PUBLISHED FROM DELHI & KOLKATA VOL. 12, ISSUE 105 | Monday, 17 April 2017 | New Delhi | Pages 16 | Rs 3.00

millenniumpost.in RNI NO.: DELENG/2005/15351REGD. NO.: DL(S)-01/3420/2015-17

NO HALF TRU THS

DIGVJAYA SINGH

EC limiting objections to EVMs. It must allow examination of possibility of software tampering at stage of writing it from server

NO NEW TAXES, HIKES IN BJP’S MANIFESTO PG3

PRIME MINISTER SETS P2 AND G2 AGENDA FOR PARTY WORKERS

BJP praises Modi government's move on OBC panel, slams Cong

SIMONTINI BHATTACHARYA

BHUBANESWAR: Playing the OBC card, the BJP on Sunday hit out at opposition parties, including the Congress, for stalling a “his-toric” bill granting constitutional status to the OBC Commission and asserted that the Modi government is firm in its resolve to ensure jus-tice to backward castes.

Seeking to consolidate its sup-port among the other backward classes (OBC), it passed a separate resolution at its national executive meeting hailing Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who comes from an OBC caste, for the legislation and condemning rivals for block-ing it in the Rajya Sabha.

It accused the Congress and other rival parties of being “anti-backward castes”.

The OBCs, comprising over 52 per cent of the population, are vital to BJP’s fortunes and a large chunk of them had remained indifferent to it before its concerted bid to woo them bore fruits under Modi in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls and then in the recent Uttar Pradesh Assem-bly elections.

“It is a must to grant the OBC Commission constitutional status. It will give them justice and help create an equal society. The Con-gress and other parties have proved that they may preach social justice but practise only vote bank poli-tics. The Congress did not do jus-tice to them when it was in power and continues to do so now,” Union

Minister Prakash Javadekar told reporters.

He was briefing them on the resolution passed by the national executive.

The present commission is “powerless” and cannot do justice

to the OBCs, he said, asserting that the central government is firm on the bill’s passage. It will give the commission powers similar to the SCs and the STs commissions.

He said the OBC MPs belong-ing to all parties, including the

Congress and the Samajwadi Party, had met Modi recently to press for such a bill but opposition parties stalled it when it was brought.

The Lok Sabha, where the gov-ernment enjoys a big majority, passed the constitutional amend-ment bill during the recent Bud-get Session but the Rajya Sabha, where it is short of a simple major-ity, stalled it and sent to a parlia-mentary committee for review and recommendations.

Slamming the Congress, the resolution said opposing a decision aimed at improving the living con-ditions of backward people can-not be termed right and the people sidelined for long should now get their due in the society.

It is not right to oppose such decision only for politics, it said.

It is yet another pro-poor move by the government, the minister said, adding that various bodies, including the Mandal commission, had made such a suggestion.

The resolution moved by Huku-mdev Narayan Yadav and seconded by the party’s senior OBC leaders, including Madhya Pradesh and Jharkhand chief ministers Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Raghubar Das, said it is after 70 years of Indepen-dence, a government has taken this “historic” decision.

Javadekar said the OBC com-mission will help people irrespec-tive of religions as socially and educationally backward groups of minorities also fall in the OBC category. More reports on PG5

PM Modi waves to people during his visit to Lingaraj temple in Bhubaneswar on Sunday PTI

Let your work do the talking,

Modi tells BJP leaders

OUR CORRESPONDENT

BHUBANESWAR: On the second day of BJP national executive meeting here, PM Naren-dra Modi sent out a strong message to the party leaders to practice silence and not be compla-cent with the recent victories. Sources said that while addressing the party executives on Sun-day including all 13 Chief Ministers of BJP ruled states, PM Modi said: “Microphone is not a machine that forces people to speak. When in power they should practice the art of silence.”

He also said that the party workers should communicate with voters through their hard work. The Prime Minister also urged them to stay calm and focus on public welfare even after the recent election result in five states.

BJP veterans L K Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi were also present at the meeting.

The statement by PM Modi came in the back-drop of the recent controversial statements by BJP leaders in different states.

Modi gave his party a new agenda - P2 and G2 — that stands for Pro-Poor and Good Gov-ernance, to envisage his vision of empowering the poor and taking India to the top echelons of developed nations by 2022, when India completes 75 years of Independence, Union minister Nitin Gadkari told reporters at a press conference after the speech. Modi gave the example of Mahatma Gandhi in this context, Gadkari said. “In all his speeches for 20 years from 1922 to 1942, Gandhi spoke of ridding India of British rule and it took that long for people to develop the thought that they achieve Independence from the British,” the PM said. Explaining his “long jump” theory, PM Modi told the party members that the govern-ment has achieved a great deal in three years, but it does not mean that the pace of development has to remain the same; in fact, it should be has-tened so that it is like taking a long jump towards development.

MUSLIM LAW BOARD TALKS TOUGH

MPOST BUREAU

LUCKNOW: Striking a defi-ant posture on the conten-tious issue of triple talaq, the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) on Sunday asserted that it had the “con-stitutional” right to implement Muslim personal law.

On the Babri Masjid issue, AIMPLB General Secretary Maulana Wali Rehmani said the board would accept the Supreme Court’s decision on the matter while stressing that “no outside settlement was acceptable”.

On the talaq issue, he said that the board has decided to issue a code of conduct and warned that those who give talaq (divorce) without ‘Sharia’ (Islamic law) reasons will face social boycott.

“A code of conduct for talaq is being issued. With its help, the real picture of Shariat direc-tives will be brought out on the talaq issue. If talaq is given without Shariat reasons, those involved will be socially boy-cotted,” Rehmani told report-ers here.

The board is issuing appeals to all maulanas and imams of mosques to read out the code of conduct during Friday ‘namaz’ and emphasise on its imple-mentation, he said. The Board has made it clear that it will not tolerate any interference in the Shariat laws and claimed

that majority of the Muslims in the country do not want any change in their personal law.

Rehmani had earlier said that in the recent signature campaign initiated by the AIM-PLB across the country, both men and women have said that the Constitution of India guar-antees them the provision to practice their own religion.

He had also urged that no roadblocks should be put in the implementation of the personal laws. The Union government had on October 7 last year opposed in the Supreme Court the practice of triple talaq, ‘nikah halala’ and polygamy among Muslims and favoured a relook on grounds like gender equality and secularism.

The Ministry of Law and Justice, in its affidavit, had referred to constitutional principles like gender equality, secularism, international cov-enants, religious practices and marital law prevalent in vari-ous Islamic countries to advo-cate that the practice of triple talaq and polygamy needed to be adjudicated upon afresh by the apex court.

Those giving talaq against ‘Sharia’ law will face

social boycott: AIMPLB

Sonepat man live-streams suicide on FacebookOUR CORRESPONDENT

CHANDIGARH: A 32-year-old man hanged himself from a ceil-ing fan in Haryana’s Sonepat dis-trict and live- streamed the suicide on his Facebook page, police said on Sunday.

Sonepat SP Ashwin Shenvi said Deepak scribbled the reason behind him taking the extreme step on the wall of his room before ending his life.

The man wrote that he was “facing threat to his life from a married woman in his neighbour-hood and her alleged lover after he told her husband about their illicit relationship”.

Shenvi said Deepak live-streamed the suicide on his Face-book page.

“The woman and her par-amour are employed with the Delhi Police, while her husband is part of the Haryana Police.

“Deepak wrote on the wall

that the woman, an ASI, had an affair with an Inspector and after he came to know about it, he nar-rated everything to her husband,” the SP said.

The man wrote that the woman

and her alleged lover had threat-ened to kill him.

Sonepat City SHO Ajay Malik said Deepak’s family has filed a complaint based on which an FIR has been registered against the

woman and her alleged lover on charges of abetting the suicide.

“A team of Sonepat Police is already in Delhi. The mobile phones of the accused are switched off and the duo are not at their place,” he said.

Meanwhile, a relative of the deceased alleged that the accused were harassing Deepak for the past six months.

He claimed that Deepak also wrote a 60-page diary describ-ing what exactly happened, but he could not muster enough courage to approach the police.

“On Saturday he called his sister, asking her to take care of their father. He then switched off his mobile phone. And then in the evening, he live-streamed the video on Facebook.

“At the time of the incident, he was alone in his home as his parents had gone to Mathura and he had sent his wife and son to a relative’s house,” the relative said.

Telangana passes bill to increase Muslim quota despite BJP protest

GOVT MAY SOON ALLOW 100 % FDI IN CASH, ATM MANAGEMENT COS

Hijack threat: Maximum alert at Mumbai, Hyd, Chennai airports

MPOST BUREAU

HYDERABAD: Both the houses of Telangana Legislature on Sunday passed a bill which increases the reservations for Scheduled Tribes and backward sections among the Muslim community in government jobs and educational institutions.

Except BJP, all parties, backed the Telangana Backward Classes, Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes (Reservation of Seats in Educational Institutions and of Appointments or Posts in the Ser-vices under the State) Bill, 2017.

It will now be sent for the President’s assent, Chief Minis-ter K Chandrasekhar Rao told the Assembly.

Under the bill, the quota for STs will be increased to 10 per cent from the existing 6 per cent, while that for BC-E category (the back-ward sections among the Muslim community) will go up to 12 per cent from the existing 4.

The total reservations in the state, consequently, will go up to 62 per cent from the existing 50 per cent.

Speaker Madhusudanachari suspended all five BJP MLAs for today’s special session as they pro-

tested carrying placards and sport-ing black scarves and called the bill “anti- constitutional” as it provides religion-based quota.

The lone BJP member in the Council, Ramachandra Rao, also staged a walkout.

The BJP MLAs, however, were in support of the increase in quota for the STs.

Rao said if the Centre did not include the bill in the 9th schedule of Constitution (to grant it immu-nity from a judicial review), the state government will approach the Supreme Court to direct the Cen-tre to do so.

Though the Backward Class Commission had endorsed only 10 per cent reservations for BC-E,

this government increased it to 12 per cent, Rao said.

“Why can’t Muslims be given reservations? Are they sinners? They constitute one-fifth of the population of this country....Don’t they pay taxes? Are they not citi-zens of India?” he asked.

“I am not going to beg the Cen-tre (for assent). I am going to fight for it if required. If the Centre does not come forward (to facili-tate assent for the bill), we will raise the issue in the Parliament,” Rao said in the House.

Increasing the reservations for Muslims was TRS’ election prom-ise and the people of the state had endorsed it, Rao said.

Congress leader T Jeevan Reddy backed the bill but said the state government must ensure its inclusion in the ninth schedule of Constitution.

BJP floor leader G Kishna Reddy said reservations for Mus-lims were not justified as there was no caste-based discrimination in Islam, and that religion does not endorse reservations.

Meanwhile, police detained BJP workers in various parts of the city as they tried to march towards the Assembly.

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: Cash and ATM man-agement companies will soon be allowed to attract 100 per cent for-eign direct investment as they are not required to comply with the Private Security Agencies (Regulation) Act (PSARA). A clarification to this effect is likely to be issued by the home min-istry shortly. The clarification will be against the backdrop of the confu-sion among firms in cash and ATM management relating to compliance with the Act, under which they can receive FDI only up to 49 per cent. The issue was discussed at a meeting con-vened by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) last month. “In that meeting, it was decided that the home ministry would be asked to issue a clarification that these companies will not have to comply with PSARA and would be eli-gible to attract 100 per cent FDI,” an

official said. There are about a dozen cash management players in the coun-try, including Writer Safeguard, SIS Securitas, CMS, Secure Value, Logi-cash, Brinks Arya, Securitrans and Scientific Security Management Ser-vices. According to experts, compa-nies managing cash for banks have so far been caught in a policy tangle, with the home ministry insisting that 100 per cent FDI could not be allowed to them if they provide private security guards or armoured vehicles.

Companies that make devices such

as currency authenticators and sort-ing and currency counting machines will also benefit from this clarification, they added. Several players, including TVS Electronics and ITI, are in such businesses. Cash Management com-panies handle over Rs 40,000 crore of cash per day. The government in 2015 permitted 100 per cent FDI under the automatic route for white label ATM operations with an aim to promote financial inclusion. FDI into the coun-try grew 22 per cent to $ 35.85 billion during April-December of 2016-17.

Foreign investment is considered crucial for India, which needs around $ 1 trillion for overhauling its infra-structure such as ports, airports and highways to boost growth.

A strong inflow of foreign invest-ments also helps improve the balance of payments and strengthen the rupee against other global currencies, espe-cially the dollar.

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: Security at international airports in Mumbai, Hyderabad and Chennai was on Sunday put on maximum alert after the state police forces and the CISF were informed about a possible air-craft hijack attempt.

The security protocols at these civilian air facilities were increased to the level that is done on the Republic Day and the Independence Day and the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), which guards the airports, and the police were taking special measures. Mumbai Police on Sat-urday night received an e-mail, purportedly sent by a Hyderabad-based woman. She claimed she overheard six men telling each other that “all 23 people have to split from here and board flights in three cities and hijack planes”.

CISF Director General O P Singh said that the security apparatus at these airports has been put on “an enhanced alert and protocols have been stepped up”.

“The e-mail could eventually turn out be a hoax but till investigations conclude all security drills to thwart a hijack like scenario are being carried out at the three airports,” he said.

“The unidentified woman wrote in the e-mail that what she heard could be ‘true or not’ but she chose to inform the authorities as she felt it was her duty to do so as a citizen,” the officer said.

The contents of the e-mail were shared by Mumbai Police with all security and intelligence agencies last night itself and a meeting of all stake-holders at these airports was subsequently con-vened with the input being declared specific and actionable, officials said. Special anti-sabotage sweeps are being carried out at the three air-

ports since early on Sunday and security agen-cies, including the CISF, were carrying out proper passenger checks, baggage scanning, pre-embar-kation checks, secondary ladder point checking and patrols to thwart any bid to storm the airports.

The CISF has also pressed into service its sniffer dog squads and quick reaction commando teams for undertaking sanitisation drills at the air-ports, the officials said, even as the airlines have been asked to remain extra vigilant.

“However, there is no reason to panic and all the operations at these airports will be conducted as normally as possible so that passengers don’t face any problem,” a senior officer, who is part of airport security team, said.

At the Chennai airport, security has been strengthened at the domestic and international airports. However, flight traffic is unaffected by the enhanced security measures, officials said in Chennai. Other airports in the country have also been sanitised and officials asked to remain vigi-lant, the CISF DG said.

The police are probing the contents of the e-mail and trying to ascertain the identity of the sender and get in touch with the person.

STATE’S TOTAL QUOTA GOES ABOVE SC LIMIT OF 50%

THE ISSUE WAS DISCUSSED AT THE PMO LAST MONTH

In today’s paper

...CITY

MAN CREATES RUCKUS AT POSH CLUB, RML 4

NATION

YOGI’S ANTI-ROMEO SQUADS POPULAR 6

EDIT

THE PROPAGANDA MACHINE 8

INTERNATIONAL

N KOREA MISSILE TEST ENDS IN FAILURE: US 10

BUSINESS

GOVT OKAYS 8.65% INTEREST ON EPF 12

SPORT

PRANEETH CLINCHES MAIDEN TITLE 15

ARMY CHIEF AND NSA DISCUSS KASHMIR SITUATION PG7

CREDIT GROWTH PLUNGS TO OVER 60 YEAR LOW AT 5% IN FY17 PG12

I TREAT SUCCESS, FAILURE SIMILARLY PG16

mp town2MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

Published & printed by Durbar Ganguly on behalf of Front Row Media Pvt. Ltd. from Pratap Bhawan, 5 Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, New Delhi 110 002 & printed at The Indian Express Ltd., A-8, Sector-7, Noida-201 301 (U.P.) RNI REGN. NO.: DELENG/2005/15351, REGD. NO.: DL(S)-01/3420/2015-17 Editor: Durbar Ganguly, Executive Editor: Arya Rudra. Tel. No. 011-47777500, Email: durbarganguly@gmail.com, Lucknow Office: 401, Chintels House 16, Station Road, Lucknow Ph: 0522-4013126

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

DAYINDAYOUT What’s on Around Town

ATMA RATIModern individual indulges in self-explo-ration, self-reflection, self-actualization and of course selfies. A classical dance presentation ‘Atma Rati’ by Dr Dimple Kaur aims to show how the psychological view of Gita is still relevant in the mod-ern context, and the learnings from Gita need not be larger than life as por-trayed but can be inculcated in simple day to day acts.WHEN: April 18 WHERE: Stein Audito-rium, IHC TIMING: 7 pm

GOD’S SUMMITA solo show by Temsuyanger Long-kumer envisions a utopian conversation amongst the Gods and Prophets about the predicament of what humanity has done to itself. Temsuyanger highlights events from global history at some key pivotal moments where irreversible change has occurred. This seminal piece of work raises the question of what it means to have power, control, authority, wisdom, vision.WHEN: April 8 – 19 WHERE: Kamadevi Complex 40, IIC TIMING: 11 am – 7 pm

TRIBUTE TO KISHORI AMONKARLegendary Kishori Amonkar was per-haps the last great vocalist of Hindustani classical music who passed away at the age of 84 years some days ago. Her sad and sudden demise has been widely mourned throughout the country. The Raza Foundation in collaboration is organizing an evening called ‘Tribute to Kishori Amonkar’ in which several music lovers, poets and critics would talk about Kishori-ji’s vision, style and personality. WHEN: April 17 WHERE: India Habitat Center TIMING: 7 pm onwards

KOREAN FLOWER EXHIBITIONAn exhibition of flower arrangements and fragrances, which will be present-ed by 15 Korean artists. The exhibition will not only show case varieties of Korean flowers used for different occa-sions but will also give provide you with an environment for relaxing yourself in the lap of nature.WHEN: April 17 – 19WHERE: Korean Cultural Centre India, Lajpat Nagar 4TIMING: 9 am – 6 pm

Plugging your smartphone to public charging stations or com-puters using USB cables can make your device vulnerable to

hackers, warn scientists including one of Indian origin.

Experts have long known the risks of charging a smartphone using a USB cord that can also transfer data.

The new research at New York Insti-tute of Technology (NYIT) shows that even without data wires, hackers using a “side channel” can quickly find out what websites a user has visited while charg-ing a device.

Researchers, including NYIT Kiran Balagani, warn that “a malicious charg-ing station” can use seemingly unrelated data – such as a device’s power consump-tion – to extract sensitive information.

As a walk through any airport will show, most people are happy to plug their phones into public charging sta-tions, putting their phones at risk of “juice-jacking,” when a compromised outlet steals data through a USB data cable, researchers said.

The study is the first to show that even without a data cable, hackers can analyse a device’s power needs to get at

users’ private information, with speed and accuracy depending on a number of factors.

The side-channel attacks were suc-cessful as “webpages have a signature that reflects the way they load and con-sume energy,” said Paolo Gasti, assistant professor at NYIT.

The remaining power traces act as “signatures” and help hackers discover which sites have been visited.

The researchers conducted the study using power use signatures they had pre-viously identified and tested the attack under various conditions.

After collecting power traces via a range of smartphones browsing popular websites, researchers launched attacks and checked the accuracy with which their algorithms could determine which websites were visited while the phones were plugged in.

Various factors such as battery charg-ing level, browser cache enabled/dis-abled, taps on the screen, and Wi-Fi/LTE influenced the accuracy rate in tracing websites visited.

Some conditions, such as a fully charged battery, facilitate a fast and accu-rate penetration, while others, such as

tapping the screen while a page is load-ing, lessen hackers’ ability to determine what website is being viewed.

The important finding from the study is that such an attack can be carried out successfully, researchers said.

In the study, the slower, less accu-

rate attempts at penetration were still accurate within six seconds about half the time.

“Although this was an early study of power use signatures, it’s very likely that information besides browsing activity can also be stolen via this side channel,”

said Gasti.“Since public USB charging stations

are so widely used, people need to be aware that there might be security issues with them. For example, informed users might choose not to browse the web while charging,” he said. PTI

IT’S BEST to wear natural fabrics to beat the heat and to keep skin problems at bay, say experts.Follow these simple tips and deal with sweat:

4 Loose clothes don’t touch your body and allow your body to breathe. Believe it or not, but loose fitting apparel like peplum tops, flowy tops or loose pants will always keep you cooler than a pair of skin tight tank and fit denims.

4 Keep yourself cool by switch-ing to breathable and sweat absorbing fabrics. Always dress up in clothes with nat-ural fabrics it will keep your temperature low.

4 Avoid wearing dresses with embellish-ments as they weigh down your clothes and leads the fabric to touch your skin, trapping the body heat. Embellishments also don’t let air pass through the fab-ric, thus causing sweating.

4 Wearing a light coloured and relaxed fit T-shirt can save you from

sweating. They can be played around in different styles.

4 Summer style is incomplete without chinos and denim shorts. When it comes to shorts, fit and length is the key. You can pair up denim shorts with cotton Polo T-shirt to get the comfort and style. IANS

SCARVES CAN ADD a charm to a man’s look if knotted the right way, say experts. Here are some ways in which men can style a simple scarf and pep up their attire:

DRAPE: Simply drape the scarf over the neck and the front of your chest under the blazer lapels. No actual tying happens in this one, so it’s a loose way of wearing a scarf meant more for ornamentation.

Traditional silk scarves are nearly always worn under the lapel. Since little of the scarf is visible, you can afford to be bold by using con-trasting hues or patterns.

FAKE: Hang the scarf around your neck with one end being twice as long as the other. Tie a loose over hand knot near the end of the shorter side leaving about

15 inches at the end. Tug the knot apart slightly and slip the other end straight through & tighten to the desired length.

FRENCH: Also called the Euro-pean knot, it is a fast and easy way

to tie a scarf. Just fold the scarf in half at the middle so that the ends touch and hold the doubled over bend in one hand, while passing the loose ends around the back of your neck with the other. Tuck the ends

through the bend and pull snug.ASCOT: Simple yet a versatile

knot. Take the scarf and lay it over your shoulders. Take both ends of the scarf, and tie them over-and-under as if you were starting to do up a giant pair of shoelaces.

Adjust the front to be a bit smooth and tighten closer to the neck as desired for a much more bohemian look.

PARISIAN: Take the scarf in both hands and fold it over length-wise. Drape it around your neck, insert the loose ends through the loop hanging in front of you and pull them through.

You can play with the tautness of the knot and the thickness of the scarf by doubling the scarf length-wise, if you wish. IANS

There are ample brands offering sun-screens in different forms, but you need to know your skin type before you spend a hefty amount on the

product. So, make sure you buy the right kind of sunscreen, say experts.

4 Sun protection creams for face have to be of really fine quality. Rather than going for too many sun block creams, you need to choose light weighted mist spray and have a thin layer. For your body you can use thick layered sunscreen.

Lotions and sun-guards containing SPF (Sun Protection Factor) 20 to 35 are suitable for Indian skin types.

The rays of the sun affect the fair complex-ion easily. Lotions having SPF 30 is the best for people having a fair or wheatish complex-ion. In case you have a dark complexion, you should opt for lotions that contain SPF 20. If you reside near the coastal regions or are going on a vacation to the beach, you should choose a sunscreen lotions containing SPF 30 to 50.

Sometimes for buying that sun screen you need to pay extra which equally hit your pockets. But after 50 SPF all sun screen are same in their effects. 

4 There are sunscreen lotions that are waterproof or water-resistant, which means that after the application of the lotion, even if you wash your face with water, the lotion will not wear off.

Waterproof sunscreen lotions will last up to 80 minutes in water and water-resistant sunscreen lotions can last up to 40 minutes in water. These kind of sunscreen lotions are best for swimmers.

4 You need to identify if your skin is aller-

gic to certain sunscreen. Different sunscreens have different ingredients so don’t be afraid of trying new sun screen.

4 If you have oily skin make sure you use gel based sunscreen or sun foundations – soufflé based, mousse based, powder based and water based.

If you have very dry skin, you can blindly go for oily sun screen which has some greasy or oily effect in it. It will even-tually hydrate your skin besides protect-ing you from the sun. For sensi-tive skin, avoid aphelia ingre-dients in skin. Also test the product at the back of your ear lobe. If there is no reac-tion you can continue with same sun screen. IANS

Combat sweat with natural fabrics

Different ways men can drape scarves

PORTSAT PUBLIC

Don’t charge your phones

Researchers warn that besides private information, browsing activity

can also be stolen via USB cord with speed and accuracy

Spend your money on the RIGHT SUNSCREEN

mp city 3MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: With the prom-ise of not levying any new municipal tax and to work for justice, service and development for the citizens, the BJP on Sun-day released its Sankalp Patra (manifesto) for the upcoming Municipal Corporation elec-tions in Delhi.

It said it would provide ade-quate assistance to NGOs run-ning Gaushalas (cowsheds) in the city for fodder, treatment of diseases and cow protection, and also work towards popula-rising non-meat cow products.

The BJP also promised to promote solar lights at slum clusters through ‘Surya Jyoti Yojna’.

Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari released the manifesto, along with senior party lead-ers including Union ministers Harsh Vardhan and Vijay Goel.

“The Sankalp Patra embod-ies Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s policies and the views of party president Amit Shah. We are committed to work for a Delhi of Prime Minister Nar-endra Modi’s dreams after win-ning the corporation elections,” Tiwari said.

The party promised that no new tax will be levied or rates hiked if it is voted to power. This comes in the backdrop of the Aam Aadmi Party’s allega-tion that power and water tar-iffs will go up if the BJP wins the MCD polls. “Kejriwal is trying to scare the people. We will nei-ther levy any new tax nor hike rates, nor allow anyone else to do it. We will strongly resist any such move,” said Tiwari.

A scheme - the Deendayal Antyodaya Rasoi Yojana – will be launched and the civic bod-ies will provide meals priced at Rs 10, he added.

The exemption from get-ting building plans approved for plots measuring up to 105

square metres will now be extended to plots measuring up to 500 square metres, Tiwari said. He added the BJP will work for direct transfer of funds from the Centre to the Municipal Corporations.

Over the last two years, the BJP-ruled civic bodies and the AAP government had been engaged in a war of words over transfer of funds amid strikes by sanitation workers in east Delhi.

“The Delhi government has an annual budget of Rs 48,000 crore in which, the civic bodies have a share of Rs 9,000 crore. But, they received only Rs 2,800 crore. We will force the govern-ment to release the dues,” said Tiwari.

Taking a dig at Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for his allegations of corruption and non performance in the civic bodies, he said, “He (Kejriwal) should sit in the parks of MCD and his cough, for which he goes to Bengaluru, will be cured.”

The manifesto promised a “transparent and corruption- free” rule. It also promised to regularise the temporary sani-tation workers, digitalisation of citizen services, putting pres-sure on the Delhi government for regularisation of unauthor-ised colonies.

It also promised a Rs 10 lakh insurance cover for the students in the MCD schools, health cards for citizens, open gymnasiums, scrapping factory licences, promoting enterprises run by women under the Cen-tre’s Startup India scheme, spe-cial arrangements to address the problems faced by the people of north-east in the city.

It also promised autorick-shaw and taxi stands with rest-rooms for drivers and issuance of licences to hawkers and street vendors under the Street Ven-dors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vend-ing) Act, 2014.

No new taxes, hikes in BJP’s manifesto

MUNICIPAL CORPORATION ELECTIONS

Adequate assistance would be given to NGOs running cowsheds in the city for fodder, treatment of diseases and cow protection

Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari and senior leader Shyam Jaju at the release of BJP’s ‘Sankalp Patra’ PIC/PTI

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Following the indictment of the Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi government by the Shunglu Committee report on various counts of corruption and illegal actions, the Delhi Congress unit on Sunday observed a ‘maun vrath’ at the Gandhi Samadhi at Rajghat.

Leaders of the party demanded registration of an FIR against the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and its government.

