5V]YZ ^`de a`]]feVU 4RaZeR] RXRZ_ - Daily Pioneer

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I ndia's national Capital Delhi has emerged as the most polluted Capital city in the world for the fourth year in a row in the latest World Air Quality Report for 2021, a period when the countries were gradually opening up the economic activities as Covid-19 cases reported decline. Clearly, various so called anti-air pollution steps have not helped in ensuring clean air in the national Capital In fact, the report found that no country met the World Health Organisation's (WHO) PM2.5 annual air quality guide- lines last year. The WHO analysed PM2.5 air pollution measurements from air moni- toring stations in 6,475 cities. This is out of a list of 107 cities in the world. The report prepared by IQAir, a Swiss pollution technology company that monitors air quality, also revealed that smog even rebounded in some regions after a Covid-related dip. The report said, "India was home to 11 of the 15 most pol- luted cities in Central and South Asia in 2021. Delhi saw a 14.6 per cent increase in PM2.5 concentrations in 2021 with levels rising to 96.4 μg/m3 from 84 μg/m3 in 2020. No cities in India met the World Health Organization (WHO) air quality guideline of 5 μg/m3. In 2021, 48 per cent of India's cities exceeded 50 μg/m3, or more than 10 times the WHO guideline." The report is based on PM2.5 data from 6,475 cities in 117 countries around the world. According to the report, "Central and South Asia had some of the world's worst air quality and was home to 46 of the world's 50 most polluted cities" in 2021. In the Central and South Asia region, including India, Iran, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, Bhiwadi in Rajasthan's Alwar was the most polluted regional city, with an average PM 2.5 concentration of 106.2 microgram per cubic metre. The report, based on the updated annual WHO air qual- ity guideline for PM2.5 released in September last year, found fine particle pollution, known as PM2.5, is a major con- tributing factor to health effects such as asthma, stroke, heart and lung diseases. While air quality dipped in India, the report found that it improved in China as more than half of the cities in China included in the report saw lower levels of air pollution when compared to the previous year. "Pollution levels within the Capital city of Beijing continued a five-year trend of improved air quality, driven by emission control and reduction of coal power plant activity and other high emission industries. Central and South Asia had some of the world's worst air quality in 2021 and was home to 46 of the world's 50 most pol- luted cities," the report said. The report found that India's PM2.5 averages have returned to pre-Covid levels. India's annual average PM2.5 levels reached 58.1 μg/m3 in 2021, ending a three-year trend of improving air quality. The report states that India is home to 11 of the 15 most polluted cities in Central and South Asia in 2021 and Delhi saw a 14.6 per cent increase in PM2.5 con- centrations. "Air pollution has a mas- sive impact on human health in India. It is the second biggest risk factor for disease, and the economic cost of air pollution is estimated to exceed $150 bil- lion dollars annually. A t least eight people were burnt to death in Bagtui Village of Rampurhat sub-divi- sion in Birbhum district on Monday night in an alleged retaliatory attack by the sup- porters of a Trinamool Congress deputy pradhan Bhadu Sheikh. The incident took place hours after Bhadu Sheikh was bombed to death by the rival faction of his party, sources said. The incident left six women and two children dead. Six people with substantial burn injuries were undergoing treatment at hospitals in Rampurhat and Kolkata. Despite large police presence, terrified villagers were fleeing the village in hordes, locals said adding thatthe menfolk had already left the village. Even as the Opposition BJP demanded immediate imposition of Article 355 or 356 and a probe by the CBI or NIA, the Mamata Banerjee Government appointed a Special Investigation Team comprising senior IPS officers Gyanwant Singh, Miraj Khalid and Sanjay Singh. At least five houses of the rival group were set on fire by alleged TMC miscreants in their bid to avenge the murder of their leader Bhadu Sheikh, sources said, adding both the groups belonged to the TMC. “Some people entered our village and started hurling bombs indiscriminately bare- ly a few hours after Bhadu Sheikh’s death. Ten of us took shelter inside a shop and locked it from the inside. Then they threw petrol and torched the shop and two children and six women save for the two of us, were charred to death,” said Nazma Biwi admitted in a Kolkata hospital with 40 per cent burns. Another girl Khushi Khatun, a relative of the deceased per- sons said, “Ten people have died and six are in hospital … I could barely save myself by fleeing to my aunt’s house … already the menfolk had fled the village fearing retaliation after the death of the Upa Pradhan … all this while the police just sat as silent specta- tors.” On being asked why the neighbours would not come to their rescue, a local requesting anonymity said, “Who would want to come out in the midst of bombing. R oad Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari said on Tuesday that in the next two years, the price of electric vehi- cles (EVs) would be at par with petrol and diesel automobiles. The Minister also stressed the need to drastically cut down the whopping 1.50 lakh road accident deaths in India, saying his Ministry was work- ing on reducing the ‘black- spots’ which are accident- prone areas. Replying in the Lok Sabha on the Demands for Grants for Road Transport and Highways Ministry, 2022- 23, Gadkari said the transport and energy scene is rapidly changing with electric and solar energy, ethanol and hydrogen going to be the main drivers for replacing conventional energy. This, he said, would greatly improve the environment, noise pollu- tion and cut-down energy imports. He said fast construction of roads and highways has reduced the time and cost of travelling manifold. “Now, Meerut can be reached in 35 minutes from Delhi, and Jaipur in two-hours, Dehradun in two hours and Amritsar in four. Road connectivity would improve so much in the com- ing years that one could trav- el to Ladakh to Srinagar and then straightaway drive to Mumbai,” he added. S amajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav and party MP from Rampur, Azam Khan on Tuesday resigned from the Lok Sabha. Khan has been lodged in Sitapur jail for more than two years. Akhilesh handed over his resignation to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla in Delhi on Tuesday. Akhilesh and Azam Khan resigned from the Lok Sabha after winning the recently-held UP Assembly elections from Karhal and Rampur Assembly seats respectively. Both leaders have appar- ently decided to retain their Assembly seats in a bid to give a boost to the party in Uttar Pradesh. The Samajwadi Party had won five Lok Sabha seats in the 2019 General Elections. After the recent resignations, the party's strength will be reduced to three. According to Samajwadi Party sources, Akhilesh will lead the party in the State and play the role of Leader of Opposition in the UP Assembly. The decision of the SP leaders also appears to be influenced by the decimation of the Bahujan Samaj Party which won just one Assembly seat in the 2022 State Assembly polls. The former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav- led Samajwadi Party came a distant second in the 2022 Assembly elections, securing 111 seats, a massive increase from 47 in the 2017 polls and a vote share of 32.06 per cent. In the recently-concluded State polls, Akhilesh had won the Karhal seat after securing 1.48 lakh votes, while the BJP’s SP Singh Baghel came a distant second by getting over 80,000 votes. This was Akhilesh’s first State election, as he had taken the MLC route to become the Chief Minister in 2012. T he Union Cabinet on Tuesday approved the Amendment Bill to unify all three Municipal Corporations in Delhi. The Delhi Municipal Corporation (Amendment) Act, 2022, which provides for a unified Municipal Corporation of Delhi, will be tabled in Parliament soon. This comes a few days after the Aam Admi Party (AAP) has approached the Supreme Court seeking direc- tion to the State Election Commission to conduct the MCD polls and accused the BJP-led Central Government of delaying local body elec- tions. The erstwhile Delhi Municipal Corporation was trifurcated into three Municipal Corporations: South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC), North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC), and East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) in 2011 vide the Delhi Municipal Corporation Amendment Act, 1911 (Delhi Act, 12 Of 2011). "The trifurcation of the corporation was uneven in terms of the territorial divi- sions and revenue-generating potential of each corporation. As a result, there was a huge gap in the resources available to the three corporations, vis- a-vis their obligations. The gap has widened over a period of time, increasing the financial difficulties of the three Municipal Corporations, leaving them incapacitated to make timely payment of salaries and retirement bene- fits to their employees and thereby creating serious impediments in maintaining civic services in Delhi," said a Union Minister justifying the Cabinet decision. The State Election Commission had deferred the announcement of the election schedule for the civic bodies, which it was earlier slated to announce on March 9. P unjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann on Tuesday announced a "his- toric" decision to regularise the services of State Government's 35,000 Group C and D employees, saying " hun Punjab wich na koi kacha ghar rahega, na koi kacha mulazim (from now on in Punjab, there will be no kutcha house, and no contractual employee)". Mann also made it clear that Punjab will now be free from dharnas and lathi-charge. "I do not want lathi-charge or turbans or chunnis of protest- ing employees to fall off...don't want them to face water can- nons," he said in a video state- ment released on his official Twitter handle. "Today AAP Punjab Govt has taken another historic deci- sion and started the process to regularize 35,000 contractual Government employees...We're here to fulfil every promise made to people before the elec- tion. We've come to change the system," tweeted Mann along with about four-minute video. In a move towards ending the contractual recruitment in the State, Mann said that the Government will table the Bill for regularising the services of these employees in the next ses- sion of the Vidhan Sabha. "I have directed the Chief Secretary Anirudh Tewari to prepare the draft of a bill for regularising the services of these employees before the next Session of the Assembly...We will approve the draft legislation in the Assembly and regularise the employees engaged through contract and outsourcing," said Mann. This is the second major decision by the AAP-led Punjab Government after the State Cabinet, in its first meet- ing, decided to fill 25,000 posts in the various depart- ments, including 10,000 in Police Department. The AAP Government's decision came over four months after the previous Charanjit Singh Channi-led Congress Government had announced to regularise the services of 36,000 employees working on contract, ad-hoc, work charged, daily wages and temporary basis in the state. Channi Government, on November 11, 2021, had even passed "The Punjab Protection and Regularisation of Contractual Employees Bill- 2021", and forwarded it to the Governor Banwarilal Purohit for his approval. Ranchi: Incarcerated Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav’s health condition has deteriorated, and he has been shifted to AIIMS, New Delhi for better treatment, officials said on Tuesday. A medical board of the Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS), Ranchi referred him to AIIMS New Delhi, they said. "RJD chief Lalu Prasad has been taken to Delhi in an air ambulance," Ranchi's Birsa Munda Airport Director Vinod Sharma told PTI. I n a major development that prompted the Shiv Sena-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) to accuse the Modi Government yet again of “misusing” its inves- tigating agencies against its political rivals, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday attached provisionally 6.45 crore-worth of immovable prop- erties belonging to a company owned by the brother-in-law of Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray at Thane in an alleged money laundering case. The attached properties, comprising 11 residential flats, belonged to M/s Shree Saibaba Grihanirmiti Private Limited, a company “owned and con- trolled” by Shridhar Madhav Patankar, the brother of Thackeray’s wife Rashmi. The ED made a provision- al attachment of the immovable properties, including 11 resi- dential flats in Neelambari housing project at Thane belonging to Shree Saibaba Grihanirmiti Pvt. Ltd, in con- nection with a money laun- dering case registered against M/s Pushpak Bullion, one of the Group companies of Pushpak Group on March 6, 2017 under the provisions of Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002. Among other things, the ED said in a statement that it had already provisionally attached immovable and mov- able properties of Pushpak Bullion to the tune of 21.46 Crore belonging to one Mahesh Patel, Chandrakant Patel, their family members and companies controlled by them.

Transcript of 5V]YZ ^`de a`]]feVU 4RaZeR] RXRZ_ - Daily Pioneer

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India's national Capital Delhihas emerged as the most

polluted Capital city in theworld for the fourth year in arow in the latest World AirQuality Report for 2021, aperiod when the countrieswere gradually opening up theeconomic activities as Covid-19cases reported decline.

Clearly, various so calledanti-air pollution steps have nothelped in ensuring clean air inthe national Capital

In fact, the report foundthat no country met the WorldHealth Organisation's (WHO)PM2.5 annual air quality guide-lines last year. The WHOanalysed PM2.5 air pollutionmeasurements from air moni-toring stations in 6,475 cities.

This is out of a list of 107cities in the world. The reportprepared by IQAir, a Swisspollution technology companythat monitors air quality, alsorevealed that smog evenrebounded in some regionsafter a Covid-related dip.

The report said, "India washome to 11 of the 15 most pol-luted cities in Central andSouth Asia in 2021. Delhi sawa 14.6 per cent increase inPM2.5 concentrations in 2021with levels rising to 96.4 μg/m3from 84 μg/m3 in 2020. Nocities in India met the WorldHealth Organization (WHO)air quality guideline of 5μg/m3. In 2021, 48 per cent of

India's cities exceeded 50μg/m3, or more than 10 timesthe WHO guideline."

The report is based onPM2.5 data from 6,475 cities in117 countries around theworld. According to the report,"Central and South Asia hadsome of the world's worst airquality and was home to 46 ofthe world's 50 most pollutedcities" in 2021.

In the Central and SouthAsia region, including India,Iran, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lankaand Bangladesh, Bhiwadi in

Rajasthan's Alwar was the mostpolluted regional city, with anaverage PM 2.5 concentrationof 106.2 microgram per cubicmetre.

The report, based on theupdated annual WHO air qual-ity guideline for PM2.5 releasedin September last year, foundfine particle pollution, knownas PM2.5, is a major con-tributing factor to health effectssuch as asthma, stroke, heartand lung diseases.

While air quality dipped inIndia, the report found that it

improved in China as morethan half of the cities in Chinaincluded in the report sawlower levels of air pollutionwhen compared to the previousyear.

"Pollution levels within theCapital city of Beijing continueda five-year trend of improvedair quality, driven by emissioncontrol and reduction of coalpower plant activity and otherhigh emission industries.Central and South Asia hadsome of the world's worst airquality in 2021 and was home

to 46 of the world's 50 most pol-luted cities," the report said.

The report found thatIndia's PM2.5 averages havereturned to pre-Covid levels.India's annual average PM2.5levels reached 58.1 μg/m3 in2021, ending a three-year trendof improving air quality. Thereport states that India is hometo 11 of the 15 most pollutedcities in Central and South Asiain 2021 and Delhi saw a 14.6per cent increase in PM2.5 con-centrations.

"Air pollution has a mas-sive impact on human health inIndia. It is the second biggestrisk factor for disease, and theeconomic cost of air pollutionis estimated to exceed $150 bil-lion dollars annually.

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At least eight people wereburnt to death in Bagtui

Village of Rampurhat sub-divi-sion in Birbhum district onMonday night in an allegedretaliatory attack by the sup-porters of a TrinamoolCongress deputy pradhanBhadu Sheikh. The incidenttook place hours after BhaduSheikh was bombed to death bythe rival faction of his party,sources said.

The incident left sixwomen and two children dead.Six people with substantialburn injuries were undergoingtreatment at hospitals inRampurhat and Kolkata.Despite large police presence,terrified villagers were fleeingthe village in hordes, locals saidadding thatthe menfolk hadalready left the village.

Even as the OppositionBJP demanded immediateimposition of Article 355 or356 and a probe by the CBI orNIA, the Mamata BanerjeeGovernment appointed aSpecial Investigation Teamcomprising senior IPS officersGyanwant Singh, Miraj Khalidand Sanjay Singh.

At least five houses of therival group were set on fire byalleged TMC miscreants intheir bid to avenge the murderof their leader Bhadu Sheikh,sources said, adding both thegroups belonged to the TMC.

“Some people entered ourvillage and started hurlingbombs indiscriminately bare-ly a few hours after BhaduSheikh’s death. Ten of us tookshelter inside a shop andlocked it from the inside.Then they threw petrol andtorched the shop and twochildren and six women savefor the two of us, were charredto death,” said Nazma Biwiadmitted in a Kolkata hospitalwith 40 per cent burns.Another girl Khushi Khatun,a relative of the deceased per-

sons said, “Ten people havedied and six are in hospital …I could barely save myself byfleeing to my aunt’s house …already the menfolk had fledthe village fearing retaliationafter the death of the UpaPradhan … all this while thepolice just sat as silent specta-tors.”

On being asked why theneighbours would not come totheir rescue, a local requestinganonymity said, “Who wouldwant to come out in the midstof bombing.

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Road Transport MinisterNitin Gadkari said on

Tuesday that in the next twoyears, the price of electric vehi-cles (EVs) would be at par withpetrol and diesel automobiles.

The Minister also stressedthe need to drastically cutdown the whopping 1.50 lakhroad accident deaths in India,saying his Ministry was work-ing on reducing the ‘black-spots’ which are accident-prone areas.

Replying in the LokSabha on the Demands forGrants for Road Transportand Highways Ministry, 2022-23, Gadkari said the transportand energy scene is rapidlychanging with electric and

solar energy, ethanol andhydrogen going to be themain drivers for replacingconventional energy. This, hesaid, would greatly improvethe environment, noise pollu-tion and cut-down energyimports.

He said fast constructionof roads and highways hasreduced the time and cost of

travelling manifold. “Now,Meerut can be reached in 35minutes from Delhi, andJaipur in two-hours, Dehradunin two hours and Amritsar infour. Road connectivity wouldimprove so much in the com-ing years that one could trav-el to Ladakh to Srinagar andthen straightaway drive toMumbai,” he added.

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Samajwadi Party chiefAkhilesh Yadav and party

MP from Rampur, Azam Khanon Tuesday resigned from theLok Sabha. Khan has beenlodged in Sitapur jail for morethan two years.

Akhilesh handed over hisresignation to Lok SabhaSpeaker Om Birla in Delhi onTuesday.

Akhilesh and Azam Khanresigned from the Lok Sabhaafter winning the recently-heldUP Assembly elections fromKarhal and Rampur Assemblyseats respectively.

Both leaders have appar-

ently decided to retain theirAssembly seats in a bid to givea boost to the party in UttarPradesh. The Samajwadi Partyhad won five Lok Sabha seatsin the 2019 General Elections.After the recent resignations,the party's strength will bereduced to three.

According to SamajwadiParty sources, Akhilesh willlead the party in the State andplay the role of Leader ofOpposition in the UPAssembly. The decision of theSP leaders also appears to beinfluenced by the decimation ofthe Bahujan Samaj Party whichwon just one Assembly seat inthe 2022 State Assembly polls.

The former Uttar PradeshChief Minister Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party came adistant second in the 2022Assembly elections, securing111 seats, a massive increasefrom 47 in the 2017 polls anda vote share of 32.06 per cent.

In the recently-concludedState polls, Akhilesh had wonthe Karhal seat after securing1.48 lakh votes, while the BJP’sSP Singh Baghel came a distantsecond by getting over 80,000votes.

This was Akhilesh’s firstState election, as he had takenthe MLC route to become theChief Minister in 2012.

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The Union Cabinet onTuesday approved the

Amendment Bill to unify allthree Municipal Corporationsin Delhi.

The Delhi MunicipalCorporation (Amendment)Act, 2022, which provides fora unified MunicipalCorporation of Delhi, will betabled in Parliament soon.

This comes a few daysafter the Aam Admi Party(AAP) has approached theSupreme Court seeking direc-tion to the State ElectionCommission to conduct theMCD polls and accused theBJP-led Central Governmentof delaying local body elec-tions.

The erstwhile DelhiMunicipal Corporation wastrifurcated into threeMunicipal Corporations: SouthDelhi MunicipalCorporation (SDMC),North Delhi MunicipalCorporation (NDMC), andEast Delhi Municipal

Corporation (EDMC) in 2011vide the Delhi MunicipalCorporation Amendment Act,1911 (Delhi Act, 12 Of 2011).

"The trifurcation of thecorporation was uneven interms of the territorial divi-sions and revenue-generatingpotential of each corporation.As a result, there was a hugegap in the resources availableto the three corporations, vis-a-vis their obligations.

The gap has widened overa period of time, increasing thefinancial difficulties of thethree Municipal Corporations,leaving them incapacitated tomake timely payment ofsalaries and retirement bene-fits to their employees andthereby creating seriousimpediments in maintainingcivic services in Delhi," said aUnion Minister justifying theCabinet decision.

The State ElectionCommission had deferred theannouncement of the electionschedule for the civic bodies,which it was earlier slated toannounce on March 9.

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Punjab Chief MinisterBhagwant Mann on

Tuesday announced a "his-toric" decision to regularisethe services of StateGovernment's 35,000 Group Cand D employees, saying " hunPunjab wich na koi kacha gharrahega, na koi kacha mulazim(from now on in Punjab, therewill be no kutcha house, and nocontractual employee)".

