NEW DELHI: In what could be described as a significant boost to the morale of the embattled opposition party ahead of the Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections this year, the Congress has managed to retain both the Mungaoli and Kolaras constituencies, when went to bypolls on February 24.

On the other hand, the ruling Biju Janata Dal on Wednesday wrested the Bij-

epur Assembly constituency in Odisha from the Congress in a by-poll, with its candidate Rita Sahu defeating her nearest rival, Ashok Panigrahi of the BJP, by 41,933 votes.

While Congress’s Brijendra Singh Yadav won by 2124 votes in Mungaoli, Mahendra Singh Yadav defeated BJP’s Devendra Jain in Kolaras. See P6

VOL. 13, ISSUE 60 | Thursday, 1 March 2018 | New Delhi | Pages 16 | Rs 3.00

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OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Karti Chidam-baram, arrested in connection with the probe into the INX Media case, was on Wednesday remanded to one-day CBI custody by a Delhi Court.

Karti has been arrested based on the “confessional” statement recorded before a magistrate under 164 CrPC of INX Media directors Peter Mukerjea and wife Indrani.

In their statements, which is admissible as evidence in the court, the Mukerjeas had claimed to have paid close to $700,000 (Rs 3.10 crore) to Karti through subsidiar-ies abroad, for organizing clearance from the Foreign Investment Pro-motion Board (FIPB) to bring in foreign funds for their TV venture INX Media. The FIPB comes under the finance ministry, the charge of which was then with Karti’s father and senior Congress politician P

Chidambaram.46-year-old Karti, son of former

Finance Minister P Chidambaram, was produced before Metropolitan Magistrate Sumeet Anand and the CBI sought his custodial interroga-tion for 15 days claiming that he was not cooperating in the probe.

The duty magistrate remanded him to one-day CBI custody and asked the agency to produce Karti

before the concerned judge on Thursday. When Karti was brought to the Patiala House district court premises and was taken to the courtroom, he told the waiting scribes, “It is absolutely a political vendetta. I will be vindicated”.

In its remand application filed in the court, the CBI claimed that sustained interrogation of Karti was needed to unearth the “total con-spiracy” hatched in the case and also to find out the details of overseas payments allegedly received by him from INX Media as a “quid pro quo”.

At the outset, the court allowed the request of Karti’s lawyers to have an interaction with the accused inside the courtroom for 10 min-utes, after which the proceedings resumed.

Earlier in the day, Karti was taken into custody by a team of CBI officials at the Chennai airport on his return from the United King-dom. See P6

In today’s paper

...

Bypoll win would impact 2019 polls

NAVEEN PATNAIK

CITY

THREE CHARRED TO DEATH IN GR NOIDA 4

NATION

MANJHI DECIDES TO JOIN LALU CAMP 5

EDIT

INDIA’S URBAN CHALLENGE 8

INTERNATIONAL

MALDIVES THROWS OUT FOREIGN LAWYERS 10

BUSINESS

RAZORPAY TO POWER UPI ON IRCTC 13

SPORT

FEDERER BAGS TWIN HONOURS 14

11 US SOLDIERS FALL SICK AFTER LETTER OPENED AT MILITARY BASE PG11

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Aircel files for bankruptcy; SBI, others to bear brunt

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Telecom operator Aircel on Wednesday said it has filed for bank-ruptcy as the company has been facing “troubled times” in “highly financially stressed” industry.

The Malaysian owned Maxis com-pany has a debt of over Rs 16,000 crore taken from a consortium of banks led by State Bank of India.

Indian lenders exposure stands at around Rs 12,000 crore. SBI has the lion’s share of Aircel debt at over Rs 5,000 crore. SBI may provide for Rs 750-800 crore in Q3 on Aircel account. Aircel bankruptcy will also hit other public sector banks like PNB, BoB, Canara Bank. Lender banks to provide for Rs 1,800 crore provision in Q3 on account of Aircel.

The company shutting down is expected to impact tower firms, ven-dors, distributors and 500 employees associated with the operator.

In a statement here, Aircel said that

intense competition following the dis-ruptive entry of a new player, legal and regulatory challenges, high level of unsustainable debt and increased losses had together caused significant “nega-tive business and reputational impact” on the company.

“The Board of Directors of the Cor-porate Debtor on Wednesday announced that they have filed an application under Section 10 of the Insolvency and Bank-ruptcy Code 2016 for undertaking Cor-porate Insolvency Resolution Process for the respective companies: Aircel Cellular, Dishnet Wireless, Aircel Ltd,” the state-ment said.

Sources said that the filing was made in National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) Mumbai.

The company statement also noted that efforts to merge wireless business with another operator did not yield any results and had ultimately lapsed in Sep-tember 2017.

“Post detailed discussions with the

financial lenders and shareholders; the company could not reach a consensus concerning the restructuring of its debt and funding. Despite these discussions and the invoking of a Strategic Debt Restructuring scheme in January 2018...no agreement could be reached,” Air-cel said.

The company also said it believes that in the current circumstances, resolution process under the Insolvency and Bank-ruptcy Code is an “appropriate recourse”.

“The Company would like to empha-sise that CIRP is not a proceeding for liq-uidation, rather is a process to find best possible resolution for the current situa-tion and that would be in the best inter-est of everyone (vendors, distributors, employees, etc.) to protect and preserve the value of the company and manage the operations,” it added.

Aircel said it would strive to provide uninterrupted service connectivity to its customers and sought their support in the “current difficult period”.

With 7.2% Q3 growth, India set to be fastestMPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: Show-ing signs of recovery, the Indian economy recorded a five-quar-ter high growth of 7.2 percent in the October-December period on a good showing by critical sectors like agricul-ture, construction and manufacturing.

Besides, the data for eight core infrastructure sec-tors including coal, steel, cement and petroleum, showed improved growth of 6.7 per cent for Janu-ary, up from 3.4 per cent in same month a year ago.

The finance min-istry said that the data indicate a broad-based and significant acceleration of real economic activity as projected in the Economic Survey.

“...robust growth in manufacturing and significant acceleration in construc-tion mark a turnaround in the country s economic growth momentum,” the min-istry said in a statement.

According to the chairman of EAC to PM, Bibek Debroy, the economy is on the right track to accelerate and the current expansion in the growth rate in a reflection of the reforms initiated by the government.

He said the growth would pick up further in the upcoming quarter driven by the government’s commitment to implement structural reforms and aided by higher growth in the industrial and

services sector as well as spending by the Centre.

“India is on the right path to becom-ing one of the fastest major economies in the World surpassing China,” Debroy said.

The economy is expected to grow at 6.6 percent in the current fiscal ending March 31, as per the second, advanced estimates of the Central Statistics Office (CSO), com-pared to 7.1 percent in 2016-17.

The earlier esti-mate was 6.5 percent.

The growth for the second quarter (July-September) has been revised upwards to 6.5 percent, from 6.3 per-

cent estimated earlier by the CSO.The previous high was recorded at

7.5 percent in the July-September quar-ter of 2016-17.

The CSO said that the real GDP or Gross Domestic Product (GDP) at con-stant (2011-12) prices in 2017-18 is likely to be Rs 130.04 lakh crore, as against the first revised estimate for 2016-17 of Rs 121.96 lakh crore, released on Janu-ary 31.

CII Director General Chandrajit Banerjee said: “The significant improve-ment in GDP growth, which has accel-erated to a robust 7.2 percent in the third quarter as against 6.5 percent in the previous quarter is noteworthy and strengthens the perception that the Indian economy is at the threshold of a sustained rebound in growth.”

Sridevi cremated with full state honours, thousands pay last respect

MPOST BUREAU

MUMBAI: After a lifetime under the arc-lights, Indian cinema icon Sridevi was on Wednesday given a send-off fit for celluloid posterity with surging crowds of mourners walking with the cortege as it made its slow way through the city and thousands more glued to the television to watch her last rites.

The 54-year-old, whose sudden death in Dubai late Saturday sent a pall of gloom through India, was given a state funeral with her body wrapped in the tricolour and a gun salute by the Mumbai Police.

Sridevi, Indian cinema’s first woman superstar who straddled the parallel worlds of southern films and Bollywood, became an actor when she was only four years old.

Three hundred films later, the doe-eyed actor is still remembered for her comic timing, vivacity and her quicksilver expressions. Sridevi’s funeral proces-sion was the biggest Mumbai had seen for a Bolly-wood star since Rajesh Khanna in 2012 and perhaps the biggest for a woman, said old timers. There was a sea of people as far as the eye could see.

The last rites were conducted by her filmmaker husband Boney Kapoor as her family and close friends from the industry and outside packed into the Vile Parle Seva Samaj crematorium.

The couple’s daughters, Jahnvi and Khushi, were by his side, sources close to the family said.

Fans and the media were kept outside as the mor-tal remains of the star through the ages were con-signed to the flames.

The actor’s body was draped in a red kanjivaram sari with a bindi on her forehead.

Few could hold back their tears as the ceremonial gunshots rang out and the pyre was lit.

Many celebrities like Shah Rukh Khan and even Boney Kapoor’s niece, actor Sonam Kapoor, were forced to get off their cars and walk the distance.

The funeral procession took about two hours to cover the seven-kilometre distance from Lokhand-wala to the crematorium. As the flower-bedecked hearse covered with white flowers, the colour of mourning, left the Celebration Sports Club, min-utes away from the Kapoor home in Green Acres, Lokhandwala, frenzied crowds ran alongside.

Court remands Karti to one-day CBI custodyBJD wrests Bijepur; Cong retains Mungaoli & KolarasINX MEDIA CASE: INDRANI CLAIMS TO HAVE PAID KARTI `3.10 CR

Nirav Modi refuses to join CBI probe

PNB chief auditor heldOUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Billionaire jeweller Nirav Modi has refused to join the CBI investigation in the USD 2 billion fraud in Punjab National Bank citing his business engagements, prompting the agency to issue a stern letter on Wednesday ask-ing him to appear before it next week.

Meanwhile, the CBI has arrested PNB’s inter-nal chief auditor M K Sharma— a chief manager-ranked official— in connection with the case, they said, adding that it is the first arrest of any auditor of the bank.

Sharma, a scale-IV officer, was responsible for auditing the systems and practices of the bank’s Brady House branch--from Letters of Undertakings (LoUs) were issued— and report the deficiencies with zonal audit office, they said.

Meanwhile, in a terse letter, the CBI “directed” him to approach the Indian mission in the country where he is residing so that imme-diate arrangement can be made for his travel to India, officials said.

The agency has told him that it is mandatory for an accused to join the investigation whenever they are asked to, they said.

He has been asked to appear for questioning next week, they said.

Meanwhile, I-T department has attached four assets of Nirav Modi worth Rs 70 crore.

`12,000 crore

`16,000 crore

`5,000 crore

INDIAN LENDERS

TOTAL DEBT

SBI’s DEBT

People gather in large number to pay their respect during the funeral procession of actor Sridevi in Mumbai PTI

TEARFUL ADIEU

PNB, BoB, Canara Bank

OTHER BANKS HIT

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2 MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018mp around town

Although every possible care and caution has been taken to avoid errors or omissions, this publication is being sold on the condition and understanding that infromation given in this publication is merely for reference and must not be taken as having authority of or binding in any way on the writers, editors, publishers, and printers and sellers who do not owe any responsibility for any damage or loss to any person, a purchaser of this publication or not for the result of any action taken on the basis of this work. All disputes are subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of competent court and forums in Delhi/New Delhi only

Printed & Published by Jaiyendra Kumar Sharma on behalf of Front Row Media Pvt. Ltd. and printed at The Indian Express Pvt. Ltd., A-8, Sector-7, Noida-201 301 (U.P.) and published from First Floor, Pratap Bhawan, 5 Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, New Delhi 110 002. Editor: Durbar Ganguly, Executive Editor: Arya Rudra. Email: durbarganguly@gmail.com, Tel. No. 011-47777500

SEOUL, MUMBAI TO NEW DELHIExhibition ‘Seoul, Mumbai to New Delhi’ presents an archive of processes and experiments that began as public interventions in Mumbai. The art works presented at Exhibition ‘Seoul, Mumbai to New Delhi’ elicits a question into our relationship with food, how the action and function of eating - feeding - gathering - nurturing may evoke and provoke nostalgia, memory. Can food really define us, our relations with others – whilst provoking human vulnerabilities? The artwork of seven artists will make you dwell deep in thoughts of your relationship with food. WHEN: Till March 7 WHERE: Korean Cultural Center India

TOWARDS RISING INDIAConceived by Padma Shri Awardee Vidushi Sumitra Guha in collaboration with Internationally acclaimed Indian Classical musician Rupam Sarmah, the project ‘A Musical Journey towards Rising India’ depicts Indian Music and culture right from where it originated – Vedas and Upanishads, Science and Spirituality, Bhakti Movement and Folk, Meditational Chakra Music, and music during India’s Independence movement. WHEN: March 3 WHERE: India Habitat Centre TIMINGS: 6:45 pm onwards

8TH THEATRE OLYMPICS (PLAYS)Being an international theatre festival, the Theatre Olympics presents some of the greatest theatre practitioners from around the world. It is a platform for theatrical exchange, a gathering place forstudents and masters, where a dialogue despite ideological, culture and language differences is encouraged. This Saturday, witness plays like Choturthir Jor (Language:Bengali), Dark Borders (Language:Hindi), Wanarayan (Language: Marathi) and Chakka (Language: Malayalam),in the Capital. WHEN: March 3 WHERE: Sri Ram Centre, Abhimanch, LTG Auditorium and Open Lawn (respectively for each play) TIMINGS: 5:30 pm, 8:30 pm, 4:00 pm and 7:00 pm (respectively for each play)

DAYINDAYOUT What’s on Around Town

5 books to look forward to in March 2018

The shortest month of the year turned out to be quite a dull one for most readers. While Sourav Ganguly’s ‘A Century Is Not

Enough’ and ‘Do We Not Bleed’ by Mehr Tarar did create some buzz, most other books released during the month seem to have gone out of sight. A quick look at the front shelves of bookstores and also the books trending on e-commerce sites shows the disappointment that February was for bookworms.

But few recommendations for March will bring cheer. Featuring non-fiction by Romila Thapar; a biography of actor Sanjay Dutt; a politically charged memoir by Tas-lima Nasrin; a cheeky story of a little girl’s harrowing experiences with public toilets; and finally a powerful collection of stories from Anjum Hasan, these books are sure to be read and talked about widely.HERE ARE THE FIVE BOOKS THAT WE CAN’T WAIT TO READ THIS MARCH: 

Though February turned out to be a disappointment for bookworms, March has a variety of books – including non-fiction, biography and short stories – that will bring cheer

‘INDIAN CULTURES AS HERI-TAGE’ BY ROMILA THAPAR Every society has its cultures The pat-terns that reveal how people live and express themselves, and how they value objects and thoughts. What consti-tutes Indian heritage and culture has been much discussed. Thapar begins by explaining how the definitions of the concept of culture have changed in the last three centuries, and hence require added attention. Cultures, when defined by drawing on selected items and thoughts from the past, remain relatively unknown, except to a few. Yet, each has a context and meaning relat-ing them to the past and to their sig-nificance as a contemporary presence. Contexts, often regarded as uncon-nected to culture, can, to the contrary, be quite illuminating.

‘A DAY IN THE LIFE’ BY ANJUM HASAN Quixotic retirees in Coorg and young newly-weds trying to eat meat; teen-age boys travelling to Benares in the nineteenth century and a retiree with an anger-management problem in an India where the right wing is rising. Fourteen well-crafted stories give us a sense of daily Indian life of a wide cast of characters. Hasan’s protagonists are, as always, living in their own heads a lot of the time, often whimsical and vulnerable outliers. Where is their place in the new order, where have they come from and where are they going? Billed by the publisher as “quietly devastating, subtly subversive and wonderfully wry”, Hasan’s stories are increasingly a good address for authentic Indian fiction.

‘SANJAY DUTT: THE CRAZY, UNTOLD STORY OF BOLLYWOOD’S BAD BOY’ BY YASSER USMAN

Sanjay Dutt, in the brief of this book, has been dubbed as ‘the original bad boy of Bol-lywood’. In the early 1980s, it was not uncom-mon to find him passed out over the steering wheel of his car on a suburban road of Mumbai after a night of drugs and alco-

hol. Sanjay’s open love for guns and hard party-ing, his rippling muscles, long hair and many glamorous girlfriends, including the top actor of that time, defined machismo for a generation of Indian men.

But underneath the tough-guy image there were genuine struggles, too: Both his mother and his first wife died tragically young of cancer, and Sanjay had to go through long and painful periods of de-addiction therapy. In this book, Yasser Usman tells the uncensored story of San-jay’s roller-coaster life that is stranger than any fiction – from the time he smuggled heroin into the United States and went on a drunken shoot-ing spree at his Pali Hill home after breaking up with his girlfriend to his curious phone calls to gangster Chhota Shakeel and his role in the 1993 Mumbai serial blasts.

‘SPLIT’ BY TASLIMA NASRINNasrin is known for her powerful writing on women’s issues and uncompromising criticism of religious fundamentalism. “Life felt like a feather at one moment and heavy as a stone the very next. I had never really felt this weight before, the full weight of life, and before I could make sense of things, it had crept down my back and slowly bent my spine. I could not recognise this life; it was mine and yet it was not. Without paus-ing to consider I had given away everything life had offered to me to another. Later, racked with thirst, I had reached out and found that there was nothing left for me... My life was spread out in front of me like an arid wasteland,” she writes in her upcoming book.

‘Split’ has a compelling narrative that captures the plight of the eminent Bangladeshi woman writer with freedom of expression and speech at the book’s core.

‘I NEED TO PEE’ BY NEHA SINGHAnd finally, why should adults have all the fun? Here is a charming picture book empowering chil-dren to speak up about their right to use toilet facilities in a clean and safe environment. Rahi simply loves slurping refreshing drinks, and so she always needs to pee. But boy, does she hate pub-lic loos! On her way to her aunt’s in Meghalaya, she has to pee in a train as well as stop at a hotel and even the really scary public toilet at the bus depot! And when those around her refuse to help her with her troubles, her only saviour is her “Book of Important Quotes”.

Travel with Rahi and read all about her yucky, icky, sticky adven-tures in this quirky and vibrant book about the ever-relevant worry of finding safe and clean public restrooms. IANS

ELDERLY PEOPLE with a certain type of hear-ing loss may be more likely to also have memory loss and thinking problems called mild cognitive impairment, says a study.

The study, presented at the American Acad-emy of Neurology’s 70th Annual Meeting in Los Angeles, looked at people with peripheral age-related hearing loss, which is caused by problems in how the inner ear and hearing nerves func-tion and leads to people not being able to hear. 

It also looked at central age-related hearing loss, which is caused by problems in the brain’s ability to process sound and leads people to say, “I can hear, but I can’t understand.”

The researchers found that people with cen-tral hearing loss were twice as likely to have mild cognitive impairment as people who had no hearing loss. 

“These preliminary results suggest that cen-tral hearing loss may share the same progres-sive loss of functioning in brain cells that occurs in cognitive decline, rather than the sensory deprivation that happens with peripheral hearing loss,” said study author Rodolfo Sardone from the University of Bari in Italy. 

“It’s a problem with perception. Tests of hear-ing perception should be given to people who are older than 65 and also to people with cognitive impairment,” Sardone added.

Hearing loss is one of the most common dis-abilities in elderly people, affecting about one-third of people over age 65.

The study involved 1,604 participants of the Great Age Study, a population-based study con-ducted in the south of Italy, with an average age of 75, whose hearing and thinking and memory skills were tested. 

Of the participants, 26 per cent had periph-eral hearing loss and 12 per cent had central hearing loss, 33 per cent were diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment.

Of the 192 people with central hearing loss, 144 people, or 75 per cent, had mild cogni-

tive impairment. In contrast, people with peripheral

hearing loss were no more likely to have mild cognitive impairment than people with no hearing problems.

The researchers also found that people who had lower scores on a test that measured how well they understood speech also had lower scores on a test of thinking and mem-ory skills. IANS

Hearing loss may indicate memory impairment for some

OUR CORRESPONDENT

Every year, millions of individu-als get affected and die of the killer disease Cancer, either due to late treatment or because of

the unawareness about its symptoms and early warning signs. In India also, the rise of this disease is alarming. Slowly but steadily, it is gripping our society with its deadly claws.

‘Kolkata Breast Health and Welfare Association’, an educational and inspi-rational non – profit organization, has been instrumental to control and nul-lify the curse of this disease on mankind over the years.

The mission of KBHWA is to cre-ate awareness in the community by providing easy access to the informa-tion about the disease and to offer an enhanced quality of treatment to the

sufferers as well as an improved quality of life to the family and friends. Formed and guided by some extremely reputed oncolo-gists such as Dr Ashwini Malhotra, Dr (Professor) Litan Naha Biswas, Dr Tapti Sen, Dr Suma Chakravar-thy, Dr Chanchal Goswami and Dr Suchhanda Goswami, with a vision of a painless world, Kolkata Breast Health, and Welfare Association has been relentless to fight the peril.

Apart from regular conferences and awareness programs, the asso-ciation also indulges itself to cele-brate the ‘Survivorship Day’ every year so as to inspire and motivate the society.

 Aiming to spread awareness about this ailment, the association has planned to meet on March 3, 2018, at 6 pm, at Victoria 2 Ban-quet, Hotel Radisson Green, Garcha

Lane, Kolkata, where everyone shall be spending some time with the champi-ons who won their battle against the perilous malady, thereby celebrating the crusade against Cancer.

The evening shall witness the screening of Aro Aro Dao Pran – a film on cancer survivorship – which directed by  Satarupa Sanyal and pro-duced by KBHWA . The movie is based on a true story of a breast and ovarian cancer survivor who has enacted and portrayed herself in the movie.

This will be followed by champions walking the ramp with few popular faces of the city like Alokananda Roy, Shar-bari Dutta, Chaitali Dasgupta, Paroma Banerjee, Esha Saha, Imon Chakraborty, Sreemoyee Piu Kundu, Satarupa Sanyal, Shibaprasad Mukhopadhyay, Satrajit Sen, Sujoy Prosad Chatterjee, Ratul Shankar and Noor, along with chore-ography sequences by Arnab Bandyo-

padhyay and Rubena Chatterjee to add zeal to the ramp.

The entire show has been format-ted and designed by reputed fashion designer Abhishek Roy. The celebra-tion will be crowned off with the per-formance of reputed vocalist Prabir Das with snacks and dinner for the guests.

The event has been conceptual-ized and designed by pHREEDOM-4EVER, a company that specialises in the field of brand management, brand promotion, and PR.

 The effort is being made to raise awareness among the common people about the threat of the disease, its early detection, and other basic information, so as to help the society fight and over-come the desperado.

KBHWA and its crusade against cancer continues to motivate the larger society for the benefit of the mass.

Stepping up the fight against cancer

Dr. Tapti Sen - Secretary, KBHWA Dr C Goswami

DECLARATION FORM IV (SEE RULE 8)

1. Place of Publication : Pratap Bhawan, 5 Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, New Delhi 110 002.

2. Periodicity of Publication : Daily 3. Printer,s Name : Jaiyendra Kumar Sharma (Whether citizen of India) : Yes Address : House No-283, Sector-11,

Vasundhara-201012, Dist- Gha-ziabad, Uttar Pradesh

4. Publisher’s Name : Jaiyendra Kumar Sharma (Whether citizen of India) : Yes Address : House No-283, Sector-11,

Vasundhara-201012, Dist- Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh

5. Editor’s Name : Durbar Ganguly (Whether citizen of India) : Yes Address : Farm No. 13, Palm Beach Road

Fatehpur Beri, Mehrauli New Delhi — 110 074

6. Name and address of Individuals who own the Newspaper and partners or shareholders holding : Durbar Ganguly More than 1% of the total capital : Moutussi Acharyya

I, Jaiyendra Kumar Sharma hereby declare that the particulars given above are true to the best of my knowledge & belief. Place : New Delhi Jaiyendra Kumar SharmaDate : 01.03.2018 PRINTER & PUBLISHER

MILLENNIUM POST

mp city 3MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Equating IAS officers association with a "khaap panchayat" which issues "fatwa" against the Delhi government, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Siso-dia on Wednesday launched a scathing attack on Lieuten-ant Governor Anil Baijal for "backing" officers boycotting meetings with AAP ministers over the alleged attack on the chief secretary.

Sisodia's remarks came a day after Baijal wrote to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, say-ing the alleged assault on Chief Secretary Anshu Prakash by MLAs on February 19 has sent "shock waves" among all sec-tions of government employ-ees across the country and had

a demoralising effect on the bureaucracy.

Citing Baijal's letter, Sisodia said when an IAS officer goes to the LG claiming he was scolded by an AAP minister, he wipes his "tears" and despite his "use-lessness", the LG encourages him to boycott meetings, say-

ing he is standing with him."You (LG) were requested

(by the Delhi cabinet) to order some officers two days back to attend meetings, but despite this, you wrote a letter to the chief minister, which suggests that you are openly support-ing the fatwa of IAS association

under which junior officers are being forced not to attend meetings and speak to minis-ters..." Sisodia said in his letter to Baijal.

Claiming non-payment of salaries to anganwadi volun-teers for three months in his three-page letter in Hindi, Sisodia continued to fire salvo at Baijal, saying: "You are the Lieutenant Governor of Delhi. You have also been an IAS offi-cer, but I request you to stop seeing things through specta-cles of an IAS officer."

"Think about a three-year old child who goes to angan-wadi, but his teacher has not got salary for the last three months."

Baijal, a former bureaucrat, has also been a former Union home secretary.

In the letter, Sisodia demanded action against offi-cers who are responsible for non-payment of salaries to anganwadi workers. "I have tried to calmly make them (officers) understand, but they are not relenting. If they would have been sensitive, there would not have been non-pay-ment of salaries to volunteers.

"If I scold them, they would approach you to register their demoralisation in your diary. If we say more, their IAS associa-tion issues fatwa against us like a 'khaap panchayat'," he said.

In the letter, the deputy chief minister asked Baijal to understand the truth of sys-tem sitting in Rajniwas and Secretariat.

"Attacking officers, Siso-dia said, "If IAS officers union

comes to you, please ask them how they stand in front of mir-ror after stopping payment of salaries of 30,000 families who are directly connected with anganwadi," he said.

Earlier in the day, a joint forum of the Delhi government employees also welcomed the LG for asking the chief minister to take officers in to confidence.

The forum reiterated its demand to seek apology from Kejriwal and Sisodia for the alleged assault on Prakash by some AAP MLAs at the chief minister's residence.

The IAS and Delhi, Anda-man and Nicobar Islands Civil Service officers have not been attending meetings with Kejri-wal and his cabinet colleagues since the alleged assault on the chief secretary.

NEW DELHI: A day after a sessions court here denied him bail, Aam Aadmi Party MLA Prakash Jarwal, arrested for allegedly assaulting Delhi Chief Secretary Anshu Prakash, on Wednesday moved the Delhi High Court seeking the relief.

The legislator’s bail plea is likely to come up for hearing before Justice Mukta Gupta on Thursday.

Jarwal was on Tuesday denied bail for the second time, with a court here saying it could not ignore the fact that the lawmaker had “openly vio-lated the dignity” of a 56-year-old public servant who was “honestly discharging duties”.

Deoli MLA Jarwal, who was arrested on February 20, is currently undergoing 14-day judicial custody in the case in which another MLA Ama-natullah Khan was also arrested in connection with the alleged

assault on the bureaucrat dur-ing a meeting at Delhi Chief Minister’s Arvind Kejriwal’s residence on the night of Feb-ruary 19.

The court, while refusing to grant bail to Jarwal, had said the situation could not be more alarming when lawmakers do not respect the rule of law.

While dismissing the plea of the MLA, the court had noted that the chief secretary’s allegations were confirmed by his medical report as well as the statement of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s adviser V K Jain, who had claimed that he saw the CS being assaulted by the MLAs.

Seeking bail before the ses-sions court, Jarwal’s counsel had pleaded that the legisla-tor was a young politician and had got married only this year on February 6 so he be granted the relief.

Sisodia slams LG, likens IAS officers association to ‘khaap panchayat’

SAYANTAN GHOSH

NEW DELHI: The Aam Aadmi Party on Wednesday accused IAS officers of giving polit-ical statements, and questioned the IAS Officers Association about it, citing the service rules.

AAP spokesperson Ashutosh demanded a lawsuit against IAS officials for violating the service code rules, saying that the work atmo-sphere is being deliberately pulled down by senior officials.

Condemning this act, he said, “This is a major conspiracy by the bureaucrats of Delhi government,” pointing out that police has still not taken any action against the complaint of assault of Delhi Environment minister Imran Hussain.

Ashutosh alleged that under the service code rules, it is clear that government officials cannot make any political statements, nor can they join any activity like strike or protest.

"But the officials are breaking that rule and continuously attacking the government through press conferences and social media," said the AAP leader.

On Tuesday, party spokesperson Saurabh Bharadwaj had said that AAP would seek charges

of criminal conspiracy against the Chief Secre-tary, Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal, Police Commissioner Amulya Patnaik and office bear-ers of the IAS Officers Association.

He further said that the party received a major boost on Tuesday, after the Tis Hazari Court ordered that all CCTV footage from all cameras in Delhi Secretariat, where Hussain was assaulted by a mob, be preserved.

The AAP said that on March 1, the next date of hearing in the Secretariat assault case, it will press criminal charges against the alleged "conspirators" under section 120b of the Indian Penal Code.

Dy CM’s comments condemnable: Delhi govt employees body

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia’s com-ment about government offi-cers was “gender insensitive” and “condemnable”, the gov-ernment employees’ associa-tion said here on Wednesday.

Addressing media per-sons here, Delhi Government Employees Joint Forum repre-sentatives said Sisodia’s com-ment at a national seminar here on Tuesday regarding the “bureaucracy and the current situation are extremely gender insensitive and reprehensive”.

The association would con-tinue to not attend meetings or talk to ministers over phone, as decided by them last week after an alleged attack.