Party leaders claimed that the Shunglu Committee had examined as many as 404 files pertaining to various decisions taken by the AAP government and the findings of the committee unearthed many serious cases of corruption and irregularities by the Kejriwal-led government.

These irregularities, the Congress leaders said, included illegal land allotment, illegal appointments without following procedures and the many foreign tours undertaken by Kejriwal and his ministerial colleagues, MLAs and other functionaries associated with the government.

Delhi Congress president Ajay Maken said that he accessed a copy of the Shunglu Committee report through an RTI application,

and brought to light the findings of the committee before the people of the country on April 5.

“The Shunglu Committee report has levelled serious corruption charges against Kejriwal, the AAP and the Kejriwal government, but strangely, no FIR has been filed against the guilty,” said Maken.

The Shunglu Committee had submitted its report to the Lieutenant Governor on November 27 last year, but Maken was able to get a copy of the report only through an RTI.

Maken said the BJP-led central government was also complacent in taking action against the guilty on the findings in the Shunglu Committee report, as the Centre sat on the report for six months before he could get a copy of the report through an RTI application.

Maken said the central government was still reluctant to act on the Shunglu Committee report as the BJP was trying to protect the Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi government.

Earlier this week, a delegation of Delhi Congress led by Maken had met President Pranab Mukherjee urging his intervention in this regard.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The AAP on Sunday termed the BJP mani-festo for MCD polls as a doc-ument of “lies and failures”, while the Congress said the party has not been able to ful-fil promises made in the earlier civic body elections.

AAP’s Delhi unit convenor Dilip Pandey said the BJP has been raising questions over implementation of Chief Min-ister Arvind Kejriwal’s assur-ance to abolish the house tax, while it had made a similar promise in its 2007 manifesto.

“They have not kept the promises made to the people of Delhi in the previous MCD elections in 2007 and 2012. The manifesto is nothing but a doc-ument of lies and failures of the BJP over the past 10 years in power in the MCDs. They have turned Delhi into a big dustbin.

“They promised to abol-ish house tax during the 2007 MCD polls, but they failed to keep the promise,” Pandey said.

AAP leader Harish Awasthi claimed that out of a total of 50 lakh registered properties for house tax, currently the MCD gets house tax, legally, from 11 lakh properties.

“This means the BJP-led MCD exacts money through unlawful means like touts from the rest of the 39 lakh houses,” Awasthi alleged.

Ajay Maken, the Delhi unit president of the Congress, said the BJP’s manifesto should be looked in the light of party’s ten year rule in three munic-ipal corporations which was “plagued with corruption.”

The BJP on Sunday released its manifesto, promising to provide meals priced at Rs 10 apart from pledging not to levy any new municipal taxes.

It had made 44 promises with Delhi people in 2012 MCD polls out of only 38 remain to be fulfilled, Maken claimed. “So, the BJP’s score card is 6 out 44. Its leaders should be asked how they are going to fulfil the new prom-ises they have made with peo-ple which they could not do in last ten years,” he added.

Raising the issue of street vendors, Pandey said the BJP has not done anything for their welfare in the past 10 years.

“We will constitute town vending committees (TVCs), regularise street vendors as quickly as possible and for-mulate an action plan for their welfare after coming to power in the MCDs,” Pandey said.

Shunglu Report: Cong leaders go on silent protest at Rajghat

Manifesto of lies, says AAP; Cong says past promises unfulfilled

YOGESH KANT

NEW DELHI: Three months have passed since the under-ground tunnel linking the main campus of All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) to its Jai Prakash Narayan Apex Trauma Centre (JPNATC) has been ready.

However, it is yet to become operational as the formal inau-

guration has not yet taken place.According to sources at

AIIMS, the project completion report was sent to the Union Health Ministry almost three months ago, stating the proj-ect is complete and ready for inauguration.

“We are yet to receive any intimation from the Ministry about its inauguration. We are just waiting for its formal inau-

guration,” a source said.The tunnel was expected to

become operational in mid-2015, but was delayed due to certain issues regarding clear-ance from civic bodies for con-struction of the surface road connecting its exit point near Safdarjung Hospital leading to the JPNATC.

The 614-metre-long tunnel costing Rs 40 crore has been

built by the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC).

It is the first time in India that a road tunnel has been con-structed above an operational Metro tunnel, with a minimum clearance of 1.6 meters only.

“All these were sorted out and the surface road has also been constructed and is ready to be operational,” said an official.

Once the underground passage is operational, it will drastically cut the commuting time for critically-ill patients and AIIMS staffer, who fre-quently move between these two facilities from the current 35-40 minutes to around 10-15 minutes.

The tunnel will be also used by family members of patients, doctors and other hospital staff.

Underground tunnel at AIIMS awaits formal inaugurationOUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Delhi gov-ernment’s Transport Depart-ment has decided to streamline the movement of e- rickshaws in the national capital by regu-larising their routes.

The department will soon initiate a study on routes where there is an “actual” need for the battery-operated vehi-

cles to ply, a senior government official said.

In January this year, the Delhi High Court had directed the AAP government and the police to frame a comprehen-sive policy on the plying of e-rickshaws in the capital.

“As of now, there is no route regularisation of e- rickshaws due to which they occupy more space, causing traffic jams on

several busy roads. The trans-port department will regular-ise their routes in several areas,” the official said.

The official also said that a detailed report on the issue will be prepared and subsequently submitted to the government for a final nod.

In Delhi, the operation of e-rickshaws is banned on 236 roads.

E-rickshaw routes to be regularised

mp city4MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

Kingpin of inter-state drug cartel arrested by Special Cell

Cops detain four men after theft of Rs 26 lakh from cash van

Man creates ruckus at posh club, RML, held

Delhi zoo preps up to help inmates beat the heat

30 percent of snatching cases remain unsolved in Ggn, crime on rise

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Delhi Police have detained four men – including two custodians, one security guard and the driver of a cash van – after the men reported a theft of cash worth Rs 26 lakh from the van in Rajendra Nagar area of Central Delhi.

Police have registered a case in the matter and are searching for the missing cash box.

“We got the information about the theft around 5.30 on the evening on Saturday. We are analysing the statements of the custodians and the security guard to get some clue how the theft happened,” said a senior police officer privy to the investigation.

The four men told police personnel that a cash box had gone missing after they had come to refill an Axis Bank ATM in Rajendra Nagar.

The total amount in the box is estimated at around Rs 26 lakh.

The police are suspicious as to how someone could take the heavy cash box from inside the van and get away with it, without being noticed by the four men inside the van.

“They told us that the theft allegedly happened when they were standing at some distance from the vehicle, a theory unlikely to be believed. No one has got a clean chit right now,” said a senior police officer.

Delhi Police are questioning the four men based on their suspicious claim and are matching their statements to confirm their alibi. Investigators are also checking their phone records.

“A case has been registered and we are also looking for the CCTV footage along the route of the vehicle to get a clue whether the cash van was trailed,” said a police officer.

Several teams have been formed and are working on various inputs to crack the case.

ZAFAR ABBAS

NEW DELHI: The Delhi police have booked a 28-year-old man along with his family members for obstructing a public servant in imparting his duty and also for misbehaving with staff from Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital Emergency on Friday.

In his complaint, the sub-inspector posted in Can-naught place police station in New Delhi alleged that during a night emergency duty, he along with a constable had to report to a five-star hotel in New Delhi to nab accused Nishid Gupta who was misbehaving with the hotel staff. Gupta was accom-panied by his family members.

The SI then took him to RML hospital for medical where Gupta allegedly turned violent and started creating a ruckus.

According to the sources, Gupta came to the posh club that was closed and forced the attendants and bouncers to open it.

Following this, the bounc-ers threw him out of the prem-ises. Infuriated by the act, Gupta allegedly attacked his own driver.

This was reported to the cops who took him to RML for medical assistance.

In a two minute 50 seconds mobile shot video, Gupta is seen lying shirtless on the floor in the hospital while his mother

was trying to control him. The family members point-

ing to the blood spilled on the floor alleged that the SI had beaten their son. Gupta, son of a businessman was seen kick-ing the sub-inspector Kuldeep Yadav while trying to move his mother away.

Also, the video showed him misbehave with the doctors as the parents try to console him.

In the video, the cop also shows the injury marks on his neck and also alleges that Gupta behaved inappropriately with his him.

During the capture, the cop’s mobile phone broke after it slipped from his pocket as his collar was held by the accused.

In his complaint, the cops stated that Gupta also threat-ened of getting the cop termi-nated from the job.

“We have registered a case under section 186, 353 and 332 and are investigating the mat-ter,” said a top cop.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The ruthless heat wave and rising temper-atures have kept Delhi Zoo authorities on their toes.

To help the inmates beat the heat and stay active, the zoo authorities have installed water sprinklers, desert coolers and fans, and are providing the animals with sweet dishes like sugar-free kheer.

“As part of the zoo's sum-mer plans, water sprinklers, fans and coolers have been installed in the animal enclo-sures,” an official at the National Zoological Park said.

“The ponds are being filled with water. Pressure pumps are being used to bathe big animals like elephants, tigers and lions," the official added.

He also mentioned that the

animals are given vitamin sup-plements or electro powder to beat dehydration and that the meat intake of carnivorous ani-mals like tigers, panthers, jag-uars and lions is reduced by 1-2 kg during summers.

“Altering the food plan is also part of the summer action. For instance, seasonal fruits are given to prevent the inmates from infection. Climber plants are included in the diet of bears and monkeys. This time we will also provide sugar-free kheer," he added.

Also, nets are being used on the roofs of the enclosures to prevent the inmates from harmful UV rays. Wooden platforms are also removed from the enclosures.

The official also added that a vaccination programme has been initiated for the inmates.

PIYUSH OHRIE

GURUGRAM: As the incidents of snatching con-tinue to be on the steep, more than 30 percent of such cases are yet to be solved in the Millennium City. Women and oldies continue to be the prime targets of these miscreants.

Contrast to the claims of continuous surveil-lance in vulnerable areas by Gurugram cops, the snatchers are sprawled all over the city. Not only are the older parts but also, the new and posh areas of the city continues to be a victim of these incidents.

According to top cops, most of these snatch-ers belong to some organised gang. Also, as most of these criminals hailing from areas like Mewat, Alwar and some from Uttar Pradesh operate from there, it becomes a tough task for cops to nab them.

“Like any big city, even Gurugram is being affected by snatching and robbery incidents. Though we are able to make arrests, it is a major challenge to catch hold of these criminals as most of them come from the outside states,” said top cop from Gurugram Police.

The official also stated that most of the crimi-nals are not deterred even after they are arrested. “Most of the culprits continue to indulge in these activities and progress towards becoming bigger criminals who then commit burglaries, kidnap-pings, and murder. Snatching is a stepping stone for them to enter into big crime,” added the official.

Meanwhile, city residents who have been vic-tims of such incidents continue to walk in fear.

“I still remember that I was robbed of my purse at Bristol Chowk area at 7:00 pm in the evening when the traffic was at its peak. This was a year back. There were two people who came on the bike and took my purse,” said Kamini Gupta, a victim.

She stated that this incident had made me quite nervous. “From thereon I decided to not walk down the streets of Gurugram. Unfortunately not only evenings these snatchers also strike during the daytime,” added Kamini.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Delhi Police Special Cell arrested a notorious kingpin of a drug cartel of an inter-State Drug Racket namely Nazir Hussain alias Nizamuddin. This 45-year-old miscreant, a resident of North-East India carried a reward of Rs 50,000 on his arrest.

Deputy Commissioner of Police, Special Cell, Sanjeev Kumar Yadav stated that they got to know about Nizamud-din while they were investigat-ing a case in which five drug traffickers and 69 kilograms of high-grade opium worth several crores in the Interna-tional market was recovered from their possession.

“It was found that Niza-muddin is the kingpin of a drug cartel. He would col-lect opium and heroin from various small cultivators in North-East and supply them

to various middle-men located in Uttar Pradesh and Delhi-NCR through his carriers using trucks and other heavy vehicles to avoid detection by law enforcing agencies,” said Yadav.

He also stated that he was also declared Proclaimed Offender (PO) by the con-cerned Delhi Court as he

evaded arrest when the police team went to Assam and neighbouring states in search of him.

After months of efforts, information was received that Nizamuddin would be reach-ing Delhi by train from Guwa-hati on April 14 and would be at Anand Vihar Railway Sta-tion in East Delhi.

Special Cell sleuths reached Ghaziabad Railway Station and boarded the train in which the accused was seated.

Following this, he was arrested after interrogation.

During interrogation, the accused disclosed that illegal farming of opium is rampant in the North-East states like Assam, Manipur, and Naga-land and they have become a major source of supply of opium and heroin to Punjab via UP and Delhi-NCR.

After a crackdown by Border Security Forces (BSF) on Pakistan Border, illegal smuggling of the drugs in Punjab had taken a nose dive and this route has now become a preferred one by drug traf-fickers, the accused revealed to the cops.

“He also stated that North-East States are now the biggest hub for supply of these drugs to rest of North India which

are manufacturing them locally as well as smuggling from Myanmar,” said the DCP.

Nizamuddin’s mid-dle-men were regular cus-tomers who used to place orders on phone and money used to be transferred both through banks and cash. The accused disclosed that earlier he made several trips to UP and Delhi-NCR to supply opium to various middle-men.

This time he has come to make contact with his earlier arrested associates, who are lodged in Delhi jails.

Nizamuddin is a school dropout. He started as a mechanic of Maruti cars and also ran a garage at Dimapur (Nagaland) for several years.

After earning a reason-able amount from his garage, he purchased a second-hand truck for plying in goods transport from Dimapur to Western UP and Delhi and adjoining areas.

The 45-year-old miscreant, Nazir Hussain alias Nizamuddin. a resident of North-East India carried a reward of Rs 50,000 on his arrest

Delayed possession: Two separate protests by Noida homebuyers

RAHUL SINGH

NOIDA/GREATER NOIDA: Both Noida and Greater Noida witnessed massive protests held by aggrieved home buyers on Sunday afternoon. The buy-ers demanded action against the builders’ group for the huge delay in possession.

Standing under the scorch-ing sun, with the temperature around 42 degrees, the protest-ers marched to the builder’s site demanding the newly elected chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Yogi Adityanath to initiate immediate actions against the builders’ group.

In the first incident, the buyers of Airwil Intellicity in Greater Noida West staged a protest under the banner of Noida Extension Flat Owner’s Main Association (NEFOMA).

A hundred homebuyers present included women, chil-dren, and senior citizens. The protest was held over the delay in possession of their shops and also against the stagnant construction work. The pro-test went on for over two hours.

“I booked a retail shop in Airwil Intellicity with all my savings in 2014. The builder promised to deliver the pos-session within three years but looking at the progress of con-

struction work, it is impos-sible to get the shop even in next three or four years. Till now I have made 95 percent of the total cost. The builder also promised us to pay assured return till possession but he failed to provide that also after May 2016,” said a protestor, Sunil Dobriyal.

Anu Khan, Founder, Noida Extension Flat Owner’s Main Association (NEFOMA) said, “The builder has cheated thou-sands of home buyers. He has also appointed musclemen and bouncers at his site who have several times fought with us. The buyers feel hostile due to this.

"The newly elected CM of the state should take immediate actions against such builders who have made the home buy-ers suffer. We have also filed an RTI seeking information from the Greater Noida authority about the layout plan. We are yet to receive a response.”

In the second protest of the same day, homebuyers of Amrapali Platinum in sec-tor 119 demanded immediate possession and registry of their flats. The buyers insisted the government look into the mat-ter and solve the issue between the builder and the authority at the earliest.

Sacked AIIMS staff seek

help of Labour Commissioner

Ambulance services at Civil

Hospital in a pitiable state

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI:The terminated contractual fourth class workers of All India Institutes of Medi-cal Sciences, (AIIMS) Trauma Center, Delhi have intensified their agitation against the coun-try premier institute and the private company, Sudarshan Facilities Pvt Ltd which had allegedly denied them the mini-mum wages.

The workers have registered a plea before the Labour Com-missioner. Sudarshan Facilities has been given the contract for hiring housekeeping staff for running the services at AIIMS Trauma Centre. “We have been unlawfully sacked last week. You are requested to intervene in the matter to get us reinstated with back wages,” read the letter.

Meanwhile, the letter alleges that the companies ‘powerfully’ made 100 employees resign over the last one year. “When the employees raise their demand for minimum wages as per the law, the hospital administration called the police which in turn manhandled the workers. The next day, the services of the 18 employees was terminated,” said general secretary of the union, Mriganka. He also stated that the workers employed under the contract were hired for Rs 9,500 but since January, they were receiving only Rs 8,500. On March 1, the issue was initially taken up with the management which failed to respond. In a let-ter to AIIMS deputy director, the contractual workers’ union has alleged that they were also being compelled to perform work of Class III staff, like OT technicians and computer oper-ators. Also, the letter mentioned the delays in payment of wages and denial of bonus.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

GURUGRAM:Ambulance ser-vices at civil hospital in Guru-gram continue to be in abysmal state. Recently, the breakdown of one of the ambulances at the civil hospital resulted in the death of a three-month-old infant as he could not be transferred to Safdarjung hos-pital in time.

While the death is under probe, the parents of the infant have blamed the authorities at the civil hospital. The parents alleged that breakdown of the ambulance delayed the trans-fer which resulted in the infant’s untimely demise.

Sources at the civil hospital admitted that the ambulance in the hospital is in a sorrow state and requires revamp from government authorities. For patients in emergencies, only three Advanced Life Support (ALS) ambulances in addition to thirteen Basic Life Support (BLS) ambulances are available. Also, no addition has been made to the ALS for over five years. This gives rise to the mainte-nance problem. “The ambulance system is a part of poor state of infrastructure. Most of them are in extremely poor state because of the large distances travelled by them over the years,” said a senior doctor.

Parents protest against fee hike at Indirapuram public school

OUR CORRESPONDENT

GHAZIABAD: A contingent of parents gathered outside Indirapuram Public School in Pratap Vihar, Ghaziabad on Sunday protesting against the fee hike.

In the two-hour-long pro-test, the parents alleged that the school hiked its fee on the name of annual charges. They have demanded an explana-tion from the institution and a rollback of the hike.

Also, the protesters demanded that the school share the details of expenses. Some parents have also written to the director, school educa-tion department.

“We are planning to approach district educa-tion officials to obtain Form 6 which has details of the

fee structure and finances of schools. Further, we will meet the Fee and Fund Regulatory Committee, demanding a fee audit if we find any irregulari-ties in the form,” echoed the parents.

“We have also approached the district education office and requested officials to speak to the school about the hike. There is already a 10 percent annual hike in the school fees. The additional hike is a bur-den on salaried parents” said the protester.

According to another pro-tester, in the last two years, fees have been increased by 30-40 percent.

“There is no place for poor students in our education sys-tem. We have now planned to write an application which will be handed over to the District

Magistrate, Ghaziabad. The application will be signed by a maximum number of parents who are against the fee hike. We seek strict and immediate actions to be taken against the school management and the hike should get rolled back. If our demands are not met, we will continue to protest out-side the school and will write to Uttar Pradesh chief minis-ter Yogi Aditya Nath seeking his intervention”, said Manish, another protester.

On the other hand, school management stated that the hike is reasonable keeping in mind the facilities provided.

“We will not rollback our decision and the fees are raised only after receiv-ing the consent from par-ents,” said an official from school management.

Students protest outside SOL, demand committee against sexual harassmentPOOJA SAPRA

NEW DELHI: Following the death of the 21-year-old Dalit, the students of Delhi University staged a protest demonstration demanding the formation of a committee against sexual harass-ment in School of Open Learning (SOL) on Sunday.

The students held the first round of campaigning outside the institution and this is to be followed on Monday in regard to the same.

Further, the students demanded immediate formation of a Gender Sensitization Com-mittee against Sexual Harassment (GSCASH) in SOL and probe in the matter of negligence by police.

Hundreds of women stu-dents signed the memorandum demanding immediate consti-tution of Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) for sexual harassment in all DU colleges, investigation on police officials who did not take action and for-mation of Equal Opportunity

Cells.“We refuse to lose more lives

and further to caste and gender violence, to the lack of institu-

tional mechanisms of support,” highlighted the students.

A delegation met H.C Pokhri-yal, Executive director, SOL with

the demand to form GSCASH. He said, “The administration

is willing to form it and will initi-ate the process if elaborate mecha-nism and structure is suggested.”

The 21-year-old was a Bcom students at Delhi University's SOL left behind a suicide note blaming her ex-boyfriend for her death.

In her suicide note, she talked about how her boyfriend started ignoring her and used caste-based slurs after she revealed her caste.

Students alleged that com-plaints were filed in two police

stations- first in Roop Nagar and later in Model Town police station.

However, the cops failed to take any action, until the girl was pushed to such desperation that she had to commit suicide.

“This tragic incident points to the absence of a functional Gender Sensitization Commit-tee against Sexual Harassment, which institutions such as the SOL must have, where such cases of violence and intimidation can be addressed,” echoed students.

Ggn residents face major challenges as HUDA denies land for public toilets

PIYUSH OHRIE

GURUGRAM: The scarcity of public toilets in the Millennium City continues to pose threats to many, especially to women.

Tasked with the responsibil-ity of setting up public toilets, the Municipal Corporation of Guru-gram (MCG) continues to face the challenge of acquiring land across different sectors.

In a recent move,s HUDA has denied land to MCG for setting up public toilets in some of its sectors on the request of Resident Wel-fare Associations (RWA) in these sectors.

According to RWA’s, MCG had planned to build public toilets near green belt area and parks. But, this would make the surrounding areas dirtier owing to poor maintenance of toilets by the officials.

Certain prominent sectors in the city where the residents have protested against setting up of pub-lic toilets are Sector 15, Sector 8, Sector 5, Sector 46 and Sector 9.

Interestingly, MCG is in charge of maintenance of the sectors but it has to seek permission from HUDA, as the land belongs to the latter. With MCG not getting land in the densely populated areas of

the city, it is building public toilets near the surrounding villages that are not been frequented by many.

Meanwhile, not only in the sec-tors but also in posh public areas like MG road and Golf Course road, lack of public toilets contin-ues to be a major problem. While MCG officials have claimed that they are setting up the public toi-lets on a large scale, most of the

residents remain unimpressed by the claims.

“There is no denying the fact that Gurugram is woefully short of toilets. Even in areas like MG road that is well known for its malls, offices and residential societies, there are certain areas at MG road where the stench caused due to lack of public toi-lets is completely unbearable. Further, the levels of mainte-nance and cleanliness in most of the public toilets continue to be in an abysmal state,” said a resi-dent, Rahul Kapoor. He also stated that the problems of no public toilets are faced mostly by women.

“It’s unfortunate that cer-tain toilets that have built by res-idential and market societies in the city, no attention is paid towards building women toilets,” added Kapoor.

Delhi Police are questioning the four men based on their suspicious claim and are matching their statements to confirm their alibi

SOL students protesting outside the institution on Sunday PIC/MPOST

HUDA has denied land to MCG for setting up public toilets in some of its sectors

Video grab showing the 28-year-old man at RML Hospital PIC/MPOST

PIC/MPOST

Nizamuddin, a school dropout started as a mechanic of Maruti cars and also ran a garage at Dimapur (Nagaland) for several years PIC/MPOST

5MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

mp nationBABRI MASJID DISPUTE

Proposed surrogacy law says no parenthood for singles

Govt to set up 31 new earth observatories by year end

AIMPLB rejects SC suggestion for out-of-court settlement

Triple talaq: PM Modi pitches for justice to Muslim women

SURESH PRABHU FLAGS OFF TRAIN WITH VISTADOME COACH ALONG VIZAG-ARAKU VISAKHAPATNAM: Aiming to provide a delight-ful travelling experience to the picturesque Araku valley here, the Railways on Sunday introduced a see-through Vistadome coach on its Visakhapatnam-Kirandul passenger train. Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu flagged-off the train through a video link from Bhubaneswar. The specially-designed Vis-tadome air-conditioned coach, claimed to be a first-of-its-kind on Indian Railways, has large glass windows and an observation lounge that offer pas-sengers a panoramic view of the sites along the 128-km rail route from Visakhapatnam to Araku valley hill station.

PRESIDENT WISHES FOR PEACE, PROSPERITY IN SYRIANEW DELHI: President Pranab Mukherjee on Sunday said he looked forward to the success of a Syria-led political solution fulfilling the aspira-tions of the Syrian people. Extending greetings and felicitations to the people of Syria, Mukherjee in his message to President Bashar Al-Assad on the eve of the country’s National Day said: “India and Syria have traditionally enjoyed warm and cordial rela-tions.” “The tragic loss of human lives and violence during the many years of conflict that have devas-tated Syria have greatly saddened us in India,” the President said.

BJP MLA’S CAR ATTACKED IN GUJARATBHUJ: The car of Bharatiya Janata Party legislator from Bhuj Nima Acharya was attacked by unidenti-fied persons near Loriya village of the district on Sunday. Acharya was passing along the highway near Loriya when the attackers started pelting stones at her car and smashed its window panes. The driver immediately sped off and the legislator managed to escape unhurt. She was later closeted with regional BJP leaders and party supporters at the Bhuj Circuit House. When reporters confronted her, the assembly member was all smiles and evaded questions related to the attack on her car. However, her remark that “the party’s image will be affected (if she discussed the attack in public)” set the tongues wagging that the incident was organised by party insiders to garner sympathy. No police complaint has been lodged yet.

BRIEFSNATION

OUR CORRESPONDENT

LUCKNOW: The All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) on Sunday rejected the Supreme Court’s suggestion for an out-of-court settlement of the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid dispute and said that only a verdict by the apex court will be acceptable to it.

“No out-of-court settlement is acceptable to us,” AIMPLB General Secretary Maulana Wali Rehmani told reporters after a two-day meeting of the board executive.

A resolution passed by the board executive also said that “on the Babri Masjid issue, the board would only accept a deci-sion by the Supreme Court”, making it clear that the AIM-PLB is not willing to accept the Supreme Court’s suggestion.

On March 21, the apex court had suggested an out-of-court settlement of the dis-pute at Ayodhya, observing that issues of “religion and senti-ments” can be best resolved through talks.

Chief Justice J S Khehar had even offered to mediate as a bench headed by him suggested that the parties to the dispute adopt a “give a bit and take a bit”

approach for meaningful and sincere negotiations to resolve the issue.

The board also dug its heels on the contentious issue of tri-ple talaq asserting that Muslims have the “constitutional” right to follow their personal law.

Rehmani said that the board has decided to issue a code of

conduct and that those who give talaq (divorce) without ‘Sharia’ (Islamic law) reasons will face social boycott.

“A code of conduct for talaq is being issued. With its help, the real picture of Sharia directives will be brought out on the talaq issue. If talaq is given without Sharia reasons,

those involved will be socially boycotted,” he said.

The board will issue appeals to maulanas and imams of mosques to read out the code of conduct during Friday ‘namaz’ and emphasise on its imple-mentation, he said.

The board has made it clear that it will not tolerate inter-ference in the Shariat laws, Rehmani said, claiming that a majority of the Muslims in the country do not want any change in their personal law.

He had earlier said that in a recent signature campaign initi-ated by the AIMPLB across the country, men as well as women had said that the Constitution of India guarantees them the right to practice their religion.

He urged that no “road-blocks” should be put in the implementation of the muslim personal laws.

The Union government had on October 7 last year opposed in the Supreme Court the tri-ple talaq mode of divorce, ‘nikah halala’ and the prac-tice of polygamy among Mus-lims and favoured a relook on grounds like gender equality and secularism.

The Ministry of Law and Justice, in its affidavit, had

referred to constitutional prin-ciples like gender equality, sec-ularism as well as international covenants, religious practices and marital laws prevalent in Islamic countries to suggest that the practice of triple talaq and polygamy needed to be adjudi-cated upon afresh by the apex court.