Mann also made it clearthat Punjab will now be freefrom dharnas and lathi-charge."I do not want lathi-charge orturbans or chunnis of protest-ing employees to fall off...don'twant them to face water can-nons," he said in a video state-ment released on his officialTwitter handle.

"Today AAP Punjab Govthas taken another historic deci-sion and started the process toregularize 35,000 contractualGovernment employees...We'rehere to fulfil every promisemade to people before the elec-

tion. We've come to change thesystem," tweeted Mann alongwith about four-minute video.

In a move towards endingthe contractual recruitment inthe State, Mann said that theGovernment will table the Billfor regularising the services ofthese employees in the next ses-

sion of the Vidhan Sabha."I have directed the Chief

Secretary Anirudh Tewari toprepare the draft of a bill forregularising the services ofthese employees before thenext Session of theAssembly...We will approve thedraft legislation in the

Assembly and regularise theemployees engaged throughcontract and outsourcing," saidMann.

This is the second majordecision by the AAP-ledPunjab Government after theState Cabinet, in its first meet-ing, decided to fill 25,000posts in the various depart-ments, including 10,000 inPolice Department.

The AAP Government'sdecision came over fourmonths after the previousCharanjit Singh Channi-ledCongress Government hadannounced to regularise theservices of 36,000 employeesworking on contract, ad-hoc,work charged, daily wagesand temporary basis in thestate.

Channi Government, onNovember 11, 2021, had evenpassed "The Punjab Protectionand Regularisation ofContractual Employees Bill-2021", and forwarded it to theGovernor Banwarilal Purohitfor his approval.

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Ranchi: Incarcerated RashtriyaJanata Dal (RJD) supremoLalu Prasad Yadav’s healthcondition has deteriorated,and he has been shifted toAIIMS, New Delhi for bettertreatment, officials said onTuesday.

A medical board of theRajendra Institute of MedicalSciences (RIMS), Ranchireferred him to AIIMS NewDelhi, they said.

"RJD chief Lalu Prasadhas been taken to Delhi in anair ambulance," Ranchi's BirsaMunda Airport Director VinodSharma told PTI.

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In a major development thatprompted the Shiv Sena-led

Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) toaccuse the Modi Governmentyet again of “misusing” its inves-tigating agencies against itspolitical rivals, the EnforcementDirectorate (ED) on Tuesdayattached provisionally �6.45crore-worth of immovable prop-erties belonging to a companyowned by the brother-in-law ofMaharashtra Chief MinisterUddhav Thackeray at Thane inan alleged money launderingcase.

The attached properties,comprising 11 residential flats,belonged to M/s Shree SaibabaGrihanirmiti Private Limited, acompany “owned and con-trolled” by Shridhar MadhavPatankar, the brother ofThackeray’s wife Rashmi.

The ED made a provision-al attachment of the immovableproperties, including 11 resi-dential flats in Neelambarihousing project at Thanebelonging to Shree SaibabaGrihanirmiti Pvt. Ltd, in con-nection with a money laun-dering case registered againstM/s Pushpak Bullion, one ofthe Group companies ofPushpak Group on March 6,2017 under the provisions ofPrevention of MoneyLaundering Act, 2002.

Among other things, theED said in a statement that ithad already provisionallyattached immovable and mov-able properties of PushpakBullion to the tune of �21.46Crore belonging to oneMahesh Patel, ChandrakantPatel, their family membersand companies controlled bythem.

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jharkhand 02RANCHI | WEDNESDAY | MARCH 23, 2022

PNS JAMSHEDPUR

On March 11, 2020, just about twoyears back, WHO had announcedthe arrival of a rare novel coronavirusdisease called covid 19 ( first docu-mented case in December 2019 )and categorised it for the first time asa ‘pandemic’ . It engulfed the entireworld ,maimed and killed people inthousands globally . Probably now forthe first time in last two years we aresitting at the edge of it and hopinganxiously that we have finally won theongoing battle against the mostdreaded beast of the century!Have we really won in finality? IsCovid 19 gone forever and can weshout a Hurrah ! The answer unfortu-nately is an emphatic ‘No’ ! Covid isgoing to stay in an ‘Endemic ‘form atbest and the reason for it is not verydifficult to understand !‘Pandemic ‘ denotes extensivespread of the disease processbreaching national or defined geo-graphic boundaries thus coveringpeople of all ethnicities and groups incourse of time , while ‘ Endemic ‘de-notes constant prevalence of the dis-ease for years confined within a geo-graphic area or in a population groupwhich may wax and wane!Historically , for example Malaria orHIV- AIDS , were pandemic onceupon a time , when it created no lesshavoc than what Covid has done andhas been doing currently !. The abovediseases continue to be present in en-demic form in parts of the world eventoday and are yet to be banished inthat sense ! Just that We have be-come wiser over the years and havelearnt to live with the above old dread-ed diseases , and in the process wehave certainly acquired powerfulmedications and reliable protectionmeasures against the disease !

PRESENT STATUS OF COVID 19Needless to say that as much as wemay wish , this Novel Coronavirus-Covid 19 disease to go away forever,it is very much present today in largeparts of the world in significant num-bers .China and Hong Kong for ex-ample which kept the numbers quitelow and manageable for a very longtime ,has now been struggling to con-tain the spread of the highly infectiousOmicron’s B.2 form , and so is themighty Germany and a sizeable partof eastern Europe ! Amongst thebest managed countries in this crisis ,South Korea and Vietnam , has justnow reported highest ever number ofpatients of Covid 19 omicron B.2 ! Is-rael has reported a new variant mak-ing WHO to issue a fresh warningagainst complacency!As we all know now that the originalWuhan (Chinese) strain of the novelcoronavirus, later named as Alpha

variant, created the first wave of thisrespiratory virus pandemic killing mil-lions of people world over including In-dia. Soon the numbers came downsignificantly and gave us to believethat it is all over only to be followed bymuch dreaded Delta strain of the nov-el Coronavirus which brought evengreater wave of loss of lives, devasta-tion and drudgery for the humanity.Needless to say that we remainedclueless about how to combat thisvirus altogether! Once again therewas a period of lull and relief for a fewmonths making us complacent , to befollowed by highly infectious Omicronvariant, almost three times as infec-tious as Delta but far less dangerousin terms of claiming lives specially inthose who were protected by twodoses of available vaccines!.Fortunately our understanding of thedisease improved significantly in theperiod and in a record time we coulddevelop a range of Vaccines of differ-ing nature , based on newer platformssuch as mRNAvaccine and conven-tional whole virus killed vaccine , ‘ Co-vaxin ‘ indigenously made by BharatBiotech and covishield vaccine creat-ed by Oxford Astrazenica but pro-duced in India by Serum institutehelping us to vaccinate a very largeproportion of our population at arecord pace almost free of cost . Poorand struggling countries largely inAfrica and parts of Asia and SouthAmerica were not so lucky and eventill the date only 10% of their popula-tion are covered by two doses of vac-cines. As expected they continue tobe threatened by this disease. Suchunprotected large population even ina remote corner of the world keepsthe rest of the world vulnerable for theemergence of next significant strain ofcoronavirus! Sooner the entire hu-man population is vaccinated appro-priately, sooner will be the control ofthe disease possible! So the apt ax-iom “No one is safe until everyone issafe “holds good as ever!Generous donation for free vaccinesfor deprived population of the entireworld is the call of the day!Besides effective vaccination by twoor three doses there has to be regularvigilance to note the possible failingantibody level with passage of timeagainst the virus and it’s variants inthe population and thus the need for

appropriate booster doses to en-hance the protection level specially invulnerable old and diseased . Somecountries such as Israel have alreadystarted giving the fourth dose of theCovid vaccine and are contemplatingannual vaccination against the newervariants on long term basis!There is no doubt that in our countrythe number of cases of Covid 19 -Omicron , has come down drasticallyspecially in last two months and theprocess appears downhill including inKerala and Maharashtra, the frontlinestates in Covid 19 disease . Novel coronavirus’s recent strain‘Omicron ‘has three known sub vari-ants B.1 , B.2 , B.3 . Sub variant B.1of Omicron has been the main subvariant of concern so far in India andmost part of the world besides smallpockets of B.2 in eastern states of ourcountry. However, B2 is yet to spreadto other parts of our country whereB.1 had swept earlier without signifi-cant loss of life. It is good that it addedsignificant additional natural immunityby way of mild or asymptomatic in-fection as natural booster in thosewho were already vaccinated.Whether B.2 sub variant is capable ofinfecting dangerously once again tothose who had been infected withomicron B.1 and/ or Delta in the pastand to those who have been vacci-nated properly, is yet to be seen in reallife conditions!Intravenously administered mono-clonal antibodies targeted against theviral spike protein, a cocktail of Sotro-vimab plus Casarivimab , has beenrecommended early in the course ofdisease, specially to the elderly and inimmunocompromised individuals .Pockets of covid 19 disease still existsin our country and in several parts ofthe world as mentioned above. In thishighly connected world spreading ofcritically contagious variants evenfrom one small pocket of the worlddoesn’t take much time and we allhave been witness to it during thispandemic !Immune escape and receding levelsof antibody protection vis a vis emer-gence of entirely a new strain, is al-ways a possibility as shown in thepast , even in fully vaccinated individ-uals !Though available evidence that vac-cination and naturally acquired immu-nity against virus will save death andblunt seriousness in a given patientbut this is not an absolute statement!Besides frequent hand washing asemphasised in the past, using Maskspecially for old and vulnerable of allages, should be continued to be inpractice specially in enclosed crowd-ed spaces ! Not to forget, Preventionis always better than cure!!

The author is former Professorand Head, Department of

medicine, RIMS, Jharkhand.

Have we conquered Covid - 19 finally? Whereare we now? Where do we go from here?

SURESH NIKHARBERMO

These workers, who have beentrapped in Malaysia identified as:Rohit Mahto (Tiskopi), Premlal Mahto(Tiskopi), Dashrath Mahto (Tiskopi),Keshu Mahto (Tiskopi), BasudevMahto (Tiskopi), Vishwanath Mahto(Tiskopi), Puneet Mahto (Tiskopi) ofGomia block of Bokaro district. Thereare Badki Sidhabara), PremchandMahto (Chhotki Sidhabara), Tuka-man Mahato (Chilgo), DularchandMahto (Mahuvatand), BhuneshwarKamar (Mahuvatand), Jhari Kamar(Mahuvatand), Bishnugarh block ofHazaribagh district of Nawadih block

of Bokaro district. Mahto (Chano),Gobind Mahto (Chano),Chetlal Mah-to(Chano), Bhuneshwar Mahto(Chano), Manoj Mahto (Chano),LiloMahto (Chano),Suresh Mahto(Man-gro),Girghari Mahto (Keephwa),Prakash Kumar Mahto (Bhelwara),Tileshwar Mahto (Sapmarwan),Pradeep Kumar Mahto (Tutki).Among the trapped laborers are Bin-od Kumar Mahato (Khetko), BasudevMahto (Farmco), Rameshwar Mahto(Farmco), Budhan Mahto (Ketko) ofBagodar block of Giridih district, Bud-hdev Prasad (Mangaluahra), De-vanand Mahto (Sewatand) in Dumriblock of Giridih district while BinodMahto of Ghutwali.

M FAIYAZ AHMAD DALTONGANJ

The maximum temperature in Jamshedpur and several other districtshad already touched 38 degrees Celsius

Jal Jungle JameenPNS JAMSHEDPUR

PNS DHANBAD

PNS RANCHI

IIT- ISM students protest against offline exams

ECR GM inspects Carriage Repair Factory

PNS BERMO

PNS JAMSHEDPUR

CSTEP Study: Prepare for warmer days

PANKAJ KUMARDHANBAD

Body of girl found hanging in toilet

jharkhand 03RANCHI | WEDNESDAY | MARCH 23, 2022

ROSHAN KUMARRANCHI

PNS RANCHI

PNS RANCHI

PNS RANCHI

SBPS students shine in SKGKO21

Students of Sarala Birla Public School earnedlaurels by showing their astounding perform-ance in Smart Kid G.K. Olympiad(SKGKO21) 2021-22 conducted by Silver-Zone Foundation. In SKGKO21 Shree Mon-dal and Swaroop Tripathy of Std I, KavyaPoddar, Vinit Kumar Mishra, Rubal Mukher-jee, Saharsh Sharma, Raj Laxmi, Mihit Rajand Vivaan Pradhan of Std II, Awantika Ku-mari and Shivansh Aarav Chandra of Std III,were Zonal Rank I and also were awardedwith Gold medal and Special Achievementcertificate. Shlok of Std IV, Tejasveer SinghSaini of Std V, Navya Raj of Std VI, AtharavGupta of Std VII, Abhiraj Shree of Std VIIIalso received Gold medal and SpecialAchievement Certificate along with severalother students of different classes.

Bokaro student shines in World MathsChampionship

Utkarsh Raj, a Class IX student of DPSBokaro, has bagged silver medal in TheWorld Mathematics Team Championship(WMTC) which was held in Nov 2021 on thevirtual platform. It was for the first time that In-dian students participated in WMTC andUtkarsh was among the top six students inthe senior group to represent India. He waseligible to participate in the championshiponly after clearing the prelims and advancedlevel examination of Hanoi Open Mathemat-ics Competition (HOMC). Utkarsh is felicitat-ed with a silver medal and a certificate.HOMC is organized by the Meccademia Ed-ucation, Institute for Junior (Grade 7 & 8) andSenior (Grade 9 & 10) students with the ob-jectives to identify andnurture mathematicaltalent and motivate thestudents at junior andsenior high schools.

Dr VS Gupta GoldMedal Award

In the 19th AnnualConference of Jhark-hand Ophthalmologi-cal Society held atJamshedpur, the EyeDepartment of BokaroGeneral Hospital wasawarded the Dr. VSGupta Gold Medal

Award. Under the leadership of Dr. SophiaAhmed, Head of the Department of Eye De-partment of Bokaro General Hospital, Dr.Rahul Mahala, Dr. Bhanu Prakash, Dr. S. Mo-hanty, Dr. N. Ahmadi and Dr. Deepali, nation-al and international level eye experts pre-sented their papers in the conference. Duringthe programme, Dr. N. Ahmadi was awardedthe Dr. V. S. Gupta Gold Medal Award for hispaper “Increasing Myopia in Children and Ef-fect of Covid on Nerves in the Retina”. A ses-sion of the Women's Ophthalmological Soci-ety was also organized in the conference un-der the leadership of Dr. Sofia Ahmed inwhich women ophthalmologists from all overthe country participated.

PNS RANCHI

PNS RANCHI

Suchitra Sinha, a retired IAS officerfrom Jharkhand has been honouredwith the Women's TransformingAward. On the occasion of Interna-tional Women's Day, this award is giv-en by NITI Aayog for promotion ofarts, culture and handicrafts. Theaward is given to those women whohave brought a change in the societythrough their efforts.Suchitra Sinha has been selected forher tireless efforts for their uplift byworking among the Sabar primitivetribe for the last two and a halfdecades in Nimdih of Seraikela. Sin-ha has done remarkable work to

hone the handicraft skills of the arti-sans of the Sabar tribe and markettheir products, which includes trainingfrom NIFTand participation in nation-al-international handicraft fairs. Sabarof Neemdih is earning up to ten thou-sand rupees per month as well astheir products are also available onplatforms like Amazon and Flipkart.She received this award from boxer

Lovlina Borgohain and female crick-eter Mansi Joshi. She has dedicatedthis award to the artisans of the Sabartribe, whose handicrafts became pop-ular in the country and abroad andthey got this honour. Sinha also saidthat with this award, my responsibilityhas increased even more and willcontinue to discharge it with full sin-cerity and also thanked NITI Aayogand expressed happiness over thefact that people move from metropol-itan cities to remote villages and ar-eas. People working in this are alsogetting such rewards..This year the award was given in thecourtesy of United Nations CIS C,CSR, ICCI and Grant India.

Court convicts former minister Yogendra Sao, wife Nirmala Devi

Ex-IAS officer Suchitra Sinha receives 'Women's Transforming India' award

MLAs target bureaucrats for not following protocolC P Singh describes an ADG as 'ghatiya', accuses a DC of taking bribe

PNS RANCHI

2 BAU students secure under 30 rank in GATE

Automated Unmanned Way Bridge System

Automated Entry Exit and Unmanaged Way Bridge System was inaugurated by SAIL Director(Commercial) VS Chakraborty in the presence of Director-in-Charge of BSL AmarenduPrakash at Warehouse of SAIL CMO (Central Marketing Organisation), Bokaro. On this oc-casion, Executive Director (Sales and ITD) MC Agrawal and Executive Director (MS) D. Ku-mar, CMO Bokaro Office Branch Manager Avadhesh Kumar along with other senior officersand employees of CMO were present. In the afternoon Mr. Chakraborty visited some of themajor units of the plant. After this, he held a meeting with the senior officers of BSL and SAILCMO at Ispat Bhawan. Director-in-charge of BSL, Amarendu Prakash, Executive Director andother senior officers were present in the meeting.

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The steep hike in prices offuel and cooking gas on

Tuesday led to vociferousprotests in Parliament. WhileRajya Sabha witnessed disrup-tions with the Opposition forc-ing adjournment of proceed-ings, the Lok Sabha hadOpposition parties stage a briefwalkout.

In Rajya Sabha, agitatedMPs from the Congress andTMC carried placards andraised slogans. Some of themthen trooped into the well ofthe house. The first adjourn-ment came shortly after theproceedings commenced forthe day.

Chairman M VenkaiahNaidu did not allow a discus-sion on fuel price hike. He saidhe had not accepted noticesgiven by Shaktisinh Gohil(Congress), Dola Sen (TMC),V Sivadasan, ElamaramKareem and John Brittas(CPM) under rule 267, requir-ing setting aside of the listedagenda to take up a discussion.As the chair started Zero Hour,the TMC members came intothe well carrying placards.Congress, Left, SamajwadiParty and Shiv Sena MPs wereup on their feet, some shouting

slogans. Naidu then adjournedthe house for nearly 50 minutesat 11.10 am. Similar sceneswere witnessed when the housereassembled with the deter-mined Opposition trying toraise the issue. DeputyChairman Harivansh tried toreason with them and appealedfor smooth functioning of theQuestion Hour. The chair alsoasked TMC leader DerekO'Brien to call his party MPsback to their seats.

The protesting membersdid not relent and Harivanshthen adjourned the house till2pm. Petrol and diesel priceswere on Tuesday hiked by 80paise a litre each while domes-tic cooking gas LPG rates wereincreased by Rs 50 per cylinderafter four and half months.

Raising the issue afterQuestion Hour in Lok Sabha,Congress leader Adhir RanjanChowdhury said the opposi-tion parties had been claimingthat the prices of diesel andpetrol would increase after theelection process. Members ofthe Congress, TMC, NCP,DMK and Left parties raisedslogans from their seats againstthe fuel price hike anddemanded a rollback. Theopposition parties had tried toraise the issue of as soon as LokSabha met for Question Hour,

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The Opposition on Tuesdayin Lok Sabha sought to

punch holes in theGovernment's regional con-nectivity scheme UDAN claim-ing that less than 50 per centroutes awarded under the mar-quee initiative were opera-tional and only a fraction werefunctioning without subsidy.

BJP MP Rajiv Pratap Rudywho is also a commercial piloturged for the need to develop30-40 greenfield airports in thecountry to cater to the require-ment of ever increasing num-ber of air passengers.

Participating in the dis-cussion on demands for grantsfor the Civil Aviation Ministry,he said that upgrading existingairports and using defenceenclaves for civil aviation "is notthe future." Former CivilAviation Minister Rudy saidthe capacity of existing airportsor brown field airports cannotbe increased beyond a point

even after incurring hugeexpenditure. Similarly, the air-ports at defence enclaves can-not be upgraded as air forceplanes do not need CAT-3 ornight landing facilities whichare essential for operating largecivilian aircraft. He asked thegovernment to expedite devel-opment of a new airport atPatna and focus on "developing25, 30 or 40 greenfield airportsin the country."

