I f future generations were to look for a memorial to Sheila Dikshit, they would only need to look at the present cityscape of Delhi and not any particu- lar monument. Indeed con- temporary Delhi is itself a trib- ute to the vision and energy of the City-State’s longest-serving Chief Minister who untiringly worked for its people till almost her last breath. Apart from her visionary leadership, Dikshit will be remembered for her charm, affability and connect with a city she made her own. A dedicated Congress worker, she continued to lead the party despite her advanced age and failing health. Her sudden death on Saturday, nev- ertheless, came as a shock because, as president of the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee she was enthusias- tically immersed in political activities till the evening before she was taken ill. In an age when politics is the preserve of the uncivil, she was an embod- iment of civility who bore mal- ice towards none, her ideolog- ical enemies included. A devoted lover of nature, she worried about the degra- dation of the environment of India’s Capital. When most political leaders ducked the issue, she braved the crisis by firmly implementing the Supreme Court order to direct Delhi’s public transport vehicles to shift to CNG from polluting fuels like diesel almost overnight. She withstood a barrage of criticism; it is truly commendable that she stood her ground so that we can con- tinue to breathe Delhi’s air even now despite its arguably polluted content. Architect of myriad fly- overs and underpasses, planner of a drastic overhaul of road structures, a massive proponent of metro rail and other trans- port innovations, Sheila Dikshit lived and died for Delhi’s bet- terment. Despite her suppos- edly elitist background, her dedication to the city’s under- privileged ensured she won three successive elections, no mean feat in our highly com- petitive political milieu and had recently been tasked to regain the Delhi Assembly by her boss Rahul Gandhi once more. (Her accessibility too was legendary. Personally, I will miss her classy but frugal breakfast over which we exchanged views at her invita- tion very often despite my ide- ological difference with her). She came under a cloud as a result of the actions of some of her colleagues over the organ- isation of the Commonwealth Games, but undoubtedly it was one of the most spectacular, world-class sporting extrava- ganzas held in India. Besides, Games-related activities pro- pelled Delhi’s infrastructural growth to new heights. In the passing away of Sheila Dikshit, India has lost one of the last remaining politi- cians with dignity and vision. Indeed they don’t make politi- cians like her any more. She will be remembered for many things, but mostly for her con- tribution to the making of the new, New Delhi, a city built not by conquerors like the Mughals or British but by creating the Ninth Delhi — by Indians, for Indians. She made us proud by lending our Capital a heart and soul besides making it a city befitting India’s growing pros- perity and global stature. I ndia on Saturday said it was in touch with Iran to secure release of the Indians on board a British- flagged oil tanker seized by the Gulf country in the Strait of Hormuz. “We are ascertaining further details on the incident. Our Mission is in touch with the Government of Iran to secure the early release and repatriation of Indian nationals,” External Affairs Ministry Spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said in response to a question on the detention of Indian crew members along with the oil tanker Stena Impero by Iranian authorities. According to a media report, 18 Indian nationals are among the 23 crew members of the oil tanker seized by Iran amid fresh escalation of tensions in the Gulf region. The Stena Impero was seized on Friday by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Iran’s seizure of a British-flagged oil tanker was allegedly due to a col- lision with an Iranian fishing boat, Iran’s official news agency IRNA said. “There are 18 Indians and five crew members from Russia, Philipines, Latvia and other countries on board of Stena Impero. The cap- tain is Indian, but the tanker is UK- flagged,” the news agency quoted Allahmorad Afifipour, director gen- eral of Ports and Maritime Affairs of Hormuzgan province, as saying. Stena Bulk, a Swedish company which owns the vessel, said they have been unable to contact the ship. “Soon after the vessel was approached by unidentified small naval craft and a helicopter during her transit of the Strait of Hormuz in international waters...The vessel suddenly deviated from her passage to Jubail and headed north towards Iran,” the company said in statement. The vessel, Stena Impero, was in full compliance with all navigation and international regulations, Stena Bulk said. Continued on Page 4 F ormer Delhi Chief Minister and Congress leader Sheila Dikshit died at the age of 81 on Saturday at 3.55pm. The veteran Congress leader died of a pro- longed illness. Her mortal remains were brought back to her residence in Delhi’s Nizamuddin East later in the evening. The last rites will be performed at Nigam Bodh Ghat on Sunday around 2.30pm. She was admitted in Fortis Escorts Heart Institute around 10.30 am on Saturday. The three- time Delhi Chief Minister had cardiac arrhythmia (irregular heart beat) and had to be imme- diately put on ventilator. “A multi-disciplinary team of doctors, led by Dr Ashok Seth, Chairman of the hospital, carried out the advanced resuscitative measures. Her condition was stabilised temporarily. However, she had another cardiac arrest and despite all the resuscitative efforts, she passed away at 3.55 pm on Saturday,” said a spokesperson of the hospital. Dikshit underwent a heart surgery in France last year. Dr Ashok Seth had earlier advised her to undergo the procedure performed at University Hospital in Lille, France, under the care of Dr Thomas Modine. She was currently serving as the Delhi Congress chief, a charge she took over in January this year. Condolences poured in from various quarters. The Congress party tweeted, “We regret to hear of the passing of Smt Sheila Dikshit. Lifelong congresswoman and three-time CM of Delhi, she transformed the face of Delhi. Our condolences to her family and friends. Hope they find strength in this time of grief.” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said he was deeply sad- dened by the death of Sheila Dikshit. “Blessed with a warm and affable personality, she made a noteworthy contri- bution to Delhi’s develop- ment. Condolences to her family and supporters. Om Shanti,” Modi tweeted. Accompanied by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla, Modi paid his tributes to senior Congress leader at her residence. Former Congress president and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi too paid her tributes to Sheila at her residence. She met the Sheila’s sister Rama Dikshit and expressed her condolences. Others who paid their last respects included senior Congress leaders Jyotiraditya Scindia, Shivraj Patil, Ahmed Patel and Jagdish Tytler, LJP leader Sharad Yadav and CPI(M) leaders Sitaram Yechury and Brinda Karat. President Ram Nath Kovind tweeted, “Her term in office was a period of momentous trans- formation for the capital for which she will be remembered. Condolences to her family and associates.” “I’m devastated to hear about the passing away of Sheila Dikshit Ji, a beloved daughter of t h e Congress party, with whom I shared a close personal bond. My condolences to her fam- ily & the citizens of Delhi, whom she served selflessly as a 3 term CM, in this time of great grief,” Rahul Gandhi wrote on Twitter. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeted, “It is a huge loss for Delhi and her contribution will always be remembered. My heartfelt condolences to her family members. May her soul rest in peace.” Delhi BJP president and North-East Delhi MP Manoj Tiwari said in a tweet that he was deeply pained to hear the sad and sudden demise of Sheila Dikshit. Tiwari and Dikshit contested against each other for the North-East Delhi Lok Sabha seat in the 2019 general elec- tions. Continued on Page 4 C ontinuing with its phase-wise reshuffle of Governors, the Modi Government on Saturday appointed new Governors in six States, including polit- ically volatile West Bengal where former MP and noted Supreme Court lawyer Jagdeep Dhankhar has been named for the post. He replaces Keshari Nath Tripathi, whose term comes to an end later next week. Former interlocutor on Naga talks RN Ravi has been appointed as Nagaland Governor, while Madhya Pradesh Governor Anandiben Patel is now Uttar Pradesh Governor. Veteran BJP leader and Bihar Governor Lalji Tandon replaces Patel, who will be suc- ceeded by Phagu Chauhan, a former four-term MLA from Ghosi. Tandon was appointed Bihar Governor in August last year. BJP veteran from Chhattisgarh Ramesh Bais, who was denied a party ticket this year, has been appointed as the Tripura Governor in place of Kaptan Singh Solanki, whose term comes to an end on July 27. Dhankhar (68), who was Union Deputy Minister of Parliamentary Affairs in 1990-91, quit the Congress in 2003 and became a member of the BJP. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee welcomed the appointment of Jagdeep Dhankhar as Governor. She said Union Home Minister Amit Shah informed her about Dhankhar’s appointment. “I welcome Jagdip Dhankhar (sic) who has been appointed as the new Governor of Bengal. I just now came to know from media about this. I welcome him to our beautiful State,” Mamata wrote on her Twitter handle. “Hon’ble Home Minister just now talked to me about appointment of new Governor of West Bengal. I informed him that I have already welcomed the new Governor,” the Trinamool Congress (TMC) supremo added. Retired Intelligence Bureau special director N Ravi, a 1976-batch IPS offi- cer, has worked closely with National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and broad- ly worked on a treaty with dominant Naga group NSCN-IM to reach an agreement with the Government. Continued on Page 4 A nimal Husbandry Minister Lakhan Singh Yadav told the State Assembly on Saturday that all stray cows in Madhya Pradesh would be shifted to gaushalas (cowsheds) in the next 16 to 18 months. Yadav was replying to the demand for grant of funds for his department. He told the House that all stray cows would be shifted to 'gaushalas' in the next 16-18 months. He further said 1000 gaushalas would be set up in the state to accom- modate the stray cows. The minister also said that grants for 625 'gaushalas' being run by NGOs have been increased from 3.32 per cow per day to 20 per cow per day. Yadav said dairy science and food technology colleges are being set up in Jabalpur and Gwalior for conducting research. The minister said the Kamal Nath government was also making efforts to increase milk production. The sitting of Legislative Assembly is being held on Saturday and Sunday because of holi- days announced on July 15 and 16-- Monday and Tuesday. The move is seen as the latest out- reach by the Congress to the majority community in the state. In its maiden budget tabled recently, the state Government proposed to allocate 132 crore for the welfare of bovines. In its manifesto for the assembly elec- tions held last year, the Congress, which was then in opposition, had promised commercial production of ‘gaumutra’ (cow urine) and ‘kanda’ (cowdung cakes) and setting up of cowsheds in every vil- lage panchayat and making arrangements for the upkeep of injured cows. RNI Regn. No. MPENG/2004/13703, Regd. No. L-2/BPLON/41/2006-2008
Transcript
If future generations were tolook for a memorial to Sheila
Dikshit, they would only needto look at the present cityscapeof Delhi and not any particu-lar monument. Indeed con-temporary Delhi is itself a trib-ute to the vision and energy ofthe City-State’s longest-servingChief Minister who untiringlyworked for its people till almosther last breath. Apart from hervisionary leadership, Dikshitwill be remembered for hercharm, affability and connectwith a city she made her own.
A dedicated Congressworker, she continued to leadthe party despite her advancedage and failing health. Hersudden death on Saturday, nev-ertheless, came as a shock
because, as president of theDelhi Pradesh CongressCommittee she was enthusias-tically immersed in politicalactivities till the evening beforeshe was taken ill. In an agewhen politics is the preserve ofthe uncivil, she was an embod-iment of civility who bore mal-ice towards none, her ideolog-ical enemies included.
A devoted lover of nature,she worried about the degra-dation of the environment ofIndia’s Capital. When mostpolitical leaders ducked the
issue, she braved the crisis byfirmly implementing theSupreme Court order to directDelhi’s public transport vehiclesto shift to CNG from pollutingfuels like diesel almostovernight. She withstood abarrage of criticism; it is trulycommendable that she stoodher ground so that we can con-tinue to breathe Delhi’s aireven now despite its arguablypolluted content.
Architect of myriad fly-
overs and underpasses, plannerof a drastic overhaul of roadstructures, a massive proponentof metro rail and other trans-port innovations, Sheila Dikshitlived and died for Delhi’s bet-terment. Despite her suppos-edly elitist background, herdedication to the city’s under-privileged ensured she wonthree successive elections, nomean feat in our highly com-petitive political milieu and hadrecently been tasked to regain
the Delhi Assembly by herboss Rahul Gandhi once more.
(Her accessibility too waslegendary. Personally, I willmiss her classy but frugalbreakfast over which weexchanged views at her invita-tion very often despite my ide-ological difference with her).
She came under a cloud asa result of the actions of someof her colleagues over the organ-isation of the CommonwealthGames, but undoubtedly it wasone of the most spectacular,world-class sporting extrava-
ganzas held in India. Besides,Games-related activities pro-pelled Delhi’s infrastructuralgrowth to new heights.
In the passing away ofSheila Dikshit, India has lostone of the last remaining politi-cians with dignity and vision.Indeed they don’t make politi-cians like her any more. Shewill be remembered for manythings, but mostly for her con-tribution to the making of thenew, New Delhi, a city built notby conquerors like the Mughalsor British but by creating theNinth Delhi — by Indians, forIndians. She made us proud bylending our Capital a heart andsoul besides making it a citybefitting India’s growing pros-perity and global stature.
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India on Saturday said it was intouch with Iran to secure release
of the Indians on board a British-flagged oil tanker seized by the Gulfcountry in the Strait of Hormuz.
“We are ascertaining furtherdetails on the incident. Our Missionis in touch with the Government ofIran to secure the early release andrepatriation of Indian nationals,”External Affairs MinistrySpokesperson Raveesh Kumar saidin response to a question on thedetention of Indian crew membersalong with the oil tanker StenaImpero by Iranian authorities.
According to a media report, 18Indian nationals are among the 23crew members of the oil tankerseized by Iran amid fresh escalationof tensions in the Gulf region. TheStena Impero was seized on Fridayby the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
Iran’s seizure of a British-flaggedoil tanker was allegedly due to a col-lision with an Iranian fishing boat,Iran’s official news agency IRNA said.
“There are 18 Indians and fivecrew members from Russia,Philipines, Latvia and other countrieson board of Stena Impero. The cap-tain is Indian, but the tanker is UK-flagged,” the news agency quotedAllahmorad Afifipour, director gen-
eral of Ports and Maritime Affairs ofHormuzgan province, as saying.
Stena Bulk, a Swedish companywhich owns the vessel, said they havebeen unable to contact the ship.“Soon after the vessel wasapproached by unidentified smallnaval craft and a helicopter duringher transit of the Strait of Hormuzin international waters...The vesselsuddenly deviated from her passageto Jubail and headed north towardsIran,” the company said in statement.
The vessel, Stena Impero, was infull compliance with all navigationand international regulations, StenaBulk said.
Continued on Page 4
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Former Delhi Chief Ministerand Congress leader Sheila
Dikshit died at the age of 81 onSaturday at 3.55pm. The veteranCongress leader died of a pro-longed illness. Her mortalremains were brought back to herresidence in Delhi’s NizamuddinEast later in the evening. The lastrites will be performed at NigamBodh Ghat on Sunday around2.30pm.
She was admitted in FortisEscorts Heart Institute around10.30 am on Saturday. The three-time Delhi Chief Minister hadcardiac arrhythmia (irregularheart beat) and had to be imme-diately put on ventilator.
“A multi-disciplinary team ofdoctors, led by Dr Ashok Seth,Chairman of the hospital, carriedout the advanced resuscitativemeasures. Her condition wasstabilised temporarily. However,she had another cardiac arrestand despite all the resuscitativeefforts, she passed away at 3.55pm on Saturday,” said aspokesperson of the hospital.
Dikshit underwent a heartsurgery in France last year. DrAshok Seth had earlier advisedher to undergo the procedureperformed at University Hospitalin Lille, France, under the care ofDr Thomas Modine.
She was currently serving asthe Delhi Congress chief, a chargeshe took over in January this year.
Condolences poured in fromvarious quarters. The Congressparty tweeted, “We regret to hearof the passing of Smt SheilaDikshit. Lifelong congresswoman
and three-time CM of Delhi, shetransformed the face of Delhi.Our condolences to her familyand friends. Hope they findstrength in this time of grief.”
Prime Minister NarendraModi said he was deeply sad-dened by the death of SheilaDikshit. “Blessed with a warmand affable personality, shemade a noteworthy contri-bution to Delhi’s develop-ment. Condolences to herfamily and supporters. OmShanti,” Modi tweeted.
Accompanied by LokSabha Speaker Om Birla,Modi paid his tributes tosenior Congress leaderat her residence. FormerCongress president andUPA chairperson SoniaGandhi too paid hertributes to Sheila at herresidence. She met theSheila’s sister RamaDikshit and expressedher condolences.
Others who paid their lastrespects included seniorCongress leaders JyotiradityaScindia, Shivraj Patil, AhmedPatel and Jagdish Tytler, LJPleader Sharad Yadav and CPI(M)leaders Sitaram Yechury andBrinda Karat.
President Ram Nath Kovindtweeted, “Her term in office wasa period of momentous trans-formation for the capital forwhich she will be remembered.Condolences to her family andassociates.”
“I’m devastated to hearabout the passing away of SheilaDikshit Ji, a beloved daughter oft h e
Congress party, with whom I shared a closepersonal bond. My condolences to her fam-ily & the citizens of Delhi, whom she servedselflessly as a 3 term CM, in this time of greatgrief,” Rahul Gandhi wrote on Twitter.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwaltweeted, “It is a huge loss for Delhi and hercontribution will always be remembered. My
heartfelt condolences to her family members.May her soul rest in peace.”
Delhi BJP president and North-East DelhiMP Manoj Tiwari said in a tweet that he wasdeeply pained to hear the sad and suddendemise of Sheila Dikshit. Tiwari and Dikshitcontested against each other for the North-EastDelhi Lok Sabha seat in the 2019 general elec-tions.
Continuing with its phase-wisereshuffle of Governors, the Modi
Government on Saturday appointed newGovernors in six States, including polit-ically volatile West Bengal where formerMP and noted Supreme Court lawyerJagdeep Dhankhar has been named forthe post. He replaces Keshari NathTripathi, whose term comes to an endlater next week.
Former interlocutor on Naga talksRN Ravi has been appointed asNagaland Governor, while MadhyaPradesh Governor Anandiben Patel isnow Uttar Pradesh Governor. VeteranBJP leader and Bihar Governor LaljiTandon replaces Patel, who will be suc-ceeded by Phagu Chauhan, a formerfour-term MLA from Ghosi. Tandonwas appointed Bihar Governor inAugust last year.