Rehmani also said the board will help women against whom talaq was misused and injustice was meted to them.

The board’s women wing head, Asma Jahra said that the issue of talaq of Muslim women was not religious but social.

“In India, women’s issues are the same and in such a scenario only Muslim law should not be targeted,” she said.

Jahra said that a 15,500 mat-ters were heard on a helpline started for talaq related cases. This helpline is being run in seven languages including Hindi, Urdu and Bengali, she said.

Referring to the signature campaign conducted by the board, she said that 5.81 crore people including 2.71 crore women had voted against any change in Shariat laws add-ing that there were “misunder-standings on the issue”.

Father’s name on degree certificates: Maneka writes to HRDM for change in rule

Modi in Surat, welcomed with road show

SURAT: Prime Minister Nar-endra Modi arrived here on Sunday on a two-day visit to Gujarat, to be welcomed by a unique road show where an 11-km saree will list the BJP’s achievements.

The road show will begin from the Surat airport and continue till the Circuit House where the PM will spend the night. The saree will cover the entire stretch of the road show depicting schemes launched by the Modi government. A con-voy of motorcycle-borne girls will accompany Modi’s caval-cade. The Prime Minister will on Monday inaugurate a Rs 500 crore hospital made by philan-thropic diamond industrialists of Surat. Later in the day, he will open a diamond manufacturing unit of Hare Krishna Exports and an ice cream making unit of the Surat District Milk Produc-ers Union (Sumul) Dairy coop-erative in Tapi district.

Expressing excitement over his visit, Modi tweeted: “My gratitude to all those who are participating in the various pro-grammes. Visiting the vibrant city of Surat is a matter of great joy.”

OUR CORRESPONDENT

BHUBANESWAR: Raising the ‘triple talaq’ issue, Prime Minis-ter Narendra Modi on Sunday said justice should be done to Muslim women and asked the BJP to reach out to the backward sections in the community over his government s bill to accord constitutional status to the OBC Commission.

Speaking at the party s national executive meeting, he said if there are social evils, the society should be woken up and efforts made to provide justice to the victims.

He also sought to allay apprehensions among Mus-lims about the BJP on the issue.

“He (Modi) talked about social justice. He said our Mus-lim sisters should also get jus-tice. Injustice should not be

done to them. Nobody should be exploited. We do not want that there is conflict within the Muslim community over this issue. “What we have to do is that if there are any social evils, we have to wake up the society and make efforts to provide jus-tice to them (Muslim women),” Union Minister Nitin Gadkari said while briefing reporters on Modi s speech.

Earlier, Modi also made an intervention during a discus-sion on a party resolution on his government s bill to accord constitutional status to the OBC Commission.

He noted that some back-ward sections of Muslims already enjoy the benefits from the OBC quota and such a com-mission will look into their con-cerns as well. Modi asked BJP leaders to reach out to them.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Following con-cerns raised by single mothers, Women and Child Develop-ment Minister Maneka Gandhi has written to HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar, urging him to change the rule that requires father’s name to be mandato-rily mentioned on a student’s degree certificate.

Last year, at the behest of Maneka, the Ministry of External Affairs had revised its passport application rules and announced that the name of only one parent, and not both, was enough, enabling single parents to apply for passports for their children.

“I have been approached by several women who are sep-arated from their husbands and who face problems get-ting degree certificates issued

for their children without their father’s name,” reads the letter written by Maneka to Javadekar. She explains in her letter that “breakdown of mar-riages and separation between husband and wife is now a real-ity” and rules must reflect this.

“Keeping in view the sen-sitivity of the single/separated mother, we need to make a provision for this purpose by changing rules/guidelines,” the

letter adds.Priyanka Gupta, a single

parent, had initiated a petition last year on Change.org, asking for passport rules to be altered, so that she was not required to mention her husband’s name on her daughter’s passport. The petition was addressed to Maneka and External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.

Subsequently, Maneka had written to Swaraj and a three- member committee comprising officials of the two ministries was constituted.

Months later, the MEA announced the revised set of passport rules and declared that the name of only one par-ent was enough and that mar-ried applicants will not have to produce a marriage certifi-cate and share their spouse’s name if they were separated or divorced.

Nepal Prez Bhandari arrives on 5-day India visit today OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: In her first over-seas tour, Nepalese President Bidya Devi Bhandari will arrive here on Monday on a five-day visit, during which she will hold talks with top Indian leadership to strengthen bilateral ties.

She will hold talks with Pres-ident Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, exploring ways to expand coop-eration between the two close neighbours whose ties faced some strain following the agita-tion by the Madhesi community last year. Vice President Hamid Ansari, External Affairs Minis-ter Sushma Swaraj, Home Min-ister Rajnath Singh and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley will call on the Nepalese President.

Bhandari was scheduled to visit India in May last year, but the trip was cancelled after the

then cabinet did not endorse the visit programme, citing lack of preparations on the part of the government. The bilateral ties between the two had faced turbulence last year due to the Madhesi agitation and the sub-sequent blockade which halted the supply of essential goods to landlocked Nepal from India.

Madhesis, mostly of Indian-origin, had been demanding that the new Constitution be amended to include their con-cerns about adequate political representation and redrawing of federal boundaries.

It will be Bhandari’s first state visit abroad after assum-ing the charge of the high office in October 2015. She will be staying at the Rashtrapati Bha-wan. A high-level delegation comprising several ministers, MPs and senior officials will be accompanying her.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Bollywood celebrities like Karan Johar and Tusshar Kapoor became proud fathers via surrogacy but other aspiring singles may face roadblocks as a proposed law restricts this method by allowing only legally wedded couples.

Several experts including lawyers and doctors, barring a few, were of the view that the window of surrogacy should not be closed for single parents and the couples should have the option to choose anyone who is not a close relative as a surro-gate mother.

However, senior advocate Shekhar Naphade had a dif-ferent and mixed take on the entire issue. While maintaining

that it has become a “fashion” among celebrities to become a single parent, he advocated doing away with the provision to allow only a couple’s close relative to become a surrogate mother.

The Surrogacy (Regula-

tion) Bill, 2016, introduced in Lok Sabha last year, also faced criticism from practitioners of family law like Priya Hingo-rani and Anil Malhotra, who assailed the provisions which take away the rights of gays and lesbians from attaining parent-

hood with a clause that only legally wedded persons can go for surrogacy.

The proposed law virtually bars all others like unmarried couples, single parents, live-in partners and homosexuals from opting children through surrogacy.

Dr Bikas Kumar Singh, Chief Medical Officer at a major private hospital here who preferred not to comment on the aspect of single parents, expressed reservation on the point of restriction that man-dates a surrogate mother to be a close relative.

“The last hope for a child-less couple should not be cur-tailed but extended with due filtering,” Singh said.

Giving a broader perspec-tive, Hingorani said it was not

correct to only allow a close rel-ative to be a surrogate mother as her confidentiality has to be maintained and anyone else should be permitted to do so.

Malhotra said the bar on unmarried couples and oth-ers from opting for surrogacy was violative of Article 14 of the Constitution which pro-vides equality before the law and equal protection.

As per the bill, the intend-ing couples should be legally married for at least five years and should be Indian citizens to undertake surrogacy which would be allowed only for altruistic reasons. It also speci-fies the age limit for an infer-tile couple, where the woman should be aged between 23-50 years and the man between 26-55 years.

Email id for black money info receives over 38,000 mails

OUR CORRESPONDENT

MUMBAI: The email address launched by the Finance Min-istry for getting tips about black money received over 38,000 emails, but only 16 per cent of them were forwarded for fur-ther inquiry, CBDT said in a reply to an RTI query earlier this month.

Jitendra Ghadge, a city-based Right To Information activist, had asked for infor-mation about response to the email address `blackmon-eyinfo@incometax.gov.in’, launched last December.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes said in its reply dated April 7 that 38,068 emails were received, and 6,050 or about 16 per cent of them were for-warded to the respective Direc-tor Generals Of Income Tax (Investigation) for further inquiry.

The remaining 32,018 emails were closed without any action, it said.

To Ghadge’s query about number of “false” emails received, CBDT said this infor-mation was “subject to comple-tion of investigation”.

In December last year, Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhia announced launch of the email address blackmon-eyinfo@incometax.gov.in for whistle blowers.

“Over 84 per cent tip-offs have been closed without any inquiry. This shows that either most emails were frivo-lous, or the authorities did not take them seriously, or may be shortage of staff forced them to do so,” Ghadge said.

Par panel raps intel agencies for ‘failure’ to prevent attacks

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: A parliamen-tary panel has rapped intelli-gence agencies for the terror attacks in Pathankot, Uri and a few other places saying these strikes “exposed the deficien-cies” of the agencies but there was no analysis of their “failure”.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs, headed by senior Congress leader P Chidambaram, said a year had passed since the Jan-uary 2, 2016 terror attack at the Indian Air Force station in Pathankot but the probe has not been completed by the National Investigation Agency.

Moreover, it said, no analy-sis seems to have been done of the “failure” of the intelligence agencies to provide credible and actionable inputs regarding the attacks at Pathankot, Uri, Pamp-ore, Baramulla and Nagrota.

“The committee feels that these attacks have exposed the deficiencies of our intelligence agencies,” it said.

While in the Pathankot attack, seven security person-nel were killed, 19 army sol-diers lost their lives in the attack at the Brigade headquarters in Uri on September 18 last year.

Terrorists also attacked a convoy of CRPF vehicles on June 25, 2016 at Pampore along the Srinagar-Jammu high-way, killing eight paramilitary personnel.

While in Baramulla district

of Jammu and Kashmir, mili-tants attacked a camp of the Rashtriya Rifles killing a secu-rity personnel on October 3, 2016, seven soldiers were killed when an army base in Nagrota in the state was attacked by mil-itants on November 29, 2016.

“The committee, therefore, recommends that the (Home) ministry should instruct the NIA to complete the investi-gations of these attacks at the earliest so as to identify the loopholes in the intelligence setup in the border areas,” it said.

‘Over 1 crore households in urban India don’t have bathrooms’

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Over 1 crore households in urban areas of the country don’t have bath-rooms, according to data provided by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation (HUPA).

Under the Centre’s flagship programme Swachch Bharat Mission, the government aims to make India open-defecation free (ODF) by 2019.

So far, 31.14 lakh individual toilets have been constructed under the programme, while 1.15 lakh community and public toilets have been con-structed with the assistance of the government.

The total number of house-holds in urban areas is about 7.8 crore.

“Nearly 1 crore or about 13 per cent of the total house-holds in urban areas do not have latrine facility -- neither access to public latrine nor do

they have toilets within their premises,” according to the data provided by the HUPA minis-try in Parliament recently.

While 74.64 lakh houses use enclosures without roof, 18 per cent or about 1.42 crore households do not have sep-arate kitchen in their houses.

It indicates that members of these households are exposed to pollution which may lead to severe health problems.

Under a component of Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban), the households lack-ing in facilities like kitchen, toilet or bathroom may get cen-tral assistance of upto Rs 1.5 lakh for construction of these amenities.

SC collegium clears 51 names for appointment as HC judges

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court collegium has recom-mended 51 names for appoint-ment as judges in 10 high courts in the country.

The collegium headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) J S Khehar cleared the names after finalising the memoran-dum of procedure (MoP) for the appointment of judges, offi-cial sources said. The 51 names were cleared by the collegium by trimming a list of 90 names received from the various high court collegiums, they said.

Of the 51, 20 are judicial officers and 31 are advocates, the sources said.

The collegium has recom-mended the names for the high courts of Bombay, Punjab and Haryana, Patna, Hyderabad (for the states of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh), Delhi and Chhattisgarh.

The high courts of Jammu and Kashmir, Jharkhand, Gauhati and Sikkim are also expected to get judges if the Cen-tre agrees with the apex court collegium’s recommendations.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: As many as 31 new seismological observato-ries will come up in the country by the year end to boost infor-mation gathering capability on earthquakes. The observatories generate ground motion data recorded by the digital seis-mography used for estimation of data and other earthquake parameters.

The National Centre of Seis-mology (NCS), a unit of the Ministry of Earth Science, will install five observatories in Uttar Pradesh, four each in Bihar and Haryana, three each in Himachal Pradesh and Delhi, two each in Jammu and Kashmir, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh and one each in Uttarkhand, Jharkhand, Punjab, Chhattisgarh, West Ben-gal and Lakshadweep.

The panel headed by P Chidambaram said that a year had passed since the January 2, 2016 terror attack at the Indian Air Force station in Pathankot but the probe has not been completed by the National Investigation Agency

The 51 names were cleared by the collegium by trimming a

list of 90 names received from the various high court

collegiums

PM during his visit to Lord Lingaraj temple in Bhubaneswar on Sunday

All India Muslim Personal Law Board general secretary Maulana Wali Rahmani addressing a press conference in Lucknow on Sunday

WCD Minister Maneka Gandhi

mp nation6MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

HEAT WAVE HITS LIFE AT MANY PLACES, SRIGANGANAGAR SIZZLES AT 46 DEG C NEW DELHI: The mercury in most parts of northern India hovered above the 40 degree mark and severe heat wave conditions disrupted normal life in Rajas-than even as the IMD has forecast thunderstorm in eastern parts of the country. It was another hot day in the national capital with the mercury hovering slightly below the 40 degree mark. The maximum temperature was recorded at 39.8 degrees Celsius, three notches above normal, while the minimum was 21.4 degrees Celsius. Normal life was thrown out of gear in Rajas-than as a severe heatwave swept through the desert with minimum temperatures seeing a increase of 2 to 4 degrees Celsius from Saturday. Sriganganagar was the hottest place in the state with maximum tempera-ture of 46 degrees Celsius, followed by Barmer 45.8 degrees Celsius, Churu 45.5 degrees Celsius, Bikaner 45.4 degrees Celsius, Jaisalmer 45.1 degrees Celsius,

Kota 44.3 degrees Celsius.

60% SWINE FLU CASES IN MAHARASHTRA REPORTED FROM CITIES: HEALTH MINISTERMUMBAI: Maharashtra Health Minister Deepak Sawant has said that of the total swine flu cases which came to light in the state since January, 60 per cent are reported from the urban areas. "There are some 60 per cent patients coming from urban areas (since January) while the remaining are from rural areas. Nashik, Pune, Ahmednagar, Solapur are the major affected urban areas in the state," Sawant said after holding a video conference with the health officials on Saturday. He said cities like Nagpur, Ahmednagar, Buldhana, Nashik, Pune and Latur will be surveyed again to detect cases of H1N1 viral infection.

WOMAN COMMITS SUICIDE OVER HARASSMENT BY NEIGHBOURS BUNDI (RAJASTHAN): A 21-year-old woman alleg-edly committed suicide by hanging from a ceiling fan in her house after being harassed by three women neighbours in Bhopra Mohalla here, police said today. Nidhi Shringi, a MA student, on Saturday night commit-ted suicide in her room when her family members were not there, Bundi city police station Sub-inspector Kamal Kishore Puri said. In a suicide note recovered from her room, Shringi had accused the three women neighbours of harassing and defaming her and held them respon-sible for her extreme step, he said.

'

BRIEFSNATION

OUR CORRESPONDENT

CHANDIGARH: Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Sunday warned gov-ernment officials and party colleagues against interfering in administrative and police functioning and sent a strong message to all departments to not succumb to any political pressure.

He also took a serious note of the alleged assault on a Mukt-sar journalist and directed the officials concerned to treat the case on merit, without allowing political compulsions, if any, to obstruct the course of justice.

Amarinder's media advisor Raveen Thukral said he spoke to the journalist to convey the chief minister's assurance that the law would take its own course in the case and those found guilty would be brought to book through an impar-tial probe. The journalist, who works with a vernacular new-paper, was allegedly attacked by some unknown people at Gid-derbaha in Muktsar district on Saturday.

The chief minister has also ordered the DGP to provide security to the journalist and his family in view of the appre-hensions expressed by him

about their safety, Thukral said.The journalist is also being

provided free treatment in the local civil hospital, he said.

In a categorical warning, Amarinder said that officials acting at the behest of politi-cal masters, as they had been allegedly doing under the Akali regime, would face stringent action if they did not immedi-ately mend their ways.

Notably, a day after a Pun-jab minister was seen fuming at a school principal, another purported video went viral on Saturday in which a Congress MLA is seen allegedly warn-ing police officers to submit to demands of his followers or face consequences.

Ramanjit Singh Sikki, the ruling party MLA from Kha-door Sahib, is seen in the video

issuing a warning to police offi-cials after which the opposition Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) attacked him.

In a strong missive to the police, Amarinder on Sun-day directed senior officials to ensure that this message goes down to the lowest rung in the department to make the police functioning transparent and fair, as promised by the Con-gress in its election manifesto.

Though the 'Halqa in-charge' system had already been abolished by the Con-gress government, the mind-set change needed to transform the police functioning would take some time, Amarinder said in a statement.

He, however, asserted that his government would adopt a zero-tolerance approach in all

cases of overt or subtle political interference in administrative or police functioning.

The Congress govern-ment, said the chief minister, was committed to freeing the government machinery from political shackles "which had become the rule rather than the exception during the SAD-BJP rule".

"The erstwhile Badal-led government had destroyed all systems in the state and, though the process of restor-ing the same had already been initiated, the transformation required concerted and collec-tive efforts of all officials and also the people of the state," Amarinder claimed.

"Those who had felt sup-pressed under the Badal regime all these years should refrain from taking the law in their hands and take legal recourse to ensure that all those guilty of misdeeds in the past 10 years are made to pay for their actions," he said.

The abolition of the Halqa in-charge system was the first step in the direction of ridding the police of political interfer-ence and more reforms would soon be announced to make the police functioning fair and unbiased, Amarinder said.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

PANAJI: A Special Investiga-tion Team (SIT) of Goa crime branch has summoned for-mer Chief Minister Digam-bar Kamat to appear before it in connection with an ille-gal mining case of 2013. "For-mer Chief Minister Digambar Kamat has been summoned to appear before the SIT on April 18," Superintendent of Police, Goa crime branch, Priyanka Kashyap said on Sunday.

This is the second summon issued to Kamat in connection with the illegal mining case. He was first questioned by the SIT in February 2014. According to a senior crime branch offi-cial, Goa Mines and Geology Department's former director Arvind Lolienkar has also been summoned along with Kamat. Lolienkar was arrested by the SIT in connection with the case in March 2014. He is currently out on bail.

A report of Justice (retd) M B Shah Commission had earlier stated that illegal mining of Rs 35,000 crore took place in Goa from 2005 to 2012, when the Supreme Court banned iron ore extraction in the state.

A complaint was filed by the Mines and Geology Depart-

ment in July 2013 seeking to fix criminal liability on those involved in the illegal mining as pointed out by various com-mittees, including the Centre-appointed Shah Commission.

The crime branch then reg-istered an FIR in August 2013 against those named in various reports (Shah Commission and other committees) including Kamat, Lolienkar, and some other officials of the depart-ment, mining firms and others.

The FIR was registered under various IPC sections, including 120 (b) (conspiracy), 166 (public servant disobey-ing law), relevant sections of Prevention of Corruption Act, Mines and Minerals Develop-ment Act, Mineral Conserva-tion and Development Rules and Goa Prevention of Illegal Mining Transportation, Stor-age of Minerals Rules 2004.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

LUCKNOW: Samajwadi Party patron Mulayam Singh Yadav on Sunday blamed the media and voters for the party's elec-toral loss in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls but the state BJP said that he was "putting a question mark on the wisdom of the people of the state".

Yadav claimed that the media only highlighted the family feud in the Samajwadi Party, while the people of Uttar Pradesh were "befooled" by the BJP. "Despite rendering a good performance (by the Akhilesh Yadav government), the vot-ers inflicted a defeat to the SP. The people were befooled by call of Chal Modi - Chal Modi, and they went with the BJP," he said.

"The media only gave prominence to the family feud of the Samajwadi Party fam-

ily. If the media had shown anarchy during the SP rule, it must highlight the same dur-ing regime of other parties as well," Yadav said while speak-ing to reporters in Etawah.

On the issue of change of leadership in the party follow-ing the drubbing in the UP Assembly polls in which SP got 47 seats, he said that for him the post of party chief is "meaningless".

"Which post did social-ist ideologues Ram Manohar Lohia and Jai Prakash Narayan hold?," he asked.

The SP patron also categor-ically mentioned that what-ever be his next step, it would be in the interest of the party and people. The state BJP said that the statement made by the SP chief indicated that he has not been able to digest the SP's electoral loss in the UP Assem-bly polls.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Nearly a month into his tenure, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Aditya-nath's popularity has soared with his swoop on illegal abat-toirs and "anti-Romeo" drives capturing the public imagina-tion, a survey has claimed.

The decisions, that crit-ics said were components of a larger saffron project, enjoy a high degree of popularity among the people, suggested the survey that was conducted among 2,000 respondents spread across 20 districts of the state.

Adityanath's drive against illegal slaughterhouses, anti-Romeo squads, action against VIP culture and ban on paan masala and tobacco in gov-ernment offices came up as

the most popular decisions in the survey conducted by Gaon Connection, a rural media platform.

While the crackdown on illegal slaughterhouses got 38.1 per cent approval, the forma-tion of the anti-Romeo squads was hailed by around 25.4 per cent of the respondents, it said in a statement.

Interestingly, among

women, the anti-Romeo drive emerged as the most popu-lar decision with around 37 per cent approving it, despite instances of alleged police excesses and gender activists highlighting its adverse impact on autonomy and the right to make choices.

On the other hand, the action against slaughterhouses have had a debilitating impact on the state's meat industry.

It has also reportedly emboldened cow vigilantes and fringe outfits active in this field.

Overall, decisions taken by the Adityanath-led BJP govern-ment have 62 per cent approval ratings while 71 per cent citi-zens feel the firebrand Hindu leader, seen as a highly pola-rising figure in the past by his critics, is working in the "right direction", the survey said.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

BUNDI (RAJASTHAN): If you hear someone saying here "Rashtrapati has gone to graze goats" or "Pradhan Mantri has left for the city to purchase essentials", don't be surprised.

Also a doctor being asked to prescribe medicines for Sam-sungs or Androids suffering from dysentery isn't something uncommon. Names of people after top-ranking posts, high offices and mobile brands and accessories aren't something new in this district. So apart from Rastrapati, Pradhan Man-tri, Samsung and Android, there are others who have names like SIM Card, Chip, Gionee, Miss Call, Rajyapal and High Court.

In Ramnagar village, which

is about 10 km from the district headquarters and has a popula-tion of a little over 500 people from the Kanjar community, the names are usually after top rank-ing posts, high offices and popu-lar figures. Though most of the people in the village are illiterate, their names speak otherwise.

A woman was so impressed by the aura of the district collec-tor during his visit to the village that she named her grandson Collector, who never went to

school and is now 50 years old."Several people in the village

often engage in illegal activities and frequent police stations and courts. Influenced by the repu-tation and dignity of officials, they tend to name their children after posts and offices like IG, SP, Hawaldar and Magistrate," says a teacher in the government school of the village.

Congress, a passionate fan of Indira Gandhi, named all his family members as Sonia,

Rahul and Priyanka.A disabled person named

High Court is popular in the village for his fierce nature. At the time of his birth, his grand-father was granted bail by the high court in a criminal case and hence his name.

People of the Moggiya and Banjara communities living in villages in Nainwa region of the district name their children after mobile brands and accessories.

"So you will find several people named Nokia, Sam-sung, SIM Card, Chip, Gionee in Bargani, Arniya, Hanu-mantpura, Suwaliya and Ses-ola villages of Nainwa," Ramesh Chand Rathore, a government employee at the registration counter of Nainwa's Commu-nity Health Centre, said.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

LUCKNOW: Senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad on Sunday supported the idea of forming a 'mahagathbandhan' (grand alliance) along with the SP and the BSP in Uttar Pradesh to counter the surge of the BJP.

"The idea of 'mahagath-bandhan' is good," the Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha said here. However, Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Raj Babbar, while commenting on the issue, said, "It is too early to say. If we do not honour the feeling of the people and work-ers, it will be wrong. We will also talk about 'mahagathband-han' with our senior leaders."

He also claimed the Con-gress does not practice vote-bank politics as done by

Samajwadi Party chief Akh-ilesh Yadav.

The party's Rajya Sabha MP Pramod Tiwari, when asked about the idea of formation of a grand alliance with the SP and the BSP, said, "My best wishes are with them."

Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav had on Sat-urday supported the idea of forming a coalition of political parties against the BJP, saying,

"There should be a coalition, which can pave the way for-ward. We are ready to welcome it. We had welcomed such a move earlier too." BSP chief Mayawati too had asserted that she would join hands with other parties to take on the BJP.

The Congress' district unit presidents, who had gath-ered here to deliberate upon the strategy for the upcoming civic body elections in the state, alleged that the pre-poll tie-up with the SP was a major road-block for the party's prospect in the Assembly elections.

"Most of the district presi-dents are of the view that the SP-Congress pre-poll alliance proved to be a major roadblock for the party's poll prospect in the 2017 UP Assembly elec-tions," a party office bearer who attended the meeting said.

CHANDIGARH: A total of 1,468 persons have been arrested and 1,277 cases under the NDPS Act registered across Punjab in last four weeks after the Amarinder Singh govern-ment began its crackdown on drug mafia in the state.

The Special Task Force (STF), constituted by the gov-ernment to combat the drug menace, has "choked" trans- border and interstate-border supply lines of drugs, with a whopping 1,277 NDPS Act cases registered and 1,468 per-sons arrested since March 16, STF chief Harpreet Singh Sidhu said on Sunday.

The arrests and the cases registered are double of what was reported last year during the same period, he said.

With a multi-pronged approach, the STF, joined by various state police and intel-ligence agencies, has cracked down on the drugs trade in the state, virtually strangulating the supply of all types of drugs in the state, Sidhu claimed.

He said though the formal notification on the constitu-tion and the terms of reference of the STF came on Friday, the STF began its drive against the drugs scourge from April.

Citing data gathered by Sid-hu's team, an official spokes-person said that 31.804 kg heroin (including 24.4 kg by the BSF), 1.527 kgs smack, 2.272 kgs of charas, 81.99 kgs of opium (including 0.065 kgs by BSF), 2812.5 kgs of poppy husk, 169.223 kg of ganja, 14.8 kgs of bhang, 34.911 kg of intoxicant powder, 3,201 vyles of injections and 3,36,314 pills/capsules have been seized as part of the government's crack-down on drugs in Punjab in the period between March 16 and April 14.

Pertinently, Chief Minis-ter Amarinder Singh has given Sidhu a free hand to manage the anti-drugs operations.

Amarinder had also directed the STF to cacth "the big fish" allegedly involved drugs trade in the state. MPOST

Amarinder warns officials against interfering in police functioning

1,468 arrested in Punjab’s crackdown on drugs

SIT summons former Goa CM Kamat in

illegal mining case

Idea of ‘mahagathbandhan’ in UP is good, says Azad

Mulayam blames media, voters for SP's defeat in UP polls

Adityanath’s anti-Romeo drive popular: Survey

What’s in a name? Rashtrapati, Pradhan Mantri, Miss Call et al

GAUTAM LAHIRI

NEW DELHI: The Comptrol-ler and Auditor General has found that Indian sea-lane and borders have become vulnera-ble due to lack of security appa-ratus and infrastructure. This was revealed in the latest report presented in both the Houses of Parliament recently on compli-ance on Customs department.

The Centre has directed to ensure that Customs marine vessels are optimally used by conducting Sea patrolling for 4 to 6 hours per vessel every day. The audit reviewed the patrolling records of 102 ves-sels under Mumbai, Goa, Mangalore, Chennai, Cochin, Trichy, Calicut, Kolkata, Shil-long, Kandla, Jamnagar, Vizag,

Bhubaneswar and Patna Com-missionerates for the period 2013-14 to 2015-16 and noticed that out of 102 ves-sels only 58 patrolling vessels were operational. On examina-tion of these vessels, the audit observed that patrolling carried out was only 6 to 7 percent of the norms prescribed.