Rudy said that the first rev-olution in the civilian aviationsector was started by the fatherof current Civil AviationMinister Jyotiraditya Scindia,Madhavrao Scindia whoopened the sector by allowingprivate airlines.

Initiating a discussion inLok Sabha, Congress memberRavneet Singh Bittu said only405 routes out of the 948awarded by the AirportsAuthority of India (AAI) sinceOctober 2016 were operationalas on December 2021. Bittualso voiced concern over thebudgetary cuts for Directorate

of Civil Aviation (DGCA),Bureau of Civil AviationSecurity (BCAS) and theAircraft Accident InvestigationBoard (AAIB).

"In wake of recent air crashin China, I would urge minis-ter to seek greater allocationsfor three divisions at revisedestimate stage," said Bittu, a LokSabha member from Ludhiana.Trinamool member MahuaMoitra also questioned thelower allocation for the UDANscheme. She demanded that thecivil aviation ministry bescrapped and merged to createa holistic ministry for transportas it was no longer in the busi-ness of running a national air-line.

DMK member S RParthiban wondered how theUDAN scheme would succeedwhen private airline operatorswere looking for profitableroutes. Bittu also flagged con-cerns about double night shiftsfor pilots, claiming that itresulted in fatigue and couldhave serious consequences.

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On World Water Day PrimeMinister Narendra Modi

on Tuesday called for savingevery drop of water and said itis heartening to see water con-servation become a massmovement over the last fewyears. "On World Water Day,let's reaffirm our pledge tosave every drop of water. Ournation is undertaking numer-ous measures like Jal JeevanMission to ensure water con-servation and access to cleandrinking water for our citizens,"Modi said in a tweet.

"Over the last few years, itis heartening to see water con-servation become a massmovement, with innovativeefforts taking place in all partsof the nation. I would like toappreciate all those individualsand organisations who areworking towards saving water,"he said. He also appreciated allindividuals and organisations

working towards saving water.Modi posted a video that

showed his earlier messagesabout the importance of waterpreservation and his govern-ment's efforts in this regard."Together, let's further waterconservation and contributeto a sustainable planet. Everydrop saved helps our peopleand enhances our progress," hesaid.

Referring to a tweet fromthe Jal Shakti Ministry, he saidthe Jal Jeevan Mission, a pro-

gramme aimed at bringingpiped water to every house-hold, is proving very effectivein making the lives of womensimple. The resolve of takingwater to every house will be ful-filled with people's participa-tion, he added. The ministryhad said that over six crorehouses have been given pipedwater in the last two-and-halfyears under Modi's leadership.There was a time when womenhad to travel a long distance tofetch water, it said.

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The Centre on Tuesday toldthe Rajya Sabha that it is

closely following the virus tra-jectory globally, given theemergence of its new variantseven as it almost rejected var-ious mathematical modelsmeant for predicting coron-avirus waves, saying that theyhave repeatedly failed to givereliable results due to a smallsample size.

In a written reply to aquestion in the Rajya Sabha,Minister of State for HealthBharati Pravin Pawar furthersaid the network of IndianSARS-CoV-2 GenomicsConsortium (INSACOG) oflaboratories is undertakingwhole genome sequencing ofsamples for a timely detectionof the mutant variants of thevirus.

On whether researchers atthe Indian institutes of tech-nology (IITs) have predicted afourth wave of the pandemic inthe country between June andAugust, she said the IITKanpur has clarified that it hasnot forecast a fourth wave ofCovid-19.

It is an independent studyconducted by a team ofresearchers from theDepartment of Mathematicsand Statistics at the institutethat has prepared a mathe-matical model and submittedthe same to a pre-print serverfor experts to comment. Thesame is not peer-reviewed,Pawar said.

Modelling studies arebased on a certain set of inputseither based on real-world sce-narios or approximations ofthose inputs that are not avail-able (which may vary in accu-racy according to the techniqueused), she stated.

"Often these studies involvetaking a relatively small actualsample and extrapolating theresult to the entire population.While this may achieve nearaccurate results for a smallhomogenous country orregion, such techniques havefailed repeatedly to give reliableresults for a large, diverse pop-ulation," the minister said.

Later, at the launch of theBRICS Vaccine R&D Centreand Workshop on VaccineCooperation through video-conference here, Union HealthMinister Mansukh Mandaviyasaid that India is willing to offerits robust manufacturing indus-try for developing vaccines forBRICS countries as well as theworld.

India has one of the world'slargest vaccine manufacturingindustries which supplies vac-cines to more than 150 coun-tries and meets 65-70 per centof the WHO's vaccine require-ments, Mandaviya said "Indiais willing to offer its robust vac-cine manufacturing industryfor developing vaccines forBRICS countries (Brazil,Russia, India, China and SouthAfrica) as well as the world,"the minister said.

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The Union Cabinet onTuesday increased the min-

imum support price (MSP) ofraw jute by �250 to �4,750 perquintal for the 2022-23 season.The Cabinet Committee onEconomic Affairs, chaired byPrime Minister Narendra Modi,also approved extension ofapplicability of 'New InvestmentPolicy-2012' for three upcomingunits of Hindustan Urvarak &Rasayan Ltd (HURL) atGorakhpur, Sindri and Barauni.The CCEA approval of increas-ing MSP of raw jute is based onrecommendations ofCommission for AgriculturalCosts and Prices. "The MSP ofraw jute (TDN3 equivalent toTD5 grade) has been fixed at�4,750 per quintal for 2022-23season with an increase of �250over previous year. This would

ensure a return of 60.53 per centover all India weighted averagecost of production," an officialstatement said. Jute Corporationof India (JCI) will continue asCentral Government nodalagency to undertake price sup-port operations and lossesincurred, if any, in such opera-tions, will be fully reimbursed byCentre."It assures a minimum of50 per cent as margin of profit.It is one of important and pro-gressive steps towards ensuringbetter remunerative returns tojute growers and to incentivisequality jute fibre," the statementsaid. HURL, incorporated inJune, 2016, is a joint venture ofCoal India Ltd, NTPC andIndian Oil Corporation. It isreviving erstwhile Gorakhpurand Sindri Units of FCIL andBarauni Unit of GFCL by settingup new gas based urea plantswith an installed capacity of12.7 lakhtonnes per annum.

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The Food Safety and StandardAuthority of India’s (FSSAI)

proposed plan to introduceHealth Star Rating (HSR) forpackaged food products as rec-ommended by the private insti-tution, IIM Ahmedabad, hasnot gone down well with theconsumer organisations anddoctors who strongly felt thatsuch “a system can be easilymanipulated by the industry”.

As per the 'Health Star' rat-ing system, packaged foods willdisplay the number of stars onthe front of the pack, indicatinghow healthy or unhealthy it isdepending upon the amount ofsalt, sugar and fat it has. Theseare on the lines of the Bureau ofEnergy Efficiency (BEE) starrating for electrical appli-ances.“This is where problemlies. Industry can easily manip-ulate the system as food prod-ucts high in sugar or fat that

deserve a low rating (1 star)could get a moderate rating (3or even 4 stars) only becausethey contain some positivenutrients (for example, fruitand nut chocolates),” explainedDr Arun Gupta from NutritionAdvocacy for Public Interest(NAPi) and central coordinatorof the Breastfeeding PromotionNetwork of India.

NAPi , representing theconsumers’ organizations seek-ing mandatory pictorial warn-ing labels on all processed foodhigh in salt, sugar and fats, hasnow sought the Niti Aayogintervention in the matter.

In fact, the IIM report tootalks about our point of viewthat “There is scientific evidencewhich proves that warninglabels deter people from pickingup unhealthy packaged food,”said Dr Gupta. Yet, the HSR sys-tem has been favoured to pleasethe industry at cost of the healthof the consumers, he

added.“What is purpose of hav-ing such a system if it is not ableto help people, particularly par-ents, to distinguish betweenhealthy and unhealthy food fortheir child.

The FSSAI must under-stand that packaged foods thatare high in salt, sugar, fat(HFSS), are the main cause forthe increasing number of noncommunicable diseases suchas diabetes and stroke. Only asimple warning FOPL can checkas has been happening in Chile,”Dr Gupta said matter-of-factly.

The consumer activists havealso pointed out that in thebackdrop of a recent study con-ducted by the AIIMS, Rishikeshwhich has stated that a major-ity of consumers prefer simplelabeling, the FSSAI should callfor a wider consultation beforeintroducing (HSR) system.Consumer Unity & TrustSociety (CUTS), Jaipur,Consumer Voice, New Delhi,

and Citizen consumer and CivicAction Group (CAG), Chennaitoo have questioned the deci-sion of FSSAI in going aheadwith HSR label without properconsultation with stakeholdersand that too when processes arein initial stages.

“Consumers, especiallyfrom the districts, rarely look forstar labels on products,” saidSaroja Sundaram, ExecutiveDirector, CAG, a member of theCouncil of ConsumersInternational.

George Cheriyan fromCUTS International, AsimSanyal from Consumer Voiceand Amit Khurana, CSE tooopposed HSR Model for Indiadue to reasons that health starratings are taken with a positiveconnotation and do not meetintention of FOPL regardingwarning for negative nutrients,which may be overwhelmed bypositive nutrients in the algo-rithm design for HSR.

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In line of fire for the recentAssembly poll debacle,

Congress president SoniaGandhi continued to engagewith the dissident leaders, par-ticularly with the Group of 23(G23) affiliations, and metDeputy Leader of Congress inthe Rajya Sabha Anand Sharmaand Lok Sabha MP ManishTewari on Tuesday.

This meeting has comewithin days of her meeting withGhulam Nabi Azad and her sonRahul Gandhi’s meeting withBhupinder Singh Hooda. Azad,Hooda, Sharma, Tewari aremembers of group of 23 seniordisgruntled and dissentingparty leaders who have advo-cated an overhaul of the grandold party. Sources said Sonia isexpected to meet other leaders

of the G-23 as well in the com-ing days and before she con-ducts a second CongressWorking Committee (CWC)meeting shortly.

The first was chaired by hertwo days after the assembly pollresults after which the leader-ship, particularly Sonia, Rahuland General Secretary PriyankaGandhi, were blamed for therout in five states includingPunjab, Goa and Uttarakhandwhere it had a formidablechance.

Sonia held discussions onresolving internal party issuesand it is learnt that during themeeting, the leaders suggestedways to strengthen the partyand revive it to help take on theBJP in the next round of elec-tions in more States includingHimachal Pradesh and Gujaratwithin a year. Anand Sharma is

a big leader from HimachalPradesh. Another CongressRajya Sabha MP and a leaderof the G-23, Vivek Tankha, wasalso present during the meet-ing on Tuesday at Sonia’s resi-dence. Tuesday's interactionwas part of the series of meet-ings that the Congress topleadership is having with someof the leaders who have raisedcritical organisational issuesand have suggested measures torevamp the party.

These meetings are beingheld amidst indications thatsome of the G-23 leaders maybe accommodated in the CWCor a new body like theParliamentary Board, whichwill be responsible for all pol-icy decisions including finalis-ing chief ministerial candi-dates and tie-ups with like-minded parties in states.

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Israel Prime Minister NaftaliBennett's visit to India from

April 3-5 is expected to furtherstrengthen the excellent bilat-eral cooperation in diverseareas such as agriculture, water,trade and science and tech-nology, the Ministry ofExternal Affairs said here onTuesday.

The Pioneer had onTuesday reported about hisvisit at the invitation of PrimeMinister Narendra Modi. Thevisit marks 30 years of estab-lishment of diplomatic rela-tions between Israel and India.Incidentally, Modi was thefirst Indian Prime Minister tovisit Israel in 2017. Officiallyannouncing Bennett's visit toIndia, the external affairs min-istry said Israeli PM will

undertake the three-day visit atthe invitation of PrimeMinister Narendra Modi. Thetwo leaders had earlier met onthe sidelines of COP 26 inGlasgow in November 2021,and also had a telephonic con-versation on August 16, 2021,the ministry statement noted.

The visit by Bennett wouldbe his first to India in hiscapacity as prime minister.India and Israel elevated theirbilateral relationship to astrategic partnership duringModi’s historic visit to Israel inJuly 2017, the statement noted.

Since then, the two coun-tries have continued to deep-en their strategic partnership,with a focus on innovation andresearch as two knowledge-based economies. The visit bythe Israeli PM is expected tofurther strengthen our excel-lent bilateral cooperation in

diverse areas, including inagriculture, water, trade, edu-cation and science and tech-nology, the statement said.Earlier, Bennett had said hewill be visiting India in the firstweek of April to mark the 30thanniversary of the establish-ment of diplomatic relationsbetween the two countries.

"I am delighted to pay myfirst official visit to India at theinvitation of my friend, PrimeMinister (Narendra) Modi,and together we willcontinueleading the way for our coun-tries' relations," Bennett hadsaid. "Modi restarted relationsbetween India and Israel, andthis is of historic importance.The relations between our twounique cultures, Indian cultureand the Jewish culture, aredeep, and they rely on deepappreciation and meaningfulcollaborations," he had said.

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The Central ConsumerProtection Authority

(CCPA) of the Ministry ofConsumer Affairs has slappeda fine of Rs 10 lakh onGlaxoSmithKline (GSK)Consumer Healthcare Ltd, themanufacturers of Sensodynetoothpaste products, and alsodirected it to discontinue themisleading advertisement with-in seven days.

The Sensodyne toothpasteadvertisement claiming it is'Recommended by dentistsworldwide' and is the 'World'sNo 1 sensitivity toothpaste,"was found to be misleading. Lastmonth, the CCPA imposed afine of Rs 10 lakh on the onlinehome shopping company,Naaptol, and ordered itto dropits misleading advertisements.According to the CCPA, adver-tisements which show endorse-ments by foreign dentists have

been ordered to be discontin-ued. The CCPA, headed byIAS Nidhi Khare, "recentlypassed order against misleadingadvertisements of Sensodyneproducts which make claims'Recommended by dentistsworldwide' and 'World's No 1sensitivity toothpaste," theCCPA said in a statement.

Earlier, on February 9, 2022,the CCPA had passed an orderdirecting discontinuation ofadvertisement of Sensodyneproducts which show endorse-ment by foreign dentists.

The CCPA had initiatedsuo-moto action against adver-tisement of Sensodyne productson various platforms includingtelevision, YouTube, Facebookand Twitter. The ads show den-tists practising outside India(UK) endorsing the use ofSensodyne products namelySensodyne Rapid Relief andSensodyne Fresh Gel for pro-tection against teeth sensitivity.

These advertisements makeclaims that Sensodyne is'Recommended by dentistsworldwide', 'World's No. 1 sen-sitivity toothpaste' and 'clinicallyproven relief, works in 60 sec-onds', the CCPA said.

"After examination of theresponse submitted by the com-pany, CCPA observed that thetwo market surveys submittedby company in support of itsclaims 'Recommended by den-tists worldwide' and 'World'sNo.1 sensitivity toothpaste'made in advertisements wereconducted only with dentists inIndia. "No cogent study ormaterial were submitted bycompany to substantiate claimsmade in advertisements or indi-cate any worldwide prominenceof Sensodyne products. Thus,the claims were observed to bebereft of any reason or justifi-cation," the ministry said. Withrespect to claim of 'clinicallyproven relief, works in 60 sec-

onds', the CCPA had written toDrugs Controller General ofIndia, Central Drugs StandardControl Organization (CDSCO)to furnish its comments on thecorrectness of the claims madeby the company.

The CDSCO has directedAssistant Drug Controller,Licensing Authority, Silvassa toinvestigate claims made by com-pany since product in questionis manufactured under cos-metic license granted by StateLicensing Authority, Silvassa. Inwake of consumer sensitivityaround Covid-19 pandemic,CCPA took stringent actionagainst misleading advertise-ments whereby 13 companieswithdrew their advertisementsand three companies made cor-rective advertisements.

Further, to safeguard con-sumer interest against mislead-ing advertisements and unfairtrade practices, CCPA has alsoissued two advisories.

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In a determined bid to pro-mote local industry in

defence production, theGovernment on Tuesday gavethe nod for acquiring indige-nous equipment worth over Rs8,500 crores. It also approved ascheme worth nearly Rs 400crores for innovations by theIndian entrepreneurs for devel-oping world class weapon sys-tems.

These major decisions weretaken in the DefenceAcquisition Council (DAC) inits meeting on Tuesday herechaired by Defence MinisterRajnath Singh . It is the apexbody to approve the proposalsfor acquisitions.

Giving details later, defenceministry officials said laterRajnath accorded Acceptanceof Necessity (AoN) for CapitalAcquisition proposals ofArmed Forces amounting to Rs8,357 crore. As an impetus to‘Aatmanirbhar Bharat’, all ofthese proposals have beenapproved under ‘Buy (Indian

IDDM)’ category with focus onindigenous design and devel-opment and manufacturing inIndia. The AoNs accorded bythe DAC include procurementof Night Sight (ImageIntensifier), Light Vehicles GS4X4, Air Defence Fire ControlRadar (Light) and GSAT 7BSatellite. Acquisition of theseequipment and systems willenhance operational pre-paredness of Armed Forces byproviding better visibility,enhanced mobility, improvedcommunication and increasedcapability of detecting enemyaircraft.

In a path-breaking initia-tive to encourage innovation,the DAC also accorded con-solidated AoN for procure-ments amounting to Rs 380.43crore from the iDEX startupsand MSMEs. To accelerate thepace of indigenisation,achieveself-reliance in defence and tofacilitate Ease of DoingBusiness for defence industry,the DAC approved effecting thefollowing policy initiatives inthe DAP-2020. These include

all modernisation requirementsof defence forces to be indige-nously sourced and import tobe resorted to only as excep-tion. To reduce financial bur-den on the defence industry,requirement of IPBG is to bedispensed with and EarnestMoney Deposit (EMD) to beintroduced as bid security andPCIP cover upto contract stage.EMD will be applicable only forproposals of Rs 100 Cr andabove and MSMEs andStartups will be exempted fromEMD.

Vendors whose productsare successfully trial evaluatedwill be provided a certificate tothat effect. IDEX and Make IIprocedures have been simpli-fied thereby compressing time-lines and ensuring early place-ment of contracts on success-ful iDEX and Make II vendors.

Rajnath gave the go=aheadfor procurement of 14 itemsworth Rs 380.43 crore from theInnovations for DefenceExcellence (iDEX) startups andMSMEs. These items will beprocured by the Indian Army,

Navy and Air Force. The DACalso approved the new simpli-fied procedure for procure-ment from iDEX startups andMSMEs. This would fast-trackthe procurement from the star-tups/MSMEs.

The procurement cyclefrom the AON to contractsigning will be around 22 weeksas per the new procedure.Suitable incorporation will bemade in the DefenceAcquisition Procedure 2022.The DAC also approved thesimplified procedure for Make-II category projects on similarlines of iDEX procedure andwould considerably bring downthe time taken from prototypedevelopment to Contract sign-ing in Make-II projects.

The iDEX, a game chang-er in the Defence eco-system,was launched by PrimeMinister Narendra Modi in2018 with the objective of fos-tering innovation and incor-porating cutting-edge and dis-ruptive technologies in theArmed Forces in a quick time-frame. The iDEX scheme, since

its initiative in 2018, has nowgathered momentum, and it isexpected that around 25-40items after the successful pro-totyping by the iDEX star-tups/MSMEs, will be ready forprocurement by this year end.

The iDEX scheme has beeninstituted under the over-arch-ing mission of the defenceministry to achieve self-relianceand indigenisation. The iDEXis catalysing the vibrant ener-gy of our startup eco-systemand is today steering trans-dis-ciplinary innovations.

An enterprising network ofexperts from the Services,DPSUs, Industry, Academia,iDEX officials and the star-tups/MSMEs are involved inthe process of co-creation andco-innovation. The aim is toprovide atleast 50 world classsolutions to the Armed Forcesand the defence industry in thenear future. The five editions ofDISC and the various OpenChallenges have been a hugesuccess and have witnessedtremendous interest and par-ticipation from the startups.

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Lieutenant Governor ManojSinha on Tuesday addressed

the Gulf Countries’ InvestmentSummit at SKICC, Srinagarwhich is aimed at providing aplatform for the foreign businessdelegates to explore a host ofinvestment opportunities in theUT of Jammu & Kashmir.