BJP veteran from ChhattisgarhRamesh Bais, who was denied a partyticket this year, has been appointed asthe Tripura Governor in place of KaptanSingh Solanki, whose term comes to anend on July 27.
Dhankhar (68), who was Union
Deputy Minister of ParliamentaryAffairs in 1990-91, quit the Congress in2003 and became a member of the BJP.
West Bengal Chief Minister MamataBanerjee welcomed the appointment ofJagdeep Dhankhar as Governor.
She said Union Home MinisterAmit Shah informed her aboutDhankhar’s appointment.
“I welcome Jagdip Dhankhar (sic)who has been appointed as the newGovernor of Bengal. I just now came toknow from media about this. I welcomehim to our beautiful State,” Mamatawrote on her Twitter handle.
“Hon’ble Home Minister just nowtalked to me about appointment of newGovernor of West Bengal. I informedhim that I have already welcomed thenew Governor,” the Trinamool Congress(TMC) supremo added.
Retired Intelligence Bureau specialdirector N Ravi, a 1976-batch IPS offi-cer, has worked closely with NationalSecurity Adviser Ajit Doval and broad-ly worked on a treaty with dominantNaga group NSCN-IM to reach anagreement with the Government.
Animal Husbandry Minister LakhanSingh Yadav told the State
Assembly on Saturday that all straycows in Madhya Pradesh would beshifted to gaushalas (cowsheds) in thenext 16 to 18 months.
Yadav was replying to the demandfor grant of funds for his department.He told the House that all stray cowswould be shifted to 'gaushalas' in thenext 16-18 months.
He further said 1000 gaushalaswould be set up in the state to accom-modate the stray cows. The ministeralso said that grants for 625 'gaushalas'being run by NGOs have beenincreased from �3.32 per cow per dayto �20 per cow per day. Yadav said dairyscience and food technology collegesare being set up in Jabalpur and
Gwalior for conducting research.The minister said the Kamal Nath
government was also making efforts toincrease milk production. The sittingof Legislative Assembly is being held onSaturday and Sunday because of holi-days announced on July 15 and 16--Monday and Tuesday.
The move is seen as the latest out-reach by the Congress to the majoritycommunity in the state. In its maidenbudget tabled recently, the stateGovernment proposed to allocate �132crore for the welfare of bovines.
In its manifesto for the assembly elec-tions held last year, the Congress, whichwas then in opposition, had promisedcommercial production of ‘gaumutra’(cow urine) and ‘kanda’ (cowdung cakes)and setting up of cowsheds in every vil-lage panchayat and making arrangementsfor the upkeep of injured cows.
Remakes never live up to one’sexpectations. Makingcomparisons always raises it ugly
head whether justified or not. WhenWalt Disney released its trailer of theremake of the 1994 animation TheLion King, there was a lot of buzz.People wanted to know how thetreatment would be? Would there beany changes in the storyline itself?
Director Jon Favreau has kept thestory as close to the original animationas possible with such a few tweakshere and there. The good part is thathe has added a lot more sass when itcomes to some of the characters likethe Meerkat — Timon and Pumbaa(warthog).
In fact, Timon and Pumbaa is
what makes this remake such a delightto watch. Their repertoire makes youlaugh. Billy Eichner who has lent hisvoice for Timon is brilliant. His voicemodulations and the exasperation isso endearing. Pumbaa too keeps youengaged with a steady witty banterwhich will keep the adults interested.Sadly, he is not as plump as he was inthe animation. But we are notcomplaining — much. Simba’s sassybum walk in the song — HakunaMatata is missing too.
What is great is the fantastic use ofphotorealistic computer-animation.The HD frames are stunning from thewater residue on a plant to thewhiskers on a small mouse. Theimages of the animals are realisticenough to make one go ‘aww so cute’especially when it comes to Simba as acub.
Over all, a dazzling visual delightthat takes you through the full circle oflife making it a must watch for all.
?>�)��� )����!"#����� ��!�!�!"�5�What prompted you to playVishkanya in Vish: APoisonous Story?
The character has a lot ofversatility and style. There wasa lot of scope to show my actingskills. It was different from whatI had done before. There wasroom to explore and experimentwith this genre. Then there wasthe fact that it was a Colorsshow. All this made me say ‘yes’.�How did acting happen withyou?
It started when I sawSushmita Sen winning MissUniverse. Back then, I wasawestruck and thought if shebeing a Bengali can win this titlethen I should also try. I told myparents that I want to become anactor. It was a very randomthought. When, I was in ClassIX, I told my parents that I wantto participate in Miss Kolkata. Iwas afraid that they would sayno but they were supportive. Iwon that competition. It boostedmy confidence. I came toMumbai to further mydreamsof pursue acting. I gotmy first show Ramayana and itwas followed by a couple ofSouth-Indian films. There wasa lot of struggle, anxiousness andups and downs during thisphase but I rose above all. Ienjoyed each and every phase ofmy career because struggle is apart and parcel of acting.�What is the lesson theindustry has taught you?
I have learnt to be patientand keep working hard. It isimportant to improve andevolve as an actor. If you aredoing this, then work will cometo you. The other thing is thatit is not necessary to takewhatever work that is cominginto your way. Sometimeswaiting for good roles and goodscripts is important. So, wait for
the right work. This will help yousustain in the industry and youwill also enjoy what you aredoing. �What kind of roles attractyou?
I love different kinds of roles.The kind of roles that I haven’tdone before attracts me. I love toexplore different genres. If youwill keep doing the same kind ofwork, it will become boring andyou will stagnate.�What does fame mean to you?
Fame means becoming moreresponsible. When people startrecognising you, they observeeach and every detail about you.You have to be careful with yourwords and actions. You have to becareful about how you areportraying yourself because theylearn from you. You shouldbehave in an ideal way and set anexample that others can follow.�Apart from acting what keepsyou busy?
Fitness is always on my cards.Everytime I am free, I like tosweat it out in the gym. Otherthan that, I am busy with myYouTube channel — DebinaDecodes.�What advice would you like togive out to the aspiring actors?
I would like to say that thereare many outsiders who want towork in this industry becausethey see it as the last careeroption. They think that thestruggle is all about stayinghealthy and fit, maintaining agood personality and appealinglooks but there is much more toit. There is a continuous strugglethat one has to go through be itin finding work or overcomingrejection. One has to go throughit all and emerge stronger. Talentalways finds its way. Be mentallyand emotionally prepared forthe worst so that you can taste thebest.
:�������������� ������>������Kuhu and Kunal, from Rajan Shahi’s Ye
Risthey Hai Pyar Ke, are engaged andwe can’t keep calm! Talking about thesame, actor Kaveri Priyam, who plays therole of Kuhu said: “It’s quite surreal, butas you would imagine getting engaged isa joyous thing with all the love comingyour way. So, yeah, I would say I am in ahappy space.”
People are loving the couple and thatfeels amazing, she added: “I am touchedbeyond words. And of course, one feelsenormous gratitude and love towards thepeople who have made it such a success.
Much love to them.Ask her if she prefers arranged
marriage or love marriage, and she says,“To each its own. We don’t have toconstruct these binaries. Love is quitedemocratic. It is everywhere. Can we saydaffodils are better than chrysanthemums?We must invest in love, rest is just noise.”
Well, marriage is a long way off for theactor as she wants to concentrate on herwork now. “I am single at the moment andam happy with that. I have a lot of goodwork coming my way and all my energiesare reserved for that” she says.
!�����=�����Working on a rigorous and
difficult scene may sound likea real struggle. But not many
realise that the actual difficulty lies inmemorising those intensive andelaborate dialogues combined withdelivering the right emotions andexpressions. While this may be a strugglefor many actors, but actress TinaaDattaa who is currently seen essayingJahnvi Morya in &TV’s Daayan, tacklesthis like a pro!
The actress revealed that she has anexcellent memory and has a knack formemorising difficult lines in the first go.It takes her only two minutes to gothrough a scene as long as four pages andin one single go, the actress is all set toact out her best shot. Only recently, theactress was delivering a scene with herco-actor, wherein the latter forgot acouple of dialogues and our mnemonistTinaa prompted him his lines to helphim complete the scene. In fact, Tinaais a go-to-person for many who want tolearn their dialogues by heart andrehearse their scenes.
On asking her, how she manages tomemorise every word of her line withoutusing a prompter, Tinaa said, “I have aknack for memorising difficult lines likea pro irrespective of however long andelaborate they might be. I can memorisemy lines by reading the scene just once,and that usually doesn’t take me morethan two minutes. I don’t re-read myscene after that. Ratta queen is mynickname on the set for this very reason!I have never believed in rememberingmy lines word to word. Once the contentdepicted in the lines is clear in my mind,I improvise here and there and framethem in them in the best manner I can.This is where the screenplay comes inhandy as it helps an actor get a grip ofthe character and a flow of the scene asper the best. I tend to intensely focus onreading that.”
Adding further about some of the
best co-stars the actress has worked with,Tinaa said, “I really enjoyed working withHiten Tejwani, Aashka Goradia andVicky Ahuja while shooting for Daayan.They have a knack to improviseeffortlessly as well, delivering a scenewith them is never a challenge. Wehonestly do not get a lot of time toprepare ourselves especially since we areworking day and night shifts forepisodes. I believe developing an abilityas such really helps an actor grow.”
While Tinaa can tackle this issue, asJahnvi, she continues to face a crisis onher hand with the Daayan’s presencearound.
1��������� ����* ���� ������Actress Shirin Sewani is excited about her
big screen debut in KhandaniShafakhanna, which has Sonakshi Sinha,Varun Sharma and Nadira Babbar in pivotalroles. Shirin has been seen in shows like YehRishta Kya Kehlata Hai earlier and is currentlyworking in Kawach 2. Speaking about heroverall experience Shirin said: “It was greatfun. We have shot in Amritsar and Mumbai.On the set the vibes were great. We used tobond over food a lot. Sonakshi was fun andshe is very humble. Off camera we used tochitchat a lot. In fact, we connected a lot onour mutual love for food. I am a Sindhi butbrought up in Delhi so I know how muchPunjabis love food. I am a good cook too. Weused to have on set pot luck as well.”
Veteran actress Nadira Babbar is also inthe film and Shirin says she got to learn a lotfrom her. “The first day when I met her onset I went upto her and told her that she wasan institution. It was an honour for me toshare the screen with her. She made me verycomfortable,” she says. Shirin is playingSonakshi’s younger sister in the film.
had promised to enactAdvocates' Protection Act andit would honour its promise.Soon it will be finalized in thecabinet to make it a model law.
Responding to the demandof the advocates, Kamal Nathsaid that if they form housingsocieties, the government willprovide them all the necessaryfacilities. He was addressing asymposium on the Advocates'Protection Act at Minto Hallhere on Saturday.
At the outset, participatingadvocates paid tribute to vet-eran Congress leader and for-mer Chief Minister New DelhiSmt. Sheila Dikshit by observ-ing two-minute silence.
The Chief Minister saidthat the biggest ideologicalcommitment for advocates istowards the protection of theConstitution and the laws. Hesaid that the Constitution ofIndia is world's most uniquedocument as this is evolved ina nation, which is known for
its rich diversity of castes,religions, communities, cul-tures, traditions. TheConstitution of such a coun-try is an example for theworld. It is the responsibilityof everyone to respect andprotect it. He urged all theadvocates to respect theirnoble profession.
The Chief Minister saidthat every law is born out of theConstitution. He said that free-dom, equality and justice arethe constituents of democracy.Despite this, freedom andequality have limitations ofbut there is no limit for the jus-tice. Therefore, the legal pro-fession must be respected.
Minister for Law PC
Sharma welcomed the lawyersand said the draft Advocates'Protection Law is being final-ized. Every issue of the safetyof the lawyers is being incor-porated so that it becomes amodel law. He the issues likeinsurance for lawyers and giv-ing them pension cover arebeing debated. Concrete resultswill come out soon. He saidthat every promise under theguidance of Chief MinisterKamal Nath will be honoured.Rajya Sabha member VivekTankha spoke about the back-ground of the Act. TheAdvocate General ShashankShekhar and senior advocatesfrom across the state were pre-sent.
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Hundreds of nursing stu-dents staged a dharna at
the Divisional Commissioner’soffice situated at Moti Mahalbefore taking out a rally fromPhoolbagh ground. Later theagitating students submitted amemorandum to the DivisionalCommissioner BM Sharma.They were agitating over thegovernment’s antipathy towardstheir plight due to the nonrecognition of nursing col-leges.
Thousands of studentsfrom Gwalior and other partsof the state had taken admis-sion for GNM, BSc (Nursing),Post Basic BSC and MSc(Nursing) in the various pri-vate nursing colleges in thestate. At the time of admission
the college authorities hadassured the students that thecolleges would get the neces-sary recognition from theMedical EducationDepartment and MadhyaPradesh Nurses RegistrationCouncil.
On the assurance of thecollege authorities the studentstook admission and paid theentire fees. However later on itcame to their knowledge thatmany colleges in the state havenot got the recognition.Students from colleges that donot have recognition will not beallowed to sit for exams.
The leaders of the agitationhave petitioned the DC to takeimmediate action against theerring colleges even whileallowing the students to shift tocolleges with recognition.
The leaders including theNursing Association’s statepresident Vishu Pandey, Vice-President Rajkumar Tyagi, Stateoffice bearer Vikki Arhela andDistrict President Raja Kapasiahave cautioned that they will goon an indefinite sit in dharnafrom tomorrow onwards iftheir demands are not metwith immediate effect.
Talking to the media per-sons, Vishnu Pandey said thatthey have already brought tothe notice of the state ministersand the MLS the gravity of thesituation but till today noassurance has been given byany of them. He added that thislethargic attitude of the author-ities towards such a sensitiveissue is a grave injustice tonursing students and their par-ents.
Bhopal: The presence of mur-der accused Govind SinghThakur, husband of BSP MLARambai Thakur in the MadhyaPradesh Vidhan Sabha buildinghas triggered a political con-troversy in the state.
Thakur is an accused in themurder of Congress leaderDevendra Chaurasia. A videoof murder-accused Thakur, anaccused in 17 criminal cases,and his wife, BSP legislatorRambai Thakur, inside theVidhan Sabha premises onThursday went viral on Friday,leaving the Kamal Nath gov-ernment and the rulingCongress in an embarrassingposition. Thakur also spoke tojournalists in the Vidhan Sabhabuilding on Thursday.
State BJP vice presidentand saffron party MLARameshwar Sharma questionedthe presence of the murderaccused in the Vidhan Sabha.
“This shows that that copsand Assembly security staffturned a blind eye towards themurder accused’s presence, allat the behest of the Congressgovernment, which is beingsupported among other MLAsby the BSP legislator wife of themurder-accused man. Just toensure that there is no threat tothe government from the BSPMLA, the Kamal Nath govern-ment is protecting the legisla-tor’s murder-accused husbandfrom arrest,” alleged Sharma.
The state BJP media con-vener Lokendra Parashar alsotweeted over the issue, sharingthe details of the 17 criminalcases in which Govind SinghThakur has been accused. Statehome minister Bala Bachchanexpressed ignorance overThakur’s presence in the VidhanSabha building. When shown avideo of the same, he said,“We’ll look into the matter.”SR
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Habibganj police havebooked a female accoun-
tant of a private hospital formisappropriation of funds ofRs 6 lakh in a period of sevenmonth; a complaint was lodgedon Thursday after the compa-ny found the discrepancy in theaccounts during audit.
Police said that the ownerof Fracture hospital SandeepSharma lodged a complaintagainst Shikha Thapa who usedto work as accountant with hishospital and from November2017 to June 2018 she wasinvolved in misappropriation offunds of Rs 6 lakh
In his complaint, Sharmastated that the Geeta Singhused to work as accountant. Sheused to maintain three registersfor cash, cheque and card. Inthe audit which was conduct-ed it was found that for the
period November 2017 to June2018 she registered cash col-lected against payment of billsby patients in the register whichwas meant for card which wasaround Rs 6.03 lakh. Laterwhen it was found she accept-ed that she have cheated thehospital.
After it was found that themoney was collected by her acomplaint was lodged with theHabibganj police. Based onthe complaint after the pre-liminary investigation thepolice have registered a caseunder sections 406 and 420 ofthe IPC and started furtherinvestigation.
The police suspect that theaccused might have embezzledmore funds which would berevealed in the further investi-gation. Police said that the vic-tim is not working with thehospital and would be traced inthe further investigation.
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Habibganj police havebooked a miscreant and
registered a case for sexuallyassaulting a 25-year-old mar-ried woman intimidating her ofthrowing her one and a halfyear old daughter from the ter-race at Shalimar Enclave onJuly 16; a complaint was lodgedby victim with police on Friday.
Police said both theaccused and victims areacquainted and used to work asdomestic help.
On July 16 Rampal cameto the place where victim wasworking and was with herdaughter. Unaware of the illintentions the victim allowedthe accused to the terracewhere the accused sexuallyassaulted her.
After committing theheinous crime the accusedthreatened her that he willthrough the victim’s daughter
from the terrace if the victimwould resist and the accusedsexually assaulted her. But theundaunted victim informedthe incident to the family. Thevictim along with the familymembers lodged a complaintwith the Habibganj police.
During the investigationpolice found that as both thevictim and accused used to livein the same locality they wereacquainted with each otherand the accused used to visitvictim’s house but in the pres-ence of his family members. Onthe day of incident he wasaware that the victim was aloneand took advantage of the sit-uation.
After the preliminaryinvestigation a case underSection 376, 506 of the IPC andstarted the search for theaccused. The crime record ofthe accused would be investi-gated and his friends and fam-ily would be quizzed.