The audit observed that out of 102 vessels, 44 vessels were non-operational. As per Customs Preventive Man-ual, Commissioner of Cus-toms is responsible for sea surveillances. Section 104 of the Customs act 1962 empow-ers customs officer to arrest any person in India or within Indian customs water while other section empowers officer to stop and search any vessels.

In view of this, the audit ver-ified the deployment of vessels in preventive commissionerate, Mumbai and found that only six vessels were deployed there. Outside Mumbai, at Dahanu, Vasai, Mora, Revdanda and Sri-vardhan port lower category vessels were deployed.

Department of Logistics authority in Mumbai had noted that these lower category boats were not suitable for rough weather which means not fit for utilisation beyond sea state. The CAG observed that since these boats were not suitable for patrolling in rough weather and no better quality vessels were deployed, the entire juris-dictional territorial waters were not being covered for effective patrolling.

Lack of security infrastructure makes sea-lane, borders vulnerable: CAG

HYDERABAD: Child prodigy Agastya Jaiswal has achieved the rare feat of pass-ing the class XII examination at the age of 11. Agastya's father Ashwani Kumar said he passed the intermediate sec-ond year examination with 63 per cent. He claimed his son is the first person in the state to have passed the examination at such a young age.

He is a student of St Mary's Junior College, Yousufguda, and appeared for the exam in March this year. The results of the exam were announced on Sunday.

Agastya cleared the SSC examination at the age of 9 in 2015, and had then taken permission from the Telan-

gana SSC Board to appear for the exam, Kumar said. But no such special permis-sion is needed to appear for intermediate examination, Kumar said.

An official with the Board of Intermediate Education said the students appearing for the class XII exam only have to give information related to subjects, medium of instruction and the second language, but not age. AGENCIES

BUCK STOPS HERE

A bridge collapsed at Gandachara Amarpur road, 105 kms from Agartala, Tripura on Sunday

11-yr-old Hyderabad boy clears class XII exam

Agastya Jaiswal

A disabled person named High Court is popular in village for his fierce nature. At the time of his birth, his grandfather was granted bail by the high court in a criminal case and hence his name

Ghulam Nabi Azad

Digambar Kamat

7MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

mp nation

BSF INTENSIFIES SEARCH AFTER SUS-PECTED TRESPASSING ALONG IBBIKANER (RAJ): Search operations were intensified along the international border (IB) in Khajuwala area here following suspected movement of a trespasser, BSF officials said on Sunday. The search was held af-ter the Border Security Force (BSF) officials got a tip-off about the suspected trespassing from the local vil-lagers. “We have contacted Pakistani Rangers after few villagers informed about a suspect trespassing at international border fencing late last night,” BSF DIG Yeshwant Singh said. He added that the force personnel have found foot marks of a suspected per-son near IB fencing. “We are also inquiring about the suspect with the villagers,” DIG Singh said.

PIL IN BOMBAY HIGH COURT QUESTIONS GOVT POLICY ON TOBACCO MUMBAI: A PIL in the Bombay High Court has ques-tioned the Union govenment’s policy of allowing pub-lic sector insurance companies to invest in the tobacco industry, which, it said, contradicts the “anti-tobacco” stance taken by the Centre. The PIL was recently filed by Sumitra Pednekar, widow of Maharashtra’s former home and labour minister Satish Pednekar who died of oral cancer in 2011, and six others including of-ficials of Tata Trust and doctors of Tata Memorial Hospital. The petition, which is expected to come up for hearing in due course, seeks directions from the court to respondent insurance companies to divest their shareholding from tobacco companies and not to make such investments in future.

PB SC COMMISSION SETS UP SIT TO PROBE CUSTODIAL DEATHPHAGWARA: The Punjab State Scheduled Castes Commission on Sunday set up a four-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the custodial death of 26-year-old Dalit youth Balbir Ram. Rajesh Bagha, the Commission’s chairman said that the Phagwara Additional Deputy Commissioner Babita Kler will head the SIT while the local Sub Divisional Magistrate (SDM), the DSP and a government doctor will be its members. “The SIT will submit its report to the Commission within five days and the panel will forward it to the state government for necessary action,” Bagha said.

ALLOW PARTIES TO EXAMINE EVM COD-ING SOFTWARE: DIGVIJAYA TO ECNEW DELHI: Senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh on Sunday urged the Election Commission to allow political parties to examine the coding software of EVMs. His demand comes in the wake of the poll body throwing an open challenge to hack its EVMs following a chorus by Opposition parties on alleged tampering of the machines in the recent state Assem-bly elections, especially in Uttar Pradesh where BJP staged a stunning victory.

'

BRIEFSNATION Pak yet to respond to India's demand

on Jadhav case

ITBP publishes health book for jawans, duty book for wives

J&K: Normal life hit due to separatists' strike

Karnataka has no right over Bengaluru's 'Beaulieu' estate: SC

Army chief, NSA discuss Kashmir situation

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Army Chief General Bipin Rawat on Sun-day apprised National Secu-rity Advisor Ajit Doval of the security situation in Kashmir, amidst growing outrage in the Valley over the controversial “human shield” video.

Rawat’s meeting with Doval comes a day after he had sepa-rate deliberations with Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti and Gover-nor N N Vohra over the law and order situation in Kash-mir during his visit to the state.

Government sources said the Army chief called on Doval at his residence and briefed him about the overall state of security in the Kash-mir Valley

The video, showing a man tied to an army vehicle pur-portedly as a shield against stone pelters during polling in the Srinagar Lok Sabha by-election, has triggered a pub-lic outcry prompting civil and army authorities to launch separate investigations.

In her meeting with Gen Rawat, the Jammu and Kash-mir chief minister had raised the issue of the video that has now gone viral on social media.

Gen Rawat has assured

the J&K CM of timely action against the personnel who were responsible for the act of tying the man to the vehicle at Budgam.

According to the sources, the army officials told a probe team that they had received a call from the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) and the local police guarding a poll-ing station to save them from a mob that was out to lynch them.

The army convoy rushed in from Kandipura and tied 36- year-old Farooq Dar to a jeep, they said.

This incident, which took place on April 9, was shot by unidentified persons on their mobiles and the video show-ing Dar being used as a shield against stone-pelting protest-ers was circulated on social

media. The video surfaced days after another clip, show-ing a Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel walk-ing down a street being beaten up by some youths, triggered nationwide outrage.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Do not allow your husband to tie the nup-tial knot again while he is still married to you; be updated with the regimental number and rank of your husband.

These are some of the instructions that border guarding force ITBP has com-piled in a unique booklet and distributed among the wives of its troops deployed in far-flung frontier areas and in the hinterlands.

The Sino-India frontier force has undertaken a first-

time initiative to make aware the wives of its troops about their “rights and duties”.

The booklet has been attached in another book that the paramilitary has prepared to educate its jawans and their families about issues of health

and personal hygiene.Over 85,000 copies of these

two booklets have already been printed and dispatched to the field formations of the force. ITBP Director General Krishna Chaudhary, who has

also written a foreword in the book, told a news agency that strict directions have been issued to all the formations to ensure that these books are handed over by the troops to their families when they visit

them on leave. “We got these booklets prepared by talk-ing to experts and doctors of the force. The aim is to keep the troops and their families healthy and happy given the fact that they are deployed in hard areas where communi-cation with the world is mini-mal,” the DG said.

The booklet for wives tells them that they should be updated and informed about the regimental number (force ID), rank, current pay, location of battalion or unit and even the number of official leaves their husbands are entitled to.

“Ensure that your name is included in his service book, your name has been entered as the next of kin in the service record and all bank accounts and life insurance policies,” the instructions state.

ITBP spokesperson Dep-uty Commandant Vivek K Pandey explains the rationale behind the initiative:

“The duty charter of the force is such that troops are on duty and away from home for long and visit their homes only during the leave period and it is the wives who run the household in their absence.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

SRINAGAR: The BSF on Sun-day admitted the youth killed here had died when its troop-ers opened fire in the air in self-defence during a weapon snatching incident.

Border Security Force (BSF) sources told IANS here that the youth killed in firing in Batmaloo area of Saturday had died during “aerial firing” by its troopers.

“We are ready to cooperate with the police investigation in this incident,” said a source.

The source said there was heavy stone pelting in S.D.Colony (Batmaloo) area and protesters had tried to snatch the service rifle of one of their troopers leading to them firing in the air in a bid

to deter them.“An internal inquiry into

the allegations of firing, which led to the death of Sajad Has-san, has prima facie revealed that our men fired at Batm aloo leading to the unfortu-nate death of the youth.

“The intention of our jawans was not to kill any-one, but they fired in a bid to prevent snatching of rifle as attempted by the youth,” the BSF source added.

Police said that an FIR has already been registered in this incident and the BSF has been approached to hand over the accused troopers.

A protest shutdown called by the separatists against the killing of the youth adversely affected life across the Valley on Sunday.

12 states, 4 UTs favour NEXT exam

The booklet for wives tells them that they should be updated and informed about the regimental number (force ID), rank, current pay, location of battalion or unit and even the number of official leaves their husbands are entitled to

JAIPUR: As many as 12 states and four Union Territories have favoured making it mandatory for medical students to clear the National Exit Test (NEXT) to get the ‘doctor’ title.

Replying to an RTI query, the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Hary-ana, Himachal, Kerala, MP, Meghalaya, Odisha and Pun-jab have favoured the conduct of the exam. Union Territories of Chandigarh, Delhi, Andaman and Nicobar and Puducherry have also supported it. Nine states -- Assam, Goa, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Telangana, West Ben-gal, Andhra Pradesh, Jammu

and Kashmir and Uttarakhand –have said there is no need of conducting such a test. A high-powered committee had last year proposed NEXT for MBBS students passing out of govern-ment as well as private colleges to address concerns over the standard of medical education in the country.

The move was part of wide-ranging reforms in the medical

sector, including recommen-dations to scrap the Medical Council of India with a National Medical Commission to oversee under-graduate and post-gradu-ate education, accreditation and rating of colleges. Following the introduction of draft of Indian Medical Council (Amendment) Bill 2016, the Union Health Ministry had asked the states if they favoured NEXT.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

SRINAGAR: Normal life was on Sunday affected in the Kashmir Valley due to a strike called by separatists to pro-test the killing of a 23-year-old man allegedly in firing by BSF jawans in Batamaloo area of the city.

Shops, fuel stations and other business establishments were shut. Public transport was off the roads, but private cars, cabs and auto-rickshaws were seen plying in many areas.

Business at the weekly flea market was also hit as vendors chose not to put up their stalls.

Similar reports of strike being observed in other dis-trict headquarters were com-ing in, the officials said.

The separatists, including the chairmen of both factions of Hurriyat Conference - Syed Ali Shah Geelani and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq - and JKLF chief Yasin Malik had called for a shutdown to protest the killing of Sajjad Ahmed, a resident of Chandoosa area of north Kashmir’s Baramulla district.

Ahmad was killed when Border Security Force jawans opened fire opened fire on a group of people hurling stones at them at Reka chowk in Bata-maloo area.

A police spokesman said while there were no restric-tions in place anywhere in Srinagar, security forces were deployed in strength in Bata-maloo and other sensitive areas of the city to maintain law and order.

Srinagar youth killed when troopers fired in air: BSF

CBI books firm for illegally transferring Rs 11.92 cr to HK NEW DELHI: A Mumbai-based company has been booked by the CBI for transferring around Rs 11.92 crore to a Hong Kong-based firm “illegitimately” by evading reporting mechanisms at the Bank of Baroda. The company’s mo-dus operandi to send money in tranches of less than USD 100,000 was also adopted by several entry operators at the bank’s Ashok Vihar branch here in 2015. Over Rs 6,000 crore was trans-ferred to several en-tities based in Hong Kong and Dubai by entry operators in tranches of less than USD 100,000 to evade detection. MPOST

Army chief Rawat’s meeting

with Doval comes a day after he had separate deliberations with Jammu

and Kashmir CM Mehbooba Mufti

and Governor N N Vohra over

the law and order situation in

Kashmir

OUR CORRESPONDENT

SRINAGAR:The Jammu and Kashmir police has issued an advisory to its personnel to avoid visiting their hometowns “for the next few months”, fol-lowing incidents of attacks by militants on their residences and family members.

The advisory issued by the police headquarters referred to the recent incidents in the

valley where terrorists, and anti-national and anti-social elements have cause dam-age to the life and property of police personnel.

“In view of these unfortu-nate incidents, police person-nel, particularly from south Kashmir, are advised to exer-cise extreme caution while visiting their homes. They should preferably avoid vis-iting their homes for thhe

next few months as their per-sonal security is of paramount importance,” the advisory said.

It advised all the heads of various formations to brief their officers and men regard-ing the threat so the life and property of police personnel were secure.

The advisory follows over a dozen incidents of attacks on families of police personnel in Kulgam and Shopian in South

Kashmir. The family members of police personnel deployed in anti-insurgency operations were threatened and asked to persuade the uniformed men to quit service. The first inci-dent of militants entering the house of a police personnel was reported in March this year when Hizbul Mujahideen militants threatened the family of a Deputy Superintendent of Police in Shopian.

J&K police asks its personnel to avoid visiting hometowns

Negative posts against TDP may land you in trouble in AP

AMARAVATI: Critical or neg-ative remarks on social media against the Telugu Desam Party or the Chandrababu Naidu gov-ernment in Andhra Pradesh may soon land netizens in trou-ble, or even behind the bars.

Taking a serious view of the “growing criticism” of the party and the government, TDP gen-eral secretary and state Infor-mation Technology Minister Nara Lokesh has asked his fel-low leaders to initiate criminal action against those “tarnishing our image”. “The (mainstream) media is favourable to us but we have no control over the social media and there is a lot of nega-tive propaganda against us. We have to curb this,” he is said to have told party leaders in a Pow-erPoint presentation during the coordination meeting recently.

“If we start taking criminal action against those making critical posts, it will be a deter-rent to others,” Lokesh, the son of chief minister Naidu, said.

What ostensibly angered Lokesh, who only days ago became an MLC and a minis-ter, was the way he was increas-ingly targeted on social media platforms over his public utter-ances. Video clips of his com-munication skills went viral on social media in recent days and apparently showed him in a “very poor light”. MPOST

NEW DELHI: India on Sunday said it was yet to get a response from Pakistan on its demand for a certified copy of the charge-sheet as well as the military court order awarding death sentence to the retired Indian Navy officer Kulbhushan Jadhav.

“We have sought from the Foreign Ministry (of Pakistan) a certified copy of the charge-sheet as well as the judgement in the death sentence of Jad-hav, but there is no response yet from Pakistan’s side,” MEA spokesperson Gopal Baglay told reporters.

India had already announced that it would appeal against the death sentence to Jadhav. Indian High Commissioner in Islam-abad, Gautam Bambawale, had met Pakistan Foreign Secretary Tehmina Janjua on Friday in connection with the case and

demanded a certified copy of the charge-sheet and the judge-ment, besides consular access to Jadhav. “India made the demand for the two documents on Fri-day when the Indian High Com-missioner in Islamabad met the Pakistan Foreign Secretary,” said Baglay, replying to a question on the issue.

The death sentence to Jad-hav, 46, was confirmed by Paki-stan army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa after the Field Gen-eral Court Martial found him guilty of “espionage and sabo-tage activities” in Pakistan.

Pakistan claims its security forces had arrested Jadhav from the restive Balochistan province on March 3 last year after he reportedly entered from Iran. It also claimed that he was “a serving officer in the Indian Navy”. MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court has said that Karnataka has “no right” over the historic Beaulieu Estate in the heart of the Bengaluru city as it was purchased nearly 117 years ago by the Dewan of Mysore on behalf of the First Princess.

The estate, measuring over 24 acres, is a heritage prop-erty located in Bengaluru’s prime Palace Road and now houses a hotel and a number of commercial buildings and residences.

The apex court restored the order passed by the Kar-nataka High Court’s single judge quashing the state gov-ernment’s order initiating pro-ceedings under Section 67 of the Karnataka Land Revenue Act, 1964 against the occupants of the land. Section 67 of the Karnataka Land Revenue Act, 1964 states that all lands which are not the property of others belong to the government.

A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta held that after over 100 years of the execution of the original

conveyance deed, and after the state acquiring many portions of land out of this estate, “we cannot permit the state to urge that the original conveyance deed is fraudulent or that the subsequent transfers are all col-lusive and, as such, void”.

“It is held that the ‘Beau-lieu’ estate was purchased by the Dewan of Mysore on behalf of the First Princess and the consideration was paid from the personal funds of the First Princess. Therefore, the state of Karnataka has no right over the property,” the bench said.

CBI to get new online system to deal with black money cases

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The CBI will get a new online system to assist it in probing cases of illegal wealth or black money.

It will help officials collect and collate data from vari-ous agencies including banks, Income Tax (I-T) department and Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) among others.

The move comes after a multi-disciplinary com-mittee formed by the Cen-tral Vigilance Commission (CVC)-- which exercises superintendence over the CBI in investigation of corruption cases, suggested changes in the existing system.

The CVC observed that the present system for calculation of disproportionate assets was formulated several years ago when access to information was limited and the extent of disproportion had to be arrived at using cumbersome proce-dures and that too manually.

“A need was felt to improve the system for computation of disproportionate assets, including development of a software to capture all the events related to income and expenditure during the check

period,” according to an official document.

It was also observed by the CVC that in the present system, data availability with banks, FIU, taxation depart-ments, etc are not being man-datorily obtained and utilised for computation of dispropor-tionate assets.

Following which a commit-tee comprising officers from the CVC, the CBI, the FIU and the Department of Person-nel and Training -- the nodal department for anti-corruption measures, was formed.

The panel has submitted its report which is now with the CBI for its further input before it is eventually accepted, a senior CVC official said.

A high-powered committee had proposed NEXT for MBBS students passing out of government as well as private colleges to address concerns over the standard of medical education in the country

Army chief Bipin Rawat National Security Advisor Ajit Doval

MNS supporters take out a bike rally to protest against the death sentence awarded to Kulbhushan Jadhav by a Pakistani court in Navi Mumbai on Sunday

mp editorial

Why this huge fuss? I am talking about the auto-mobile manufactur-ers’ insistence that huge

injustice has been done to them because they have been asked to move to Bharat Stage IV (BS-IV) technologies for emis-sion control before the due date. The government notification they are using in their defence says companies would stop making Bharat Stage III (BS-III) vehicles by March 31, 2017. The com-panies say this does not mean that reg-istration of BS-III vehicles would be stopped as of April 1, 2017. Automobile companies, ably represented by their association Society of Indian Automo-bile Manufacturers, say as a result of the decision to stop registration huge inventories have piled up. This means huge losses for them and for the coun-try. This is injustice, they say.

I ask the question because I was involved with this decision—first taken by the Environment Pollution (Con-trol and Prevention) Authority for the National Capital Region (NCR), or EPCA; and then by the amicus curiae in the air pollution case, Harish Salve; and finally, by the Supreme Court. I write this both to explain my position and to ask, once again, humbly: why the fuss?

Let’s understand the issue. Firstly, vehicles contribute to the pollution that is making us ill. Secondly, improving the quality of fuel and vehicle technol-ogy is a critical way to clean up emis-sions. But thirdly, this improvement in fuel quality and technology has always been hard-fought. It has always come in spite of Indian automobile companies and not because of them.

It was in April 1999 that the Supreme Court had directed that all vehicles in India would have to meet Euro I (BS norms were not fashioned then) by the June of that year. It also directed that Euro II would be manda-tory in the NCR by April 1, 2000. At that time, the court had set a precedent

by directing that “no vehicle shall be registered unless it conforms to Euro II norms”.

The telling one-liners from the apex court at that time should remind us of today. In May 1999, counsels for auto-mobile companies argued for more time to implement the Euro norms. The court remarked in obvious sar-casm, “People can’t breathe and you are asking for more breathing time!” The transition happened in Delhi and NCR. Leading companies pushed for technology improvement and the lag-gards caught up.

The government set up a commit-tee under R A Mashelkar to finalise the road map for clean fuel technology for the country. In 2003, it was agreed that Delhi, NCR and 12 other polluted cities would get BS-III by April 2005, and the rest of the country by April 2010. Then there was a pause. The 2008 notifica-tion only said that Delhi, NCR and 12 other cities would get BS-IV by 2010. In 2015, the road map for the rest of the country was decided—fuel would be progressively made available and tech-nology transition would happen. The deadline was April 1, 2017, when the entire country (barring small remote

pockets) would switch to 50-ppm-sul-phur fuel as compared to the 350 ppm fuel available till then.

The automobile companies, there-fore, knew well in advance that the fuel would be available across India by April 1, 2017. The transition to BS-IV is also not new as technologies have been available since 2010. The date of “manufacture” is, then, only a technical argument. The only constraint, that of clean fuel being available nationwide for long-distance carriers like taxis and trucks, has been removed.

The case of two-wheelers is slightly different. These are largely petrol vehi-cles, so fuel is not such a constraint—diesel has high particulate matter and emission control requires stringent quality control in fuel. The vehicle man-ufacturers were given an entire year, April 2016 to March 2017, to switch over to BS-IV. Again, the companies knew and the transition should have been seamless.

But it was not. This is my fourth point. EPCA, of which I am a member, had convened a meeting in October 2016 to discuss this switch date. Our position was that since clean fuel would be available by April 1, 2017, at a con-

siderable cost to the public exchequer, companies should plan their invento-ries accordingly. The objective was to ask them to reduce the production of BS-III and to ramp up the manufactur-ing of BS-IV. Instead, the data supplied by the companies to the Supreme Court shows that most of them continued to produce BS-III vehicles at the same or even increased rate. This then built up inventories.

The fifth issue is that this transition matters. BS-IV vehicles, particularly diesel trucks, are much less polluting than BS-III. There is 80 per cent reduc-tion in particulate emissions between the two generations. That’s why bring-ing cleaner vehicles into the market as fast as possible matters. No doubt the country has a massive problem of older and more polluting vehicles. But why should this be an argument for delaying the transition? After all, vehicles have a life of 10-15 years. The faster the new stock takes over the better it is. How can there be any argument on this? Tell me. Please. DOWN TO EARTH

(Sunita Narain is the Editor of Down To Earth magazine.

The views expressed are strictly personal.)

8MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

President Donald Trump has furnished proof that the leader of the Free World,

which dropped the first nuclear bomb on Hiroshima, remains true to form: it has dropped an even bigger Mother Of All Bombs (non-nuclear, we are being persistently reminded) on Nangahar province in east Afghanistan on what are being described as IS tunnels. Since details are not known, let us first sort out the Syrian outrage.

The alleged Sarin gas attack on Khan Shaykhun, a small town in Idlib province where the Jabhat al Nusra’s militant offshoots are now fighting with their backs to the wall, invited a massive US retaliation: 59 cruise missiles were fired on the nearby Shurayat air strip to teach Bashar al Assad a lesson.

Analysts under pressure to meet deadlines, hurriedly sug-gested the strikes made Trump look virile in his meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Florida, that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson looked strong in his meeting with Russian For-eign Minister Sergei Lavrov and that the North Koreans will think twice before their next menacing launch.

All of this is fanciful because the big players know the truth. Yes, the opposition to the Syrian army, mostly al Nusra and IS wearing other labels, and their regional sponsors, now know that the Trump, browbeaten at home, can be dragged into the Syr-ian fight. The civil war can be prolonged.

To make sense of the air strikes, it would be use-ful to visit a similar incident in August 2013. Then also a Sarin gas attack was allegedly mounted on an even bigger scale on Ghouta township, on the outskirts of Damascus. Two US missiles took off from a US base in Spain -- in retali-ation, of course. On that occa-sion, the Russian anti-missile

paraphernalia at their base in Tartus, brought down the mis-siles in the Mediterranean Sea. Apparently, a sizeable num-ber of missiles fell in the sea this time too. So the Russian S400 and S300 are indeed operational.

President Barack Obama would have met President Vladimir Putin at the Sep-tember 2013, G20 summit in St. Petersburg from what the US “Deep State” had designed to be a position of strength once the two missiles were launched. Instead, his face was in the lower mould during his bilateral meet with the Rus-sian leader. If the Russian inter-cepts had caused a loss of face, subsequent face-saving for the Obama administration in 2013 was also provided by the Rus-sians. They suggested that Syria sign the Chemical Weapons Convention and surrender its chemical weapons.

On September 11, 2013, Putin wrote in the New York Times: “No one doubts that poison gas was used in Syria. But there is every reason to believe it was used not by the Syrian army, but by opposition forces, to provoke interven-tion by their powerful foreign patrons, who would be siding with fundamentalists.”

Putin then pointed to something even more sinis-ter. “Reports that militants are preparing another attack, this time against Israel, cannot be ignored.”

In other words, the oppo-sition were checked in their tracks by timely Russian inter-vention. Air attacks in retalia-tion for the false flag at Ghouta were prevented. The desperate opposition was now about to play its trump card: launch a poison gas attack on Israel.

In his weekly address to the nation, Obama said: “Until recently, the Assad regime would not admit that it possessed chemical weap-ons. Today Syria has signalled a willingness to join with 189 other nations, representing 98 per cent of humanity, in abid-ing by an international agree-ment that prohibits the use of chemical weapons.”

There was praise for Rus-sia. “Russia has staked its own credibility in supporting this outcome,” Obama said.

It was clear even then that this Washington-Moscow entente over Syria would set the cat among the pigeons else-where in the region. All their huge investments in arms, money, mercenaries and years of planning were liable to be

wasted in Obama’s second term when John Kerry became his Secretary of State.

On the issue of Russia and Syria, the Deep State, with the media as amplifier, was not going to give up. No wonder it pitched its tent behind Hill-ary Clinton’s platform for the 2016 Presidential elections. The spider in the Deep State web, weaving the Syrian yarn, is one Robert Stephen Ford, US Ambassador to Damascus in 2011 when the “insurgency” was first initiated.

The most accurate narra-tive of Ford, in cahoots with this French counterpart, Eric Chevallier, and how they stoked the fires in Syria should be available with New Delhi’s Ministry of External Affairs. Of the entire diplomatic corps in the Syrian capital that this reporter met, the sharpest eye was that of Ambassador V.P. Haran. The grinding of the US-led propaganda machine in Syria never stopped.

Every now and then the White Helmets in Syria would produce a heart-wrenching story of “Assad’s brutality”. The photograph of a four-year-old Syrian boy, his face burnt by “Assad’s” attack on civilians in Aleppo, found its way to the final Trump-Clinton debate

in Las Vegas on October 19, 2016. Clinton simulated a lump in her throat describing the child with burns as evi-dence of indiscriminate Rus-sian (not just Syrian) bombing of civilians.

Exactly on cue, Chris-tiane Amanpour of the CNN, in her high-profile interview with Lavrov, produced the very same picture for Lavrov to see. “This is a crime against humanity,” Amanpour thun-dered. Lavrov looked at the photograph. “Very tragic,” he said. He then made a bold assertion: the US was probably supporting the Jabhat al Nusra.

Meanwhile, NGOs in the field furnished video record-ings of the “burnt boy” being diligently filmed to be pre-sented to the world media: pro-paganda of the macabre genre.

If the Pulitzer Prize-win-ning investigative journal-ist Seymour Hersh is to be believed, the West is itself implicated in all the Sarin gas scandal. His outstanding piece in the London Review of Books after Ghouta, quite incontrovertibly establishes that “the Sarin that was used didn’t come from Assad’s stockpiles”. He quotes British Intelligence for this detail.

