women. TheGovernment is not sensitive atall when it comes to womenissues. The government is try-ing to erode the morale of the

police force in the State...ThisGovernment has stayed theimplementation of variousdecisions taken by our gov-ernment like the water grid andour flagship schemes like GramSadak yojana and Jal YuktShivara. The Shiv Sena is notready to speak on the insultsbeing heaped by the NCP andCongress on the descendents ofMaratha warrior ChhatrapatiShivaji,” Fadnavis said.

On its part, the rulingMVA is preparing to dig upalleged irregularities in sever-al schemes, including Fadnavis’pet project “Jal Yukt Shivara”,implemented by the previousBJP-led saffron alliance gov-ernment. During the course ofthe budget session, the stategovernment is expected toeither order inquiries or comeout with details of corruptionin the earlier Government.

Available indications areanything to go by, both theHouses of the State Legislatureare expected to witness a lot offireworks during the budgetsession.

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(G�G�� 4�� E�� Patna: Schools in Bihar wouldsoon have ‘POCSO cells’ tohear complaints of sexual mis-conduct and exploitation, aGovernment official said hereon Sunday. Bihar EducationProject Council, an organiza-tion dedicated to achievingUniversal ElementaryEducation (UEE) in the State,had last week issued directionto all district education officersto set up POCSO cells inschools, with students amongothers as its members, she said.

“We have given directionsto the district education offi-cers (DEOs) to set up POCSOcells in all schools of the state,starting March 1...

“There will be a commit-tee headed by the headmasterin each school, which willlook into the complaints andtake necessary action, accord-

ing to the provisions ofPOCSO Act,” Kiran Kumari,special project officer, BiharEducation Project Council(BEPC), told PTI.

The Protection ofChildren from Sexual Offences(POCSO) Act, 2012 aims topunish those engaging in sex-ual crimes against children,while safeguarding their inter-ests at every stage of the judi-cial process.

In the first phase, the unitswould be established in sec-ondary schools, she said,adding that the model wouldbe later replicated in primaryand middle schools.

Each committee will havethe school principal or head-master, a senior school teacher,a panchayati raj representative,a girl student, a boy studentand a clerk as its members,Kumar explained.

“A student can eitherdirectly submit a written com-plaint of sexual exploitation ormisconduct to the committeeor leave it in the complaintbox, with or without men-tioning his or identity. Thecomplaint box will be openedonce every week.

“If the committee deemsfit, the complaint will be for-warded to the nearest policestation. It will be the panel’s jobto find out the identity of thecomplainant at the time oflodging of an FIR. As perPOCSO rules, confidentialityof the complainant will bemaintained,” she said

Noting that the “cellswould work at two levels”, theBEPC state programme officersaid awareness would be gen-erated about sexual harass-ment in schools, as part of theinitiative. PTI ��C�)#'��.�'��"��'��#��.�'��C�� 4

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Senior officials of the telecomdepartment and other key

ministries met on Sunday todiscuss urgent relief measuresthat can be extended to the tele-com industry, which is battlingan unprecedented crisis onaccount of massive statutorydues it owes the government.

The meeting, held at theDepartment of Telecom, lastedfor over an hour and is said tohave deliberated on optionsbefore the Government to pro-vide much-needed lifeline to

the AGR-hit industry.Telecom czar and

Chairman of Bharti Airtel SunilMittal had last week made anappeal to the government forcut in levies and taxes to pullthe sector out of what he haddescribed as an “unprecedent-ed crisis”.

Telecom department offi-cials remained tightlipped afterhigh-level government meetingon Sunday, where officials fromNITI Aayog and FinanceMinistry are said to have beenpresent. DoT Secretary AnshuPrakash remained unavailable

for comments. The crucialmeeting comes at a time whenthe telecom companies arestaring at �1.47 lakh crore inunpaid dues — �92,642 crorein unpaid licence fee andanother �55,054 crore in out-standing spectrum usagecharges.

Of the estimated dues thatinclude interest and penalty forlate payments, Airtel andVodafone Idea owe about 60per cent.

While Airtel has raised $3billion in last few months andis expected to have sufficient

funds to tide over the AGR cri-sis, Vodafone Idea — that hasonly paid just seven per cent ofits total �53,000 crore statuto-ry dues — remains deeply vul-nerable.

The Government, mean-while, is looking to strike a bal-ance between complying withthe Supreme Court order onAGR dues, ensuring health ofthe sector and safeguardingconsumer interest.

Both Mittal and VILChairman Kumar MangalamBirla continued to meet topgovernment functionariesthroughout last week to seekprompt measures that wouldoffer a breather to the sector.

A top Government officialhad said recently that attemptsare being made to balance theneed for health of the sector,consumer interest while com-plying with the Supreme Courtorder on statutory dues.

Although the official had

not elaborated, sector watchershad said the statement alludesto the government keen onensuring adequate competi-tion by retaining the presentthree-plus-one model of com-petition (three private players

and one public sector compa-ny). The statutory dues aroseafter the Supreme Court, inOctober last year, upheld thegovernment’s position onincluding revenue from non-core businesses in calculating

the annual Adjusted GrossRevenue (AGR) of telecomcompanies, a share of which ispaid as licence and spectrumfee to the exchequer.

The Supreme Court earli-er this month rejected a plea by

mobile carriers such as BhartiAirtel and Vodafone Idea Ltdfor extension in the paymentschedule and asked all of themto deposit an estimated �1.47lakh crore in past dues for spec-trum and licences.

It threatened to initiatecontempt proceedings againsttop executives of these firms fornon-payment.