The Chief Secretary alleged last week that he was beaten up by AAP MLA Amanatullah Khan and another AAP MLA in the presence of Chief Minis-ter Arvind Kejriwal at the CM’s residence here on February 19 night, where he had been called for a meeting.

The association said that they would continue to con-tact ministers and MLAs only through written channel till Kejriwal and Sisodia tender a “written public apology” for the alleged attack.

Efforts by Social Welfare Minister Rajendra Pal Gau-tam and Transport Minister Kailash Gahlot to resolve the impasse were acknowledged by the association, but insisted for the written public apology.

IAS officers making political statements against rules: AAP

LG asks CM to reach out to officials to resolve impasse

AAP leaders Ashutosh and Dilip Pandey at a press conference here on Wednesday PIC/NAVEEN SHARMA

SAYANTAN GHOSH

NEW DELHI: A week after the alleged assault on Chief Sec-retary Anshu Prakash, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Wednesday met Lieuten-ant Governor Anil Baijal for a face-to-face meeting, where the issue of the assault, women’s safety and other government works were discussed.

The LG said he had urged the Chief Minister to reach out to government employees to resolve the impasse.

On his official Twitter handle, the LG posted, "Met Hon’ble CM @ArvindKejriwal. Reassured him of my complete support for steps to remove mistrust with Govt. employ-ees. Encouraged again to reach out to them. It is important for all to work together in public interest in a secure and digni-fied work environment.”

Meanwhile, Kejriwal also discussed the issue of girl stu-dents being provided addi-tional safety from Delhi Police personnel after leaving school, as there were various com-plaints about anti-social ele-ments disturb students outside schools.

"Beat constables of the area could be directed to move around in his area during school closing time to ensure the safety of school girls," said Kejriwal after the meeting.

He further urged the LG to discuss the matter with the Delhi Police and also take note of the increasing number of sexual offences in the city.

The Chief Minister also dis-cussed the drainage system of Delhi, saying that land would be made available soon for the Public Works and Irrigation and Flood Control Department drains soon.

However, Kejriwal did not mention anything regarding the discussion of alleged assault on the Chief Secretary.

On Tuesday, the LG, in a letter to Kejriwal, had said dur-ing his meetings with various service associations that he felt the government employees in Delhi were feeling physically insecure.

“The unfortunate incident of alleged misbehaviour and physical assault on the Chief Secretary (Anshu Prakash), who is the head of the bureau-cracy, at the residence of the Chief Minister by the elected MLAs, was unprecedented and has had a demoralising effect on the entire bureaucracy.

“This incident has sent shock waves through all sec-tions of government employ-ees in not only Delhi but also in the entire country,” Baijal said in the letter.

AAP MLA Prakash Jarwal moves High Court for bail

ROUSHAN ALI

NEW DELHI: Continuing with its initiative of ‘Outcome Budget’ introduced last year, aimed at ensuring transparency and accountability in expendi-ture, the Aam Aadmi Party-led Delhi government is gearing up before the Budget session for the 2018-19 year with the Outcome Budget 2017-18 to be tabled on March 20.

With the Delhi government scheduled to present the Bud-get 2018-19 on March 21, Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia on Wednesday directed the Planning Department to prepare a detailed department-wise summary of performance against critical indicators of Outcome Budget up to third quarter of 2017-18.

"Specifically, the Planning Department should clearly highlight the percentage of critical indicators that were on-track and off-track as on 31 December, 2017, and the top 5-10 achievements for cash Department as per Outcome Budget,” Sisodia stated in a let-ter to the Department.

He also directed that based on the department-wise anal-ysis of critical indicators that were on track as on 31 Decem-ber, 2017, the Planning Depart-ment shall also prepare a table ranking top to bottom per-forming departments, and mention the names of Heads of Departments against each of the Departments.

“Planning Department is also directed to summarise its own learnings regarding how

the comprehensive Outcome Budgeting exercise initiated in 2017-18 has been useful in improving governance and performance-orientation in Government of NCT of Delhi, and what further measures can be taken to strengthen it for FY 2018-19,” he added.

An official said the Envi-ronment Department has pro-posed fast-tracking of adoption of clean tandoors, while the Transport Department advo-cated engagement of electric buses, promotion of smaller electric vehicles and strength-ening of PUC system.

"The Power department has also proposed special policy mechanism/incentives to pro-mote adoption of solar energy in PWD departments, schools and hospitals," the official said.

Outcome Budget 2017-18 to be tabled on March 20

BSES team attacked, one

injured

HC reserves order on plea of 20 disqualified

AAP MLAs

NEW DELHI: One person was injured when a team of a Delhi-based power distribution com-pany (discom) allegedly came under attack by a mob during a routine check of power theft in outer Delhi’s Kamruddin Nagar area, the police said on Wednesday.

The 20-strong BSES team was chased and attacked with iron rods on Tuesday by a mob of 15-20 people, including two women. The BSES employee -- retired Delhi Police ACP Santosh Kumar Singh -- sus-tained head injuries, the dis-com spokesperson said. “The attack was pre-planned as the team was attacked when two Delhi Police personnel accom-panying it had gone for lunch,” a police officer said. AGENCIES

NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court on Wednesday reserved its order on 20 Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLAs’ plea chal-lenging their disqualification in office-of-profit case.

A bench of justices Sanjiv Khanna and Chander Shekhar kept its decision pending after the MLAs, Election Commis-sion of India (EC) and other parties concerned concluded their arguments.

“Arguments heard. Judge-ment reserved,” the bench said.

The MLAs had on Tuesday told the court that EC’s order disqualifying them for alleg-edly holding office-of-profit was passed in “complete viola-tion of natural justice” as they were not given the opportunity to explain their stand before the poll panel. The bench was also requested by the legislators to remand their case back to the poll panel with a direction to hear the matter afresh.

The MLAs had approached the high court challenging their disqualification after Pres-ident Ram Nath Kovind gave his nod to the EC’s recommen-dation. AGENCIES

Badarpur power station can start operation: EPCANEW DELHI: Starting on Thursday, the Badarpur power plant that has been shut for over four months can start temporary operation, ban on diesel generators will be lifted, and hundreds of brick kilns can resume production due to “some visible improve-ment” in air quality in Delhi, the Supreme Court-appointed EPCA on Wednesday said.

On October 17 last year, the Environment Pollution Con-trol Authority (EPCA) had imposed the measures under the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) to combat pol-lution in the city ahead of the winter.

The EPCA on Wednesday said its action plan category has been changed. “The GRAP cat-egory of ‘very poor’ and ‘severe’ will be lifted, starting March 1. So, the restrictions imposed in the city last October will also be lifted. However, the cate-gory now would be ‘moderate to poor’ until we (EPCA) fur-ther upgrade it,” EPCA mem-ber Sunita Narain said.

Narain, also the director general of the Centre for Sci-ence and Environment (CSE), said, at a press conference

here, “There is a some visible improvement in air quality, but it it still a long way to go to achieve a clean air. It is not safe to breathe yet.”

Since October 17, the Badarpur power plant has been shut, use of diesel generators banned, and hundreds of brick kilns ordered to stop produc-tion in Delhi under the GRAP. Only those brick kilns, which have implemented the zigzag technology that helps reduce black carbon emission, were allowed to function.

Narain and EPCA chairman Bhure Lal, who too addressed the reporters, released a ‘Report card on Delhi’s air pollution’ and enunciated the measures to be taken by the EPCA from March onwards.

The Badarpur plant in south Delhi would be “perma-nently closed” from July this year, the EPCA said.

“About 1,400 brick kiln owners have submitted affi-davits to EPCA undertak-ing commitment to shift to improved-zigzag kiln technol-ogy by April 2018. Roughly, 600 have converted. By July 1, 2018, only zigzag technology-compliant kilns will be allowed to operate ,” Narain said.

Asked if the recent ‘Clean Air Campaign’, jointly organ-ised by the Environment minis-try and the Delhi government, had any impact on the air quality, Narain said, “Let’s no talk about taking credit. It is a result of combined action by all people.”

The Air Quality Index in Delhi stood at 259 (‘poor’) this evening. Under the GRAP, measures under ‘very poor’ and ‘severe’ categories are rolled out when levels of PM2.5 are between 121-250 microgrammes per cubic metre ( g/m3) and above 250 g/m3 respectively. PM10 levels have to be between 351-430 g/m3 and above 430 g/m3 respec-tively. AGENCIES

The plant had been shut down four months ago

mp city4MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

Ggn schoolboy murder case: Court acquits Ashok Kumar

Special court in Gurugram directs CBI to file full copy of charge-sheet on April 10PIYUSH OHRIE

GURUGRAM: Ashok Kumar, the 42-year-old bus conduc-tor who was falsely charged by Gurugram police for the mur-der of a seven-year-old boy in the washroom of a private school, was a relieved man on Wednesday.

A special court in Guru-gram discharged the Sohan res-ident off the murder charges and acquitted him from the case, which had taken the entire nation by shock back in September last year.

The court also directed the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to submit the full copy of the charge-sheet in the murder case on April 10.

On February 5, the premier investigating agency, in its first charge-sheet, absolved Kumar of the murder and established

it clearly that the accused was a 16-year-old student of the same private school in Bhondsi.

After Kumar’s acquittal, his legal team is mulling pursuing a case against the Gurugram Police officials who falsely charged him.

On September 8 last year,

after the murder came to light, Gurugram Police arrested Kumar and theorised that he slit the throat of the class II stu-dents, after failing to sexually exploit him.

Not impressed by the police’s claims, the family of the seven-year-old persisted for

a CBI-monitored probe. The Haryana government finally relented to the pressure and allowed CBI to take the case.

The police’s claims, how-ever, came undone, after the CBI charged the 16-year-old for the murder, and revealed that the juvenile committed the gruesome act out of fear of an impeding examination.

Lodged in Bhondsi jail all this time and after overcoming several hurdles, Kumar finally able got bail on November 20.

He managed this despite his meagre Rs 6,000 per month salary – with which his family was barely able to manage their household, which includes an ailing father and two young children, one of whom is also seven-years-old.

Meanwhile, along with Kumar and his family, residents of his entire village too heaved a

sigh of relief after his acquittal.In a country where social

ostracisation is very common over the most trivial of allega-tions, elders in Kumar’s village went against the tide.

At one point of a time, the entire fraternity of lawyers in Sohna and Gurugram refused to fight Kumar’s case. But his village residents stood by him and ultimately the case was taken up by Rohtak-based law-yer Mohit Verma.

Residents of Kumar’s village located in Sohna reportedly had also pooled in money to support his family’s expenses.

“I feel happy and satisfied. I want to thank my family and my village elders who stood by me during difficult times. I now want that justice must also be done to the family of the deceased child,” said Kumar after his release on Wednesday.

Three charred to death as ambulance rams into truckOUR CORRESPONDENT

GREATER NOIDA: At least three persons died while two others were critically injured when the ambulance they were travelling in collided with a truck in Badalpur area of Greater Noida early Wednesday morning, police said.

They added that the victims were charred to death, while the injured passengers are in a critical condition.

According to police, the ambulance had dropped a patient at Guru Teg Bahadur Hospital in Delhi and was on its way to Bulandshahr when the accident took place.

“The incident happened near Chhapraula village on NH-91 around 2 am. The ambulance was behind a truck and trying to overtake it. As the truck tried to take a turn, the ambulance rammed into it and caught fire,” said Mukesh Kumar, SHO, Badalpur Police Station.

The impact of the collision and the fire which engulfed

the ambulance were so severe that the driver and the two passengers sitting in the backseat were immediately killed.

The truck driver, meanwhile, is on the run.

“The two other passengers managed to survive because they were thrown out of the ambulance as the glass window broke.

“Had they been inside the vehicle, they might not have survived,” Kumar further said.

The injured men have been identified as Nand Maurya of Ballia district and Manek of Bulandshahr district.

“They are undergoing treatment at the district

hospital in Noida. The three bodies are in the mortuary.

“We are waiting for the families to come forward to claim the body. They have not been identified yet. Once the bodies are claimed, post-mortem examination will be conducted,” said Kumar.

An FIR under sections of the Indian Penal Code relating to rash driving and culpable homicide was registered at Badalpur police station against the truck driver.

“The truck driver fled the spot and efforts to nab him are underway. We are tracking down the owner of the truck which has been registered in Amroha,” said Kumar.

Celebratory firing by nephew kills groom during processionOUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: In a tragic incident reported from the Capital’s Shahdara district, a bridegroom was killed during celebratory fire at his marriage procession in Seemapuri.

Police said that on Tuesday night, the marriage proces-sion was being taken out from Kalandar Colony and was pro-ceeded towards Faridabad.

During the procession, the bridegroom Deepak’s nephew fired from a gun to celebrate the occasion.

One of the shots struck the 23-year-old bridegroom in the head and he fell off his horse during the Ghud Chadi tradition.

Panic immediately spread among the guests at the pro-cession, as they saw the groom collapse to the ground and bleeding profusely.

A senior police official said that Deepak was rushed to Guru Tegh Bahadur Hos-pital with a gunshot injury in the head, and he succumbed to the wound around 2 am on Wednesday.

He added that the accused is currently absconding.

Sources said that the vic-tim worked as a helper on a bus at Anand Vihar inter state bus terminal.

Police said they have formed several teams to inves-tigate the case and search for the absconding accused.

They are also scanning the CCTV footage from areas where the incident occurred and the wedding photogra-pher is being roped in for the investigation.

Cops are also inquiring other attendees at the wedding to know whether someone made a video of the incident, which may help law enforce-ment officials get a clearer pic-ture of the incident.

In December 2017, a 24-year-old car mechanic was killed and two others injured during a suspected celebratory firing in north east Delhi’s Wel-come. The shots were fired by men in a car, which was a part of the wedding procession.

In another incident in December, a teenager identi-fied as Mohammad Nayeem was killed during celebratory firing in a wedding procession in Chandni Mahal area. The accused was later arrested.

Traffic cops to crack down on unruly Holi revellers

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Ahead of Holi celebrations on Friday, Delhi Traffic Police has made elab-orate traffic arrangements to ensure safety of motorists on roads and check drunken and/or reckless driving, over-speed-ing, red light jumping, triple riding, underage driving, rid-ing two-wheelers without hel-met, performing stunts on two-wheeler and other traffic violations.

Joint Commissioner of Police (Traffic) Garima Bhatn-gar said, “Special checking teams with alcometers have been deployed at major inter-sections and vulnerable points to detect and prosecute traffic

violations. Special traffic police checking teams with intercep-tors, along with PCR and local police teams, will be stationed on various roads and strate-gic locations/intersections all over Delhi to check drunken driving, red Light jumping and other traffic violations.”

“Interceptors will be deployed at various vulnera-ble roads to check incidences of over-speeding,” she added.

Police sources further said that action will also be initiated against the registered owners of those vehicles which will be found to be driven by minors and/or unauthorised persons, being used for stunts or being driven without a valid license.

Moreover, as per directions

of the Supreme Court Com-mittee on Road Safety, in cases of drunken driving, red light jumping, using mobile phone while driving, dangerous driv-ing and over-speeding, an indi-vidual’s driving license will also be seized and he/she would be liable for suspension for a mini-mum period of three months.

“Delhi Traffic Police appeals to all motorists to avoid traffic violations especially drunken driving. Parents should not allow their minors to drive vehicles. All motorists are advised to obey traffic rules and regulations and follow the directions of the traffic police-men on duty for their safety as well as the safety of other road users,” said the officer.

Elderly madrasa

teacher held for rape of 9-yr-old

Viral clip shows traffic cops

manhandling motorist

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: An nine-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a 70-year-old teacher inside a madarsa in Narela area of north west Delhi, police said on Wednesday.

The incident reportedly took place on February 25, after which the Delhi Police arrested the accused teacher on Tuesday. The girl was admitted to BR Ambedkar Hospital in Rohini, where doctors said that though she is in trauma her condition is stable. The madarsa teacher has been identified as Zakir Alam and was arrested after the girls parents informed with a complaint with the police on Monday.

The incident took place inside a madarsa in Narela’s JJ colony. The girls, along with her parents, lives near the madarsa.

The accused had threatened the girl not to reveal the incident to anyone. However after she reached home, the girl fainted. Suspicious, the parents asked her what was the matter and the girl revealed the ordeal to her mother.

Swati Jai Hind, chairperson, Delhi Commission for Women, on Wednesday tweeted, “Feel-ing sick to the core. Seeing child rape survivor is gut wrenching. Her eyes, her pain, her trauma is inexpressible. 9 year old rape survivor has suffered severe injuries. Who is responsible? Both system and society -for its their deafening silence which ensures status quo.”

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: A video clip gone viral on Wednesday afternoon shows traffic cops manhandling a man in Ranjit Nagar area of central Delhi on Wednesday afternoon.

The exact reason behind the incident is yet to be deter-mined, sources said.

The incident was filmed on mobile by a bystander in the crowd and shows two traffic policemen slapping and chas-ing a man, who was accom-panied by a woman, in Ranjit Nagar. Later, the lady is seen trying to slap the policemen.

The man then falls down at some distance, after being chased by the cops, who then dragged him by his trousers along the ground.

As bystanders watched the entire episode, some filmed it and sent it across social media, making it viral in a few hours.

A senior police officer claimed, “The altercation started after the traffic cops tried to check the documents of the couple on the scooty, which took an ugly turn.”

He added that a Head Con-stable Rajender made a PCR call about the incident and police are now investigating the case.

EIGHT NORTHERN RAILWAY EMPLOYEES CONFERRED SAFETY AWARD

NEW DELHI: Northern Railway on Wednesday honoured services of eight of its employees through Safety Awards at a ceremony held at Northern Rail-way Headquarters Office, Baroda House here. The Awards were presented by Assistant General Manag-er Manju Gupta. Chief Safety Officer Seema Kumar and Principal Heads of all departments of Northern Railway also attended the ceremony

ANGELIQUE FOUNDATION LAUNCHES SEVEN LIBRARIES ACROSS DCB SCHOOLS

NEW DELHI: Angelique Foundation on Wednesday inaugurated seven libraries, known as ‘Angelique Pustakalayas’, in seven schools run by the Delhi Can-tonment Board here. The initiative, undertaken by the CSR arm of Angelique International Ltd, was launched by New Delhi MP Meenakshi Lekhi.

CITY BRIEFS

EXAMINEES PROTEST

Thousands of examinees took to the streets on Wednesday to protest against the Staff Selection Commission over the alleged paper leak for the Combined Graduate Levele Tier-II Exam. Massive traffic jams were seen in south Delhi, while JLN Stadium Metro station was closed for some time PIC/MPOST

Narrow escape for 50-year-old shot at by masked men in Connaught Place

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: In a sensational shootout reported from cen-tral Delhi’s Connaught Place on Wednesday morning, two masked men opened fire on a 50-year-old man and escaped after their attempt to snatch his belongings failed.

Delhi Police said that the injured man has been identi-fied as Tasveer Singh, a resident of Rohini, who was shot near PVR Rivoli, located in A block of Connaught Place.

Onlookers immediately

rushed Singh to the nearby Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital, where is condition is reported said to be stable.

Sources said he works as in

a money exchange bureau in Connaught Place.

Though police claim there was no money in the bag that the accused tried to snatch

from him, they are investigat-ing whether the shootout was thre result of a personal enmity.

CCTV footage of the area around is also being scanned and police are questioning the victim’s relatives. However, police are yet to completely rule out the robbery angle.

Sources said that the two assailants attacked Singh as he was walking towards his office.

It is still unclear whether the attackers had done a rec-cee of the area or had shot the victim in the busy Connaught Place area purely by chance.

PIYUSH OHRIE

GURUGRAM: Questions over safety of students travelling in school buses were raised again in Gurugram, after a school bus collided with an SUV on Feb-ruary 24, claiming the life of a 60-year-old travelling in the car and injuring several school stu-dents in the bus.

Preliminary investigation revealed that the bus did not have speed governor. Taking cognisance of the case, the child welfare committee has asked the Deputy Commissioner to ensure that proper safety guide-lines are met while transporting students to and from school.

In spite of periodic checks by the district authorities, most school buses – in order to cut costs – compromise on the safety guidelines, thus putting the safety of students in peril.

According to transport coor-dinators working in schools, a 37-seat school bus costs around Rs 16 lakh, with the cost only going higher with further with precautions.

In the past, campaigns have been launched by the Regional Transport Authority (RTA) to promote safe transportation of students. But they seem to have lost steam, as students are still ferried in a risky manner.

Key parameters of the RTA directives were identification of the school transport vehicle through yellow and blue paint, installation of speed governors and CCTV cameras, and not filling the vehicle with students beyond capacity.

Authorities have often fined schools for flouting these rules, but parents’ grievances of unsafe buses still pour in. With most private schools charging exorbi-tant sums for school transporta-tion, most parents are forced to turn to private transport vehi-cles, like cabs and auto.

“I was forced to have my child travel in a private vehicle in Vasant Kunj because they were providing safe and effec-tive school transport facility for my child. Even though long transportation time is a mat-ter of inconvenience, it is also important for his safety, “said Anju Sachdeva, a city resident.

School transport a cause of worry for

parents in Gurugram

Ashok Kumar (centre) coming out of the Gurugram court, along with his lawyer, after being acquitted in the Gurugram schoolboy murder

PIC/MPOST

PIC/MPOST

The spot in Connaught Place, where the incident occurred PIC/MPOST

YOGESH KANT

NEW DELHI: Health services in the Capital took a severe hit, after LNJP and GB Pant hos-pitals stopped their outpatient department (OPD) services on Wednesday – with LNJP Hos-pital going so far as to close its emergency services.

Patients and their atten-dants from Delhi-NCR were left high and dry, as resident doctors at prominent Delhi government hospital’s contin-ued their strike for the second consecutive day, demanding better security for doctors and staff inside the hospital.

Sherada, a resident of Far-ash Khana whose six-month-old baby girl is suffering from a severe chest infection, reached LNJP Hospital, only to find doctors on strike and had to return home dejected and without a check-up of her daughter.

Meanwhile, Rambeer Dabaas, said, “I came from Narela to get my 70-year-old mother examined, who is suf-fering from cancer. But we were shocked to hear about the doc-tor’s strike here (LNJP).”

Talking to reporters, presi-dent of GB Pant Hospital resi-dent doctors’ association Dr Nishant said, “We want a safe and secure environment to give our services at the hospital. We also want the administration to register institutional FIR against the miscreants.”

“Three layers of security should be established to fil-ter out the excessive number attendants coming with the patients,” he further said.

The recent spate of attacks on doctors at hospitals here came under the scanner of the Delhi High Court, which on Wednesday, directed the authorities to take adequate measures to ensure safety and

security of medical profession-als. It also warned of contempt if steps were not taken.

JC Passey, medical direc-tor at LNJP Hospital, said, “We have approved all the demands raised by the resident doctors, Now the ball is in their court to call off the strike.”

The school bus which collided with an SUV on February 24

Doctors’ strike leaves patients helpless in Delhi

Patients stranded outside LNJP Hospital on Wednesday PIC/NAVEEN SHARMA

NEW DELHI: Scores of res-ident doctors and interns at Safadarjung Hospital went on strike on Wednesday over seat cuts in post grad-uate courses and termina-tion of the acting principal of Vardhaman Mahavir Medi-cal College.

The agitating doctors said that earlier, the Depart-ment of Surgery had 21 seats and Pediatrics had 15 seats. But now these have been reduced to almost half, with 12 seats in Surgery and six in Pediatrics.

The Resident Doctors Association said this would lead to significant compro-mise for patients. MPOST

Safdarjung Hospital

doctors protest seat cuts

Police said that the victim Deepak was rushed to Guru Tegh Bahadur Hospital with a gunshot injury in the head, but succumbed early Wednesday morning

The incident happened near Chhapraula village on NH-91 around 2 am on Wednesday, when the ambulance tried to overtake a truck. As the truck tried to take a turn, the ambulance rammed into it and immediately caught fire

mp nation 5MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

NEW DELHI: The CBI has booked a computer manufac-turer RP Info Systems and its directors for allegedly cheat-ing a consortium of banks to the tune of Rs 515.15 crore, and carried out searches at six loca-tions in Kolkata on Wednesday, officials said.

It is alleged that the direc-tors of the company, Shivaji Panja, Kaustuv Ray and Vinay Bafna, and its vice president Canara Bank and nine other consortium member banks to the tune of Rs 515.15 crore.

The CBI on Wednesday car-ried out searches at the resi-dence of all the accused and the corporate office in Kolk-ata, they said. It is not the first time that the company has had a brush with law as the CBI had booked it in 2015 for cheating IDBI bank, once a leader of the consortium before relinquish-

ing the position in 2013, to the tune of Rs 180 crore.

The other members of the bank were State Bank of India, State Bank of Bikaner and Jai-pur and State Bank of Patiala (both now part of the CBI), Union Bank of India, Alla-habad Bank, Oriental Bank of Commerce, Central Bank of India, Punjab National Bank, State Bank of Patiala and Fed-eral Bank.

It is alleged that loans were taken on the basis of false and fabricated documents.

The bank in its complaint on February 26, now part of the FIR, has alleged that the company which manufactured computers with brand name Chirag had taken funds from the consortium from time to time from 2012 onwards.

These loans have become NPA, it said,

The banks alleged that com-pany manipulated financial statements and did not route sale proceeds through the loan account.

The agency had booked the company and its directors in 2015 in connection with the case related to IDBI. But in the FIR, the agency had only focussed on the exposure to IDBI bank which was over Rs 180 crore.

“During 2013, IDBI Bank relinquished their position as consortium leader after the deliberations with RBI. It is learnt that in the month of December 2013, IDBI Bank lodged a complaint regarding the fraud committed on their bank alone to the CBI and the CBI investigated only their exposure of IDBI Bank,” the latest complaint from Canara Bank said. PTI

CBI books RP Info Systems for ̀ 515 crore fraud

DHIRENDRA KUMAR

NEW DELHI: With school education boards of the states staying away from National Academic Depository (NAD), it seems the initiative taken by the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to put a check on frauds in marks and certificates may prove to be a non-starter.

However, in contrary to state boards, the higher educa-tion institutions have adopted National Academic Deposi-tory (NAD) initiative with top priority.

According to official sources, only four major states such as Tamil Nadu, Punjab, Chhattisgarh and Assam have joined the NAD platform as of now while the CBSE and north-eastern states are relying on the services of their board’s aca-demic depository. The NDA-ruled Bihar has recently joined the national depository as the fifth state.

“In contrary to the tepid

response of state boards, over 300 institutions have so far been enrolled with the NAD and most of the institutions are Central varsities, IITs, IIMs, NITs. Apart from these, some state universities and private varsities have also started tak-ing the services of NAD,” the official sources said.

“Its secondary education boards of states that are show-ing least interest in joining the NAD platform. As of now, out of 55 education boards, only 11 have joined the NAD and of which seven boards are from the small states like Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura,

Meghalaya and Goa,” the offi-cial said.

Hoping that more education boards would get registered with the depository platform, the official stressed that unless all boards don’t become a part of NAD, it wouldn’t be possi-ble to put a complete check on counterfeiting of marksheets, certificates, etc.

Notably, the national aca-demic depository was approved by the Union Cabinet in Octo-ber 2016 and became opera-tional last year. The CDSL and NDSL have been entrusted with the responsibility of providing depository services.

State boards thumb down Nat’l Academic Depository

NEW DELHI: The junior HRD minister, Satyapal Singh, has courted another contro-versy with his comment that ‘mantras’ had codified laws of motion before Isaac Newton, even as he sought to clarify his earlier remarks on Darwin’s theory that had raised eye-brows, saying it was his “per-sonal opinion”.

At a meeting of the Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) which was chaired by Union HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar, the IPS-turned-politician said that “certain ‘mantras’ codified the laws of motion much before they were discovered by Isaac Newton, according to the minutes of the meeting held last month

Singh had also suggested that Vaastu compliance of edu-cational buildings was impor-tant for learning.

CABE is the government’s highest advisory body for pol-icy making in education.

“Whatever I had said on Darwin was my personal opinion. It has nothing to do

with the government or par-ty’s line,” the minister said at the National Science Day event here today.

He, however, refused to comment on the controversy over his Newton remarks.

Singh had drawn flak last month when he claimed that Darwin’s theory of evolu-tion was incorrect and should not be taught in schools and colleges.

“Nobody, including our ancestors, in written or oral, have said they saw an ape turning into a man.... Humans appeared on Earth as humans from the very beginning,” he had said at an event in Aurangabad.

Javadekar had asked Singh to refrain from making such comments and leave the sci-ence to scientists as it is their domain. MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

PATNA: Jitan Ram Manjhi gave a big jolt to the Nitish Kumar-led NDA government in Bihar on Wednesday by announcing his decision to join Lalu Yadav led Mahagathbandhan.

This is a realignment of political forces ahead of the 2019 General Elections with Lalu Yadav attempting to stitch a new caste combina-tion of Yadavs, Muslims and Mahadalits.

Manjhi’s decision is also seen as a coming of age moment for Lalu Yadav’s younger son and RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav.

For sometime now Hindu-stani Awam Morcha (HAM) leader Jitan Ram Manjhi and Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) leader Upendra Kush-waha have been giving a tough time to Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) and Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (United) as they started to bargain for more say in the alliance.

Manjhi had made his

intentions clear just after the announcement of by-polls as he was willing to fight from at least Jehanabad seat. Kush-waha was also eying this seat but the BJP played a master-stroke and told JDU to contest. Earlier, JDU had announced its decision not to contest the by-elections.

Both Manjhi and Kush-waha were restless after Nit-ish Kumar’s return to the NDA fold as they feared lesser repre-sentation in coming elections. On the other hand, Lalu Yadav, serving jail sentence after found guilty in fodder scam cases, and his party also knew that a MY (Muslim-Yadav) combina-tion is not not enough to win elections.

After Lalu’s incarceration, Mahagathbandhan leader Tejashwi Yadav, with the sup-port of the Congress, tried to mount all-out attack against Nitish and the BJP by alleg-ing misuse of the CBI against his family. Tejashwi contin-ued his effort to lure Kush-

waha and Manjhi into the Mahagathbandhan.