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Chief Minister Kamal Nathhas told journalists that
they may ask questions fromthe government fearlessly andimpartially and also criticizethe government. Nath was onSaturday launching the'Towards Excellence 2019' pro-gramme of MakhanlalChaturvedi National Universityof Journalism andCommunication. He told thestudents of journalism thatthey should respect their pro-fession and take an oath as well.
Nath said that in order tostrengthen democracy, it isnecessary for journalism tostay away from temptation andpressure and assimilate theConstitution of India, whichgives us the right to express ourthoughts. He said that it helpsme a lot when I read the criti-cism of my government'sschemes and system in news-papers. I take action on it. Ithelps me to overcome the short-comings of my government.
The Chief Minister toldnew students studying jour-nalism that they are associatedwith a profession that is animportant pillar of democracy.So they should be impartial
because fearless and impartialwriting affects democracy in a
positive way. The ChiefMinister said that journalists
and newspapers are not publi-cations of the government. You
have the right to criticize andit is your duty as well.
Chief Minister Shri Nathsaid that Indian Constitution isunique in the whole world.Many countries have createdtheir constitutions with thehelp of Ambedkar, the creatorof our Constitution. Our con-stitution gives the message ofunity in diversity. India is iden-tified for this feature in thewhole world. He said that ourculture is to connect. Thosewho believe in seperation of thecountry, can never flourish.
Nath announced to grant7th pay scale to Universityteachers, scholarships to stu-dents of Scheduled Caste-Tribesstudying in the University edu-cational institutes andUniversity’s contribution inemployees insurance. He saidthat the government is com-mited to extend full support tothe university in the commit-ment of developing an excellentUniversity. He hoped that everystudent will establish the pres-tige of the University by turn-ing into an independent andunbiased journalist. The ChiefMinister released the syllabus ofthe new session. Nath was hon-oured with shawl, shrifal andwelcome book.
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Chief Minister Kamal Nathhas expressed profound
grief over the demise of formerChief Minister of New Delhiand eminent Congress leaderSheila Dikshit. In his condo-lence message, Kamal Nathsaid that the contribution ofDikshit in the transformationof New Delhi in terms of max-imising civic facilities willalways be remembered.
Nath said that Dikshit, wasknown for her sensitivitytowards public issues and wasdevoted to politics based onGandhian philosophy andprinciples. She was skilled inorganizing capacity. Sheremained committed towardsdevelopment while serving theCongress for a long time.
The Chief Minister prayedto the Almighty to grant peaceto the departed soul and givestrength to the family to bearthe loss.
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Adaylong seminar on‘ H o m e o p a t h y
Hypnotherapy & Mesmerismits Practical application withdemo’ was organized underresearch project Sickle CellDisorder at GovernmentHomeopathy University andhospital.
The chief guest of theseminar was Indian MedicalScience Research CouncilDirector of National TribalHealth Research Jabalpur DrAprup Das.
He detailed on the bene-fits of Homeopathy andemphasized on the researchwork in Homeopathy andassured that he would supportin the ongoing research pro-jects at the university. Heinvited students to visit theresearch institute Jabalpur.
Renowned Homeopathic
doctor Dr Dheeraj Nandashared his views on use ofHypnotherapy inHomeopathy and how it isrelated with HomeopathicMedical Science subjectOrganon in which rules arethere.
Dr Nanda is among veryfew doctors who have relatedHypnotherapy withHomeopathy and providedtreatment to patients sufferingfrom severe diseases. He gavelive demo of use ofHypnotherapy in a practicalmanner. There are miscon-ceptions about Hypnotherapywhich have to be cleared. Ithas been spread in a wrongmanner.
Principal of GovernmentHomeopathy College Dr SKMishra said that these kinds ofseminars are achievementsand students should learnfrom such seminars.
New Delhi: In the winter of2012, Sheila Dikshit underwenther second angioplasty and herfamily wanted her to quit poli-tics but then the horrificDecember 16 gang rape tookplace and she made up her mindnot to "run away from the bat-tlefield".
After she complained offatigue and bouts of breathless-ness, doctors confirmed a 90 percent blockage in her right coro-nary artery, and she underwentthe procedure.
"My family told me in nouncertain terms that I needed toput health concerns beforeeverything else. My decision toresign was almost certain.Moreover, with a year to go forthe assembly election, the partyhad enough time to find analternative," Dikshit wrote in herautobiography "Citizen Delhi:My Times, My Life" publishedlast year.
But as she slowly recoveredher strength and prepared toinform the high command ofher decision to step down, thecountry was shaken to the coreon December 16, 2012, as theyoung woman — later namedNirbhaya by the media — wasbrutally raped by a gang of men
in a moving bus."After the Nirbhaya inci-
dent, I was in a bind. My fam-ily, which had seen my distressthroughout that period, urgedme to step down as planned ear-lier, but I felt that such a movewould be seen as running awayfrom the battlefield. The Centrehad not wanted the blame to fallon it directly; and I, knowingwell that our government wouldbe blamed by the opposition,decided to take it on the chin.Someone had to take theblame," she wrote.
The incident "pierced"Dikshit's heart. "I immediatelycalled up senior officials in theDelhi government as well aspolice officers to get a sense ofthe situation.
She also went to JantarMantar to show her solidaritywith the people who had gath-ered there, even though her offi-cials had warned her that shemight not be welcomed.
"When I reached JantarMantar, I sensed some resis-tance to my presence, but noone abused me or tried to blockmy passage as I lit a candle forNirbhaya."
Dikshit also wrote in hermemoir, published by
Bloomsbury, about her threeterms in office, the changes shebrought about in Delhi, the dif-ficulties she faced and the elec-toral loss in 2013, among otherthings.
"Our party was defeated inunambiguous terms," she wroteabout the Congress's loss toAAP in 2013.
"I myself was defeated by amargin of over 25,000 votes, los-ing the prestigious New Delhiseat to Arvind Kejriwal of AAP,a party that many of us hadunderestimated."
According to her, therewere many who attributed theloss to public anger against thecentral government as the Delhigovernment was often identifiedwith the UPA II simply becauseit was a Congress-led govern-ment.
"There was one more factor,I feel. A considerable chunk ofvoters who were casting theirballot for the first time, had notseen the Delhi of 15 years ago. Tothem a Delhi with regular power,flyovers and Metro rail, as wellas several new universities, wastheir natural right and thereforetaken for granted. They couldnot be expected to feel ecstaticabout it," she wrote. PTI
New Delhi: With the void cre-ated by the sudden demise ofSheila Dikshit, the Congressfaces the uphill task of lookingfor a leader who can fill intoher shoes, ahead of the DelhiAssembly polls slated in lessthan six months.
The new leader also has todeal with the challenge ofuniting the faction-riddenDelhi unit, which had alreadyput Dikshit and other leaders,including PC Chacko, at log-gerheads on a host of issues.
Although Dikshit enjoyedconfidence of the party lead-ership, the Opposition to herwas evident when she andseveral Congress leaders wereon different page on whetherto have a pre-poll tie-up withthe Aam Aadmi Party for the2019 Lok Sabha elections.
"None in the current cropof leaders matches up to thepopularity and appeal of
Dikshit. The three workingpresidents Haroon Yusuf,Devender Yadav and RakeshLilothia are relatively junior to
other senior leaders like JPAgarwal, AK Walia andSubhash Chopra," said aleader.
"The sudden demise ofDikshit badly hurts DelhiCongress which is totallyunprepared for it," the leader
said.From being wiped out and
relegated to the third positionin every major election since2013, the party saw some hopeafter it managed to dislodgethe AAP and secure secondposition in the 2019 Lok Sabhapolls. The Congress was onnumber two position in fiveseats.
Dikshit was also gearingup for the state assembly pollsscheduled to be held inJanuary-February next year.
Now, the party has to huntfor a new leader to lead theorganisation ahead of the polls.
Former Delhi PradeshCongress Committee chiefAjya Maken had resigned onhealth grounds.
Arvinder Lovely, who hasalso served as the DPCC chiefin the past, has recently comeback to the party after a briefstint at the BJP. PTI
chief executive, Stena Bulk,said, “There are 23 seafarers onboard of Indian, Russian,Latvian and Filipino national-ity. There have been noreported injuries and the safe-ty and welfare of our crewremains our primary focus.”
“We are in close contactwith both the UK and SwedishGovernment authorities to
resolve this situation and weare liaising closely with ourseafarers’ families,” Hanell said.
In early July, Britishmarines and Gibraltar policeseized an Iranian tanker off theSouthern coast of the IberianPeninsula. Gibraltar claimedthat the ship was transportingcrude oil to Syria “in violation”of the EU sanctions placed onDamascus, escalating tensionsin the Gulf.
From Page 1The details of the agree-
ment have not been made pub-lic since 2015.
Recently, the Governmenthad appointed senior BJPleader Kalraj Mishra asHimachal Pradesh Governorreplacing Devrat Acharya, whowas made Governor ofHimachal Pradesh in 2015. Hereplaced Gujarat Governor OPKohli.
From Page 1“May God bless her soul
and give her eternal peace...Delhi will miss you Ma’am, uwere a mother figure in mylife...#RIPSheilaDixit,” Tiwariwrote on Twitter.
Sheila Dikshit was credit-ed for Delhi’s growing infra-structure including roads andflyovers, a less polluted city, bet-ter public transport system aswell as development on thehealth and educational fronts.
Dikshit, a well-known fig-ure in Indian politics, was apowerful administrator and
leader who ruled Delhi thricesince 1998. She held the recordof leading her party to threeconsecutive victories in NewDelhi constituency in theLegislative Assembly of Delhi.She was the second womanChief Minister of Delhi afterSushma Swaraj.
Dikshit’s entry into Indianpolitics was coincidental. Herfather-in-law was a renownedactivist during India’s freedomstruggle and later went on tobecome a Union CabinetMinister in the Indira GandhiGovernment.
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Chandigarh: A flood-like sit-uation due to torrential rainsprevailed in some places inPunjab on Saturday with theseasonal Ghaggar river inun-dating standing crops, includ-ing cotton and paddy, asArmy and NDRF teamsworked to save lives and prop-erties.
The Ghaggar river over-flowed in Patiala, Moga,Mansa, Sangrur, Ferozepur,Faridkot and Bathinda fol-lowing heavy torrential rain-fall, officials said.
Residents along the riverhave been alerted, they said.
Many villagers startedmoving to safer places withtheir belongings and live-stock.
Army, National DisasterResponse Force and stateteams continued to plug thebreaches in embankments ofGhaggar river at Moonak inSangrur district, officials said.
They hope the waters willstart receding in the next 24hours. Several acres of land inthese districts were sub-merged and officials wereassessing the damage to thecrops. PTI
Chandigarh: The acceptanceof Navjot Singh Sidhu's resig-nation as Punjab Cabinet min-ister is the end of his politicalcareer, the Bharatiya JanataParty said on Saturday.
Chief Minister AmarinderSingh accepted the cricketer-turned-politician's "one-line"resignation and forwarded it toGovernor V P Singh Badnorewho conveyed his acceptanceof the same, an officialspokesperson said.
"Sidhu has no future inPunjab politics now. His politi-cal career is over," said BJPNational secretary Tarun Chugh.Hitting out at the Congressleader, Chugh said Sidhu first"deceived" the BJP and has now"cheated" the Congress with his"non-performance".
Punjab BJP chief ShwaitMalik also hit out at Sidhu,dubbing him as a "selfish" indi-vidual "who thinks only abouthimself ".
"He is a selfish man whoearlier deceived the BJP whichbrought him into politics... Henow has nowhere to go," saidMalik, hailing AmarinderSingh for accepting Sidhu's
resignation."When Sidhu joined the
Congress, both Rahul Gandhiand Amarinder Singh had wel-comed him. Now whenAmarinder realised truth aboutSidhu, he took the right deci-sion (of accepting the resigna-tion)," said Malik.
The Rajya Sabha MP fur-ther accused Sidhu of being the"worst ever" minister in the his-tory of Punjab. "No party willnow invite him to join. He is arejected commodity," allegedMalik. Sidhu, who remained afour-time BJP MP fromAmritsar, had quit the saffronparty to join the Congressahead of the 2017 assemblypolls in Punjab.
Meanwhile, Aam AadmiParty MLA Harpal SinghCheema said that Sidhu shouldhave assumed the charge as thestate's power minister andworked for the welfare of thepeople. "People had expecta-tions from Sidhu as they are suf-fering because Punjab has thehighest electricity rates in thecountry. He had the opportunityand should have availed it anddelivered," said Cheema. PTI
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New Delhi: External AffairsMinister S Jaishankar is expect-ed travel to China next monthto prepare ground for the sec-ond informal summit betweenPrime Minister Narendra Modiand Chinese President XiJinping in India in October,Government sources said.
In Beijing, Jaishankar willheld wide-ranging talks withState Councilor and ForeignMinister Wang Yi covering var-ious aspects of bilateral tiesbesides discussing key region-al and global issues, they said.
The primary objective ofthe visit will be to prepareground for the second informalsummit between Modi and Xiwhich is likely to be held in thesecond week of October, thesources said.
In the informal summit, thetwo leaders are likely to focuson further broadening India-China ties which will includeenhancing people-to-peoplecontacts and expanding coop-eration in trade and investment.
The two leaders held the
first informal summit in Aprilin Chinese city of Wuhanmonths after bilateral ties cameunder severe strain following a73-day standoff between thearmies of the two countries inDoklam in the Sikkim sector ofthe border.
In the Wuhan summit,Modi and Xi decided to issue"strategic guidance" to mili-taries of the two countries tostrengthen communications tobuild trust and understanding,a move aimed at avoiding aDoklam-like situation in thefuture.
China's new Ambassadorto India Sun Weidong said inBeijing that with two strongleaders at the helm in both thecountries, the ties are set toreach new heights. Under thestrategic guidance provided byXi and Modi at their first infor-mal summit in Wuhan lastyear, the China-India relationshave gathered a "very good andsound momentum of develop-ment", Sun told a group ofIndian journalists. PTI
Neemuch: A 58-year old manhas been allegedly beaten todeath by a mob on suspicion ofstealing peacocks in MadhyaPradesh's Neemuch district,police said on Saturday, addingthat nine persons have beenarrested.
The incident occurred onFriday night in Lasudi Antarivillage under Kukdeshwarpolice station limits, about 40kms from the district head-quarters, Superintendent ofPolice Rakesh Kumar Sagarsaid.
Narrating the sequence ofevents, the SP said some vil-lagers noticed four personsfleeing after allegedly stealingpeacocks and chased them.
"While three of them man-aged to escape, the mob caughthold of Hiralal Banchhda, aDalit, and thrashed him," hesaid.
Banchhda was rushed tohospital by police where hedied during treatment, the SPsaid, adding that four dead pea-cocks were found with thedeceased.
A case under various sec-tions of the Indian Penal Code(IPC) and the SC/ST(Prevention of Atrocities) Acthas been registered against tenvillagers, and nine of them havebeen arrested.
The deceased and threeothers were booked under theWildlife Protection Act, headded. PTI
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In his younger days, HarryPhilip Michael entertained
sports lovers with his prowess inhockey. He was an instant hitwith hockey lovers across TamilNadu because of his stick-work,dribbling skills and ability toconvert even half-chances intogoals. People who watched himplay in State level matches sawin him another VJ Philips, TamilNadu's all-time great, who wasa member of the World Cupwinning India team of 1975.
But wayward life spoiled abright career and India lost aplayer who could have been agame changer for the countryin the international arena. Hispassion for narcotics, liquorand the opposite sex saw thefading out of the hockey play-er in him.
During his playing daysMichael had deceived manydefenders deployed by the rivalsto check-mate him from enter-ing the D-circle to score goals.But he could not wriggle out ofthe prowling eyes of ChennaiPolice who were searching forthe master brain behind some
of the well planned and exe-cuted house breaks in that tookplace in some of the well guard-ed residential colonies.
The cops who were deput-ed to solve the mystery behindthe disappearance of ten sov-ereign of gold and cash of Rsone lakh from theAbhiramapuram residences oftwo individuals in the month ofMay. Though the investiga-tors scanned the visuals fromthe CCTV footages collectedfrom the premises where therobberies happened, they couldnot make out suspicious move-ments by anybody.
But one of the cops noticedthe presence of a person onCCTV visuals collected fromthe adjacent streets in the local-ity. It did not take them muchtime to nab the former hock-ey player. Michael's modusoperandi would put even hard-ened criminals in a shade.During the recce missions, hewould find out the CCTVcameras installed in andaround his targets and avoidthe same at the time of the mis-sions. He made use of his"skill" in deceiving the defend-ers of the opposition side while
entering the houses he hadearmarked to rob.
Michael was an expert inentering the 'destinations' likea trapeze artist. He couldjump or swing from one rooftop to other like the Supermanwe see in films. Though he wassuccessful in hoodwinking theCCTVs installed around thehouses, he could not help him-self from some of the cameraskept in the adjoining streets.These images helped the policeto pick him up from the resi-dence of one of his wives. As acommitment to his Dravidianideology, this hockey player-turned-narcotics addict-turnedrobber had married twice andwas pampering both his sweet-hearts with the stolen materi-als. The looted gold and cashhave been recovered from thetwo wives.
What helped Police to iden-tify Michael was his presence inthe neighborhood on the occa-sions when the robberies werecommutted as well as his earli-er stints with the police underthe Goonda's Act and also as asmall-time robber. He hadserved jail terms in the past asa robber and drug peddler.
Ujh (Kathua): DefenceMinister Rajnath Singh said onSaturday that Jammu &Kashmir will soon become a"terror-free state" as the IndianArmy has successfully con-tained terrorists who had madethe Valley a "hell".