Some telecom firms arealready struggling with mount-ing losses and debt and theadditional liability has raisedconcerns of them defaulting onexisting loans.

Vodafone Idea has so farpaid only �3,500 crore in twotranches. Airtel has paid�10,000 crore out of its esti-mated liability of over �35,000crore. Tata Teleservices haspaid �2,197 crore, the entireoutstanding it believes to havearisen after the October rulingof the apex court for calculat-ing dues.

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Terming “test checks” pro-posed by the Government

on telcos’ AGR arithmetic asstandard audit procedure,Industry body COAI has saidthe DoT needs to ensure con-sistency among its different cir-cles on calculation of dues tominimise any differences.

Cellular Operators’Association of India (COAI)also cautioned that any deci-sion to encash bank guaranteeswill be “disastrous” for thetelecom industry, which onlyhas three private players.

“Any move to encash bankguarantees will precipitate analready precarious situation,”COAI Director General, RajanMathews told PTI.

Mathews termed the ‘testchecks’ being proposed by thetelecom department to exam-ine deviation in calculation ofdues by companies as a “stan-dard audit procedure”.

He pointed out that whileamounts need to be finalised assoon as possible, operatorstoo should be given a fairopportunity to explain thedeviations in calculation.

“There should be consis-tency amongst all LSAs(Licensed Service Areas) of theDoT (Department ofTelecommunications) on howthe amounts are calculated, sothe differences are minimised,”

Mathews added. TheGovernment has made it clearthat it will verify the compa-nies’ claims on AGR math andexamine any deviations fromits own calculation, throughrandom ‘test checks’ beforeMarch 17.

The Government will con-duct ‘test check’ for any oneyear (of telcos’ dues) to exam-ine variances between tele-com companies’ assessmentand the government’s own cal-culation of AGR liabilities.

The test check will happenfor all telecom firms, but couldstart with those, which havealready claimed they havemade full and final settlementtowards their statutory liabil-ities, like Tata Teleservices.

In all, as many as 15 enti-ties owe the government �1.47lakh crore — �92,642 crore inunpaid licence fee and anoth-er �55,054 crore in outstand-ing spectrum usage charges.

These dues arose after theSupreme Court, in October lastyear, upheld the government’sposition on including revenuefrom non-core businesses incalculating the annual adjust-ed gross revenue (AGR) of tele-com companies, a share ofwhich is paid as licence andspectrum fee to the exchequer.

The Supreme Court earli-er this month rejected a plea bymobile carriers such as BhartiAirtel and Vodafone Idea Ltd

for extension in the paymentschedule and asked them todeposit an estimated �1.47lakh crore in past dues forspectrum and licences.

The apex court hadwarned that it will initiatecontempt proceedings againsttop executives of these firmsfor non-payment.

Some telecom firms arealready struggling with mount-ing losses and debt, and theadditional liability has raisedconcerns of them defaulting onexisting loans. Of the estimat-ed dues that include interestand penalty for late payments,Airtel and Vodafone Idea oweabout 60 per cent. VodafoneIdea is confronted with totalAGR dues of over �53,000crore. Of this, it has so far paidonly �3,500 crore in twotranches earlier this week.

Airtel has so far paid�10,000 crore out of its esti-mated liability of over �35,000crore.Tata Teleservices has paid�2,197 crore, the entire out-standing it believes to havearisen after the October rulingof the apex court for calculat-ing dues.

Tata Teleservices and TataTeleservices Maharashtra havesubmitted to the governmentthe details of calculation insupport of its payment, butsources in the DoT said thatwide gap between the compa-ny’s calculations.

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Finance Minister NirmalaSitharaman on Sunday

apprised the G-20 countries onthe steps taken in the UnionBudget to open up India’s bondmarket.

During the FinanceMinisters & Central BankGovernors meeting in Riyadh,she outlined the efforts taken todeepen India’s bond marketsuch as removal of capital con-trols for identified categories ofG-Secs and increased FPI limiton corporate bond market inthe session on “FinancialResilience & Development” onthe second day of the confer-ence, the Finance Ministrysaid.

FPI limits with respect toinvestment in corporate bondsare proposed to be increased to15 per cent. This may be a steptowards local bond inclusion inglobal indices and interna-tionalisation of the rupee.

The Finance Minister’sannouncement should helpboost investments in the Indiandebt market, the Ministry said,adding Sitharaman looked for-ward to continued engagementwith the G20 on this agenda.

Hiking the FPI limit in cor-porate bonds and concession-al tax rate on interest incomeearned by FPIs are among thesteps that can increase capital flows into themarket.

To promote a deep and liq-uid market, the governmenthas announced that a nettinglegislation would be formulat-ed to expand the scope of thecorporate default swaps market.This would also significantlyhelp banks manage their capi-tal requirements and exposuremonitoring.

Sitharaman also congratu-lated the G20’s SaudiPresidency for identifyingdevelopment of capital marketsas a priority area.

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Following the KarnatakaHigh Court ordering a stay

on the anti-trust probe againste-commerce giants Amazonand Flipkart, the Confederationof All India Traders (CAIT) islikely to file a petition chal-lenging the stay in the SupremeCourt in the coming week.

Speaking to IANS, PraveenKhandelwal, National GeneralSecretary of CAIT said that thetrade body’s lawyers are cur-rently working on filing a peti-tion.

“I hope by Thursday orFriday we will be able to file thepetition. The lawyers arealready working on it,” he said.

“We can go to SupremeCourt, because that is the rightforum as the High Court hasgiven its order. Most likely, itwill be Supreme Court,”Khandelwal told IANS.