Kushwaha was look-ing more rebellious but after meeting with Amit Shah, he announced his decision to con-tinue support to NDA candi-dates in the by-elections. One of his close associates said, “Hamne faisla kiya hai ki batashe ke liye mandir nahi todenge.”

But Manjhi became more vocal and demanded a Rajya Sabha seat from the NDA.

Meanwhile, in its effort to woo Dalits, Tejashwi offered Rajya Sabha seat to Mayawati which she humbly declined. Then on Tuesday, Lalu’s close

aid and RJD MLA Bhola Yadav said his party has extended open offer to Manjhi.

Political circles were abuzz that talks were on between both the parties. Danish Rizwan, one of the close associate of Manjhi, conveyed to the RJD camp that his leader was ready to switch side if HAM gets respect-ful representation in Maha-gathbandhan. On Wednesday morning, Tejashwi dropped in at Manjhi’s residence and the deal was finalised.

With the Muslim-Yadav combination, with about 30 percent vote share (Muslims – 16 percent, Yadav – 14 per-cent), already in Mahagath-bandhan kitty, Manjhi’s entry means he will influence about 10 percent Mahadalit votes. Manjhi comes from Mushhar community.

After Manjhi’s exit, Kush-waha is likely to up the ante as he too is considered leader of Koeri community which con-stitutes roughly seven percent vote share.

Jitan Manjhi decides to join Lalu camp

HRD Min stokes controversy over

Newton again

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Meh-booba Mufti met Prime Minis-ter Narendra Modi today and discussed the prevailing situ-ation in the state and various development issues with him, an official said.

During the hour-long meeting, Mehbooba briefed Modi on the security situation in the Valley as well as along the border with Pakistan, which has been witnessing heavy cross-border firing and con-tinuous attempts of infiltration by militants.

The two leaders also dis-cussed the ongoing peace initiatives undertaken by the Centre’s representative, Dineshwar Sharma, the offi-cial added.

The prime minister and the chief minister also discussed various aspects of the imple-mentation of the Rs 1 lakh crore package for Jammu and Kash-

mir, which was announced by Modi in 2015.

The central government has already sanctioned a total of Rs 62,599 crore of the package.

On Monday, the General Officer Commanding of the army’s Srinagar-based Chinar Corps, Lt Gen A K Bhatt, had said a large number of terror-ists were waiting at launching pads across the Line of Con-trol (LoC) to cross over into Kashmir and that the ceasefire violations by Pakistan were an attempt to facilitate the entry of the infiltrators.

There were 515 incidents of infiltration in Jammu and Kashmir in 2017, in which 75 militants were killed. In 2016, there were 454 such cases, in which 45 militants were killed.

In January alone, eight civil-ians and six security person-nel were killed and around 70 injured in ceasefire violations by Pakistani troops along the Indo-Pak border in the Jammu region.

Mehbooba meets PM; discusses security

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednes-day reviewed the progress made in handling and resolu-tion of grievances related to Delhi Police. He also reviewed the progress of the Kedarnath reconstruction work in Utta-rakhand. The state government presented the progress of works through drone imagery. Chair-ing the 24th interaction through ‘Pragati’, an ICT-based platform for communicating with the bureaucracy, Modi stressed on the importance of improv-ing the quality of disposal of grievances.According to an offi-cial statement, he also reviewed the progress of 10 infrastructure projects in the railway, road, power, petroleum and coal sec-tors, spread over several states like Himachal Pradesh, Pun-jab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. PTI

PM Modi reviews grievance handling

in Delhi Police

OUR CORRESPONDENT

AHMEDABAD: Shivanand Jha, a 1983 batch Indian Police Service officer, was today appointed as the new Direc-tor General of Police (DGP) of Gujarat through a notifica-tion issued by the state home department on Wednesday.

“The government is pleased to appoint Shivanand Jha, IPS (GJ-1983) on a vacant post of DGP,” the notification said.

With this, Jha will be be the first full-time DGP to be appointed in the state since April 15, 2016, when the incumbent P C Thakur was transferred and replaced by an in-charge DGP P P Pandey.

Jha, who was heading the CID (Intelligence) as its DGP, was appointed to the top post after in-charge DGP Pramod Kumar retired. Kumar him-self followed another in-charge DGP, Geeta Johri, who retired after serving on the post for a month.

Shivanand Jha is new Gujarat DGP

NEW DELHI: Cana-dian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s trip to India was a public relations disaster and it is not going away. Trudeau now finds himself at the cen-tre of the Indian government’s fire after telling the Canadian parliament that he agreed with what one of his senior officials had said -- that factions within the Indian government were behind the move to invite Kha-listani terrorist Jaspal Atwal to the Canadian high commis-sioner’s reception in Delhi.

The opposition Conserva-tive Party raised the issue in Canadian parliament, demand-ing to know whether Trudeau agreed with the remarks of the official, identified by the Cana-dian media as national security adviser Daniel Jean.

“Will the prime minister tell the house whether or not anyone in his office arranged, organised or participated in the media briefing provided to reporters that included the alle-gation that the Government of India was somehow involved in his embarrassing blunder in

India?” asked opposition leader Andrew Scheer.

“Our professional, non-par-tisan public service does high quality work and when one of our top diplomats and secu-rity officials says something to Canadians, it’s because they know it to be true,” said Mr

Trudeau in his response.Reacting strongly to Mr

Trudeau’s remarks, the minis-try of external affairs said, “We categorically state that the Gov-ernment of India, including the security agencies, had nothing to do with the presence of Jas-pal Atwal at the event hosted by the Canadian High Com-missioner in Mumbai or the invitation issued to him for the Canadian High Commission-er’s reception in New Delhi. Any suggestion to the contrary is baseless and unacceptable.”

Jaspal Atwal was a Sikh separatist active in the banned International Sikh Youth Fed-eration when he was convicted of a botched attempt to assas-sinate Punjab minister Malkiat Singh Sidhu in Canada in 1986.

In a huge embarrassment

for Canada, Jaspal Atwal was photographed with Mr Trudeau’s wife Sophie Trudeau and Canadian minister Amar-jeet Sohi at an event in Mumbai last week. Amidst the row, the Canadian envoy in India with-drew an invite to Jaspal Atwal for a dinner hosted for the vis-iting prime minister.

After Mr Trudeau said he would take action against “the person responsible” for the invites, Canadian lawmaker Randeep Sarai had taken the blame and apologised.

The External Affairs Minis-try said it is investigating how Jaspal Atwal got an Indian visa and why he was cleared for the Trudeau events.

After a lukewarm visit, this row won’t help India-Canada ties in the near future. AGENCIES

India, Justin Trudeau again head for spat on Jaspal Atwal OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday asked the chief ministers of the BJP-led states to work hard to take his government’s flagship welfare measures like health insurance for the poor, and electricity and house for all, to the masses as the party gears up for the next Lok Sabha polls in 2019, party sources said.

Chhattisgarh Chief Minis-ter Raman Singh told reporters that the issue of simultane-ous polls, strengthening the organisation further ahead of the next Lok Sabha polls, and taking the party’s development agenda to the poor were among the matters discussed at the meeting which lasted for over five hours.

All BJP chief ministers, barring Goa Chief Minis-ter Manohar Parrikar, and six deputy chief ministers were

present in the meeting which was attended by top party leaders, including its president Amit Shah and Union minis-ters Rajnath Singh, Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley besides the prime minister among others.

A key matter on the meet-ing’s agenda was the central government’s proposal to have a Rs 5 lakh medical cover for 10 crore poor families, the Chhat-tisgarh chief minister said.

“We discussed key planks of our good governance agenda and the chief ministers high-lighted what they have been doing in this aspect,” Singh said, adding that the work to take electricity to all house-holds by next year and provid-ing a home to all families by 2022 was also reviewed.

On simultaneous polls, Singh said the party is keen to implement it and discussed measures in this regard.

Modi asks BJP CMs to work hard to take govt’s flagship measures to masses

MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

BOLLYWOOD DIRECTOR RAJKUMAR SANTOSHI ADMITTED TO HOSPITALMumbai: Bollywood director Rajkumar Santoshi was admitted to Nanavati Hospital here for a heart ail-ment on Wednesday."He has been admitted to the hospital for a heart- related problem. We can't share any further information at the moment," a hospital official said. Santoshi, who started his career as an assistant director for Govind Nihlani's "Ardh Satya" (1982), is known for hit films such as "Ghayal", "Damini" and the cult comedy "Andaz Apna Apna".

ASI SUSPENDED FOR LEVELLING GRAFT CHARGES AGAINST SHOJAIPUR: An assistant sub inspector (ASI) in Nagaur district has been suspended after he accused the SHO of Kuchera police station of pressuring the station staff for extorting money from people. On Monday night, ASI Mehram has levelled corruption charges against SHO Mahaveer Prasad Meena, a sub inspector, through WhatsApp following which he was suspended yesterday on charges of indiscipline and unwarranted action, a senior police official said. The ASI Mehram has the history of misconduct and negligence on duty. He was suspended for indiscipline yesterday and a separate probe was ordered into the allegations lev-elled by him, IG Ajmer Malini Agrawal said.

CENTRE SANCTIONS FUND FOR RURAL ROADS IN ARUNACHAL PRADESHITANAGAR: The Union Ministry of Rural Development has sanctioned Rs 706.47 crore for the construction of 43 roads and 15 bridges in Arunachal Pradesh under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY).An official sanction order signed by the Director (rural connectivity) in the Union Rural Development Ministry, P Manoj Kumar, addressed to the state RWD commis-sioner said. Chief Minister Pema Khandu assured the Union government that the funds sanctioned will be judiciously utilised and the projects will be completed well in time, an official release said on Wednesday.

PAK RESORTS TO FIRING, SHELLING ALONG LOC IN RAJOURI, JAMMUJAMMU: Increasing its arc of ceasefire violations, Pakistani troops have fired and shelled forward areas along the LoC in Sunderbani, Nowshera and Khour sectors of Rajouri and Jammu districts, forcing the Indian Army to retaliate effectively. The Pakistan Army violated the ceasefire agreement around 1030 hours today in Nowshera, Kalal and Sunderbani sectors along the Line of Control in Rajouri district, a defence spokesman said. Pakistani troops also resorted to ceasefire violations in Chakla and Baldoo areas in Khour sector late last night, police said. "(The Indian) Army is retaliating effectively", they said.

IT MADRAS ROPES IN EXPERTS FOR RESEARCH IN ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCECHENNAI: Indian Institute of Technology Madras signed a joint development agreement on Wednesday with Applied Materials India to conduct research in data sciences, machine learning and artificial intel-ligence (AI). The industry sectors that can potentially benefit from this initiative are semiconductors, pharma and display. Speaking about the agreement, IIT Ma-dras Director Prof. Bhaskar Ramamurthi said, “We look forward to collaborating with Applied Materials in the fast-expanding field of AI. The IIT Madras is already a leader in this area and bringing the expertise from academics and industry ...for making early break-throughs in applications.”

10 IPS OFFICERS SHIFTED IN UPLUCKNOW: The UP government on Wednesday transferred 10 IPS officers, including IG, Women Power Line (1090) Navneit Sikera. ADG Brijraj, attached to the DGP office, has been made ADG anti-corruption organisation, while ADG crime cell Anju Gupta has been made ADG, Women Power Line (1090). The Women Power Line (1090) service was set up by the UP government in 2012 to empower women against all forms of harassment and ensure their safety.

NATION BRIEFS

mp nation6BYPOLLS IN ODISHA AND MADHYA PRADESH

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Congress on Wednesday dubbed the arrest of senior leader P Chid-ambaram's son Karti Chidam-baram a "diversionary tactic" by the government to hide its scams and said "vendetta" would not deter the party from speaking the truth.

Several Congress leaders, including the party's commu-nications in-charge Randeep Surjewala, Kapil Sibal and Abhishek Singhvi, spoke out against Karti Chidambaram's arrest.

It was a "classical diversion-ary tactic" to hide "corruption scams, mal-governance and mal-administration that have marred this government", Sur-jewala said.

"The Congress party will not be deterred by unleashing

of vendetta against Mr P Chid-ambaram or his family. We will continue to speak the truth. We will continue to expose the Modi government’s corruption and we will continue to hold them accountable to people of the country," he told reporters.

Senior Congress leader Sibal also termed the arrest "malafide" and said it was done to harass P Chidambaram."This is complete vendetta politics, this is completely malafide," he said. Sibal challenged the agencies to produce evidence against Karti Chidambaram. "They are always misusing the law," he said.

Karti Chidambaram was arrested at Chennai airport around 8 am when he returned from the United Kingdom.

An FIR filed by the CBI on May 15 last year had alleged irregularities in the FIPB clear-

ance to INX Media for receiving overseas funds to the tune of Rs 305 crore in 2007 when Chid-ambaram was Union finance minister. It is alleged that Karti Chidambaram received funds to the tune of Rs 10 lakh in the case, officials said.

Surjewala said scams worth over Rs 30,000 crore were unearthed in the last 10 days alone. “But the prime minis-ter has not moved the tran-sition from ‘Maun Modi’ to ‘Bol Modi’. The prime minister remains mum about Çhhota Modi’ as also Mehul Choksi,” he said.

He cited the cases of designer jeweller Nirav Modi and his uncle Mehul Choksi, Rotomac and Durga Das Seth jeweller to say that fresh scams were being unearthed every-day but the prime minister was keeping quiet.

Karti arrest is vendetta, diversionary tactic: Cong

OUR CORRESPONDENT

MUMBAI: Mumbai Congress chief Sanjay Nirupam has said that every person living in Maharashtra should speak Marathi and make an "honest and sincere" attempt to keep the language alive. His remarks came against the backdrop of the goof-up in translation dur-ing Governor Ch Vidyasagar Rao's address to the Maharash-tra legislature on Monday.

A similar glitch happened on Tuesday when the last stanza of 'Marathi Abhimaan Geet' wasn't played in the Vid-han Bhavan premises on the occasion of 'Marathi Bhasha Gaurav Din', inviting the oppo-sition's ire.

Nirupam said Marathi is the state language of Maha-rashtra and it is important that every person living in the state

speak the language. "Everybody should make an honest and sin-cere attempt to keep the lan-guage, its literature and beauty alive. This is the responsibility of each and every person who lives in Maharashtra," he said in a statement on Wednesday.

In a state where several elec-tioneering slogans are raised over Marathi, not much has been done by the BJP govern-ment for the language, he rued.

NCP leader Jayant Patil yesterday sought to know in the state Assembly about the demand for giving Marathi, the status of a classical language. Nirupam said even the prom-

ise made three-and-a-half years ago by the state government to set up a 'Marathi Bhavan' has not been fulfilled.

The Congress has been at the forefront of promoting the Marathi language and ensuring that it is given its due impor-tance, he said. The state edu-cation minister, Vinod Tawde, told the Legislative Council yesterday that the government is considering to make Marathi language a compulsory sub-ject up to class 10 in CBSE and CISCE schools.

At present, Marathi is a compulsory subject up to class 8 in schools run by the Central Board of Secondary Education, and the Council for the Indian School Certificate Examina-tions, a private board which conducts the Indian Certifi-cate of Secondary Education examination.

Every person in Maharashtra must speak Marathi: Nirupam

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The apex anti-terror body National Investi-gation Agency (NIA) will be the nodal authority for probing cases of human trafficking after the government on Wednes-day approved a proposal in this regard, according to an official.

The Union Cabinet Wednesday okayed the draft Trafficking of Persons (Preven-tion, Protection and Rehabilita-tion) Bill, which also proposes a punishment of life imprison-ment for repeat offenders, the source said.

According to officials of the ministry of women and child development, the NIA would receive financial aid under Nirbhaya Fund for safety of women in order to set up a cell for investigating human trafficking.

Government officials say that in order to empower the NIA to probe trafficking cases, the National Investigation Act, 2008, will have to be amended.

The draft Bill divides vari-ous offences into "trafficking" and "aggravated trafficking".

The former category of crimes would carry a jail term

of seven to 10 years and the latter would carry a punish-ment of at least 10 years in jail, which can be extended to life imprisonment.

Aggravated offences will include forced labour, bonded labour, forced surrogacy, use of narcotics to induce forced labour, trafficking in the garb of marriage and those that lead to a pregnancy or grave illness such as HIV/AIDS.

The draft bill also moots three years in jail for abet-ting, promoting and assisting trafficking.

The proposed law recom-mends a national anti-traffick-ing relief and rehabilitation committee which would be headed by Secretary of Women and Child Development ministry.

It also suggests setting up of a rehabilitation fund and pre-scribes a process to be followed for repatriation of trafficked persons.

NIA to probe human trafficking cases

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: In what could be described as major boost to the morale of the embattled opposition party ahead of the Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections this year, the Con-gress has managed to retain both the Mungaoli and Kolaras constituencies, when went to bypolls on February 24.

On the other hand, the ruling Biju Janata Dal on Wednesday wrested the Bij-epur Assembly constituency in Odisha from the Congress in a by-poll, with its candidate Rita Sahu defeating her nearest rival, Ashok Panigrahi of the BJP, by 41,933 votes.

While Congress’s Brijendra Singh Yadav won by 2124 votes in Mungaoli, Mahendra Singh Yadav defeated BJP’s Devendra Jain in Kolaras.

Both seats fall in the Guna Lok Sabha constituency that is represented by Jyotiraditya Scindia, who had put in the hard yards in ensuring Con-

gress’ stranglehold in the two regions, the bypolls for which were necessitated due to the death of Congress’s Mun-gaoli MLA Mahendra Singh Kalukheda and its Kolaras MLA Ram Singh Yadav.

However, the BJP can claim solace from the fact that the winning margins in the two seats were much less than what transpired in the 2013 Assem-bly elections. While Congress won by a margin of 24,953

votes in Kolaras assembly constituency, in Mungaoli it thumped BJP by 20,765 votes in the last state polls. How-ever, this time Brijendra Singh Yadav who bagged 70,808 votes defeated his BJP rival Baisa-hab Yadav by just over 2000 votes. Baisahab Yadav secured 68,684 votes.

Scindia said the mandate in favour of Congress was a vic-tory of truth and development. “People have taken a decision.

It’s victory of truth and devel-opment. The people of MP have already taken a decision to oust the BJP from the state. The gov-ernment that had not seen the face of Mungaoli in 14 years, camped there with their entire Cabinet during election,” the Congress leader said.

Odisha Election Commis-sion said Sahu polled 1,02,871 votes against the 60,938 secured by Panigrahi.

Pranaya Sahu of the Con-gress, which had held the seat three terms in a row, came third with 10,274 votes and lost his deposit. The BJP had polled 30,001 votes from Bijepur in the 2014 Assembly elections.

As many as 1,684 voters opted for the NOTA (None Of The above) option in the by-poll held on February 24, EC's returning officer Tapiram Majhi said.

The by-election was held following the death of three-time Congress MLA Subal Sahu in August last year.

The BJD fielded his widow

as its candidate, while Pani-grahi left the BJD and contested from the BJP.

Chief Minister Naveen Pat-naik said the Bijepur by-poll result would have an impact on future elections in the Odisha.

Patnaik thanked the peo-ple of Bijepur for the "massive victory".

"I would like to express my deep gratitude to the people of the Bijepur Assembly constitu-ency for having showered their blessings on the BJD," he said.

Asked about pre-poll vio-lence in Bijepur, Patnaik said Odisha was a peaceful state.

"People will not stand for violence in a democracy," he said.

Odisha's people were peace loving and had rejected the pol-itics of hatred and violence, the chief minister tweeted. "Hum-bled by love and trust of the people of Bijepur for giving @bjd_Odisha a massive victory. BJD lives in the hearts of the people of Odisha," he said in his Twitter post.

Congress retains Mungaoli & Kolaras; BJD wrests Bijepur OUR CORRESPONDENT

BHUBANESWAR: Hailing his party candidate Rita Sahu's victory in Bijepur Assembly bypolls on Wednesday, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik said the outcome of the polls would have an impact on the general elections in 2019.

Sahu won the by-election by defeating her nearest BJP rival Ashok Panigrahi by a margin of 41,933 votes, an EC official said.

"Such an enormous victory with a margin of over 40,000 votes will have an impact on future elections," Patnaik told reporters while thanking the people of Bijepur for their over-whelming support to the ruling BJD's candidate. While hail-ing the party's impressive show, Patnaik, also the party chief, said the people of Bijepur have rejected violence.

"Odisha is a peaceful state; the people will not stand for violence in a democracy," he added.

'Bypoll win would impact '19 polls'

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Jordan's King Abdullah II, who is a 41st generation direct descen-dant of Prophet Muhammad and is known for his global initiative to fight radicalisa-tion, will deliver a lecture on Islamic heritage and promot-ing understanding and mod-eration at a conference in Delhi on Thursday.

Prime Minister Naren-dra Modi, diplomats, repre-sentatives from a wide range of Islamic institutions, acade-micians and think-tanks will attend the event to be held at Vigyan Bhavan, officials said.

India has around 17 crore Muslims which is around 15 per cent of the country's total population. The Muslim pop-ulation in India is one of the largest globally.

The Jordanian King arrived

here last evening on a three-day visit which is aimed at tak-ing bilateral relations to a "new high". Reflecting the impor-tance of his visit, Modi received King Abdullah II bin Al-Hus-sein at the airport, in a spe-cial gesture. Tomorrow's event will also witness the release of the Urdu translation of a book titled 'A Thinking Person's Guide to Islam' authored by Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad

bin Talal, a cousin of the King.Prince Ghazi, a well-known

scholar, is also the Chief Advi-sor for Religious and Cultural Affairs in Jordan.

The book is an attempt to interpret the real meaning of Islam and to wean it away from those that have been distorting its philosophy and seeking to bring it into perpetual conflict with the rest of the world, said an expert in Islamic studies.

"Because of their actions, very few non-Muslims under-stand the real difference between Islam as it has always been, and the distorted per-versions of the religion today," he said. "So, this book is an attempt to positively say what Islam actually is- and always was- as well as what it is not. The book is split into twelve thematic chapters, each begin-ning with and centered around a key Quranic verse," he said.

Prince Ghazi bin Muham-mad had studied at Harrow School in UK and Princeton University, the US.

He had received his first PhD from Trinity College, Cambridge University, and his second PhD from Al-Azhar University, Cairo. The King's visit comes nearly three weeks after Modi travelled to Jordan as part of his trip to West Asia, including Palestine.

Jordan King to talk on Islamic heritagePM TO ATTEND EVENT

LUCKNOW: The BSP today demanded disqualification of its former leader Nasimuddin Siddiqui from the membership of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council.

In a letter to the Legislative Council, Chairman Ramesh Yadav, Leader of the BSP Leg-islature Party in the Upper House Sunil Kumar Chit-tor informed that Siddiqui had joined another party on Feburary 18 after resigning from Mayawati's party on his own. Hence, it amounted to violation of the anti-defection law, BSP national general sec-retary SC Misra said, quoting Chittor's letter to the Coun-cil chairman. Siddiqui had become a BSP MLC on Janu-ary 23, 2015 and quit the party to join the Congress on Febru-ary 18. In November last year, Council Chairman Ramesh Yadav had rejected the Bahu-

jan Samaj Party's petition to disqualify Siddiqui as a mem-ber of the legislative council on the ground that he had left the party. In an application to the council chairman on June 29, the party had demanded that Siddiqui should not be given any facility or allowance that he used to enjoy as a legislator.

At that time too, Chittor had sent the application to the chairman citing various rules, seeking that Siddiqui be dis-qualified from membership with effect from May 27.

It was on May 27 that Sid-diqui floated a new outfit, the Rashtriya Bahujan Morcha, after he was expelled from the BSP. The BSP in its petition had said that Siddiqui was elected on a BSP ticket and since he was no longer associated with the party, he should be disqual-ified from the membership of the council. MPOST

Terminate Siddiqui's membership to UP legislative council: BSP

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Senior Con-gress leader P Chidambaram appeared to have a premoni-tion of the arrest of his son Karti when he filed a peti-tion recently in the Supreme Court apprehending "contin-ued harassment" to him and his family members.

Karti was arrested by the CBI today on his arrival from London, even before Chidam-baram's petition could be listed for hearing by the top court.

Chidambaram, who has been closely monitoring the case of his son in the Supreme Court which is argued by his party colleague and senior advocate Kapil Sibal, had sprung a surprise last week by filing a petition on his own accusing the CBI and the ED of carrying out a political vendetta against him and his family.

In his petition, Chidam-baram has sought the apex court's direction prohibit-ing the CBI and Enforcement Directorate (ED) from continu-ing their "illegal investigations" and from acting in any manner "causing repeated harassment" to him and his family members, including his son.

However, the CBI swung into action by arresting Karti today even before the petition was heard by the top court.

In his plea, Chidambaram, himself a senior advocate, has said that the position in the INX Media case was "worse" as, though the CBI had lodged an FIR in May 2017, the probe agencies have not filed any report "concluding that any criminal offence had been committed or that any pro-ceeds of crime had arisen out of that criminal offence".

An FIR, filed by the CBI on May 15 last year, had alleged irregularities in the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) clearance to INX Media for receiving overseas funds to the tune of Rs 305 crore in 2007 when Chidambaram was the Union finance minister.

While the CBI has alleged that Karti had received funds to the tune of Rs 10 lakh in the case, the ED has also registered a money laundering case in the matter.

Chidambaram, in his peti-tion before the apex court, has said that his fundamental rights were being violated due to "ille-gal" investigations being car-ried out by the CBI and the ED and the central government has been "misusing" its probe agencies.

He has said that being the Finance Minister then, he had granted FIPB approvals in the

INX Media case and the Air-cel-Maxis case in the "normal course of official business". In discharge of his functions, he has "never allowed any member of his family, including his son, or any other person to interfere with or influence the conduct of official business".

Chidambaram has said that the CBI and ED can-not "harass" Karti and others, who were totally unconnected with the FIPB approval by issuing repeated summons to them.

"The petitioner (Chidam-baram) feels sad that his son and his business friends are being targeted," the plea said, adding, "The entire investiga-tion being conducted by the CBI and ED is a total farce and is being made only to malign the name of the petitioner and his son in the eyes of the public".

PC had filed petition in SC fearing 'harrassment'BEFORE SON'S ARREST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Children with special needs appearing for class 10 and 12 board exami-nation will be able to use com-puter or laptops to write their exam from this year, with the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) approving the proposal, according to an official order.

However, the candidates will have to submit a certifi-cate issued by a registered medical practitioner or qual-ified psychological consul-tant recommending use of a computer facility while also citing the grounds for the recommendation.

The CBSE's Examina-tion Committee in its recent meeting resolved to grant the additional concession for Can-didates With Special Needs (CWSN) category from this year.

"The use of computer shall be limited to only for typing the answers, for viewing the questions in enlarged font size and for listening the question items. Concerned candidates shall bring his/ her own com-puter or laptop duly formatted and the Centre Superinten-dent (CS) shall allow the can-didate only after inspection of the computer by a computer teacher," the order said.

"The computer/laptop should not have any internet connection in order to main-tain the sanctity of the exam-ination. The request for such an arrangement will have to be made in advance by the candi-date by sending a communica-tion with required documents to the CS through school," it added.

The invigilator will sign the printouts of the answers typed by the candidate which will be facilitated by the CS.

CBSE boards: Laptops for kids with special needs

mp nation 7MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KANCHIPURAM (TN): Jay-endra Saraswathi -- the 69th Shankaracharya of the Sri Kan-chi Kamakoti Peetam -- passed away here on Wednesday fol-lowing a cardiac arrest.

The 82-year old seer was rushed to a private hospital on Wednesday morning after he complained of uneasiness, hos-pital sources said.

Jayendra Saraswathi was the senior pontiff of the mutt founded by Adi Shankara-charya, receiving the mantle from his predecessor, the late Sri Chandrasekarendra Saras-wathi Swamigal.

The junior pontiff Vijayen-dra Saraswathi will succeed Jay-endra Saraswathi.

The mutt was established by Adi Shankaracharya about 2520 years ago. The rites of the seer, described as 'Brindavana Pravesha Karyakramam' in vedic parlance, will commence from Thursday, according to the mutt.

"Brindavana Pravesha Karyakramam of HH Pujyas-hri Jayendra Saraswathi Shan-karacharya Swamigal will be performed tomorrow from 8 am," the mutt's official twitter handle said.

The seer's body has been

kept at the Kamakoti peetam here for the public to pay final respects. Many of the devotees who visited the mutt were in tears and described him as a 'jagathguru.' 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Vice President M Ven-kiah Naidu, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister K Palaniswami, DMK Working President MK Stalin, PMK founder S Ramadoss and others condoled the demise of the Shankaracharya.

"Deeply anguished by the passing away of Acharya of Sri Kanchi Kamakoti Peetam Jagadguru Pujyashri Jayendra Saraswathi Shankaracharya. He will live on in the hearts and minds of lakhs of devotees due to his exemplary service and noblest thoughts. Om Shanti to

the departed soul," Modi said.Jayendra Saraswathi was

at the forefront of innumer-able community service initia-tives, the Prime Minister said in a tweet, adding, "he nur-tured institutions which trans-formed the lives of the poor and downtrodden."

Vice President Naidu recalled the contribution of Kanchi Sankaracharya Jayen-dra Saraswathi, who passed away today, in promoting spirituality.

"Pay my respects to Kanchi peethadhipathi Shri Jayendra Saraswati who attained mok-sha. His contribution for the welfare of mankind and in pro-moting spirituality will always be an inspiration for others," he tweeted.

Kanchi Mutt head Jayendra dies at 82 OUR CORRESPONDENT

JAIPUR: A whopping 98.87 lakh metric tonnes of miner-als were illegally excavated in a period of five years in five Rajasthan districts, says a lat-est Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report, which highlights rampant unlawful mining and gross violations in the desert state, including flout-ing of Supreme Court orders pertaining to the Aravalli hills.

The CAG report, tabled in the state Assembly on Tuesday, claims that apex court direc-tions regarding Aravali hills were not followed by the state's department of mines as mining leases falling within the moun-tain range area were granted and renewed.