Singh, who visited theKargil War Memorial in Drasssector and inaugurated twobridges in Kathua and Basantar,said the resolution of Kashmirissue is on the cards and that"no power on Earth can stop it".
"There is no two opinionsabout it. Jammu and Kashmirwill get rid of terrorism (soon)",Singh told reporters at a briefpress conference here.
He was replying to a ques-tion on how long will it take tostamp out terrorism fromKashmir in the backdrop of theArmy's "Operation All-out"which has badly hit the back-bone of terrorism in J&K.
Singh said not only India,
but the international commu-nity too has decided to collec-tively fight against terrorism,which he described as a glob-al concern.
All nations sufferingbecause of terrorism are readyto fight it, he said.
"Army chief Gen BipinRawat is sitting with me. Theway the terrorists had decidedto make this valley of Kashmira hell, he (the Army) has been— to a large extent — success-ful in gaining victory overthem," Singh said.
Replying to another ques-tion whether Pakistan canrepeat a mischief like the 1999Kargil infiltration, he said hehas just returned from Kargilsector and seen how the bravearmy personnel scored victoryby dislodging the infiltratorsfrom there.
The Army will continue tobe vigilant and guard theheights, he added. PTI
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Bhopal: Investiture Ceremonyof Campion School Bhopal forPrimary & Secondary sectionfor the academic session 2019-20 were held and ‘Feast day’was celebrated on Saturday ina very special way at theCampion School Arera Colony.
The event was presidedover by the Chief Guest andPrincipal Fr Athnas Lakra SJ. Itconducted with the high degreeof sincerity and enthusiasm.The ceremony began with thePrayer song service ‘What afriend we have in Jesus, all oursins and grieves to bare Whata privilege to carry, everythingto god in prayer’ and Itni
Shakti hame denadata”... . . . . . . .” followed byLighting of the lamp by ChiefGuest Tanmay Verma DeputyCollector and Ex-Campioniteof 2008 Batch, Principal FrAthnas Lakra SJ, Manager FrChristdhari Kujur SJ, VicePrincipal Fr Amrit Lal ToppoSJ, Bursar Blacius Kullu, SeniorTeacher Mahendra Kothari Sir,Sister Mary along withSecondary staff secretaryShabista.
On this occasion, DeepakVerma DIG Sagar, father of thechief guest Tanmay Verma wasalso present. Secondary &Primary Cabinet March Pastcommand given by JohnsyKoshy and Imran to the newlycabinet members.
The badges were bestowedby the Chief Guest, Principal,Vice Principal, Superior Fatherand Treasurer to all the select-ed Newly 444 Council orCabinet members and others.All the selected students tookthis Oath under the guidanceof Commanding Officer JohnsyKoshy. School Cultural com-mittee was also the part of thisauspicious occasion.StaffReporter
asked the National MineralDevelopment Corporation(NMDC) to prepare a closureplan for Panna diamond minein Madhya Pradesh PannaTiger Reserve (PTR) by theend of September 2019 so thatit can be shut by June 2020.But the Public SectorUndertaking (PSU) hasinstead gone ahead and isseeking an extension of themining lease till 2035.
Sources said that at ameeting held on July 5, 2019,under the chairmanship ofMadhya Pradesh ChiefWildlife Warden, the PSUofficials asserted that since notall diamonds have been exca-vated and that diamond cut-ting and polishing industry isa major foreign exchangeearner and job provider, thelease for mining in theMajhgawan mine in the PTRshould be extended up to2035. The PTR is spread overan area of 54,200 hectares (ha)across Panna and Chhatarpurdistricts. It adjoins the GangauWildlife Sanctuary.
The SC-monitored com-mittee had been time andagain seeking the PSU’s clo-sure plans but the NMDC haspreferred to look the otherway. So far, eight meetingshave been held, sources in theknow of things said.
In 2005, the State (MP)wildlife protection board hadgiven mining clearance toNMDC, which is under theadministrative control of theMinistry of Steel, with thecondition that it should phaseout its operations by 2020.
Panna is the only diamondmine in India.
The Union EnvironmentMinistry is keen that the PSUshut down its diamond min-ing operation in the reserve byJune 2020 to prevent furtherdegradation of the regionwhere NMDC has set up a sortof township with numerouslabour camps and mine dig-ging machines, threateningthe ecology and wildlifeincluding big cats. The NMDChas denied the allegations.
Instead, it said that thenumber of royal Bengal tigershave increased in the PTR dueto the presence of its man-power. “Number of tigers hasincreased from 42 last year to52 this year. Is this not a signof a positive impact of ourpresence?” a senior NMDCofficial said on the conditionof anonymity.
However, the NMDC jus-tification to allow its miningextension has not gone downwell with the State wildlifeofficials. A senior PTR officialsaid, “If that is the reason forincrease in number of tigers,should we allow mining inevery tiger reserve? Tigersare saved because of our bet-ter surveillance, monitoringand management strategy.Our recommendation is inline with earlier apprehen-sions that mining activity inthe tiger reserve and sanctu-ary will affect the wildlife,especially the population oftigers.”
He also argued that whilevillagers are being relocatedfrom the tiger reserve tomaintain the undisturbednature of the habitat, whyshould the NMDC be allowedto mine in the protected area?
After 2005, in 2006 too thecentral empowered committee(CEC), appointed by the apexcourt, had remarked in itsreport on Panna mine that itwas undesirable to allow min-ing indefinitely within pro-tected areas and asked for adeadline for closure.
During the last onedecade, the Panna diamondmines have been closed thricefor want of environmentalclearances and other relatedissues. The longest period forwhich it remained closed wasfrom August 28, 2005 to June19, 2009.
After the mine was closedin 2005, the NMDC movedthe Supreme Court against theorder. The SC then appointeda seven-member CEC thatvisited the Panna mines andsurrounding areas in 2008 totake stock of the ground real-ity.
In September 2008, theSupreme Court revoked theban on diamond mining inPanna Tiger Reserve turningaround its 2002 directive. Thecourt, however, ordered for-mation of a monitoring com-mittee chaired by the chiefwildlife warden of MadhyaPradesh. The committee wasmandated to be responsiblefor approval of the mine clo-sure plan, prescribing andmonitoring of various safe-guards for mine operationand so on.
The SC-monitored panelcomprises of member secre-tar y, National TigerConservation Authority, fielddirector of Panna NationalPark and a non-official mem-ber of the National Board forWildlife of the UnionEnvironment Ministry.
‘valour’ and ‘courage’ of the sol-diers, who had sacrificed theirlives in the 1999 Kargil War, onbehalf of the ‘grateful’ nation,at a memorial in Drass sector,marking 20th anniversary of‘Operation Vijay’.
“The defence ministerstarted his visit by laying awreath in memory of the gal-lant martyrs of ‘OperationVijay’ at the iconic Kargil WarMemorial, which was followedby observing of one-minutesilence as a mark of respect forthe fallen heroes,” Srinagar-based defence spokesmanColonel Rajesh Kalia said.
Singh later visited the ‘VeerBhoomi’ and the ‘Hut ofRemembrance’, which are locat-ed in the war memorial premis-es at Drass, he said.
The defence minister wasbriefed on ‘Operation Vijay’and the heroic actions of theIndian troops to thwart thenefarious designs of the enemyin the Drass, Kargil and Bataliksectors, the spokesman said.
Singh was accompaniedby Union minister JitendraSingh, chief of Army StaffGeneral Bipin Rawat andGeneral Officer Commandingin chief Northern Command LtGen Ranbir Singh, Kalia said.
On the occasion, RajnathSingh dedicated a ‘Memory Lane’that displays information on afew important battles, he said.
Lieutenant General YKJoshi, General OfficerCommanding Fire & FuryCorps, a veteran of ‘OperationVijay’, briefed the defence min-ister at Lamochan View Point
on various battles that tookplace during the 1999 war.
Ahead of his day long visitto the state, Pakistan violatedceasefire agreement along theline of control in Poonch sec-tor. According to groundreports, Pakistan army target-ed civilian pockets using mor-tar shells in Balnoi, KrishnaGhati, Mankote and Shahpurareas of Poonch. In response,Indian army retaliated effec-tively and strongly. One civilianreceived bullet injuries on hisright hand and was shifted tothe district hospital in Poonch.
During his visit to thestate, Defence Minister alsosent out a stern warning to theKashmiri politicians, whostayed away from the dialoguetable, to decide whether theywant to accept the dialogueoffer or not.
Without naming any oneSingh asserted, “the Kashmir
issue will be resolved and nopower on the earth can stop it”.
Interacting with the mediain Kathua, Defence Ministersaid, “Kashmir ki samasya kahal ho key raheyga, duniya kikoi taqat nahi rook shakti hai(Resolution of Kashmir issue isbound to happen and no poweron earth can stop it).”
“If talks will not be fruitfulthen we know how to tacklethis problem”,he added.
Singh maintained that hehas made repeated appeals asa home minister asking “so-called leaders” for talks toresolve the issue. “Now it is upto them. They have to decidewhat they want to do”.Singhwas commenting to a specificquery whether fresh invita-tion would be extended to thekashmiri leaders to join the dia-logue table.
Referring to his bondingwith the state of Jammu and
Kashmir, Rajnath Singh saidKashmir is in his heart and thegovernment wants it to becomenot only paradise of India buttourist paradise of the world.
He also inaugurated twobridges built by the BorderRoads Organisation at Ujh inKathua and Basantar in Sambadistrict.
The bridge over the Ujhriver in Kathua was construct-ed at a cost of Rs 50 crore. LtGen Harpal Singh, DirectorGeneral Border Roads, MajGen Y P Khanduri, GOC, GurjDivision alongwith many otherArmy & Civil administrationdignitaries attended the inau-guration ceremony. It is thelongest bridge constructed byBRO so far. Both these bridgeshave been constructed under69 Road ConstructionCompany of 13 Border RoadsTask Force under supervisionof Project Sampark.
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Kishtwar police has regis-tered a First Information
Report (FIR) and also identi-fied former PDP MLC, FirdousTak and three others for rais-ing ‘provocative’ slogans duringprotest demonstrations overthe issue of arming villagedefence committee memberswith the state weapons.
Senior Superintendent ofPolice, Kishtwar, Shakti Pathaktold The Pioneer, “a FIR hasbeen registered in the Kishtwarpolice station and so far fourindividuals including formerPDP MLC, Firdous Tak havebeen identified behind raisingprovocative slogans”.
“Wasil Doolwal,NasirBaghwan and Arshad Giri wereamong those identified by theKishtwar police along withPDP leader”.
According to officialsources, “FIR no 163 U/S153A/120B RPC dated July19,2019 has been registered inthe Kishtwar police station”.
Reacting to the policeaction, PDP leader FirdousTak late Saturday evening post-ed another provocative tweet tovent his ire. “When adminis-tration is more answerable toChadi-dharies and report toNagpur. This is what happenswhen you speak about Sanghiesin Modi’s New India”,Tak tweet-ed.
Another PDP leader AijazAhmad Mir tweeted, “Thereare no words to condemn thisaction of registering FIR againstPDP leader Firdous Tak for
protesting against the plans tocreate more VDCs in Kishtwar.The soul of democracy is dyinga slow death under the presentrule .”
Tak along with his sup-porters had earlier organised aprotest demonstration againstthe decision of the districtauthorities to revamp defunctVillage Defence committeeson Friday.
Labelling VDC membersas ‘Godse brigade’ Tak had evendoled out an open threat to thedistrict authorities by claimingthat to counter armed VDCmembers they will go to theextent of procuring their ownweapons from the market.
He also vent his ire againstthe district authorities for notequipping them with the stateweapons. “Those who havebeen replaced in the revampedVDC’s are not the representa-tives of the Hindu communitybut cadre of RSS”, Tak hadclaimed while leading protestdemonstrations against the dis-trict authorities.
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The Nitish KumarGovernment has had to
eat crow. Having houndedlegally and administratively ayoung recruit IAS officer ofBihar cadre in a false casewherein he was framed by theState’s ‘transport mafia’, theNitish dispensation has finallyrelented. It has agreed to followthe Delhi High Court’s order torestore his salary for the lastthree years, pay a compensa-tion of �5 lakh and give its con-sent to the cadre-changerequest of Dr Jitendra Gupta,the 2013-batch officer whohad to even serve a month injail within days of his first everposting three years ago.
The Delhi-born medicoofficer had attempted to put acurb on the transport mafiawhich enjoyed some ‘authori-tative’ patronage.
Gupta had sought histransfer to Haryana, allegingthreat to his life for actingtough against the transportmafia in Bihar.
The latest developmentcomes almost a fortnight afterthe Delhi High Court on July 2rebuked the Bihar Governmentfor “humiliating, harassing andvictimising” Gupta.
“Required decision on DrGupta’s cadre transfer in thelight of the Delhi High Court’s
order should be taken at thelevel of government of India.The procedures to pay thecompensation and other duesto Dr Gupta are under process,”the Bihar government wrote ina letter to the Department ofPersonnel and Training(DoPT) last week.
Gupta as SDM in Kaimurdistrict was arrested in analleged corruption case andremained in jail for 29 days. Hewas later granted bail. The FIRtoo was quashed twice on theorders of the Patna High Courtand Delhi High Court, wherethe Bihar Government hadmoved challenging his bailplea. In fact, even the SupremeCourt upheld the order of theDelhi High Court.
In its vindictiveness againstGupta, the Bihar government
even challenged the CAT orderbefore the Delhi high courtclaiming that the tribunalfailed to understand themalafide intention of the offi-cer for seeking cadre transferwhich was to avoid a criminalcase. The Delhi High Courtdismissed the State govern-ment’s appeal against the CATorder.
“Both CAT and HighCourt had taken note of this inthe judicial proceedings thatintention of Bihar Governmentto resist cadre transfer is malafide as they want to implicateGupta in a criminal case whichhas been found false andquashed right uptill SupremeCourt of India. CAT had evenexpressed displeasure over this,”said Sourabh Ahuja, the peti-tioner’s advocate in this case.
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The Congress on Saturday alleged that the UttarPradesh Government was trying to protect the
accused in the Sonbhadra clash and instead ofensuring justice Chief Minister Yogi Adityanathwas targeting party general secretary PriyankaGandhi Vadra, who met the victims after a day’sdetention and asserted she would be back.
Congress’s chief spokesperson RandeepSurjewala said the chief minister and the rulingBJP were afraid of her, adding, “The reign of AjayBisht (Adityanath) continues to be the most insen-sitive in memory.”
Surjewala accused Adityanath of “lying”that the previous Congress governments wereresponsible for the dispute that triggeredWednesday’s violence in Sonbhadra. Surjewalanarrated various incidents since 2017 to drivehome the point that the Uttar Pradesh govern-ment was trying to protect the accused.
The party alleged that “jungle raj” wasprevalent in the state and the government hadfailed to take action against the guilty. “BJP gov-ernment fails to prevent Sonbhadra Massacre. BJPgovernment fails to act against guilty.BJP gov-ernment illegally arrests Priyanka ji for wantingto meet families,” Surjewala said.
Congress President Rahul Gandhi accusedthe State government of being “dictatoriallyinclined” and said Priyanka’s “imprisonment” atChunar guesthouse is an attempt to trample upondemocracy.
“The imprisonment of Congress general sec-retary Priyanka Gandhi, on way to meet the fam-ilies of Sonbhadra massacre victims, in Chunarguest house through the night without water andelectricity by a dictatorially inclined UP gov-ernment is an attempt to trample upon democ-racy,” Rahul Gandhi said in a Facebook post inHindi. Congress will not get scared of such tac-tics and stop fighting for Dalits and tribals, he said.
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The CPI (M) on Saturday con-demned the killings in
Sonbhadra and accused the YogiAdityanath-led BJP government of“protecting” the land mafias.
After a CPI (M) delegation vis-ited Ubbha village on Friday to meetthe families of the victims, theparty said in a statement that the vil-lagers told the six-member delega-tion “horrifying” details of the clash.
Ten people were gunned downand 28 injured in the clash betweensupporters of Ubbah village head-man Yagya Dutt and the tribal vil-lagers on Wednesday.
“The Adivasis have been tillingthe land for the past seven decades butno government gave them land pat-tas which was their right. After theAdityanath government took office,the Adivasis have been threatened bythe local land mafia to stop tilling theland. Even though the Adivasis hadcomplained to the authorities, thegovernment and administrationrefused to act.
“The Adityanath government istrying to put the responsibility onothers but it is during its rule thatthe land mafia led by the pradhanclaimed to have ‘bought’ the landand unleashed terror on the
Adivasis. It is highly condemnablethat the government has not givena single rupee to help the injured andon the contrary some were forciblydischarged from the hospital,” theparty said in the statement.
The party alleged that the BJPgovernment was responsible for“protecting the land mafia anddenying land pattas to the Adivasis”.
“The CPI (M) demands thatland pattas be immediately given to
the Adivasi families who have beentilling the land for over sevendecades. It demands strong actionagainst the administration officials
and the police who connivedwith the criminals and immediatearrest and stringent punishment ofall those involved in the brutalmassacre. It demands immediatecompensation to the families ofthose killed and to the injured,” thestatement said.
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Patients suffering with skincondition known as post-
Kala-Azar dermal leishmania-sis (PKDL) should be detectedat the earliest and treatedpromptly as they can act as areservoir for the parasite thatcauses Kala Azar (KA) orVisceral leishmaniasis (VL), anew study has said.
The observation holdsimportance given that India hasset 2020 as a deadline to rootout KA. But neglecting PKDLmay put the poor people, whoare the most affected, in avicious cycle, as has been indi-cated in the study published the
journal Clinical InfectiousDisease.
Caused by parasite infect-ed sandfly, while KA is poten-tially life threatening, PKDL isa neglected form of KA thatmanifests into skin disease.The PKDL patient suffers nofever, or even itching for thatmatter. Since the problem is byand large cosmetic-beginingwith skin discoloration andlater to nodules in the body, thepatients either remain neglect-ed to their condition or do notfeel need to access the health-care.