On February 14, theKarnataka High Court ordereda stay on the CCI probe intoviolation of competition lawsby e-commerce majors. Theorder came on the writ petitionfiled by Amazon seeking astay on the investigation.

The High Court was of theview that the ongoing investi-

gation by the EnforcementDirectorate (ED) should becompleted first. Last year, theED initiated insvestigationagainst both Amazon andFlipkart for alleged violation ofthe foreign exchange law.

The anti-trust body had inJanuary ordered an enquiryinto the operations of bothAmazon and Flipkart on mul-tiple counts, including deepdiscounts and exclusive tie-upswith preferred sellers.

Further, days after theKarnataka High Court ordereda stay, Walmart-backed Flipkartalso moved the court urging itto set aside the probe. In its writpetition, Flipkart InternetPrivate Ltd said that althoughthe High Court has ordered astay on the investigation, theprobe order of the CompetitionCommission of India (CCI)“deserves to be set aside”.

It said that the CCI direct-ed an investigation withoutthe existence of a “prima facie”case. It further said that theorder was passed in a pre-determined manner, by treat-ing allegations of abuse ofdominance as an anti-com-petitive agreement.

In its petition, Flipkart alsoquestioned the “bona fides” of

CAIT, which has been protest-ing against what it calls “deepdiscounts” by the e-commercemajors and reached out to theCCI and the governmentagainst them.

“The CCI is duty bound toact with caution, especially, inassessing the bona fides of theinformant. In this, the peti-tioner submits thatConfederation of All IndiaTraders has repeatedlyindulged in forum shoppingagainst the petitioner byapproaching various judicialforums, directly and through itssister entities raising exactly thesame baseless allegationsagainst the petitioner,” it said.

The organisation has timeand again written to and metCommerce Minister PiyushGoyal, among others, to regis-ter their protest against what itdescribes as deep discountingand unfair means by both theonline platforms, which hasimpacted the offline traders.CAIT has blamed both theplatforms of violating thenorms for foreign direct invest-ment (FDI).The traders bodyhad staged protests across Indiaduring the visit of AmazonCEO Jeff Bezos to India lastmonth.

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Finance Minister NirmalaSitharaman on Sunday said

the international communityhas a unique opportunity todesign a new international taxsystem to handle the chal-lenges of digitalisation with acost-efficient dispute preven-tion mechanism.

She called upon the G20countries to ensure that theconsensus solution being devel-oped by G20 inclusive frame-work for addressing tax chal-lenges arising from digitalisa-tion is truly inclusive, accord-ing to tweets by the FinanceMinistry.

The Finance Ministeremphasised on the need for acloser collaboration betweenrevenue agencies to investigatetax affairs of offenders whocross-borders for escaping taxinvestigation, a tweet said.

During the second day ofthe G20 Finance Ministers andCentral Bank GovernorsMeeting in Riyadh, Sitharamanhighlighted the efforts under-

taken by the Government ofIndia to deepen the corporatebond market, such as removalof capital controls for identifiedcategories of government secu-rities (G-Secs) and increasedForeign Portfolio Investment(FPI) limit on the corporatebond market.

The Finance Minister saidshe looked forward to contin-ued engagement with G20 onthis agenda.

According to the tweets,Sitharaman explained the stepsbeing taken to reform the cred-

it default swap market, chang-ing the method of buying andselling bonds electronicallythrough exchanges, and facil-itating on-tap issuances for all,among others, for furtherenabling greater investments inIndia’s bond market.

Speaking during the ses-sion on infrastructure invest-ment, Sitharaman welcomedthe efforts underway in G20 todevelop infrastructure tech-nology — the InfraTechAgenda.

However, she also cau-tioned that G20 should refrainfrom developing any commonprescriptive approach sincevarious countries are at variedstages of adoption of technol-ogy in infrastructure, accord-ing to the tweets.

The Minister highlightedsuccessful Indian experience inthe area of adoption of tech-nology in infrastructure such asFASTags. She also pointed outthe efforts being taken forinstallation of smart energymeters across India to reducerevenue leakages.

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Riyadh: The deadly coron-avirus epidemic could put analready fragile global economyrecovery at risk, theInternational Monetary Fundhead told G20 finance minis-ters and central bank governorson Sunday.

Global growth was poisedfor a modest rebound to 3.3 percent this year, up from 2.9 percent last year, IMF chiefKristalina Georgieva said at themeeting in the Saudi capital.

“The projected recovery...Is fragile,” Georgieva said.

“The COVID-19 virus -- aglobal health emergency -- has

disrupted economic activity inChina and could put the recov-ery at risk,” she said in a statement.

“I reported to the G20 thateven in the case of rapid con-tainment of the virus, growthin China and the rest of theworld would be impacted.”Alarm has been growing overthe new virus as Chineseauthorities lock down millionsof people to prevent its spread,with major knock-on effectseconomically. The virus hasnow claimed 2,345 lives inChina, cutting off transporta-tion, disrupting trade and fan-ning investor alarm as busi-

nesses are forced to close theirdoors. Georgieva told the two-day Riyadh gathering that theoutbreak would shave about 0.1percentage points from globalgrowth and constrain China’sgrowth to 5.6 per cent this year.

The IMF chief urged G20nations to cooperate to containthe spread of the virus.

“COVID-19 is a starkreminder of our interconnec-tions and the need to worktogether,” Georgieva said. “Inthis regard, the G20 is animportant forum to help putthe global economy on a moresound footing.” AFP

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The US has surpassed Chinato become India’s top trad-

ing partner, showing greatereconomic ties between the twocountries.