Even the Union ministry

of environment and forests granted clearance for mining leases despite the area falling under the Aravali hill range, it adds.

"We noticed serious vio-lations of the orders of the Supreme Court of India as mining leases falling in Aravalli mountain range were granted, renewed and extended. Besides, the MoEF also granted envi-ronmental clearances for min-ing lease despite the area falling in Aravalli hills," the auditor said.

Rajasthan has a rich reserve of copper, lead, zinc, rock phos-phate, soapstone, silica sand, limestone, marble and gypsum, and most of these minerals are found in the Aravalli moun-tain range.

The audit also castigated

authorities claiming there was inadequate follow up of ille-gal mining cases, lack of deter-rence due to delay in issuing of notices and non- implementa-tion of policy measures.

According to the report, a scrutiny of the records of nine superintending mining engi-neers (SME) or mining engi-neers (ME) in five districts - Alwar, Jaipur, Sikar, Rajsa-mand and Udaipur - revealed that these offices registered 4,072 cases of illegal mining, transportation and storage of mineral during 2011-12 to 2016-17.

"Around 98.87 lakh metric tonnes of minerals were found to have been illegally excavated (during 2011-12 to 2016-17).

The department, however, could recover only Rs 25.57

crore against the recoverable amount of Rs 204.50 crore," the CAG report on the economic sector for the financial year ended March 31, 2017 said.

The Rajasthan mineral policy, 2011, stipulated cer-tain measures for curbing illegal mining in the state but perusal of records of selected offices disclosed that no concrete measures like regu-latory supervisions, proper vigilance, non- initiation of incentives schemes, moderni-sation of check posts and res-toration and reclamation of mined out pits were taken, the CAG observed.

Another finding of the audit was that the state government had levied an environment and health cess in 2008 on selected major mineral proceeds which

was to be utilised for the pro-tection of environment and health and maintenance of eco-logical balance, especially in the mining areas.

But the funds were sanc-tioned for activities which did not meet the objectives the cess was actually collected for, the CAG report said.

Mining without a licence, mining outside lease area, rais-ing of minerals without pay-ing royalty are illegal mining activities which not only put immense pressure on envi-ronment as they do not com-ply with any regulations or environmental conditions but they also have serious conse-quences on natural resources like forests, rivers, flora and fauna and public health, the report said.

98.87 lakh MT minerals illegally mined in 5 Rajasthan districts in 5 years: CAG

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday constituted an organising committee, a draft-ing committee and its four sub-groups, and a constitution amendment committee for the party's upcoming plenary session to be held here from March 16 to 18.

While former prime minis-ter Manmohan Singh is chair-man of the drafting committee and Mukul Wasnik its conve-ner, AICC treasurer Motilal Vora is chairman of the organ-ising committee and party gen-eral secretary Oscar Fernandes its convener, a party statement said.

The constitution amend-ment committee will have senior party leaders Ghulam Nabi Azad and Janardan Dwivedi as its chairman and convener, with 10 other senior leaders, including Ahmed

Patel, P Chidambaram, Mal-likarjun Kharge and Kapil Sibal, as its members.

The drafting committee has 44 other senior party lead-ers as its members. It also has four sub-groups on political, economic affairs, international affairs and agriculture and employment.

While A K Antony will be the chairman of the political sub-group and Selja its conve-ner, Chidambaram has been made chairman of the eco-nomic affairs sub-group with Jairam Ramesh as its convener

and Anand Sharma the head the international affairs sub-group with Jyotiraditya Scndia as its convener.

Former Haryana chief min-ister Bhupinder Singh Hooda will be the chairman of the sub-group on agriculture, employ-ment and poverty alleviation, with Meenakshi Natarajan as convener.

The Congress leadership will brainstorm on the party's strategy ahead of 2019 general elections, in its bid to oust the BJP from power.

The party will also dwell on its prospects in elections to key states of Karnataka, Mad-hya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh slated this year and is likely to evolve its plan at the session. This will be the Congress' first plenary ses-sion under the presidentship of Rahul Gandhi, after he took over the reigns of the party from his mother Sonia Gan-dhi in December last year.

Rahul Gandhi sets up panels for Congress plenary session

OUR CORRESPONDENT

MUMBAI: The Bombay High Court has sought the opinion of the Centre and the Coast Guard on whether under water cameras can be installed along the Bandra-Worli sea link to enhance security around the area and to prevent incidents of suicides or other crimes around it.

A bench of Justices BR Gavai and Bharati Dangre directed today that the Cen-tre and the Coast Guard be impleaded as parties to a PIL seeking better security arrange-ments at the sea link.

The PIL, filed by activist Ketan Tirodkar, alleges that the "sea link is fast becoming the favoured suicide spot for disheartened citizens,"and that there existed loopholes in the existing security arrangements.

On previous hearings,

Tirodkar had sought that more security guards be employed and cameras be installed under water, and bomb detectors be used along the 4.8 km long stretch.

However, Prashant Sawant, the advocate for Maharashtra State Road Development Cor-poration Limited, the author-ity responsible for maintenance of, and surveillance along the sea link, told HC that since 2014, when the PIL was filed, the security arrangements had been upgraded.

"86 CCTV cameras have been installed along the bridge.30 security guards remain deployed all along the stretch 24x7," Sawant said.

He, however, said that the Court's previous suggestion on installing 'travel through X-Ray scanners' to check against potential bomb threats couldn't be implemented.

HC seeks opinion of Govt, Coast Guard on under

water cameras at sea link 

PRIYANKA TIKOO 

NEW DELHI: Ahead of his India visit, Vietnam President Tran Dai Quang has strongly advocated enhanced trade ties and boosting maritime and aerial connectivity between the two countries, a push that comes amid increasing Chinese assertiveness in the region.

Tran, who will arrive in India on March 2 on a three-day state visit, also feels that India and Vietnam are "blessed" with strategic loca-tions in South Asia and South East Asia, respectively, and there is immense potential for the two countries to cooperate in different areas.

"Furthermore, both coun-tries are endowed with advan-tages to develop maritime economy. In this regard, we could increase information exchange and share experience in formulating maritime strate-gies," Tran said.

His call for deepening Indo-Vietnam maritime connectiv-ity assumes significance as the US, Japan and a number of other countries have pitched for a greater role for India in the Indo-Pacific region, appar-ently to contain China's grow-ing influence.

The Vietnamese leader also said both countries have forged a high level of politi-cal trust through mutual vis-its at the high and lower levels, and worked closely for effective implementation of the signed agreements, particularly the Joint Vision Statement on Defense Cooperation for 2015 2020.

"In order to achieve the tar-

get of USD 15 billion of bilat-eral trade turnover by 2020, both sides need to promote investment in areas where India s advantages coincide with Vietnam's demands, step up aviation and maritime con-nectivity, and reduce and work towards abolition of the trade barriers so as to create favor-able conditions for the two-way trade," Tran said in the email interview.

The strong pitch by the Viet-namese president for increased aviation and maritime connec-tivity with India may not go down well with China, which is in conflict with Vietnam and several other countries in the region, including Brunei and the Philippines over maritime claims in the South China Sea.

The presidential visit comes just over a month after Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc's trip to India as one of the chief guests for the Republic Day parade.

Tran also identified defence, security and trade as effective strategic areas of cooperation.

"India and Vietnam are blessed with strategic loca-tions in South Asia and South East Asia, respectively, aside from young population, large workforce, huge markets and rapid economic growth. Hence, the two countries may promote cooperation in such areas as production, manufac-turing, infrastructure devel-opment, renewable energy, information technology...and new technology application such as biotechnology, green agriculture, nano technology, new materials, among others," he said. PTI

Vietnam Prez pitches for expanding Indo-Vietnam maritime connectivity

OUR CORRESPONDENT

AHMEDABAD: Gujarat Assembly Speaker Rajendra Trivedi on Wednesday sus-pended around 15 Congress MLAs for a day after they sat in the well and shouted slogans against the ruling BJP over VAT being charged on fuel by the state government.

Besides these, another Con-gress MLA was suspended for two days by the Speaker.

The exact number of MLAs suspended from the Assem-bly for a day was not immedi-

ately clear.Following the suspen-

sion and eviction, nearly 50 other Congress MLAs staged a walkout from the Legislative Assembly.

Earlier during the Ques-tion Hour, Congress MLA Vimal Chudasama sought details about the Value Added Tax (VAT) being charged on petrol and diesel by the BJP government.

The MLA also asked if the government plans to reduce the taxes on fuel to give relief to the people.

In his reply, Deputy Chief Minister Nitin Patel said the government charges 20 per cent VAT on fuel.

He then compared Con-gress-ruled states like Punjab and Karnataka with Gujarat and claimed both these states charge 28 and 30 per cent tax respectively is much higher than Gujarat.

Irked by the comparison, Leader of Opposition Paresh Dhanani asked Patel to stick to Gujarat and have a debate on it.

When Speaker Trivedi stopped him from making fur-

ther comments, all Congress MLAs started shouting slogans against the BJP government.

As around 15 Congress MLAs sat in the well, the Speaker first suspended them for the day and called in mar-shalls to evict them.

While the MLAs were walking out of the House, the Speaker took a serious note of Congress' Unjha MLA Asha Patel's sloganeering. Speaker Trivedi termed the words "BJP Hooligans" said by Asha Patel derogatory and suspended her for two days.

15 Congress MLAs suspended, 50 others walkout from Guj Assembly

OUR CORRESPONDENT

GURGAON: RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat on Wednes-day inaugurated the National Cooperative Development Corporation's (NCDC) train-ing centre, named after the late Lakshmanrao Inamdar, a Sangh leader and Prime Min-ister Narendra Modi's mentor.

Inamdar, popularly known as Vakil Saheb, was a founding father of the RSS-affiliated Seh-kar Bharti, which works for the development of cooperatives in the country.

The centre has now been upgraded as a national level institute and renamed Lax-manrao Inamdar Academy for Cooperative Studies and Human Resource Management.

"I have myself worked with Inamdar. For many years, he was in charge of the Sangh's activities in Gujarat and had inducted our Prime Minis-ter Narendra Modi into the organisation and was his men-tor also," Bhagwat said at an event here to inaugurate the centre.

Modi has written about Inamdar in his book "Jyoti Punj", he said.

Haryana Chief Minis-ter Manohal Lal Khattar also recalled Inamdar's contribu-tion and said he was the one who brought Modi into the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh

and guided his development.Discussing the coopera-

tive movement in the coun-try, Bhagwat said the modern model of cooperatives may have come from abroad but the concept was always there.

Cooperation and coopera-tiveness are qualities which are inculcated in Sangh workers, he added.

"Bina sehkar nahi udhar, bina sanskar nahi sehkar (Without cooperation there cannot be any progress and without moral values there cannot be any cooperation)," he said.

The event was also attended by Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh.

NCDC is a state-run organisation which works for development of the coopera-tives in the country and pro-vides them loans at reduced interest rates.

Bhagwat inaugurates NCDC centre named after Modi's mentor

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Members of Parliament are set to get increased allowances with the Union Cabinet on Wednes-day approving a proposal in this regard.

The constituency allow-ance, furniture allowance and communication expenses of the MPs would go up consid-erably, sources in the govern-ment said.

The parliamentary affairs ministry had proposed an increase in the constituency allowance from Rs 45,000 a month to Rs 60,000.

The ministry had also pro-posed that the one-time fur-niture allowance be hiked to Rs one lakh from the present

Rs 75,000.Finance Minister Arun

Jaitley had announced in his budget speech that a perma-nent mechanism would be set up to revise the salaries of MPs every five years, and it would be linked to inflation.

The remuneration of an MP includes a basic salary of Rs 50,000 per month and Rs 45,000 as constituency allow-ance, apart from other perks. The Centre spends around Rs 2.7 lakh a month on an MP.

As of today, excluding the Speaker, the Lok Sabha has 536 MPs, including two nom-inated from the Anglo-Indian community. There are eight vacancies.

The Rajya Sabha has 239 members.

Cabinet nod to hike MPs' allowances

OUR CORRESPONDENT

FARRUKHABAD (UP): Eminent Shia cleric Maulana Kalbe Jawwad on Wednes-day alleged that a handful of terrorists working at the behest of Israel and the US were tarnishing the image of Islam.

"A handful of terrorists working on the directions of Israel and the United States are trying to spoil the image of Islam in the world," Jaw-wad, also a member of All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), told a con-gregation at the dargah Hus-

sainiya Mujibiya here."The basis of Islam is

peace and brotherhood... It is stated in history that Islam spread in India because of the Sufi saints like Khwaja Moi-

nuddin Chisti," he said.The cleric said that a Shia-

Sunni sadbhavana sammelan (meeting for communal har-mony) is being organised in Lucknow on March 25.

'Handful of terrorists tarnishing image of Islam'

OUR CORRESPONDENT

BALLIA: The vice-president of Uttar Pradesh BJP unit, Dayas-hankar Singh, on Wednesday renewed his attack on BSP chief Mayawati, terming her a "stub-born woman" and calling her party a "shop".

"Even a stubborn woman like Mayawati had to back off only because of the massive support I got from the peo-ple," Singh, who had caused a massive furore in 2016 for

his alleged derogatory remarks against the BSP supremo, said here. Singh was speaking at a function organised by the local party leaders to welcome him to his home town after being made the state BJP vice-pres-ident early this month.

"BSP is not a political party, but a shop," he told media per-sons later in an interaction.

He also attacked the Samajwadi Party and Con-gress, terming them a party of "baap-beta" and "ma-beta"

respectively. In 2016, Singh was caught on camera alleging t*-hat Mayawati was distributing party tickets on the basis of the amount of money paid to her and made some objectionable comments against her.

Singh's statement had led to a major controversy with a case being registered against him. The BJP had expelled Singh for his comments. After abscond-ing for more than 10 days, he was arrested on July 29 that year from Bihar's Buxar town.

'Mayawati a stubborn woman'

Corrigendum Ist corrigendum to the NIeT No. 138 Sl. No. 01) of 2017-18 (2nd Call)Ref. no. To be read as In place ofCI. No. 4(g) Page No.02

PF Registration Certificate (Not after February’2016) and up to date PF Challan (Cur-rent as per Govt. rules)

PF Certificate and up to date PF Challan (Current as per Govt rules)

Sd/- Superintending Engineer (Elect)

North Bengal Development Departrnent

Details can be seen in the Official Website www.wbnorthbengaldev.gov.in For all details and online tender submission visit https://wbtenders.gov.in

Government of West Bengal North Bengal Development Department

Branch Secretariat Uttarkanya, Fulbari, Jalpaiguri

mp editorial8MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

KR SUDHAMAN

TAPONEEL MUKHERJEE

In a decade or two, nearly 50 per cent of the 1.3 billion people in India will live in urban areas and transportation will perhaps

become a major hurdle, particularly in the major cities, which are already choked. Lately, there is a new dimen-sion to this problem—pollution, to which vehicles are a major contribu-tor. It has been medically proven that Indian children have 30 per cent less stamina because of pollution, especially in cities like Delhi, where air pollution is far beyond safe limits, especially dur-ing winter.

So, experts have already begun work-ing on a plausible manner to tackle this problem. There is a crying need to fast-track the development of public trans-port and this is one of the reasons that the metro is being expanded massively in major cities, but last-mile connectiv-ity is critical for the success of public transport and this is perhaps a major hurdle, for which the solution could be electric vehicles. Presently, electric vehi-cles have not caught on to the desired level because of the prohibitive cost of batteries and the need for frequent and time-consuming charging.

E-rickshaws provide a simple, easy and pollution-free solution. But, its full potential has not yet been completely realised even though it is slowly catch-ing on in Delhi and several north Indian states that are replacing cycle rickshaws. In the matter of a few years, e-rick-shaws have grown to 15 lakhs and are expected to double by 2020. E-autos, e-bikes, and e-scooters too are slowly picking up pace. Though the e-vehicle technology is simple and cost-effective, the cost of the battery is quite high and also requires frequent charging, which necessitates the creation of huge infra-structure. For example, e-rickshaws, which can be manufactured in a small shed, cost a little over Rs one lakh but the lithium battery in it costs Rs 60,000. Lead-acid batteries may cost much less at Rs 20,000 but its life is one-tenth, besides requiring more frequent charg-ing. Apart from setting-up charging stations, which are expensive, the high battery cost has reduced the attractive-ness of operating e-vehicles.

To overcome this problem, a start-up

has come up with a bright idea to have Battery Swap Stations that are expected to revolutionise the use of electric vehi-cles for last-mile connectivity, especially in major cities. This will virtually reduce the cost of e-rickshaws by half as the battery no longer needs to be owned but leased for rent on a daily basis. The number of e-autos in the country may be in thousands as against half a million petrol, diesel, and CNG autos. Because of the emergence of swap stations, the use of e-autos is going to grow manifold and within a year or two, the majority of autos in the country would become e-autos. This is because, without battery, which will now be leased out, the cost of e-autos would drastically come down.

The start-up, Lithion Power, is per-haps the first to launch Battery Swap Stations in the country. To begin with, it has established battery swap operations in Delhi for public electric vehicles, par-ticularly e-rickshaws. The swap stations will provide batteries for e-autos and e-two-wheelers as well. The company has established five stations in North and North-West Delhi and by the end of March, the company proposes to have 20 such stations.

Unveiling the company’s plans, the

director of Lithion Power Piyush Gupta indicated that by 2019, Lithion custom-ers will not be more than two km away from a Lithion swap station in NCR. The company proposes to set up at least 500 swap stations in the capital. It will be setting up more than 10,000 such swap stations across the country. If this model is successful, the company proposes to set-up such stations in Indonesia, Ban-gladesh, Sri Lanka and perhaps also in several countries of Africa.

Gupta believes that electric vehi-cles will be the predominant mode of transportation by 2020. This is because of economics. EVs would be cheaper to manufacture and operate, besides solving urban pollution problems. With economies of scale operating, the cost of e-vehicles, as well as batteries, will fall further as in the case of solar power, mobile phones and LED bulbs in the country.

There are at present only about half a million e-two-wheelers in the country. This is now expected to grow exponen-tially to several million in the next few years with the availability of leased lith-ium batteries in every nook and cranny of the country.

“Lithion Power has commercialised

a model which simultaneously solves an economic need for its customers and a societal need, without relying on fund-ing from the government. We believe we are the first EV company in the world to make a sustainable model. Lithion aims to become the largest supplier of power to electric vehicles worldwide,” Gupta claimed.

The pollution from two-wheelers contributed to nearly half of vehicular pollution in Delhi and hence e-two-wheelers, e-autos and e-rickshaws will make a big difference, besides being much cheaper than fossil fuel-driven vehicles.

This will also create a huge oppor-tunity for the manufacture of lithium batteries in the country with more bat-tery swap stations dotting the land-scape. With swap stations being set up, e-buses and commercial vehicles too will become a reality in major cities, providing a cheap solution to the public transport problem plaguing most urban areas. Just as mobile telephony created huge employment, battery swap stations too have tremendous potential for job creation. IPA

(The views expressed are strictly personal)

India’s urban challengeEDITORIAL

As urban spaces are increasingly choked—electric vehicles with supportive battery swap stations will mark the way ahead

The pollution from two-wheelers contribute to nearly half of the vehicular pollution in Delhi and hence, e-two-wheelers, e-autos, and e-rickshaws will make big difference besides being much cheaper than fossil fuel-driven vehicles. This will also create a huge opportunity for the manufacture of lithium batteries in the country

Since the Nirav Modi-Mehul Choksi fraud at Punjab National Bank (PNB) came to light at the end of Jan-uary, a series of banking frauds have been unearthed at disturbingly regular intervals. The PNB scam that

was pegged at Rs 11,300 crore has grown in proportion as the bank has recovered several more Letters of Under-taking and Foreign Letters of Credit worth Rs 1,251 crore which have allegedly been used by the companies linked to Gitanjali Gems. After the Modi-Choksi frauds, Rotomac Pens’ Chairman and Managing Director Vikram Kothari was charged with swindling nearly Rs 4,000 crore worth of bank loans availed from a consortium of seven public sec-tor banks (PSBs). This was followed by the revelations that one Delhi-based jewellery house, Dwarka Das Seth Interna-tional Private Limited, availed bank loans worth nearly Rs 400 crore in 2014 and the promoters of the company have since disappeared. And, this was followed by the CBI reg-istering a case against Simbhaoli Sugars for defrauding Rs 110 crore from the Oriental Bank of Commerce. As analysts have been pointing out—the PSBs are sitting over a pile of bad loans and after the Modi-Choksi scam, several more such similar frauds are likely to be reported by the banks. In less than a month since the Modi-Choksi scam came to light, there have been three more cases of banking frauds that have been reported to the Central investigative agencies. Looking at the number of bank frauds that came to light in the first two months of the New Year, the government has asked the banks to scan all bad loans worth Rs 50 crore and above. The government has also asked banks to fix opera-tional risks within 15 days. As the ambit of frauds at PSBs has been expanding, the CBI has also questioned Former Managing Director of PNB and current Managing Director and CEO of Allahabad Bank Usha Ananthasubramanian and Executive Director of ICICI Bank NS Kannan. The CBI has clarified that they are being questioned in the perspective of the accused. And finally, Nirav Modi’s international business arm Firestar Diamond has filed for bankruptcy in the US.

The fact that in so many banking frauds, none of the private sector banks has been involved or lost money is a grim reminder of the fact that it is the PSBs that have been unable to protect themselves from being defrauded by their clients while the private sector banks are successful in protecting themselves from the fraudsters. This makes a case for Public Sector Banks to be handed over to pri-vate management. The Central government has pumped Rs 2.6 lakh crore in the past 11 years into the PSBs. But that has not improved the banks’ lending capability. The poor financial health of PSBs can be attributed to the high scale of Non-performing Assets (NPAs), which, as per an estimate, stands at above Rs 6.5 lakh crore. When so much of money turns into NPA, there are certainly loopholes in the banking system, which cannot be changed much as long as the management of the PSBs is vested with the political masters. To run the PSBs efficiently and in a fair manner, the banks have to learn certain things from their private sector counterparts. A day earlier, Finance Minis-ter Arun Jaitley had rapped the banking sector regulator and auditors for not being vigilant against the frauds. Now, the government has announced the setting-up of a govern-ment agency—National Financial Reporting Authority—which will regulate and discipline the auditors. This will take away the review and disciplinary roles of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India.

As the PSBs are holding a large sum of money under NPAs, more frauds are likely to emerge from the bank-ing sector. As most of these bad loans are stuck in court cases, there is virtually nothing that the government can do to improve the prevalent situation. The only thing it can do is to put more safeguards in the banking system and pursue the court cases earnestly so that those who have defrauded the banks are brought to justice and the banks’ money is recovered from them. The banks should also try and streamline its lending policies and favour small entrepreneurs over the big corporates. In a country like India where the population is large and the government is saddled with the responsibility to provide jobs to all those who are unemployed, the banking sector can play a deci-sive role. By offering easy loans to small entrepreneurs, the banks can help people set up their businesses and instead of asking for a job, they can create some jobs for others.

The situation in Syria, especially in Eastern Ghouta, a suburb of Damascus, has not merely dipped from bad to worse. It seems, by all accounts, to have reached a point of no return. Indeed, the unani-

mous decision of the United Nations Security Council to implement a ceasefire came, for all practical purposes, to a nought. Even if the Russians said they had asked their Syrian allies to suspend bombing for a few hours, there was a lull only for a few minutes. The over 400,000 residents played it safe by staying indoors in the rubble. Horrific stories have emerged of death, doom and despair. Emergency provisions for food, water, and medical supplies have become virtually impossible to come by. So, has the UN and its decision-mak-ing become a farce in this God-forsaken place? Further, the reports showing evidence of chemical weapons being used have added to the living nightmare. Amidst all this comes the news that North Korea has been sending supplies to Syria that could be used to produce chemical weapons. A report on North Korea authored by a UN panel of experts has it that Pyongyang had sent acid-resistant tiles, valves, and thermometers to Syria. The same report also claims that North Korean missile experts visited Syria in 2016 and 2017 after the chemical weapons supplies had been sent to the Middle-Eastern state. During one of the trips, the technicians stayed at Syrian military facilities. A UN member state reported to the panel of experts that scientists from North Korea may still be operating in Barzeh, Adra, and Hama. The details come just two days after the Syrian regime was accused of carrying out a chlorine gas attack on Eastern Ghouta. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has repeatedly denied claims of appropriating chemical weapons. Medical aid organisations, however, insisted that they have routinely treated victims of chemical attacks and blames the government forces for this perpetuation. In this crisis, the country’s war nears its seventh anniversary. The report says that the Syrian government specifically denied the accusations that there were missile experts from North Korea inside the country, saying, instead, they were “sports trainers”. And, now, it is openly exporting terror in the form of chemical warfare. These startling revelations apart, the fact remains that, there’s little or no hope for the innocent civilians and children of the war-ravaged Syria. Bombings continue ceaselessly—whether by day or by night. Some “rebels” have been the so-called targets. But, hundreds have perished. Precisely, how a State can inflict such unimagina-ble horrors, death, and destruction on its own people and that, too, with foreign aid, remains the greatest mystery. At this rate, unfortunately, time alone will tell if anything will ultimately be left of Syria.

PSBs lead banks frauds

Syrian inferno

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millenniumpost.inSRIDEVI THE LEGENDdear

EDITOR

Bollywood witnessed a black day on 25th Feb when the first female superstar was no more. Over four decades her naughty smile made everyone laugh and her tears made us cry. But now she has gone beyond our reach living us in deep sorrow. For many, Sridevi and the word, 'Heroine' were synonymous. In a male-dominated industry in terms of popularity, she was far ahead of her contemporary male superstars. In spite of her stardom, she was very down to earth, shy and friendly to everyone, and very dedicated to her prior commitments. Miss Hawa Hawai will always reign in the hearts of Indian film lovers. May her soul rest in peace.

SUBHADIP PAUL Via email

I am very simple, all these praises scare me. I feel like a newcomer

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SRIDEVI

For India to become a $5 trillion econ-omy, the government needs to go from being

a spender to an even greater enabler of businesses than it currently is. With debates about the appropriate level of government spending abound, the tight balance between spending to boost critical sec-tors versus managing a fiscal deficit is a tightrope the gov-ernment must tread.

Numbers such as the $526 billion infrastructure gap sug-gest that innovation in pol-icy will be essential for India to truly bridge this gap, cre-ate jobs and generate growth. Our premise is that while spending by the government is important, it needs to focus much more on how to enable businesses, especially private investment in infrastructure.

According to a World Bank report, government spending as a percentage of the GDP has averaged at 10.29 per cent between 1960 and 2016, with the number in 2016 being 11.65 per cent. There is pressure on both the fiscal deficit and rev-enue deficit in India. In addi-tion, no remarkable change in tax revenues is expected soon that would provide a signifi-cant increase to government spending – therefore, it will be wise to assume that spend-ing as a percentage of the GDP will not see a significant change upwards anytime soon. Hence, for India to create the neces-sary infrastructure and jobs it is essential to allow the invest-ment of private capital. The government must continue to spend and efficiently allocate

public finances, but to truly push up growth rates and aspire to more than double the size of the economy, it is imperative that more thought is given on the measures to boost private investment.

The recent policy by the Modi government to open the coal mining to the private sec-tor is a welcome step. If imple-mented well, this should pave the way for more competition and higher efficiency.

The most important step towards allowing private capital into infrastructure is to bifur-cate the infrastructure market to identify two segments: (1) The financially viable sectors

(2) The economically value-creating but not fully financially viable sectors. If infrastructure sectors such as ports, refineries, renewable energy, power trans-mission, mining, toll-roads, water and irrigation can all be categorised between the “finan-cially viable” and the “econom-ically value-creating but not fully financially viable”, then the former needs effective and transparent regulations while the latter needs government spending in addition to effec-tive regulations.

The above analysis must be based on robust cash-flow models and past project expe-rience. The bifurcation is

important because for finan-cially viable sectors the govern-ment must push for regulations that attract capital. Tax pol-icies to boost capital expen-diture such as competitive accelerated depreciation, tax-free windows, and centralised clearance windows would be the key. While for the sectors that deliver economic value but aren’t fully financially feasible, government spending in vary-ing degrees will be required. What is important to realise is that high-quality infrastruc-ture will be essential to pro-vide India with an opportunity to push up growth rates. It is simply not possible for the gov-

ernment spending to bear the entire burden of the infrastruc-ture spending.

According to a World Bank global ranking of trade and transport-related infra-structure for 2016, the Neth-erlands was given 4.29 points and Singapore 4.20. India in this ranking was at 3.34 points, significantly lower at the 35th rank versus the Netherlands at fourth and Singapore at the fifth position. It is interesting to note that according to the World Bank, the government spending in the Netherlands was at 25.04 per cent of the GDP, while the same number for Singapore was at 11.28 per cent. While not all government spending is on infrastructure, what the data seems to suggest is that the different countries, given their economic dynam-ics, have used different tools to boost infrastructure. It isn’t essential for a government to spend a significant percentage of the GDP to be a high-quality infrastructure country.

A five-trillion-dollar econ-omy is a target worth aspiring for. Infrastructure spending will have to form a signifi-cant component of the value-creation in the economy. The positive multiplier effect of infrastructure creation cannot be over-emphasised in terms of job creation, economic growth, and national prosperity. It is time for the Indian government to pay greater attention to its role as an enabler and facilita-tor of infrastructure. IANS

(The author heads Devel-opment Tracks, an infrastruc-ture advisory firm. The views

expressed are strictly personal)

The government must continue to spend and efficiently allocate public finances, but to truly push up growth rates and aspire to more than double the size of the economy, it is imperative that more thought is given on the measures to boost private investment

To fulfil the aspirations of becoming a five-trillion-dollar economy, it is essential for the government to become an enabler too

Government’s enabling role

Developing infrastructure is key to creating jobs and facilitating economic growth (Representational Image)

E-rickshaws are a most effective solution to providing connectivity and reducing pollution

9mp in focusMILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

SAMAR LAHIRY

PATHIKRIT PAYNE

A slew of fire accidents occurred in less than a month dam-aging human lives,

properties, and goods. The fire that broke out in a factory in Delhi, Mumbai’s Kamala Mills rooftop hotels, and Madurai’s Meenakshi temple were disas-ters waiting to happen. Initial findings suggest that storing inflammable materials, block-ing exit passages, overhang-ing electrical wirings are some of the causes. These incidents should be treated as a wake-up call.