However, this is where thethreat lies. PKDL lesions con-tain the same parasite thatcauses KA, said the researchersof the study who had con-ducted xenodiagnosis test, thatis, exposing sandflies to indi-viduals with different stages ofdisease and infection.
In other words, PKDLpatients were allowed them-selves to be bitten by laborato-ry-reared sandflies (which werefree from infection) by plung-ing their hands into a cage for
15 minutes containing maleand female sandflies. The sand-flies were then analysed for theparasites that cause KA.
The results showed thatnearly 60 per cent of the 47PKDL patients in the studypassed on the parasites to sand-flies. This means the insectscould then go on to infectsomeone else, said the studyconducted by the Drugs forNeglected Diseases initiative(DNDi) and the InternationalCentre for Diarrhoeal DiseaseResearch, Bangladesh (ICCDR,B). It aimed to access whetherparasites in the skin of PKDLpatients could be transmitted tothe sandflies that transmit KA.
“This is the largest study ofits type to date. Until now,information on the role ofPKDL was scarce and scatteredacross decades of differentresearch initiatives,” said DrJorge Alvar, senior leishmani-asis advisor at DNDi and co-principal investigator of thestudy. “The results unequivo-cally show that PKDL is of piv-otal importance for maintain-
ing transmission of the diseasein-between epidemics.”
“Because PKDL is not fatalit has largely been ignored bypublic health efforts, and manyscientific questions around itsrole have remained unad-dressed,” said Dr DineshMondal, senior scientist at theICDDR, B and principal inves-tigator of the study. “Whilethese new findings don’tanswer all our questions, theydo show that early treatment ofPKDL patients will be a criti-cal element of any leishmani-asis public health and elimina-tion strategy.”
‘’Great strides have beenmade in the control of KA inSouth Asia, but this studyshows that now we mustengage in active PKDL casedetection and provide prompttreatment as an integral part ofKA control and elimination,”said Dr Suman Rijal, Directorof the DNDi Regional Office inIndia. “PKDL must beaddressed in order to sustainelimination or we risk jeopar-dizing our earlier successes.”
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An attempt by some of theterrorists to set up a unit of
the ISIS in Tamil Nadu hasbeen revealed by the arrest ofa group of youth by theNational Investigating Agency(NIA). Five extremists weretaken into custody by the NIAfrom various places of theState, includingRamanathapuram, Theni ,Coimbatore, Tirunelveli andChennai in a dawn to duskcrack down.
The five persons who weretaken into custocy by the NIAis in continuation of the arrestof 11 youth who were deport-ed from a West Asian country.According to sources in theNIA, the sleuths have comeacross the intention of theseyouth to launch the IS unit inTamil Nadu.
“They were on a mission tocollect money and logistics forthe purpose. We have foundthat all of them have been
indoctrinated by anti-Indiaforces,” said a official of theNIA. The materials seized fromthose whjo were taken into cus-tody include electronic gadgetsincluding laptops, mobilephones, hard disks, nearly 20SIM cards and Islamic litera-ture.
The arrested persons hadconspired to raise funds toprocure arms to eliminateHindu leaders. The NIA hadtaken into custody ten personsin April 2018 and the infor-mation collected from themproved to be crucial. “TamilNadu has become a hotbed ofIslamic terrorism . We have suf-ficient evidence to prove thatthe Thowheed Jamaat in SriLanka (the group responsiblefor the Easter Congregationblasts that led to the death ofmore than 250 Christians) andTamil Nadu are working intandem,” said an intelligenceofficial.
But M Thamimum Ansari,leader of the ManithaneyaJananayaga Katchi, an Islamicoutfit who is also a member ofthe Tamil Nadu LegislativeAssembly has lambasted theNIA and Police for harassingMuslim youth in the State.“The NIA is picking up inno-cent Muslim youth. They aretargeting one community. Thecontinued targeting of theMuslims would lead to manyissues,” warned Ansari.
Beijing: China has said it val-ues India's concerns on thebilateral trade imbalance andis willing to discuss newapproaches to address the issueand asked New Delhi to joinBeijing in its fight against"unilateralism and protection-ism" amidst a bruising tradewar with the US.
India for long has beenpressing China to open itspharmaceutical market forIndian pharma exports toaddress the yawning tradedeficit which last year accord-ing to Chinese figures, crossed$57 billion in a $95.5 billiontrade.
China's new Ambassadorto India Sun Weidong said,"China highly values India'sconcerns on trade imbalance.But I have to point out that wehave never deliberately pur-sued a trade surplus againstIndia."
China for its part, Sun saidhas taken measures to increaseimport of rice and sugar andaccelerated the process ofreview and approvals of Indianpharmaceuticals and agricul-tural goods.
He said latest figures showthat China's imports of Indiangoods grew by 15 per cent andmore Indian goods have foundtheir way to the Chinese mar-ket.
India's export of agricul-tural goods to China last year
actually doubled, he said. "According to the statistics
in the first half this year, India'strade deficit against China isdown by five per cent. So I amconvinced that with the con-certed efforts the issue of tradeimbalance between India andChina will be graduallyaddressed," he said.
"China and India have var-ious channels for dialogue totalk about issues like tradeimbalance. We are willing todiscuss and find newapproaches to address the tradeimbalances with our Indianfriends," he said.
"According to the statisticsin the first half this year, India'strade deficit against China isdown by five per cent. So I amconvinced that the with theconcerted efforts the issue oftrade imbalance between Indiaand China will be graduallyaddressed," he said.
Sun also asked India to
join China in the fight againstunilateralism and protection-ism, a reference to USPresident Donald Trump's pol-icy using tariffs as a weapon toassert his America first policy.
Trump kicked off a tradewar with China last year byslapping 25 per cent duties onmore than $250 billion ofChinese imports, demandingBeijing to reduce massive tradedeficit which climbed to over$539 billion.
He is also insisting onChina to workout verifiablemeasures for the protection ofintellectual property rights(IPR), technology transfer andmore access to US goods toChinese markets.
Both the countries haveimposed additional tariffs onbillions of dollars' worth oftheir exports to each other.
There has been a tradefriction between India and theUS on several issue. PTI
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New Delhi: Despite bankingrestrictions put in place by theReserve Bank of India, thecountry has not put any blan-ket ban on trading in cryp-tocurrencies yet, theGovernment has clarified.
Responding to questions inthe Rajya Sabha on whether theGovernment has prohibitedcryptocurrency in the country,Minister of State for Financeand Corporate Affairs AnuragThakur this week said theanswer was no.
"Presently, there is no sep-arate law for dealing with issuesrelating to cryptocurrencies.Hence, all concerned depart-ments and law enforcementagencies, such as RBI,Enforcement Directorate andIncome Tax authorities, etc.take action as per the relevantexisting laws," the Minister said.
"Similarly, police/courtstake action on IPC (IndianPenal Code) offences. Further,in view of the risks and dangersassociated with cryptocurren-cies, (the) government andRBI have been issuing advi-sories, press releases and cir-culars to the public," he added.
Earlier the Reserve Bank ofIndia issued a circular banningregulated entities from pro-viding services to crypto busi-nesses. The ban went intoeffect on July 6 last year,Bitcoin.com reported onFriday.
But a draft bill for banningcryptocurrency has been inthe works for some time withEconomic Affairs SecretarySubhash Chandra Garg leadingthe exercise.
According to the draft"Banning of Cryptocurrencyand Regulation of OfficialDigital Currency Bill 2019",holding, selling or dealing incryptocurrencies such asBitcoin could soon land you injail for 10 years.
The draft has proposed a10-year prison sentence forpersons who "mine, generate,hold, sell, transfer, dispose,issue or deal in cryptocurren-cies.
Besides making it com-pletely illegal, the bill makesholding of cryptos a non-bail-able offence.
A cryptocurrency is a dig-ital or virtual currency that usescryptography for security andis generally based onBlockchain technology, a dis-tributed ledger enforced by adisparate network of comput-ers. Bitcoin is the most popu-lar cryptocurrency in theworld. PTI
,�����������+$�������� ����+�����!��� New Delhi: No-frills carrier
IndiGo said on Saturday it willseek shareholders' approval atthe upcoming annual generalmeeting for expanding its boardso that an independent womandirector can be inducted.
In a letter to markets reg-ulator Sebi on July 8, RakeshGangwal, one of the twoIndiGo promoters, had point-ed out the airline's non-com-pliance with Sebi regulations innot bringing onboard an inde-pendent woman director sinceMay last year.
As per Sebi regulations, alllisted companies should have atleast one woman director ontheir respective boards.
"The Board has decided toseek the approval of the share-holders at the upcoming AGMfor expanding the Board toenable the induction of anindependent woman director,"IndiGo said in a statementafter a two-day board meeting
that ended on Saturday.The board's size will be
expanded to 12 directors fromthe current six once the share-holders' approval is obtained atthe upcoming AGM.
In the expanded board,IndiGo's other co-promoterRahul Bhatia will have theright to nominate six directorswhile Gangwal will have theright to nominate two direc-
tors. Remaining four directorswill be independent.
The two-day board meet-ing came against the back-drop of an ongoing spatbetween the two promotersover alleged corporate gover-nance lapses.
Fuelled by higher passen-ger revenues, the airline's par-ent company InterGlobeAviation Friday posted its high-est-ever quarterly profit of Rs1,203.14 crore for the threemonths ended June and assert-ed that co-promoters are on thesame page on growth strategy.
The company told BSE onSaturday that as on June 30 thisyear, Bhatia's family and hiscompany InterglobeEnterprises Limited owns 38.23per cent of InterGlobe Aviation.
Gangwal and his familyown 36.65 per cent of theInterGlobe Aviation as on June30, IndiGo told BSE onSaturday. PTI
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New Delhi: A forensic audit ofcredit ratings obtained by crisis-hit Infrastructure Leasing andFinancial Services(IL&FS) groupentities under theerstwhile man-agement has flagged widespreadirregularities, including induce-ments to get favourable ratings
despite adverse financial situa-tion.
Citing an interim report ofthe special auditconducted byGrant Thorntonon a mandate
from the Government-appoint-ed new board, sources said theformer top management per-
sonnel at IL&FS and its groupfirms extended favours andgifts to the top executives ofrating agencies and their fam-ilies and also suggestedchanges in the rating reportsbefore they were made public.
While the continuingprobe has already led to CEOsof two rating agencies havingbeen sent on leave by theirrespective boards, fresh detailshave emerged about suspect-ed attempts by the former topmanagement personnel ofIL&FS Group to influence therating agencies and their topofficers for high credit ratingsand also to thwart any nega-tive ratings. The new board ofIL&FS, which was appointedin October last year after mas-sive defaults by the group
post its debt burden ballooningto over �90,000 crore and sus-pected wrong-doings by theformer top management, hadmandated Grant Thornton tocarry out a a special audit for allhigh-value transactions under-taken by IL&FS Ltd and someof its group companies for theperiod between April 2013 andSeptember 2018. PTI
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New Delhi: Finding itself at thecentre of the IL&FS controver-sy, India Ratings on Saturdaysaid its investigation into therole of a senior director at par-ent firm Fitch's Singapore officefound him in violation of thecompany's code of conduct andhe is no longer an employee.
The rating agency alsodefended its rating process,saying its ratings for IL&FSgroup entities followed a robustand transparent analysis of rel-evant information includingthe company's audited financial
statements and sought to shiftthe blame to falsification andsprucing up of the financials bythe former top management ofthe group.
It rejected the observa-tions made in a special audit byGrant Thornton of the ratingsgiven by five credit rating agen-cies, including India Ratings, tosome IL&FS entities, in whichit has been alleged that theagencies continued to give topratings despite being awareabout weak financials of thegroup. PTI
New Delhi: Richest IndianMukesh Ambani has kept hisannual salary from his flagshipfirm Reliance Industriescapped at �15 crore for theeleventh year on the trot.
Ambani has kept salary,perquisites, allowances andcommission together at �15crore since 2008-09, forgoingover �24 crore per annum.
This is at a time whenremunerations of all whole-time directors of the compa-ny, including cousins Nikhiland Hital Meswani, saw ahandsome increase in the fis-cal year ended March 31,2019.
"Compensation of ShriMukesh D Ambani, Chairmanand Managing Director, hasbeen set at �15 crore, reflectinghis desire to continue to set apersonal example for modera-tion in managerial compensa-tion levels," RIL said in its lat-est annual report. PTI
The UK has said it is “deeplyconcerned” over Iran's
seizure of a British-flaggedtanker, comprising 18 Indiansin its 23-member crew, in theGulf and warned Tehranagainst choosing a "dangerouspath of illegal and destabilisingbehaviour."
British-flagged tankerStena Impero was seized onFriday by the IranianRevolutionary Guard in theStrait of Hormuz amid freshescalation of tensions in theGulf.
Iran's state-run IRNA newsagency said the tanker wasseized after it collided with afishing boat and failed torespond to calls from the small-er craft.
It said there no reportedinjuries among the crew mem-
bers, which also includes fiveRussians, a Latvian and aFilipino.
UK foreign secretaryJeremy Hunt termed theseizure as "completely unac-ceptable" and stressed that"freedom of navigation must bemaintained".
The incident comes daysafter an Iranian oil super-tanker, Grace 1, was seized offthe Spanish coast earlier thismonth by Iran and four of itsIndian crew members werearrested by the the RoyalGibraltar Police (RGP).
“Our reaction will be con-sidered but robust. We havebeen trying to find a way toresolve Grace 1 issue but WILLensure the safety of our ship-ping,” Hunt said in a statementon Twitter on Saturday.
“Yesterday's action in Gulfshows worrying signs Iran may
be choosing a dangerous pathof illegal and destabilisingbehaviour after Gibraltar'sLEGAL detention of oil boundfor Syria,” he added.
The British-flagged StenaImpero was surrounded byfour vessels and a helicopterbefore heading into Iranian
waters, Hunt said.The Stena Impero's owners
say they have been unable tocontact the ship.
They said that the vesselowners was fully complyingwith regulations and it was ininternational waters when itwas approached.
hack into Scotland Yard's newsand Twitter service to reopenhis feud with London MayorSadiq Khan, blaming him forthe breach.
A series of bizarre messagesfrom the official news websiteand Twitter were sent out tomore than a million followersof the Metropolitan Policeaccounts overnight on Friday.
"With the incompetentMayor of London, you willnever have safe streets," Trumpsaid, alongside a retweet of aTwitter message related to thehack.
The US president andKhan have repeatedly clashedin the past, exchanging Twitterbarbs against each other.
The Met Police clarified ina statement that there hadbeen no hack of the MetPolice's own IT infrastructurebut that the breach was linkedwith a third-party news serviceit uses.
“We are assessing to estab-lish what criminal offenceshave been committed,” theforce said in a statement.
It adds: “The Met PolicePress Bureau uses an onlineprovider called MyNewsDeskto issue news releases andother content. When a story ispublished via MyNewsDesk, itappears on the Met's websiteand Twitter accounts and gen-erates an email to those who'vesubscribed to receive our newsupdates.
"On Friday (July 19), unau-thorised messages appearedon the news section of our web-site as well as on the @metpo-liceuk Twitter feed and inemails sent to subscribers.”
The Met police said it hasbegun making changes to itsaccess arrangements toMyNewsDesk.
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Apowerful council in Iransaid Saturday the country's
seizure of a British oil tanker inthe strategic Strait of Hormuzwas in response to Britain's rolein impounding an Iraniansupertanker two weeks earlier.
Spokesman of Iran'sGuardian Council, Abbas AliKadkhodaei, was quoted inthe semi-official Fars newsagency saying "the rule of rec-iprocal action is well-known ininternational law" and thatIran's moves to "confront theillegitimate economic war and
seizure of oil tankers is aninstance of this rule and isbased on international rights."
The council rarely com-ments on state matters, butwhen it does it is seen as areflection of the supreme leaderAyatollah Ali Khamenei'sviews. That's because the coun-cil works closely withKhamenei, who has final say onall state matters.
The free flow of trafficthrough the Strait of Hormuzis of international importancebecause one-fifth of all globalcrude exports passes throughthe waterway from Mideast
exporters to countries aroundthe world. The British-flaggedStena Impero was seized byIran on Friday evening with acrew of 23 crew aboard. Noneare British nationals. Maritimetrackers show it was headed toa port in Saudi Arabia.
Two weeks earlier, Britain'sRoyal Marines took part in theseizure of an Iranian oil tankercarrying more than 2 millionbarrels of Iranian crude byGibraltar, a British overseas ter-ritory off the southern coast ofSpain. Officials there initiallysaid the July 4 seizure happenedon orders from the US.
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Iran's seizure of a UK-flagged tanker in the Strait
of Hormuz has further height-ened tensions in the Gulfregion after the US militaryclaimed it had downed anIranian drone.
Britain's allies have calledfor the release of the vessel,warning of the danger of esca-lation.
US President DonaldTrump said he would holdtalks with Britain about thetanker's seizure by Iran'sRevolutionary Guards.
manufacturing lab ahead ofanother weekend of protests inthe semi-autonomous Chineseterritory.
Banners voicing opposi-tion to an extradition bill thathas sparked more than a monthof demonstrations were foundat the lab, according to HongKong media reports. Policesaid the investigation was con-tinuing and that they had notfound concrete evidence link-ing the explosives-making to amajor protest march plannedfor Sunday.
Police said they foundabout 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds)of TATP, or tri-acetone tri-per-oxide, in the late Friday nightraid.
Alick McWhirter, a seniorbomb disposal officer, said thehomemade explosive is veryunstable and extremely pow-erful. One kilogram was deto-nated Saturday morning. Publicbroadcaster RTHK said a 27-year-old man was arrested.Police said more arrests mayfollow.