According to the data ofthe commerce ministry, in2018-19, the bilateral tradebetween the US and Indiastood at $87.95 billion.

During the period, India’stwo-way commerce with Chinaaggregated at $87.07 billion.

Similarly, during April-December 2019-20, the bilat-eral trade between the US andIndia stood at $68 billion. Itstood at $64.96 billion withChina in the same period.

Trade experts believe that

the trend will continue in thecoming years also as New Delhiand Washington are engaged infurther deepening the eco-nomic ties. An expert said thatif the countries will finalise afree trade agreement (FTA),then the bilateral trade wouldreach at different levels.

“FTA with US will be verybeneficial for India as the US isthe biggest market for domes-tic goods and services,”Federation of Indian Exportorganisations Director GeneralAjay Sahai said.

He said that India’s exportsas well as imports are increas-ing with the US, while withChina both are declining.

America is one of the fewcountries with which India

has a trade surplus. On theother hand, India has a hugetrade deficit with China.

In 2018-19, India has atrade surplus of $16.85 billionwith America, while it has adeficit of $53.56 billion with theneighbouring country.

The data showed thatChina was India’s top tradingpartner since 2013-14 till 2017-18. Before China, UAE was thecountry’s largest trading nation.

A top American businessadvocacy group has said that afree trade agreement betweenIndia and the US is a key toresolving their trade disputes asit will cover biggest irritants inties, including tariffs andmobility of Indian profession-als. Professor at Indian Institute

of Foreign Trade (IIFT) RakeshMohan Joshi said that Indiashould be a bit cautious whilenegotiating a trade pact withthe US in areas, including agri-culture and food products, asAmerica is the world’s largestproducer and exporter of cer-tain commodities like maizeand soybean.

“A trade deal between theUS and India would furtherincrease the trade between thetwo countries easing tariffrestriction and opening up ofbigger market for products.India is a major exporter ofsteel, steel products and alu-minium products with com-bined exports of $22.7 billionlast year.

“Steel exports to the US

have continued to decline andit went down from $372 mil-lion in 2017-18 to $247 millionlast year. This is only 2.5 percent of our overall $9.74 billionsteel export to the world,”Pawan Gupta, the Founderand CEO of online trade plat-form Connect2India observed.

Commenting on trade withChina, Gupta said despite thefall in volume exports to theAsian neighbour increased 25per cent last year to $16.7 bil-lion while imports decreased byaround 8 per cent to $70.3 bil-lion last year.

The major reduction inimports from India has been onelectrical machinery, equip-ment and apparatus category,the CEO said.

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Natural gas prices in Indiaare likely to be cut by a

steep 25 per cent beginningApril, in line with the slump inglobal rates, sources said.

The price of most of thenatural gas produced by state-owned ONGC and Oil IndiaLtd, which account for thebulk of India’s existing gas out-put, is likely to be cut to around$2.5 per million British thermalunit for the six-month periodbeginning April 1, from $3.23as of now.

This will be the secondreduction in six months andwill reduce rates to the lowestin two-and-half-years.

Sources said the price ofgas produced from difficultfields too is likely to be cut to$5.50 from $8.43 per mmBtu now.

Prices of natural gas, whichis used to produce fertiliser andgenerate electricity and is alsoconverted into CNG for use inautomobiles as fuel and cook-ing gas for households, are setevery six months — on April 1and October 1 each year.

The rates, besides dictatingthe price of urea, electricity andCNG, also decide the revenueof gas producers such as Oiland Natural Gas Corp(ONGC).

Natural gas price was lastcut by 12.5 per cent on October1. Rates were cut to $3.23 permmBtu from earlier $3.69. Fordifficult fields, the rates werecut from an all-time high of$9.32 per mmBtu to $8.43.

Sources said the reductionwould impact revenues ofIndia’s biggest producer ONGCas well as Reliance Industriesand its partner BP plc whichplan to start gas productionfrom their ‘second-wave’ ofdiscoveries in eastern offshore KG-D6 block frommid-2020.

The cut in price will lowerthe earnings of producers likeONGC but will also lead to areduction in the price of CNG,which uses natural gas as input.

It would also lead to lowercost of natural gas piped tohouseholds (PNG) for cookingpurposes as well as of feedstockcost for the manufacturing offertilisers and petrochemicals.

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State-run Central Bank ofIndia is looking to sell its

entire 64.40 per cent stake in itshousing finance subsidiary –Cent Bank Home Finance(CBHFL), a top bank officialsaid. The lender has floated arequest for proposal (RFP) forappointing merchant bankers.The shortlisted bankers willhelp the lender scout for apotential investor to buy its

stake in the mortgage financier.“We plan to exit from Cent

Bank Home Finance. The bankalready provides housing loans,and so, we feel that there is noneed to have a housing financesubsidiary,” Central Bank ofIndia managing director andchief executive officer, PallavMohapatra, told PTI.

The bank holds 64.40 percent in the unlisted housingfinance company, while theremaining stake is held by

Housing & Urban DevelopmentCorporation (HUDCO), UnitTrust of India (UTI) andNational Housing Bank (NHB).The bank is facing operationalcurbs under the Reserve Bank’s(RBI) prompt corrective action(PCA) framework.

Mohapatra said the processof determining the valuation ofthe Bhopal-headquarteredhome finance company willbegin as soon as the merchantbankers are appointed.

New Delhi: A 28 per centGoods and Services Tax (GST)will be levied on lotteries fromMarch 1, according to a noti-fication. The GST Council hadin December last year decidedto impose a single rate of 28 percent on state-run and autho-rised lotteries.