A recent report, FICCI-Pinkerton’s The India risk sur-vey, 2017 ranks natural hazards the fourth highest risk to busi-ness up from last year’s seventh position. India is considered at a high risk of natural haz-ards with a significant risk to businesses and communities compared to developed econ-omies. India has the scope to strengthen its institutional capacity, financial resources, and infrastructure to mitigate the adverse effects of natural hazards. According to National Crime Record Bureau, 18,450 cases of fire accidents were reported in 2015 which injured 1,193 and killed 17,700. Fire has been ranked fifth, up by three positions from the last year’s ranking, cites the report.

There has been a steep rise in the constructions of build-ings in India, especially High Rise buildings. Because of its peculiar nature, fire in resi-dential buildings, particularly high rise buildings becomes more complex and the salvag-ing operations become more difficult and sometimes even resulting in many deaths and huge property losses. In metro cities, high rise buildings lack adequate in-built fire protec-tion systems. In commercial establishments, major fires start in storage area and ware-houses than production areas.

Poorly stored goods, even though they are not flamma-ble, may help to spread fire and hinder firefighters gain access to the seat of the fire or reduce the effectiveness of sprinkler systems. Goods tidily stored with gangways may help to inhibit the spread of fire.

Fire Safety Audit (FSA) is found to be an effective tool to assess fire safety standards of an organisation or an occu-pancy. In other words, it is aimed to assess the building for compliance with the National Building Code of India, rele-vant Indian standards and the legislations enacted by state governments and local bodies, on fire prevention, fire protec-tion, and life safety measures. Although FSA is an effective tool to assess fire safety stan-dards of an occupancy, there are no clear provisions in any of the safety legislations

regarding the scope, objective, methodology, and periodicity of a fire safety audit. Therefore, FSA should be made manda-tory all over India and the work should be entrusted to inde-pendent agencies. It is reason-able to have a fire safety audit every year. In India, although there are many rules and reg-ulations, codes and standards related to fire safety, these are seldom followed. There is a need to revisit fire safety audit regulations and state fire ser-vices as well.

Fire service is a state sub-ject and has been included as a municipal function in the XII schedule of the Constitution. The municipal corporations and local bodies are respon-sible for providing fire ser-vices in many states. Due to lack of resources, fire services are ill-equipped in providing adequate fire safety cover to

the population. Based on a 2011 study, 65 per cent defi-ciency was reported in fire stations. According to Min-istry of Home Affairs, in 144 towns with population over 1 lakh, there is a huge defi-ciency of fire fighting infra-structure. The government has provided financial assis-tance of Rs 176 crore during 2009-13 to modernise states fire services and supplements the efforts towards moderisa-tion of state governments by providing funds. Thus, the gov-ernment should continue to provide financial support and assistance in augmenting and modernising the fire depart-ments. This should be over and above higher states allocation (42 per cent) recommended by the Fourteenth Finance Commission.

Building awareness among citizens about fire preven-

tion and protection measures is also of paramount impor-tance. Organising firefighting workshop once in six months in localities/mohallas/schools with the involvement of local councellor/elected represen-tatives is one way to achieve the aforementioned. There are many offices/high rise build-ings/mandir and religious places having firefighting equipment installed but hardly any person has the knowledge of using them. Lack of main-tenance makes the equipment dysfunctional. The schools where mid-day meals are cooked are potential fire haz-ards. Fire service departments should visit above-mentioned installations periodically (once in six months) and take appro-priate actions against erring establishments. DOWN TO EARTH

(The views expressed are strictly personal)

Rohingyas could not have reached Jammu and settle near sensitive army bases had the eastern borders not been porous and prone to orchestrated infiltration. Given the murmurs of a possible Rohingya hand in the Sunjuwan Army base attack, it is time to realise that external dimensions of India’s internal security issues do not always emanate from western borders

Fire service is a state subject and has been included as a municipal function in Schedule XII of the Constitution. Due to lack of resources, fire services are ill-equipped in providing adequate fire safety cover to the population

In defence of the General’s statementIndia must devise a stringent policy for national border to tackle Bangladeshi influx

Why fire accidents are unabated

Army Generals in India nor-mally do not make too many statements beyond their operational para-

digm. But when they do, one has to take them seriously. General Bipin Rawat made the following statement recently, ‘A planned immigration is taking place because of our western neighbour. They will always try and ensure that this area is taken over, playing the proxy dimension of war-fare.’ The statement was invariably about the apocalyptic level of infiltra-tion that has been consistently taking place from Bangladesh into India’s northeast and perhaps some of India’s eastern states like West Bengal. The influx has been such that the demog-raphy of most of lower Assam has been irreparably altered with ethnic Assamese and others on the verge of being reduced to minorities in their own states in the times to come. The burgeoning migration resulted in altered political clout as was stated by General Rawat about the rise of parties like AIUDF standing on the edifice of migrant Bengali Muslim population of Assam.

The backgroundTo understand the deeper con-

nection between Pakistan and Ban-gladesh-based demography altering illegal migration to India, one has to understand the internal dynamics of Bangladesh. Post 1971, in spite of disintegration of Pakistan and cre-ation of the Bengali speaking state, after a horrendous war dotted with innumerable genocides, Bangladesh, beneath the semblance of homoge-neity, has for long remained deeply divided internally. The crack runs deep between secular nationalist Bangladeshis and those who had deep sympathy for the state of Paki-stan, resented the split and worked actively to help Pakistan Army dur-ing war. The Razakars and their sup-porters never stopped collaborating with Pakistan. The Gulf States, where Bangladeshis go en masse for work became rendezvous points for hatch-ing plots. Funds from Saudi Arab and spread of Wahhabism fuelled it fur-ther. While Pakistan was simultane-ously hatching plots for fomenting separatism in Punjab and Kashmir to avenge its dismemberment in 1971, the Razakars and their progenies were orchestrating a Trojan War on India, the impact of which is now being felt.

Illegal migration can to a cer-tain extent be deliberated upon or justified if there are issues related

to persecution. However, that was not the case with what was happen-ing in eastern India. The migration was systematic, calibrated and com-pletely aimed at altering religious demography. Most of those migrat-ing en masse cannot claim to be vic-tims of persecution in Bangladesh. As per reports, a former Governor of Assam Lt Gen (Retd) Ajay Singh had stated more than a decade back that the extent of infiltration is to the tune of 6000 Bangladeshis entering Assam every day. This has been fur-ther given impetus by alleged aspira-tions of a Greater Islamic Republic of Bangladesh that many in Bangladesh secretly nurture. That includes parts of West Bengal and a significant por-tion of Northeast.

Is there a Trojan invasion happen-ing with a sinister motive?

While India continued with its massive defence spending to prepare for conventional wars, it remained horribly unaware and ignorant of the Trojan invasion with sinister objectives taking place in its seem-ingly peaceful eastern borders. This has been aided by certain political parties who found in this swarming mass of infiltrators a readymade vote bank. Can one deny how IMDT Act

of 1983 enacted by Congress created severe impediments in deporting illegal immigrants? Can one deny that certain political parties go head over heels to provide such infiltra-tors with readymade ration cards and voter ID card in lieu of assured votes for their respective parties? Can one also deny that whenever the issue of demographic alteration is raised, it is given a communal colour by nay-sayers to obfuscate the core issue? In fact, the IMDT Act was so obnoxious that eventually it was struck down by Supreme Court in 2005 but by then much of that damage was done.

The cycle of crime and infiltrationHowever, the issue is not just

related to illegal immigration alone. There have been innumerable instances of terror attacks in India having clear evidence of involve-ment of either ISI’s Bangladesh-based sleeper cells or that of radical Islamist Bangladeshi entities themselves. While ISI’s stranglehold and funding in Bangladesh to foment violent anti-India narrative is well known, over a period of time many of Bangladesh-based terror groups such as Harkat Ul Jihad al Islami Bangladesh (HUJI-B) and Jamaat ul Mujahideen Bangla-desh (JMB) have deeply entrenched

themselves in many parts of east and northeast India. The enclaves with significant illegal Bangladeshi pop-ulation now work as safe havens for them and often local vote-bank poli-tics ensured that agencies turn a blind eye to all this.

This apart, ISI has been incred-ibly active in pushing in fake Indian currencies through the Bangladesh route. Malda in West Bengal is often termed the fake currency capital. Most of the illegal trade across the border happens with fake currencies. Goods go out of India without pay-ing the requisite taxes while payments in fake currencies are pumped in. Overall as things stand, India’s bor-der regions with Bangladesh are akin to tinderbox or a dangerous cock-tail of Molotov where the writ of the state is often abysmal if not entirely absent. Porous borders combined with illegal trades transacted with fake currencies aided by safe havens of Bangladeshis protected by local politicians in lieu of vote have created the perfect ecosystem for mushroom-ing of countless Madrasas poisoning a generation of minds with a deadly concoction of Wahhabism and anti-Indian hatred. All of this has been happening for decades, right under the nose of local administrations. But

now with change of regime in Assam and also at the Centre, some may be feeling the heat. Given the alarm-ing pace at which the demography is shifting in northeast, it is bound to trigger resistance from ethnic groups over there who are increasingly feel-ing insecure as a result of this persis-tent invasion and who may not wait inordinately for New Delhi to take decisive actions.

Let us realise: Eastern borders are not benign

For decades India’s policymakers remained obsessed with its western borders with a false presumption that threats can never emanate from the east. It is only perhaps in the last two decades especially since the nuclear test of 1998 that India has been con-sciously waking up to the possibility of a two frontal war. The Modi Gov-ernment has taken some significant steps to fortify India's preparedness along the China border. The same needs to be replicated along the Indo-Bangladesh border.

The need for a National Border Policy

Further, India lacks a coherent National Border Policy. India’s schizo-phrenic approach and the self-defeat-ing concept of putting everything under the garb of ‘law & order’ issue is also to be blamed for the mess. When a miscreant involved in cross-border nefarious activities is arrested by BSF, he is generally handed over to the state police since law & order is a state subject. From then on, his eventual release is a foregone con-clusion. Stringent punishment pre-ceded by strong prosecution is the last thing that happens with Bangladeshis caught in borders for illegal activi-ties. The distinction between petty local crimes and cross-border crimes with national security ramifications rarely exists. This often emboldens the perpetrators. There have been several instances of BSF personnel being brutally beaten up and even been lynched by cattle smugglers who know too well about the restric-tions put on BSF on use of firepower, thanks to an Indo-Bangladesh agree-ment signed in 2011 to restrict the use of lethal firepower on border. This has only given more impetus to smuggling of fake currencies, and infiltration.

The incident of court marshal pro-ceedings against BSF Assistant Com-mandant Anubhav Atrey for killing a Bangladeshi smuggler to protect one

of his own men is a vindication of India’s confused border management policy torn apart between keeping the pro-India Bangladesh Govern-ment in good humour and secur-ing its own borders. There is a sheer disconnect between ground realities and how New Delhi perceives issues. One wonders what Assistant Com-mandant Atrey should have done instead of firing to protect one of his own men, from the smugglers about to lynch a BSF jawan, if the Indian approach continues to be to treat such acts as murder. Sadly, the nation stood behind Major Leetul Gogoi because of a media furore but it seems that the BSF officer has been forgotten.

If India has to stop the problem of Bangladeshi influx, it has to come out with a stringent national border policy and treat all borders as equally sensitive. In this era of sub-conven-tional and Trojan wars, no border can be termed benign anymore. Rohing-yas could not have reached all the way to Jammu and even settle near sensitive army bases had the eastern borders not been porous and prone to orchestrated infiltration. Given the murmurs of a possible Rohingya hand in the Sunjuwan Army base attack, it is time to realise that exter-nal dimensions of India’s internal security issues do not always ema-nate from western borders but from elsewhere too.

Why General Rawat’s statement is justified

The reason why General Rawat’s statement deserves unequivocal sup-port because he has shown the con-viction to tell the truth as it is. Those who are opposing it have been the same lot who for long had refused to acknowledge the problems of Kash-mir until it went literally out of con-trol and the armed forces had to move it to stem the rot and clear the mess through spillage of blood of their own men in uniform. Northeast and possibly even parts of eastern India are heading towards similar mess if infiltration is not stopped and the apocalyptic demographic shift is not reversed. Pakistan might have failed in Punjab and J&K in its misadven-tures but may have the last laugh if New Delhi fails to take cognisance of the Trojan invasion taking place in the east and northeast India. Hope-fully, the Modi Government will con-tain it in time.

(The views expressed are strictly personal)

India has a fire safety audit to assess the safety of an organisation but it lacks certain crucial legislative provisions

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Hindi-Chini bhai bhai under Nehru resulted in loss of buffer Tibet and rout in 1962. Hindi-Chini bhai bhai under Modi has led to China’s trade surplus spiraling from less than $2.5 billion a month to over $5 billion a month, with India now underwriting China’s India containment.

Reading a fascinating book by the great French thinker Tzvetan Todorov. He says: "The protection of the status of minorities should be the great political principle of the 21st century. A nation furthers its own good by respecting & protecting its minorities". Absolutely!

Science is not just a subject, but your key to the future. I urge the youth to read more, research more & adopt scientific thought. #NationalScienceDay

Presenting Pakistan's point of view on UN Security Council reform in the inter govt negotiations at the United Nations

General Rawat’s statement regarding the influx of immigrants must be heeded and acted upon

Fires breaking out in public buildings are disasters waiting to happen due to lack of adequate in-built fire protection systems or the knowledge of it

mp world10MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

Rohingyas flee to B’desh on new Myanmar threat

TOMBRU (Bangladesh): Hundreds of Rohingya living in no man's land have left their makeshift camp and crossed into Bangladesh after soldiers from Myanmar used loud hail-ers to threaten them, commu-nity leaders said on Wednesday.

Around 6,000 Rohingya have been living on a thin stretch of land between the two countries since fleeing Myan-mar in the wake of a brutal mil-itary crackdown on the Muslim minority in late August.

They were among the first to flee Myanmar when the vio-lence erupted last year and set up makeshift shelters in no man's land in the weeks before Bangladesh agreed to let the Rohingya into the country.

In recent weeks they have come under pressure from soldiers who have stepped up patrols along the barbed wire border fence just yards (metres) away from the camp and broadcast messages using loud hailers ordering the Rohingya to leave.

Community leader Dil Mohammad said the messages had spread panic through the

camp."We can't now sleep peace-

fully. Most of the Rohingya in the camps now want to flee and take shelter in Bangladesh," Mohammad said.

"Around 150 families have already left the camp for Ban-gladesh as they were afraid they might be forcefully sent back to Rakhine," he said, referring to the area of Myanmar where the Rohingya used to live.

One Border Guard Ban-gladesh official said the Myan-mar soldiers were playing the announcement at least 10 to 15 times a day.

In it, they urge the Rohingya to leave, saying the land they are on is under their jurisdic-tion and threatening them with prosecution if they remain.

Last week Bangladesh and Myanmar officials visited the camp and urged the refugees to return to Rakhine.

But community leaders have said they won't go back unless their demands for citi-zenship and security guaran-tees are met.

Myanmar views the Rohingya as illegal settlers from Bangladesh and has long denied them citizenship and

basic rights.Nearly 700,000 have fled

since the military backed by Buddhist mobs launched a brutal crackdown last year in the wake of militant attacks on police posts.

Doctors without Borders has said 6,700 Rohingya were killed in the first month of the violence alone in a campaign the United Nations has called ethnic cleansing.

Most of the refugees are now living in camps in Bangladesh.

The Bangladesh govern-ment has signed an agreement with Myanmar to repatriate them, but the refugees them-selves say they do not want to return.

Bangladesh was supposed to start the repatriation pro-cess last month but it has been delayed amid concerns over a lack of preparation.

Myanmar forces have also erected a kilometres-long barbed wire fence along the border in recent weeks and installed multiple outposts with armed guards and loudspeak-ers, the refugees said. AGENCIES

Posing as jihadist, Czech ‘crashed’ 2 trains to provoke anti-Muslim ire

PRAGUE: A 70-year-old Czech man is facing terror charges after allegedly causing two train crashes and pretend-ing he was a jihadist in a bid to provoke a backlash against Muslims, a news report said on Wednesday.

The man felled trees by two different railways near the cen-tral city of Mlada Boleslav in early June and late July 2017, the lidovky.cz news site said, quoting a prosecutor.

Trains crashed into both trees but no one was injured.

In both places, the man left leaflets with messages in Ara-bic transliterated into Roman characters. Police arrested the man last week.

"The culprit is a Czech-born citizen whose motivation was to raise fears of the Mus-lim migrant wave and terror attacks," the website quoted Prague prosecutor Marek Bod-lak as saying. AGENCIES

Maldives throws out foreign lawyers for internal meddling

COLOMBO: The Maldives detained and deported a group of international lawyers who travelled to the troubled hon-eymoon islands to study the impact of emergency rule, their organisation said on Wednesday.

Law Asia, a regional law-yers' association, said it had sent four members in response to an open invitation the government issued two days after President Abdulla Yameen imposed a state of emergency.

That followed a Supreme Court order, later rescinded, to release political prisoners and reinstate sacked lawmak-ers -- a move that would have cost Yameen his majority in parliament.

The president has overseen a major crackdown on dissent in recent years, jailing a series of prominent critics including the opposition leader and sack-ing MPs who defected from the ruling party.

Earlier this month Yameen sacked the chief jus-tice and another senior judge before imposing emergency rule, sparking international condemnation.

The crisis has hit the image

of the Maldives as a peaceful holiday paradise, although it has had little impact on life away from the capital in the upmarket resort islands popular with hon-eymooners. The four lawyers were detained on Sunday when they arrived at Male interna-tional airport, where they were held and subsequently deported, Law Asia said.

"By such action, the gov-ernment of Maldives deprived itself of the benefit of an inde-pendent and impartial assess-ment by a fact-finding team not sponsored by any individuals, parties or organisations in the Maldives," it said.

The government had invited international organisations to send representatives to "assess the situation in the Maldives and

witness the safety and security of Male" under emergency rule.

Law Asia said they had been trying for more than two weeks to arrange special visas before deciding to send the delegation after informing the immigration authorities.

Separately, Yameen's niece Dunya Maumoon resigned late last night as health minister.

She had been under pressure to resign since Yameen ordered the arrest of her father, ex-presi-dent Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.

The 80-year-old was presi-dent for 30 years until the coun-try's first democratic elections in 2008 and was initially see as the power behind the throne until be became estranged from his half brother and backed the opposition. AGENCIES

Simple urine test can tell how much our body has aged BEIJING: Scientists have iden-tified a promising new marker of ageing in urine that may help predict the risk of developing age-related diseases and even death.

Researchers, including those from Sichuan Univer-sity in China, found that a substance indicating oxidative damage increases in urine as people get older.

The study, published in the journal Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, also describes a way to easily measure the levels of this marker in human urine samples.

The new marker potentially provides a method to measure how much our body has aged - our biological rather than chronological age, research-ers said.

This could help predict our risk of developing age-related disease, and even the likely time-frame for our death, they said.

While everyone born in the same year has the same chron-ological age, the bodies of dif-ferent people age at different rates.

This means that, although the risk of many diseases increases with age, the link between our age in years and our health and lifespan is rela-tively loose.

Many people enjoy long lives, relatively free of disease, while others suffer chronic ill-ness and premature death.

Some researchers consider normal ageing to be a disease, where our cells accumulate damage over time.

The rate of this cellular damage can vary from person to person, and may be dictated by genetics, lifestyle and the environment we live in.

This cellular damage may be a more accurate indication of our biological age than the number of years since we were

born.We need to be able to mea-

sure biological age to know whether treatments to slow ageing - which may be possi-ble in the future - are effective, researchers said.

One mechanism thought to underlie biological ageing

involves a molecule vital to our survival - oxygen - in what is called the free radical theory of ageing.

"Oxygen by-products produced during normal metabolism can cause oxida-tive damage to biomolecules in cells, such as DNA and RNA," said Jian-Ping Cai from National Center of Gerontol-ogy in China.

"As we age, we suffer increasing oxidative damage, and so the levels of oxidative markers increase in our body," Cai said.

One such marker called 8-oxo-7,8-dihydroguanosine or 8-oxoGsn results from oxi-dation of a crucial molecule in our cells called RNA.

The researchers measured 8-oxoGsn in urine samples

from 1,228 Chinese residents aged 2-90 years old, using a rapid analysis technique called ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography.

"We found an age-depen-dent increase in urinary 8-oxoGsn in participants 21 years old and older," said Cai.

"Therefore, urinary 8-oxoGsn is promising as a new marker of ageing," Cai said.

Interestingly, levels of 8-oxoGsn were roughly the same between men and women, except in post-meno-pausal women, who showed higher levels.

This may have been caused by the decrease in oestro-gen levels that happens dur-ing menopause, as oestrogen is known to have anti-oxidant effects. AGENCIES

Humans can use sound to 'see' like bats: Study

LONDON: Humans - just like bats - can 'see' their surround-ings using sound by producing clicks that bounce off objects to "sonify" them into a picture, scientists say.

In a study published in the journal Proceedings B, researchers revealed how louder clicks allow "echoloca-tors" to see behind them.

Previous studies have shown that echolocation can provide detail about objects in the environment, including shape, size, distance, and even the material they are made from.

Just like bats, expert echo-locators instinctively increase the intensity (or loudness) of their clicks, and click more fre-quently when an object is off to the side or behind them, 'BBC News' reported.

Lore Thaler from Dur-ham University in the UK and colleagues used a special sound-deadening room to put echolocating volunteers to the test.

Eight participants stood in this soft, foam-lined room with their fingers in their ears hum-ming a tune, while one of the

scientists placed an echo-pro-ducing disc somewhere around them.

"We would then retreat behind them and use a long stick to tap them gently on the back of their foot," said Thaler, who led the study.

"Then, they would stop humming, unblock their ears and start making mouth clicks and using the echoes to tell us - was there a target present or not?"

This revealed that echolo-cators could spot the target in front of them after a click or two.

However, if it was off to the side or behind them, they needed about 10 or 12 clicks, and the clicks became much louder, researchers said. AGENCIES

Egypt court gives singer two-year jail sentence for belly dancing CAIRO: An Egyptian court has sentenced a little-known female singer to two years in prison over an online video it says "incites debauchery and immorality." The decision late on Tuesday against Laila Amer by the Giza misdemeanour court came on the same day that another court sentenced a famous Arab singer to six months in prison over comments she made that were interpreted as an insult to the Nile River. Amer's video showed her belly dancing and playing a downtrodden housewife complaining to her husband about his bossy mother. Unlike her famous contemporary Sherine Abdel-Wahab, she awaits her yet-to-be-decided appeal date in prison. AGENCIES

Australia recalls 2.3 million vehicles over airbag problems

SYDNEY: Australia announced the compulsory recall of 2.3 million vehicles on Wednesday due to problems with faulty Takata airbags that have caused at least 23 deaths worldwide.

The government interven-tion -- one of the country's biggest ever consumer recalls -- follows consultations with affected manufacturers and industry stakeholders.

It affects vehicles made by Ford, GM Holden, Mercedes-Benz, Tesla, Jaguar, Land Rover, Volkswagen, Audi and Skoda. Similar action has taken place around the world. "The com-pulsory recall will capture approximately 2.3 million vehi-cles that still have a defective airbag that needs replacement," said assistant treasurer Michael Sukkar. "Absolute priority will be given to replacing alpha air-bags, which pose an immediate and critical safety risk." Given the scale of the task, suppliers have until the end of December 2020 to progressively replace all

defective airbags made by the Japanese group.

A total of four million vehi-cles in Australia are affected. Some have already been vol-untarily recalled by manufac-turers, with on Wednesday's action concerning those that have yet to be fixed.

An investigation by Aus-tralia's Competition and Con-sumer Commission found that Takata airbag inflators without a desiccant -- a drying agent -- or with a calcium sulphate des-iccant had a design flaw.

It said that over time the ammonium nitrate propel-lant could degrade, potentially leading to the airbags being deployed in error.

Worldwide at least 23 deaths and more than 230 seri-ous injuries have been reported in connection with the Takata airbags, Sukkar said, with a man killed in Australia last year. In total, at least 100 mil-lion units across all car man-ufacturers have been affected globally. AGENCIES

Jared Kushner's access to US top secrets withdrawnWASHINGTON: US Presi-dent Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner has been stripped of his top-secret security clearance, limiting his unfettered access to see the country's top secrets, media reports said on Wednesday.

The decision made by White House chief of staff John Kelly came as the Trump administration struggles with claims of intelligence leaks.

Kushner, along with other White House officials who had been operating on interim clearances, had their access altered last week after Kelly stipulated new changes to the security clearance system, Politico and other media out-lets reported.

The security clearance of 37-year-old Kushner, who is also Trump's senior adviser, was downgraded after months of delays in completing his background check, the reports said.

Kushner, who is married to Trump's eldest daughter Ivanka, had access to the Presi-dent's Daily Brief, a secret intel-ligence report.

Kushner was notified of the downgrade in a memo last Fri-day, the reports said.

Kushner and the aides pre-viously held what is known as 'Top Secret/SCI-level' clear-ances, which provided them with unfettered access to clas-sified information and some of the country's most guarded secrets.

Despite the clearance downgrade, the president has the unilateral authority to share classified information as he sees fit, including with his son-in-law.

Kushner and his wife Ivanka have enjoyed a special

status within the White House as both family members are assistants to the president.

Kushner recently has embraced a lower profile as more questions have been raised about his interactions with foreign officials and about his financial entanglements.

The White House did not immediately comment on the memo on downgrading the security clearance to Kushner.

"We do not comment on individual security clearances. We actually haven't com-mented on Jared's. But we have commented on his ability to do his job, which he's a valued

member of the team, and he will continue to do the impor-tant work that he's been doing since he started in the admin-istration," White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders told reporters.

According to Politico, Kushner's security level has been downgraded from the top secret to secret level.

Abbe Lowell, an attorney for Kushner, said that he "has done more than what is expected of him in this process."

The changes would "not affect Mr Kushner's ability to continue to do the very impor-tant work he has been assigned by the president."

Kushner is currently in charge of the vexed Middle East peace process.

The decision to reduce Kushner's access to classified information was made after John F Kelly, the White House chief of staff, announced plans to overhaul the security clear-ance process at the White House. Last week, Kelly in a statement has said that Kush-ner would be able to continue his work unabated. AGENCIES

Lebanon PM in Saudi for 1st

visit since ties became strained

BEIRUT: Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri has headed to Saudi Arabia in his first visit to the kingdom since his now-reversed resignation from Riyadh late last year in a bizarre sequence of events that deeply strained relations between the two countries.

Hariri arrived in Saudi Ara-bia early on Wednesday, and is expected to meet the king and his powerful crown prince. His visit followed an invite by a Saudi envoy who visited Hariri in Beirut. Hariri's visit is likely to boost relations with his Saudi backers.

Relations between Hariri and Saudi rulers took a major hit last year. Hariri reversed his resignation -- submitted from the kingdom -- upon returning to Beirut, saying he reached a domestic deal to distance Leb-anon from regional conflicts.

The resignation was widely perceived as Saudi-orches-trated. AGENCIES

30 kidnapped, six killed in

south Afghanistan KANDHAR: Afghan officials say at least 30 people, includ-ing 19 police officers, have been kidnapped and six police killed by insurgents in separate inci-dents in southern Afghanistan.

Gen Abdul Raziq, Kan-dahar's police chief, said on Wednesday a group of insur-gents attacked a police check-point, killing six police and wounding five others.

At the same time another group of insurgents wearing army uniforms stopped a bus and kidnapped 30 people, of whom 19 are policemen, said Raziq.

Both incidents took place last night at the border between Kandahar and Uruzgan prov-inces, he said.

Dost Mohammad Nayab, Uruzgan governor's spokes-man, confirmed both reports, but couldn't provide more details.

No one has claimed respon-sibility for the attack or abduc-tion, but Raziq blamed Taliban fighters. AGENCIES

After alert mistake, Hawaii suspends

missile siren testsHONOLULU: Hawaii authori-ties won't sounds sirens warn-ing of a nuclear missile attack during a monthly test this week. The decision comes after an agency employee last month mistakenly sent cellphone and broadcast alerts warning of an incoming ballistic missile.

Instead Hawaii Emergency Management Agency officials only plan to test a separate siren that warns of tsunamis and other natural disasters. The test is scheduled for Thursday.

Brigadier General Kenneth Hara last week recommended that the agency suspend its missile attack outreach until it prepares a report on how the state should respond to a chem-ical, biological, radiological or nuclear attack or accident.

Hara didn't recommended suspending the missile siren tests. AGENCIES

Woman tells police Steve Wynn raped her in '70s LAS VEGAS: A woman told police she had a child with casino mogul Steve Wynn after he raped her, while another reported she was forced to resign from a Las Vegas job after she refused to have sex with him.

The Associated Press on Tuesday obtained copies of police reports recently filed by the two women about allega-tions dating to the 1970s.

Police in Las Vegas revealed earlier this month that they had taken the statements after a news report in January revealed sexual misconduct allegations against the billionaire.

The allegations are the lat-est levelled against Wynn by women. He resigned as chair-man and CEO of Wynn Resorts on February 6, less than two weeks after the Wall Street Journal reported that a num-ber of women said he harassed or assaulted them and that one case led to a USD 7.5 million

settlement.Wynn has vehemently

denied the misconduct accu-sations the newspaper reported and he attributed them to a campaign led by his ex-wife, whose attorney has denied that she instigated the January 26 news story.

One police report obtained by the AP shows a woman told officers that Wynn raped her at least three times around

1973 and 1974 at her Chicago apartment. She reported she got pregnant and gave birth to a girl in a gas station restroom.