Sarin gas has been in the news earlier when President Bill Clinton’s Defence Secre-tary William Cohen caused journalists as senior as Peter Arnett and Bernard Shaw to be sacked for having pointed to US stockpiles or nerve gas which were used on a village in Laos to hunt down US army defectors. It became notori-ous as Operation Tailwind. The official version then was that the gas was not dropped on Americans. That which was dropped, on whoever, was not Sarin “but garden variety CS tear gas”. The reporters stuck to their guns. IANS

(Saeed Naqvi is a com-mentator on political and

diplomatic affairs. The views expressed are strictly personal.)

The propaganda machineEDITORIAL

US fireworks: Awaiting details from Afghanistan, a look at Syrian outrage

If the Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh is to be believed, the West is itself implicated in all the Sarin gas scandal. His outstanding piece in the London Review of Books after Ghouta, quite incontrovertibly establishes that “the Sarin that was used didn’t come from Assad’s stockpiles”. He quotes British Intelligence for this detail

BS-IV vehicles, particularly diesel trucks, are much less polluting than BS-III. There is 80 per cent reduction in particulate emissions between the two generations. That’s why bringing cleaner vehicles into the market as fast as possible matters

It is evident that the situation in Kashmir has deteriorated to levels not seen in a very long time. Former officers of the Indian armed forces have warned that unrest in the region is spiraling out of control. “What is worrisome is

that it now seems to have become a direct fight between the security forces and the civilian population. This goes against our whole approach to counter-insurgency that people are the centre of gravity of all our actions. What has happened is that the political healing touch is missing. If it carries on any lon-ger, it will end up brutalising both the security forces and the civilians. That is what we are seeing with these recent videos,” said Lt Gen DS Hooda (retd), who headed the Udhampur-headquartered Northern Command till last November. No one could have said it better. While social media has become the battleground over the alleged decision of one army officer to use a ‘human shield’ during the current unrest, very few people are talking about the complete failure of the political class. What we are witnessing in Kashmir is a political fail-ure, not a military one. By and large, the Indian armed forces have achieved some major successes, especially in containing the number of terrorists and violence.

Unfortunately, since the unrest last summer triggered by the death of militant leader Burhan Wani, the political class, especially the BJP-PDP government, has miserably failed to engage with the people productively and continues to ride on a military strategy which is useless against an alienated mass. This is not a problem relegated to the current ruling dispensa-tion in Kashmir or the Centre, but a legacy of past attitudes. In fact, what we see today is more of the same. On this occa-sion, however, the failure of the political class was brought home when the Election Commission decided to postpone the April 12 Lok Sabha by-election in Anantnag, South Kash-mir, to May 25, after widespread violence during a similar poll in Srinagar that left eight people dead and over 300 injured. The voter turnout for last weekend’s polling in Srinagar stood at a dismal 7.14%, a new low for the constituency. Anantnag was once considered a PDP stronghold, and the State govern-ment’s plea for the postponement of elections raises further questions over its legitimacy to govern the state with the BJP. This complete rejection of the democratic process and main-stream political parties is especially worrying, and all indica-tions seem to suggest that the ground situation has moved beyond the control of the State government. “Admittedly, the fear of violence and threats by militants contributed to this stunning debacle. Let us for a moment assume that it is just the threat of violence that kept people away. But isn’t that sup-posed to be the point? Why, after three years of this govern-ment’s strategy, are we less able to protect Kashmiri voters? What does that say of our counter-insurgency strategy,” asks noted scholar Pratap Bhanu Mehta. It goes without saying that the military functions at the behest of the political class. To prevent further incitement of violence in the state, the Indian State cannot and must not merely depend on the brute force of its military. Leaders from across the aisle have suggested that after the withdrawal of troops from civilian areas, the pri-mary responsibility of maintaining law and order should be handed over to the state government and J&K Police. Home Minister Rajnath Singh had earlier asserted that once nor-malcy and peace are restored, there will be further engage-ment with all while moving forward in resolving issues. But the problem is of past precedence. Despite a prolonged period of relative peace and calm between 2003-08, little or no steps were taken to demilitarise or withdraw AFSPA from certain districts there. There was little dialogue with the key stake-holders in the region. Allied with the chronic state of poor governance in the state, Kashmir is tinder box always wait-ing to explode. “Government must define the political end state it is seeking, and the political strategy for the same must be shared with all stakeholders in J&K, the opposition, and the Armed Forces. ‘Sky is the limit under the Constitution,’ must be spelt out in concrete terms. Shed the ideological bag-gage and do not let ideological frenzy of the rank and file run away with the political strategy”, argues Lt Gen HS Panag, a decorated officer of the Indian Army, in a recent column.

Political failure

Individual rights vs. community rights

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comments to The Editor,Millennium Post,

Pratap Bhawan, 5 Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, New Delhi 110 002

millenniumpost.inMORE THAN PHYSICAL HEALTHdear

EDITOR

Healthcare of women and children is dismal and has a long way to go. The grave matter about malnourished children and stunted growth that bears a permanent effect on their lives is one that needs immediate attention. No amount of government policies will re-verse the condition of thousands of children affected by malnutrition. Beginning in prenatal stage, care for children begins with welfare for their mothers. Women and child welfare is an area that lies trapped in the cobwebs of oppressive socio-economic conditions. Improve-ment in the social sector is the beginning of addressing these issues.

SAEED NAQVI

SUNITA NARAIN

Eventually you can get into the nuts and bolts of reality: nurturing, caring, and getting along

Quote martial

JODY WATLEY

The country has a massive problem of older and more polluting vehicles. But why should this be an argument for delaying transition?

BS-IV checkmateIn a show of defiance on the contentious issue of triple

talaq, the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIM-PLB) asserted that it had the “constitutional” right to implement Muslim personal law. Speaking to the press

on Sunday, AIMPLB general secretary Maulana Wali Rehm-ani said: “A code of conduct for talaq is being issued. With its help, the real picture of Shariat directives will be brought out on the talaq issue. If talaq is given without Shariat rea-sons, those involved will be socially boycotted.” Coinciden-tally, Prime Minister Narendra argued that the practice was a menace crippling the lives of Muslim women in India. Earlier, the NDA government had urged the apex court to declare the Islamic practices of triple talaq, Nika Halala, and polygamy inconsistent with Muslim women’s fundamental right to life and dignity. Earlier this year, the court said that a five-judge Constitution Bench would hear a batch of petitions chal-lenging the Islamic practice of triple talaq. There are many cases pending before the apex court that involves the issue of individual rights versus community rights. The Sabari-mala temple entry case, for example, is one such case. Late last year, the court asserted that it would decide on the right of women to enter the historic Sabarimala shrine in Kerala based on constitutional principles and not by the prevalent customary practices. The court had slammed temple authori-ties regarding a ban on entry of women into the temple. It asked whether such archaic traditions were more important than constitutional rights. In the triple talaq case, the court may venture along similar contours.

Both cases require the court to take difficult decisions on competing constitutional rights. Standing in the way of repealing triple talaq is the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, which argues that the rights bestowed by religion cannot be questioned in a court of law. Read the Quran, and one would not find any mention of triple talaq, argue many scholars of Islam. They claim that the Quran has laid down elaborate injunctions on divorce, and calls for reconciliation and mediation over a period of 90 days involving both sides. It is in stark contrast to the immediate and binding nature of the triple talaq. In fact, many Muslim-majority countries have rejected the practice including, Indonesia, Iran, and Tunisia. The court must dismiss the AIMPLB’s contention that “per-sonal laws cannot be challenged.” Many among the Muslim community have also called for a repeal of a practice, which is inordinately cruel on women. Late last year, the Alla-habad High Court called the practice of triple talaq, by which Muslim men can orally end their marriages, is “cruel” and the “most demeaning form of divorce.” In fact, the Supreme Court had in 2002 rendered illegal the practice that many Muslim men employ to divorce their wives instantaneously and without their consent, merely by uttering the word talaq thrice. Unfortunately, the court’s orders did not stop the prac-tice, and many Muslim women have suffered in silence owing to ignorance of past judgments and societal pressure. It took one such victim of this arbitrary custom—Shayara Bano—to speak out and file a public interest litigation in the Supreme Court seeking a ban on the practice.

SK SINGH Via email

Representational Image

After chemical attack in Syria (Representational Image)

Despite the jargon that the Congress is at its historic low today after Bhartiya Janta Party’s landslide victory in

Uttar Pradesh, one must acknowledge that Rahul Gandhi has emerged as the strongest voice against the Modi gov-ernment. The voting pattern shown by the electorate during recently held bye-polls for Assemblies is indica-tive of growing disillusionment from BJP and the regional parties and the beginning of a shift towards Congress. Rahul’s matured initiative to form a united opposition has received a posi-tive response from different opposi-tion parties. Even the warring regional groups have shown their inclination to join the anti-BJP front.

Rahul never deserved the image he was painted with. A particular image of the young potential leader was deliber-ately created by social media teams fully supported by BJP. For years together skillfully designed campaigns were run against Rahul on an hourly basis. Twit-ter handles, websites, and WhatsApp groups were financed by the political opponents to turn perception about Rahul. Joke factories, dirty tricks work-shops and fake video uploading studios worked day and night to portray Rahul as someone who is not capable enough to lead a country like India.

Now when Rahul is about set to for-mally take over the reins of the Congress party, he needs to have a strong, dedi-cated, honest, and humble team with him. Pulling out Rahul from the pond of wrong perception must be the first and foremost responsibility for the Con-gress party. There was no dearth of well-meaning efforts by Rahul in past one decade when he did not leave any stone unturned with his hard work to give strength to his party. But all his efforts could not yield much result because the Congress could not find any mechanism to effectively counter the propaganda guns aiming towards Rahul Gandhi.

While preparing to wear the ‘crown of thrones’, Rahul cannot afford now to major in minor things in which many of his ‘colleagues’ had been pursuing him to indulge for years. He has to become a strong coach with empathy at the same time. He must learn fast to be assertive with kindness and generosity. There is a strong need to engender trust among the leaders and workers at all levels in

Congress which is the essence for reviv-ing any organisation. No organisation can afford to lose quality talent if it wants to exploit its full potential. No organisation can afford to leave its win-dows to the guards of doubtful integrity, especially at the time of the change in guard at the topmost level.

This is also the time to redesign the methods of inspiration to rejuvenate the Congress party which has, unknow-ingly or knowingly, but surely unneces-sarily, lost three years after its defeat in 2014. Even if Rahul tried to do some-thing better, it was not translated on ground because Congress workers had no faith in the middle-level leadership. It is still hard for them to understand the compulsion of this protectionism when Rahul has always been assuring at every forum to promote merit.

Rahul’s vision is bold enough and I also know that he has plenty of doubters within the Congress party. Therefore, he needs to be more decisive. Testing your commitment to your cause can-not be an indefinite process. The Con-gress party has seen the worst. Rahul had to face unexpected failures, cour-

tesy the unscrupulous enemies within. He must ensure that any repeat perfor-mance of such situations do not turn into fatal resolutions. Authenticity of a leader is one thing that must not be compromised at any time. Investing in developing and maintaining great rela-tionships is the demand of the hour for which making fast and loud calls should not be a matter of hesitation.

To achieve a major goal in 2019, Rahul Gandhi needs a battery of com-mitted soldiers. The rise of BJP has taught us that the most successful team does not always have to have the most talent. It should have teammates with the right combination. Delega-tion of responsibility and authority with accountability is what takes you to the destination. If the process of empow-erment derails in a wrong direction, it hurts the very root of right actions. Standing at a crossroads the Congress has to well prepare itself for the future challenges.

At a time when BJP in Centre is about to complete its three years, there is an undercurrent that suggests an unease among the masses over the fact

that unemployment is at its peak and economy is failing to pick up. Despite all heehaw for Modi-Yogi, the percep-tion about Rahul Gandhi has changed fast and he is seen as the most potential force in the current political arena. His initiatives to form a front against BJP have taken shape as Sharad Pawar, Nit-ish Kumar, and Mamata Banerjee are playing a proactive role in this direction. Left parties, Biju Janta Dal and Bahu-jan Samaj Party have also supported the idea mooted by Rahul. Soon Rahul Gandhi would be making all efforts to change the narrative of future politics and the road to 2019 will no more be that easy for BJP as it looks now.

First, they ignored Rahul, then they laughed at him, and now they are fight-ing him. To come out of the depth of defeat, suffering, and loss, Congress has to take the path of struggle and sacrifice. All it needs is a plan, road map, cour-age, and the right people around with a focus on the journey.

(The writer is the Editor and CEO of News Views

India. Views expressed are strictly personal.)

9mp in focusMILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

Regenerative farming practices can restore the world’s agricultural soils. In both the developed and developing worlds, these farmers rapidly rebuilt the fertility of their degraded soil, which then allowed them to maintain high yields using far less fertiliser and fewer pesticides. Key to sustaining highly productive agriculture lies in rebuilding healthy, fertile soil

Even if Rahul tried to do something better, it was not translated on ground because Congress workers had no faith in the middle-level leadership. It is still hard for them to understand the compulsion of this protectionism when Rahul has always been assuring at every forum to promote merit

Healthy soil: Key to feeding the worldConventional wisdom says we need industrial agriculture to feed the world. Not so, says

David R Montgomery. Practices that focus on creating healthy soil can transform agriculture

Rahul Gandhi needs executors

PANKAJ SHARMA

One of the biggest modern myths about agriculture is that organic farming is inherently sustainable. It

can be, but it isn’t necessarily. After all, soil erosion from chemical-free tilled fields undermined the Roman Empire and other ancient societ-ies around the world. Other agri-cultural myths hinder recognising the potential to restore degraded soils to feed the world using fewer agrochemicals.

When I embarked on a six-month trip to visit farms around the world to research my forthcom-ing book, “Growing a Revolution: Bringing Our Soil Back to Life,” the innovative farmers I met showed me that regenerative farming prac-tices can restore the world’s agricul-tural soils. In both the developed and developing worlds, these farm-ers rapidly rebuilt the fertility of their degraded soil, which then allowed them to maintain high yields using far less fertiliser and fewer pesticides.

Their experiences, and the results that I saw on their farms in North and South Dakota, Ohio, Pennsyl-vania, Ghana, and Costa Rica, offer compelling evidence that the key to sustaining highly productive agri-culture lies in rebuilding healthy, fertile soil. This journey also led me to question three pillars of conven-tional wisdom about today’s indus-trialised agrochemical agriculture: that it feeds the world, is a more effi-cient way to produce food and will be necessary to feed the future.

Myth 1: Large-scale agriculture feeds the world today

According to a recent U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report, family farms produce over three-quarters of the world’s food. The FAO also estimates that almost three-quarters of all farms world-wide are smaller than one hectare – about 2.5 acres, or the size of a typical city block.

Only about 1 per cent of Ameri-cans are farmers today. Yet most of the world’s farmers work the land to feed themselves and their fami-lies. So while conventional indus-trialised agriculture feeds the developed world, most of the world’s farmers work small family farms. A 2016 Environmental Working Group report found that almost 90 per cent of U.S. agricultural exports

went to developed countries with few hungry people. Of course, the world needs commercial agricul-ture, unless we all want to live on and work our own farms. But are large industrial farms really the best, let alone the only, way forward? This question leads us to a second myth.

Myth 2: Large farms are more efficient

Many high-volume industrial processes exhibit efficiencies at large scale that decrease inputs per unit of production. The more widgets you make, the more efficiently you can make each one. But agriculture is different. A 1989 National Research Council study concluded that “well-managed alternative farming sys-tems nearly always use less synthetic chemical pesticides, fertilisers, and antibiotics per unit of production than conventional farms.”

And while mechanisation can

provide cost and labor efficiencies on large farms, bigger farms do not nec-essarily produce more food. Accord-ing to a 1992 agricultural census report, small, diversified farms pro-duce more than twice as much food per acre than large farms do.

Even the World Bank endorses small farms as the way to increase agricultural output in developing nations where food security remains a pressing issue. While large farms excel at producing a lot of a particu-lar crop – like corn or wheat – small diversified farms produce more food and more kinds of food per hect-are overall.

Myth 3: Conventional farming is necessary to feed the world

We’ve all heard proponents of conventional agriculture claim that organic farming is a recipe for global starvation because it produces lower yields. The most extensive yield com-

parison to date, a 2015 meta-analysis of 115 studies, found that organic production averaged almost 20 per cent less than conventionally grown crops, a finding similar to those of prior studies.

But the study went a step fur-ther, comparing crop yields on con-ventional farms to those on organic farms where cover crops were planted and crops were rotated to build soil health. These techniques shrank the yield gap to below 10 per cent. The authors concluded that the actual gap may be much smaller, as they found “evidence of bias in the meta-dataset toward studies report-ing higher conventional yields.” In other words, the basis for claims that organic agriculture can’t feed the world depend as much on specific farming methods as on the type of farm.

Consider too that about a quar-ter of all food produced worldwide

is never eaten. Each year the United States alone throws out 133 billion pounds of food, more than enough to feed the nearly 50 million Amer-icans who regularly face hunger. So even taken at face value, the oft-cited yield gap between conventional and organic farming is smaller than the amount of food we routinely throw away.

Building healthy soilConventional farming practices

that degrade soil health undermine humanity’s ability to continue feed-ing everyone over the long run. Regenerative practices like those used on the farms and ranches I visited show that we can readily improve soil fertility on both large farms in the U.S. and on small sub-sistence farms in the tropics.

I no longer see debates about the future of agriculture as simply conventional versus organic. In my

view, we’ve oversimplified the com-plexity of the land and underuti-lised the ingenuity of farmers. I now see adopting farming practices that build soil health as the key to a sta-ble and resilient agriculture. And the farmers I visited had cracked this code, adapting no-till meth-ods, cover cropping and complex rotations to their particular soil, environmental and socioeconomic conditions.

Whether they were organic or still used some fertilisers and pesti-cides, the farms I visited that adopted this transformational suite of prac-tices all reported harvests that con-sistently matched or exceeded those from neighboring conventional farms after a short transition period. Another message was as simple as it was clear: Farmers who restored their soil used fewer inputs to pro-duce higher yields, which translated into higher profits.

No matter how one looks at it, we can be certain that agriculture will soon face another revolution. For agriculture today runs on abundant, cheap oil for fuel and to make fertil-iser – and our supply of cheap oil will not last forever. There are already enough people on the planet that we have less than a year’s supply of food for the global population on hand at any one time. This simple fact has critical implications for society.

So how do we speed the adoption of a more resilient agriculture? Cre-ating demonstration farms would help, as would carrying out system-scale research to evaluate what works best to adapt specific practices to general principles in different set-tings. We also need to reframe our agricultural policies and subsidies. It makes no sense to continue incen-tivising conventional practices that degrade soil fertility. We must begin supporting and rewarding farmers who adopt regenerative practices.

Once we see through myths of modern agriculture, practices that build soil health become the lens through which to assess strategies for feeding us all over the long haul. Why am I so confident that regen-erative farming practices can prove both productive and economical? The farmers I met showed me they already are. DOWN TO EARTH

(This article was originally published on The Conversation.

The views expressed are personal.)

Congress Vice President needs to be more decisive now

Why would I call China a currency manipulator when they are working with us on the North Korean problem? We will see what happens!

DONALD J. TRUMP@realDonaldTrump

Jadhav issue is now complicated because US and China have reached a common view on what response of India is "acceptable"

SUBRAMANIAN SWAMY@Swamy39

tweetRETWEET

Absurd 'promise' in BJP MCD manifesto to pressurise Delhi govt on unauthorised colo-nies. If anything they should pressurise Modi govt.

YOGENDRA YADAV@_YogendraYadav

For the current po-litical establishment, Kashmir is just about territorial integrity. That Kashmiris are fellow Indian citizens is sec-ondary

SANJAY JHA@JhaSanjay

Rahul Gandhi

Representational Image

SEEK PEACE, NOT WAR

Pope Francis urged an end to “horror and death” in Syria on Sunday as he celebrated the traditional Easter Day mass in Rome PTI

TRUMP WANTS TO RIDE IN QUEEN’S GOLD CARRIAGE DURING UK VISITLONDON: US President Donald Trump wants to ride in the Queen’s gold-plated royal carriage when he travels to London on a state visit an insistence that has thrown British security forces into a tizzy, a media report has said. The White House has made clear it re-gards the carriage procession as an essential element of the itinerary for President Trump’s visit currently planned for the second week of October, The Sunday Times reported, citing officials. But security officials have warned that the carriage journey down The Mall to Buckingham Palace will require a “monster” security operation, far greater than for any recent state visit.

US TEEN ACCIDENTALLY SHOOTS SELF DEAD LIVE ON INSTAGRAMWASHINGTON: A 13-year-old boy accidentally shot and killed himself live on Instagram as his friends watched in horror. Malachi Hemphill of Forest Park, Georgia, was found unconscious by his mother Shani-qua Stephens and her daughter after they heard a loud bang from his bedroom. “I heard a big boom. I couldn’t tell if it was a gunshot or what. I just knew that it was something that was wrong,” the boy’s mother Shaniqua Stephens told WXIA-TV. She and her daugh-ter ran upstairs and found him dead.

INDIAN WORKER JAILED IN DUBAI FOR BEATING COUNTRYMAN TO DEATHDUBAI: A 26-year-old Indian worker in Dubai has been jailed for five years for beating another Indian to death with a wooden rod while he was inebri-ated, according to a media report. The victim and his 30-year-old countryman were drinking liquor when the accused joined them in December last year. The victim, who seemed to be troubled, started talking about his family disputes, when his 26-year-old countryman asked him to stop discussing his family problems as he was not interested in listening it, Gulf news reported.

LANKA RESCUERS RACE AGAINST TIME AS GARBAGE TOLL HITS 24COLOMBO: At least 24 people, including four chil-dren, were killed when a mountain of garbage came crashing down on homes following a fire near Sri Lanka’s capital, with rescuers racing against time to find any survivors. Police have launched a probe to ascertain whether the collapse of the 91-metre open garbage pile on Friday was a natural calamity or an act of sabotage.

BRIEFS

mp world10MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

US VICE PRESIDENT MIKE PENCE IN NORTH KOREA

North Korea missile test ends in failure, says US

SEOUL: A North Korean mis-sile “blew up almost imme-diately” on its test launch on Sunday, the US Pacific Com-mand said, hours before US Vice President Mike Pence was due in the South for talks on the North’s increasingly defiant arms programme.

The failed launch from the east coast came a day after North Korea held a military parade in its capital, marking the birth anniversary of the state founder, in which what appeared to be new long-range ballistic missiles were on display.

Pence is due in Seoul at the start of a 10-day trip to Asia in what his aides said was a sign of the US commitment to its ally in the face of rising tension over North Korea. A US nuclear-powered aircraft carrier strike group is also heading for the region. The North has warned of a nuclear strike against the United States if provoked. It has said it has developed and would launch a missile that can strike

the mainland United States but officials and experts believe it is some time away from master-ing the necessary technology.

“The North attempted to launch an unidentified missile from near the Sinpo region this morning but it is suspected to have failed,” the South’s Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said

in a statement. The US Pacific Command said the missile “blew up almost immediately”, adding the type of missile was being analysed. Pence had been briefed on the failed launch en route to Seoul and had been in touch with Trump, the White House said.

South Korea’s Yonhap news

agency cited an unnamed South Korean intelligence source as saying the missile appeared to have not flown far from its land-based launch site. The North launched a ballistic missile from the same region earlier this month ahead of a summit between the leaders of the United States and China, its

key ally, to discuss the North’s arms programme.

That missile flew about 60 km (40 miles) but what US officials said appeared to be a liquid-fuelled, extended-range Scud missile only travelled a fraction of its range before spinning out of control.

A US Navy attack on a Syr-ian airfield this month with Tomahawk missiles raised questions about US Presi-dent Donald Trump’s plans for reclusive North Korea, which has conducted sev-eral missile and nuclear tests in defiance of U.N. sanc-tions, regularly threatening to destroy the US.

Sinpo, where the launch took place, is the site of a North Korean submarine base and where the North has tested the submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) it is developing.

“It appears today’s (Sunday) launch was already scheduled for re-launching after the ear-lier test-firing” Kim Dong-yub, a military expert said. AGENCIES

Former Afghan prez calls decision to drop massive US bomb ‘treason’

KABUL: Former Afghan presi-dent Hamid Karzai accused his successor on Saturday of com-mitting treason by allowing the US military to drop the largest conventional bomb ever used in combat during an operation against Islamic State militants in Afghanistan.

Karzai, who also vowed to “stand against America”, retains considerable influence within Afghanistan’s major-ity Pashtun ethnic group, to which President Ashraf Ghani also belongs. His strong words could signal a broader political backlash that may endanger the US military mission in Afghan-istan. Afghan defense officials have said the 21,600-pound (9,797-kg) GBU-43, dropped late on Thursday in the east-ern province of Nangarhar, had killed nearly 100 suspected mil-itants, though they acknowl-edged this was an estimate and not based on an actual body count. “How could you per-mit Americans to bomb your country with a device equal to an atom bomb?” Karzai said at a public event in Kabul, ques-tioning Ghani’s decision. “If

the government has permitted them to do this, that was wrong and it has committed a national treason.” Ghani’s office said the strike had been closely coor-dinated between Afghan and U.S. forces and replied to Kar-zai’s charges with a statement saying: “Every Afghan has the right to speak their mind. This is a country of free speech.”

Public reaction to Thurs-day’s strike has been mixed, with some residents near the blast praising Afghan and U.S. troops for pushing back the Islamic State militants.

While the bomb has been described as one of the largest non-nuclear devices ever used, its destructive power, equiv-alent to 11 tonnes of TNT, pales in comparison with the relatively small atomic bombs dropped on Japan in 1945, which had blasts equivalent to between 15,000 and 20,000 tonnes of TNT. During Karzai’s tenure as president, his oppo-sition to airstrikes by foreign military forces helped to sour his relationship with the United States and other Western nations. As the Kabul govern-

ment, split between Ghani and his rival Abdullah Abdullah under a US-brokered power-sharing deal, remains fragile, Karzai’s political interventions draw close attention. Ghani has failed to build the kind of domestic following that Karzai still has despite stepping down in 2014. Karzai said he planned to “stand against America”, a stance he compared to deci-sions earlier in his life to fight against the Soviets and later the Taliban regime.

“I decided to get America off my soil,” he said. “This bomb wasn’t only a violation of our sovereignty and a disrespect to our soil and environment, but will have bad effects for years.” While Karzai did not elabo-rate on how he would oppose the United States, his stance may pose problems for Ghani’s administration, which is heav-ily reliant on the US and other foreign donors for aid and mili-tary support. On Friday, the top US commander in Afghanistan defended the strike, saying the decision to use the bomb was based on military needs, not political reasons. AGENCIES

British Muslim ISIS fighter calls for London attacks

LONDON: A 30-year-old Brit-ish Muslim Islamic State fighter has been allegedly using an encrypted messaging service Telegram to call on his sup-porters to launch bomb attacks in London.

Omar Hussain, a former supermarket worker from Buck-inghamshire who had fled to Syria in 2013, has also posted bomb-making guidelines using the same service. Hussain has called on his followers to carry out a nail bomb assault similar to the attack in St Petersburg which killed 15 people earlier this month, the ‘Mirror’ reported. He reportedly posted a picture of a finished explosive device with a caption that said: “Looks like creme brulee.”

Hussain had left his UK home to join the al Qaeda affil-iated group Jabhat al-Nusra before switching allegiance to the ISIS terror network. In December last year, he had delivered a Christmas message urging followers to rob party-goers in order to get money for knives and bombs. “At Christ-mas the kuffaar (non-Muslims) are loaded with money so it’s the best time. Wait around the cor-ner from a pub for a drunk kafir

(non-Muslim) to exit and go down an alleyway,” he wrote on a secure message service.“Once in the alleyway it only takes a few punches for a drunk kafir to fall unconscious. Take a few ikhwa and u can rob him. They could stab a kafir or slit his throat.