The revenue departmentnotified the GST rate on supplyof lotteries and amended its ear-lier Central Tax (Rate) notifi-cation. Accordingly, the CentralTax rate for supply of lotterieshas been amended to 14 percent and a similar percentagewill be levied by the states. This

will take the total GST incidenceon lotteries to 28 per cent.

“This notification shallcome into force on the 1st dayof March, 2020,” the revenuedepartment notification said.

Currently, a state-run lot-tery attracts 12 per cent GST,while a state-authorised lotteryattracts 28 per cent tax.

There were demands thata uniform tax rate should beimposed on lotteries followingwhich a group of ministerswere set up to suggest the GSTrate. Following this, the GSTCouncil in December voted fora single rate of 28 per cent on

supply of lotteries.AMRG & Associates

Senior Partner Rajat Mohansaid: “Gambling in the form ofLottery has been allowed in afew states, where it has pene-trated at grass root levels, nowchanging the tax rate from aprospective date would help thedealers in effectively imple-menting the new tax rate”.

EY Tax Partner AbhishekJain said a uniform rate on lot-tery brings a parity betweenstate-run and authorized lot-teries; thereby aligning an equalfooting for businesses in thesame line. PTI

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Left-arm spinner Siddharth Desaigrabbed a fifer as Gujarat

thrashed minnows Goa by a whop-ping 464 runs to storm into the RanjiTrophy semifinals, here on Sunday.

Set a daunting target of 629 foran improbable win, Goa were bun-dled out for 164 in their second essayon day 4 of the quarterfinals at theSardar Patel Stadium.

Desai (5-81) ran through theGoa batsmen and got able supportfrom pacer Arzan Nagwaswalla (4-18).

Barring Suyash Prabhudessai(66), no other Goa batsman couldeven put up a fight.

Earlier, Goa’s medium-pacerLakshay Garg (4/30) grabbed fourquick wickets as Gujarat declaredtheir second innings for 199/6, withan overall lead of 628 runs.

J&K OUT FOR 192�� Karnataka took the crucialfirst-innings lead after bowling outJammu and Kashmir for 192 on thefourth day.

Resuming the day on 88 for twoin reply to Karnataka’s 206, Jammu

and Kashmir let theadvantage slip by losingwickets at regular inter-vals to be bundled outin 62.4 overs.

Pacer M Prasidh Krishna(4/42) impressed once againas he returned with a four-wicket haul, while JagadeeshaSuchith (2/46) and Ronit More(2/40) grabbed two wickets each andKrishnappa Gowtham (1/30)claimed one.

For the hosts, Abdul Samadscored a 50-ball 43.

In their second essay, Karnatakareached 245 for four in 67 overs withopener Ravikumar Samarth (74)and Krishnamurthy Siddharth (75not out) doing the bulk of the scor-ing.

BENGAL VIRTUALLY IN S/F�� Bengal put up a strong bat-ting display in their second essay to

virtually seal a semifinalberth with a massive 443-run lead over Odisha.

At close on thepenultimate day, Bengal were361 for seven following halfcenturies from ShreevatsGoswami (78), Abhishek

Raman (67) and ShahbazAhmed’s unbeaten 52.It was almost all over for Odisha

as there was no sign of a declarationfrom Bengal, who already hadsecured three points by virtue of afirst-innings lead to put one stepinto the semifinals.

SAURASHTRA ON TOP!��!��Saurashtra batted Andhraout of their quarterfinal by extend-ing their overall lead to a mammoth658 runs.

By stumps on the fourth day,Saurashtra had made 375 for ninein their second innings.

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The Indian batsmen,caught betweenover-cautiousness

and impetuosity, producedyet another inept battingperformance to put NewZealand firmly on the dri-ver’s seat at the end of thirdday’s play in the first Testhere at Basin Reserve onSunday.

At stumps, Indiareached 144 for 4 in theirsecond innings as the top-order found Trent Boult’s(3/27 in 16 overs) high-quality swing bowling toohot to handle.

India now trail NewZealand by 39 runs goinginto fourth day, whichcould well be the final dayof this game unlessAjinkya Rahane (25 bat-ting, 67 balls) and HanumaVihari (15 batting, 70balls) show the art of sur-vival that was distinctlylacking in some of theother top-order batsmen.

Asked what kind oftotal can be defended inthe fourth innings, seniorspinner RavichandranAshwin remained non-committal.

“I know to keep it sim-ple and say this is defend-able and this is not, (it) ispretty much how youwould want me to presentit, but it’s too much — likesix sessions to go and weare not even at a stagewhere we can say what is

a good score to defend,” hesaid.

There is still some-thing there in the BasinReserve pitch, reckonedAshwin.

“We have to take everyball at a time to be honestbecause there is st i l lenough in the surface. Weare not yet in a stage of thegame from our perspective

where we can look at itvery far.”

After New Zealand’stail wagged big time topost a good first inningstotal of 348, the deficit of183 understandably putIndia under severe pres-

sure.If Cheteshwar Pujara

(11 off 81 balls) paid forhis ultra-defensive mind-set shouldering arms to anin-dipper, skipper ViratKohli’s (19 off 43 balls)split-second indiscretionbecame his undoing as hewent for a needless pull-shot to a well-disguisedshort ball.

Mayank Agarwal (58off 99 balls) was impressivein one session and lostconcentration in the sec-ond, ditto to what hap-pened on the first day andwas caught down the leg-side.

The bowler on boththe occasion was Boult,who successfully took overthe job of tormenting theIndian batsmen from TimSouthee (1/41 in 15 overs)and Kyle Jamieson (0/33 in17 overs). It was a top-classseam and swing bowlingshow on a third day pitch,which still had somethingfor fast bowlers.