In one instance, the woman claimed that Wynn pinned her against the refrigerator and raped her. She said he then made a phone call, kissed her on the cheek and left. The report does not explain how Wynn is alleged to have entered the apartment or if they knew

each other. The woman claimed she did not give him a key.

The second police report shows a woman told police she had consensual sex with Wynn "several times" while she worked as a dealer at the downtown Las Vegas casino-hotel Golden Nugget, but "felt coerced to perform the acts." She reported she was forced to resign when she turned him down.

"In the Summer of 1976, Wynn approached her in the back hall and wanted her to go with him," according to the report filed January 29. "(S)he told him, "no", she was done and had someone she was see-ing. She was soon after accused of stealing USD 40.00 and forced to resign."

The women's names are redacted on the reports, and police said they do not identify people who say they are victims of sex crimes.

The Las Vegas case will not

be investigated because the statute of limitations in Nevada is 20 years.

Ralph Frammolino, spokes-man for Wynn, yesterday declined comment on the lat-est allegations.

Wynn Resorts is facing scrutiny by gambling regu-lators in Nevada and Massa-chusetts, where the company is building a roughly USD 2.4 billion casino just outside Bos-ton. Regulators in Macau, the Chinese enclave where the company operates two casi-nos, are also inquiring about the allegations.

In addition, groups of shareholders have filed law-suits in state court in Las Vegas accusing Wynn and the board of directors of Wynn Resorts of breaching their fiduciary duties by ignoring what the lawsuits described as a longstanding pattern of sexual abuse and harassment by the company's founder. AGENCIES

Casino mogul Steve Wynn

mp world 11MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

Cosmonaut, two astronauts return to Earth from ISS DZHEZKAZGAN (Kazakh-stan): Two NASA astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut returned to Earth on Wednes-day, rounding off a mission of more than five months aboard the International Space Station.

Alexander Misurkin of Rus-sia's Roscosmos space agency and NASA's Mark Vande Hei

and Joe Acaba touched down on steppe land southeast of the town of Dzhezkazgan in cen-tral Kazakhstan at the expected time of 0231 GMT.

"All descent and landing operations went according to plan. The crew members that have returned to Earth are feel-ing well," Roscosmos said in a

statement.Misurkin, 40, who handed

over command of the Interna-tional Space Station to com-patriot Anton Shkaplerov on Tuesday and took charge of the Soyuz descent module carry-ing the trio down to Earth has spent 334 days in space over two flights.

He was in buoyant mood on the way down, telling Russian Mission control he felt "better than anyone", and was the first crew member to emerge out of the spacecraft onto the snow-covered steppe.

Following him out of the craft that landed upright were Acaba, 50, who has now racked

up some 10 months in orbit over three missions and his 51-year-old colleague Vande Hei, who was in space for the first time.

Both NASA astronauts were active on Twitter while aboard the ISS, while Misurkin eschewed the micro-blogging platform. AGENCIES

Boats sink in River Congo; 14 missing

KINSHASA: At least 14 people are feared drowned after two over-crowded, rickety boats sank in the River Congo, the interior minister of DR Congo said on Wednes-day, though local sources fear the toll could be much higher. "Fourteen missing, 108 survived," the Democratic Republic of Congo's interior minister, Henri Mova, said in an email, after the two ves-sels sank in the river in the southwestern province of Mai-Ndombe. Local of-ficial Didace Pembe said many more people may have died. AGENCIES

Nobel Institute gets fake Peace prize nomination for TrumpOSLO (Norway): Has Donald Trump really been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize? The Norwegian Nobel Institute said Wednesday it had filed a police report after receiving a seem-ingly fraudulent nomination for the US president.

"We have good reason to believe that a nomination we received concerning Trump has been falsified," Nobel Institute director Olav Njolstad said.

He refused to provide fur-ther details, saying it was for the police to give more information.

Each year, nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize must be submitted by January 31. Among those entitled to pro-pose names are members of parliament and government, former laureates and some uni-versity professors. While the list of candidates is kept secret for at least 50 years, those who nominate are however allowed

to disclose their choice. The Peace Research Institute of Oslo (Prio) said in early February that Trump's name was on the list.

Like last year, Trump was nominated for his "ideology of peace by force" by an American who did not want his identity revealed, according to Prio, a body independent of the Nobel organisation which closely mon-itors the nominations revealed publicly. It is possible that this nomination was submitted by a

person suspected of committing identity fraud to appear eligible to nominate.

The Nobel Institute said it had received 329 valid nomina-tions for the 2018 Peace Prize. The five members of the Nobel committee that selects the win-ner are also allowed to submit names during their first meet-ing of the year, which was held on Monday. The name of the 2018 winner will be announced in early October. AGENCIES

US Prez’s ex-digital adviser to manage his re-election bidWASHINGTON DC: President Donald Trump never stopped campaigning after winning the White House, and now he’s making fresh moves to establish his re-election effort.

The president on Tuesday named former digital adviser Brad Parscale as campaign man-ager for his 2020 election bid, a sign he is prioritizing loyalty as he works to secure his own political future in what is shap-ing up to be a bruising 2018 midterm election cycle for the GOP.

The rise of Parscale, largely unknown in politics until just two years ago, has been inex-tricably linked to Trump’s own political success.

In a statement, the Trump campaign said Parscale will lead “advanced planning” for the 2020 effort, and that the campaign also will be engaged in the midterm elections. The announcement turned heads on Capitol Hill, where Republicans have been lobbying the presi-dent for months to keep focused on the November 2018 contests _ with leaders and political aides warning Trump that Democrats could gain subpoena power over his administration if Republi-cans lose the House or Senate.

The campaign also announced that former dep-uty campaign manager Michael Glassner will serve as chief oper-ating officer. AGENCIES

Indiana legislature hails Sikh role in America’s rise to power

INDIANAPOLIS: Both Houses of the US' Indiana state legislature have unanimously passed resolutions praising the "significant contribution" of Sikh Americans in the country.

The House of Representa-tives, the lower house passed the Sikh resolution on Wednes-day, within days of the Senate, the upper house, passing a sim-ilar resolution.

A Sikh prayer marked the opening of the day's proceed-ings at the House of Represen-tatives in Indiana, which has a population of about 10,000 Sikhs who own around 3,500 businesses in the state.

Noting that Sikhs in Amer-ica pursue diverse professions and walks of life, making rich contributions to the economic vibrancy of the US as farmers, engineers, doctors, scientists, and business owners, the reso-lution said Sikhs continue to make strides toward securing religious liberty as patriotic members of the United States Armed Forces.

It observed that Sikhs have served on local, state, and fed-eral levels of government in

the US, and said the commu-nity provided significant con-tributions to and continued to serve the country, state and the communities.

"As such the faithful ser-vice of the Sikh community to this state and the coun-try merits appreciation as an integral thread in the fabric of American plurality," said the resolution sponsored by Repre-sentative Cindy Kirkhofer and co-authored by House Speaker Brian Bosma.

"Indiana's growing Sikh community continues to make tremendous contributions to our state, and it's an honour to

formally recognise them and their efforts on Wednesday at the Statehouse," Bosma said.

"Thousands of Sikhs call Indiana home, which adds to our state's vibrancy and diver-sity while strengthening our economic engine," he added.

Asserting that Indiana is home to a large and thriving Sikh community, Kirkhofer said as owners and operators of businesses, Sikhs play a vital role in the state's economy, pro-viding jobs, services and goods to Hoosiers.

"They are also deeply involved in philanthropic and civic activities that make Indi-

ana more vibrant and stronger. I look forward to fostering rela-tionships with the Sikh com-munity as our state continues to grow," the state legislator said. Earlier the day's proceed-ing of the Indiana House of Representatives opened with a Sikh prayer by Gurinder Singh Khalsa, founder and head of Sikhs Political Action Committee.

"Sikhs across Indiana are honoured to receive this rec-ognition," Khalsa said. "We are dedicated to the future of Indi-ana and the United States and we commit ourselves to serv-ing with an open, honest heart," he added. The House proceed-ings, he said, was an opportu-nity for others, perhaps who are not even aware of exactly who the Sikhs are, to hear a little bit about the community.

Acknowledging that the Sikh community has been a victim of maltreatment, because of their traditional attire, Bosma said the religion itself was created as a protector. "We understand here that the (Sikh) community just wants to live the American dream...

We can learn about the Indian dream and the Sikh dream as well. It's good for those cultural exchanges," he told PTI.

The Speaker, who is yet to travel to India, said he wants to visit the "largest vibrant democ-racy" of the world.

"It is the largest democ-racy, most populated democ-racy in the world. While we've had some differences here and there, we've been key allies through much of the twenti-eth century and continues to be key allies through the 21 first century, particularly as the East and the Middle East continues to be a point of conflict, its criti-cal for us to have close ties with India," he said in response to a question.

Bosma said there are some key business ties that are begin-ning that he is aware of and some that have not yet been announced but are in the works. "It's exciting for us to continue the strong relation-ship, a historical relationship that we've had. And we want to expand it, particularly in the economic arena in both direc-tions," he added. AGENCIES

11 US soldiers fall sick after letter opened at military base

WASHINGTON: An enve-lope containing an unknown substance was opened at a US military base near Washington, leaving 11 Marines sick and prompting the FBI to launch an investigation.

A gunnery sergeant opened the envelope received on Tues-day at Joint Base Fort Myer-Henderson Hall in Arlington, Virginia.

People who were exposed reported symptoms includ-ing itchy hands and faces and bloody noses, a Marine official told NBC News. The building was evacuated immediately.

A law enforcement offi-cial said field tests for the let-ter all came back negative for any harmful substance, but the FBI is transporting it tonight to its lab in Quantico for further analysis, CNN reported.

The official said the enve-lope was addressed to the Marines' headquarters bat-talion on the base, not to an individual.

"Shortly after receiving the letter, 11 people started to feel

ill and caused the evacuation of the building," Major Brian Block, a Marine spokesman said.

After the evaluation of 11 people, three personnel were transported in stable condition for further medical evaluations.

The building was screened and cleared.

"The letter was removed, and NCIS (Naval Criminal Investigative Service) and FBI are conducting a joint investi-gation," he said.

The law enforcement offi-cial said the text of the letter contained derogatory, at time unintelligible and ranting lan-

guage, CNN reported.Investigators are still deter-

mining what relationship, if any, the sender had with the base. The spokesperson for the Arlington Country Fire Department said that the inci-dent response is being scaled back, however, the investiga-tion remains ongoing.

Fort Myer is adjacent to Arlington National Cemetery and is jointly controlled by the Army and Marine Corps.

It is also home to the Army's Third Infantry Regi-ment, known as the Old Guard, which serves as the presidential honor guard. AGENCIES

Philippine chief justice to take leave... expects impeachment

MANILA: The Philippine Supreme Court's chief justice -- who has drawn the ire of President Rodrigo Duterte -- expects to be impeached by the House next month and will go on leave to prepare for the trial she's confident of winning, her spokesman said on Wednesday.

International rights groups and local critics have accused Duterte of drifting toward authoritarianism after declaring martial law in the south. He has overseen a drug war marked by thousands of killings of mostly poor suspects and has publicly threatened his opponents.

Last year, he said he wanted Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno and a top anti-graft prosecutor impeached and accused them of allowing them-selves to be used to discredit his administration.

Sereno will start an indefi-nite leave on Thursday but will not resign amid reports that rival justices demanded she quit in a closed-door meeting, her spokesman Jojo Lacanilao said.

"There is no body or institu-tion outside of the Senate which can force the chief justice to resign," Lacanilao told a news conference. He added that any action to force Sereno to step down other than by convict-ing her in a Senate trial would be unconstitutional.

"The chief justice has a deep commitment to the constitu-tion, democracy and to the con-stitutional process," Lacanilao said. "If the Senate trial ends and chief justice is convicted,

she will not last for a day in her position."

He said Sereno has not committed any wrongdoing and "did not do anything that can amount to an impeachable offense" and looks forward to the trial, where her defense attorneys could confront her accusers.

The complaint filed by a lawyer cited 27 grounds for impeachment, including alleged corruption and culpable vio-lation of the constitution. She has been accused of not declar-ing her assets and liabilities as required by the law, buying a luxury vehicle with public funds and deciding without consult-ing fellow justices.

Sereno has sought dis-missal of the complaint, call-ing the allegations totally false and "nothing short of an impeachment exercise based on fake news." A committee in the House of Representatives, which is dominated by Duterte's allies, has preceded with tele-vised impeachment hearings and is expected to cast an ini-tial vote on whether to impeach

Sereno next week.Duterte last year accused the

Ombudsman anti-graft agency of allowing the use of illegally obtained or fabricated informa-tion to investigate allegations that he kept undeclared wealth in past bank accounts.

The president denied the allegations and challenged Sereno and Ombudsman agency head Conchita Carpio-Morales to resign along with him and to open their bank accounts to scrutiny. Morales and Sereno denied any wrong-doing and rejected Duterte's challenge. The investigation of the alleged undeclared wealth was recently terminated.

Opposition groups and pol-iticians have backed Sereno, who was appointed in 2012 by Duterte's predecessor. A left-wing group of lawyers, the National Union of Peo-ples' Lawyers, expressed con-cerns over reported efforts by some fellow justices to force Sereno to step down, saying this undermines the high court's integrity and respect for the constitution. AGENCIES

Christian-Muslim violence in

Nigeria leaves 13 more dead

LAGOS: At least 13 people have been killed in clashes between Christian and Muslim youths in central Nigeria, police said on Wednesday, in the latest vio-lence to hit the region.

Fighting broke out on Mon-day in Kasuwan Magani com-munity in Kaduna state, about 45 kilometres by road from the state capital, Kaduna city.

"The mayhem led to the death of 13 people with many houses and shops burnt," Kaduna state police commis-sioner Austin Iwar said by telephone. Local reports gave a higher death toll. Iwar said 20 suspects have been arrested, and troops and police had been deployed to quell the violence.

"The place is now calm. I was in the village on Tuesday to implore the community and traditional leaders to appeal to the warring youths to sheath their swords," he added.

An investigation has been launched into the incident.

"We don't want to jump into conclusion as to what led to the mayhem. The speculation was that some Christian boys were not happy that their girls are befriending Muslim boys," Iwar said.

Central Nigeria is where the country's mainly Muslim north meets it largely Christian south, and tensions between the two communities have fre-quently boiled over into deadly violence. AGENCIES

Church at Jesus's traditional burial site reopens after protest

JERUSALEM: The Jerusalem church built at the site many see as the holiest in Christianity reopened on Wednesday after a three-day closure to protest against Israeli measures had left thousands of visitors locked outside.

The two men who act as keepers of the key of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre opened its large wooden doors at around 4:00 am, ending the protest that began on Sunday at noon.

Shortly afterwards, a group of pilgrims emerged from the still darkened corridors of Jeru-salem's Old City to visit the sacred site.

"We prayed in front of the doors every day since Sun-day," said Francois-Roch Fer-let, a 29-year-old visiting with a group of 50 people from France, standing near the ornate shrine encasing the traditional site of Jesus's tomb inside the church.

They were due to leave later on Wednesday and were relieved they were able to visit.

The church is built where Christians believe Jesus was crucified, buried and resur-rected. Custody of it is shared by the Greek Orthodox, Arme-nian and Roman Catholic denominations.

The closure seemed to be the longest since at least 1990.

Christian leaders decided to

reopen the church after Israel on Tuesday suspended tax measures they strongly oppose.

A proposed law that Chris-tian leaders say would allow Israel to expropriate church land is also to be shelved.

A statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanya-hu's office said a "professional team" would be appointed to come up with a solution to the tax measures imposed by Israeli authorities in Jerusalem.

Israeli Regional Coopera-tion Minister Tzachi Hanegbi will also look into the issue of land sales in Jerusalem by Christian bodies, which prompted the proposed law that is now also suspended.

Christian leaders are in part angry over attempts by Israeli authorities in Jerusalem to enforce tax collection on church property they consider commercial, saying exemptions only apply to places of worship or religious teaching.

Jerusalem Mayor Nir Bar-kat says the city is due 650 mil-lion shekels (USD 186 million) in uncollected taxes on church properties.

He stresses the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and all other churches are exempt, with the changes only affect-ing establishments like "hotels, halls and businesses" owned by churches. AGENCIES

Daffodil extract may help fight cancer: Study

LONDON: Scientists have extracted a natural anti-cancer compound from Daffodils that may help improve treatments for the deadly disease.

Researchers, led by Denis Lafontaine from Universite libre de Bruxelles (ULB) in Belgium, discovered that this compound triggers the activa-tion of an anti-tumoral surveil-lance pathway.

They established that this compound, an alkaloid named haemanthamine, binds to the ribosome.

Ribosomes are nanoma-chines essential to the survival of our cells because they syn-thesise all our proteins.

To sustain their unre-strained growth, cancer cells rely on increased protein syn-thesis. They are therefore par-ticularly sensitive to treatments that inhibit the production and the function of ribosomes.

In the study published in the journal Structure, the researchers have shown that haemanthamine from Daf-fodils blocks the production of protein by ribosomes, thus slowing growth of cancer cells.

Haemanthamine also inhibits the production of these nanomachines in the nucleolus (the "ribosome factory").

This nucleolar stress trig-gers the activation of an anti-tumoral surveillance pathway leading to the stabilisation of the protein p53 and to the elimination of cancer cells, researchers said. AGENCIES

PIO Canadian MP quits key post over Atwal inviteOTTAWA: Indian-origin Randeep Sarai, a Canadian MP who had invited a con-victed Sikh terrorist to a formal dinner during Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's visit to India, has quit as chair of the Liberal party's Pacific Caucus, taking responsibil-ity for the goof-up, a media report said on Wednesday. Sarai, 43, had invited Jaspal Atwal - a Sikh convicted of at-tempting to assassinate an Indian minister in 1986 - to attend a reception at the residence of Canadian High Commissioner Nadir Patel in New Delhi. The invitation was revoked as soon as Atwal's name was

discovered on the guest list. Trudeau met with Sarai late on Tuesday during which the lawmaker offered to resign as chair of the party's Pacific Caucus, The Star newspaper reported. "I want to again apologise for my role in recent unfortu-nate events," Sarai said in a statement, adding that he'll "be exercising better judgment" in future."As I don't want to distract from the good work of the Pacific caucus, I will be stepping down as caucus chair." Trudeau has accepted Sarai's offer to resign, the paper added. AGENCIES

15 killed, 40 hurt in Egypt train collisionCAIRO: At least 15 peo-ple were killed and 40 others injured on Wednesday when a passenger train collided with a freight train in Egypt, offi-cials said, the latest deadly rail accident in the North African country.

The passenger train col-lided with the goods train near Kom Hamada station in north-ern Behira governorate.

At least 15 people were killed and 40 others injured in the accident, according to the Ministry of Transportation.

The injured were taken to nearby hospitals.

The cause of the accident was not immediately known.

The passenger train was en route to Alexandria while the cargo train was heading to Cairo, local media reported.

Egypt's railway system has a poor safety record, mostly blamed on decades of badly maintained equipment and poor management.

Deadly accidents have claimed hundreds of lives over the years.

According to latest figures by the state's statistics agency, 1,249 train accidents took place last year, the highest since 2009 when the number reached 1,577.

In August, 43 people died in a train collision near the coastal city of Alexandria. In 2016, at least 51 people were killed when two commuter trains collided near Cairo. AGENCIES

mp business12MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

OUR CORRESPONDENT

MUMBAI: India no longer fea-tures among the most attrac-tive regions for investment in the mining sector, as a possible fall-out of a mining ban in Goa, says an international rpt inter-national report.

According to the Fraser Institute’s annual survey of mining companies, after being ranked among the bottom 10 countries at 97 of 104 in the investment attractiveness index in 2016, and at 73 in 2015, India has been dropped from the list of 91 countries in 2017.

Earlier this month, the Supreme Court had cancelled all the iron ore mining leases in Goa, effective mid-March.

The mining ban in the tiny state would expectedly have a far-reaching impact not only on the state, but also on the country’s image as an invest-ment destination, a report by the Vancouver-, Canada-based public policy think tank noted.

During the last 10 years, iron ore mining has added Rs 30,000 crore to the exche-quer and brought in around USD7 billion worth of foreign exchange, according to the

report.“The limitations put by the

legislative system on the mining industry in the form of cap on iron mining (in Goa and Kar-nataka), high export duty, and permission for export (of iron ore from Karnataka) would impact not only the investment options in the country but also all those individuals directly connected to the sector. This would further generate a slump on the already adverse unem-ployment rate in the country,” the agency warned.

The survey is ranked by

combining a metric ‘best prac-tices mineral potential index, which rates regions based on their geologic attractiveness, and the ‘policy perception index’, a composite index that measures the effects of gov-ernment policy on attitudes toward exploration investment, a statement said here.

“However, the policy per-ception index alone does not recognise the fact that invest-ment decisions are often siz-ably based on the pure mineral potential of a jurisdiction,” the report concluded.

‘Goa mining ban yanks down India investment ranking’

India’s mfg sector growth falls to 4-month low in Feb: PMI

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: India’s manu-facturing sector activity fell to a four-month low in Febru-ary as factory output and new business orders rose at a slower pace, says a monthly survey.

The Nikkei India Manu-facturing Purchasing Manag-ers Index (PMI) fell to 52.1 in February from 52.4 in January, indicating a modest improve-ment in operating conditions.

This is for the seventh con-secutive month that the index remained above the 50-point-mark, that separates expansion from contraction.

According to Japanese financial services major Nomura, India s manufac-turing PMI remained in the expansion zone but suggested some consolidation after the rapid ramp up of activity in December. In December 2017, the index had touched a 60-month high of 54.7.

“It was promising to see that

India s manufacturing sector remained in growth territory, as the impact of July s Goods and Services Tax continues to dissipate,” said Aashna Dod-hia, Economist at IHS Markit and author of the report.

In response to greater pro-duction requirements, firms raised their staffing levels dur-ing February. Although mod-est, the pace of job-creation was slightly faster than January.

On the prices front, the survey said that cost inflation accelerated to the sharpest since February 2017, adding to expectations that inflation-ary risks will continue over the coming months.

IHS Markit upgraded its CPI forecast to 5.2 per cent for financial year 2017-2018 amid a stronger oil price forecast and growing fiscal risks.

The survey further noted that Indian manufacturers remained optimistic towards the 12-month outlook for out-put during February.

Note-ban has led to 5x rise in fintech deals in ‘17: Report

OUR CORRESPONDENT

MUMBAI: The note-ban deci-sion upped investor interest in the country’s fintech industry that led to a five-fold increase in deal activity in 2017, a report said today.

Venture investing in the country’s fintech sector shot up five times to USD 2.4 bil-lion during the year and was a major factor driving the surge in investments into such new- age companies globally, it said.

At the global level, height-ened activity in India, along with the UK and US led to a 18 per cent rise in fintech financ-ing at USD 27.4 billion in 2017, the report said. The report by global tech major Accenture attributed the surge in deals to the controversial demon-etisation decision of the gov-ernment. “India s boom was driven by strong demand for cashless services following the country s ‘demonetisation’ events,” senior managing direc-

tor in its financial services prac-tice Julian Skan said.

It can be noted that the decision has had a limited impact on its key aims as Indi-ans returned over 99 per cent of the cash held by them.

Deal activity in the country was led by the mobile wallet-turned-payments bank Paytm, which witnessed a USD 1.4 bil-lion infusion during the year.

Going by numbers, there was a 65 per cent surge in num-ber of deals as compared to the activity in 2016, the report said.

Demonetisation “prompted millions of Indians to shift to mobile payments and other cashless service providers like Paytm”, the report said.

The report includes data from investments by venture-capital and private-equity firms, corporations and corpo-rate venture-capital divisions, hedge funds, accelerators, and government-backed funds, and both equity as well as non-equity financing.

Core sector grows at 6.7% in Jan;

Cement, refinery output zoom

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Eight infra-structure sectors grew a faster pace of 6.7 per cent in January against 3.4 per cent in the year-ago month as petroleum refin-ery and cement output zoomed while steel power and coal pro-duction improved.

The eight core sectors -- coal, crude oil, natural gas, refinery products, fertilisers, steel, cement and electricity -- had grew by 4.2 per cent in December and 7.4 per cent in November this financial year.

Petroleum refinery pro-duction spurted 11 per cent in January against a flat output in the year-ago month. Cement output jumped 20.7 per cent in the month against 13.3 per cent contraction in the year-ago period.

Electricity generation growth also fast paced to 8.2 per cent in January against 5.2 per cent in January 2017.

Coal sector output improved by 3 per cent and steel production by 3.7 per cent in January 2018.

Crude oil production how-ever dropped 3.2 per cent, fertilisers by 1.6 per cent and natural gas by 1 per cent in the month under review.

Nafed gets govt guarantee to obtain higher bank credit

NEW DELHI: The Cabi-net Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) today approved a proposal to double the guar-antee to Rs 19,000 crore to cooperative Nafed to help it obtain credit from banks for procurement of pulses and oil-seeds at the support price.

The CCEA also approved the government guarantee up to Rs 45 crore to the Small Farmers Agri-Business Con-sortium (SFAC) for meeting its existing liability and settle-ment of extant claims, an offi-cial statement said.

“These government guaran-tees are provided for a period of five years i.e. till 2021-22 by Government of India and with waiver of 1 per cent govern-ment guarantee fee,” the state-ment said.

The government guaran-tee to Nafed has been dou-bled to Rs 19,000 crore from Rs 9,500 crore for undertaking procurement of pulses and oil-seeds under the Price Support Scheme (PSS), it said.

In view of fall in prices of pulses and oilseeds below the MSP, the provision of govern-ment guarantee will help in protecting the farmers from making distress sales during the peak arrival period and to provide remunerative prices, it added. MPOST

Stocks drop as US rate hike fear spooks investors

MUMBAI: The benchmark BSE Sensex dropped 162.35 points or 0.47 per cent and the broader Nifty settled below the 10,500 mark as investors were spooked by worries about US Fed rate hike and weak eco-nomic data.

The Sensex resumed lower at 34,156,63 and dropped fur-ther to a low 34,076.45 due to heavy selling pressure in view of foreign capital outflows and lower global cues. It closed at 34,184.04, a loss of 162.354 points, or 0.47 per cent.

The broader Nifty dipped below the key 10,500-level to touch a low of 10,461.55 and finally concluded 61.45 points, 0.58 per cent down at 10,492.85. “Weak global mar-ket on account of Fed’s hawk-ish view on future rate hike and extension of selling in banks continued to impact the mar-ket. FIIs are sellers in the mar-ket due to domestic headwinds and is adding pressure on INR,” Vinod Nair, Head of Research, Geojit Financial Services said.

Nifty is consolidating near the recent low while 10-year yield is still floating at higher levels keeping investors cau-tious, Nair said.

Banking stocks led by Axis Bank, Yes Bank, ICICI Bank and HDFC Bank took a hit after the finance ministry set a 15-day deadline for banks to take pre-emptive action on

operational and technical risks, following a USD 2 billion fraud at Punjab National Bank.

In addition, sustained capi-tal outflows and the rupee con-tinued to trade at 3-month low of 65.31 against the US dollar, down 44 paise during the day, weighed on sentiments.

Investors turned cautious ahead of the macroeconomic data, brokers said. The Decem-ber quarter GDP growth num-bers were set for release later in the day.

Market sentiment suffered a jolt after other Asian mar-kets closed with widespread losses and European markets dropped in early trade, track-ing a slump in the US stocks overnight after the US Fed chair revived worries about a sharp increase in interest rates.

A declining Chinese fac-tory activity, which slowed to

a 19-month low in February, also hit the market sentiment.

Also, a monthly survey showed India’s manufacturing sector growth eased slightly in February as factory output and new business orders rose at a slower pace.

The Nikkei India Manufac-turing Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) fell from 52.4 in January to 52.1 in February, indicating a modest improve-ment in operating conditions even as remained above the 50-point-mark that separates expansion from contraction for the seventh consecutive month. However, Moody’s Investors Service on Wednes-day estimated that India will grow 7.6 per cent in calen-dar year 2018 and 7.5 per cent in 2019, amid signs of eco-nomic recovery from impact of demonetisation and GST.

1614 159 12 1310 11 14

Intra-day on February 28, 2018 Intra-day on February 28, 2018BSE SENSEX

15 12 1311

NSE NIFTY

16 9 10

Previous close:

10,554.30

Close:

10,492.85

Previous close:

34,346.39

Close:

34,184.04

Open

34,155.63

Open:

10,488.95

-61.45

(-0.58%)

Low: 10,461.55

High:

10,535.50

High:

34,302.74

Low: 34,076.45

-162.35

(-0.47%)

Harley Davidson unveils 2 models in Softail portfolioNEW DELHI: American cult bike maker Harley Davidson today unveiled two new mod-els in its Softail portfolio - Low Rider and Deluxe - priced at Rs 12.99 lakh and Rs 17.99 lakh, respectively.

The models are an addition to the four MY18 Softail mod-els launched in October 2017.

The Low Rider comes with 19-inch front and 16-inch rear radiate cast wheels and stan-dard ABS (anti-lock braking system) while the Deluxe has features such as retro-modern styled LED lighting from front to back, running lights and tombstone tail, among others.

“The addition of two new

models is aimed at strengthen-ing the brand’s Softail portfolio in the country. It also contin-ues to reinforce our leadership position among the leisure rid-ing segment in the country,” Harley Davidson India and China MD Peter MacKenzie said here. The new models are equipped with 1745 cc Milwau-kee-Eight 107 engine.

The vehicles are powered by dual-bending valve front suspension and an adjustable hidden rear monoshock, the company said, adding that the models are faster, lighter and have better handling than any of their predecessors.

“The Indian market has evolved and customers look forward to innovation in tech-

nology and comfort. This is evi-dent from the growth in the leisure riding segment for pre-mium motorcycles,” MacKen-zie said.

The company also announced a price revision for their popular Touring and CVO lineup. The price of Road King has been reduced to Rs 24.99 lakh from Rs 28.37 lakh, while Street Glide Special is now priced at Rs 33.50 lakh from the earlier Rs 29.99 lakh.