Speaking on the occasion,the Lt Governor highlighted thescope for J&K and GCC com-panies’ economic cooperation tomake J&K UT, paradise onearth, as the most beautifulinvestment destination in the

world.The Lt Governor said that

the visit of CEOs of top com-panies, entrepreneurs, start-uprepresentatives, exporters inJ&K is an expression of confi-dence of the industry leaders inthe potential for business coop-eration between J&K and Gulfcountries.

The CEO of CenturyFinancial, Bal Krishen, a nativeof Jammu’s Doda region, whoheaded the delegation of busi-nessmen said that the delegationhas visited J&K with a clearmindset for investments.

He termed the visit of busi-

ness delegates from the Gulf ahuge step towards growth anddevelopment of UT, and saidthat it will lay a strong founda-tion for a better and prosperousfuture where dreams and aspi-rations transform into reality.

He called for a joint effortbetween Government and busi-nessmen to create opportunitiesfor the welfare of people in J&Kand lauded the UT Governmentfor providing the people withthe right opportunities andEase of Doing Business. He alsourged the delegates to serious-ly consider the local talent fromJ&K.

Since 2014, India’s relation-ship with Gulf countries hasundergone a massive evolutionwhich is being translated into avibrant, revitalised economicpartnership with J&K that willnot only diversify our exportbasket but will also create a con-ducive environment for theexpansion of the existing trade,the Lt Governor observed.

“We have worked with acoherent framework in the lasttwo years to harness immensenatural resources, economicpotential of J&K,” said the LtGovernor.

Under the guidance of

Prime Minister Narendra Modiand Home Minister Amit Shah,we have also worked out ablueprint to unlock investmentflows from compliance andrestrictions, he said. Over�70,000 crores worth invest-ment proposals have beenreceived within a year, he added.

We promise to provideglobal standard end-to-endfacilities for the businesses,skilled workforce, transparentand hassle-free regulatorymechanism, and creation ofnecessary infrastructure wher-ever required, the Lt Governorsaid.

Jammu: Vikramaditya Singh,elder son of former Sadar-e-Riyasat and Congress stalwartDr Karan Singh on Tuesdayresigned from the primarymembership of the party, claim-ing it has “failed to realize andreflect the sentiments and aspi-rations of the people of Jammuand Kashmir”.

Singh had joined Congressparty in October 2018 afterquitting Peoples DemocraticParty (PDP).

Singh had started his polit-ical innings by first joining thePDP in the presence of MuftiMohd Sayeed and PDP ChiefMehbooba Mufti in the monthof August 2014.

On Tuesday afternoonSingh himself posted a copy ofhis resignation letter on histwitter timeline in which heclearly stated he submitted hisresignation to CongressPresident Sonia Gandhi onMarch 22, 2022.

In a brief message on histwitter timeline Singh clarified,"My position on critical issuesvis-à-vis Jammu & Kashmirwhich reflect national interestsdo not align with that of theCongress Party. @INCIndiaremains disconnected withground realities".

Recently Singh had alsoexpressed his views on the filmThe Kashmir Files. "What hap-pened in Kashmir was nothingshort of genocide. Hindus fromKashmir, Doda, Bhaderwah &Kishtwar were killed & drivenout of their homeland. I was inSrinagar in 1989. My family suf-fered irreparable losses there-after. Hundreds lost their lives.30 years on justice & closureawaits all those who suffered asa consequence of this brutalgenocide. It is clear who theplayers & enablers were.Shameful to see those in denial", Maharaja Hari Singh's grand-son wrote on his twitter timeline.

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Ahead of the crucial meetingof the Lt-Gov Manoj Sinha

with the entrepreneurs andCEOs from Gulf countries, whoare on a four-day long visit toexplore business opportunitiesin J&K, a brief shoot out wasreported at Soura area ofSrinagar city in which a selec-tion grade constable attainedmartyrdom after he succumbedto his fatal injuries in the hos-pital on Tuesday.

The shootout followed threeback to back terrorist strikes inBudgam, Pulwama and Tralareas of Central and SouthKashmir districts on Monday inwhich a civilian was killed whiletwo non-local labourers hadreceived injuries.

Interacting with the mediaafter attending the wreath lay-ing ceremony of martyredpolice cop identified as AmirHusaain Lone, hailing fromKupwara, Inspector General ofpolice,Kashmir range VijayKumar said, "a three membergroup of Lashkar-e-Tayyebaterrorists were roaming aroundin the area in a red colored fourwheeler". He said while a policeteam was covertly chasing thema brief shootout took place.

A police jawan and one ofthe terrorists received bullet

injuries. The police jawan wasrushed to the nearby hospitalwhere he succumbed to his fatalinjuries while the terroristsmanaged to fled away from thespot. We are tracking their foot-prints and very soon they willbe neutralised, IGP claimed.

Since March 1, 2022 around11 hardcore terrorists have beenneutralsied in different anti-ter-rorist operations.

Meanwhile, LieutenantGovernor Manoj Sinha Tuesdayvisited the SMHS hospital toenquire about the well being oftwo labourers - Bisujeet Kumarfrom Bihar and MuhammadAkram from Bijnoor, UttarPradesh who had sustainedinjuries in the recent terroristattacks at Pulwama andTral.

The Lieutenant Governormet the injured labourers andassured them of the best possi-ble health facility for theirtreatment.

While condemning the ter-rorist attacks on civilians, the LtGovernor asserted that the gov-ernment is determined to elim-inate terrorism and perpetratorsof despicable terror attacks willbe brought to justice soon.

In Jammu, DGP DilbaghSingh said targeted killings willcontinue to remain a challengefor security agencies till there is

a presence of gun and terroristsin the Valley.

He also said security forcesare alert at the border to foilinfiltration attempts of terrorists.When was not targeted killingsa challenge? This (targetedkillings) challenge is alwaysthere until there is presence ofgun, terrorists and involvementof Pakistan,” Singh toldreporters after flagging offmotorbikes for borderpatrolling duties.

“Terrorists and their men-tors are present everywhere.Such incidents (grenade attacksand targeted killings) take placedue to their (terrorist) activities,”he said.

The DGP said J&K Policehas been quick to solve incidentsof targeted killings and action asper law has been taken againstthe guilty.

“A large number of terror-ists have been neutralised,” headded.

Replying to a question oninfiltration, the police chief saidthe border grid is alert to foil anysuch activity. “Any such attempt(from across the border), willnot be allowed.”

The motor bikes were pro-vided to the JKP by HeroMotoCorp through CSR initia-tive for border patrolling and forwomen’s squads in the cities.

Lucknow: The stage is set for agrand swearing-in ceremony ofthe second Yogi AdityanathGovernment in Uttar Pradesh atthe sprawling Atal BihariVajpayee Ikana stadium in thestate capital on March 25.

According to sources, an allimportant meeting of the BJPlegislature party to elect itsleader will be held Thursdayevening, in which Union UnionHome Minister Amit Shah andformer Chief Minister ofJharkhand Raghubar Das willtake part as observer and co-observer.

The formality of electingYogi Adityanath as the newchief minister will be done in themeeting, they said on Tuesday.Shah will also deliberate on theconstitution of the Ministry inthe meeting with the newlyelected MLAs, they said.On Monday, State unit presidentof the party Swatantra DevSingh and general secretary(organisation) Sunil Bansal hadheld a meeting with party officebearers, during which they wereassigned with responsibilitiesfor the swearing-in ceremony.After coming to power with full

majority in 2017 assembly elec-tions, the BJP had chosenAdityanath, the five-term MPfrom Gorakhpur, as the stateCM, and had also made him theleader of the BJP legislatureparty. On March 19, 2017,Yogi took the oath as chief min-ister of UP along with twodeputy Chief Ministers KeshavPrasad Maurya and DineshSharma, as well as other minis-ters. During the recentlyconcluded assembly elections,BJP and its allies together post-ed victory on 273 of the total 403seats.

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Congress general secretaryPriyanka Gandhi Vadra

and her secretary SandeepSingh find themselves in theline of fire for her party’s anni-hilation in the recent Assemblypolls in which the party’s tallyshrank to just two legislators.

State Congress leadersdemanded the immediateremoval of Priyanka claimingthat since she was the in-chargeof UP, she should also face themusic for the party's patheticpoll show.In an open letter toCongress president SoniaGandhi on Tuesday, UPCongress leader Zeeshan Haider,demanded that Priyanka beremoved as general secretary asthe party fought UP electionsunder her leadership. Recently,Haider was expelled from theparty for accusing Priyanka’s‘servant’ for being responsible forthe poll debacle. Haider stressedthat as UP in-charge, Priyanka

Gandhi Vadra was equallyresponsible for the party's poorlike former UP Congress chiefAjay Kumar Lallu, who wasasked to quit after the results.

He said that it was unfair toonly blame Lallu for the polldebacle.Jaider pointed out thatafter Congress' debacle in the2012 Assembly elections, thethen UP in-charge DigvijayaSingh and UP Congress chiefRita Bahuguna Joshi had toresign from their positions.Soon after the results ofAssembly polls were declaredon March 10, Haider had raisedthe banner of revolt against theCongress brass in the state.Earlier he was the party's elec-tronic media and Urdu presscoordinator. Besides Haider,another expelled leader KonarkDixit, who recently ledCongress workers to AICC andtried to meet Sonia Gandhi andapprise her of the reasonsbehind the defeat, also sup-ported the removal of Priyanka.

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Taking forward its vision to establishUttar Pradesh as the ‘religious

tourism hub’ of the country, YogiGovernment 2.0 has several reforms inthe pipeline which will provideimmense employment opportunities tothe people in the State. In its secondinnings, the BJP Government is keen onreviving and boosting the state tourismindustry, and has come up with specialplans for the same. The authorities havealready worked on developing religioussites and increasing facilities for devo-tees over the past five years. The Yogigovernment, in its first term itself, pri-oritised the development of the religioussector, accelerating development ofplaces including Ayodhya, Kashi andMathura.

Even as construction of Ram tem-ple in Ayodhya is going on, the infra-structure development in Ayodhya isalso going at a rapid pace. More than17 projects worth �138 crores have beencompleted in Ayodhya. Besides, workis going on war footing on 54 projectsat a cost of �3,126 crore. The pilgrim-age centres falling on 84 Kosi ParikramaMarg are also being developed. Thegovernment also plans to developAyodhya as a Vedic City under whichroads are being constructed forPanchkosi, 14 Kosi and 84 kosiParikrama. In these places, airports arebeing constructed, roads are beingwidened and markets are being organ-ised so that tourism can be facilitat-ed.After taking over the reins in 2017,the Yogi government worked for the

development of religious tourism in thestate which was ignored by previousregimes. Despite being a big center ofreligious faith, Varanasi could notachieve the position that it should havein terms of tourism due to meagre facil-ities. Shri Kashi Vishwanath Dham wasconstructed at a cost of more than 600crores within five years of the BJP gov-ernment. Cruise service started oper-ating to woo tourists. Besides, a newdevelopment project was prepared forthe 70-km-long Panchkosi road whichfurther strengthened the identity ofKashi globally thereby boosting touristinflow from India andabroad.Promoting religious tourismin the state, the state government gavepriority to maintaining the purity ofBraj region and taking it to the nation-al and world level. For this, Braj TeerthVikas Parishad has been set up and agrand celebration of Krishnotsav inMathura and Rangotsav in Barsana arebeing organised.

The construction of a ropeway is alsogoing on in Barsana. The Yogi govern-ment had declared Vrindavan,Nandgaon, Govardhan, Gokul, Baldevand Radhakund pilgrimage areas in2017 itself. The country's largest city for-est is being developed near Kalidah Ghatof Yamuna river in Vrindavan, which willbe the centre of tourist attraction. ATourist Facilitation Centre, GeetaResearch Institute and Auditorium, con-struction of Annapurna Bhawan is beingundertaken in Vrindavan, Jubilee Park inMathura, Barsana and Nandgaon arealso being developed for tourist facili-ties.

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In what appeared to be ashocking incident of honour

killing, a minor girl was doneto death by her family membersin Kothi police station area ofBarabanki.

Later, the family memberstried to burn the body and con-ceal the crime but the policereached the spot after whichthe accused fled the scene ofcrime. As per reports, BindaPrasad's daughter Roshni wasstudying in class eight inKasturba Gandhi BalikaVidyalaya (KGBV) located inKaiserganj area.

The family reeside inDedhia hamlet of Kothi inBarabanki. About a fortnightback, Roshni came to her houseon Holi holidays. On Mondayaround 11 pm, the familymembers killed the girl andtried to burn her body by tak-ing her to the fields. After thevillagers informed the police, ateam immediately reached thespot but the family membersfled after seeing them.

The cops immediatelysummoned a dog squad andforensic team for inspection.Samples of blood stains foundin the house were collected andthe half-burnt body found inthe field were recovered andsent for autopsy.

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Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati launcheda scathing attack on Samajwadi Party patron

Mulayam Singh Yadav and party presidentAkhilesh Yadav on Monday, alleging that SP isthe B-Team of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.She referred to Mulayam’s daughter-in-lawAparna Yadav joining the saffron party. Earlier,the Samajwadi Party had labelled the BSP as theB-Team of the BJP. Mayawati alleged that ratherthan her party, it was Mulayam Singh who wasopenly with the saffron party and even got hisson blessed by its leaders.

She also attacked Akhilesh for renaminginstitutions named after Dr BR Ambedkar, dur-ing his tenure.“It is not the BSP, but SP patronMulayam Singh Yadav who is openly with theBJP. In the last swearing-in, he had got Akhileshblessed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi andhas now sent a member of his family to the BJPfor his work,” the BSP chief tweeted in Hindi.

“The Ambedkarites of UP will never forgiveSP chief Akhilesh Yadav, who had changed mostof the names of schemes and institutionsnamed after Dr Ambedkar during his regime,which is disgusting and shameful,” Mayawatiposted in another tweet.

The Bahujan Samaj Party is often called theB-Team of BJP by its political rivals, especiallyafter Union Home Minister Amit Shahremarked that the party has maintained its rel-evance in the recently concluded Assembly poll.Mayawati had appreciated Shah for acknowl-edging that her party would getvotes.

The senior BJP leader’s remark had also trig-gered speculation over the possibility of a post-election tie-up between the two parties. In 1995,1997 and 2002, Mayawati was sworn in as ChiefMinister of UP with BJP’s support.

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Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) hasstarted preparations for con-

testing the municipal electionsto be held across the state in nextfew months. The party will alsolaunch a membership drive toextend its reach among the peo-ple in Uttar Pradesh from April2. The decision was taken at ameeting, chaired by Rajya Sabhamember Sanjay Singh, to reviewthe performance of party can-didates in the recently heldAssembly elections on Monday.

The meeting was attendedby AAP district chiefs and thepoll candidates. Singh discussedwith the participants the ways tostrengthen the party and tomake people aware of the poli-cies of the party. He asked AAPleaders to start preparing forcontesting the municipal elec-tions and sought to know abouta tentative poll strategy.

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In a sensational incident, BJPleader and leading lawyer

Gaurav Jaiswal was shot deadin front of a liquor shop inChiruha area of Maharajganjlate on Monday night. Thedeceased was the nephew ofMunicipality Board ChairmanKrishna Gopal Jaiswal.

As per reports, Gaurav wascalled at the liquor shop bysomeone over a phone call. Ashe reached there, the assailantshot Gaurav in the head andfled from the spot. The victimwas rushed to a hospital wheredoctors pronounced him deadupon arrival. The killing led totension in the area and withinno time, hundreds of support-ers and party leaders con-verged on the spot and stageda protest demanding the arrestof the assailant. Later on theassurance of senior officers, theprotesters allowed the body tobe taken for autopsy.

Panaji: The swearing-in cere-mony of Pramod Sawant asGoa's Chief Minister will be heldon March 28 and prominent BJPleaders, including PrimeMinister Narendra Modi, willattend the event.

Talking to reporters onTuesday, Sawant said the cere-mony would be held at DrSyama Prasad Mookerjee stadi-um near here on March 28 at 11am. Prime Minister Modi,Union Home Minister AmitShah, BJP national president J PNadda, Union Minister NitinGadkari andChief Ministers ofseven BJP-ruled states wouldattend the ceremony, he said.

The BJP has already sub-mitted a letter of support of 25MLAs to Goa Governor P SSreedharan Pillai, who has invit-ed them to form the nextGovernment in the coastal State.

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common, there are many sim-ilarities that underlie our utter-ances, habits and moorings.The spouted globular vessel(colloquially called a ‘lota’ onboth sides), typically made ofbrass or copper, has been in thisancient land since 2nd millen-nium BC. The functional ves-sel for multiple usages hasbirthed many idioms — themost widely used being ‘Beypendey ka lota’ (a spherical ves-sel without a base which tendsto roll in any direction).Commonly used to describe anundependable, unfaithful orunhinged person who could‘bend with the wind’, as itwere. Expectedly, the murkyand unreliable world of parti-san politics remains the obvi-ous playground of itsmetaphorical exponents, andtherefore our cultural cousinsfrom across the LOC havecoined a hilarious dimension tothe various ‘types’ of democra-cy that afflicts us both ie,‘Lotacracy’ (adding to the basicdefinition of democracy as the‘rule of the people’, to a more(un)qualified, ‘rule of the peo-ple, who cannot be trusted tostay true to their words’).

India has just about fin-ished with its electioneering tothe various State Assemblieswith the most polarising,debasing and bitterly contest-ed saga, which had a more than

fair share of its own turncoats(Lotas), who till the proverbialenlightenment leading to theshift had been waxing elo-quently a completely differenttune. Some won, some lost, butthe sad reality is that all partieswithout exception had enter-tained these Lotas and theIndian citizens and India’s con-tinuing experiment in democ-racy was poorer for the same.Many of the current Ministersin the Union Cabinet and evenChief Ministers/Ministers inState Governments have had ahopping and fleet-footed past.But the Pakistanis are no bet-ter, and their tryst withLotacracy is staring PrimeMinister Imran Khan in theface as he undergoes a no-trustvote in the National Assembly.Besides the Opposition parties,supposedly 24 of Imran’s ownLotas (estranged lawmakers)have taken shelter in enemyquarters! A desperate Imranunconvincingly tried to wooback his party lawmakers bysaying, “Time has changed asthere is no more room forchanga manga (horse-trading)politics” — ironically, his law-makers are disagreeing with theexact same thing ie, nothinghas changed in so-called NayaPakistan and, if anything, gov-ernance has gone from bad toworse. Sounding extremelysanctimonious, Imran warned

his Lotas, “There is a market topurchase conscience of thepeople through illegal pelf”,especially rich coming from aman whose Cabinet is stuffedwith suchlike Lotas.

The spirit of mufad kisiyasat (politics of self-interest)infects both countries, and thefleeting ideology can be glee-fully traded at the drop of a hat.As winning dispensations onboth sides had sought for voteson the platform of ‘change’(Naya there, Badlaav here) —the only ‘change’ is the extentof revisionism and referencingof the ‘past’ to justify the sadmorass of the present. Name-calling dissidents as Lotas maybe convenient for Imran as hefights an uphill battle of hisown creation, but his darkinstincts are given away by hiscuss language, intimidatorytactics and sheer lies that he isinvoking to protect hisGovernment. He is clearly notfighting Lotacracy as he cava-lierly postures, but only reap-ing the consequences of himworsening the system.Lotacracy could have beenfunny, but for the debilitatingconsequences that it breeds.

(The writer, a militaryveteran, is a former LtGovernor of Andaman &Nicobar Islands andPuducherry. The viewsexpressed are personal.)

��������������� ������������Sir — Close on the heels of the KarnatakaHigh Court’s hijab verdict upholding theban on wearing hijab on the premises ofeducational institutions, the KarnatakaGovernment has decided to introducethe Bhagavad Gita in the school syllabusfrom the next academic year. True, theteachings of the Bhagavad Gita haveenormous significance. On the otherhand, it shouldn’t be included as a sub-ject in school syllabus. It is a sacred bookof Hindus; what is the logic of introduc-ing it in schools where students ofother religions also study? Is it right toforce them to study the Gita?