Boult bowled with a lotof fire as he exposedPrithvi Shaw’s (14 off 30balls) poor technique, lay-ing a trap for the openingbatsman.

A short ball hurriedthe f lamboyantMumbaikar, whose hugeback-lift became his undo-ing. By the time the ballgrew big on him, he wasfending it awkwardly witha closed bat and at theshort square-leg TomLatham was waiting glee-fully for that chance.

Pujara and Agarwaldid add 51 runs for the sec-ond wicket but it was large-ly because of the Karnatakaopener, who played hisshots and showed positiveintent. He, in fact, hit AjazPatel for a six and a fourbut Pujara, at the otherend, only looked keen ondefending.

Just like first innings,Pujara was leaving balls onlength but at one stage, hewas stuck on personalscore of 6 for 28 consecu-tive balls. While leavingJamieson from length wasnot an issue, Pujara did notaccount for Boult, shoul-dering arms a delivery thatcame in sharply.

In the first session,Jamieson (44) continuedwith his dream debut as heand No 11 Boult belted theIndian bowlers for fun.

Ishant Sharma (5/68in 22.2 overs) remained thestand-out bowler for India.

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Najmul Hossain and skipperMominul Haque hit half-centuries

as Bangladesh replied strongly toZimbabwe in their one-off Test inDhaka on Sunday.

Najmul made 71 off 139 ballswhile Mominul was unbeaten on 79 asBangladeshreached 240-3 at stumpson the sec-ond day,trailing Zimbabwe by 25 runs in the firstinnings.

Pace bowler Abu Jayed earlier fin-ished with a career-best 4-71, asZimbabwe were bowled out for 265 inthe opening session, after the visitorsresumed on 228-6.

Najmul, who struck seven fours inhis fluent innings, led Bangladesh’s ini-tial batting charge after Victor Nyauchiremoved opener Saif Hasan for eight togive Zimbabwe an early breakthrough.

He was involved in partnerships of78 and 76 runs with Tamim Iqbal andMominul on his way to a maiden Testfifty in only his fourth match.

Tamim made 41 runs before heedged Donald Tiripano to wicketkeep-er Regis Chakabva.

Charlton Tshuma dismissedNajmul for his maiden Test wicket asChakabva claimed a third catch behindthe stumps.

Mominul, who hit nine fours, andMushfiqur saw off the day without fur-ther damage as they shared 68 runs inan unbroken fourth-wicket stand.

Mushfiqur, who returned to the sideafter skipping the previous Test againstPakistan, remained unbeaten on 32.

Zimbabwe earlier added 37 runs totheir overnight score before Jayed andleft-arm spinner Taijul Islam wrappedup their innings.

Jayed dismissed overnight batsmanTiripano for eight when he nicked anedge to wicketkeeper Liton Das in theseventh over.

The same bowler trapped AinsleyNdlovu leg before for a duck in his nextover.

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Their confidence on a high afterthe impressive win over title

holders Australia, India will lookto carry forward the momentumagainst a plucky Bangladesh intheir second Group A match ofthe ICC Women’s T20 World Cuphere today.

L e g - s p i n n e rPoonam Yadav’smagical spell helpedIndia beat Australiaby 17 runs in thetournament openeron Friday but theHarmanpreet Kaur-led side can’tafford to take Bangladesh lightlyas their eastern neighbours hadbeaten them twice in the 2018 T20Asia Cup.

Jemimah Rodrigues and 16-year-old promising opener ShafaliVerma, who hit a typically aggres-sive 29 off 15 balls againstAustralia, were not a part of thatAsia Cup team and the duo willneed to play crucial roles if Indiawant to beat Bangladesh.

In the last five meetingsbetween the two sides, India lead3-2 on head-to-head record anda win today will take them clos-er to the knock-out rounds fromthe five-team group.

India will, however, need toimprove their batting perfor-mance as they scored a below par132 against Australia.

Since the tri-series precedingthis World Cup, the Indian battinghas been inconsistent and has notposted big totals barring a fewmatches.

Captain Harmanpreet andopener Smriti Mandhana, whoboth have done well in the tri-series before this World Cup,contributed little with the bat inthe previous match and both willneed to fire for India to put up abig total or chase down a target.

Another key middle-order

batswoman Deepti Sharma camegood against Australia with anunbeaten 49 off 46 balls and shewould look to continue her goodform.

Medium pacer ShikhaPandey also bowled well againstAustralia and Harmanpreet ishappy that her team is not depen-dent on a few players only.

For Bangladesh, the key play-ers will be all-rounder JahanaraAlam and top-order batswomanFargana Hoque.

The 26-year-old seasonedHoque has a T20I hundred to hername. She had played a major rolein Bangladesh’s group stage winover India in 2018 T20 Asia Cup.

Alam is another key player forBangladesh and she was a part ofthe IPL Velocity team underMithali Raj in India’s domesticWomen’s T20 Challenge tourna-ment in Jaipur last year.

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Gabriel Jesus struck lateto give Manchester

City a 1-0 win atLeicester onSaturday, strength-ening their holdon second placebehind champi-ons-in-waitingL i v e r p o o ldespite morewoe from thepenalty spot.

P e pGuardiola’s menhave endured aturbulent week after theywere banned from Europeanclub competitions for twoyears for breaches of financialfair play rules.

But a second-half winnerfrom substitute Jesus afterSergio Aguero had failed to

convert a penalty put them 17points clear of Tottenham andsends them into their midweekmatch against Real Madrid in

good spirits.City looked like

they might have tosettle for a drawafter squanderingtheir fourth penal-ty in a row in the

Premier League,with each being

missed by a differentplayer.