I had friends in the UK who would do this in London and they never once got caught,” he wrote. Hussain, who had com-pleted a university course in IT in Britain, has now reportedly taught graphic design to stu-dents in the ISIS terror group in the war zone. He first came in news when he appeared in an ISIS propaganda video, urg-ing then Prime Minister David Cameron to send troops to fight the terror group, vowing “we’ll send them back one by one in coffins”. AGENCIES

Lahore raid: Arrested girl

terror suspect linked to IS

LAHORE: The 20-year-old woman, who was arrested in a terror bust in Lahore, is a medical student and had joined the dreaded Islamic State (IS) militant group on Facebook sometimes ago, the army said on Sunday. Pakistan’s secu-rity forces yesterday claimed to have foiled a “major” ter-ror attack on minority Chris-tians ahead of Easter here after they killed a militant in Punjab Housing Society and arrested his two aides, including the woman. Six personnel had suf-fered injuries in the shootout, the Inter-Services Public Rela-tions, a media wing of Pakistan army, said.

During investigation, the woman has been identified as Naureen Leghari, a sec-ond-year student of the Lia-quat University of Medical and Health Sciences (LUMHS) in Jamshoro, Sindh province of Pakistan. Naureen spent two months in Syria and returned to Lahore almost six days back, Dunya news reported. Nau-reen, resident of Hyderabad, had disappeared from the var-sity in early February to join the ISIS. “After reaching Lahore on February 10, Naureen had messaged her brother through a friend’s Facebook profile that she has reached the land of Khilafah (caliphate),” an offi-cial said. AGENCIES

British FM: Syria’s Bashar al-Assad is an

‘arch-terrorist’LONDON: Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is an ‘arch-terrorist’ and it is time Russia realised he is ‘literally and met-aphorically toxic’, British For-eign Secretary Boris Johnson said on Sunday.

Johnson said Assad’s ally Moscow still had time to be on the ‘right side of the argument’, in a Sunday Telegraph newspa-per article. “Assad uses chemi-cal weapons because they are not only horrible and indis-criminate. They are also terri-fying,” Johnson wrote.

“In that sense he is him-self an arch-terrorist, who has caused such an unquenchable thirst for revenge that he can never hope to govern his popu-lation again. “He is literally and metaphorically toxic, and it is time Russia awoke to that fact. They still have time to be on the right side of the argument.”

Johnson was widely criti-cised for failing to get the G7 to back his bid for new sanc-tions against senior Russian and Syrian figures following the chemical weapons attack in Syria’s Idlib province that killed dozens and caused an interna-tional outcry.

But he said the chemical assault had changed the West’s stance on Syria.

“The UK, the US and all our key allies are of one mind:

we believe that this was highly likely to be an attack by Assad, on his own people, using poi-son gas weapons that were banned almost 100 years ago,” he wrote.

“Let us face the truth: Assad has been clinging on. With the help of Russians and Iranians, and by dint of unrelenting sav-agery, he has not only recap-tured Aleppo. He has won back most of ‘operational’ Syria.”

Before the April 4 chem-ical attack, the West was ‘on the verge of a grim consen-sus’, which had now changed, said Johnson.

The consensus had been that it would be more sen-sible to concentrate on the fight against Islamic State jihadists and to accept reluc-tantly that removing Assad, “though ultimately essential — should await a drawn out political solution”. AGENCIES

6,000 UK pupils face threat of extremism at illegal schools LONDON: As many as 6,000 pupils may be faced with the threat of extremism at illegally operating schools in the United Kingdom, according to the lat-est figures released by British schools watchdog on Sunday.

In the past 15 months, Ofsted inspectors have identified 241 suspected illegal schools in England, ‘The Sunday Times’ reported.

Around 99 of these schools have been inspected, 33 of which were confirmed to have been operating illegally. Of those, 25 have either been closed or have been registered as legal schools.

These include Islamic, Jew-ish and Christian faith schools as well as secular centres set up to teach pupils with behav-ioural difficulties who have been excluded from mainstream education.

The sites used by such schools include warehouses and old factory buildings.

More than 140 of the sus-pected illegal schools have not been inspected and no criminal cases have reached court, though two were considered for pros-ecution, the report said.

Most of the schools remain open and more than half have

not yet been visited by inspec-tors, prompting fears that some children are at risk of radicali-sation. There are also fears that children are being taught by adults whose backgrounds have not been vetted.

When an unregistered school is identified in Britain, local councils are supposed to write to parents with children there but Ofsted fears some councils are failing to do that.

“We continue to investigate the remaining and will take all necessary action to close these down,” said an Ofsted spokesperson. AGENCIES

Nepal braces for ‘traffic jam’ at Mount Everest as climbers increase

KATHMANDU: Nepal-ese officials are bracing for a “traffic jam” at Mount Everest this season due to a surge in the number of climbers eye-ing to conquer the world’s tall-est peak.

This time, there would be around 400 climbers who will embark on the journey to scale the 8,848-metre-high Mt Ever-est from mid-May, according to the Department of Tourism.

As climbers are accompa-nied by high altitude workers, whose number is usually more than that of climbers, there could be around 1,000 individ-uals on their way to the sum-mit, creating a queue whose snail-paced movement will be punctuated by frequent halts, The Kathmandu Post reported.

Expedition teams have started arriving at the base camp a month before the start of the season to acclimatise.

“Everyone will be in a hurry to reach the peak when the weather clears; there is no management up there to fix turns for the climbers,” said Sonam Sherpa, who has scaled

Mt Everest five times working as an aide to climbers.

“So there is a possibility of a traffic jam this year.

Returning climbers in general have depleted stock of

oxygen with them and they are exhausted, which means life hangs in the balance,” he said.

A good weather means expedition teams will start climbing up from camps two, three and four, resulting in “traffic jam”, the report said.

Those with 2014 permis-sion are likely to return to scale the peak this year as in 2015, the government introduced a new law allowing climb-ers a three years’ window to scale Mt Everest with a sin-gle permit and fare. “This is the final year of the three-year period and the climbers who had taken permission earlier have also arrived to ensure that they do not miss the chance. That is why the number of climbers this season is high,” Durgadatta Dhakal, infor-mation officer at the Depart-ment of Tourism, was quoted as saying. AGENCIES

Top US official visits Afghanistan

after massive bomb attack

KABUL: US National Secu-rity Advisor Gen. H R McMas-ter arrived in Kabul on Sunday days after the American mili-tary dropped its largest non-nuclear bomb on Islamic State group hideouts in eastern Afghanistan, killing nearly a hundred militants.

On his first visit to the country as President Don-ald Trump’s envoy, McMaster said on Twitter he was set to hold “very important talks on mutual cooperation”.

“Welcome Lt. Gen. HR #McMaster to Kabul and thank you for your continuous support,” Afghanistan’s pres-idential palace tweeted. On Thursday the US military in Afghanistan dropped its GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast, dubbed the “Mother of All Bombs”, in combat for the first time on IS hideouts in the Achin district of Nangarhar province.

Afghanistan’s defence ministry on Sunday put the death toll at 95 militants and no civilians. The attack trig-gered global shock waves, with some condemning the use of Afghanistan as what they called a testing ground for the weapon, and against a militant group that is not considered as big a threat as the resurgent Taliban. It came a week after US President Donald Trump ordered missile strikes against Syria in retaliation for a sus-pected chemical attack, and as China warned of the potential for conflict amid rising US ten-sions with N Korea. AGENCIES

Hussain has called on his followers to carry out a nail bomb assault similar to the attack in St Petersburg

McMaster was set to hold ‘very important talks on mutual cooperation’

PTI

WORLD

mp world 11MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

BRIEFSWORLDVIETNAMESE POLICE ‘HELD HOSTAGE’ BY RESIDENTS IN LAND DISPUTEHANOI: At least a dozen Vietnamese police have been held hostage over a land dispute with residents near Hanoi, activists and state media said on Sunday, in a rare show of defiance of communist authorities.The incident began on Saturday in the suburban My Duc district when authorities clashed with villagers who alleged their land was illegally seized for sale by a military-owned telecoms firm.

NEW SPECIES OF 125-YEAR-OLD DINOSAUR IDENTIFIEDLOS ANGELES: Scientists have discovered a new spe-cies of a herbivorous dinosaur that lived about 125 million years ago. The new species belongs to a group of herbivores known as sauropods, which includes gi-ants such as Brontosaurus and Brachiosaurus, who had long necks and pillar-like legs, said researchers from Brigham Young University (BYU) in the US. The bones of the dinosaur called Moabosaurus Utahensis were assembled using bones extracted over the course of four decades.

CHINA REMAINS SILENT OVER NORTH KOREA’S FAILED MISSILE TESTBEIJING: China’s top diplomat Yang Jiechi on Sunday-held telephonic talks with US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, even as Beijing remained silent over North Korea’s ‘failed’ missile test. China, which warned two days ago that conflict could break out “any moment” in the Korean peninsula, did not comment on North Korea’s missile test but stepped up dialogue with the Trump administration, state-run CCTV reported.

NINE WOUNDED IN SHOOTING AT OHIO PARTY HALLOHIO: Nine people were wounded by gunfire on Sunday at an after-hours club in Columbus, Ohio, with injuries ranging from minor to life-threatening, police said. An argument broke out around 3:20 a.m. inside the J&R Party Hall, Columbus police said in a state-ment. Five females and four males were shot, the statement said. “At this point in the investigation there is no information available on the suspect(s),” police said.

IRAQI FORCES MAKING NEW PUSH TOWARD OLD CITY IN MOSULBAGHDAD: Iraqi forces launched a new attack on Is-lamic State in Mosul’s Old City on Sunday, military of-ficials said, trying to break the stalemate in attempts to seize the militants’ last stronghold. Mosul, Iraq’s second biggest city, was captured by the Sunni Muslim fighters in 2014, but government forces have retaken much of it during a six-month operation. The advance has hardly moved for more than a month, though, as the militants are holding out in western Mosul.

At least 68 children dead in Syria evacuees bombing

RASHIDIN: Nearly 70 chil-dren were among 126 people killed when a suicide car bomb-ing tore through buses carrying evacuees from besieged gov-ernment-held towns in Syria, a monitor said on Sunday.

Saturday’s blast hit a con-voy carrying residents from the northern towns of Fuaa and Kafraya as they waited at a tran-sit point in rebel-held Rashidin, west of Aleppo.

At least 68 children were among those killed in the attack, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, updat-ing a previous toll of 112 dead.

At least 109 of the dead were evacuees, the Britain-based monitoring group said, while the rest were aid workers and rebels guarding the convoy.

The evacuations were tak-ing place under a deal between Syria’s regime and rebels that is also seeing residents and rebels transported out of Madaya and Zabadani, towns near Damas-

cus which are surrounded by pro-government forces.

The agreement is the lat-est in a string of evacuation deals, which the government of President Bashar al-Assad says are the best way to end

the violence after more than six years of civil war. Rebels say they amount to forced reloca-tions after years of bombard-ment and crippling sieges. Body parts and the belongings of evacuees - including clothes,

dishes and even televisions - were still strewn at the scene of the attack today, an AFP corre-spondent said.

The shattered buses were nearby as was the shell of a pick-up truck - with little left

but its engine block - that was apparently used to carry out the bombing. There was no imme-diate claim of responsibility for the bombing, though the key Ahrar al-Sham rebel group denied any involvement. The government blamed “terror-ists” - a catch-all term for its opponents.

The Observatory, which relies on a network of sources inside Syria to monitor the con-flict, said hundreds of people were also wounded in the blast.

It said a petrol station at the transit point was caught up in the explosion, adding to the number of victims.

The Syrian Red Crescent said three of its workers were among the wounded. Maysa al-Aswad, a 30-year-old evac-uee from Kafraya, said she was sitting on one of the buses with her six-month-old son Hadi and 10-year-old daughter Nar-jis when the blast shook the parked convoy. AGENCIES

Indian doctors suffer bias within UK medical systemLONDON: Doctors trained in countries like India are suf-fering from an inherent bias within the UK medical system, a new report has indicated.

An analysis of the UK’s General Medical Council (GMC) data between 1996 and 2013 revealed that Indian doctors were five times more likely to undergo “perfor-mance assessments within the state-funded National Health Service (NHS).

The research conducted by University College London (UCL) and published in ‘BMC Medical Education’ journal recently concluded that doc-tors trained outside the UK

had significantly higher rates of GMC performance assess-ments than UK-trained doc-tors. “Bias within the system, particularly in terms of who is complained about, could be and probably is a factor. But I suspect it is not the only fac-tor. We have raised these issues and we think more research is needed to tease apart different explanatory factors,” said Dr Henry Potts, the lead author of the research.

The report recommends a more globalised testing arrangement that would help counter this imbalance.

“There may be implications for transnational agreements

on freedom of movement of healthcare professionals, and for what testing is required by national governments of indi-viduals trained elsewhere,” the report said.

Susan Goldsmith, Deputy Chief Executive of the General Medical Council, said: “We believe doctors and patients are best served by bringing in a single route to UK practice, replacing the multiple routes that exist now.

We are consulting on a medical licensing assessment that would be taken by every doctor wishing to practise in the UK, regardless of where they qualified in the world.”

While Indian doctors were five times more likely to face investigations, Bangladeshi doctors fared the worst at 13 times. Doctors from Egypt and Nigeria were eight times more likely to be questioned, compared to seven times more likelihood for Iraqi doctors and six times for Germans. Doctors from India make up a large chunk of the NHS work-force and the GMC currently has 25,281 Indian-trained doc-tors on its register. The latest analysis supports the claims of the British Association of Physicians of Indian-origin, launched a high court battle in 2014. AGENCIES

Turkey: ‘Yes’ vote leads with 63% after quarter of votes counted

ISTANBUL: Early counting in Turkey’s referendum reg-istered 63 percent support for a “Yes” vote to give sweep-ing new powers to President Tayyip Erdogan, broadcaster NTV said on Sunday, adding that around a quarter of the ballots had been tallied.

Ahead of Sunday’s vote, opinion polls had shown a narrow lead for a “Yes” vote, which would replace Turkey’s parliamentary democracy with an all-powerful presi-dency and may see Erdogan in office until at least 2029.

The outcome will shape Turkey’s strained relations with the European Union. The NATO member state has curbed the flow of migrants – mainly refugees from wars in Syria and Iraq – into the bloc but Erdogan says he may review the deal after the vote.

A crowd chanted “Recep Tayyip Erdogan” and applauded as the president shook hands and greeted people after voting in a school near his home in Istanbul. His staff handed out toys for chil-dren in the crowd.

“God willing I believe our people will decide to open the path to much more rapid development,” Erdogan said in

the polling station after cast-ing his vote. “I believe in my people’s democratic common sense.” Some 55 million people were eligible to vote at 167,140 polling stations. Turkish vot-ers abroad have already cast their ballots.

The referendum has bit-terly divided the nation. Erdo-gan and his supporters say the changes are needed to amend the current constitution, writ-ten by generals following a 1980 military coup, confront the security and political chal-lenges Turkey faces, and avoid the fragile coalition govern-ments of the past. “This is our opportunity to take back con-

trol of our country,” said self-employed Bayram Seker, 42, after voting “Yes” in Istanbul.

“I don’t think one-man rule is such a scary thing. Tur-key has been ruled in the past by one man,” he said, referring to modern Turkey’s founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.

Opponents say it is a step towards greater authoritari-anism in a country where some 47,000 people have been jailed pending trial and 120,000 sacked or suspended from their jobs in a crackdown following a failed coup last July, drawing criticism from Turkey’s Western allies and rights groups. AGENCIES

US: Defeat of ISIS only a matter of time

WASHINGTON: The defeat of the ISIS in Syria is only a mat-ter of time, but there is a need for a security situation that is conducive to reconstruction in the war-torn country, a top US official said on Sunday.

US national security adviser H R McMaster said the forces who will take over after the defeat of ISIS will be critical for establishing security and legiti-macy of the population in the country. It is a matter of time only until ISIS is defeated there (in Syria), said McMaster, who is currently in Afghanistan.

What’s going to be really critical though is what forces can then establish enduring security in those regions that have a legitimacy with the pop-ulation, that are representative of the population, that can set conditions for reconstruction to begin, he told ABC News in an interview.

McMaster said the US was nw supporting partner forces in Syria in certain parts of the country, including the north-eastern part along the Euphra-tes river valley. “The cities of the Sunni Arab world in that region are in rubble. And so in a very successful conference in Washington two weeks ago, the

United States State Department organised a bunch of donors and like-minded allies, part of coalition to pledge money for reconstruction,” he said.

“But what we need now is we need a security situation that’s conducive to that recon-struction, that can allow so many of these displaced people and refugees to return. And for those long-suffering people to enjoy the security, stability, that they deserve, McMaster said.

War in Syria has killed more than 320,000 people since it began with protests in 2011 that were brutally repressed. It has involved jihadist groups as well as regional and inter-national powers in a complex multi-sided conflict. AGENCIES

Beauty queen sues United Airlines after she was ‘handcuffed mid-flight’

A former beauty queen has begun legal proceedings

after she was allegedly hand-cuffed while on a flight.

Miss Venezuela 1984 claims that she was restrained in zip-ties and taken to the back of the plane.

Carmen Maria Montiel claims she was in the midst of an argument with her now former partner.

The now-54-year-old claims that her ex-husband, Alex Lechin, slapped her when she used his shoulder to try to get some sleep.

He then told a flight steward, Samuel Oliver, that Montiel was ‘invading his per-sonal space.’ She claims she had not been drinking and did not assault the United employee, who claimed he felt threatened. While on-board the overnight flight from Houston to Colombia, she was moved to another section of First Class. When Lechin

complained Montiel was still bothering her she was moved to economy class. The woman, who weighed just 8.5 stone, was taken by two men to the back of the plane where she had to sit next to an off-duty police officer.

‘It’s about the culture of United,’ Montiel told the NYPost. ‘They treat the cus-tomer as the enemy.’

After the flight in June 2013 she was taken to court but found not guilty of inter-ference with a flight attendant.

After seeing viral footage of Dr Dao being taken off the plane, she said she decided to speak out.

She is now seeking dam-ages from United for mental anguish, malicious prosecu-tion and defamation. AGENCIES

Mass evacuation in Syria proceeds after deadly blast killed hundredsBEIRUT: More than 3,000 Syrians are expected to be evacuated Sunday from four areas as part of a population transfer that was briefly stalled the day before by a deadly blast that killed scores of people, most of them government supporters. The United Nations is not oversee-ing the transfer deal, which involves residents of the pro-government villages of Foua and Kfarya and the opposition-held towns of Madaya and Zabadani. All four have been under siege for years, their fate linked through a series of reciprocal agreements that the UN says have hindered aid deliveries. Rami Abdurrahman, who heads the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, and Hezbollah’s Al-Manar TV said 3,000 people will be evacuated from Foua and Kfarya, while 200, the vast majority of them fighters, will be evacuated from Zabadani and Madaya. Abdurrahman said Saturday’s blast — which hit an area where thousands of pro-gov-ernment evacuees had been waiting for hours — killed 126. No one has claimed the attack, but both the Islamic State group and the al-Qaida-affiliated Fatah al-Sham Front have targeted civilians in government areas in the past. After the blast, some 60 buses carrying 2,200 people, including 400 opposition fighters, entered areas held by rebels in the northern province of Aleppo, Abdurrahman said. AGENCIES

Putin lauds Orthodox Church

for its service to people

MOSCOW: Russian President Vladimir Putin in his Easter Sunday message hailed the con-tribution made by the country’s Orthodox Church and other Christian denominations to the lives of his compatriots.

Putin, himself an Orthodox Christian, attended a service led by Patriarch Kirill of Mos-cow and all Russia at the Cathe-dral of Christ the Saviour here, Efe news reported.

“I want to highlight the enormous and devout work of the Russian Orthodox Church and representatives of other Christian denominations in solving important social prob-lems, strengthening the family, educating young people and harmonising inter-ethnic and inter-religious relations,” Putin said. Across Russia, worship-pers participated in Easter Sun-day celebrations.

“The great holiday of Eas-ter has a special moral sense, it spreads the eternal light of faith, fills hearts with joy, love and goodness,” the Pres-ident said. Putin also person-ally lauded the hard work of Patriarch Kiril. Many Rus-sian citizens visit cemeter-ies on Easter Sunday — the day of Jesus Christ’s resurrec-tion — to pay tribute to their

People coming together, uniting post-Brexit: Theresa MayLONDON: British Prime Minister Theresa May to-day used her Easter message to strike a concilia-tory note post-Brexit, saying people were “coming together” and uniting behind the opportunities that lie ahead following the vote. She also said that people should feel “confident” about Christian-ity’s role in the society and feel free to speak about their faith. “This year, after a period of intense debate over the right future for our country, there is a sense that people are coming together and uniting behind the opportunities that lie ahead. For at heart, this country is one great union of people and nations with a proud history and a bright future,” May said in her message released by the Downing Street. “And as we face the oppor-tunities ahead of us the opportunities that stem from our decision to leave the European Union and embrace the world our shared interests, our shared ambitions and above all our shared values can and must bring us together,” she noted. AGENCIES

late ancestors. AGENCIES

‘The forces who will take over after the defeat of IS will be critical for establishing security and legitimacy of the population in Syria

mp business12MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

Credit growth plunges to over 60-year low at 5% in FY17

MUMBAI: Saddled with high bad debt and weak corporate demand, credit growth plunged to a whopping six-decade low of 5.08 per cent in the financial year 2016-17, as against 10.7 per cent a year ago, according to the Reserve Bank data.

For the year to March, banks’ outstanding credit stood at Rs 78.81 trillion compared to Rs 75.01 trillion as of April 1 2016, show the central bank data. The numbers are surpris-ing as the economy has been clipping at close to 7 per cent during the year under review and interest rates have been heading south.

One main reason for the massive plunge is the rising corporate bond market from where companies are tapping funds even for working capi-tal as most of them could have been turned away by banks due to their over-leveraged balance sheets.

It can be noted that the credit growth in financial year 2016-17 is the lowest since 1953-54 when it had inched up by a paltry 1.7 per cent, accord-ing to the apex bank data.

In the year to March 2016, banks reported a credit growth

of 10.69 per cent at Rs 75.30 trillion. According to domes-tic rating agency Icra, the out-look on the asset quality of the banking sector seems to be weak even as the fresh non-performing asset (NPA) gen-eration rate continues to show signs of moderation.

The annualised fresh NPA generation declined to 4.1 per cent during the third quarter of 2016-17 compared to 10.7 per cent during the fourth quar-ter of the financial year 2015 -16, 6.1 per cent during the first quarter of 2016-17 and 5.8 per

cent in the second quarter of 2016-17, Icra had said in a report.

Fresh NPA additions to gross NPAs during Q3 of fis-

cal 2017 inched down to Rs 26,400 crore compared to Rs 1.36 trillion during the first nine months of the fiscal 2017, partly aided by higher write-offs dur-

ing the last quarter.Icra has projected gross

NPAs to increase to Rs 7.5-7.7 trillion or 9.7-10 per cent for March 2017 and Rs 8.2-8.5 trillion or 9.9-10.3 per cent for fiscal 2018 with upside risks in case of slower resolution of SDR accounts, leading to higher slippages.

Warning of more pains on the restructured accounts, specially those under the 2/25 scheme, Icra said, of the 40 large borrowers with a total debt of Rs 3.16 trillion, 29 per cent of the debt turned NPA till December 2016. Bank deposits, however, grew by 11.75 per cent during fiscal 2017, helped by large flow of funds into the banking sys-tem after demonetisation of high value notes last November.

Outstanding bank deposits stood at Rs 108.05 trillion as of March 31, 2017 as against Rs 96.68 trillion on April 1, 2016. Last financial year deposits grew 9.72 per cent.

It can be noted that the banking system is saddled with close to Rs 14 trillion of bad loans, including those turned dud after restructuring. This is almost 15 per cent of the sys-tem. PTI

Merger with BSNL desirable for strong pan-India play: MTNL CMD NEW DELHI: The merger of BSNL and MTNL is “desirable” for operational synergy and even the fiercely- competitive telecom market neces-sitates such a combination for a stronger pan-India play, a top MTNL official has said.

The comment comes amid what seems to be a renewed push for BSNL-MTNL merger with a Parliamentary panel report recently not-ing that the Telecom Department plans to place the merger proposal before the Cabinet by June.

“The industry is consolidating. It is not an issue of BSNL and MTNL...for any operator to succeed in India a pan India operation is a must,” MTNL CMD P K Purwar said.

BSNL-MTNL merger is a “desirable situa-tion”, he said.

Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha, however, said in a written reply in Parliament that there was no such proposal at present for the merger of BSNL and MTNL.

Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL) offers services in Delhi and Mumbai. Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), on the other hand, operates across rest of India.

“The days of marginal operators are over...you have to have pan-India operations,” Pur-war emphasised citing the spate of mergers in the industry including Airtel-Telenor, RCom- Aircel and Vodafone-Idea Cellular.

“I think it is the necessity of the market not just requirement of one entity versus another entity,” he said. Purwar felt that there are opera-tional synergies between the two telecom PSUs and that merger is a natural outcome for realis-ing their full potential.

“Also to provide a better customer interface, merger is desirable,” said the MTNL CMD said.

His counterpart in BSNL had recently said

BSNL-MTNL combination will be “advanta-geous” for both firms, given the synergies in areas like enterprise and mobile businesses.

However in the same breath, BSNL CMD Anupam Shrivastava had pointed out that issues pertaining to debt and salary structure will have to be sorted out first. Purwar said such issues can be resolved. The debt issue can be sorted out if MTNL’s surplus land and buildings along with debt are hived off into a separate company.

“...So the merged entity should not carry any debt...the health of the merged entity needs to be such that it can compete with the market on an equal footing,” Purwar said, adding that discus-sions can be held both in BSNL and MTNL to lay down a roadmap where the payscale can be brought on a similar footing. PTI

The industry is consolidating. It is not an issue of BSNL and MTNL...for any operator to succeed in India a pan India operation is a must

The annualised fresh NPA generation declined to 4.1% during the third quarter of 2016-17 compared to 10.7% during the fourth quarter of the financial year 2015 -16, 6.1% during the first quarter of 2016-17 and 5.8% in the second quarter of 2016-17

Assembly unit in India a matter of when, not if: Volvo Cars

COIMBATORE: Swedish lux-ury car maker Volvo Cars will consider assembling its vehicles in India, where it is looking to garner 10 per cent market share in the high-end segment by 2020. The company is also gear-ing up to enter into pre-owned car segment with its global pro-gramme Volvo Select in India as it looks to widen customer base here.

Volvo Cars sells a range of luxury cars and SUVs from the hatchback V40 D Kinetic to SUV XC90 T8 Excellence priced between Rs 26 lakh and Rs 1.28 crore. It has been wit-nessing double digits growth for the last two years.

“India is among the fast-est growing markets for Volvo cars globally. This year also we are looking at double-digit growth,” Volvo Auto India Managing Director Tom von Bonsdorff told PTI here.

The headquarter of the company is “really opening up its eyes to India”, he said, add-ing that the top management was also confident about the country’s potential consider-ing its economic growth thus

giving impetus to the talks of setting up assembly plant here.

When asked about Volvo’s plans for assembling in India, von Bonsdorff said: “While no decision has been taken yet on starting assembling our vehi-cles in India, it is no longer a question of if but it is about when.”

The company is also look-ing at the possibilities of part-nerships for such a step, as and when a decision to assemble in India is taken, he added.

Volvo currently sells fully imported cars and SUVs from parent plant in Sweden and another in Belgium.

Elaborating the company’s ambitions in India, he said: “While we are still behind the big players (Mercedes, Audi and BMW) in the luxury seg-ment in absolute numbers, we are the fastest growing brand.