Similarly, the new price for Road Glide Special is Rs 32.99 lakh against Rs 35.61 lakh and CVO TM Limited is now avail-able at Rs 49.99 lakh against the old price of Rs 53.72 lakh. MPOST

The price of Road King has been reduced to Rs 24.99 lakh from Rs 28.37 lakh, while Street Glide Special is now priced at Rs 33.50 lakh from the earlier Rs 29.99 lakh.

Reliance Aerostructure-Thales joint venture gets CCI approval

NEW DELHI: Fair trade regu-lator CCI has given its nod to the formation of joint venture between Reliance Aerostruc-ture and Thales India.

Reliance Infrastructure-promoted Reliance Aerostruc-ture would have 51 per cent stake in the entity.

The joint venture would be known as ‘Thales Reliance Defence Systems’.

In a tweet today, the Com-petition Commission of India (CCI) said it has approved the formation of joint venture between Reliance Aerostruc-

ture Ltd and Thales India Pvt Ltd.

Deals beyond a certain threshold require the fair trade regulator’s clearance.

The proposal to set up the joint venture was announced in June 2017.

“Leveraging Thales off-

set commitment as part of the Rafale contract, the joint venture is to develop Indian capabilities to integrate and maintain the radar and elec-tronic warfare sensors,” a joint statement from the companies had said last year.

The joint venture would develop skills and activity in the Special Economic Zone of Mihan-Nagpur together with an Indian supply chain for the manufacturing of microwave technologies and high perfor-mance airborne electronics, it had said. MPOST

The proposal to set up the joint venture was announced in June 2017

Renowned doctor censures PNB chief for comparing scam with cancer

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: PNB MD and CEO Sunil Mehta got chas-tised from unexpected quar-ters when a globally acclaimed doctor V Shanta censured him for using the word ‘cancer’ to describe the Rs 12,717 crore fraud at the bank by billion-aire jeweller Nirav Modi and his associates.

Corruption is something to be ashamed of, cancer is not, she said.

“... do not try to find paral-lels where none exist. Do not mix cancer with corruption. Ever.”, said the Ramon Magsay-say Award winner and cancer specialist in a letter to Mehta.

While addressing a press conference in connection with the USD 2 billion scam ear-lier in the month, the Punjab Nation Bank chief had said: “This cancer, that’s been going on since 2011, we have brought it out and we are resolving it.”

Strongly objecting to the use of the word ‘cancer’, the leg-endary cancer specialist who was awarded Padma Bhushan in 2006 and is currently Chair-man of Chennai based Cancer Institute (WIA), said one ought to be ashamed of corruption but not of cancer.

“I was extremely disturbed to read your reference to can-cer in the context of the recent scam unearthed at your bank.

Corruption is a crime and something to be ashamed of; cancer is not,” Shanta said in her letter.

Observing that several can-cer patients are cured and lead productive lives, she said, “we do not want the word cancer to be associated with guilt, hope-lessness or dread. And defi-nitely not with the shame.”

She also appealed to the others not to use the word in cancer in such sense as it could outrage medical personal working in the field of cancer prevention and cure.

The spate of frauds in the banking sector running into thousands of crores or rupees have outraged common people, who often liken deep-rooted corruption to something per-nicious as cancer.

The worried government yesterday asked all state-owned banks to scrutinise non per-forming assets (NPAs) exceed-ing Rs 50 crore for fraud and accordingly report the matter to Central Bureau of Investi-gation (CBI).

PNB shares gain 3% at

close NEW DELHI: Shares of Punjab National Bank recovered all its early losses and ended over 3 per cent higher on value-buying.

The stock which declined 6.45 per cent to Rs 92 during the day on BSE, bounced back during the fag-end of trade. The stock finally ended at Rs 101.35, up 3.05 per cent. At NSE, shares of the company set-tled with a gain of 3.10 per cent to close at Rs 101.40.

In terms of equity vol-ume, 167.83 lakh shares of the company were traded on BSE and over 21 crore shares changed hands at NSE during the day.

Shares of PNB slumped during the morning trade after Nirav Modi’s Fire-star Diamond filed a bank-ruptcy plea in the US, and a local court in Mumbai issued summons to the accused diamantaire.

The stock had plum-meted over 12 per cent in the previous trading ses-sion, registering its fourth straight session of fall. MPOST

TVS Auto Assist inks pact with Paytm MallOUR CORRESPONDENT

CHENNAI: TVS Auto Assist today said it has partnered with Paytm Mall to provide 24x7 breakdown assistance to automobile owners across the country.

As per the partnership, car and bike owners would receive breakdown assis-tance services from any TVS Auto Assist service from Paytm Mall, a company state-ment said. TVS Auto Assist has about 5,000 authorised service providers covering 28 States and 1,795 cities.

TVS Automobile Solutions had hived off its breakdown assistance business into a separate entity TVS Auto Assist India in 2015.

It is a 51:49 joint venture between TVS Automobile Solutions and the Automobile Association, United Kingdom.

TVS Auto Assist would also offer its service to women passengers who travel between 8pm and 5am.

“This is a first of its kind initiative in the country. The service will be offered in New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyder-abad and Bangalore,” the statement said.

Commenting on the partnership, TVS Automobile Solutions Pvt Ltd. Executive Director, G Srinivasa Raghavan said, “we believe this partnership is a game changer as it is a truly digital model, including pay-ment options”.

The tie-up would digitally connect mil-

lions of car and bike users across the coun-try and the service is being extended to even non-members of TVS Auto Assist through pay-per-use model, he added.

Paytm Mall COO, Amit Sinha said the automobile segment in the company’s plat-form was “gaining massive traction”.

“We are currently focused on building this further and diversifying into newer offerings. TVS Auto Assist will be a key partner in driving this agenda. We expect to sell over 30,000 road assistance service packages in this quarter,” he said.

The TVS Auto Assist breakdown assis-tance is offered under two categories-- gold membership at Rs 1,499 and platinum at Rs 2,999, the statement added.

SBI revises deposit rates for various tenors by

up to 0.75%MUMBAI: The country’s larg-est lender State Bank of India has revised retail and bulk deposits rates by up to 0.75 per cent for various maturi-ties, effective today.

For retail deposits, below Rs 1 crore, rates have been increased by up to 0.50 per cent.

For deposits maturing in one year to less than two years, rates have been raised by 0.15 per cent to 6.40 per cent from 6.25 per cent earlier.

The retail deposit rates for two years to up to 10 years have been changed by 0.50 per cent to 6.50 per cent from 6 per cent.

The lender revised its bulk term deposit rates for the third time in as many months.

For Rs 1 crore to Rs 10 crore bulk deposits, maturing in one year to less than two years, the bank raised rates by 0.50 per cent from 6.25 per cent to 6.75 per cent.

For deposits maturing in two to less than three years, the rates have been increased by 0.75 per cent to 6.75 per cent.

For above Rs 10 crore bulk deposits maturing between one year to less than two years, the rates have been raised by 0.50 per cent to 6.75 per cent.

Air India to recruit 500 cabin crew by MayOUR CORRESPONDENT

MUMBAI/NEW DELHI: Dis-investment-bound Air India plans to hire 500 cabin crew members as the national carrier prepares to induct more air-craft and meet new regulatory requirements, a senior official has said. The government is working out the modalities for strategic stake sale in the loss-making airline, which reported a net loss of Rs 5,765.16 crore last fiscal.

The official said the airline plans to hire 500 cabin crew to meet various requirements, including to comply with avia-tion regulator DGCA’s revised norms wherein an airline should have a higher number of such staff.

Besides, more cabin crew would be required as more air-craft such as the A320 Neos are being inducted in the coming months, the official added.

“The Directorate Gen-eral of Civil Aviation has put in place new norms, under which now flights, particularly on the ultra-long haul routes

should have higher number of cabin crew. Besides, we are also expanding our operations by adding new aircraft such as the B777s and A320Neos,” the official said. In addition, the normal attrition has also neces-sitated hiring of the cabin crew, the official added.

According to a public

notice, the airline is looking to hire 500 male/female cabin crew for its Northern, Delhi and the Western regions on a “fixed term engagement basis”.

It was in 2016 when Air India had hired last time cabin crew when it took on board 800 fresh faces in one of the largest hiring exercises in the industry.

The national airline has cabin crew strength of 3,500 at present.

The appointment would initially be for five years and to maintain a “wait list for future requirements”, as per the Air India public notice. The air-line plans to recruit 163 males and 337 females. Of the total vacancy, 270 are reserved for the ST/SC/OBC candidates.

As part of the turnaround

plan, Air India has been taking various measures, including rationalisation of routes and enhanced utilisation of aircraft.

Air India along with its regional arm Alliance Air operates around 534 flights a day to domestic and interna-tional destinations. Of these, 34 flights are operated daily on ultra-long haul routes such as New Delhi-San Francisco, Hyderabad-New Delhi-Chi-cago, New Delhi-Washing-ton, New Delhi-New York and Mumbai-Newark, among oth-ers, according to the official.

Air India plans to recruit these 500 cabin crew by early next fiscal, the official said add-ing, “since we are hiring only trained staff, we hope them to join the duties by April-May.”

mp business 13MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

15th Finance Commission to define populism

NEW DELHI: In a first, the Finance Commission which recommends how much money states should get out of the taxes collected by the cen-tral government, will define what a populist measure is and recommend incentives for states that do not resort to them.

The 15th Finance Com-mission, headed by N K Singh, has many firsts to do in the the nearly six decade old history of the constitutionally man-dated body.

It has also been asked to propose measurable perfor-mance-based incentives for states that have made efforts to expand and deepen the tax net, slowed population growth, pro-moted ease of doing business and saved money by adopting Direct Benefit Transfer where government dole is paid via bank accounts of users, Singh said at a media roundtable.

Besides, the Commission has been asked to recommend incentives for states that have been able to control or elimi-

nate incurring expenditure on populist measures.

"The Commission has been asked to look at monitorable performance criteria on things like progress made on ease of doing business, demography management and whether or not a state is deliberately pur-suing a populist policy," he said.

"It is now for the Commis-sion to decide what a populist policy is."

The previous 14th Finance Commission had recom-mended that states should get a record 42 per cent of the tax revenues collected by the Cen-tre. Recommendations of all the previous Finance Commis-sions have been accepted by the government.

For the purpose of devo-lution of funds, the panel has been asked to take census of 2011 as the basis for popula-

tion data instead of 1971 cen-sus which was the basis of recommendations till the 13th Finance Commission, draw-ing some criticism from south-ern states.

The previous commission introduced that idea in a small way for the first time. It gave a weightage of 10 per cent for Census 2011 data and resulted in hurting states like Tamil Nadu that had seen slower growth in population as com-pared to states like Bihar and Madhya Pradesh.

Singh reasoned that the terms of reference of the 15th Finance Commission provide for incentives to states that have seen controlled popula-tion growth and so it balances out the concerns.

The 15th Finance Commis-sion has been asked to submit its report by the end of Octo-ber 2019. Its recommendations would be valid for five year period beginning April 1, 2020.

Singh said the panel would hold wide-ranging consulta-tions with all stakeholders and

would tour all the states begin-ning with Arunachal Pradesh in April, followed by a trip to Jammu and Kashmir and Ker-ala. It intends to complete the consultations with the states within 2018.

Multilateral agencies like OECD, IMF, World Bank and EU would also make presentations.

This is the first Commis-sion after the abolition of the Planning Commission as well as doing away of the distinc-tion of plan and non-plan expenditure.

Also, it will be the first one after the rollout of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), which has subsumed 17 indirect taxes of centre and state including excise duty, service tax and VAT. Officials in the Commis-sion said the panel has no say in fixing the Terms of Reference and it is expected to adhere to the guideline given by the gov-ernment. "We have no say in fixing of terms of reference but we are expected to adhere to the ToRs," an official said. MPOST

CCI rejects complaint against AAI, PGCIL

NEW DELHI: The Compe-tition Commission has dis-missed the allegations of abuse of dominant position against Airports Authority of India (AAI) and Power Grid Cor-poration of India Ltd (PGCIL) while availing laboratory ser-vices for testing of construc-tion materials.

The complaint was filed by one Madhya Pradesh-based Prem Prakash, who runs an engineering testing laboratory accredited by the Accreditation Commission for Conformity Assessment Bodies.

It was alleged that by impos-ing the condition requiring testing of construction materi-als through labs accredited to National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories, among others, AAI and PGCIL had put the laboratory of the complainant and other accreditation bodies out of competition.

For the case, CCI consid-ered the market for laboratory services for testing construc-tion materials in India as the relevant one.

In an order dated February 27, CCI said that AAI is a con-sumer of laboratory services and testing services availed by

it do not constitute a significant part of the potential market in the country, as there are many other customers availing these services.

"As a buyer, AAI does not appear to enjoy dominant position and has every right to choose from amongst the vari-ous available options to meet its requirement," CCI said adding that no case of contravention of the provisions of Section 4 of the Competition Act is made out against the public sector enterprise.

Section 4 pertains to abuse of dominant market position.

Referring to one of its ear-

lier orders as well as that of erst-while Competition Appellate Tribunal, CCI said PGCIL does not operate in the same market as the complainant does and is instead, a consumer of labora-tory services.

"Every consumer/ pro-curer must have the freedom to exercise its choice freely in procurement of goods and ser-vices and such a choice is sacro-sanct in a market economy as the consumers are best placed to evaluate what meets their requirements and has a com-petitive advantage. "Further, while exercising the choice, they are free to stipulate stan-dards for procurement and the same cannot be held to be anti-competitive," CCI said.

Noting that present alle-gations against PGCIL are substantially similar to those levelled earlier by the same complainant, CCI said that it sees no merit in re-examining the same issue, particularly when nothing new has been brought out against PGCIL.

CCI disposed of the mat-ter after taking a view that "no case of contravention of the provisions of Section 4 of the (Competition) Act" is made out against AAI and PGCIL. MPOST

The complaint was filed by one MP-based Prem Prakash, who runs an engineering testing laboratory accredited by the Accreditation Commission for Conformity Assessment Bodies

Amazon launches ad-free music

service for Prime members

MUMBAI: E-commerce major Amazon India today launched its ad-free music streaming service, Amazon Prime Music, for the Prime members, at no extra-cost.

The service offers unlimited offline downloads and includes a wide range of songs across international and Indian music labels in over 10 languages, the American e-tailer said in a statement.

"With ad-free streaming at no additional cost to the Prime members, we offer a welcome break from text and voice ads that come between the music," said Sahas Malhotra, director at Amazon Music India.

When asked if the company is planning to monetise the ser-vice, he said there is no plan on the cards as of now.

Amazon Prime Music, which was launched in 2014 across 30 countries, will now be available on Android and iOS mobile platforms, as well as desktops in the country. It will also be available on Fire TV sticks and Echo devices. MPOST

Data decision: NSE working with global bourses, index providers for orderly transition

NEW DELHI: NSE is working with international bourses and index providers to facilitate an orderly transition that is not disruptive to the markets and stakeholders, its chief Vikram Limaye said today.

Top officials of NSE vis-ited USA and other countries this week to address their con-cerns of wide range of stake-holders including the market participants.

"The visit was organised with an objective to reassure all stakeholders that the exchange is working with them to facili-tate an orderly transition that is not disruptive to the markets and stakeholders.

"This engagement with var-ious stakeholders will continue going forward to address any concerns," Limaye, who is the managing director and chief executive at NSE, told PTI here.

His comments come days after after top bourses NSE, BSE and Metropolitan Stock Exchange on February 9 termi-nated agreements that allowed their index derivatives to be traded on overseas bourses and data vendors from providing

data to entities which would use it to trade on international bourses.

The NSE chief also said the move by Indian stock exchanges to restrict data feeds is not anti-competitive as the decision is consistent with the policies adopted across by every international exchange.

"It is very common to find other exchanges around the world not licensing indi-

ces or data in any of their core contracts if it is being used to fragment liquidity and build liquidity outside their market, Limaye said.

He also said that NSE will continue to provide market data to market participants and index providers includ-ing MSCI to help them raise money for exchange traded funds (ETFs) as long as the data is not used to price and

trade a derivatives contract on Indian securities on an offshore exchange.

The National Stock Exchange (NSE) said that stock prices would be shared with everybody including index constructors and they can con-struct India indices based on the data provided.

"We have had several con-versations with MSCI and are working with them to help them make transition changes. Indian markets are open and continue to provide easy, sim-ple access to all foreign inves-tors who can trade in India or in GIFT city. Also licensing of indices and data is a com-mercial matter and should be viewed as such," Limaye said.

MSCI, earlier this month, had termed the move by Indian stock exchanges to restrict derivatives trading and data feeds overseas as anti-competitive.

NSE said it is also working with the regulators to further enhance the attractiveness and competitiveness of the Indian markets for accessing and trad-ing India related products.

Razorpay to power UPI on IRCTC

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Payment solu-tions company Razorpay has collaborated with Indian Rail-way Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) to help customers make online pay-ments on latter's website and mobile app through UPI (Uni-fied Payment Interface).

"Razorpay's partnership with IRCTC is intended to offer a frictionless payment expe-rience to consumers through the UPI channel and help users get comfortable with digital money, which will eventually help in increasing adoption of digital payments," Razorpay said in a statement.

It added Razorpay's pay-ment gateway is expected to process more than a mil-lion transactions a month on IRCTC website and mobile app.

"Rail travel in India has been growing exponentially

over the years and 2017 saw 30 million more passengers than the previous year. Our UPI offering will help IRCTC offer a new payment channel for customers that will effectively manage online payments dur-ing peak hours of the day in a frictionless manner," Razorpay CEO and co-founder Harshil Mathur said. UPI grew the fast-est among all modes of retail digital payments last year, clocking 151 million transac-tions in January, reporting a growth of around 40 per cent.

Razorpay currently pow-ers online payments for more than 65,000 small and large businesses like GoIbibo, Yatra, Zomato, Zoho, DSP Black-rock, Zerodha among oth-ers. It expects its merchant count to touch two lakh by the end of 2018 and impact 500 million end consumers by 2020. It has clocked in a growth rate of 30-35 per cent month-on-month.

Gold plunges Rs 460 on weak global cues, fall

in demand NEW DELHI: Gold prices tumbled by Rs 460 to Rs 31,390 per 10 grams at the bullion market on Wednesday, snapping their four-day rising streak due to subdued global cues amid slump in local jew-ellers' demand.

Silver also fell by Rs 250 to Rs 39,300 per kg owing to reduced offtake by industrial units and coin makers.

Traders said, sentiment was downbeat as the precious metal fell in global markets, because the dollar held recent highs after Federal Reserve Chair-man Jerome Powell vowed to prevent the economy from overheating while sticking with gradual rate rises.

Gold prices fell 0.07 per cent to USD 1,316.80 an ounce, and silver by 0.37 per cent to USD 16.32 an ounce in Singapore.

In the national capital, gold of 99.9 per cent and 99.5 per cent purity plunged by Rs 460 each to Rs 31,390 and Rs 31,240 per 10 grams, respectively. The precious metals had gained Rs 500 in the previous four ses-sions. MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The govern-ment on Wednesday approved an action plan for 12 'cham-pion' services sectors, includ-ing IT, tourism and hospitality, for realising their potential through establishment of a Rs 5,000 crore dedicated fund.

The fund, once set up, will support initiatives for sectoral action plans of the 'champion sectors'.

The Cabinet has also directed the ministries/ Departments concerned with these sectors to utilise the available draft sectoral plans to finalise and implement the action plans for the identified Champion Services Sectors, an official statement said.

Moreover, the respective

line Ministries/Departments shall finalise the Action Plans and the implementation time-lines along with a monitoring mechanism to monitor imple-mentation under the overall guidance of the Committee of Secretaries (CoS) under Cabi-net Secretary.

The 12 sectors include Information Technology & Information Technology enabled Services (IT & ITeS), Tourism and Hospitality Ser-vices, Medical Value Travel, Transport and Logistics Ser-vices, Accounting and Finance Services, Audio Visual Ser-vices, Legal Services, Commu-nication Services, Construction and Related Engineering Ser-vices, Environmental Services, Financial Services and Educa-tion Services.

KALEIDOSCOPE

BHEL has paid an interim dividend of 40 per cent on the enhanced equity capital, post-bonus, for fiscal 2017-18

NTPC was awarded for Overall Best Financial Performance by Governance Now at the 5th PSU Awards ceremony held in Delhi

NTPC-Ramagundam’s Quest Professional Circle (PC) received Winner Award at 17th Southern Region Professional Circles Convention

Cabinet okays Rs 5k cr action plan for Champion Sectors

India's STEM talent sees shortage despite maximum graduates

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Shortage of skilled talent in Science, Tech-nology, Engineering and Math-ematics (STEM) sector persists in India despite the country producing maximum num-ber of graduates globally, says a report.

According to data from the leading job site Indeed, the average level of shortage of skilled talent in India has risen from 6 per cent in Janu-ary, 2014 to 12 per cent in Jan-uary this year in STEM sector.

The leading sectors hiring STEM talent include infor-mation technology, banking and financial services. The top job roles these companies

offer include software engi-neer, web developer, business analyst, software architect and SAP consultant. Findings of the survey assume significance as India produced the maximum graduates worldwide with 78 million fresh graduates in 2016 alone, of which 2.6 mil-lion were from STEM.

"This puts India in a posi-

tion to outstrip the US in terms of STEM graduates produced annually, given that it leads by a margin of over 2.5 million," the report said adding that despite ample talent, some job roles remain vacant due to lack of requisite skills.

According to industry experts and academicians, one of the chief contributors to the

talent mismatch is the disparity between college curricula and industry expectations.

"Today, India produces a significant share of the world's graduates, and this share will only continue to grow in size as we work towards building and strengthening our knowledge economy," Indeed India MD Sashi Kumar said.

Kumar further noted that the shift towards higher educa-tion will not only give a boost to STEM sector, but also help expand India s contribution to the global talent pool.

Indeed's data also indicates that job seekers in the age group of 21-25 show 12 per cent more interest in STEM jobs than in any other sector.

Skipper in JV pact with Israel's Metzerplas

KOLKATA: Skipper Lim-ited, one of the fastest grow-ing and a significant player in water infrastructure of India, announced a Limited Liabil-ity Partnership Agreement with Israel based company, Metzerplas. The name of the LLP shall be “Skipper-Metzer India LLP”. The agreement is of Equal Ownership Interest – 50:50 and the total investment in the first phase is agreed to be 8 Million USD. The deal was signed in Tel Aviv, Israel earlier this month.

The joint venture will lever-age Metzerplas’s global portfo-lio of brands and unparalleled expertise in advanced plastic and irrigation technologies. From production equipment to advanced emitters, from modern plastics and com-pounds to complete irrigation systems, the company provides immediate access to the mar-ket’s most advanced, yet afford-able, drip irrigation solutions. Skipper’s manufacturing band-width and nationwide footprint along with knowledge of gov-ernment operations will make this agreement stand out and revolutionize the drip irriga-tion business in India and other SAARC nations.

Drip irrigation is a type of

micro-irrigation that has the potential to save water and nutrients by allowing water to drip slowly to the roots of plants, either from above the soil surface or buried below the surface. The goal is to place water directly into the root zone and minimize evapora-tion. Drip irrigation systems distribute water through a net-work of valves, pipes, tubing, and emitters. Depending on how well designed, installed, maintained, and operated it is, a drip irrigation system can be more efficient than other types of irrigation systems, such as surface irrigation or sprinkler irrigation. The Drip Irriga-tion business holds immense potential in India and is one of the focus sectors of the gov-ernment. The current domes-tic industry size is estimated at over Rs 5,000 crore. Under the Hon’ble Prime Minister’s flag-ship scheme Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchai Yojna which has been launched with the aim of extending irrigation cover –“Har Khet ko Pani” – and improving water use efficiency – “Per Drop More Crop”, we expect this sector to grow at a robust pace and for the JV to become a major player in the years to come. MPOST

mp sport14MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

MONACO: Tennis legend Roger Federer became the most decorated winner in the history of Laureus World Sports Awards after he won twin honours, his sixth, which includes the Sportsman and Comeback titles at the 18th edi-tion of the prestigious awards ceremony, here.

In the Sportsman of the Year category, Federer waved off tough competition from the likes of Rafael Nadal and Cristiano Ronaldo to bag the honours.

The Swiss tennis star, who won the Australian Open and Wimbledon this year, also clinched the Comeback of the Year award following his achievements after making a comeback from a serious knee injury.

While Federer bagged the title in the men’s category, American tennis great Ser-ena Williams won the Sports-woman of the Year Award following her Australian Open success, her 23rd Grand Slam title.

Serena, who gave birth to her first child last year, is now the most decorated female Lau-reus Award winner with five Laureus statuettes.

Speaking after receiving the awards, an ecstatic Federer said, “This is a very special moment for me. Everyone knows how highly I value my Laureus Awards, so to win another would have been won-derful, but to win two is a truly unique honour. It was so unex-pected. I am delighted and I would like to thank the Laureus Academy for all their support.

“It was an unforgettable year for me, to come back after a very difficult 2016, and these awards just make it even more memorable. When I won my first Laureus Award back in 2005, if you had said I would have ended up winning six I would not have believed you. It’s been an amazing ride.”

Spanish golfer Sergio Gar-cia won his second Laureus

Award, 18 years after winning the Laureus Newcomer acco-lade at the 2000 Awards when he bagged the Breakthrough of the Year Award for winning the 2017 Masters, his first ever Major Championship win on his 74th attempt.

Among other winners, Mercedes AMG Petronas beat the likes of Real Madrid and the Golden State Warriors to win the Team of the Year Award, after securing their fourth successive Construc-tors World Championship title.

French Vendée Globe win-ning sailor Armel Le Cléac’h won the Action Sportsperson of the Year Award, while Swiss

triple world champion wheel-chair racer Marcel Hug won the World Sportsperson of the Year with a Disability Award, for his 800m, 1,500m and 5,000m titles in the T54 class at the 2017 World Para Athlet-ics Championships in London.

Attended by sports stars,

celebrities and business lead-ers from around the world, the awards recognised sporting achievement in the 2017 cal-endar year and were hosted by Hollywood superstar Benedict Cumberbatch, while world-renowned singer-songwriter Emeli Sandé performed for

guests.Brazilian football team

Chapecoense, which was torn apart by a devastating plane crash but made a remarkable comeback six months later which inspired the sporting world, were honoured with the Laureus Best Sporting Moment of the Year Award.

Active Communities Net-work, an international sport for development organisation which works in the UK, Ireland and South Africa, received the Laureus Sport for Good Award for their life-changing work in using sport to help young people make positive lifestyle choices, by learning life skills

and progressing into educa-tion, training and employment programmes.

Among other awards, Italy and Roma football leg-end Francesco Totti received the Laureus Academy Excep-tional Achievement Award, honoured for his inspirational 22-year one-man-club career with Roma and his 2006 World Cup success with Italy.

Houston Texans defen-sive end J J Watt received the Laureus Sporting Inspiration Award for his incredible fund-raising efforts after Hurricane Harvey hit Houston, where he raised more than USD 37 mil-lion to support relief efforts. PTI

Federer bags twin honoursFederer grabs Laureus Sportsman of the year & Comeback title; Mercedes Petronas win Team of year.

While Federer bagged the title in the men’s category, American tennis great Serena Williams won the Sportswoman of the Year Award following her Australian Open success, her 23rd Grand Slam title.

Roger Federer with Boris Becker after recieving the Laureus Sportsman of the year award on Tuesday

MONACO: Out of the national team reckoning for a while now, India all-rounder Yuvraj Singh says he will continue playing cricket till 2019 before taking a call on his retirement.

Yuvraj, who last played for India in June 2017 in an ODI, said the upcoming IPL holds great significance for him as a good performance in the T20 event will help him keep in the fray for a spot in the 2019 World Cup.

“I am looking forward to a good IPL. It’s a very impor-tant tournament for me as it will only set me to play cricket till 2019. I am looking to play cricket till 2019, whatever cricket I get to play and take a call after that,” Yuvraj told PTI in an exclusive interview on the sidelines of the 18th Lau-reus World Sports Awards here.

A regular in the Indian ODI team till the 2011 World Cup triumph before his career was jeopardised by a rare germ cell cancer, Yuvraj’s only regret was that he could not cement his place in the Indian Test side.

“Definitely, in the first 6-7 years of my career when I was at my best I did not get a lot of opportunities because there were such great players in the (Test) team and when I got an opportunity I was diagnosed with cancer. So that regret will always be there but these things are never in my control. I am just looking forward to what-ever cricket I get to play,” the 36-year-old all-rounder said.

Yuvraj, who is here as a Lau-reus ambassador from India, praised Virat Kohli and his men for the character they showed to bounce back in the limited overs series after the close 1-2 loss in the Test rubber.

“I think it is a pretty great performance. They showed a lot of character after losing the Test series. It was as a hard-fought Test series, could have gone either way. But it was a

very convincing win in the ODI series. Kohli led from the front with some big runs,” the left-handed batsman said.

“Spinners bowled very well especially Kuldeep (Yadav) and (Yuzvendra) Chahal and got South Africa into trouble. And then they stepped on the gas and won the T20 series 2-1. Going abroad playing three series winning two definitely shows India’s dominance.”

Kohli might have set his sights on winning the upcom-ing tours of England and Aus-tralia but Yuvraj said India will need consistent performances from the players to achieve the goal.

“It’s a good start to believe that you can dominate outside. If you can consistently do that in England and Australia you definitely will have the belief,” he said.

“Now the team is set to con-quer the world. England and Australia will be testing series but if we can get some consis-tent performances it will give a lot of self belief to the players,” he added.

Yuvraj himself has climbed up the ladders of age group cricket to stand where he is today and so he offered some words of advice for the likes of young Prthivi Shaw and Shub-man Gill, who have already fetched big money from their respective franchises in the last IPL auctions.