“We have missedfour penalties in a rowbut maybe we willshoot a penalty whenwe need it to wins o m e t h i n g , ”Guardiola told theBBC. “The keepersare good too, but the

next one we are goingto score.”

�� 24+

Lazio kept their bid for a first SerieA title in 20 years on track as a

3-2 victory at Genoa on Sunday keptthem one points behind leadersJuventus, but four Serie A footballmatches were postponed amid grow-ing coronavirus fears in northernItaly.

Reigning champions Juve hadedged out bottom club SPAL 2-1 onSaturday, but Lazio responded tokeep the pressure on at the top,extending their unbeaten run in theleague to 20 games in the north-west-ern port city.

Third-placed Inter Milan, whoare six points behind Juve, saw theirgame scheduled for later on Sundayat the San Siro postponed, withThursday’s Europa League matchagainst Bulgarian club Ludogorets atrisk, along with next weekend’sleague clash with Juventus in Turin.

Three other top-flight matcheswere also pushed back — between

Torino and Parma, Atalanta versusSassuolo and Hellas Verona againstCagliari.

Prime Minister Giuseppe Conteannounced late on Saturday evening

that all sporting events in two north-ern regions would be suspended onSunday.

Strong measures are being takenin Italy with over 132 con-firmed cases in an outbreakthat has claimed two lives inthe country.

“I think it’s right to takethe necessary precautions,”said Lazio coach SimoneInzaghi.

“Do a lot of prevention, try todefeat and understand the problemby stopping the championship,because we shouldn’t underestimatewhat is happening.”

In Genoa, Adam Marusic scoredthe opener for Lazio with less thantwo minutes on the clock before CiroImmobile, the top flight’s leadingscorer this season, netted his 27thSerie A goal of the campaign six min-

utes into the second half.The Italian striker pulled six

goals clear of Juventus star CristianoRonaldo who scored for a record-

equalling 11th consecutive SerieA game in his 1,000th profes-sional match against SPAL.

Francesco Cassata pulledone back for the relegation-threatened hosts, but DaniloCataldi secured Lazio all three

points despite Domenico Criscito'slate consolation.

“We’re doing something great.The lads know it and I’m not hidingfrom saying it,” said Inzaghi.

“In 21 games between the cham-pionship and the Super Cup we havewon 17 times. In other champi-onships we would be first, but hereyou have to fight with Juve and Inter.

“We are there in the chase andwe will try to fight.”

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Eden Hazard’s seasoncould be at risk after

Real Madridannounced onSunday that hehad fracturedhis right ankleduring histeam’s 1-0 LaLiga defeat atLevante.

Belgium forwardHazard, whose first seasonat Real has been plagued by injury, will now missWednesday's Champions League last 16 clash withManchester City and the Clasico with league lead-ers Barcelona next weekend.

Madrid did not announce a recovery time forHazard but his latest setback will be a worry forBelgium boss Roberto Martinez ahead of Euro 2020this summer.

On Saturday, Madrid coach Zinedine admit-ted that the 29-year-old’s injury “doesn’t look good”ahead of those two huge matches, which coulddefine his side’s season.

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South Africa's bowlers heldtheir nerve as the hosts

bounced back from a recorddefeat to win the second T20Iagainst Australia at St George'sPark on Sunday.

Opening batsman DavidWarner hit an unbeaten 67 forAustralia but it wasn't enough asSouth Africa defended a modesttotal of 158 for four to win by 12runs and level the three-matchseries.

Australia lost three wicketsfor eight runs in the last 2.1 oversto finish on 146 for six. It wastheir first T20 defeat in ninematches going back to November2018.

South Africa captainQuinton de Kock was namedman of the match after heslammed 70 off 47 balls to get thehome team off to a blazing startas they set out to recover from arecord 107-run defeat in the first

match in Johannesburg onFriday.

He hit two sixes in the sec-ond over, bowled by PatCummins, and raced to 50 off 31balls.

Warner, Aaron Finch andSteve Smith got Australia off toa similarly fast start but bothteams found scoring increasing-ly difficult on a slow pitch withlow bounce as the ball lost itsshine and hardness.

“We realised the new ball isreally key with the bat,” said DeKock. “It gets more difficulttowards the end so we were try-ing to capitalise on the powerplay.

“We thought 160 was parbecause we know this wicket. Itwas always going to be more dif-ficult towards the end.”

The series decider takesplace on Wednesday atNewlands in Cape Town, thescene of the ball-tamperingscandal which led to bans forSmith and Warner.

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Boult, Southee leave India on thin ice

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��)��Bangladesh have called upuncapped batsmen MohammadNaim and Afif Hossain for their 15-man squad for the first two ODIsof a three-match series againstZimbabwe next month.

Naim and Afif have playedT20 for Bangladesh, but were notpart of the ODI side to be led bypacer Mashrafe Mortaza.

Mashrafe was retained as cap-tain despite concerns over hisfuture, and will lead the side for thefirst time since the World Cup lastyear.

Batsman Liton Das and all-rounder Mohammad Saifuddinalso return to the ODI side aftermissing the previous series againstSri Lanka in July.

The first two ODIs againstZimbabwe will be held in Sylhet onMarch 1 and 3. AFP

Naim, Afif back for ODIs� �� Gujarat thrash Goa by 464 runs, enter Ranji semis

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Jitender Kumar sealed his placein the Indian team for theOlympic Qualifiers with a

Silver medal at the AsianChampionship here on Sunday, aresult that could slam the TokyoGames door on veteran SushilKumar.