“We currently have about 5 per cent market share and our target is to double it to 10 per cent by 2020.” PTI

Snapdeal founders summoned for usurping marketing concept

NEW DELHI: E-commerce major Snapdeal’s CEO Kunal Bahl and two others have been summoned by a Delhi court on a criminal complaint of an entrepreneur who alleged that his idea of connecting sell-ers and buyers through an e- platform was unauthorisedly usurped by the firm and its officials.

Additional Sessions Judge R K Tripathi issued notice to Snapdeal CEO Kunal Bahl, COO Rohit Bansal and its former chief financial officer (CFO) Vijay Ajmera for alleg-edly cheating entrepreneur Gaurav Dua’s concept of “non-inventory holding marketplace model for retail” in the garb of collaborating with him.

“Heard. Record perused. Issue notice of revision peti-tion to respondents vide all pre-scribed modes returnable for May 17, 2017,” the judge said.

Dua had lodged a criminal complaint against the founders and the CFO under sections 420 (cheating), 406 (crimi-nal breach of trust) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC, which was dismissed by a trial court earlier. He had then

filed a revision petition before sessions court.

As per his complaint, Dua, an engineer and entrepreneur, founded portals marketsdelhi.com in 1999 and indianretail.net in 2005 and brought the benefits of digital technology to the retail community.

He claimed in his petition that he was the brain behind the non-inventory holding marketplace model for retail in India and alleged that the Snapdeal officials cheated him under the garb of raising funds for his business.

“Snapdeal founders, who claimed to champion the

approach which put them ahead of other e-commerce companies, cheated Dua in the garb of collaboration with him and raising venture funds for his validated business.

Instead, “under the garb of collaboration and fund-ing, held extensive discussions over many months but instead duped him by deploying all criminal tactics to part with the insights and workings of his work done over 10 years,” the complaint alleged.

He claimed that for two years, the Delhi Police failed to register an FIR on his com-plaint after which he knocked the door of the court.

The trial court, however, dismissed his complaint, after which he filed a revision peti-tion before the present judge.

Snapdeal, in a statement, has denied the allegations lev-elled against its CEO, COO and former CFO by Dua in his criminal complaint. “The allegations made in the revi-sion petition filed by Gaurav Dua are absolutely baseless and devoid of any merit,” a state-ment issued by the e-commerce major said. PTI

Now, investors get updates on BSE-listed cos round-the-clock

NEW DELHI: Right from board meeting outcomes to regulatory actions, investors are now getting updates about BSE-listed companies even at midnight with a new corporate announcement filing system where the delay in dissemina-tion is less than 10 seconds.

Moving away from the ear-lier practice of “pre- verifica-tion”, the exchange is seeking to provide price sensitive infor-mation about companies at the earliest with the new system.

Now, most filings by listed firms on the BSE come with two sets of timings and their difference shows the gap in dis-semination of the information by the exchange after receiving the information from the entity concerned.

A cursory glance at the tim-ings of filings on the bourse shows that some of them have come even close to midnight, making the dissemination almost a round-the-clock affair.

Under the new system, introduced last month, cor-porate announcements would be disseminated “without pre-

verification”, according to the BSE. “Corporate Announce-ment Filing System will be operated 365 days and 24 by 7 to provide up to date, timely, accurate information to the investors and also to news agencies at the fastest possible speed,” the exchange said last month.

Presently, the delay between reports by the company and availability of the information on website varies from 2 to 10 seconds in most cases, as per the BSE. A slew of corpo-rate announcements, includ-ing those related to outcome of board meetings, postal bal-lot, change in directorate, reg-ulatory action and business updates, have been brought under the dissemination system. PTI

Snapdeal CEO Kunal Bahl

PSU insurers gain big from ITC; private players turn ‘responsible’

NEW DELHI: State-owned insurance firms, including behemoth LIC, have made huge gains of thousands of crores of rupees with signifi-cant investments in cigarette maker ITC even as private insurers and mutual funds have turned ‘responsible’ by dras-tically cutting their exposure.

Insurance companies and mutual funds typically use the premium or funds collected from their customers to invest in various securities includ-ing stocks to generate returns, but globally many insurers and fund houses have been staying away from investing in sectors like tobacco.

During the last quarter itself, all four state-run insur-ers in India recorded an appre-ciation of more than Rs 15,000 crore in their collective ITC holding of over 21 per cent, while the gains have been worth more than Rs 20,000 crore for the entire fiscal 2016-17.

Besides, the government also owns a significant stake worth about Rs 31,000 crore in ITC through SUUTI (Specified Undertaking of the Unit Trust of India) that acts as a holding entity for the erstwhile UTI’s investment portfolio.

This is despite SUUTI sell-ing a stake of nearly 2 per cent in ITC recently for about Rs 6,700 crore, following which its holding has now come down to 9.1 per cent in the private sector conglomerate. ITC has market value of close to Rs 3.4 lakh crore for which cigarettes remain the biggest revenue

generator despite its diversifi-cation into FMCG and other businesses. However, it is Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) which has a lion’s share of the stake in ITC at nearly 16.3 per cent, which increased by about 2 per cent during the last quarter ended March 31 and is now worth over Rs 55,000 crore, shows an analysis of the company’s shareholding pat-tern. PTI

During the last quarter itself, all four state-run insurers in India recorded an appreciation of more than Rs 15,000 crore in their collective ITC holding of over 21%, while the gains have been worth more than Rs 20,000 crore for the entire fiscal 2016-17

Finance Ministry okays 8.65% interest on EPFNEW DELHI: The Finance Ministry is believed to have permitted the Labour Minis-try to go ahead with 8.65 per cent rate of interest on employ-ees’ provident fund for 2016-17, which will benefit over four crore EPFO members. The Finance Ministry in its com-munication to the Labour Min-istry has, however, put a rider that the interest rate should not result in a deficit for the retire-ment fund. This will enable the Labour Ministry to provide 8.65 per cent rate as decided by the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) trustees.

According to EPFO esti-mates, the fund will see a sur-

plus after providing 8.65 per cent interest rate for the last fiscal. A reluctant Finance Ministry had been nudging the Labour Ministry to lower the EPF rate to below 8.65 per cent as approved by the EPFO trustees in December last year.

“The Finance Ministry in its recommendation to the Labour Ministry said it is up to the lat-ter to decide on what interest rate should be given. However, it should be ensured that there should not be any deficit to the fund,” according to a source.

“The Finance Ministry had earlier suggested an EPF rate slightly lower than approved by the trustees as it wanted the

interest to be aligned with the rates of small savings,” added the source.

Labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya has been maintain-ing that the EPFO subscrib-ers would be provided 8.65 per cent rate of interest for 2016-17.

“The Central Board of Trustees (CBT) had decided to give 8.65 per cent. Our ministry keeps on discussing with the Finance Ministry. We would have surplus of INR 158 crore on providing 8.65 per cent,” Dattatreya had said earlier last week when asked whether the Finance Ministry is making a case for lowering the interest rate.

“If need be, I will talk to them. I have requested them to approve 8.65 per cent. In any case this amount (interest income) will be given to work-ers,” the minister had said.

As per the practice, the board’s decision is concurred by the Finance Ministry after evaluating whether the EPFO would be able to provide the rate approved by trustees through its own income or not.

Once the Finance Minis-try ratifies the rate of interest approved by the CBT, it is cred-ited into the account of EPFO members for that particular financial year.

The Finance Ministry had

last year also decided to lower the EPF interest rate of 8.8 per cent for 2015-16, decided by the CBT, to 8.7 per cent. The decision had drawn flak from all quarters forcing the govern-ment to uphold 8.8 per cent.

The Finance Ministry has been asking the Labour Minis-try to rationalise the EPF inter-est rate in view of lowering of returns on various adminis-tered saving schemes like PPF.

The government gener-ally ratifies the rate of return approved by the CBT because the EPFO is an autonomous body and provides interest on EPF deposits from its own income. PTI

ITC looks to spice up food portfolio with ‘Master Chef’ NEW DELHI: FMCG major ITC is spicing up its food portfolio, with master chefs from its hotels curating different blends of spices for a premium range to be sold under the ‘ITC Master Chef’ brand. The company, which is pursuing to create world class brands by leverag-ing on enterprise strengths, is banking on spices sourced by its Agri Business division. “We are focusing on blended spices through ITC Master Chef brand. This is one new segment on which we are working,” ITC Foods Division Divisional Chief Executive Hemant Malik said. PTI

Govt to replace 7.7 GW old power units with efficient plants

NEW DELHI: The govern-ment has identified old power projects totalling 7,738 mw capacity owned by the Centre and states for replacement with energy-efficient supercritical plants, which will generate a gross 18,560 mw.

“The government has iden-tified 7,738 mw inefficient thermal plants, which would be replaced with supercritical units, to conserve scarce natu-ral resources like land, water and coal,” a senior official said.

According to the official, the replacement will result in creation of 18,560 mw of capac-ity as per the assessment of power generation utilities. The move is expected to save natu-ral resources and boost genera-tion capacity of the plants.

Taking an example, the offi-cial added that 440 mw of the Haryana Power Generation Corporation in Panipat will be replaced with an 800-mw energy efficient plant, which will almost double the genera-tion capacity. Breaking down the numbers, state power gen-eration utilities have marked out 6,608 mw for the purpose, which will lead to creation of 16,580 mw. The central util-ities have marked 1,130 mw for replacement that will cre-ate 1,980 mw, going forward.

According to power minis-try estimates, as on March 31, 2016, the capacity of coal-based thermal plants that are more than 25 years old was about 37,453 mw, including 35,509 mw in the government sector

and 1,947 mw in private space.The official said the move

towards energy efficiency and less-polluting technology makes more sense than reno-vation and modernisation and will yield long-term benefits.

The plan is being chalked out after stringent norms for thermal power plants were laid down by the environment ministry. The new guidelines for coal-based power stations were introduced in Decem-ber 2015 to cut down emission of PM10, SO2 and NOx and improve ambient air quality around plants. The ministry for the first time had fixed SOx and NOx norms for such sta-tions and mandated that plants must adhere to these guidelines by 2017. PTI

NEW DELHI: Six of the 10 most-valued Indian compa-nies saw a cumulative erosion of Rs 47,463 crore in market valuation last week, with TCS and RIL taking the hardest knock. IT major TCS’ market capitalisation (m-cap) tum-bled as much as Rs 19,556.5 crore to Rs 4,58,686.07 crore, the worst hit in the group.

For RIL, the fall was Rs 13,387.62 crore. With a mar-ket cap of Rs 4,43,595.61 crore, the Mukesh Ambani-led firm is fast narrowing the gap with the top-ranked TCS. RIL’s valuation is just Rs 15,090.46 crore less than that of TCS. The final pic-

ture showed TCS leading the ranking chart of mar-ket cap, followed by RIL, HDFC Bank, ITC, ONGC, SBI, HDFC, Infosys, IOC and HUL, in that order.

While TCS, RIL, ONGC, HDFC, Infosys and HUL lost out, the market capitalisation (m-cap) of HDFC Bank, ITC, SBI and IOC advanced for the week to Thursday. The markets were shut on Friday because of Baba Ambedkar Jayanti and Good Friday. For RIL, the fall was Rs 13,387.62 crore at Rs 4,43,595.61 crore and that of Infosys came down by Rs 11,450.27 crore to Rs 2,13,937.43 crore. PTI

More losers than gainers in m-cap play;

TCS, RIL badly hit

CORPORATE KALEIDOSCOPE

mp business 13MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

Dr Sarat Kumar Acharya, CMD, NLC India Limited, laid down the foundation stone for the new Corporate Office at Chennai in the campus of Chennai Regional Office. Also seen are Directors, P Selvakumar and R Vikraman, along with Officers of NBCC India Limited

Kalpana Chawla Government Medical college (KCGMC), Karnal has been inaugurated by the Chief Minister of Haryana Manohar Lal Khattar. The event was graced by Anil Vij, Minister of Health and Family Welfare, Govt of Haryana, Karan Dev Kamboj Kabirpanthi along with Surender Kshyap, Director, KCGMC

Infosys to ramp up local hiring in US amid visa concerns

NEW DELHI: IT major Info-sys plans to focus more on local hiring in the US and is also looking at setting up devel-opment and training centres in the country as part of its efforts to tide over visa-related issues.

Infosys has been in favour of a healthy mix of local and global personnel even though hiring locals in overseas mar-kets often pushes up opera-tional costs for IT outsourcing companies.

With the US mulling over various measures to make visa norms stricter under the Don-ald Trump administration, Indian IT firms have been contemplating tweaking their business models and accom-modating more locals.

“We are closely monitor-ing the overall situation with respect to visa... in the last 24 months, we have focused on increasing our presence in the US with a lot more local hir-ing,” Infosys Chief Operating Officer U B Pravin Rao told investors on a recent confer-ence call. He added that at this stage, Infosys has not seen any “undue things” that will impact the way it does business.

“In this year, we will con-

tinue that focus. We will accel-erate it. We will also start looking at developments and training centres in the US as well,” he said.

Rao, however, did not talk about the investments Infosys will make on the expansion.

The North American mar-ket accounted for over 60 per cent of Infosys’ $10.2 billion revenue in the 2016-17 fiscal.

During his election cam-paign, US President Trump had promised stricter immi-gration laws and protection of

local jobs.Besides, a legislation (Lof-

gren Bill) in the US was intro-duced that proposed doubling of the minimum wages of H-1B visa holders to $130,000.

Most recently, the US Citi-zenship and Immigration Ser-vices (USCIS) had come out with a policy memorandum that potentially makes it diffi-cult for Indian technology pro-fessionals to work in the US at entry-level positions.

Any change in visa norms can affect the movement of

labour as well as spike opera-tional costs for the IT players.

Indian firms like TCS, Info-sys and Wipro that are depen-dent on visas are now focusing on bringing on board more locals to comply with the norms.

Once considered an indus-try bellwether, Infosys has had its share of challenges over the past few years. Apart from competition from rivals like

TCS and Cognizant, it is also facing a public spat between founders and the Board over allegations of corporate gover-nance lapses.

Under CEO Vishal Sikka, the company has been trying to turn things around.

The former SAP executive has set up an ambitious target for Infosys reaching $20 billion revenue by 2020 with a strong focus on new technologies like automation and artificial intel-ligence. While Sikka himself has admitted that the goal is “aspirational”, the company has continued to invest in start-ups working on these new-genera-tion technologies.

“...our FY17 revenues from new software and soft-ware- related services includ-ing Mana, Panaya, Skava and Edge grew at more than 42 per cent,” Sikka said.

He added that the com-pany will report revenues on a quarterly basis from the new software and offerings such as digital, Internet of Things and cybersecurity from this fiscal onwards. The new services are also helping the company gen-erate over $125,000 per year in revenue per employee. PTI

SRM university holds national seminar on ‘concept of Bharat in the eyes of constitution makers’

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: Education Minister of Haryana Ram Vilas Sharma inaugurated a two-days National Seminar on “Concept of Bharat in the Eyes of Constitution Makers” at SRM University Haryana, Sonepat on Wednesday. The seminar was organised by the Faculty of Law, SRM Univer-sity, in association with the Jammu and Kashmir Study Centre, New Delhi. After the invocation and lamp-lighting, Prof Ashok Kantroo, Dean of Law, welcomed the audience. Prof S Rajarajan, Vice-Chancel-lor, SRM University, presided over the function. Ashutosh

Bhatnagar, who enlightened the participants on the Con-stitution of India and its importance, articulated that

the students of law are to be attuned and focused on making our constitution for the better-ment of every citizen of India.

Haryana Governor and Visitor of SRM University, Haryana, Prof Kaptan Singh Solanki, addressed the Vale-dictory Function for the two-days National Seminar held on “Concept of Bharat in the Eyes of Constitution Makers” at SRM University Haryana, Sonepat, on Thursday, where hundreds of students, faculty and scholars participated with great fervor and spirit.

The seminar was jointly organised by the Faculty of Law, SRM University, Sonepat, Constitution Club and JK Study Centre as a part of Haryana Golden Jubilee Year and Dr BR Ambedkar Birth Anniversary.

Most recently, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) had come out with a policy memorandum that potentially makes it difficult for Indian technology professionals to work in the US at entry-level positions

FinMin expects 6 banks to raise funds via FPO as mkt improves

NEW DELHI: Stock prices on the mend, the Finance Minis-try will nudge at least six pub-lic sector banks to hit markets to raise funds and ease the pressure on the exchequer of pumping in capital as per the Indradhanush plan.

“Time has come for banks to tap capital market and we think that at least half a dozen banks would take advantage of the opportunity and raise capi-tal from the market during the current fiscal,” a senior finance ministry official said.

“It is up to individual banks to decide when they want to raise capital and how much, but in our assessment, there are a few fit candidates for this, including State Bank of India, Bank of Baroda and Punjab National Bank,” the official said.

As per the scheme, public sector banks need to raise Rs 1.10 lakh crore from markets, including follow-on public offer, to meet Basel III require-ments, which kick in from March 2019.

This will be over and above Rs 70,000 crore banks will get as capital support from the gov-ernment. Of this, the govern-ment has already infused Rs 50,000 crore in the past two fis-

cals and the remaining will be pumped in by the end of 2018-19. SBI has already taken board approval for raising up to Rs

15,000 crore through various means, including public offer and overseas issuance of shares, during the current fiscal. PTI

Sebi chief Tyagi takes inclusive path for market reforms

NEW DELHI: The new Sebi chief Ajay Tyagi has decided to follow an “all-inclusive path” by personally meeting stake-holders from across the spec-trum as the capital markets regulator gears up to usher in key reforms in areas like IPOs, foreign investors, commodi-ties, mutual funds and investor protection.

Ahead of his first board meeting as Sebi Chairman next week, Tyagi has already met several groups of market participants and industry lead-ers, including foreign portfolio investors, brokerages, invest-ment bankers and mutual funds.

Tyagi, who took over as Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) last month, would be meeting more groups of representatives from various sectors includ-ing mutual fund CEOs in the coming days before the sched-uled board meeting on April 26, where a number of reform measures are expected to be discussed, a senior official said.

The regulator will also look at steps to make the registra-tion process easier for foreign investors, while some further

steps could be considered to check any misuse of P- Notes or Participatory Notes.

Besides, a status update would be discussed in cases being looked into by the reg-ulator where there could have been some misuse of the P-Note route, including by way of their issuance in the past to Indians or NRIs, which the rules now do not allow.

While Sebi already follows a participatory model in framing of its regulations, under which it puts draft of all proposed norms in public domain and decides final norms after tak-ing into consideration inputs from all stakeholders, the new Chairman has decided to meet all concerned stakehold-ers directly to get “a first-hand

understanding and follow an all-inclusive path to reforms”, the official added.

Tyagi’s predecessor U K Sinha had also followed a sim-ilar practice of meeting indus-try representatives on a regular basis and framing necessary regulations after taking into account their feedback.

The key reforms likely to be discussed by the Sebi board include permitting institutional investors in commodity deriva-tives in a phased manner, intro-duction of options trading in this market and tightening of norms to check any diversion of IPO funds.

Besides, issues like possi-ble steps to attract startups to get listed and widening dis-tribution network for mutual

funds including by allowing sale through e-commerce and e- wallet platforms would also be discussed, the official said, while adding that the board will also take stock of ongoing probes in cases like NSE co-location issue and the NSEL scam.

The Sebi board will also dis-cuss ways to conclude enforce-ment action in long-pending matters, some of which involve large corporate houses, while a status report is likely to be presented on all high-profile cases including those that have come to light in recent months and those concerning corpo-rate governance issues.

Also on the agenda would be compliance by listed PSUs to the requirement for minimum 25 per cent public sharehold-ing and whether they need to be given some more time.

Besides, some compa-nies are yet to appoint at least one woman director on their respective boards.

The Sebi board itself has now got a full-time woman member with eminent banker Madhabi Puri Buch having taken charge as a Whole Time Member. PTI

The key reforms likely to be discussed by the Sebi board include permitting institutional investors in commodity derivatives in a phased manner, introduction of options trading in this market and tightening of norms to check any diversion of IPO funds

NEW DELHI: President Pranab Mukherjee will inau-gurate Global Exhibition on Services (GES) today which will highlight India’s potential to boost its services exports across sectors.

Finance Minister Arun Jait-ley will also address the inau-gural session to be held at Rashtrapati Bhavan.

The third edition of the GES comes in the backdrop of increased focus on services trade and India’s submission to the World Trade Organisation on trade facilitation in services.

India’s services exports increased from $52 billion in 2005 to $155 billion in 2015, with a share of 3.3 per cent in global services exports. In the first 11 months of 2016-17, services exports stood at $146.5 billion, growing at 3 per cent.

The four-day event, to be held from 17-20 April at India Expo Mart, Greater Noida, will see participation from over 70 countries and focus on 20 ser-vices sectors including infor-mation technology, tourism and hospitality, logistics, edu-cation and financial services, among others. PTI

President to inaugurate 3rd

Global Exhibition on Services

Withdrawal slows in Jan Dhan a/cs; deposits up Rs1,000 cr NEW DELHI: Arresting the trend of withdrawals that began in December, the net balance in Jan Dhan accounts swelled by Rs 1,000 crore to Rs 63,971.38 crore during the week ended April 5. The net balance in the accounts opened under the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) was Rs 62,972.42 crore on March 29, as per the Finance Ministry’s data. Total deposits in these accounts had increased to a record high of Rs 74,610 crore on December 7 and thereafter, started declining gradually. PTI

Centre, states taxmen to decide services rate in GST this week

NEW DELHI: Tax officials of the central and state govern-ments will this week hold their maiden meeting on devising a formula for tax rate to be levied on services under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime from July 1.

While the GST Council had previously decided on a four- tier rate structure of 5, 12, 18 and 28 per cent, its fit-ment committee will hold its first meeting this week on slot-ting different services in one of the slabs, a senior official said.

The task before the panel is to keep the impact of GST on inflation and prices near neu-tral or zero.

The fitment committee is likely to hold more meetings before GST Council’s meeting on May 18-19 where tax rates for different products and ser-vices are to be finalised so as to enable roll out of the biggest tax reform from July 1.

“The fitment committee will start with deciding on tax rates on services. Since the Centre alone has the power to levy service tax under the cur-rent regime, fixing of the tax rate on services would be an easier task,” the official said.

The official said that most of the services where both VAT and service tax were levied would be fit around the stan-dard rate of 18 per cent, while those on which only 12.5 per cent VAT was levied would be brought to 12 per cent.

Also services provided by transportation and logistics players would be fitted in 12 per cent bracket, while services in 9 per cent bracket could be fitted in 12 per cent, the offi-cial said.

Tax rate which is closest to

the present incidence of tax on a good or service will be cho-sen with a view to keeping the shift from the present regime of excise duty plus VAT or ser-vice tax to a new uniform GST neutral for consumers.

The official said tax rates will be decided in a fashion to keep their impact on inflation as well as revenues to the gov-ernment near neutral.

Once tax rates on services are decided, the fitment com-mittee will meet again after a fortnight or so to decide on tax rates on goods before a full report of the panel is put up for consideration before the GST Council in its May 18-19 meet-ing in Srinagar.

The GST Council, headed by Union Finance Minister and comprising state repre-sentatives as members, would kick start the discussion on rates in the May meeting and the final fitment would be done by June.

Under the current regime, the Centre has the power to levy tax on production of goods (except liquor for human con-sumption, opium, narcotics) while the states have the power to levy tax on sale of goods. PTI

The fitment committee will start with deciding on tax rates on services. Since the Centre alone has the power to levy service tax under the current regime, fixing of the tax rate on services would be an easier task

Hidesign in expansion mode, to open 15 stores in FY18

MUMBAI: Premium leather goods manufacturer Hidesign is looking to launch 15 stores across airports and malls this financial year. “Hidesign plans to open 15 stores, nine of which will be in airports, and about 5-6 will be across malls,” its president Dilip Kapur said.

The company will invest Rs 20 crore to open new stores, he said. Hidesign will open stores at the airports of Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Kochi, and some more stores will be opened at tier-I cities, he added.

The brand has 80 stores across the country and abroad.

It entered the US in 2014 to make international inroads.

For a premium brand like Hidesign, the segment is small but growth is higher than the mass market, Kapur said. The brand has greatly benefited from the e-commerce wave and has made strong inroads into the US market, he said.

It markets and distributes competitively priced bags and small leather goods in the US through online as well as high-end independent retailers.

“E-commerce has aided us greatly in our expansion in the US. Selling directly through

e-commerce is very useful and building a brand is much eas-ier,” he said.

He said the company is con-sidering selling directly in the US instead of going through distributors.

The company also plans to overhaul Hidesign’s India- oriented lifestyle brand ‘Holii’ this year in terms of product mix, and price points. Founded over 35 years ago, Hidesign, besides its 80 exclusive stores, sells products through several independent stores and major department stores in interna-tional markets. PTI

Corporate debt trade up 44%MUMBAI: Trading in corpo-rate debt securities at leading stock exchanges BSE and NSE zoomed nearly 44 per cent to a record Rs 14.7 lakh crore in 2016-17, official data shows.

Trading worth Rs 10.22 lakh crore in corporate bonds were reported on the two bourses during 2015-16, according to data compiled by capital mar-ket regulator Sebi.

During 2016-17, the National Stock Exchange (NSE) represented the largest share of trading in corporate bonds at 80 per cent. Bonds worth Rs 11.78 lakh crore were traded on the exchange in the period.

The stock exchange had

witnessed trades amounting to Rs 8.14 lakh crore in 2015-16.

The remainder of the bonds worth Rs 2.92 lakh crore were traded on the BSE during 2016-17 -- a pick up of about 41 per cent compared to the same period year-ago.

Corporate bond trades in the country have seen an upward trend in most of the financial years since 2007-08, barring 2011-12 when the trade dipped by 2 per cent and 2015-16, when it fell 6 per cent com-pared to the preceding year.

In the fiscal gone-by, March 2017 recorded the highest value in terms of trading in corporate debt at Rs 1.92 lakh crore. This was followed by trading worth

Rs 1.43 lakh crore in September 2016 and Rs 1.40 lakh crore in December 2016.

Lowest trading was reported in April (Rs 81,520.85 crore) and February (Rs 82,142.24 crore).

Corporate bonds or debt securities issues are increas-ingly becoming a preferred route for companies to raise funds for various business pur-poses like building a new plant or purchasing equipment.

When an entity buys a bond, one lends money to the firm that issued the security and in exchange the company promises to return the money with interest on a specified maturity date. PTI

No firm shows interest to manage divestment

of 3 SAIL unitsNEW DELHI: SAIL’s effort to engage a transaction advi-sor for managing the divest-ment process of its three units suffered a jolt as no company showed interest in the Request for Proposal (RFP). Steel Authority of India (SAIL) had in February invited proposal for engagement of the transac-tion officer for strategic divest-ment of three units of the PSU. The last date for the submis-sion of bids was April 3. But, no company evinced interest in RFP, an official privy to the development said.

The advisor will also under-

take tasks related to all aspects of the strategic disinvestment culminating into successful completion of the transaction.

The advisor will also advice SAIL on the modalities and the timing of the strategic disin-vestment, and prepare and submit a detailed operational scheme to successfully imple-ment the stake sale process, including tentative timelines for each activity.

SAIL has proposed to engage the transaction advisor for providing advisory services and managing the disinvest-ment process. PTI

mp sport14MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

DIDN’T WANT TO COME FOR SHIVAJIANS TIE, SAYS EAST BENGAL COACH MORGANKOLKATA: East Bengal coach Trevor Morgan said he did not want to turn up for their I-League game against DSK Shivajians match after what transpired over the week, apparently refer-ring to the brawl that took place at the club tent two days back. Shivajians handed East Bengal their fourth defeat on the trot to all but knock them out of title contention in the I-League.