Education must not be mixed withreligion. It must inculcate secularism instudents, not communalism. India is acountry of religious pluralism. If the Gitabecomes a part of school syllabus, whatabout the Quran and the Bible? This isclearly another case of religious discrim-ination and segregation. Education isimparted for character formation andpersonality development. It widens stu-dents’ outlook and develops positive atti-tudes in them. While people have theright to follow religions of their choice,it must not become a part of studies.Developing religious feelings amongschoolchildren is dangerous. The sanctity of educational institutions mustbe preserved.

Venu GS | Kollam

�����������������������������Sir — For the last few years, the nation’spolitical climate has been made suchthat an impression is being made thatonly one party is right for this country.That all other parties don’t work, thatthey are corrupt and dynasts. What canbe a greater hymn and anthem ofpraise for his high command whenMaharashtra BJP presidentChandrakant Patil claims that PrimeMinister Narendra Modi sleeps foronly two hours. Not only this, he isdoing further experiments for thefuture so that he doesn’t have to sleepeven for two minutes and spend the

entire 24 hours in the service of thenation and its people.

Till about five-seven years ago, it wassaid that Modi ji works for 18 hours. Nowit is being increased to 24 hours. Whenthe researchers of science and the humanbrain will come to know that such ahuman being is roaming this earth whonever sleeps, it will be nothing short ofa miracle for them. If this happens, thenthere will be a great revolution in the fieldof biology globally. People will only workall their life, not rest. That means that theproduction of the world will at least dou-ble. After that, no one on earth will haveto face scarcity of any kind!

Jang Bahadur Singh | Jamshedpur

������������������������Sir — Since Independence, India hasbeen known as a developing country,however in the coming years, no doubtthat it will reach the level of a developedcountry. India already ranks among thetop five nations by its tremendousachievements in science, technology,

agriculture and pharmaceutical sectors.The youth from villages have beenmigrating to cities in search of work asthere are no or fewer opportunities foremployment in villages. They leavebehind the good quality of life in the vil-lage for the poor quality of life in cities.

For the purpose of stopping migra-tion from villages to cities and creatingwork opportunities in villages, theGovernment is taking the initiative tomake villages ‘smart’ for our citizens.There is no doubt that the time has comewhen we are turning our nation’s villagesinto smart villages which will not lagbehind cities in any manner whatsoev-er. Dholpur village in Rajasthan was thefirst smart village. Many more smart vil-lages are soon to turn into reality. I amproud to say that we are Indians. In a fewyears, we will be one of the developednations, for sure.

Ruchika Pareek | Jaipur

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The civilisational lands ofBharat were vivisectedwith different belief sys-tems in 1947. If Nehru

had hauntingly posited, “we stepout from the old to the new, whenan age ends, and when the soulof a nation, long suppressed,finds utterance”, days earlier,Jinnah had loftily stated: “We arestarting in the days where thereis no discrimination, no distinc-tion between one communityand another, between one casteor creed and another. We arestarting with this fundamentalprinciple: that we are all citizens,and equal citizens, of one State.”Tellingly, the only speech ofJinnah that clearly outlines thecontours of his conceptualisedPakistan, strangely, is withoutaudio recording! Author KhalidAhmad in Pakistan BehindIdeological Mask notes that manyMuslim League membersattempted modifying the progres-sive passages — till the bigotedZia-ul-Haq bluntly expunged thespeech from Government mediaand textbooks.

Nonetheless, 75 years afterIndependence in the Indian sub-continent, it is the chronologicalminnow and till then non-exis-tent Bangladesh (‘East Pakistan’till 1971) which has fructified andharnessed its potential, relative-ly speaking. It seems there is amad race across both sides of theLine of Control to outdo eachother in stymieing the narrativeand inherent promise, with thun-dering jingoism and populism,that postures a lot more than itdelivers. Oddly, the rallying cryin India of ‘Achche Din’ (days ofprosperity) or ‘Sabka Saath,Sabka Vikas, Sabka Vishwas’(everyone’s cooperation, every-one’s progress, everyone’s confi-dence) and in Pakistan the emptythunder of ‘Naya Pakistan’ (NewPakistan) or ‘Riyasat-e-Madina’(Holy prophet’s principles gov-erning the State of Medina) —beyond partisan passions and loy-alties, cold statistics pertaining tothe Sustainable DevelopmentGoals (SDGs) or various othersocietal indexes by independentglobal ranking agencies reflect astarkly worrisome picture.

Since the fount of societal cul-ture besetting both countries was

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being by buying 12 lakh diyasfrom them to light across the cityof Ayodhya on Diwali 2021.

While the party used thecommunity leaders as influencersof the members of the caste, itdeepened its connection withcastes by appointing politiciansrepresenting them to importantpositions in the party organiza-tion. The party deepened the con-nection further by selecting can-didates from the castes. It wasbecause of the depth of connec-tion with the non-Yadav back-ward castes and non-Jatav sched-uled castes that the BJP outwit-ted the Samajwadi Party thattried to cobble together a coali-tion of backward castes and non-Jatav communities just beforethe elections.

The BJP’s victory was there-fore a victory of deep casteismover shallow casteism.

The party cannot take a highmoral stand that its politics iscasteless and nationalist. Theparty is not breaking up caste butreinforcing it, much like otherpolitical parties have done and do.

Caste exists in three differentforms. One is political form. TheBJP, like other parties, is using thepolitical expression of the castesto gain support in elections. Theexpression keeps changing. Thecastes keep shifting their patron-age from one party to another.The political party in the govern-ment changes. But the political

organizations of the castes do not.The BJP cannot make us believethat it has melted castes with itsrainbow coalition. The rainbowwill vanish today or tomorrow.

The second form of caste issocial organization. If the BJPwants to break up caste it has tobreak up the social hierarchy ofcaste. How many of the Thakursin UP are willing to accept aMaurya son-in-law or a Pasidaughter-in-law? Can a Jatav buyland and build a house in theBrahmanstreet in a village? Justbefore elections, Yogi Adityanathgot himself photographed diningat a neat-looking house of adalit. But how many men andwomen of upper castes inter-dinewith those of dalit communities?How many people from the lowercastes get invited to weddings inupper caste homes?

The social hierarchy persistsbecause there are deep-rooted,misconceived notions about puri-ty of blood and rebirth in accor-dance with karma. These notionsare the legs on which the edificeof social hierarchy stands. TheBJP has never attacked thoselegs. It has not done so, becausethat would imply an attack on thebeliefs and traditions ofHinduism, something which itexists to champion and sustain without any room forquestioning.

The third form of caste is eco-nomic organization. For cen-

turies, each caste was destined tofollow a certain occupation. Theoccupations had a ranking fromlow to high, which formed thebasis for untouchability, segrega-tion and hierarchy. With indus-trialization and urbanization, thelinks between caste and occupa-tion are weakening. However,the members of lower castes arestill seen and treated as lowercastes, even though they might bein other occupations-occupa-tions away from the village, inindustry or trade. The socialform of caste seems to have alonger life than its economicform.

The persistence of the socialform of caste does not mean thatit will never go away. While thereare many examples of its persis-tence, there are also several exam-ples of its blurring. The way tobreak down caste is to put thelower castes in occupations hith-erto held by higher castes. Inshort, a political party that wantsto root out casteism has to makejob creation in industry andtrade its main instrument. Is theBJP doing that in UP? Accordingto the Centre for Monitoring ofIndian Economy, of the totalpopulation of 70.99 million youthin the 15-29 age group in thestate, only 12.17 million (or about17 percent) were employed inSeptember-December 2021. Howcan the linkage between caste andoccupation be broken?

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Will the Delhi chiefminister ArvindKejriwal emerge as a

challenger to Prime MinisterNarendra Modi, the CongressParty, or both? No doubt win-ning Punjab will encouragehim to spread his Aam AdmiParty’s wings to other states, butcan he achieve his ambition? Itmay be difficult as the otherregional satraps have a firmhold on their fiefdoms to checkhis rise.

Whatever may be the gameplan, it will be a long haul. Evenif Kejriwal wins half a dozenstates by 2024, it will be aHimalayan task to competewith Modi or Congress, whichstill has a national presencedespite its decay. Already,Kejriwal’s supporters are pro-jecting him as a national leaderwho could threaten Modi.

Some say his goal may not be2024 but 2028 or even later.After all, he has age on his side.

Kejriwal is a shrewd,manipulative, sensationalist,and ambitious politician who isin a hurry to achieve higherpeaks. After joining IndiaAgainst Corruption movementled by Anna Hazare and takingcentre stage as a spokesman forthe movement, Kejriwalbecame known. He quicklyseized the moment andlaunched his Aam Admi Partyin 2012. After winning with athumping majority in Delhi,not once or twice but thrice,Kejriwal became a dictator inthe past eight years and threwaway most of the founder mem-bers who were a threat to him.He even distanced himself fromAnna Hazare. He started build-ing a personality cult around

himself. AAP and the Congressare now more or less equal inone sense that they both ruleonly two states. "It is time tobring revolution to the country.We have wasted 75 years now.There is no time to waste.Everyone should join AAP.AAP is not the name of theParty. It is the name of the rev-

olution. AAP is a name for ful-filling Bhagat Singh’s dreams"Kejriwal roared after winningPunjab. What is Kejriwal’s strat-egy? Since the dominant BJPwins around 40% votes, who dothe rest vote for? Kejriwal iseying that 60 percent. But hehas to share this with Congress,other regional satraps, and even

independents.The first step is to grab the

voter base of the Congressparty, which includes Dalits andMuslims. Even in Punjab, hismain target was Congress. AAPleader Raghav Chadha hasopenly said AAP would be the"national and natural replace-ment to the Congress.’

Other regional satraps likeK.Chandrasekhar Rao, MamataBanerjee,Y.S. Jagan MohanReddy and Naveen Patnaik, toname a few, have all come topower by luring away the vot-ers of the Grand Old Party.

Kejriwal’s second step is tospread to other states. TheAAP chief has been eyeingstates where there is a directfight between the BJP andCongress. There are over 200seats where the two parties aredominant. He wants to project

himself as the alternative ask-ing the voters to give his ‘Delhimodel’ a chance. If he succeeds,it will be only at the cost of theCongress, as is seen in Punjab.

The third is to get an entryinto the regional satrap-ruledstates. After getting a footholdin Goa, Kejriwal is looking atTelangana, where he is planninga state-wide padayatra soon. Hehas already tried in Karnataka.The calculations of AAP’s entryinto Tamil Nadu riding piggy-back on filmstar Kamal Hasan’sMakkal Needhi Maiam havefizzled out. The MNM hasfailed to make any progress inthe State. Some say that theAAP is spreading the butterthinly, beyond its capacity tobuild. But AAP is drunk withPunjab’s success and plans tofield its candidates in Himachaland Gujarat first and then take

it to other States. But there isa complex problem for Kejriwal.As this trend grows, the BJPwould want Congress to remainsomewhat relevant to checkthe rise of AAP. After all, Modihas been targeting the Congressmisrule even eight years afterbecoming Prime Minister,which shows that Congress is aconvenient whipping horse.Therefore, in states where theAAP may emerge as a thirdforce, the BJP would likeCongress to stay alive.

Incidentally, many non -BJP chief ministers like MamataBanerjee, KCR, M.K. Stalin, andothers are trying to build a non-BJP front but Kejriwal is not ina hurry to join them though hehas not said no. But before2024, he has to decide whetherto go along with the new coali-tion or stay aloof.

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3��+�� The BJP’s claim that its victory inUttar Pradesh was a victoryagainst casteism does not haveany legs to stand upon. It was

definitely a tempestuous victory againstthe Samajwadi Party which, while rely-ing predominantly upon Yadav vote,tried to mobilize other backward castes,but that victory was not a victory of a‘casteless’ party over a ‘casteist’ party buta victory of a party with a better-nur-tured and better-oiled caste coalitionover a party with a weaker one.

Of course, hyper-nationalism andHindutva played a role. But the BJP usedthem as a rope to string together thecaste boats rowing with their separateflags in the social Ganga. The boats havenot gone away.

The BJP primarily succeeded byoffering itself as a political instrumentto the backward castes and dalits thatwere hostile to Yadav ascendancy anddominance. The five years of Akhileshrule (2012-2017), which was perceivedboth by the Yadavs and the non-Yadavsas ‘Yadav raj’ for contrarian reasons,broadcast seeds of anti-Yadav sentiment that yielded a plentiful harvest to the BJP.

The BJP did not go to the voters witha casteless stance that would have beenbefitting a nationalist party. It did notsay, "Whether one is a Yadav, a Teli, aMaurya, a Jatav or a Pasi, all are mem-bers of the same family. Let all of us gettogether to build the nation." It did notwork to foster a brotherhood of theYadavs and the Telis, Mauryas, Jatavsand Pasis. On the contrary, it worked tofoment hostility and widen the gulfbetween the Yadavs and other backwardcastes and the Jatavs and other sched-uled castes for its political benefit.

Of course, it only did what NitishKumar had done in Bihar. Much like theSamajwadi Party in UP, the RashtriyaJanata Dal in Bihar had come to be dom-inated by the Yadavs. Nitish Kumar wovea coalition of non-Yadav backwardcastes. He added to it a new category of‘Mahadalits’ to isolate the Dusadhs thatwere the leading caste among Dalits inorder to build a formidable electoralbase, which is still paying him.

But the BJP went beyond NitishKumar. It organized meetings of repre-sentatives of every caste to which itsleaders belonging to the particular castewere invited to speak. It identified‘community leaders’ in every caste withwhom the local BJP workers weredirected to keep in active touch.Through these ‘community leaders’ theparty workers were to spread awarenessamong the voters of the caste of the ‘ben-efits’ the Modi government at the Centreand the Yogi government in the state hadbrought to the community. For instance,the BJP workers told the Kumhars, thepotters, of the Yogi government’sschemes to promote their craft and well-

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Ukraine said it retook astrategically important

suburb of Kyiv early Tuesday, asRussian forces squeezed otherareas near the capital and theirattack on the embattled south-ern port of Mariupol ragedunabated. Two "super power-ful bombs" rocked Mariupol onTuesday as Ukrainian author-ities made a fresh attempt atrescuing civilians from thebesieged port city which hassuffered relentless shelling sinceRussia's invasion began almosta month ago.

More than 200,000 peopleare trapped in the strategic citydescribed by those who man-aged to escape as a "freezinghellscape riddled with deadbodies and destroyed build-ings", Human Rights Watchsaid, quoting figures providedby a local official.

"We know that there willnot be enough space for every-one" on Tuesday, but "we willtry to carry out the evacuationuntil we have gotten all theinhabitants of Mariupol out,"vowed Deputy Prime MinisterIryna Vereshchuk in a videoaddress.

Explosions and bursts ofgunfire shook Kyiv, and blacksmoke rose from a spot in thenorth. Intensified artillery firecould be heard from the north-west, where Russia has sought

to encircle and capture sever-al suburban areas of the capi-tal, a crucial target.

Residents sheltered athome or underground under a35-hour curfew imposed byauthorities in the capital thatruns to Wednesday morning.

Russian forces also pressedtheir siege of Mariupol afterthe southern port city's defend-ers refused demands to sur-render, with fleeing civiliansdescribing relentless bom-bardments and corpses lying inthe streets.

But the Kremlin's groundoffensive in other parts of the

country advanced slowly or notat all, knocked back by lethalhit-and-run attacks by theUkrainians.

Early Tuesday, Ukrainiantroops forced Russian forcesout of the Kyiv suburb ofMakariv after a fierce battle,Ukraine's Defense Ministrysaid. The regained territoryallowed Ukrainian forces toretake control of a key highwayand block Russian troops fromsurrounding Kyiv from thenorthwest.

Still, the Defense Ministrysaid Russian forces battlingtoward Kyiv were able to par-

tially take other northwest sub-urbs, Bucha, Hostomel andIrpin, some of which had beenunder attack almost sinceRussia's military invadedalmost a month ago.

Russian President VladimirPutin's forces are increasinglyconcentrating their air powerand artillery on Ukraine's citiesand the civilians living there.

The invasion has drivenmore than 10 million peoplefrom their homes, a numbersimilar to the population ofPortugal and almost a quarterof Ukraine's pre-war popula-tion, according to the United

Nations. The U.N. Has con-firmed over 900 civilian deathswhile saying the real toll isprobably much higher.Estimates of Russian militarydeaths vary, but even conserv-ative figures are in the lowthousands.

U.S. And British officialssay Kyiv remains Russia's pri-mary objective. The bulk ofMoscow's forces remain milesfrom the center, but missilesand artillery have destroyedapartment buildings and alarge shopping mall, whichwas left a smoking ruin afterbeing hit late Sunday by strikesthat killed eight people, accord-ing to emergency officials.

A senior U.S. Defense offi-cial, speaking on condition ofanonymity to discuss the mil-itary's assessment, said Russiahad increased air sorties overthe past two days, carrying outas many as 300 over a 24-hourperiod, and has fired more than1,100 missiles into Ukrainesince the invasion began.

U.S. President Joe Biden,who is heading to Europe laterin the week to meet with allies,suggested Monday evening thatworse may be still to come.

“Putin's back is against thewall,” Biden said. “He wasn'tanticipating the extent or thestrength of our unity. And themore his back is against thewall, the greater the severity ofthe tactics he may employ."

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The UN refugee agency saysmore than 3.5 million peo-

ple have fled Ukraine sinceRussia's invasion, passinganother milestone in an exodusthat has led to Europe's worstrefugee crisis since World WarII.

UNHCR reported Tuesdaythat 3.53 million people haveleft Ukraine, with Poland tak-ing in the lion's share - morethan 2.1 million - followed byRomania with more than540,000 and Moldova withmore than 367,000.

Shortly after the invasionon Feb. 24, UNHCR predictedthat some 4 million refugeesmight leave Ukraine, though ithas been re-assessing that pre-diction. The outflows havebeen slowing in recent daysafter peaking at more than200,000 each on two straightdays in early March.

The InternationalOrganization for Migrationestimates that nearly 6.5 millionpeople are internally displacedwithin Ukraine, suggesting thatsome if not most of themmight to flee abroad if the warcontinues.

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Germany's parliament onTuesday paid tribute to

Boris Romanchenko, who sur-vived several Nazi concentra-tion camps during World WarII but was killed last weekduring an attack in theUkrainian city of Kharkiv. Hewas 96.

The Buchenwald concen-tration camp memorial said onMonday that Romanchenko,who survived Buchenwald aswell as camps at Peenemuende,Dora and Bergen-Belsen, waskilled on Friday.

It said that, according tohis granddaughter, the multi-story building where he livedwas hit by a projectile.

Romanchenko was dedi-cated to keeping alive the mem-ory of Nazi crimes and was vicepresident of the InternationalBuchenwald-Dora Committee,the memorial said.

Opening a session ofGermany's parliament onTuesday, deputy speaker KatrinGoering-Eckardt paid tributeto Romanchenko.

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Russian journalist DmitryMuratov says he wants to

auction off his 2021 NobelPeace Prize medal to raisefunds for Ukrainian refugees.

Muratov called Tuesday inthe independent NovayaGazeta newspaper, which heedits, for people to “share withrefugees, the wounded andchildren who need urgent treat-ment what is dear to you andhas a value for others”. Muratovis asking auction houses aboutthe possibility of organising asale.

Muratov said last year hewas giving away his share of theNobel prize money to causesincluding independent media,a Moscow hospice, and care forchildren with spinal problems.He said he wouldn't keep anyhimself.

UK-bound Ukraineorphans stuck in Poland await-ing paperwork

Warsaw, Mar 22 (AP)Dozens of Ukrainian orphansand their carers who are head-ed to refuge in the UK were onTuesday stuck in Poland due tomissing paperwork fromUkraine.

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President Joe Biden is urgingU.S. Companies to make

sure their digital doors arelocked tight because of “evolv-ing intelligence” that Russia isconsidering launching cyber-attacks against critical infra-structure targets as the war inUkraine continues.

Biden's top cybersecurityaide, Anne Neuberger,expressed frustration at a WhiteHouse press briefing Mondaythat some critical infrastructureentities have ignored alertsfrom federal agencies to fixknown problems in softwarethat could be exploited byRussian hackers.