Two-time Olympic medallistSushil had skipped the continen-tal event citing an injury.

A Gold eluded India on thesecond day of the men’s freestylecompetition with Deepak Punia(86kg) and Rahul Aware (61kg)finishing with Bronze medals.

Up against Kazakhstan’sDaniyar Kaisanov, Jitendershowed tremendous defensiveskill, but was lacking in attack.The Indian lost 1-3 to the defend-ing champion.

However, his performancewas enough to convince thenational federation that he shouldtravel to Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan forthe Olympic Qualifiers, withouta re-trial.

It means that Sushil, who alsocompetes in 74kg, will have towait and see how Jitender fares inBishkek, where the finalists willdirectly qualify for the Tokyo

Games.If Jitender reaches the Gold

medal bout there, it will affect theprospect of Sushil, who has beenstruggling since the 2018 AsianGames.

If Jitender fails to seal anOlympic quota in Bishkek, thelast chance would be through aWorld qualifying event in April.

“I tried one move towards theend but could not execute itproperly, it could have got me theGold. There are improvements inthe my game and it could be seen.This Silver is special. Now I willtry harder to get Olympic quota,”said Jitender.

His attacking moves from adistance were not good enough toget a good grip on his rivals.Largely, he was defending fromstanding position.

In fact, in the semifinalagainst his Mongolian opponent,all three points were scored onpassivity and the bouts lackedflare.

Before that, Jitender had wonhis qualification bout rather eas-ily but just about managed to winhis following bouts against Iran’sMostafa Mohabbali Hosseinkhani(2-2) and Mongolia’s SumiyabazarZandanbud (2-1).

“We will not have trials in anycategory in men’s free style. Wewill see how our wrestlers per-form in Bishkek,” WrestlingFederation of India (WFI) pres-ident Brij Bhushan Sharan Singhsaid.

Much to the disappointmentof the home fans, world champi-onship Silver medallist Deepaklost his 86kg semifinal to Japan’sShutaro Yamada.

His style was identical toJitender’s and his moves from dis-

tance did not yield the desiredresult.

Against Yamada, the onlypoints he scored from a takedownwere removed after a successfulchallenge from his opponent’scamp.

In the fight forBronze against IssaA b d u l s a l a mAbdulwahhab AlObaidi, theIndian looked adifferent man,winning iteasily. Hedefated hisIraqi rivalby technicalsuperiority.

“I had nottrained enoughbecause of an injury Isuffered during train-ing after I arrived inIndia from Russia. I hadsix stitched just above myright eye,” Deepak, whowon a Silver at 2019Worlds, said.

In the non-Olympic61kg category, Rahul,who won a Bronze atthe Worlds in NurSultan, paid the price

for being overconfident as hisunnecessary challenges cost himdearly.

His movement was terrificand so were his attacks butuntimely challenges resulted inhim losing points in both thequarterfinal and semifinal.

In a fast-paced, high-scoringquarterfinal bout againstUzbekistan’s JahongirmirzaTurobov, Rahul won 11-9, large-

ly because of his superiordefence.

The Pune grappler losthis semifinal to Kyrgyzstan’sUlukbek Zholdoshbekov 3-5.

He won Bronze afterdowning Iran’s Majid

Almas Dastan 4-2 inan exciting bout.

In the 125kg,Satender wonhis qualificationbout but laterlost his quarter-

final and repechagerounds.

In the 92kg,Somveer’s challengelasted just 24 secondsagainst his Uzbekrival AjiniyazSaparniyazov.

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�� Indian men’s doublespair of Achanta Sharath Kamaland Gnanasekaran Sathiyan set-tled for a Silver medal at the ITTFWorld Tour Hungarian Openafter losing the summit clash toGerman combination of BenediktDuda and Patrick Franziska.

The Indian pair, whichdefeated top seeds Ho Kwan Kitand Wong Chun Ting of HongKong 3-2 in the semi-finals, putup a strong effort in the summitclash but eventually went downfighting 5-11, 9-11, 11-8, 9-11 tothe 16th seeds German pair in a30-minute showdown onSaturday.

It is Sharath Kamal’s secondmedal from the prestigious tour-nament. He also won a Bronzewith Manika Batra in mixeddoubles. PTI

�� Stefanos Tsitsipas suc-cessfully defended his Marseille titleon Sunday with a straightforwardvictory over Felix Auger-Aliassime.

Greek star Tsitsipas eased to a6-3, 6-4 win to leave Felix still wait-ing for his maiden ATP title afterhis fifth final defeat.

Tsitsipas, who had arrived insouthern France with a 3-4 losingrecord this season, enjoyed anemphatic return to form as heclinched his fifth ATP trophy.

“I did well mentally,” saidTsitsipas. “I didn’t crack when I wasunder pressure.”

Auger-Aliassime would havebeen confident of finally ending hiswait for tournament success aftertwo wins from his three previousmeetings with Tsitsipas, but has stillfailed to even win a set in his five

Tour-level finals.“Playing a final is wonderful,

you have to have that perspective,remember that everything is goingin the right direction despite every-thing,” said Auger-Aliassime.

“It’s heavy, losing every time inthe final. There is a little doubt...when will it be my turn?”

World number six Tsitsipas,the ATP Finals champion, broke inthe third game and saved threebreak points to serve out the open-ing set. The second seed got thebetter of a run of three successivebreaks in the second set to move4-3 in front and only dropped onemore point on serve.

He will now travel to the UAEfor the Dubai C’ships, where he issecond seed behind number oneNovak Djokovic. AFP

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Jitender ensures place in Indian team for Olympic Qualifiers

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