Police have erected hugebarricades near governmentheadquarters in preparationfor Sunday's march. Earlierprotests have often ended withpolice clashing with groups ofprotesters who try to occupy streets or refuse to dis-perse after the demonstrationis over.
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Hong Kong actor SimonYam was stabbed in the
stomach while appearing onstage for a promotional eventin southern China on Saturday.
A man ran onto the stageand stabbed and slashed theveteran actor, video broadcaston local media showed.
"We are extremely shockedby this incident," Yam's man-agement company saidSaturday evening in a statementreleased on the Twitter-likeWeibo platform.
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Pakistan Prime MinisterImran Khan on Saturday
left for his maiden trip to theUS to have face-to-face talkswith President Donald Trumpand reboot bilateral relationsthat were hit after he publiclycriticised Islamabad, cancelledmilitary aid and asked it to domore to fight terrorism.
Prime Minister Khan's visitcomes at a time when talksbetween the US and AfghanTaliban are thought to haveentered a decisive phase.
Relations between Pakistanand the US have remainedtense during Trump's tenure.The US president has publiclysaid that Pakistan has given us"nothing but lies and deceit"and also suspended securityand other assistance for back-ing terror groups.
Prime Minister Khan, whois undertaking the three-daytrip to the US on the invitationof Trump, will be accompaniedby army chief Gen. QamarJaved Bajwa and ISI chief Lt.Gen. Faiz Hameed.
He would visit the White
House on Monday for detailedtalks with Trump and wouldalso meet House SpeakerNancy Pelosi before returningon July 23.
Diplomatic sources saidthat issues like the Afghanpeace process, Pakistan gov-ernment's action against ter-rorism and terror financing andrestoration of military aid toPakistan would be the high-lights of the trip.
Prime Minister Khan isexpected to brief PresidentTrump about the steps he hastaken to normalise relationswith India, especially after thePulwama terror attack inKashmir and the Indo-Pakmilitary standoff following theBalakot air strikes, they said.
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German Chancellor AngelaMerkel has urged
Europeans to confront pop-ulism, nationalism, racism andanti-Semitism as she paid trib-ute to the Nazi resistance in herown country. SpeakingSaturday at a solemn ceremo-ny marking the anniversary ofthe failed attempt to kill Nazidictator Adolf Hitler, Merkelsaid the courage and sacrificeof the conspirator should serveas an example to people today.
"They put humanity overtheir own human lives," she toldthe crowd at the site where plotleader Colonel Claus vonStauffenberg and others wereexecuted. Von Stauffenberg triedto kill Hitler with a briefcasebomb on July 20, 1944, duringa meeting at his headquarters inwhat was then East Prussia.Hitler escaped the full force ofthe blast when someone movedthe briefcase next to a table leg,deflecting much of the explosiveforce. The plot crumbled whennews spread that Hitler had sur-vived. Von Stauffenberg andhis fellow plotters were execut-ed within hours.
Former India captain MahendraSingh Dhoni on Saturday madehimself “unavailable” for the
tour of West Indies but ruled outimmediate retirement a day before theselectors meet in Mumbai to pick thesquads for the upcoming away series.
Amid mounting speculationaround his international retirementafter India’s semi-final exit from therecent World Cup, Dhoni has told theBCCI that he will take a two-monthsabbatical from the game to serve hisparamilitary regiment.
Dhoni is an Honorary LieutenantColonel in the Parachute Regiment ofthe Territorial Army,
“We would like to clarify threethings. MS Dhoni is not retiringfrom cricket right now. He is takinga two month sabbatical to serve hisparamilitary regiment which he hadcommitted much earlier. We have nowintimated his decision to skipperVirat Kohli and chairman of selectorsMSK Prasad,” a senior BCCI officialsaid on Saturday.
The 38-year-old Dhoni’s refusal totake retirement now leaves the ball inthe court of the selectors, who wereexpected to drop him from the squadfor the West Indies. India will playthree T20 Internationals, as manyODIs and two Tests in the tour start-ing August 3.
It is believed that the selectioncommittee chaired by MSK Prasadwants to move forward with an eye onfuture but they would also like to geta sense of where the Indian captainstands on this issue.
“The selection committee hasalways been clear on one issue. Theyhave no right to tell anyone irrespec-tive of their stature as to when theyshould call it quits but when it comesto team selection, it remains theirdomain,” a senior BCCI official said.
With Dhoni pulling out of thetour, Rishabh Pant is expected to befirst wicketkeeper in all three formats
while Wriddhiman Saha will be Pant’sunderstudy in the Tests.
From now, the focus will be moreon T20 cricket keeping the World T20in mind, which is scheduled to be heldin Australia next year.
India will be playing a lot of bilat-
eral three-match T20 series in run-upto the global meet and with Dhoniexpected to play one more season ofIPL with Chennai Super Kings, thingsare a bit tricky at the moment. Thereare a few questions that the selectorsneed to answer.
Whether they see Dhoni play-ing till World T20? If the answer isyes, are they willing to give him 15to 18 T20s during the phase as akeeper-batsman?
If that answer is also yes, itwould boil down to whether skip-per Virat Kohli sees him as a bats-man in T20s where keeping isn’t theprimary skill required.
With Dhoni’s ever-declininghitting abilities, can he come in atNos 6 or 7 where he might, at best,get 6 to 8 balls in most games andeven less in some?
If that answer is also yes, thenext question that would crop up isif he can hit the likes of Jofra Archer,Jason Behrendorff or MohammedAmir straightaway in the slog overs.
There is a case about Dhoni’sstellar success in death overs at theIPL. He always gets one weakIndian bowler — say a MohammedSiraj, Harshal Patel or DhawalKulkarni or Sandeep Sharma fromwhom he scores those 15 to 20-runovers.
But would that be possibleagainst a Lockie Ferguson or a PatCummins?
The current selection commit-tee’s term ends in October when
the BCCI elections arescheduled and they
would like to puta transitionphase inplace in con-
sonance withwhat the captain
and the coach want.However, once the board mem-
bers take over after the electionsand if Dhoni decides to stick with
his decision of not retiring, therecould be some twists and turns in thecoming months.
Till then, all roads lead to theBCCI headquarters on Sunday wherePrasad will address the most definingpress conference of his eventfultenure.
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Three-time championJohn Isner rallied to beat
Australian Matthew Ebden4-6, 6-3, 6-4 and reach thesemi-finals of the ATP grasscourt tournament inNewport, Rhode Island.
Isner, the top seed play-ing on a wild card invitationas he continues his returnfrom a foot injury, on Fridaybooked a final-four show-down with fourth-seededFrenchman Ugo Humbert, a7-5, 3-6, 6-2 winner over IlyaIvashka of Belarus.
Humbert, 20, is comingoff his best performance ina Grand Slam, a run to thefourth round at Wimbledon.He cracked the top 50 in theworld rankings this week at
No 48.Isner, 34,
was sidelinedthree monthsafter suffering astress fracture inhis left foot inhis loss to Roger
Federer in the final at Miamiin March.
He missed the FrenchOpen and fell in the secondround at Wimbledon.
Isner belted 24 aces toovercome Ebden in arematch of the 2017Newport final won by theAmerican.
Isner took his recordover Ebden to 5-1 as he viesto get his season back ontrack at Newport — wherehe also won in 2011 and2012 — and next week inAtlanta, where he is a five-time champion.
S e v e n t h - s e e d e d
Alexander Bublik ofKazakhstan also reached thesemi-finals downingAmerican Tennys Sandgren0-6, 6-3, 6-0.
Bublik, who lost 10 ofthe last 12 points in the firstset but dropped just fivepoints in the third, will faceSpain’s Marcel Granollers,who completed a rain-dis-rupted 6-3, 6-0 victory overGermany’s Mischa Zverev 6-3, 6-0.
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Mahendra Singh Dhoni is stillfit to continue and if the
Indian team wants the best out ofhim, the selectors should think ofmanaging his workload properly,feels the former India captain'schildhood coach Keshav Banerjee.
The mystery surroundingDhoni’s future was put to rest tem-porarily after he decided to takea two-month break and serve hisarmy regiment after a gruellingIndia Premier League season andthe 2019 World Cup.
“Dhoni still has cricket left inhim. I know that. He is still fitenough to play internationalcricket,” Banerjee said.
“I feel they (selectors) shouldtalk to Dhoni and make thingsclear,” Banerjee said. “I knowDhoni very well since he was aboy. Not even his best friendwould know when he will retire.So I really have no idea. But helooks fit as ever and is enjoying hisgame. To me, he had a goodWorld Cup and looked sharp.”
Asked about youngsters likeRishabh Pant waiting in the wings,and whether Dhoni should makeway for them, Banerjee opined:“He (Pant) needs guidance andwho better than Dhoni to guidehim. It is my personal opinion. Idon’t know what BCCI will do.But if you ask me, they shouldmanage Dhoni well from here onif they want him in the T20World Cup as well. Dhoni doesnot need to play every series.That’s how Rishabh Pant can alsofit in.”
The T20 World Cup is slatedto take place in Australia nextyear.
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Former Australian captain SteveSmith and Ashes aspirant
Matthew Wade will be facing lead-ing pacers Mitchell Starc and PatCummins in an internal trial atSouthampton that will decideAustralia’s squad for the upcomingtour of England. David Warner andCameron Bancroft will also be partof the practice match, albeit in thesame squad as Starc and Cummins.
According to ESPNCricinfo,teams coached by Brad Haddin andGraeme Hick were named on Fridayevening with Travis Head and Testcaptain Tim Paine leading the twosides. Head will have Starc,Cummins, Josh Hazlewood, PeterSiddle and David Warner in his sidewhile Paine’s side will include Smith,Wade, Nathan Lyon, James Pattinsonand Cameron Bancroft.
“I think it’ll definitely get theadrenaline up like in a Test match,”Cummins was quoted as saying. “Itdoesn’t happen too often — you’ll seeour egos be put to the test, we’ll begoing at each other I think. Maybe(played Smith before) in a T20, butnot that I can remember.
“I think personally from mypoint of view it’s about trying to getmyself 100 per cent ready for a Testmatch. I haven’t played a first-classgame in a few months so it’s going tobe trying to bowl long spells, get the
ball swinging, try and think of waysto get batsmen out. These guys arereally good players just like theEnglish Test side. There’s no reallyobvious flaw so you’ve got to try towork a batsman out. It’s going to bea good hit-out, everyone is in good
form.”Haddin XII: David Warner, MarcusHarris, Kurtis Patterson, Travis Head(c), Marnus Labuschagne, WillPucovski, Alex Carey (wk), PatCummins, Mitchell Starc, PeterSiddle, Josh Hazlewood, Jon Holland
Hick XII: Joe Burns, CameronBancroft, Steve Smith, PeterHandscomb, Matthew Wade,Mitchell Marsh, Tim Paine (c),Michael Neser, James Pattinson,Jackson Bird, Chris Tremain, NathanLyon
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Axar Patel’s reargaurd hero-ics went in vain as India A
suffered a narrow five-run lossagainst West Indies A in thefourth unofficial ODI of thefive-match series here.
With the series already inpocket after winning the firstthree games, India A tastedtheir first defeat in the tour onFriday despite Axar’s (81 notout of 63 balls) valiant effortwith the bat while chasing 299runs.
Chasing the home team’s298 for nine, India A’s top-orderfailed to put up big scoresdespite getting starts and at onestage were struggling at 160 forsix.
Then came in Axar and inthe company of WashingtonSundar raised 60 runs for theseventh wicket to keep India Ain the hunt.
Axar marshalled the tailbeautifully but Khaleel Ahmedand Navdeep Saini fell in aspace of three balls towards theclose as West Indies’ registered
their first win in the series.India A needed nine runs of thelast over but could only man-age three to finished on 293 fornine.
Axar hit eight boundariesand one six during his fieryknock.
Sundar (45), KrunalPandya (45), skipper ManishPandey (24), Ruturaj Gaikwad(20) and Hanuma Vihari (20)all got starts but couldn’t pro-long their stay.
Rovman Powell (2/47) andKeemo Paul (2/61) shared fourwickets between them for WestIndies A.
Earlier, West Indies A rodeon Roston Chase (84), DevonThomas (70), Jonathan Carter(50) and skipper Sunil Ambris’(46) fine efforts with the bat topost 298 for nine after beingsent into bat.
Left-arm pacer Khaleelcontinued his fine form, return-ing with figures of 4 for 67 whileAvesh Khan picked up 3 for 62.
The fifth and final one-dayer will be played at thesame venue on Sunday.
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The custodian of cricketlaws, Marylebone Cricket
Club (MCC) is likely toreview the overthrow rules inthe aftermath of the contro-versy that rocked the just-concluded World Cup finalbetween New Zealand andEngland, a newspaper reportsaid.
According to a report in‘The Sunday Times’, “There isa feeling at MCC that over-throws are worth looking atwhen it next reviews thelaws of the game, which is theresponsibility of theMCC Laws sub-committee.”
The overthrowrules drew MCC’sattention after NewZealand were left torue a fortuitous, last-over overthrow thatwent for four after getting adeflection of Ben Stokes’ batto help England take thematch into Super Over andeventually lift the trophy viaboundary count.
Chasing New Zealand’s241 for 8, England needednine runs from the final
three balls when a throw byMartin Guptill deflected offdiving Stokes’ bat for a
boundary.O n - f i e l d
umpires KumarDharmasena andMarias Erasmusawarded Englandawarded six runsin total, two by thebatsmen and four
for the overthrow.But former ICC Elite
Panel umpire Simon Taufelsaid as per the rules, theumpires should have award-ed England five runs insteadof six as the batsmen didn’tcross when Guptil releasedthe ball from deep.
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Eoin Morgan says he has not yet decidedwhether to remain as England’s white-
ball skipper following their dramatic WorldCup win against New Zealand.
Morgan, 32, told BBC Sport it would bea “big commitment” to continue until the2023 World Cup, with next year’s T20 WorldCup a “more realistic” target.
“I don’t think I’m in a good state to makea decision at the moment, just simply thatI haven’t had a chance to get away from themadness and the craze of winning the WorldCup,” said Morgan. “I’ve not been able to getinto a logical mindset and actually ask myselfa couple of questions.
“It’s taken a huge amount out of me, bothmentally and physically, so once everythingcalms down over the next couple of monthsI’ll hopefully come to a decision that at theforefront of it will be my family and the team.
Under Morgan’s leadership Pomsclimbed to the top of the international rank-ings and also reached the final of the WorldTwenty20 in 2016 after they suffered ahumiliating group-stage exit at the 2015World Cup just weeks after Morgan wasappointed as the 50-over captain.
Head coach Trevor Bayliss, anotherarchitect of England’s success, will leave hisposition after the upcoming Ashes cam-paign.
Asked if England’s World Cup tri-umph, and the remarkable circumstances inwhich they won it, had sunk in yet, Morgansaid: “No, I think it will take time. The mad-ness has been taken to a new level every-where I go.”
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Still going strong at age of46, veteran Leander Paes
reached the semifinals of theATP Hall of Fame Open withpartner Marcus Daniell, edg-ing out Matthew Ebden andRobert Lindstedt here.
The third seeded Indo-Kiwi combination prevailed6-4, 5-7, 14-12 over theAustralian-Swede team in thequarterfinals after savingthree match points.
Paes, who made his Hallof Fame Open debut wayback in 1995, is now the old-est ATP Tour semi-finalistsince John McEnroe (47) at2006 San Jose.
“These are the nights thatI live for. The hard work,playing when you have fever,being in the gym when youdon’t really want to be there.Most people see us travellingto lovely places and being onshow courts, but the hardyards are what allow me tostill compete at this level,”said Paes.
The winner of 18 Grand
Slam titles asserted that hestill has a lot in his tank.
“The experience is stillthere, the legs are still there,the knowledge and strokesare there. It’s about findingthe right doubles partnersand I’ll have success. Being astudent of life and the game,I used to try to learn from the
older players. Now, I try tolearn from the younger ones,”he told ATP website.
It is fourth time this sea-son that Paes has reached thesemifinals on the ATP WorldTour, reaching the same stageat Lyon (May), Marrakech(April) and Montpellier(February) in the first half of
the season.“I have to work three
times as hard now as I did 10or 15 years ago. That’s justage, but I love the work.When I was younger, I’dwaste a lot of energy practis-ing for five or six hours a day.
“My training is very spe-cif ic now, focusing onimproving specific areas ofmy game, focusing on my dietand recovery. The knowl-edge we have nowadays intennis on fitness, health andrecovery is why the marginsof winning and losing are soslim.”
With 766 tour wins, Paesis sixth on the all-time dou-bles matchw i n n e r s ’list. He isjust one ofsix playersto pick up750 tour-level dou-bles match wins, which heachieved in April 2018.
Next up for Paes andDaniell are Marcel Granollersand Sergiy Stakhovsky.
India is close to its cherished destina-tion, the World Cup final. It hasbeen an arduous journey, a fortu-itous one too, given the demise ofcricketing standards of some of its
opponents. Tasked with a chase to scaleonly an average total for a one-day inter-national match, its hopes are high. But thedream comes crashing down with a flurryof wickets. At that moment, hope showsup in the form of a man, who has provedhis mettle from time to time. Famouslyknown for his cool temperament,Mahendra Singh Dhoni steps onto thefield. The dying hope is revived to its pre-pubescent stage and the belief in victory isfurther fortified on seeing his conviction,in the form of batting.