“Notwithstanding these

repeated warnings, we contin-ue to see adversaries compro-mising systems that use knownvulnerabilities for which thereare patches,” said Neuberger,who is the president's deputynational security adviser forcyber and emerging technolo-gies. “That makes it far easierfor attackers than it needs to be.”

The federal governmenthas been providing warnings toU.S. Companies of the threatsposed by Russian state hackerssince long before the countryinvaded Ukraine last month.The Cybersecurity andInfrastructure Security Agencyhas launched a “Shields Up”campaign aimed at helpingcompanies strengthen theirdefences and has urged com-

panies to back up their data,turn on multifactor authenti-cation and take other steps toimprove cyber hygiene.

Neuberger said there's nointelligence suggesting a spe-cific Russian cyberattackagainst U.S. Targets, but she didadd that there has beenincrease in “preparatory activ-ity,” like scanning websites andhunting for vulnerabilities, thatis common among nation-statehackers.

In a statement, Biden saidRussia could launch an cyber-attack against U.S. Targets asretaliation for “the unprece-dented economic costs we'veimposed” on Russia throughsanctions.

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Yulia Bondarieva spent 10days in a basement as

Russian planes flew over andbombs were falling on theUkrainian city of Kharkiv.Having reached safety inPoland, Bondarieva's only wishnow is for her twin sister in thebesieged city of Mariupol to getout, too.

“They have been in thebasement since Feb. 24, theyhave not been out at all,”Bondarieva said. “They arerunning out of food and water.”

Bondarieva, 24, managedto speak to her sister on thephone recently. The fear ofwhat will happen to her in theencircled and bombed-out citythat is going through some of

the worst fighting in the warhas been overwhelming.

“She does not know how toleave the city,” Bondarieva saidafter arriving in the Polishborder town of Medyka.

Before the war, Mariupolhad a population of about430,000, and about a quartergot out shortly after Russiainvaded Ukraine on Feb. 24.Leaving the besieged city laterbecame nearly impossible. Tensof thousands escaped over thepast week by way of a human-itarian corridor, including3,000 on Monday, but otherattempts have been thwarted bythe fighting. The MariupolCity Council has asserted thatseveral thousand residents weretaken into Russia against theirwill.

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The family of slain Pulitzer-winningphotojournalist

Danish Siddiqui has lodged acomplaint with theInternationalCriminal Courtto probe his killing and to bringto book thoseresponsible,including high-level commanders and leadersof the Taliban, theirlawyer AviSingh said on Tuesday.

Siddiqui, 38, was onassignment in Afghanistanwhen he was killedon July 16last year. The journalist wascovering clashesbetweenAfghan troops and theTaliban in Spin Boldak districtof Kandahar city.

Addressing a press confer-ence, Singh said the formalcomplaint hasbeen filed againstTaliban commanders, includ-ing MullahHib atu l l a h A k hu n d z a d a ,Supreme Commander of theTaliban; Mullah HassanAkhund,Head of the TalibanLeadership Council; MawlawiMuhammad YaqoobMujahid,Minister of Defence,Taliban; Gul Agha Sherzai,Governor of theK a n d a h a r P r o v i n c e ;Zabbihullah Mujahid, Talibanspokesperson; and MullahAbdulGhani Baradar, Head ofTaliban's Political Office inQatar.

The complaint has also

been filed against local com-manders as wellas perpetrators.

Singh said they will also beseeking help from the Indiangovernmentin the matter.

"We have just filed beforethe International CriminalCourt (ICC)a complaint withregard to the condition of warcrimes and crimesagainsthumanity on and about July 16in the context of Pulitzerprizewinning photojournalistDanish Siddiqui's murder," hesaid.

The lawyer said the com-plaint has been filed on behalfof Siddiqui'sparents — AkhtarSiddiqui and Shahida Akhtar.

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India's new Ambassador toChina Pradeep K Rawat on

Tuesday met the Secretary-General of the ShanghaiCooperation Organisation(SCO) Zhang Ming here anddiscussed various initiativesproposed by India and thecountry's upcoming presiden-cy of the eight-member group-ing.

“Ambassador Pradeep K.Rawat met SCO Secretary-General Zhang Ming today,”the Indian Embassy here tweet-ed.

Both the officials discussedin detail "India's initiatives inthe SCO including “#Startups& #Innovation, #TraditionalMedicine” as well India'supcoming SCO Presidency2022-23," it added.

India has proposed newinitiatives for cooperation in

areas like startups and innova-tion and traditional medicineamong the SCO member states.

India is due to take over thepresidency of the SCO organ-isation from September thisyear. Currently, Uzbekistan isholding the chair of the organ-isation.

Rawat, who was previous-ly India's Ambassador to theNetherlands, took charge of hisposting in China this month.

Chinese diplomat Zhangtook charge as the newSecretary-General of the SCOin January this year. He suc-ceeded Vladimir Norov, formerForeign Minister of Uzbekistan.

The Beijing-headquarteredSCO is an eight-member eco-nomic and security bloc whichhas emerged as one of thelargest transregional interna-tional organisations.

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Russian Opposition leaderAlexei Navalny was con-

victed of fraud and contempt ofcourt and sentenced to nineyears in a maximum securityprison on Tuesday.

A judge also ruled thatNavalny would have to pay afine of 1.2 million rubles (about$11,500).

Navalny is currently serv-ing another prison sentence of2 1/2 years in a prison colony east of Moscow.

His associates have said thenew trial was intended to keepNavalny, President VladimirPutin's longtime foe, behindbars for as long as possible.Navalny has rejected thecharges as bogus.

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Sri Lanka's Parliament onTuesday approved amend-

ments to the country's contro-versial counter-terrorism law,which has drawn widespreadinternational criticism for itsharsh provisions.

The bill to amend thePrevention of Terrorism Act(Temporary Provisions) of1979 was approved with 86votes in favour and 35 againstin the 225-member assembly.The main Opposition SamagiJana Balavegaya (SJB), the mainTamil minority party TNA andthe NPP voted against theamendments.

The Sri Lankan govern-ment by a gazette notificationin late January announcedamendments to PTA, which theofficials described as its bid tomake the law fall in line withinternational standards ofcounter-terror legislation.

The amendments gazettedincluded steps such as the

reduction of the period ofdetention, magistrates visitingthe places of detention to elim-inate torture, lawyers to begiven access to detainees, allowcommunication with relatives,to expedite hearing of cases andthe introduction of a new sec-tion to allow bail for PTAdetainees.

Foreign Minister G L Peiristold parliament that the gov-ernment is of the view that thelaw needs amending in con-sideration of the social trans-formations that have takenplace since when it was origi-nally enacted. The Oppositionargued that the amendmentswere inadequate.

MA Sumanthiran, themain speaker for the TNA

said, “the amendment is apuerile attempt at pulling woolover the eyes of the world. Itmakes absolutely no change onthe ground”.

The TNA has been carry-ing out an island wide signaturecampaign to force the repeal-ing of the PTA.The EuropeanParliament in June 2021 hadcalled for the repeal of the PTAand urged the EU Commissionto consider temporarily with-drawing Sri Lanka's access toGSP+, a favoured trade con-cession for the island's exports.

GSP+ preferences for SriLanka were withdrawn in 2010due to significant shortcomingsin the country's implementa-tion of three UN human rightsconventions.

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Adrive to vaccinate more than nine million children againstpolio has been launched this week in four countries in south-

ern and eastern Africa after an outbreak was confirmed in Malawi.The urgent vaccination drive has started in Malawi where dropsof the inoculation are being placed in the mouths of childrenacross the country. The vaccination campaign will be expand-ed on Thursday to include the neighbouring countries ofMozambique, Tanzania and Zambia, according to UNICEF whichis working with the governments and other partners to eradi-cate the virus.

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Mumbai: Benchmark stock indicesSensex and Nifty made a spiritedrecovery to close over 1 per centhigher on Tuesday, riding on gainsin Reliance Industries, Infosys andTCS amid a recovery in global equi-ties.

After opening lower, the 30-share BSE Sensex had plunged to aday's low of 56,930.30 points onconcerns over inflation and growthas India hiked fuel prices after a 137-day hiatus.

However, the barometerrebounded in afternoon trade in linewith gains in European and Asianstocks. The BSE Sensex closed up by696.81 points or 1.22 per cent at57,989.30 as 26 of its constituentsended in green.

The broader NSE Nifty climbed197.90 points or 1.16 per cent to fin-ish at 17,315.50.

"We witnessed good rebound inmarkets driven by buying inReliance. Market recovery after themorning fall is a good sign forIndian market. In coming days, westill expect volatility to persist till thewar situation between Russia andUkraine and crude price stabilize,"said Rahul Sharma of Equity 99.

Gains in the broader market

were marginal compared to thebenchmark index, with the BSEmidcap index gaining 0.17 per centand smallcap gauge 0.15 per cent.

Tech Mahindra emerged as thelead gainer with a jump of 3.83 percent, followed by RIL (2.59 percent), Bajaj Finserv (2.46 per cent),ITC (2.21 per cent), TCS (2.09 percent), Kotak Mahindra Bank (1.88per cent) and Infosys (1.87 per cent).

In contrast, Hindustan UnileverLimited, Nestle India, NTPC, andSun Pharma were the laggards.

"The domestic market startedwith a negative bias taking cuesfrom rising crude prices and hawk-ish signals from Fed on aggressivepolicy tightening. However, thetrend reversed as European marketsopened on a positive note buoyedby hope that Ukraine may consid-er working towards a truce," saidVinod Nair, Head of Research atGeojit Financial Services.

Among BSE sectoral indices,energy (1.96 per cent), oil and gas(1.94 per cent), IT (1.93 per cent)and Teck (1.76 per cent) were thebiggest gainers.

"Markets posted strong gainsand settled around the day's highamid mixed cues. Initially, the bias

was slightly on the negative side incontinuation to Monday's fall, how-ever a strong surge in the selectindex majors from IT, energy, andbanking space completely changedthe tone in the latter half," AjitMishra, VP - Research, ReligareBroking Ltd said.

Stock exchanges in Europewere trading higher in mid-sessiondeals. Equity exchanges in Shanghai,Seoul, Hong Kong and Tokyo endedwith significant gains.

Meanwhile, rating agency Fitchhas slashed India's growth forecastfor the next fiscal to 8.5 per centfrom 10.3 per cent, citing sharplyhigh energy prices on account of theRussia-Ukraine war.

"The war in Ukraine and eco-nomic sanctions on Russia have putglobal energy supplies at risk.Sanctions seem unlikely to berescinded any time soon," theagency said.

State-run oil marketing firmshiked petrol and diesel prices by 80paise a litre each while domesticcooking gas LPG rates wereincreased by �50 per cylinder, end-ing an over four-and-a-half monthelection-related hiatus in rate revi-sion, fanning inflation fears. PTI

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AParliamentary Standing Committee on Food,Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution has

asked the department to make an objective assess-ment to find out, upto what extent the PradhanMantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY) hashelped beneficiaries and how long it needs to becontinued further. Under the scheme, of the 759lakh metric tons of foodgrain was allocated to Statesand Union Territories, 667.4 lakh metric tons waslifted and 625.56 lakh metric distributed under fivephases to poor and needy people due to econom-ic disruptions caused by the pandemic in the coun-try. The scheme has cost the government to the tuneof �2, 68,348 crore so far. The scheme is likely toend by March 2022. It is not cleared whether theGovernment is planning to extend the scheme fur-ther or not.

The report tabled in Parliament Tuesday notedthat the Department has not carried out or pro-posed a Study or an objective assessment of theScheme - in terms of Capital Outlay andExpenditure and their final outcome on the livesof beneficiaries.

“The Committee, therefore, recommended theDepartment to make an objective assessment to findout, upto what extent the Scheme has helped ben-eficiaries and how long it needs to be continued fur-ther,” the report said.

The Committee applauded the government thatthey had launched scheme like PMGKAY under thePradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Package as part ofthe Economic Response to COVID -19, for addi-

tional allocation of food-grains from the CentralPool @ 5 kg per person per month free of cost forall the beneficiaries covered under Targeted PublicDistribution System (TPDS)/National Food SecurityAct(NFSA) (Antyodaya Anna Yojana (AAY) &Priority Households(PHH)) including those cov-ered under Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) for a totalperiod of 19 months during the year 2020-21 and2021-22.

The Committee noted that during the years2019-20, 2020-21 and 2021- 22, value of TransitLosses is �257.92 Crore, Rs. 426.85 Crore and�295.65 Crore (till December, 2021) respectively.“Though, in terms of value, Transit Losses havecome down to �295.65 Crore during 2021-22 tillDecember, 2021, the amount is still more than theyear 2019-20 i.e. �257.92 Crore,” the report said.The Committee observed that these losses are stilltoo high and needs to be reduced further.

The Committee further noted that total num-ber of regular/surprise checks undertaken by theHeadquarter Vigilance Squad during the last threeyears, 2019-20, 2020-21 and 2021-22 are 76, 31 and58 respectively, which is very less, keeping in viewthe magnanimity of transition work involved. “Anydamage of foodgrains that occurs due to humanerror should be thoroughly investigated andresponsibility for the, losses should be fixed.Regular monthly inspection and constant moni-toring are also required to check the losses. TheCommittee, therefore, recommended that vigorousefforts should be made to minimize the TransitLosses and to increase the number and frequencyof surprise checks,” the report said.

New Delhi: Common Services Centers, under theMinistry of Electronics & IT, has invested in theOpen Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC)to promote e-commerce and logistics in ruralareas. ONDC is an initiative of the Departmentfor Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade(DPIIT) under the Ministry of Commerce andIndustry and is based on open protocol.It willenable buyers and sellers across segments, suchas mobility, grocery, food order and delivery, hotelbooking and travel, to be visible and transact. Theplatform aims to create new opportunities formicro, small and medium enterprises and smalltraders by helping them get on online platforms,said a statement from the CSC.

Apart from investing in the platform, CSC willalso integrate its e-commerce application, CSCGrameen eStore with ONDC to support the rural

e-commerce market. The integration will helpsmall and medium enterprises and local businessesin rural areas to access customers across the coun-try.

Elaborating on the partnership, Dr. DineshTyagi, MD, CSC SPV, said, “It is for the first timethat CSC has invested in an initiative like this.ONDC will democratise digital commerce bymoving to an open network. According to anAccenture report, rural customers are increasinglyaspiring to buy branded products.

With the CSC Grameen eStore being inte-grated with ONDC, companies can look towardsreaching out to the rural market through the net-work of over 3 lakh Grameen eStores across thecountry. The partnership will also generateemployment opportunities for rural youth byenabling a last mile logistics network.” PNS

New Delhi: The number of Indianworkers requiring digital skills for theirjobs is set to rise by 27.3 million, repre-senting seven per cent of India's work-force, over the next year, according to areport.

Amazon Web Services (AWS), anAmazon.Com company, released find-ings from a new research report thatrevealed digital skills training needs havebecome more pronounced amid thepandemic. About 95 per centof workers surveyed in India acknowl-edged that they require more digital skills-- the ability and knowledge to apply dig-ital technologies for tasks in the work-place –- in order to cope with changesin their jobs due to the COVID-19 pan-demic. "...Over the next year, thenumber of India workers requiring dig-

ital skills for their jobs is projected toincrease by 27.3 million, representing 7per cent of India's workforce," accordingto the report.

That said, only 45 per cent ofemployers in India have a training planin place, which could affect their com-petitiveness in areas such as productiv-ity, innovation and employee reten-tion.The 'Building Digital Skills for theChanging Workforce' report, prepared bystrategy and economic consulting firmAlphaBeta and commissioned by AWS,surveyed 1,012 digitally skilled workersin technology and non-technology roles,and 303 employers in India, with repre-sentation from public, private, and non-profit sectors of different industries. The ability to use cloud-based tools, suchas cloud developer tools, as well as online

collaboration, accounting, and customerrelationship management (CRM) soft-ware will be the most in-demand skillrequired by employers by 2025, followedby technical support and cybersecurityskills. The findings also highlight theneed for more advanced cloud comput-ing skills, including machine learningand cloud architecture design. These skills are expected to be in highdemand in businesses from healthcareto agriculture, fintech to media andentertainment, the report said." O v e rthe course of the pandemic, we have seenorganisations of all sizes accelerate theirdigital transformation plans, driving anincreased need for employers and theirworkers to advance skills training forcloud computing, cybersecurity, andmachine learning,” noted Rahul Sharma,

President, Public Sector – AmazonInternet Services Private Limited(AISPL), AWS India and South Asia.AWS is investing heavily as part of itsglobal endeavour to provide free cloudcomputing skills training to 29 millionpeople. AWS offers over 500 free digitaltraining courses. To prepare the nextgeneration of professionals for earlycloud careers, and to build a diversepipeline of entry-level talent into theworkforce, AWS partners with highereducation institutions, non-profits, work-force development organisations, gov-ernments, and employers on a range ofdigital upskilling programmes. In India,this includes programmes like AWSre/Start, which is a free, full-time, 12-week course that prepares individuals forcareers in cloud computing. PTI

New Delhi: Tata group hospitality firmIndian Hotels Co Ltd (IHCL) on Tuesdaysaid it will completely eliminate single-useplastic across all its hotels by 2030, besidescommitting to skill 1 lakh youths in the nextfive years as part of its sustainability andsocial impact measures under a newlylaunched initiative, Paathya.

The company has outlined a host ofshort and long-term goals for 2030 with acommitment to sustainability, social impactand growth.

These include ensuring 100 per centreuse of wastewater, 50 per cent of energyto come from renewables and 100 per centof the company's hotels certified to a glob-al sustainability standard.

"By 2030, all (our) hotels will be sin-gle-use plastic-free, have onsite organicwaste management systems, and all of thewastewater will be recycled or reused. Also,100 per cent of all of our hotels will beEarthCheck certified," IHCL

Managing Director & CEO PuneetChhatwal said while launching the Paathyainitiative.

Amongst other initiatives that willmake a large impact, he further said, "50 percent of our energy will come from renew-ables and over 50 per cent of raw materi-als will be sourced locally and there will be 100 per cent adoption ofsupplier code of conduct by tier-one sup-pliers." PTI

New Delhi: IT company Infosys will acquireOddity -- a Germany-based digital marketing,experience, and commerce agency -- in an allcash deal for 50 million euros (about �419crore), the company said on Tuesday.

As part of Infosys' digital experience anddesign offering, oddity will become part ofWongdoody and join its network of studiosacross Seattle, Los Angeles, New York,Providence, Houston, and London, and designhubs in five cities in India, Infosys said in astatement.

The company had acquired US-basedWongdoody, which offers creative and mar-keting services, in a USD 75 million deal in2018. "To consummate the transaction,Infosys will also acquire Germany-basedKristall 247 for 3,000 euros (about �2.5lakh)," the Indian IT firm said.

Infosys said the cost of acquisition foroddity is "up to 50 million euros, includingearn-out, management incentives and bonus-es." With more than 300 digital experts,oddity is one of the largest independent dig-ital agencies, the statement said.

"With oddity's digital commerce and mar-keting knowledge as well as its metaverse-readyset-up, it is the perfect complement to Infosys'prowess in technological transformation,"Infosys President Ravi Kumar S said.Oddity has a comprehensive service portfo-lio comprising digital-first brand managementand communication, in-house production,including virtual and augmented reality, expe-rience design and e-commerce services acrossEurope and China, the statement said.

Acquisition of oddity is expected to closeduring the first quarter of FY23. PTI

Mumbai: In spite of a massivejump in the number of the uberrich and rich becoming richer,their contributions to charity con-tinued to decline during the Covid-19 pandemic when a whopping200 million-plus were forced intopoverty, says a report.

While CSR (corporate socialresponsibility) spends haveincreased from 12 per cent in FY15(two years into mandatory CSRspends) to 23 per cent in FY21,charity by the uber rich slippedfrom 18 per cent of the total fund-ing in FY15 to a paltry 11 per centin FY21, says global consultancyBain & Company and charity-focused domestic consultancyDasra in their India PhilanthropyReport 2022.

The report said that donationfrom private foreign companies hascontracted from around 26 percent in overall private giving inFY15 to around 15 per cent inFY21.