“The more they get better the more they will earn. PTI

I will take a call on my career

after 2019: Yuvi

MOUNT MANGANUI (NEW ZEALAND): Ben Stokes and Eoin Morgan made half centu-ries to guide England to a six-wicket win over New Zealand in the second one-day inter-national here on Wednesday, leveling the five-match series at 1-1.

Morgan made 62 and Stokes signalled his return to form after a five-month layoff with an unbeaten 63 as Eng-land surpassed New Zealand’s total of 223 with more than 12 overs remaining.

Stokes scored 12 and took 2-43 in the first match of the series, which was his first appearance for England since his arrest on Sept. 25 after a brawl outside a Bristol, Englnd nightclub.

He had a more imposing influence on Wednesday’s match, taking 2-42 from eight overs, contributing to a runout

and reaching his a half century from 54 balls, his first 50 in ODIs since his 73 against the West Indies in Bristol on the day before his arrest.

New Zealand’s medio-cre total seemed unlikely to challenge England and after it briefly slipped to 86-3 losing Jason Roy for 8, Joe Root for

9 and Jonny Bairstow for 37 Morgan and Stokes put it on track to victory with a part-nership of 88 for the fourth wicket.

Stokes and Jos Buttler (36 not out) then added an unbro-ken 56 for the fifth wicket to steer England home in the 38th over.

“We wanted to come back strong after the defeat in the first game,” Stokes said. “We felt we’d let ourselves down a little bit in the field.

“I think the lads jumped around that and I think we showed new intensity by the way that we fielded. Then to restrict them to 220 on a pretty decent batting wicket, I think the bowlers did a great job.”

England bowled and fielded superbly after win-ning the toss to dismiss New Zealand for 223 in 49.4 overs. Martin Guptill’s 50, his 34th ODI half century, and Mitch-ell Santner’s first held together a ragged New Zealand innings.

Two early wickets to Chris Woakes, two in the middle of the innings to spinner Moeen Ali, two brilliant catches by Jason Roy and four run outs helped England take control of the match.

New Zealand, playing without captain Kane Wil-liamson, who has a hamstring strain, lost opener Colin Munro (1) to the third ball of the second over the first bowled by Woakes then Mark Chapman, for 1 on debut, in Woakes’ second over, leaving it 9-2.

The first runout of the innings cost it Ross Taylor (10), whose century in the opening match of the series on Sunday guided New Zealand to a three-wicket win with four balls to spare.

Ali bowled superbly to fin-ish with 2-33 from 10 overs, Woakes took 2-42 and Stokes 2-42.

Big-hitting Colin de Grandhomme (38) and Sant-ner, who also played a match-winning role in Hamilton, were the last hope for a New Zealand fightback. AFP

England beat Blackcaps by 6 wickets

ACAPULCO: World number two Rafael Nadal pulled out of the Mexican Open, cutting short his comeback from an injury when his ailing right hip flared up again.

“My goal and hope was to play in this tournament. Unfortunately, in my last train-ing session yesterday, I felt a sharp pain in my leg again,” the 31-year-old Spanish star said hours before what was to have been his opening match of the ATP Tour event in Acapulco.

Nadal, favoured to win the tournament and champion here in 2005 and 2013, had been due to face fellow Span-iard Feliciano Lopez.

“I took all the appropri-ate steps to arrive at the tour-nament in form. I went to Cozumel first, to adapt (to the climate),” he said.

“But yesterday, in my last training session before the tournament, during one move-ment I felt a sharp pain again in the same area where I had the problem in Australia.”

Nadal limped out of the

quarter-finals at the Austra-lian Open on January 23. He has since lost his number one ranking to Roger Federer.

Nadal said doctors in Mex-ico warned him not to play for fear of aggravating the injury.

“I still don’t know what it is, because we don’t know. It seems it’s not as bad as what I had at the Australian Open,” he said.

“Now, my main goal is to find out the extent of the injury.”

This marks the sixth tour-

nament in a row that Nadal has pulled out of or retired from -- the Australian Open, Bris-bane, London, Paris, Basel and Acapulco.

The 16-time Grand Slam winner Nadal previously announced himself fully fit and said he was looking forward to competing in his second event of 2018.

“I took a couple of weeks of rest and worked hard on reha-bilitation,” he said earlier in the week. “Last week, I started practising hard again. I feel

ready.” Nadal is expected to remain at least one more day in Acapulco to have more tests done.

“Maybe it is a minor situa-tion, but the reality is that there is liquid and until it goes down a bit and the relevant tests are done, it will not be possible to diagnose,” he said.

While a victory this week would not have been good enough to overhaul Federer, it would leave Nadal primed to replace the Swiss star at Indian Wells or Miami next month.

The 2008 Olympic gold medal winner is known as the “King of Clay” and is consid-ered the greatest clay-court player in the history of the sport.

But his success is not lim-ited to clay. Nadal has won 10 French Open titles, three US Opens, two Wimbledons and one Australian Open.

Nadal, who turns 32 in June, ended 2017 as the oldest year-end world number one in the 45-year history of the ATP rankings. AFP

Nadal cuts short comeback after injury flares up

NEW DELHI: In a departure from the current formula for sharing the Davis Cup prize money, non-playing captain Mahesh Bhupathi and coach Zeeshan Ali were allowed by the AITA to claim a share from the players’ prize purse from the Canada tie.

Till the World Group Play-off tie against Canada last Sep-tember, the prize money was distributed only among only six players including the two reserves while the support staff was paid directly by the All India Tennis Association (AITA).

However, the prize purse for the Canada tie was distrib-uted equally among six players along with the captain and the coach, which means the play-ers’ share was reduced.

Each of the eight people got a little more than Rs one lakh.

AITA secretary general

Hironmoy Chatterjee con-firmed the equal distribution and said it was done after Bhu-pathi put forth a proposal.

“The distribution was done after the captain discussed with the players and took this call. So it was the players’ call,” Chatterjee said.

It is a move which hits the singles players the most since as per the previous arrange-ment, their share was max-imum from the prize purse. Therefore, there is a possibility that for future ties, the play-ers may devise a new formula, which does not reduce their share drastically. PTI

KARACHI: The Pakistan Cricket Board’s Anti-Corruption Tri-bunal today banned Shahzaib Hasan for 12-months in the Pakistan Super League spot-fixing case.

Shahzaib becomes the third Pakistan team batsman after Sharjeel Khan and Khalid Latif to be banned in the spot-fixing scandal that broke out last year in February at the start of the 2nd PSL.

The Anti-Corruption Tri-bunal found Shahzaib guilty of violating three clauses of PCB’s code of conduct for players and he was also fined rupees one million.

Shahzaib, who had played for Pakistan during the team’s 2009 World T20 triumph in England, was issued a charge-sheet suspended in March 2017 after being accused of having a hand in the spot-fixing scan-dal when he appeared for Kara-chi Kings in the PSL.His lawyer, Advocate Kashif Rajwana told the media in Lahore that his cli-ent was not punished for luring someone into spot-fixing “but

for informing the board about violations after a delay”.

He said the ban will be applied from the time Shahzaib was suspended last year in March.

“The ban will end on March 17 but we have yet to decide whether to appeal the ban or not,” he said.

PCB Legal Adviser Taffazul Rizvi, however, made it clear that even after the ban ends, Hasan will only be able to play official cricket after due pro-cess under a rehabilitation pro-gramme. He claimed that the punishment awarded to the player would “set an example for other players”.

The charges against Shahzaib include directly or indirectly soliciting, inducing, enticing, instructing, persuad-ing, encouraging or intention-ally facilitating any participant to breach the code of con-duct, failure to disclose to the PCB Vigilance and Security Department (without unnec-essary delay) full details of any approaches. PTI

Captain and coach to get pie of Davis Cup prize money

PCB bans Hasan for 1 year in PSL

NEW DELHI: Top Indian jav-elin thrower Davinder Singh Kang has been suspended pro-visionally by the world athlet-ics governing body after he returned positive for a steroid in an out-of-competition test last week.

The 29-year-old Kang’s dope sample was taken by the offi-cials of the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU), the IAAF’s new anti-doping body which started operations last year, four days ago in Patiala. It was found to contain a banned steroid and Kang now faces the prospect of being banned for four years. In that case, his career could well be over.

The AIU officials tested Kang at a time prescribed by him under the “whereabouts” clause of the WADA Code as he is one of the five Indian athletes placed in the IAAF Registered Testing Pool.

Kang’s dope failure was intimated to the Athletics Fed-eration of India by the IAAF yesterday and his name was immediately removed from the starting line-up of men’s javelin throw at the Indian Grand Prix held at NIS Patiala.

“The athlete gave the tim-ing window of 10am to 11am on that particular day (four days back) in his ‘whereabouts’ infor-mation. The AIU people came to Patiala and took his sample. and that contained a banned

steroid. He is now provisionally suspended,” an official of the AFI told PTI from Patiala on condition of anonymity.

Last year, the Punjab ath-lete had also tested positive for marijuana, traces of which were found in his urine sample col-lected by the National Anti-Doping Agency officials during an Indian Grand Prix event here on May 15.

Kang, a medal prospect in the Commonwealth Games and the Asian Games this year, was not suspended by the NADA at that time, since marijuana falls under the “specified sub-stance” category in the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) prohibited list of the perfor-mance-enhancing drugs. He took part in the 2017 World Championships in London and became the first Indian to reach the javelin throw final round in a World Championship. PTI

Kang flunks dope test

mp sport 15MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

LONDON: Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger faces the might of Manchester City for the second time in five days tomorrow as the Gunners seek salvation after an abject dis-play in losing the League Cup final 3-0. But But the clash has been thrown into doubt after pictures emerged of the Emirates Stadium covered in a blanket of snow.

City’s victory on Sunday delivered the first trophy of the Pep Guardiola era and underlined the sense that the two clubs are on radically dif-ferent trajectories.

Guardiola’s men also enjoy a 13-point lead at the top of the Premier League and are virtually assured of their place in the Champions League quarter-finals, thanks to a 4-0 last-16, first-leg win in Basel.

Arsenal, by contrast, face a huge challenge just to make it back into the Champions League next season. Sixth in the league, they trail north London rivals Tottenham Hotspur, in fourth place, by 10 points.

Even the emergency route of a Champions League return via winning the Europa League looks a big ask after Arsenal were paired with Ital-ian giants AC Milan in the last 16.

What is galling for Wenger and Arsenal is that in many ways Guardiola is the mod-ern-day incarnation of what the Frenchman used to be in his first decade at the club.

Wenger’s early years married attractive, aggres-sive football with a winning culture. While some of the frills to Arsenal’s football have remained in the second half of his 22-year reign, the

club have failed consistently to challenge for the biggest prizes.

“This development of mediocrity has to be arrested,” Arsenal’s second-highest goal-scorer of all time, Ian Wright, who played under Wenger, told BBC radio.

Guardiola shares Wenger’s ideals of how the game should be played and has spoken glowingly of his admiration for his counterpart’s longevity.

“I would have liked to have played for him,” said Guar-diola ahead of Sunday’s final.

“He likes one type of player, with quality and respect for the ball. They are things I like a lot, so if peo-ple say we play a little bit like Arsenal of the last 20 years then it’s good for us.”

The difference is that

Guardiola is a serial winner, lifting 21 trophies in his first seven years of senior manage-ment with Barcelona and Bay-ern Munich.

He has shone after the first season of his career without silverware in his debut cam-paign at City in 2016-17.

Rather than abandon his principles, the Catalan has doubled down on the passing and pressing game he made famous at Barcelona to cre-

ate the spectacle and suc-cess for which he was lured to Manchester by the club’s cash-rich Abu-Dhabi owners in the first place. Wenger, by contrast, despite an enviable record of success in the FA Cup in recent years, has failed to arrest his side’s general slide from the pinnacle of the Eng-lish game.

Guardiola has also demon-strated a far shrewder sense of timing than Wenger in know-

ing when to walk away.He left his boyhood club in

Barca as their most success-ful coach because the intense demands of four seasons in the job had taken their toll.

Likewise, his time at Bay-ern never seemed likely to extend beyond the initial three-year contract he signed despite winning three straight Bundesliga titles.

“No chance,” Guardiola responded at the thought of matching Wenger’s two-decade long stay at City. “That is not going to happen because I am not going to train in 20 years more.”

Wenger’s desperation to hold on to recreate his glory days means it is increasingly likely he will be edged towards the exit door before he walks come the end. AFP

Arsenal-City clash in doubt

He likes one type of player, with quality and respect for the ball. They are things I like a lot, so if people say we play a little bit like Arsenal of the last 20 years then it’s good for us.”

Pep Guardiola

Arsenal’s stadum The Emirates’ pitch covered with snow

Gunners plan to host Citizens today but game may get called off due to snowstorm BARCELONA: Cristiano Ronaldo was rested and the supporting cast failed to show up as Real Madrid endured a shock 1-0 defeat away to Espa-nyol on Tuesday.

Gerard Moreno struck in the 94th minute at the RCDE Stadium as Real’s rotated line-up felt the full punishment for a slack and disjointed display. 

Gareth Bale, Marco Asen-sio and Isco all struggled, the trio squandering the chance to impress ahead of next week’s Champions League second leg with Paris Saint-Germain.

Bale was certainly not the only Real player out of sorts but the 28-year-old, now back to full fitness, was perhaps under most pressure to stake his claim. 

After missing with a num-ber of efforts at goal, and receiving a yellow card in the first half, he was finally replaced with nine minutes remaining.

There was still time, how-ever, for Gerard to steal the show as Espanyol scored a deserved win that sees them climb to 13th in La Liga.

Real, meanwhile, will fall 17 points behind leaders Bar-celona if the Catalans over-come Las Palmas on Thursday.

With PSG left praying for a miracle after Neymar was stretchered off wth a foot injury on Sunday, Zin-edine Zidane wrapped his own star player up in cotton wool, as Ronaldo was not even included on the bench.

Karim Benzema was also rested, allowing Bale his 116th La Liga appearance, draw-ing him equal with David Beckham. 

Bale almost gave the visi-tors an early lead, reacting first to Achraf Hakimi’s deflected cross but poking his near-post header too close to Diego Lopez.

Real, however, gradually ceded the ascendancy to Espa-nyol, who twice could have been in front were it not for a combination of sloppy finish-ing and bad luck.

Gerard was the protagonist in both, the forward first fail-ing to capitalise on a skewed Raphael Varane clearance and then doing brilliantly to con-trol a thundering half-volley from Carlos Sanchez, only to see his finish ruled out for offside.

Replays suggested Real had been fortunate to escape.

Bale wanted a penalty when his driven shot was blocked by the hand of Vic-tor Sanchez at the back post but the defender knew little about it.

Instead, Espanyol sus-tained their momentum at the start of the second half, with Keylor Navas able only to watch as Sergi Darder’s header plopped onto the top of the crossbar.

Bale cut a figure of increas-ing frustration. One ballooned shot over from the edge of the area was quickly followed by two scuffed finishes. They were

not easy chances but a player of his calibre would have hoped to do better.

With just over 20 minutes left, Benzema replaced the ineffective Isco but Espanyol came closest to snatching a winner when Gerard’s header was saved from six yards.

Bale trudged off in the 81st minute and Gerard finally got the goal he deserved, catching Sergio Garcia’s cross perfectly with a brilliant shot that sailed past Navas and into the corner.

Girona defeated Celta Vigo 1-0 here to extend their home winning streak to five and climb to seventh place in La Liga. The contest on Tuesday featured two of the top three scoring duos in La Liga: Cris-thian Stuani and Portu for the hosts facing Celta’s Iago Aspas and Maxi Gomez, reports Efe.

And with Portu and Aspas vying for spots on the national team, Spain coach Julen Lop-etegui  was in the stands at  Girona’s Montilivi sta-dium to get a first-hand look.

The glory went to Portu, who scored the game’s only goal in the 14th minute, strik-ing from the edge of the box after Carles Planas astutely relayed Alex Granell’s corner.

Celta kept their compo-sure and only a desperate dive by Girona’s Juanpe prevented Maxi Gomez from equalizing in the 27th minute.

Girona sat in deeper in the second half and managed to hang on to post a fifth consec-utive clean sheet. AFP

Madrid lose 1-0 to RCD Espanyol

NEW DELHI: Jasprit Bum-rah’s emergence as ‘Test match bowler’ was India’s biggest gain during the recently con-cluded tour of South Africa and national selection com-mittee chairman MSK Prasad made it clear that the Gujarat speedster’s “workload man-agement’’ is paramount for him.

Bumrah bowled a whop-ping 162.1 overs across three formats, including 112.1 overs during the the three-Test series in South Africa.

“I am delighted with Jas-prit’s performance. We always had confidence in his abilities as he had done well for Guja-rat in Ranji Trophy. But now our primary goal is to moni-tor his workload very carefully with so much international cricket ahead. We need to be careful that he is not over-used,” Prasad said.

The chairman also indi-cated that Bumrah will be used only for the “impor-tant Test series” as his sling-ing action is one of the rarest of rare.

“If you look at his action, it is a rare one and he can be prone to injuries. We need to use him for the important Test series coming ahead. For each and every fast bowler, the balance of workload is very important and the high per-formance team will be moni-toring it closely,” the former

India wicketkeeper explained.The other big gain has

been the performance of the two young wrist spinners in Yuzvendra Chahal and Kul-deep Yadav, who shared 33 wickets between them in India’s emphatic 5-1 win in the ODI series.

“We always believed that wrist spinners are wicket-tak-ing investments that we had to make. Both Chahal and Kul-deep have really lived up to our expectations. The most heartening aspect has been the pool that we have man-aged to create. We now have five quality spinners for three formats -- Ravichandran Ash-win, Ravindra Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal and Axar Patel,” Prasad said.

He also said that the endeavour of the current selection committee was to create a proper bench-strength and they are slowly but surely inching towards that goal.

“I attribute our team’s suc-cess to the nice bench strength that we have. We have multi-

ple players for each spot. Like we have rested Hardik Pandya for the Sri Lanka series and we want to create a back-up all-rounder in Vijay Shankar.”

For someone, who has been stressing on the aspect of communication, Prasad believes that each and every player has the right to know where they stand in terms of national selection.

Talking to this season’s highest run-getter Mayank Agarwal (2141 runs across formats) and explaining to him the rationale behind his non-selection in the Indian team is one of them.

“No player should be con-fused about where he stands. Our committee speaks to every player -- even those who are to selected and try to give them a fair picture. Accordingly, I spoke to Mayank and told him that with his brilliant perfor-mances in domestic cricket, he has now definitely got him-self in the mix (national team reckoning). I told him that he is now in the queue,” Prasad informed. PTI

We have to be careful about Bumrah: MSK

NEW DELHI: In a favour-able draw, hosts India were on Wednesday clubbed in Pool C along side Olympics silver medallists Belgium, World No 11 Canada and African continental cham-pions South Africa in the men’s Hockey World Cup to be held in Bhubaneswar from November 28-December 16.

According to the sched-ule announced by the Inter-national Hockey Federation (FIH) on Wednesday, Asian champions India will open their campaign against South Africa on November 28 before taking on European giants Belgium on Decem-ber 2 and Canada on Decem-ber 8.

Pool A, meanwhile, con-sists of Rio 2016 Olympic champions Argentina, New Zealand, Spain, France. PTI

India get Belgium & Canada in hockey WC

HYDERABAD:Ace shuttler PV Sindhu on Wednesday said her dream is to become World No 1 and she is trying to reach the numero uno spot.

Sindhu, who had achieved a career-best ranking of World No 2 few months ago, said when she started playing at the age of eight her first dream was to represent India.

“When I started playing at the age of eight my dream was to play for India and that was the first dream. When I started playing for India that is when I thought someday I have to be (on) top of the world.

“I am trying to be World No 1...Now my dream is to become World No. 1 and definitely it’s in progress. I would want to see myself there,” the Rio Olympics

silver medallist said.Participating in an interac-

tion with students and teach-ers during a promotional event organised at her alma mater—Auxilium High School here, Sindhu said her mother has

been her inspiration.“She has always been there

saying that ‘do your best’ and ‘give your best’ in whatever you do. Be brave and stay strong and all women should do that and believe in ourselves,” Sindhu said on her mother.

Asked on the challenges she faced to attain success, Sindhu said she faced many challenges.

“But I don’t feel it’s a burden kind of thing because I wanted to achieve my dream and I just followed that.”

“There was a certain time where I thought what’s going on wrong because at sometimes you might not give your best. Sometimes you might just play brilliantly but when you tend to lose, you think that what’s hap-pening,” she said. PTI

‘Dream to become World no 1’NEW DELHI: Indian ace shuttler H S Prannoy is not happy with the Badminton World Federation’s (BWF) proposal to tweak the scor-ing system and reduce on-court coaching, saying such changes will not achieve the aim of increasing commercial value of the sport.

The BWF Council has pro-posed that on-court coach-ing, which is allowed at the 11-point lemon break and at the end of every game in a match, be reduced. The pro-posal also suggests “reduce time being taken between points” and “reduce warm-up time” and “racket testing”. PTI

Prannoy unhappy with proposed rule changes

BENGALUR: Kerala Blasters will look to keep themselves in contention for a play-off berth when they take on table-toppers Bengaluru FC in their last league match of the Indian Super League here on Thursday.

Currently, the Blasters are placed at fifth spot with 25 points after they managed only one point in their goal-less draw against Chennaiyin FC in last match. PTI

Blasters eye win over BFC

millenniumpost

NO H ALF TR U THS

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I, Moon Singh Alias Manmohan Singh S/o Bashan Singh R/o K-56, Krishna Park Extn., Tilak Nagar, Delhi-18, I have changed my name from Moon Singh Alias Manmohan Singh To Manmohan singh for all purposes.

CHANGE OF NAME

16MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Thursday, 1 March, 2018

mp Entertainment

NEW DELHI: Actor Rani Muke-rji recently remembered Bollywood diva Sridevi as a “guiding light” in her life, saying her untimely death is the most painful thing she has dealt with after her father’s demise. The actor said she felt close to Sridevi, who is known as India’s first female superstar, and also considered her an “inspiration personally and professionally.” 

“For me it’s the most painful thing I have dealt with after my dad’s passing away. And her face is coming in front of me again and again. The love she had for me was so tremen-dous and intense that I feel some-where I have lost a guiding light in my life.”

“She has been my inspiration personally and professionally. She was very close to me. She was like my maasi. She was someone I looked up to. I just feel there is one more per-

son I have lost in my life I loved and who loved me back,” Rani said. The 54-year-old actor passed away in her hotel room in the Jumeirah Emirates Towers late on Saturday. PTI

I HAVE LOST a guiding light in my life:

Rani on Sridevi’s death Rani, who considers Sridevi as her inspiration, says that her death is

the most painful thing she has dealt with after her father’s demise

MUMBAI: Pakistani singer Atif Aslam has been repeatedly shrugging off requests to promote his latest song ‘Sehmi hai dhad-kan’ from the forthcoming Bollywood film Daas Dev, says its producer Sanjeev Kumar.

“Atif said he will do it, but it hasn’t been done. I’m not sure why he isn’t tak-ing part in the activity, but, as a pro-ducer, I see that work promised hasn’t been executed,” Kumar said in a state-ment. ‘Sehmi hai dhadkan’ was launched on February 22 as the first song from Sudhir Mishra’s film Daas Dev, a contem-porary take on Sarat Chandra Chattopad-hyay’s novel ‘Devdas’. 

Earlier this month, politician Babul Supriyo had asked for a ban on Pakistani artistes working in the Hindi film indus-try. He had also objected to the inclusion of Pakistan singer Rahat Fateh Ali Khan’s voice in the film Welcome To New York.

Kumar said: “Normally, such state-ments are made by fringe groups. When a minister says it, it leaves an impact on more people. But we needed Atif for this song. He has 20 million followers on social media. Imagine the kind of traction we would have got had he promoted it.” IANS

Atif refuses to promote his latest

Bollywood song

NEW DELHI: Actor Aditi Rao Hydari says time is lux-ury and that she believes in living in the moment.

“Time is a real luxury and it’s the only thing that keeps moving and the only thing you have to grab and make the most of. So, I really believe in living in the moment and giving my 100 per cent to that moment,” Aditi said in an interview.

Aditi unveiled the new collection, inspired by Brit-ain, of watch a brand.  Talk-

ing about it, she said: “I love London and I always pick that as a holiday spot so I feel it is a fun collection.” But at a time when every-one has a mobile phone to see time, why is there a need for wrist watches? 

“Because it’s so beauti-ful. I think wrist watches are so much fun and they are so personal. It’s something that you wear on yourself all the time and it’s really an extension of your per-sonality... I wear the

watch like a piece of jew-ellery on myself so I love watches,” she said.

After the success of her latest release, Aditi is now gearing up for her next film with filmmaker Mani Rath-nam. She considers herself lucky to work with the film-maker for the sec-ond time. IANS

‘ I believe in living in the moment’

OUR CORRESPONDENT

With hard-hitting Trap Beats infused with Electronic Sounds, DJ

Teri Miko has shared the stage with bass giants like Marshm-ello, Slander, Dyro, and Quin-tino. It won’t be long before she becomes a household name in the music industry. “I never miss a chance to experience live art-ists because every time I learn something new from them. It can be some interesting musi-cal trick or just an attitude in the backstage. So I recommend to all upcoming artists to attend live concerts,” said Miko about shar-ing the stage with big names in the industry.

Even though she, like every other working woman, faced stereotypes in the music indus-

try for being a DJ, Miko never stopped working towards her passion. “From my initial stages, I faced a lot of stereotypes in DJing but I take it as a real chal-lenge which helps me to grow to prove myself. But such stereo-types never pushed me down,”

says the ‘Kolavo’ hitmaker. “It is not easy, but nothing is impos-sible and I believe that one day No.1 DJ in the world will be a girl,” she further added.

Being a woman in this field is not the only challenge that DJs have to face. There is a common misconception about DJs being involved in drugs and alcoholic drinks. But Teri Miko, who is known for her high energy on stage believes otherwise. “I think this is an old stereotype which is coming to us from the 90s rave times. I know a lot of artists per-sonally right now who are into a healthy lifestyle because when you give so much energy every night during your gigs, you have to stay clean in order to survive. And I follow this very strictly,” she asserted.  

Teri Miko has played for fes-

tivals like Sunburn Festival, Vh1 Supersonic, Amsterdam Dance event to name a few. Apart from this, she has been performing at the biggest colleges in India. “College performances are the most exciting gigs of mine. First of all, because the youngsters are most receptive to new music which gives me the opportunity to showcase new tracks. Sec-ondly, they are here to have fun, that’s why the biggest responses I am getting are from the colleges,” said the DJ who is looking for-ward to her collaboration with an Indian artist.

“2018 is going to be a very busy year for me, I have already planned a lot of releases and shows. Hopefully this year my team, Deep Sound Entertain-ment and I will take over new territories and new stages.”

LOS ANGELES: Actor Jenni-fer Lawrence has defended her to decision to do nude scenes for Red Sparrow, saying she felt it fit in the narrative of the film. The 27-year-old actor plays the Russian prima ballerina turned Soviet operative Dominika Egorova in the Francis Law-rence-directed film, which is based on a best-selling novel by former C.I.A. agent Jason Matthews.

“Red Sparrow really scared the hell out of me because I get nude. I tried to do the movie without nudity but realized it just wouldn’t be right to put the character through something that I, myself, am not will-ing to go through,” Law-rence said.

The “Mother!” actor, who was a victim of the 2014 phone hack in which her pri-vate nude photos were leaked to the internet, said she feared backlash for her choice.

“My biggest fear was that people would say, ‘Oh, how can you complain about the hack if you’re going to get nude any-way?’,” Lawrence told Vanity Fair. Lawrence said that the movie presented her an oppor-tunity to reclaim her sexual empowerment as she made a contrast between the hack and her choice to bare all for a film.

“One is my choice. I got something back that was taken from me,” Lawrence added. PTI

LONDON: The Kevin Spacey Foundation, created to encourage young people in the performing arts, is closing down its oper-ations in the UK. The announcement was made by the trustees of the organisation in a statement posted on the its official web-site. “The trustees have reached the con-clusion that the work of the Kevin Spacey Foundation UK is no longer viable and as

such the foundation will be closing on the 28 February 2018.

“The trustees would like to thank all their partners, artists and organisations for the great work that has been done in asso-ciation with the foundation. The trustees hope that the objects of the charity will be taken forward by other organisations,” the statement read. Steven Jackson-Winter, a drama teacher and longtime associate of Spacey, used to head the foundation’s UK operations, but he left it in November last year following the sexual misconduct alle-gations against the actor.

The organisation was officially regis-tered in Britain in 2008, during the two-time Oscar-winning actor’s tenure as artistic director of The Old Vic theatre in London from 2004 to 2015. It offered scholarships, awards, mentorships and educational programmes for young people interested in film, dance and theatre.

In October last year, Spacey was accused of sexual assaulting actor Anthony Rapp when he was 14. Spacey had said he had no recollection of the incident while coming out as gay. After the allegations surfaced, he was removed from ‘House of Cards’ by Netflix. PTI

LOS ANGELES: Actor Adam Scott has been confirmed to return for the sec-ond season of the hit HBO drama ‘Big Little Lies’. The ‘Parks and Recreation’ alum played the role of Ed Mackenzie, the bearded husband of Reese Witherspoon’s character Madeline.

Season two will see Ed being “forced to confront major challenges in his mar-riage with Madeline”, reported Variety.

Earlier, HBO had confirmed that actors Shailene Woodley, Laura Dern and Zoe Kravitz were also returning for the second season of the show.

Dern will reprise her role of Renata Klein for which she bagged an Emmy and a Golden Globe, while Woodley will be back in the character of Jane Chap-man. Kravitz will reprise her role of Bon-nie Carlson.

The studio had also announced that multiple Oscar-winning actor Meryl Streep was cast in the show. She will play the character of Mary Louise Wright. PTI

‘GETTING NUDE FOR Red Sparrow WAS MY CHOICE’

Adam Scott confirmed for

season two of ‘Big Little Lies’

Kevin Spacey Foundation to shut down in the UK

STEREOTYPES NEVER PUSHED ME DOWN: DJ TERI MIKO