He starts slow, as all previous bats-men did, since that’s what the pitch per-mitted them to do. He ensures he is defen-sive, is keeping the gap between the ballsand the chase narrow and is providingsupport and confidence to RavindraJadeja, his dominant partner at the otherend. The match is coming to a close, thetwo batsmen having kept the aforemen-tioned gap almost the same. It will be aperfect ending to a fantastic cricketingcareer. Last few balls remain, Dhoni playsand goes for a single, seeks a second toretain strike. Martin Guptill appears outof nowhere, picks the ball and makes anattempt at the stumps. Serendipity toowas running right behind Guptill. Thestumps shake and Indian hearts break.Technology is summoned and very soonthe umpire makes his decision. Dhoni isout. Everyone is put out of their respectivemisery.
Dhoni did what he was supposed toand did it well. He gave it all. His
final World Cup match and his score tooremain complete, exactly at 50.
In hindsight, to think of the match, itis obviously saddening to recall the loss.And the irony in this episode gets unwit-tingly highlighted, that one of the bestrunners between the wickets, gets run-out in his final innings. It also evokes thememory of how Javed Miandad, thePakistani giant known for his battingstyle and running between the wickets,was also dismissed by a run-out in hislast innings on the pitch.
The one thing this match did wasthat it has put Dhoni back into the lime-light. Not that he was given any lessimportance by the media and his fansbefore, but the last game has put hischaracter into a better perspective. TheDhoni we had come to admire was rul-ing the stage once again. “Dhoni, Dhoni”the chants reverberated. It was like thegood old times when the long-hairedDhoni tore the opponents apart with anauthority rarely witnessed in Indiancricket.
Did Dhoni fall short of his bench-mark? The fans did not think so. Therewas massive support for Mahi, the manwho helped Indian cricket gain respectfrom the time he led the team. The clam-our in the media for his retirement isbaffling indeed. Former players, without
exception, have backed the idea thatDhoni should be extended the privilegeof choosing the time and place of hisretirement. He is a colossus who hasearned his reputation with some mind-blowing performances. The most notablebeing the decision to promote himself inthe batting order to win the 2011 WorldCup final. The image of Dhoni smashingNuwan Kulasekara for a six is etched ingold.
Hailing from a small town, Dhoniserves as a living embodiment of resolve.Ranchi, epitomising the saying ‘humblebackground’, did not have many facilitiesto help youngsters realise their dream ofbecoming a cricketer, let alone rise to bethe captain of the national team. But it isthis same town that will go on to beknown famously as the birth place of thisprominent cricket personality, who tra-versed miles to attain his goals.
Initially having started with bad-minton and then moving onto football,Dhoni finally settled for cricket. Theadeptness and swiftness that we see inDhoni behind the stumps, first incarnat-ed while he was goalkeeping in football.His then football coach felt his goalkeep-ing skills would be better recognised ifhe put on the gloves of a wicket-keeper.This was the very beginning of the life ofan icon.
His hard work and dedication arewhat embellish his character. His strug-gle to avail all the opportunities that hereceived just made him more tenacious.He didn’t enjoy the advantages of playingin a big city but was persistent to provehis worth versus those who had moneyto enjoy better facilities. This was neverwith a bitter heart, but this attitudefuelled his ambition and momentum tomove ahead. He was known to run aftercoaches and coax them into giving himchances to play matches. A number ofthem didn’t pay him attention that time,but later tried to hoard limelight uponhis success. But that does not mean hedidn’t receive support at different stagesof his career. In fact, there are peoplewho have proven to be instrumental inconferring support at critical momentsin his life.
When Dhoni was only 15, lack ofquality equipment came in the way of hisgrowth and ability to exhibit his hiddentalent. This was the time when one of hisgood friends Paramjit Singh, with whomDhoni enjoyed gully cricket, went out ofthe way to ensure that the absence of abat or pads, need not be the reason forhis friend’s disappointment. Paramjithappened to be the owner of a smallsports equipment shop. He was almostthe same age as Dhoni, only slightlyolder. Singh aimed high with the inten-tion of seeing Dhoni succeed andreached out to the famous bat makingcompany, BAS. Abject frustration at fail-ures combined with persistent efforteventually resulted in the company offer-ing entire kit to Dhoni for free. His talentand inevitable success had been felt. Ofcourse, Paramjit had to pay a small cost,the courier charges and lifelong memo-
ries ofunconditional
support of a dearfriend. Dhoni’s gratitude
to BAS could be seen at the 2019World Cup when he honoured theirsupport by displaying the compa-ny’s sticker on the bat.
Another example of the pushthat Dhoni received is of DevalSahay. He was the ex-Bihar CricketAssociation vice-president and theRanchi District Cricket presidentat that time and it were his effortsthat helped Dhoni reach the bigstage of Ranchi team, junior Biharcricket team and eventually theBihar Ranji Team. All of this hap-pened within a span of a year sinceDhoni had started playing profes-sional Cricket.
To shed more light upon Dhoni’srigorous toil, he was employed withthe Indian Railways and used to workas a ticket examiner in one of theshifts — to see through the work,cook food for himself and then createtime for practice was his taxing rou-tine. His commendable fitness at theage 38 that we acknowledge todaycombined with his quick thinkingbehind the stumps, has a history. Hewas known to practice for almostseven hours in a day. The bolt likemovement when stumping has had astunning effect on the best of batsmenaround the world.
His hard work also made him thecompetitive sportsman that he is, orperhaps it was always there. It justneeded the spark to be let loose.Whatever sport Dhoni made himself apart of, and those that became a part ofhim, always saw him giving his complete.He is performance driven and just wants towin, and often wins too. This also shows inhis big hits. People who saw him in his initialdays, only knew him as a big hitter. He wouldbe invited for dinners and lunches to honourhis battering shots. It would have been hard tosay if time made him the “finisher” that he is orif he always intended to be one. But he soonlearned to set his instincts and the urge to win inan equilibrium. He developed the art of “stay andplay” and developed the art of shocking his oppo-nent with an occasional hit.
Life for mankind has never been easy. But the presenttimes are certainly more challenging. Not because ofenvironmental demands only. It is the human aspi-
rations to reach the sky that makes the feet leave the ground.With the mind going wayward, peace eludes humanity asit chases a mirage, thus facing unbearable stress in theprocess. Stress, thus, is a concomitant of modern life. Moreappropriately lifestyle. The type A and Type B personal-ity hypothesis which categorises people into these two class-es (the former making people impatient and stress prone,while the latter less ambitious and calm), has nowbecome redundant. The very temperament of the societyhas changed and there are only the Type A people today— ambitious, edgy and always running short of time. Giventhis lifestyle, it is only natural that stress has come to impacthuman life in a big way. Interestingly, most people are notaware of it and by the time they realise what is wrong, itis already late. While the World Health Organisation hastermed “Burnout” as an outcome of excessive workplacestress, the fact is that “Burnout” like symptoms can be foundin persons having nothing to do with the conventionalworkplace. From housewives to students to even those whohave long left the workplace after a reasonably long innings,all face stress. The observation of the World HypertensionDay last month warns that in the next five years the num-ber of adult population living with high blood pressure isexpected to grow to a mind-boggling 1.56 billion. Even ifthere are reasons to doubt these statistics, the factremains that the health of the world is not in good shape.What do we need to do? No easy answers, but given thefact that stress is the cause, yoga seems to be a probableantidote. Yoga and health have now proven positive links,despite questions on the medicinal effects of this tradition-al form of Indian exercise regime. At least yoga can go along way in preventing ill effects of stress related problemsof both the body and the mind. Individuals differ in theirstress tolerance limits. Thus, for some individuals low tomoderate stress can prove to be harmful, whereas for someeven high stress levels may not have the expected impact.It is this stress tolerance limit of individuals that can becalled the Stress Resilience Index. Stress affects all and theonly way out is to adopt effective coping mechanism thatcan help withstand the pressures of stress. Yoga can be aneffective way of coping with stress because it can providemental and physical strength needed for coping. With sim-ple yogic postures carried out as a daily regimen for evenhalf an hour, an individual can raise his stress resilience.The advantage of yoga is that it catalyses the secretion ofgood hormones in the blood while inhibiting the harm-ful ones. Since the harmful effects of stress largely resultfrom the raised cortisol levels for continuous period, Yogacan be a useful means to regulate this. It helps in balanc-ing the mind-body chemistry which is losing its equilib-rium. Certainly, you cannot always control what goes onoutside. But you can always control what goes on within.
How wonderful would it be if wecan somehow achieve it. Thereis a lot of talk about being pos-
itive around us. In one film, the leadactor repeatedly said, “Be positive.” Butsooner or later, we do realise that it iseasier said than done. Because there aremany factors working against having apositive outlook.
I begin with lack of faith in one’sability. A human body is very versatile.We have many faculties, which areexceptional. We are blessed with intel-ligence. Proper use of that has broughtenormous material advancement. Ourminds can do amazing things. What wedo generally takes shape in our mindsfirst. Our senses are not far behind. Haveyou noticed an expert drum player?However, poor health or poor trainingare great spoilers. Then, there must becourage. Without a good dose of it, onecan hardly be positive. Adequate willpower is another necessity.
In today’s interconnected world, weneed a lot of support to exist well.Personally, I have made a lot of prepa-ration in this regard; I have a chart ofall those who can help me. This is in theshape of a tree diagram. Prejudices workagainst curbing negativity, as doescompany of wrong persons. And if weare given to hate, we are workingagainst ourselves. Lastly, but mostimportantly, we need to have faith inGod, as will be clear from the rest of thearticle, and not in the chance theory, thatis anything can happen at any time.
It may appear difficult but positiveattitude can be attained. The firstrequirement is to become aware of itstremendous benefits. There are many.There is the physical health benefit.Generally, positive people enjoy goodhealth. Mental faculty should be sound,which mostly rules out suffering frommental diseases. One will not feel help-
less; will not demoralise self; rather willenthuse self and others. One is unlike-ly to be fearful. Obviously, such a per-son is likely to be generally peaceful.Positive people endear themselves toothers. They produce positive vibra-tions. This almost ensures that they willhave many friends. They use their ener-gies in useful activities and are likely tooccupy important positions.
The next requirement is to devel-op a deep desire to be not so negative,because negativity as such cannot beeliminated entirely in material bodiesliving in the material world. Control ofthe mind is crucial in this endeavour.Details of doing so are available in theBhagwad Gita. Proper attention toone’s health is also very important. Oneshould develop many skills. One mustengage is useful activities. And compa-ny of positive persons will reinforce thedesire to be positive.
The third and the most importantrequirement is gaining help from God,without that, countering negativity isalmost an impossible task. Faith in Godgets us the confidence that we are not
on our own; God can and will help ifwe make the necessary efforts to reachout to Him. One will develop spiritualconsciousness and will realise that oneis never condemned. Most important-ly, one will begin to see the positive sideof things.
Personally, I have struggled withnegativity for a very long time. And itsworst manifestation has been fear of dis-eases, till I began taking shelter of God.Diseases are feared for several reasons.Obviously, there is suffering. Life is dis-rupted. Resources come under strain.And enjoyments are curbed. My con-nection with God has helped me inmany ways. One begins to accept theinevitability of diseases of a materialbody. God gives strength to tolerate.One is able to maintain equanimity toa great extent. And the most importantpart is continuation of enjoyments; theynever cease unless the body is totallybroken. All said and done, faith is theonly real antidote to negativity; othermeasures can only help partially��� ��������������������������������� ������ ��
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According to the Chinesephilosophical classicZhuangzi, a great Daoistthinker once fell asleepand dreamt that he was a
butterfly. When he woke up, he didnot know whether he really was a manwho had dreamt he was a butterfly orwhether he was a butterfly nowdreaming he was a man. He was inacute confusion and couldn’t come toany conclusion. The story is meant tomake a philosophical point aboutwhat we take to be dream or reality.Our dreams are utterly compelling,and so long as we are dreaming, wethink they are real. Is our night whenare asleep and dream a dream or theday when we are awake a dream? Ifonly Zhuangzi would have understoodthat he as a butterfly and he as a liv-ing thinker both are dreams, it wouldhave solved his riddle.
Technically Maya means “illu-sion”. Let us understand the term bythe world around us. In the Vedic text,the world in which we are dwelling iscalled as “Maya Jagat” or illusoryworld. This material world is real butephemeral. It is not the way we gen-erally perceive. It is something differ-ent than its mere appearance. It is amystical world because although tran-
sitory it appears so permanent andinviting that everyone is ensnared intoit trying to find some pleasure. It is anillusion but certainly not a hallucina-tion. Hallucination is imagining some-thing which is not present, but illusionmeans perceiving the real object dif-ferently.
As fire is covered by smoke, as amirror is covered by dust, or as theembryo is covered by the womb, theliving entity is similarly covered by dif-ferent degrees of this lust. (BG 3.38).Everyone is seeing the world accord-ing to the degree of illusion they arein. This world is a reality but there isveneer which makes it difficult toknow the truth. To the degree one isfree from the covering to that degreehe sees the truth. Hence everyone isperceiving the world in differentways. The illusion is so subtle andstringent that almost nobody canescape it. The covering is so thick thateven if one understands the actualnature of the illusion, he still actsunder its effect. So why understand it?At least, we should try to understandwe are under illusion. That is thebeginning of the end of the illusion.A person fully intoxicated with alco-hol lying in the street thinks he is exul-tant. Gradually, when the effects of
alcohol wears off he understands heis in melancholy due to the intoxica-tion. Person acting helplessly underthe illusion understanding its natureis better off than one who is actingunder illusion thinking he is free fromthe illusion. The illusion in this worldis so powerful that it covers everyoneand then covers the covering also, soalmost nobody knows they are cov-ered. Therefore, if one at least breaksthrough the outer covering, under-stands he is under cover and thus canventure to get out.
The reality is that this world is realbut transitory hence illusory. Wehave come to this world because werebelled against the laws of God. Thebody we have is the prison costume.And we are here for life imprison-ment. We are constantly vexed by themiseries of material nature (birth, oldage, disease and death) so that one daywe can rehabilitate and get out of hereback to real home. But there is a starkdifference between a normal prisonand this prison. In a normal prison,prisoners are exasperated with the lifeinside and yearn for independence.But in the prison of the materialworld, the prisoners although belea-guered relentlessly do not wish tocome out! Very few may desire to
come out, but they end up in anoth-er better prison. Heavenly planets arereplete with astounding opulence,but it is a prison ultimately. There areno bars and manacles seen in theprison. Still people don’t want toescape. This is astonishing! The illu-sion traps and straps one to thisprison. There is enough happiness inthis world to keep one attached to thesufferings. The illusion is one’s think-ing that he can find perpetual happi-ness in this transient world.
Maya has two potencies up hersleeves. With the former, she dupes theliving entity by making him think heis blissful in this world. With the lat-ter, she puts him in unlimited anguish.On the strength of the former, the lat-ter acts and still the living entity con-siders this world as “Wonderful”.When one sees a rope at night, onemay mistake it for a snake and get pet-rified. The rope is real, and the snakeis real (somewhere else) but thinkingthat the rope is snake is illusion.Similarly, true happiness is real, andthis world is real but to think the truehappiness is there in this world is illu-sion. When we are engaged in a fan-tastic movie on the blue screen, we arecaught by so many emotions like com-edy, tragedy, romance, adventure, etc.but if we look closely, all the imageson the screen are made up of three pri-mary colour pixels — Red, Blue,Yellow. These colours in itself shallnever draw any attention from us buttheir combination in various ways cre-ates a pandemonium of emotions.Similarly, the material world consistsonly of 3 modes — Goodness, passion,ignorance but their amalgamation cre-ates the whole universe for everyone’sbewilderment.
This world is like a hospital whereeveryone is supposed to take treat-ment. But under illusion, we think itas a nice hotel. We try to give ordersand expect them to be fulfilled butinstead we get battered. Only if weconsider this world as a hospital andtake proper treatment for our mala-dy, would we be able to leave after weare healed.
We are spirit soul, which is eter-nal, and our source is spiritual world,which is also eternal. If we want to befree from the illusion, we needstronger determination which canpush us out of Maya’s influence. Justlike a rocket needs the escape veloc-ity of 11km/s and no less to escape theinfluence of earth’s gravity, the bestway to achieve that escape velocity toget out of Maya and attain the spiri-tual world is by meditating.
Someone has rightly said, “Act indrama as if it were real life and act inreal life as if it were drama. “$ ������������� ��'��������1�������������������'�����������,��� ���%�������������A�',%=�B
There was something about the muscu-lar hitter. The local bowlers dreadedhim. Many years later the international
attacks came to accept him as a tough bats-man to bowl to. His batting was unfettered.Indian fans had come to enjoy the brand ofbatsmanship best demonstrated by playerslike Kapil Dev, K. Srikkanth and VirenderSehwag. They were entertainers, bringing joywith their style — relevant to modern crick-et where performance was critical to retain-ing the interest of the spectators.
He has helped in changing the mindsetof Indian cricket. He brought with him anaggressive side of the game which makes theyoungsters look up to him. Self-belief is amuch-used cliché but Dhoni taught Indiancricket this aspect of sport. Performance, notreputation, mattered most. We can see it inthe success that Chennai Super Kings haveachieved in the Indian Premier League.
Dhoni was one batsman whoensured Indian cricket did not loseits fan base. The common manidentified himself with his success.Dhoni reflected the dreams of therustic and the polished. His rawinstincts to punish the ball, hit itinto the orbit literally, wasappreciated universally. His firstbig fan was the Australiangreat Greg Chappell.According to Kiran More, aformer chairman of thenational selection commit-tee, it was the Australiangreat Greg Chappell’svision that helped Indiaidentify Dhoni’spotential as a futurecaptain. “Your futurecaptain,”Chappell said.How right hewas!
Dhoni’sadaptability isalso a characteristic
that his team-mates admire and learn from.It can be seen in many shades. His sportsteacher, Moti Prasad, recalls Dhoni as anopener for the school team and he hasplayed as a No. 10 batsman in a VinooMankad Trophy match. Those are two oppo-site ends of the batting spectrum. One slogsto create a formidable target and the othertries to save his team when ironically the tar-get gets difficult for them. We have seenDhoni play both roles.