Donation by private domesticcompanies has grown at a moder-ate rate of 8-10 per cent annuallyduring this period, primarily aidedby CSR contributions.

The steep decline has left asocial funding gap of �8 lakhcrore in FY21, which will furtherwiden to � 10 lakh crore by FY26,as the rich continue to keep theirpurse strings tight, warns thereport.

According to the findings,pandemic years have seen therich/family offices driven charitiesfalling while CSR spends helping

overall funding towards the socialsector investments, thus meetingthe UN's sustainable developmen-tal goals (SDG).

Funding towards social sectorincreased by 12 per cent annuallybetween FY15 and FY21 to 8.3 percent of GDP. FY21 saw the fund-ing jumping by 20 per cent to 8.3per cent of GDP, but this is partlydue to the increased governmentdole-outs amid the pandemic, andmore because of the record 6.6 percent contraction in the GDP.

The report categorises char-ities across three funder segments-- CSR, retail giving, and familyphilanthropies. Total social sectorfunding in the country has seen a12 per cent annual growth over thepast five years ending FY21 whenthe fund inflows saw a sharp 20 percent jump as a result of theincreased government expendi-ture.

However, gaps remain, says thereport, adding, with the total flowof funds at an average 7 per centof GDP in recent years (8.3 per centin 2021), "we are still short of NitiAayog's estimate of annual fund-ing needed to achieve the SDGcommitments by 2030".

As a result, the deficit is of awhopping �8 lakh crore in FY21,which will jump to � 10 lakh crorein FY26, if the same trajectory con-tinues, warns the report which alsonotes that the two waves of theCOVID-19 pandemic and theunplanned lockdowns have pushedmore than 200 million into pover-ty. PTI

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New Delhi: Golddeclined margin-ally by �22 to �51,415 per 10grams here onTuesday in linewith weak global cues, accord-ing to HDFC Securities.

In the previous trade, theprecious metal settled at�51,437 per 10 grams.

Silver, in contrast, gained�162 to �68,137 per kg from�67,975 per kg in the previoustrade.

In the international mar-

ket, gold was trad-ing lower at USD1,928 per ounceand silver was flatat USD 25.18 perounce.

"Gold prices traded mar-ginally down with spot pricesat COMEX trading at USD1,928 per ounce on Tuesday.Gold prices traded weak onstronger dollar and rise in theUS bond yields," HDFCSecurities Senior AnalystCommodities Tapan Patel said. PTI

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New Delhi: Organic food companySresta Natural, engineering solutionsprovider Maini Precision Products andTPG Capital-backed Campus Activewearhave received markets regulator Sebi's goahead to raise funds through initial sharesale offers.

These companies, which filed theirpreliminary papers with Sebi betweenDecember 2021 and January 2022,obtained observation letters from Sebiduring March 15-17, an update with the

regulator showed on Tuesday.In Sebi's parlance, its observation

implies go-ahead to launch an InitialPublic Offering (IPO).

As per the draft papers, organic foodcompany Sresta Natural is looking to raise �500 crore through itsIPO.

The IPO will be a primary issuanceof equity shares of �50 crore and an offer-for-sale (OFS) of up to 70.30 lakh equityshares by the shareholders. PTI

New Delhi: Rating agency Fitch onTuesday slashed India's growth forecast forthe next fiscal to 8.5 per cent from 10.3 percent, citing soaring energy prices and ris-ing inflation on account of the Russia-Ukraine war.

It has revised upwards the GDP growthforecast for the current fiscal by 0.6 per-centage points to 8.7 per cent. "However,we have lowered our growth forecast for FY2022-2023 to 8.5 per cent (-1.8 pp) onsharply higher energy prices," Fitch said.For 2023-24, it is estimated at 7 per cent.

In its Global economic Outlook-March 2022, Fitch said the post-COVID-19 pandemic recovery is being hit by apotentially huge global supply shock thatwill reduce growth and push up inflation.

"The war in Ukraine and economicsanctions on Russia have put global ener-gy supplies at risk. Sanctions seem unlike-ly to be rescinded any time soon," the agencysaid. Last week, another global ratingagency Moody's had slashed India's growthestimate for the 2022 calendar year to 9.1per cent from 9.5 per cent earlier, sayinghigh fuel and fertiliser import bill could limitcapital expenditure. Russia supplies

around 10 per cent of the world's energy,including 17 per cent of its natural gas and12 per cent of oil.

"The jump in oil and gas prices will addto industry costs and reduce consumers' realincomes...Higher energy prices are a given,"Fitch said as it has reduced the world GDPgrowth forecast by 0.7 percentage points to3.5 per cent. International oil pricesstarted rising this year and jumped to a 13-year high of USD 140 per barrel earlier thismonth as an aftermath of the Russia-Ukraine war. Brent was trading at USD118.59 per barrel on Tuesday. India relieson overseas purchases to meet about 85 percent of its oil requirement, making it oneof the most vulnerable in Asia to higher oilprices. Observing that Indian GDPgrowth was very strong in the Decemberquarter, Fitch said the GDP is more than 6per cent above its pre-pandemic levelthough it is still well below its implied pre-pandemic trend.

"High-frequency data indicate that theIndian economy has ridden out theOmicron wave with little damage – in starkcontrast with the two previous coronaviruswaves in 2020 and 2021," it said. PTI

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In her budget speech, IndianFinance Minister, NirmlaSitaraman spoke about the

drone shakti scheme, encour-aging drones as a service in ourcountry. Undoubtedly, droneshave evolved from defense-only equipment to multi-pur-pose equipment, which can beused for several sectors likegovernance, farming, logistics,to name a few. The financeminister proposed extensiveuse of drones in agriculture,including spraying insecticidesand nutrients. The proposeddrones-as-a-service (DRaaS)model has capabilities torevamp and boost India's frag-mented drone industry for newbusiness and employmentavenues. Under the drone shak-ti scheme, startups will beencouraged to facilitate droneshakti with its application inmultiple sectors. In select ITIs,the required courses for skillingwill be started in all states, asper the finance minister.Including drones in the ITIssyllabus will enable a robustfoundation for a drone-basedecosystem.

Though drones have exist-ed for the last two decades, thelast few years have been verysignificant in the evolution ofUnmanned Aerial Vehicles.Whether we call it Flying MiniRobots or Miniature PilotlessAircraft, major drone activitiescan be identified as flight pilot-ing & operation, data analysis,and data processing. Drones arebuilt using IOT technology,which includes a controllerfrom which launch, navigation,and landing activities are con-trolled either with the help ofremote controls, mobile apps,or automated. The controllerscommunicate with the serviceof radioactive waves such as wi-fi. Like any other active device,drones also need a powersource like a battery or fuel.drones are also equipped withpropellers, rotors, and a frame.drones are made up of com-posite and lightweight materi-als so that their weight is con-siderably low with better trans-portability.

Drones are not only help-ing the military, but they arealso helping businesses withcomplex activities normallyundoable by humans in a time-ly and effective way. The adop-tion of drones by businesses isquick as companies across theglobe have identified the infini-tive potential of drones. Itboosts speed, productivity, andefficiency and improves accu-racy. Drones are majorly usedfor Express shipping and deliv-

ery, Unmanned cargo trans-port, Aerial photography forjournalism and film, gatheringinformation for effective dis-aster management, Thermalsensor drones for search andrescue operations, Geographicmapping of inaccessible terrainand locations, building safetyinspections, Crops monitor-ing and assessments, Bordercontrol surveillance and Lawenforcement, Weather forecastfor storm tracking, hurricanes,and tornadoes. Drones canreach remote areas with little orno human interference andwithin the least required effort,time, and energy.Consequently, drones are get-ting adopted worldwide, specif-ically by Military, Commercial,Personal, and FutureTechnology.

Recently, the Ministry ofCivil Aviation approved a pro-ject of the Telangana stateGovernment to use drone tech-nology to deliver vaccines inremote areas. A lot depends

upon drone technology for thegrowth of the Agriculture sec-tor. Drones will spray pesticidesand micronutrients evenly infarms and be used extensivelyto monitor crops and identifythe challenges faced by farmers.The SVAMITVA schemelaunched by the governmenthas helped millions of villageresidents with property cards.Drones can be effectively usedfor emergency services likefire protection, healthcare, andflood relief where human inter-vention risks life. Policedepartments of several statesuse drones for law enforcementactivities like - search and res-cue, crime scene analysis, sur-veillance, crowd monitoring,etc. Recently Bihar police havestarted using drones to traceliquor manufacturers and dis-tributors located in remote anddensely populated areas toenforce the liquor ban.

An Irish company namedManna began its drone deliveryservices last year. According to

them, drone delivery is 90 percent cheaper than car-baseddelivery. The drone industrylooks promising as the droneservice market is expected togrow threefold to US$ 40.7 bil-lion in 2026 from the recentmarket worth of 13.9 billion in2021. To boost the growth of thedrone sector, the governmenthas banned the import ofdrones and their raw materials.Lockdown imposed duringCOVID 19 grew the growth ofdrone technology as companies,and government organizationsstarted using it exponentially.Major companies like AmazonPrime Air, Zomato, FedEx,Boeing, DHL InternationalGmBH, drone Delivery CanadaCorp, Airbus have already start-ed their drone delivery services.The drone sector has become alucrative career option foryouths with rapid growthopportunities. It has the poten-tial to grow and penetrate sev-eral other industries with ampleemployment opportunities.

The growing use of dronesin multiple sectors has severalassociated risks like droneattacks, delivery of weapons,increased terrorism, to name afew. drones are comparativelycheaper than conventionalweapons but still can bedestructive with a far betterreach. Apparently, the numberof drone strikes is increasing,we also encountered a droneattack in our country at Jammuairport last year. Consequently,DRDO has developed an anti-drone system, and another is indevelopment. The Anti-dronesystem has soft kill and hard killoptions available. Soft killoption jams the drone, hard-killoption shoots down the dronewith the help of laser technol-ogy, other drone or missile.Government should makestrict laws and regulations toprevent the destructive use ofdrones. Further defense dronesshould not be procured fornondefense purposes underany circumstances.

Alternate asset industry providesalternatives to traditional ways ofinvesting in the capital markets. PE

Front Office solution is intuitive, easy-to-use, and has a flexible framework that eas-ily allows customising as per the customer’sspecific functionality, at any given time. PEFront Office is cost-effective, fast &responsive, promises the shortest imple-mentation cycle in the industry using agilemethodology and integrates easily with anythird-party data information source sys-tem, making it the ideal solution.

These solutions drive efficiency andtransparency and help investmentprofessionals make highly informeddecisions. Currently, PE Front Office isservicing 100+ customers across 15countries including USA, Canada, UK,Switzerland, Italy, The Netherlands,Belgium, Malta, South Africa, Nigeria,Kenya, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong,and India. PE Front Office was foundedby Anup Kumar Adlakha and AnkurAgarwal. Anup is a technologyentrepreneur having more than 28 yearsof experience with providing solutionsand consulting in IT services, themajority of which are with theAlternative Investment Managementindustry. “Over the last few years, PEFront Office expanded its presencecovering different market segments andgeographies delivering a solution for the

Alternate Asset industry. The solution iscomfortably established in the marketswhich include India, Africa, Europe, UK,and Southeast Asia (Singapore and HongKong). In the next few years, we lookforward to further accelerating ourgrowth trajectory and establishing astrong presence in the United States andbeing on the path to being a marketleader,” says Anup Kumar Adlakha.

Ankur Agarwal, Co-Founder &CTO, has more than 20 years ofexperience with defining, designing, andimplementing large and complexbusiness IT systems across variousindustry domains, including PrivateEquity, Insurance, Travel, Media, andTelecom. "Our approach is tocommunicate in customer’s specificterminology, understand the businessprocess, map it to the availablefunctionality and customize the solutionif needed. PE Front Office can alsointegrate easily with any third-party datainformation source system, making it theideal solution" says Adlakha.

Having several years of experience inthe domain the founders deeplyunderstood the need for a simple andcomplete Industry-specific technologysolution, and hence created a simple,seamless, technology solution to takecare of the Alternate Asset Industryrequirements.

With rapid transformations inthe EdTech space, post-sec-

ondary education has drasticallychanged. Online education hasbecome the new normal. There hasbeen a rise in new credentials thatengage millions of students, acad-emicians and learners across theglobe. There is a wide range ofalternative credentials. Theseincluded micro-credentials, digitalbadges and industry-recognisedcertificates that grabbed the atten-tion of learners, owing to the hugebenefits they offer in terms ofupskilling and reskilling. Anotherreason for the huge demand forthese alternative credentials is itsaffordability. It offers the ease oflearning from remote locationswith the comfort of learning at one’sown pace.

Over the past year, there hasbeen a rise in alternative credentialsas it bridges the gap between theprogrammes that higher educationinstitutions offer and the skills thatthe firms require. COVID19 haschanged the perception of educa-tion and skills. This has furtheraccelerated the market for 36 bil-lion fully online bachelor’s degreesin 2019. To what extent the onlinedegrees or alternative credentialssupported, converted or replacedthe traditional market is yet to bedetermined. But the data suggeststhat the global alternative andmicro-credential market still onlyaccounted for $10B in 2019.However, by 2021, this number

grew dramatically. Due to the pan-demic, people focussed onupskilling and acquiring knowl-edge ahead of traditional learning.

Reasons for the rise of alter-native credentials

Offers Flexibility andAdditional Knowledge: Highereducation has traditionally beendominated by long-term learningmodels. This consists of carefullycurated, ordered and selected cur-riculums, combined with bodies ofknowledge suitable for future rolesand professions. The range of stan-dard qualifications is calculated bycalculating the learning time whichis then divided into smaller mod-ules with generally agreed stan-dards for the overall learning levelof each qualification. These smallmodules (subjects, units, courses,classes) were traditionally notrecognised independently beyond

credits. Hence, alternative creden-tials which offer a wider learningscope and flexibility gainedmomentum as businesses are keenon acquiring resources that haveacquired skills beyond course stud-ies.

Higher credibility amongstrecruiters: The extent to which tra-ditional post-secondary educationmodels support the rapidly chang-ing industry requirements is con-troversial. In an environment whererising costs of degrees and formaleducation exceed government andindividual solvency, numeroustools and alternatives have beendeveloped over the last 5-10 years.However, the confusion and com-plexity of recruiters, options, andmodels remain. Today, alternativecredentials are an effective way ofresolving all these issues and gain-ing the trust of the recruiters.

Growth in the past yearAs per Class Central, a

MOOCs search engine, there wereapproximately 900 HEIs offeringMOOCs in 2019 across the world.Higher education institutions likeMassachusetts Institute ofTechnology, University ofMichigan, Stanford University,Indian Institute of TechnologyKharagpur and University ofNaples Federico II, among others,offer more than 150 courses. Today,several other private organisationsoffer highly advanced alternativecredentials to help learners gethighly accredited certifications,accepted by organisations global-ly.

Large companies, especiallytechnology companies, also offerspecifically curated training pro-grammes. Amazon, Cisco, Google,IBM, Microsoft and other techcompanies are proactively offeringalternative credentials programmesfocused on information technolo-gy, especially emerging technolo-gies fields such as artificial intelli-gence and cyber security.

Today, other private organisa-tions have also ventured into pro-viding advanced training to theiremployees. The future of alterna-tive credentials lies in furtherresearch and development in curat-ing as well as implementing newprograms to help learners fromevery field. While there has beenmassive growth in the field over theyears, this is just the beginning!

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At an awards function in NewDelhi, SpeakIn recognised

and honoured India’s MostDistinguished IAS Officers foradministrative distinction and forexcellence in speech and thoughtleadership.

SpeakIn is Asia's first andlargest consortium of ThoughtLeaders, Industry Influencers,Speakers, and Subject MatterExperts.

At what is being described asIndia’s first and finest celebrations

of the contribution of civil ser-vices fraternity to governanceand public administration, theIAS officers were honoured foraddressing some of the biggestand most ardous challenges fac-ing the country and helpingresolve them.

Among the ten IAS awardeeswas Amitabh Kant, a 1980 batchIAS officer, who won the LifetimeAchievement Award. Mr. Kant iscurrently the CEO of Niti Aayog.

He has been a key driver ofthe "Make in India” and "StartupIndia” initiatives. He also drove

the “Ease of Doing Business” ini-tiative. Accepting his award,Amitabh Kant said, “There is nojob content anywhere in theworld like the IndianAdministrative Service that givesyou an opportunity to transformlives.

You can be a great disruptorand bring in radical changesthat actually impact the lives ofthe people of this country.

I thank SpeakIn for recog-nizing this diligence and to havehonoured the leaders in ser-vices."

Others recognised for theirstellar contribution included AnilSrivastava, who was awarded forHeavy Industries, Transport andMobility and Armstrong Pame,recognised for his contribution toPublic Policy and Governance.The event was attended by topcivil services, corporate andindustry thought leaders.

The evening also witnessed apanel discussion on The Businessof Public Service—a discussionbetween leaders of business andthe Indian AdministrativeService.

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The University ofS t r a t h c l y d e ,

Glasgow is inviting applica-tions for its MSc FinancialTechnology course startingin September 2022. This MScin Financial Technology(FinTech) teaches the big datatechniques, computer pro-gramming, and analytics thatbanks and insurance compa-nies are looking for. Graduatesin this field will have a goodunderstanding of the changingnature of finance and howaccounting, business infor-mation systems, and analyticmethods are adapting to theinternet as a delivery channel.The course is 12 months' full-time study in person at theGlasgow city centre campus ,with two semesters of classesfollowed by two projects overthe summer.

Eligibility- Minimumsecond-class Honours degree,or overseas equivalent in:accounting,eeconomics, busi-ness studies, a subject areawith a strong quantitativecomponent, no prior knowl-edge of finance is required. Aminimum of 6.5 IELTS score,with no individual score lowerthan 5.5.

Fee - £26,050 for interna-tional students for 2022/23

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The Indian Institute ofArt and Design

(IIAD) in collaboration withKingston School of Art,London offers undergraduateprogrammes in FashionDesign, Fashion BusinessM a n a g e m e n t ,Communication Design andInterior Architecture &Design. It also offers post-graduate programmes inFashion Design and FashionBusiness Management. TheInstitute offers these pro-grammes through its creativestudio-based education andstrives to groom the next gen-eration of designers anddesign thinkers at its state-of-the-art campus in New Delhi.

To know more about theadmission process and schol-arships, visit our website.

Website: www.iiad.edu.in Admissions Process:

IIAD Entrance TestLast date to apply: 2nd

April, 2022Exam Date: April 9 and

10, 2022 (Online), April 9,2022 (Offline)

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The Edu BrainAcademy collaborated

with the world's most presti-gious National andInternational universitiesoffering bachelor programmesin Fashion Design, FashionBusiness Management,Communication Design andInterior Architecture &Design. It also offers post-graduate programmes inFashion Design and Fashiontechnology.

The Edu Brain Academyrecently announced openingof admissions at the Edu BrainAcademy School of Design forUG, PG and diploma-levelcourses.

Applications: Eligible stu-dents can apply online andoffline. Due to the COVID-19,there is no entrance exam.Admissions will be based onClass 10 and 12 marks andmerit.

Eligibility: For the degreecourse, students should havecompleted Class 12 from anystream from a recognisedboard. For the diploma course,students should have passedClass 10 in any stream froman approved school board.

Admissions Process:Personal Interview

Last date to Apply: April15, 2022

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Twenty papers publishedby the learners and

instructors of GreatLearning as a part of theirCapstone projects have beenfeatured by the WorldHealth Organization(WHO) in their global lit-erature on the Coronavirusdisease. Great Learning is aleading global edtech com-pany for professional learn-ing and higher education.

The papers were writtenduring the first and the sec-ond peak of COVID-19,and cover a host of topicsincluding forecastingCOVID 19 in India usingseveral machine learningmodels, detecting the sever-ity of COVID-19 throughchest X-rays, predicting thehospital beds utilisation forCOVID-19 in Telangana,forecasting vaccination drivein India for herd immunityand effectiveness of lock-

downs in Karnataka duringthe second wave.

With this development,Great Learning becomes thefirst and only Indian edtechcompany whose learners’capstone projects have beenlisted by WHO under glob-al literature.

By putting together the‘Global research onCoronavirus disease’, WHOis bringing the world’s sci-entists and global healthprofessionals together to

accelerate the research anddevelopment process anddevelop new techniques tocontain the spread of thecoronavirus pandemic.

As a part of this, WHOindexes the latest and mostcredible international mul-tilingual scientific findingsand knowledge on COVID19.

This database representsa comprehensive multilin-gual source of current liter-ature on the topic.

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TAKE HELP TO PL AN/USEMENTORS

Logistics is a cost that everybodywants to decrease, so efficiency is thekey. Logistics companies and serviceavailers would also want the whole sys-tem to be responsive. When respon-siveness grows, down goes the effi-ciency, cost of logistics is increased. Sotreat this part with utmost importance.If you are a low cost logistics model andgive better costing and save yourclient some money, but lower on ser-vice levels, it will be an efficientmodel. If you plan to be a high endmodel with more cost, you automati-cally become more responsive, betterservice levels and you can charge yourclients premium for premium ser-vices. This can be understood by dif-ferent courier services. Few charge avery high price, and many others willcharge you a low price for the samepacketMETICULOUSLY PLAN YOURFINANCES

Have you heard about money guz-zling businesses? This is one of them.With all practical aspects you want tosee in this business, every step willrequire funds. Because you are a com-pany which has very less to do withcomputers and technology and high onmovement and/or storage of goods.You will need funds. My advice, at leastkeep 3-6 months money for turn-around of the invested funds. Paymentsfrom clients sometimes get delayed.NETWORK SHAMELESSLY

Trust me you have heard me cor-rectly. Getting into business and get-ting a business are different things. Youwill need to connect to as many peo-ple as possible. Senior, juniors, con-temporaries, everybody. Ask for help,hard-shell your start-up. Try to reachpeople who have higher positions inorganisations, but treat them withrespect and be humble. Do not actsmart, you will get nothing.WORK FOR YOUR EMPLOYEES

Personally, this is the most impor-tant thing, I love being an entrepreneur.If your team works for you, you workfor them. While launching a start-upin this domain, you will need trustedpeople. Look for like minded people,take intelligent co-founders and on-board guys who can be in your thick

and thin. If you are surrounded bygood people, you get good business,you do good business, and you makegood margins. Trust me on that.BE ASSET LIGHT

Again, this can make you or breakyou. Do not purchase assets, if you canrent them. Do not invest in purchas-ing anything until and unless yourclient pays for it and the cost is amor-tised for the period of the agree-ments. Hire trucks, when required, hirewarehouses when required. Hire com-puters as per your need.ROLE OF INFORMATIONTECHNOLOGY

Pandemic created a situation,where technology has become theintegral part no matter what domainwe are working on. Similarly in thesupply chain field IT plays a crucial rolein tracking and monitoring. Thesetools are Warehouse ManagementSystem, GPS Enabled Vehicles ,Transport Management System ,Inventory Management System andmany more.

Before equipping the technologyone should understand the technolo-gy itself. There are start-ups who haveinvested a lot in technology but allmoney has gone in vain because it wasnot up to the mark of their require-ment.

To sustain in the market we haveto keep on upgrading our technologyhowever, we must also adapt andchoose wisely.

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China Hong KongEntrance Scholarships atUniversity of Waterloo,

CanadaThe scholarship programme

aims to recognise and rewardoutstanding students from Chinaor Hong Kong who want toundertake a full-time under-graduate degree programme atthe university.

Award: $2,000Course Level: UGEligibility: Applicants must

have strong academic perfor-mance, students must be fromChina or Hong Kong

Supporting documents: Allthe applicants might be requiredto submit academic transcriptsof all the previous schoolsattended and a copy of theirpassport.

Admission requirements:Applicants must have a high-school degree certificate withoutstanding academic achieve-ment for taking admission.

Language requirement: Allinternational students must ver-ify their English language profi-ciency by meeting their Englishlanguage requirements.

How to apply: Applicantsmust take admission in theundergraduate degree pro-gramme at the university.Complete the scholarship appli-cation form.

Application deadline: April15, 2022

University of Surrey PhDI n t e r n a t i o n a lStudentships in

Biodegradable Polymers, UKThe main purpose of this

programme is to provide finan-cial support for those eligible stu-dents who are going to take partin a PhD degree in theDepartment of Chemistry.

Award: Tuition FeesCourse Level: PhDEligibility: To be eligible, the

applicants must hold a first-classor upper second class BSc orMaster’s level degree (or inter-national equivalent) in chem-istry, biochemistry, or a closelyrelated subject.

Supporting documents:Applicants should include a copyof their CV with marks of com-pleted academic degrees. EmailDr Peter Roth ([email protected]) first to discuss theirapplication.

Admission requirements:Applying at the University,claimants need to meet the min-imum entry requirements.

Language requirements:For non-native English speakers:An average score of 6.5 with eachindividual category at least 6.0 inan Academic IELTS test notolder than two years.

How to apply: For takingadvantage of this bursary, aspi-rants are recommended to takeadmission in the PhD degree atthe university. After taking con-firmation, seekers can completethe online application form forthis grant.

Application deadline: May20, 2022

As the world is transforming,digital resources are evolvingwith time. This revolution is

significant in the rural communi-ties and marginalised sectors as thepopulation is increasing enor-mously as well as their preferencesare undergoing a major shift.Despite this, the resources areunevenly distributed. Due to thisfactor, there is a substantial differ-ence between the lifestyles of indi-viduals who reside in developed orthe urban areas as compared tothose in rural areas and remotelocations. There is also a huge dis-parity in the educational experi-ences. However, with the digital rev-olution picking up pace, rural areasare bracing up for quality education.

Growing prominence of dig-ital resources in rural areas

The education industry is aconstantly evolving market. Eversince the pandemic outbreak, dig-ital adoption witnessed a surge inthis segment. As a result, digitalresources are used all the more toconsume educational content. Thisconcept encompasses learningresources such as apps, software,programs, or websites that ensurestudents are engaged while learn-

ing and help them achieve theirlearning goals.

The fact of the matter is thatrural dwellers do not have access toeducational experiences by theadvanced institutions as well aschannels. While innovation isemerging at the forefront in this dig-ital-driven era, technology is trans-forming the teaching processes aswell as the face of classrooms inrural areas and amongst margin-alised populations.

In terms of digital resources, vil-lages are not only catching up withmore urbanised areas but are alsoembarking on a journey of trans-

formation. They are now becomingall the more dynamic and are gain-ing prominence as powerful toolsto enhance the learning experiences.

Digital resources upscalingrural education

In recent years, Indian childrenand youth have become increas-ingly technology-driven. They arewilling to learn and imbibe learn-ing through social media and onlinechannels. Online portals and smartplatforms would be of tremendousbenefit to school dropouts andadults who have opted out of for-mal education to support theirfamilies. Since education hasbecome an anytime anywhere con-cept due to rising internet pene-tration and easy availability ofsmartphones; the digital content iseasily visible on devices and can beaccessed as per their convenience.The digital resources can be down-loaded and used at a later stage bythe learners as per their require-ment.

Although people are usingaffordable devices like smart-phones that are changing the livesof millions of people; they are alsoupscaling the landscape of ruraleducation in India. Additionally,

the Government of India is offer-ing help to the underprivilegedareas by embracing them with ‘old’technologies (like radio and tele-vision) as well as new-age tech-nologies such as smartphones,apps, and internet services alongwith digital content.

These can be powerful mediaof knowledge, cultural exchange,and a broader worldview in far-flung areas where the quality ofeducation needs enhancement,there is a lack of resources especiallyfinancial and skilled teachers.

As we are bracing towardsgrowth and development, digitiza-tion is picking up pace across sec-tors. As a result, digital transfor-mation in the rural and remoteareas is upscaling the educationalexperiences. The easily available andaccessible educational content ondigital resources including socialmedia platforms such as YouTube,Instagram, etc. help reach even theremotest of locations. They seam-lessly bridge the teaching-learninggap and ensure the provision of dig-ital content in regional languages aswell thereby enabling engaged,interactive and high-end learningexperiences.

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Yastika Bhatia’s grittyhalf-century and SnehRana’s all-round per-formance powered

India to a dominating 110-runwin over Bangladesh and keptthem in the hunt for a semifi-nal spot at the ICC Women’sWorld Cup here on Tuesday.

Opting to bat, India recov-ered from a mid-innings col-lapse to post a modest 229 forseven, riding a responsible 80-ball 50 by Bhatia and a lateflourish from Rana (27) andPooja Vastrakar (30).

Defending the total, thespinners, led by Rana (4/30),controlled the proceedings asthey struck at regular intervals.

As a result, India bowledout Bangladesh for 119 in 40.3overs to register their third winof the tournament. The big vic-tory helped India improve theirnet run-rate (0.768) further.

The Mithali Raj-led sidewill take on South Africa in itsfinal league match on Sunday.

Before that game however, if thesecond-placed Proteas beatWest Indies on Thursday, India’ssemifinal chances will get bet-ter.

India’s decision to bring in

senior spinner Poonam Yadav(1/25) in place of pacer MeghnaSingh paid dividends. With thespinners operating from bothends on a slow track,Bangladesh struggled to force

the pace and were reeling at 69/5after 25 overs.

Lata Mondal (24) andSalma Khatun (32) providedsome resistance with a 40-runpartnership, which was broken

by Jhulan Goswami when shedismissed the latter, whileVastrakar accounted for Mondala few overs later.

The pace duo of Goswami(2/19) and Vastrakar (2/26)shared four wickets betweenthem while the spinnersaccounted for the rest.

Earlier, Smriti Mandhana(30) and Shafali Verma (42)shared 74 runs for the openingwicket but Ritu Moni (3/37) andNahida Akter (2/42) sharedfive wickets between them toreduce India from 74 for no lossto 108 for 4.

Mandhana ended up hittingstraight to Fargana Hoque offAkter, while Moni struck twicein two balls in the next over toleave India at 74 for 3 in 15.4overs.

While Verma was stumpedby Nigar Sultana, skipperMithali Raj (0) was out for afirst-ball duck as India lostthree wickets in quick succes-sion. Vice-captain HarmanpreetKaur (14) then joined Bhatia asthe two tried to resurrect the

innings, but the duo scored only34 runs in 70 balls before adirect throw from Hoquecaught the former short of hercrease.

Bhatia (50 off 80) and RichaGhosh (26) then added 54 runsto take India past the 150-runmark.

The duo played at a goodpace with Ghosh slammingLata Mondal (0/20) for succes-sive fours in the 30th over.

However, Akter broughtBangladesh back into the gamewhen she had Ghosh caughtbehind while she tried to cut aball that was too close to herbody.

After completing her fifty,Bhatia too perished in the nextball while trying for a paddlescoop.

Vastrakar (30) and Rana(27) came together at 180 for 6at the end of 44th over andadded 48 runs in 38 balls, tak-ing India past the 200-runmark. With the two goingstrong, the last 10 overs yield-ed 64 runs.

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Australia captain MegLanning smashed an

unbeaten 135 to steer theWomen’s World Cupfavourites to a five-wicketwin over South Africa inWellington on Tuesday.

The match broughttogether the only two unde-feated teams at this year’stournament, with Australiaalready through to the semi-finals.

South Africa had moreto play for as a win wouldhave sealed a spot in thetop four, and they set asolid target of 272 offthe back of 90 fromLaura Woolvardt.

However,Aust r a l i a’sformidablebatting line-up easi lyoverhauledthe targetwith 28balls tospare, leaving SouthAfrica in a scrap for the threeother semi-final berths withIndia, the West Indies andEngland.

"We had a great firstinnings and 270 was par, onanother day the bowlingattack would have defendedit," said South Africa captainSune Luus.

"We just lost it a bit onthe field and probably lost abit of focus... it won’t happenagain."

Australia put SouthAfrica in to bat after winningthe toss but struggled tomake early inroads asWoolvardt and Lizelle Leeput on an 88-run openingpartnership.

Woolvart notched herfourth consecutive half-cen-tury at the tournament, sup-ported by Luus’s run-a-ball52 and Marizanne Kapp’s 30off 21 balls.

Australia’s openersdeparted cheaply but skipperLanning stepped up to guide

the six-time champions to146-3 after 25 overs.

"It sort of became clear tome that I had to bat throughafter we lost a couple of earlywickets," she said.

It was Lanning’s 15thODI century and came of 92balls, including 13 fours andone six.

Tahlia McGrath wasAustralia’s next best bat-ter on 32, with

Lanning’s teammatescontent to play cameo

roles.

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Daniil Medvedev will try to reclaim theworld number one ranking and top

seed Aryna Sabalenka chases her firstfinal in 10 months at the ATP and WTAMiami Open.

Men’s play starts on Wednesday andwomen’s play begins on Tuesday in thehardcourt tournament at Hard RockStadium, where highest seeds receivefirst-round byes.

Serbia’s Novak Djokovic moved intothe top spot of the rankings this week,bumping out reigning US Open cham-pion Medvedev after a three-week stayfollowing his third-round exit at IndianWells.

The 26-year-old Russian, runner-up

at the past two Australian Opens, wouldreturn to the top spot with a semi-finalrun at Miami.

Medvedev only reached his firstMiami quarter-final last year, when helost to Roberto Bautista Agut, so a last-

four spot would mark a best-ever run inMiami.

And Medvedev has a potential sec-ond-round matchup with former worldnumber one Andy Murray, provided theBriton gets past Argentina’s FedericoDelbonis. Murray, a 34-year-oldScotsman and three-time Grand Slamchampion, won the Miami crown in 2009and 2013 but lost his only meeting withMedvedev in Brisbane in 2019.

Also in Medvedev’s quarter of thedraw is defending champion HubertHurkacz of Poland.

Germany’s Alexander Zverev is thesecond seed with Greece’s StefanosTsitsipas third and Italy’s MatteoBerrettini fourth.

Sabalenka, of Belarus, fell to fifth in

this week’s rankings and has not reacheda WTA final since last May on Madridclay.

Poland’s Iga Swiatek is the secondseed with Estonia’s Anett Kontaveit thirdand Greece’s Maria Sakkari fourth.

Australia’s top-ranked Ashleigh Bartyis not in the field, but former world num-ber ones Naomi Osaka and SimonaHalep are in the draw.

Romania’s Halep could face Britain’s19-year-old Emma Raducanu, the reign-ing US Open champion, in the thirdround.

Japan’s Osaka could meet Canada’s19-year-old Leylah Fernandez, the 2021US Open runner-up who ended Osaka’stitle defense last year at New York, in thethird round.

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Bangladesh pacer Taskin Ahmed,who was approached by IPL side

Lucknow Super Giants as a replace-ment for injured England quick MarkWood, will not participate in thecash-rich league, the country’scricket board (BCB) has said.According to a report bylocal media, Super Giantsreached out to the 26-yearold pacer after Wood wasruled out of the tournamentdue to an elbow injury.

New entrants SuperGiants had paid Rs 7.5 crorefor Wood at the IPL auctionlast month.

However, the Bangladesh Cricket Boardhas refused to give Taskin the No-Objection Certificate to take part in theIPL as it clashes with the ongoing tour ofSouth Africa.

"Since we have two important serieslike the ongoing home tour of South

Africa and the home series against SriLanka, we feel it won’t be right for him

to take part in the IPL,’’ BCB cricketoperations chairman Jalal Yunuswas quoted as saying by Cricbuzz.

The Bangladesh cricket team iscurrently in South Africa, playing

an ODI series which will be fol-lowed by two Tests which

concludes on April 11,while the IPL begins onMarch 26.

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Newly-appointed fast bowl-ing coach Lasith Malinga

feels Rajasthan Royals have afantastic pace attack with agood mix of experienced inter-national players, genuine Indianquicks and youngsters.

"I think we have a fantasticpace attack. You’ve got experi-enced overseas players likeBoult and Coulter-Nile, withwhom I’ve worked before,"Malinga said. "Then we’ve gotgenuine Indian fast bowlers inPrasidh (Krishna) and(Navdeep) Saini, who have

proven themselves at the high-est level, and some new faces inAnunay Singh, Kuldeep Sen

and Kuldip Yadav."In T20 cricket, I think lit-

tle margins really matter, andI’m here to guide them to deliv-er their best in all situations," headded.

Talking about joining thenew franchise, the 38-year-old,who is also IPL’s highest wick-et-taker, said he’s enjoying hisnew role. "It is certainly a newthing for me to get into coach-ing and pass on my experienceto the younger players. I haveplayed this role before withMumbai, and now I’m delight-ed to be working withRajasthan Royals.

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Indian badmiton star LakshyaSen’s Silver medal winning

feat at the All EnglandBadminton Championshipshelped him break into the top10 of the latest BWF WorldRanking on Tuesday.

The 20-year-old fromUttarakhand, who became onlythe fifth Indian ever to reach thesummit clash of All EnglandChampionships, improved twoplaces to become world number9 with 74,786 points, surpassingreigning world champion LohKean Yew of Singapore.

Sen had suffered a heart-breaking straight-game loss toOlympic champion and worldNo 1 Viktor Axelsen ofDenmark on Sunday.

The former world juniornumber one Indian thusbecame the country’s highestranked men’s singles player,surpassing Kidambi Srikanth,who slipped to the 12th spotthis week.

Sen has withdrawn fromthe ongoing Swiss Open due toexhaustion after making thefinal of the German Open andAll England in the last twoweeks. Women’s doubles pair ofTreesa Jolly and GayatriGopichand also jumped 12places to reach a career-bestworld number 34, riding ontheir maiden semifinal finish atthe All England Championship.

The duo, who were promot-ed to the main draw from thereserve list at Birmingham, hadstunned second seeded KoreansLee Sohee and Shin Seungchanin the quarterfinals.

Commonwealth GamesBronze medallist AshwiniPonnappa and N Sikki Reddyremained India’s best rankedwomen’s doubles pair at worldnumber 20, despite losing aplace. Double Olympic medal-list P V Sindhu remained atworld number 7, while Sainaclimbed two places to 23rd, fol-lowing a second round defeat atAll England.

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Pace spearheads NaseemShah and Shaheen Shah

Afridi knocked over eight wick-ets and restricted Australia to391 before Pakistan ended daytwo of the deciding Test at 90-1 in Lahore on Tuesday.

The duo led a late charge toclose the second session asAustralia lost their last fivewickets for 71 runs after reach-ing a commanding 320-5 atlunch. Naseem finished with fig-ures of 4-58 and Shaheen 4-79.

At stumps, the game wasevenly poised and the serieshanging in the balance asAbdullah Shafique, 45, andAzhar Ali, 30, returned to thepavilion five overs early due to

bad light. The series is tied at0-0 after the first two Tests inRawalpindi and Karachi endedin high-scoring draws.Shafique and Azhar had torebuild after Pakistan opener

Imam-ul-Haq was trapped leg-before by Australian skipperPat Cummins on 11. But thepair looked untroubled,putting on 70 for the secondwicket. Before Naseem and

Shaheen brought Pakistan backinto the game, CameronGreen, 79, and Alex Carey, 67,had frustrated the hosts in themorning session, adding aninvaluable 135 for the sixthwicket.

Fortunes turned after spin-ner Nauman Ali had Carey leg-before in the fourth over afterthe break.

The wicketkeeper-batsmanhad hit seven boundaries in his175-minute knock.

Green was then bowled byNaseem after a resolute 223-minute stay intermittently litup by nine boundaries.

Pakistan were looking tomake early inroads at the startof play with the second newball only five overs in.

����� 1�1.�

Assessing and bringing outthe best version of a play-

er was something that camenaturally to "incredible leader"Shane Warne, formerAustralian all-rounder ShaneWatson said on Tuesday.

Warne, who played 55matches for Rajasthan Royalsbetween 2008 and 2011, led theside to its only IPL title in theinaugural edition.

"The thing that stood outfor me was that Rajasthan werewritten off because we didn’thave big names as compared tothe other teams. The advantagethat Rajasthan had was the abil-ity to pull the team togethervery quickly," Watson said dur-ing a Delhi Capitals virtualpress conference.

"The incredible skill thatShane Warne had was seeingwhat people’s roles were andthen tap in to that role.

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‘Bringing out best in playerscame naturally to Warne’

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