His flamboyance in limited overs isreplaced by his patience playin Test matches before hequit the longest format ofthe game to preserve him-self. Off the field too,Dhoni is adjusting.During his early days heused to stay in a dingyroom that was to beshared with his room-mate. Recently, he wasphotographed sleep-ing on the floor of an
airport when theflight got delayed.
These occasionsoften tacitlyshow that hedoesn’t need alavish bed. His decision
to hand JoginderSharma the ball for thelast over of 2007 ICCT20 World Cup final
against Pakistan reflectedhis astounding reading ofthe game. India won thefirst T20 World Cup andDhoni’s tactical move was
going to be remembered fora long time. His faith insmall-town cricketersexcelling was the compellingfactor for Joginder being
handed that responsibility. For
this very reason Dhoni had groomed playerslike RP Singh, Suresh Raina, RavindraJadeja, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, PraveenKumar, and many more.
His reading of the game is astute and hison-field inputs have proven invaluable tocaptain Virat Kohli. Setting the field, guidingthe bowlers, Dhoni is a leader. His selfless-ness is obvious to all. After completing histenure as a captain, he maintained his posi-tion in the team with his irreplaceable role ofan experienced strategist.
The Zen of Indian cricket, for his calmdemeanour even in crisis situations, is ahuman after all and we saw that towards theend of his career when he trooped on to thefield and argued with the umpires during anIPL match. This was not the Dhoni we hadknown. As an honorary Lt. Col in theParachute Regiment of the Territorial Army,we saw him wear gloves to express hisnationalism and spend time with the sol-diers to boost their spirits. The Dhoni wehave known.
At the most challenging crossroads ofhis career, Dhoni faces the dilemma of whento quit. Should he make the decision or waitfor the selectors to take the call? In theabsence of any retirement scheme from theBCCI, the cricket fraternity waits anxiously.One should not be surprised if he is ‘rested’for India’s immediate assignments in the USand the West Indies but given his contribu-tion to Indian cricket, Dhoni deserves a fit-ting farewell.
Dhoni, having commanded the respectof seniors like Sachin Tendulkar, RahulDravid, Anil Kumble, Sourav Ganguly andVirender Sehwag, has risen in stature as oneof the greats of the game. He catches youreye as a sprinter between the wickets but hiscareer resembles that of a marathoner —unflinching endurance and commitment. Itis going to be hard to find his replacement,on the field and in our hearts. Whicheverjourney he takes from here on, his well-wishers, like you and me, will always cherishhim.
On July 1, Hong Kong com-pleted 22 years under the
China rule. The day known asthe “Establishment Day” inthe lexicon of modern Chinesepolitical history witnessed afull-fledged anti-establishmentmovement against Beijing,mostly led by the young HongKongers. The fear and fury ofthe Xi Jinping regime has esca-lated the tension between theisland and the mainland inrecent years. However, whathas precipitated the crisis is theExtradition Bill proposed bycity Chief Executive CarrieLam. The Bill proposes toallow extradition to mainlandChina. Even though Lamannounced later that the Billhas been indefinitely suspend-ed, protests led by pro-democ-racy groups have refused tosubside.
Why these protests arecoming up against the Beijingrule? Does the mainland haveno right to rule over HongKong? What is the way aheadfor both Hong Kong and themainland?
These protesters mainlyconsist of the youth who don’twant to give up their freedomto the social-political control ofthe Bejing rule. The latest inci-dent of protesters ransackingthe city’s Legislative Councilhas sent warning signals toBeijing. China’s Ambassador toBritain Liu Xiaoming hasdenounced Hong Kong’s ultraradicals. He claimed that theprotesters have challenged thebottom line of “one countrytwo systems”.
The Chinese Government’sLiaison Office in Hong Kongdeclared that the “savage acts”were an outright provocationand trampling of the city’s ruleof law. These outbursts of theHong Kongers are primarilytargeted at the centralGovernment and its continuedattempt to take full control ofthe island. The original frame-work, negotiated in a treatybetween China and Britain onJuly 1, 1997, is supposed to pro-tect Hong Kong’s freedom until2047. But then occasional over-tures demonstrated by themainland quite often irk the
freedom-loving people of theisland city. This is the rootcause of the uprising, whereinthe protesters display their dis-contentment with the main-land rule.
On the other hand, Chinahas full right to exercise itspower over Hong Kong as it isan integral part of it. For this,China does not need the per-mission from any westernnation or any internationalorganisation. The demonstra-tors displaying the British-eracolonial flag and asking otherwestern nations to intervenehardly make any sense. If theyhave to find a solution, then theislanders can very well negoti-ate with the mainlandGovernment and devise a way-out formula. Decrying themainland rule and posingthreat to the security of theentire country will invite moreproblems, rather than produc-ing solutions.
The unique thing about themass protest is that it is thelargest in Hong Kong’s history.It is highlighting rising fear andanger over the erosion of civilliberties in the island. WhenHong Kong was returned toChina by Britain, the Basic Lawguaranteed the territory a highdegree of autonomy. And thispolicy has helped preserveHong Kong’s civil services,independent courts, free press,open internet and other ele-ments that distinguished itfrom the existing Communistsystem of the mainland. Thisautonomy, promised under amini-Constitutional law,known as Basic Law, will expirein 2047. But much before it, theBasic Law has weakened ascentral Government and itssecurity apparatus increasing-ly encroach on Hong Kong.Abduction of booksellers anda Chinese-born billionaire areintriguing examples. And thispressure reflects a broadertightening of control over theisland city under the Xi regime.
Hong Kong is an obvioustarget as it has a very strongand vocal community of pro-democracy supporters. Andthis is absolutely despised bythe rulers in Beijing. Tens of
thousands took part in themovement demanding freeelections for Hong Kongerswho seized control of down-town streets for 11 weeks in2014. And recently a largecrowd took out marches acrossthe city commemorating thir-ty years of the crackdown onpro-democracy supporters byBeijing on June 4, 1989 at thehistoric Tiananmen Square.This is all that continuously
disturbs the czar in Beijing.That is why the mainlandGovernment feels that HongKong might become anotherpoint of security threat like thatof Tibet, Xinxiang and Taiwanin the days to come.
Besides, the proposedextradition law would allowHong Kong to detain andtransfer people wanted incountries and territories withwhich it has no formal extra-
dition agreements, includingTaiwan and the mainland. Thecritics say that this would allowvirtually anyone in Hong Kongto be picked up by the securi-ty sleuths for detention inChina. Adding to the protest-ers’ woes is the common refrainthat judges strictly follow theorders of the Communist Party.The Hong Kongers fear thatthis law would target not onlycriminals but also all the polit-
ical activists. This extraditionplan applies to 37 crimes fornow. Although, interestingly itexcludes political crimes, crit-ics say that the law would insome point of time legalise thesort of abductions that has beentaking place in Hong Kong.Popular apprehension is thatthis controversial Bill will in thelong run end the unique judi-cial system of Hong Kong.And it brings home another
nightmare to the island and itsfreedom-loving people that themove might sound the deathknell for the “one country, twosystems”.
However, at the same time,current activism will not guar-antee a safe future for HongKong. Challenging Beijingwould not produce anything,not even safety of the existingfreedoms in Hong Kong. Chinacan’t allow it to become a secu-
rity concern.Succinctly, today’s Hog
Kong is deeply fractured.Beijing will have to take verycautious steps in moving for-ward. At this moment, remov-ing Lam, before she completesher first term in office in 2022,would not be wise. If she ismoved out of office, this willadd fuel to the fire, because theChief Executive of the city ischosen by a process whichinvolves a pro-establishmentselection panel and fullendorsement by theCommunist Party bosses inBeijing. On the other hand, theHong Kongers have beendemanding a free election forthe Chief Executive for yearsnow. So this is not the righttime for Xi to think of an alter-native to Lam.
However the adamantstance of demonstrators for theresignation of Lam would notsolve any of their problems.Many veterans of the city areapprehensive that hardlinersare poised to take up the reinsof the administration of theisland. But this time Xi will nottake any chance. And if the cur-rent imbroglio continues, theLiaison Office of the city willhave more opportunities topush the island for closer polit-ical integration with the main-land. Joshua Wong, the leaderof the famous UmbrellaMovement, too called for Lam’sresignation. But then, will therebe any chance of revival of thestatus of Hong Kong if the cur-rent city chief leaves her office?
The way ahead for bothHong Kong and Bejing is apeaceful resolution of the prob-lem. It’s time for Hong Kongersto look for solutions, not to cre-ate any more tensions with themainland. China will surely notbudge an inch. It would bemore assertive. Also increasingviolence would lessen sympa-thy for the pro-democracysupporters. However, yearningfor freedom will continuedespite Bejing’s inscrutable tac-tics to move the island closer toits power system.
where countries are competingwith each other to show theirtechnological prowess, espe-cially the USA and China. Inthis new drift, 5th generationmobile technology (5G) hasbecome the pivot.
However, this has the flipside. Although the high-speed5G is yet to become commer-cially operational, firms likeHuawei are under immensepressure and suspicion. Thegrowing security concerns inthe US forced PresidentDonald Trump to blacklistHuawei over national securityissues.
On the other hand, Chinasees the US ban as part ofongoing trade war.Inadvertently, India has alsobecome part of this trade war,which has primarily affectedIndia’s progress to obtain 5Gservices in the near future. Itmay delay, or worse, com-pletely halt the 5G trials andmanufacturing of equipment inIndia.
The Chinese’s tech giantHuawei emerged as a leaderand cost-effective manufac-turer of 5G related equipmentalong with Ericsson, Nokia,ZTE, and Samsung. The USAdministration alleged thatthe Chinese Government has a
stronghold on these telecomfirms, and these are involved inthe espionage of strategic andother prestigious institutions ofthe US. The US has alreadyfaced a bitter experience ofputative “Russian interference”in the 2016 presidential elec-tions.
So, the US is not interest-ed in the expansion of Huaweiin domestic market, and it isalso compelling its strategicpartners to follow suit.Although, US-India diplomat-ic ties are deepening, the USAdministration is exertingpressure on India to take atough stand on oil importfrom Iran. It is also meddlingwith India’s purchase of S-400from Russia and now pres-surising India not to be the partof any joint trial of 5G withHuawei.
In fact, the US may still bewilling to grant some relaxationto India on these issues, but itsattitude on Huawei is extreme-ly stiff. Despite US Secretary ofState Mike Pompeo making hisstand clear during India visit,India is working on the middlepath to find out a viable solu-tion to the problem.
Despite being the world’ssecond largest telecom ser-vices market, India is facing atwo-fold challenge. On thedomestic front, the telecom
market is already grapplingwith the lack of investment.Local service providers BhartiAirtel, Vodafone, and Idea arecompeting in transformed tele-com market after the entry ofReliance Jio with predatorypolicies. These providers do
not have sufficient capital toinvest in revamping the tele-com market. So, these compa-nies are urging theGovernment of India to delaythe auction for the time being.
On the other hand, Indiahas over-reliance on foreign
players for the manufacturingof telecom equipment as ourlocal makers are not so effi-cient. “Make in India” initiativehas been more successful inmaking handset in India butstill struggling to develop coreequipment. Thus, India needs
a partner for rolling out andoperationalising 5G services assoon as possible. We need aprompt strategy and realisticpolicy to introduce 5G servicesto keep abreast with the rest ofthe world. The Chinese com-pany has shown a keen inter-est in partnership with theIndian telecom agencies andoperators.
The Telecom Minister,Ravi Shankar Prasad, hasalready announced the rolloutof 5G trials and spectrum auc-tion within 100 days. However,the new Government also facesa set of challenges: firstly, it isstill not confirmed whetherIndia can participate withHuawei. Secondly, India shouldbe capable of making the prod-uct, and should keep her secu-rity apprehension on priority.As well as, follow the guidelinesof Indian manufacturing andregulatory institutions.
Moreover, 5G technologyis still at its early phase, andSouth Korea’s SK Telecom haslaunched first ever 5G servicesin the public domain. Chinaand Japan are the other keyplayers in 5G telecommunica-tion, but China has emerged asthe most price competitiveplayer in the 5G market.
India is among the world’sfastest-growing economy, and5G technology is destined to
take it to a new zenith. India isalready an IT superpower, and5G will improve India’s cultureof innovation, mode of trans-portation, and standard of liv-ing. As the world is continu-ously leading towards automa-tion, proper infrastructuredevelopment for high-speedconnectivity is a prerequisite todevelop India as a real-timecountry. The 5G services willprovide an opportunity to con-nect India with “fourth indus-trial revolution.”
In the emerging matrix ofhuman association, industry4.0 is going to influence everysphere of human lives andsocial relations. The currentweb of industrialisation isbased on cutting edge tech-nologies, i.e., artificial intelli-gence, driverless vehicles,voice-activated assistants, facialID recognition, or digitalhealth-care sensors. Besides,industry 4.0 is also inextricablylinked with the internet ofthings, big data analytics, cloudcomputing, cognitive comput-ing, and 3-D printing. In aneffort to develop 5G, Indiawill boom her pace of indus-trial growth and lead tobecome the 5 trillion dollareconomy in 2025.
So, a prudent telecom pol-icy is urgently needed to beadopted by the Government of
India.The Chinese tech firms
are doing incredibly well inrecent years and providing acost-effective alternative. Theselocal firms have tremendous-ly flourished across the globeand are replacing the US, Japan,and South Korea as a new tele-com leader. However, China isregarded as suspicious super-power due to over-control bythe Chinese Government.
In comparison to Asiangiant China, India has thepotential to become the engineof the fourth industrial revo-lution. Despite many difficul-ties, India’s C-DAC developedsupercomputer in the era of ITrevolution. So, it will not be anexaggeration to say that theIndian Government institu-tions and private firms have thepotential to develop this serviceindigenously.
Gradually “Make in India”is constructing a strong base forthe upcoming future initia-tive. High-speed internet andmobile services are the pillarsof this emerging automationtechnology based industriali-sation. India must be proactivein adopting emerging automa-tion technology.
(The writer is associatedwtih Jammu Kashmir StudyCentre)
Every Ashadha Purnima, which fellon July 16 this year, is marked asGuru-purnima in the annual
Hindu calendar. Following the age-oldGuru-shishya tradition, those engagedin such a relationship, pay tribute theirrespective Gurus. Why so much impor-tance to this practice? Bear in mind; theword Guru is made of two syllables —‘Gu’ and ‘Ru’. The two syllables respec-tively mean darkness/ignorance andlight/enlighten. The one who is him-self/herself enlightened enough to makeyou aware of the existential realities oflife, many aspects pertaining to eveninvisible plain but vital to life mecha-nism, qualifies to be a Guru.
We are all born with six elementallimitations, measured in the backdropof God being an unbound free spirit.First, limited creative ability, whichdoesn’t let us meet even bare existentialneeds in one’s own right. We, therefore,need due support of those beyond.Second, limited intelligence, wherebyour knowledge base remains partial,thus, calling for being supplemented byother learned ones. But for which, wemay fail to have a holistic understand-ing of the dynamics of life.
Third, for the above reasons, we areborn with a sense of ‘want’, which inturn, leads to the sense of craving,desires, and possessiveness to meet upthe void. Fourth, limitation of timewhereby we measure happenings in theframe of past, present, and future.Consequently, we often get caught inour past reminiscences, which is noth-ing but a piece of history and with norelevance in contemporary terms.Particularly, the negative memories keephounding from within. Or, we get toomuch involved in futuristic dream per-ceptions, which is uncertain. In bothcases, we unnecessarily dissipate ourenergies towards unproductive ends,and clutter our mind space with imagi-nary thoughts. We, thus, end up short ofvitals needed for fresh objective think-ing or even to do justice to the callingsof the present moment, which sets theterms of future. Consequently, we areoften left behind in the run of time,ending up disgusted and stressed.
Fifth, we are bound by limitation ofspace, whereby we identify ourselveswith our body-mind organism differen-tiated from others, and as also by ourgeographical root. A sense of divide
thus comes into play, which lays downthe ground for all sorts of conflicts wehave to contend with in life. The sixth,binds us to the laws of causation. In thisscheme of things there is a cause behindevery action, which in turn, becomesthe cause of future course of action.And there is nothing like a free lunch inthis life. We have to bear with the con-sequences of what we do — good or bad— accordingly as the intent and qualityof the cause that drives our action. Theimprints thereof lead to lot of self-acquired limitations, which makes ourthought process even more complex. Allthat has related bearing on our futurecourse of life, making our run of life allthe more arduous. The fall out of thesesix limitations in our cognitive domain,is what Kashmir Shaivism terms asbeing under the spell of Maya.
Life has to keep marching aheadchasing our aspirational urges. Herecomes the role of a Guru. He comes as abeacon of light to help us come out ofour ignorance. An enlightened Gurudoesn’t play a magic wand nor offers usa quick fix method to overcome ourignorance. Step by step, he leads usthrough awareness route. Purposely soas to help expand our vision, becomeaware and unfold our own immense
potential otherwise lying dormant outof ignorance. We then come out withour best to make it to the desired desti-nation all by oneself. He first puts usthrough a process of self-enquiry. Thatgives us exposure to our mirror image— individualistic fault lines. Once weidentify and acknowledge them, aidedby educative inputs offered by Guru insmall digestible doses, we could addressthem through regular course of self-reflection.
The Guru then makes us exploreexistential realities of life, so as to haveholistic understanding of the truths oflife, with all its strengths and weakness-es. He then shows us the way forward totranscend all our elemental limitations.Further self-reflection on these learn-ings, help absorb them in the deeprealms of mind. Over a period of time,they begin to spontaneously reflect inour day-to-day conduct. Life may thenturn into a pleasant experience overrid-ing all the oddities and hazards of life.