PANAMA INTERNATIONAL MIDFIELDER SHOT DEAD BY UNIDENTIFIED ASSAILANTPANAMA CITY: A Panama international midfielder was shot dead in Colon after an unidentified armed assailant attacked him, police said. A police report indicated that the assailant on Saturday fired several times at Amilcar Henriquez. Henriquez, who was capped 75 times for Panama, had rejoined his origi-nal club Arabe Unido in Panamanian football’s top tier.

BARCA ‘CHAMPIONS’ CAPABLE OF FRESH COMEBACK, SAYS LUIS ENRIQUEBARCELONA: Barcelona are capable of springing another re-markable Champions League comeback from 3 -0 down against Juventus on Wednesday, insists coach Luis Enrique. The Spanish champions made history by overcoming a 4-0 first leg deficit by beating France’s Paris Saint Germain 6-1 in the second leg of their last 16 tie.

Late batting collapse restrict Supergiant to 161/8 against RCB

BENGALURU: Rising Pune Supergiant (RPS) suffered a late batting collapse but managed to post a competitive total of 161 for eight in 20 overs against Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in an Indian Premier League (IPL) game at the Chin-naswamy stadium here on Sun-day.Rahul Tripathi (31) and Ajinkya Rahane (30) provided a 63-run opening stand and a 58-run third-wicket stand between Steven Smith (27) and Mahendra Singh Dhoni (28) led to expectations that they would score around 175.

But Dhoni and Smith fell off successive deliveries start-ing from the final ball of the 16th over. They lost three more wickets within three runs. But Manoj Tiwary’s quickfire 27 off 11 deliveries helped them get past 161.However, the competi-tive total could easily have been a match-winning one, thanks to the start they got from Tripa-thi (31) and Rahane (30), who posted 61 at the end of Power-play overs (six).

Both scored at a fair clip, Tripathi especially impressive with hitting three fours and a six against pacers Adam Milne and Sreenath Aravind.

Rahane too looked fluent, timing the ball nicely as he hit

five fours in his 30-run knock.Leg-spinner Samuel Badree

broke the opening partnership as Rahane missed the length completely, allowing the ball to dismantle his stumps, with Pune at 63/1 in 7.4 overs.

The following over, bowled by left-arm spinner Pawan

Negi, saw Tripathi hitting straight at Virat Kohli at short cover. These two quick wick-ets brought Steven Smith and Mahendra Singh Dhoni to the middle and a partnership slowly flourished.

Dhoni, who had 28 runs so far prior to this match, showed

flashes of his destructive self, hoicking a delivery from leg-spinner Yuzvender Chahal to the roof of the stadium in the leg side. Smith too joined in the act as the pair got their side past 100 in 13.2 overs. But just when both were seeming to be dangerous going into the last

overs, Dhoni and Smith were bowled in successive deliveries off Shane Watson and Aravind, respectively, leaving Pune at 127/4 in 16.1 overs. Five deliv-eries later, Aravind removed Daniel Christian (1). The fol-lowing over saw Kiwi paceman Adam Milne dismissing Ben

Stokes (2) and Shardul Thakur (0) in the first two deliveries, as Pune plunged to 130/7.Brief Score:Rising Pune Supergiant: 161/8 (Rahul Tripathi 31, Ajinkya Rahane 30Royal Challengers Bangalore: (Adam Milne 2/27). AGENCIES

Confident Delhi face stern test against KKR

NEW DELHI: Beaming with confidence after winning two matches on the trot, a resurgent Delhi Daredevils will be eager to keep the momentum going when they take on two-time Indian Premier League (IPL) champions Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) at the Feroz Shah Kotla here on Monday.

Delhi overcame their open-ing loss to Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) with two huge back-to-back victories -- 97-run win over Rising Pune Supergiant and then Saturday’s 51-run win over Kings XI Pun-jab at home.

Kolkata, on the other hand, have won three out of their four encounters so far, and will aim to consolidate their stay atop the points table.

Going into Monday’s first double header, the match promises to be an exciting contest between third-placed Delhi’s famed pace battery and KKR’s top order batting.

With the likes of South African quick Kasigo Rabada and India’s Mohammed Shami still warming the bench, Delhi can boast of a bowling line-up which can demolish any side on their day.

On Saturday, Delhi seized the momentum early on with three early wickets as Pun-jab struggled to get anywhere

closer to the massive total of 188/6 posted by the home side.

The all-rounder duo of South Africa’s Chris Morris and New Zealand’s Corey Anderson have been the Zaheer Khan-led Delhi’s main weapons -- be it slogging lower down the order or getting the important break-throughs with the ball.

While Morris fired an eight-ball 16 and returned with fig-ures of 3/23, Anderson came up with a breezy 22-ball unbeaten 39 besides taking one wicket. Delhi’s top-order batting also clicked to a great extent with openers Sanju Samson and top-scorer Sam Billings setting the tone with a half century stand. The return of Shreyas Iyer con-solidated the middle order and he along with Rishabh Pant can take the bowlers to the clean-ers with ease. Karun Nair will also be hoping to get back his mojo back.

Delhi’s spin duo of Amit Mishra and Shahbaz Nadeem have consistently been among the wickets, besides putting the brakes on the scoring rate in the middle overs.

On the other hand, KKR can take a lot of input on the nature of wicket from their Delhi-born captain Gautam Gambhir, who has been in prime form in the tournament so far. AGENCIES

Mumbai tame Lions, extend winning streak to 4MUMBAI: Extending their winning streak to four matches, Mumbai Indians defeated Gujarat Lions by six wickets in an Indian Premier League (IPL) match here on Sunday.

Nitish Rana (53), Rohit Sharma (40 not out) and Kieron Pollard (39) were the major contributors to Mum-bai’s cause.

Chasing a challenging total of 177, Mumbai started off on a bad note as the home side lost opener Parthiv Patel (0) on the second ball of the first over.

Parthiv, who got a leading edge, was caught by Jason Roy at backward point off Praveen Kumar while trying to flick the ball on the leg side.

Opener Jos Buttler (26) and incoming batsman Nitish Rana (53) then played sensible innings as both batsmen forged an 85-run partnership for the second wicket before the latter was sent packing in the 10th over with he scoreboard read-ing 85/2.

In the 12th over, Buttler

was also dismissed by medium pacer Munaf Patel. A 24-ball knock, which comprised one boundary and two sixes, was cut short when the 26-year-old tried to pull a short ball from Patel.

Middle-order bats-men Rohit and Pollard then

thrashed Gujarat’s bowlers all around the park and added 68 runs to give a crucial advan-tage to their side. With 17 runs required in the last two overs, Pollard was dismissed by pacer Andrew Tye. The West Indian power-hitter, who hit two boundaries and three sixes,

was caught by Ravindra Jadeja between backward point and short third man.

New batsman Hardik Pan-dya (6) and Rohit then com-pleted the proceeding to give the hosts a fourth consecutive victory in the cash-rich league.

For Gujarat, Andrew Tye took two wickets while Praveen and Munaf chipped in with one wicket each. Earlier, put in to bat, Brendon McCullum and Dinesh Karthik’s crafty knocks helped Gujarat Lions post 176/4.

McCullum played 44 balls and slammed six boundaries and three sixes to get his 64 runs while Karthik slammed 48 runs off 26 balls that helped Gujarat post a decent score. It was a poor start by Gujarat as the visitors lost their first wicket on the second ball of the innings.

Dwayne Smith (0) was caught by Nitish Rana at back-ward point off pacer Mitchell McClenaghan with just one run on the board.

Incoming batsman Suresh Raina (28) along with McCul-lum then stabilised the innings as the two batsmen forged an 80-run partnership for the sec-ond wicket.

Just when things seemed going good for the visitors, skipper Raina, who was play-ing sensibly at the crease by rotating the strike, was sent packing in the 12th over by off-spinner Harbhajan Singh. Raina’s 29-ball knock had only two boundaries. After one over, McCullum was also sent back to the pavilion by expe-rienced pacer Lasith Malinga. While trying to flick on the leg side, the ball sneaked between McCullum’s bat and pad and hit the stumps.Brief Scores:Gujarat Lions: 176/4 (Brendon McCullum 64, Dinesh Karthik 48, Andrew Tye 2/34).Mumbai Indians: 177 for 4 in 19.3 overs. (Nitish Rana 53, Rohit Sharma 40, Kieron Pol-lard 39, Mitchell McClenaghan 2/24). AGENCIES

We were pretty average against Daredevils: MaxwellNEW DELHI: Kings XI Punjab skipper Glenn Max-well lamented the opportunities lost in their defeat against Delhi Daredevils and rebuffed suggestions that the Indian bowlers in their attack are ineffec-tive. Maxwell said they had opportunities to snatch momentum right from the first ball when home opener Sanju Samson offered a half-chance but could not be converted into a catch. “The weak-nesses tonight was everything, the batting, the bowling, the fielding, it was pretty average. We let opportunities to slip. We drop Corey Anderson when he was in single figure as well. They were not straight forward chances but in T20 cricket, half chances needed to be taken, specially when they won toss and batted, we need to make sure we take our chances,” Maxwell said. “They did not let us settle and get into the game. That was frustrating because we have got skills. The guys are good enough but it’s not happening.” When asked if lack of international bowlers in the attack is affecting their chances, Maxwell chose to back the Indians bowlers. AGENCIES

Liverpool beat West Brom 1-0, retake 3rd place in EPL

LONDON: Liverpool defeated West Bromwich Albion 1-0 in an away match and managed to retake the third place, leaving Manchester City in the fourth position, in an English Premier League (EPL) here on Sunday.

The match’s only goal was scored by Brazil’s Firmino for the Reds as he headed the ball into the back of the net just one

minute into the first half ’s stop-page time, reports Efe.

Liverpool now has 66 points and two points ahead of the now fourth Manches-ter City, while West Brom remains eighth on the stand-ings with 44 points after suffer-ing its third defeat in a row. On Saturday, Tottenham Hotspur pummelled Bournemouth 4-0

at White Hart Lane, where fit-again Harry Kane was back in the goals.

The England striker net-ted his first Spurs goal in more than a month as Mousa Dembele, Heung-Min Son and Vincent Janssen also scored to move the north Londoners within touching distance of the Blues. AGENCIES

‘Indian umpires in desperate need of mentorship’NEW DELHI: Erratic umpir-ing has been a bane of Indian cricket and as it gets high-lighted through the IPL, for-mer international umpire K Hariharan says the standard can improve by having mentors guide the “clueless” officials.

“Like the selectors are con-stantly watching the players from the sidelines, you have to have mentors for umpires who can monitor their performance during the game and point out their positives and negatives right after the game,” Hariharan said in an interview.

“As of now, there is nobody to guide Indian umpires on the domestic circuit. We all know some umpiring howlers have been committed in the IPL and that can happen, human errors happen all the time.

“But there should be a group of mentors to tell them

after the game where they went wrong, where they went right, were they standing in the right position, things like that,” said the now-retired umpire who officiated in two Tests and 34 ODIs.

Hariharan, in fact, is part of the BCCI review commit-tee which is supposed to peri-odically propose changes for improving the umpiring stan-dards in domestic cricket. The panel comprises for-

mer umpires Vijay Chopra, I Shivram, V K Ramaswamy besides Hariharan himself.

“We have already submit-ted our report (to the BCCI) in which we have proposed the appointment of mentors for the top 25 umpires of the coun-try. The board will decide the future course of action,” said the 61-year-old adding that 110 umpires are certified by the BCCI at the moment.

With the IPL attracting global attention, the social media has been abuzz with posts on the embarrassing umpiring errors already com-mitted in the competition.

Especially the on-field duo of CK Nandan and Nitin Menon have had a horror tour-nament so far.

Both of them had allowed David Warner to take strike the next over after he struck a

four off the last ball of the pre-vious over in the game between Mumbai Indians and Sunrisers Hyderabad in Mumbai.

Days before, at the same venue, the same pair was officiating on the field when Rohit Sharma was adjudged lbw despite getting a huge inside edge before the ball hit the pads. That glaring mis-take prompted veteran bats-man Subramaniam Badrinath to slam the prevailing umpir-ing standards.

“Seeing a lot of domestic umpires in this seasons @IPL, and the umpiring standards have been way below par...arguably the worst.

“Among all #IPL seasons.poor umpiring standards have prevailed for ages in domestic circuit,its just being highlighted through #IPL2017,” Badrinath had tweeted. AGENCIES

SRH seek to put campaign back on track against KXIPHYDERABAD: Back-to-back losses denting their con-fidence, defending champions Sunrisers Hyderabad would look to put their campaign back on track when they take on Kings XI Punjab in their IPL match here on Monday.

The Sunrisers had a per-fect start this season by win-ning their first two games -- against Royal Challengers Bangalore and Gujarat Lions -- at home. However, they lost their next two matches away from home -- against Mumbai Indians and Kolkata Knight Riders.

Come Monday, it would be an opportunity for SRH to bounce back on their home turf. The team pos-sessed one of the best bowl-ing attacks in IPL-10 with the likes of pacer Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Afghanistan’s Rashid Khan, the experienced Ashish Nehra, Ben Cutting, Bangla-desh’s Mustafizzur Rahman and all-rounders Yuvraj Singh and Moises Henriques in their ranks.

Bhuvneshwar has been outstanding, especially in death overs, and the young Rashid has emerged as a cru-cial bowler for the side with his unique leg-spin bowling.

The other bowlers, includ-

ing Ashish Nehra, Ben Cut-ting and Rahman, can put any batsmen to test. Bangladeshi pacer Rahman, who conceded 19 runs from his first over to return with poor figures of 2.4-0-34-0 against Mum-bai, would be keen to make amends and demonstrate his capabilities.

SRH openers David War-ner and Shikhar Dhawan have been giving good starts to their innings but the other batsmen, especially those who batted at the middle order would do well by raising the bar.

The middle order, com-prising Moises Henriques, seasoned Yuvraj Singh and Deepak Hooda, did put up a strong show to see their side romp home in the first two matches. On the points table, both SRH and KXIP have four points each from an equal number of matches. The Punjab side has also won their first two matches and lost the next two, much like SRH, and they too would aim to get their momentum back.

The visiting side have some dangerous batsmen, especially the three Ms —David Miller, Glenn Maxwell and Eoin Morgan — who can pile up runs. AGENCIES

Not ruling out opening the

innings: Rohit Sharma

MUMBAI: Mumbai Indians skipper Rohit Sharma on Sun-day hinted that he might open the innings at some stage in the ongoing IPL but that will totally depend on the need of the team.

Rohit regularly opens for India in ODIs but has batted at no. 4 position in this IPL season.

“I would love to open, but you have to see certain things from the team’s perspective, find the right balance. (I) bat-ting at 4 or 3 gives the team right balance,” said Rohit, who cracked an unbeaten 29-ball 40 as MI defeated Gujarat Lions’ six wickets with three balls to spare.

“Last year we felt we wanted someone to bat till the end which was not happening and we were not able to finish the games. I am open to anything whatever the team requires. I will go and open also and I am not closing my options right now,” he added.

Parthiv Patel and Jos But-tler have been opening the innings for MI with Nitish Rana showing plenty of prom-ise at the number three spot. Rana scored 53 in 36 balls early in the successful run- chase to become the tournament’s lead-ing run-getter. AGENCIES

IPL TURNS 10: MATCH PREVIEW

IPL TURNS 10: MATCH PREVIEW

REPRESENTATIVE IMAGE

LION TAMER: Mumbai Indians’ Rohit Sharma plays a shot during the match against Gujarat Lions in Mumbai on Sunday PIC/PTI

All eyes will be on KKR skipper Gautam Gambhir who is in fine form this season

SHARING A LAUGH: Rising Pune Supergiant’s Ajinkiya Rahane and RCB Skipper Virat Kohli share a light moment in the match( left). Virat Kohli with team mates celebrate the wicket of Rahul Tripathi in the match between RCB and Rising Pune Supergiant in Bangalore on Sunday PICS/PTI

SINGAPORE: Promising Indian shuttler B Sai Praneeth clinched his maiden Super Series title at the Singapore Open after defeating compa-triot K Srikanth in a historic all-Indian final here on Sunday.

World No.30 Praneeth, who had won the Canada Open Grand Prix last year and reached the Syed Modi Grand Prix Gold final this year, out-maneuvered Srikanth 17-21 21-17 21-12 in the summit clash of the USD 350,000 event.

“It’s always difficult to play someone with whom you play everyday. I am very happy to win today. The way I played in the tournament, I’m very happy. The support here for the Indians has also been very nice,” an overwhelmed Pra-neeth said after the 54-min-ute clash.

It was the first time in the history of international bad-minton that two Indians were playing a Super Series final and it turned out to be a thrilling contest. The two trainees of the Gopichand academy exploited every chink that they were aware of in each other’s game.

In the first game, Srikanth played some angled shots to set up his points and then used his accurate smashes to seal them. He gathered many points on Praneeth’s forehand

with his brilliant returns. Sri-kanth started with two lame returns but as the game pro-gressed, he showed his class to outmaneuver his compatriot. The duo didn’t go for long ral-lies and varied the pace with their repertoire of strokes.

It was Srikanth who grabbed an 11-7 advantage during the first break with a cross-court smash which Pra-neeth couldn’t return despite a full stretch dive.

Praneeth too made Srikanth run for every point before clos-ing in to make it 14-15.

Srikanth did not relent either and came up with down the line smashes to grab five game points.

In the second game, Sri-kanth rushed to a 4-1 lead but Praneeth clawed back at

7-7. The duo, which trains together at the Gopichand Academy, moved neck-and-neck till 10-10 before Pra-neeth grabbed a one-point advantage with Srikanth hit-ting wide. Praneeth continued to dominate the proceedings and moved to a 20-17 lead when Srikanth made a service

error. He then roared back into the contest when his compa-triot hit wide. In the decider, Praneeth carried the momen-tum and surged to a 7-3 lead which he consolidated to 11-5 at the break. It was another towering smash on Srikanth’s backhand which gave him the lead. The change of court didn’t break Praneeth’s rhythm as he continued to trouble Srikanth with his array of strokes and better net-play.

In the end, a drop shot gave Praneeth a 19-12 lead and Srikanth handed him the match point when he hit wide. Praneeth made it count to seal his first Super Series title when his compa-triot again hit wide. Ever since bursting onto the scene by win-ning the bronze medal at the World Junior Championships in 2010, Praneeth has man-aged to outwit some accom-plished shuttlers such as former All England Champion Muhammad Hafiz Hashim of Malaysia, former Olympic and World champion Taufik Hidayat and World No.1 Lee Chong Wei.

But a win eluded him as he battled with a series of injuries to make early exits. However, things brightened up last year when he won in Canada. AGENCIES

mp sport 15MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi |Monday, 17 April, 2017

SINGAPORE OPEN SUPER SERIES

East Bengal’s title hopes up in smoke after losing 1-0 to ShivajiansBARASAT: There was no end to East Bengal’s misery as lowly-placed DSK Shivajians handed them their fourth loss on the trot with a 1-0 win in the I-League here on Sunday.

The decisive move came in the 29th minute when Man of the Match Jerry Mawihmingth-anga beat an offside trap to head past East Bengal goal-keeper Subhasish Roy Chow-dhury, dashing their slender hopes of winning the title, which has remained elusive so

far. Halicharan Narzary began the move in an one-two from the corner and his pass to Juan Quero Barraso was curled in by the former Real Madrid player.

Credit should also be given to the veteran Subrata Paul who stood like a wall as East Bengal’s repeated attacks were thwarted by the India goalkeeper.

Paul’s best came minutes after they went up as he pulled off saves from back to back attacks by Rowllin Borges. He also stood tall with another

brilliant save, punching off a move from Borges at the stroke of half time.

A desperate East Ben-gal went ahead with a flurry of attacks in the fag end of

the match, but Paul was sim-ply unbreakable, never letting the duo of Jackichand Singh and Wedson Anselme restore parity.

The Trevor Morgan-coached side’s loss has come after its 1-2 derby defeat to Mohun Bagan and the club also lost to Chennai City and Churchill Brothers by identi-cal margins. The third placed team is set to plummet further, with 27 points from 16 rounds.

For the eighth-placed Pune

outfit, which had lost 1-2 in the first leg, this was their second win over East Bengal, coming after more than a year when they had blanked them 2-0 on March 6 last year.

Both teams now have a 2-2 win-loss record.

His future at the club under scrutiny, Morgan went ahead with a new 3-4-3 formation, making five changes as Bikash Jairu made his first start in over seven months after an injury layoff.

Jackichand and Robin were also back in the side for the must-win match.

Having triggered a mas-sive backlash from supporters for allegedly showing the mid-dle finger, East Bengal’s regu-lar goalkeeper TP Rehenesh missed his first match in 15 games. On loan from ISL fran-chise North-East United, the Kerala goalkeeper was sent back home and his future is uncertain with the red-and-gold brigade. AGENCIES

‘Praneeth has quality

but needs consistency’

NEW DELHI: Chief national coach Pullela Gopichand on Sunday said his ward B Sai Praneeth needs to be con-sistent and hoped the win at Singapore Open will take his game to another level. It was the first time that two Indians were playing in the final of a superseries event and Praneeth made it special for him, clinch-ing the title with a 17-21 21-17 21-12 win over K Srikanth in the summit clash of the Singa-pore Open. “I am very proud of them (Praneeth, Srikanth), they reaching the finals. It is a big tournament to win. He is still young. He has many years ahead of him. It will hopefully give him the confidence to play at another level,” Gopichand said. “If you look at his career, he has some big wins. He has beaten Taufik, Lee Chong Wei, he has beaten many of them, so he has the quality but he needs consistency,” he added. Heap-ing praise on Praneeth, Gopi-chand said: “It takes a special character to win a tournament. Not many have been able to win that. I hope he qualifies for the Word Championship. In fact, Srikanth also have a chance.” Praneeth had clinched the Canada Open last year and reached the Syed Modi Grand prix Gold this year in January. However, he hurt his shoulder during the final. Asked how did he transform his game, Gopichand said: “He basi-cally just worked and trained for last two months, there is nothing specific. I think game wise he has many things going for him but he has to focus on his training. Post PBL, he has been training and it has really helped him.” AGENCIES

Praneeth stuns Srikanth to clinch maiden title

‘This event showed Indian badminton

is progressing’

NEW DELHI: Newly-crowned Singapore Open champion B Sai Praneeth said the historic all-Indian Super Series final against K Srikanth is a testimony that Indian bad-minton has progressed by leaps and bounds.

Praneeth burst onto the scene in 2010 after clinching a bronze at World Junior Cham-pionships and won many inter-national challengers but a big win always eluded him.

The 24-year-old finally achieved his dream of win-ning a Super Series today in Singapore.

“I am very happy to win today. The way I played in the tournament I’m very happy. It s the best feeling. I have been waiting for this for a long long time. I think top two singles is a first time for India and it s history and you can see Indian badminton is going up from this tournament,” Praneeth said after winning the title.

“And it’s not only men sin-gles players even women sin-gles players are also doing good,” he added. Over the last seven years, Praneeth has beaten many accom-plished shuttlers such as for-mer All England Champion Muhammad Hafiz Hashim of Malaysia, former Olympic and World champion Taufik Hidayat and World no 1 Lee Chong Wei but couldn’t win a tournament.

“I think I’ve always been playing well with top play-ers like last year with Lee

Chong Wei. But I have not won any tournament. That feeling has always been uncomfortable in my mind. I worked hard the last time at Syed Modi. I had a shoulder injury, so I had to skip All Eng-land and Swiss.

“I have trained for one and a half month continuously. I think the way I train and my fitness has improved and it helped me.”

Asked if his 4-1 head-to-head record against Sri-kanth was on his mind ahead of the final, Praneeth said: “No, because I think we always practice together we used to practice long from past so many years, so the record is just a record but as long as we Indians play each other the record doesn’t matter, it s just a day whoever wins the match. And today is my day.”

Asked if he was nervous playing his first Super Series final, Praneeth said: “It is a great feeling playing finals but I was not nervous because the opponent is Srikanth and I know his game and he knows my game.

“In the first game I was just feeling down because my thing was just not working and he was playing at a very good pace and he was catch-ing everything. I didn t know what was wrong in my game. But later in the second game I reached 7-2, 7-3 and later we were going equal. So once I got all my strokes going good, I got some rhythm.” AGENCIES

Messi keeps Barcelona alive with 3-2 win over SociedadBARCELONA: Two goals and an assist by Lionel Messi were what the doctor ordered to keep Barcelona alive for the La Liga football title in a 3-2 win over Real Sociedad, while Atletico Madrid strengthened their grip on the third spot with a routine 3-0 win at home against Osasuna.

The first half on Saturday between Barcelona and Real Sociedad at the Camp Nou sta-dium was crazy with all five goals coming in the first 45 minutes play and with the visi-tors playing good football and managing to stay in contention for at least a draw until the final

whistle, reports Efe.It was Messi who got the

home team on the board first in the 17th minute with a mighty and spot-on blast from distance into the lower right corner of the net.

He followed it up 19 min-utes later with a second strike when Luis Suarez fired a shot on goal that came right to Messi, who deftly kept the ball before him and pushed it past the Geronimo Rulli.

Inigo Martinez knocked the ball across the mouth of the net and off of Samuel Umtiti’s arm and into the net for an own goal just three minutes before

halftime.Two minutes later, after

Sergio Busquets set things up,

Messi popped one through to Paco Alcacer, who beat Rulli for another home tally.

Just moments before the break, Xabi Prieto landed another tally for the 3-2 result on a great augmentation of a William Jose pass for Real Sociedad, thus getting all the scoring in before the break.

Although Barcelona had triumphed over Sevilla and Valencia recently, they had come up luckless against Deportivo La Coruna and Mal-aga. Now, with Real Madrid still three points out in front of the Catalan squad in the title race, and one game up,

Luis Enrique’s men are bat-tling against the clock when it comes to cementing their third consecutive Spanish First Divi-sion title.

Real Madrid defeated Sporting Gijon 3-2 earlier on Saturday, transforming what seemed like a certain draw into a win on Isco’s extra-time tally.

Next weekend, Barcelona will go up against Real Madrid in El Clasico in Madrid, with a Catalan win putting them tied with the capital squad on points. AGENCIES

Defeat to Bayern one of darkest hours of my career, says Arsenal’s Ozil

LONDON: After a 2-10 humiliation at the hands of Bayern Munich in the Cham-pions League pre-quarterfinals, Arsenal attacking midfielder Mesut Ozil has said it was one of the darkest hours of his foot-ball career.

“The devastating loss against Bayern Munich this season is undoubtedly one of the darkest hours of my foot-balling career,” Ozil wrote in his book “Gunning for Glory,” which is being serialised in the Daily Mail on Sunday.

“It’s in the top five of the most humiliating defeats I’ve suffered.”

Arsenal were thrashed 1-5 at home and away to exit 2-10 on aggregate last month, It was a round-of-16 tie from which they were dumped for the sev-

enth year running.“We were positively pre-

pared for the game. Arsene Wenger had revealed to us his game plan. He was very clear about his ideas -- and they were good ones,” the Germany star quoted as saying by Daily Mail in the book.

“Our intention was to go all out for Bayern’s central defender Mats Hummels; to prevent him from opening up the game which he does so bril-liantly. We wanted to force him to play the ball to Javi Marti-nez, who’s also a fine central defender but who isn’t great at

opening up the game. In this way we hoped we’d be able to stop Bayern from building up the play at an early stage and disrupt their rhythm.”

Arsenal have been poor throughout the season with catcalls of head coach Arsene Wenger’s resignation has ringed since long. “Of course I could go on about why our game plan didn’t work. I could look for excuses. But I’m not going to. What went on between us in the dress-ing room after the match is nobody’s business, nor is what Wenger considered our failures to be in his postmatch anal-ysis. The fact is, we all failed. We were all bad! We played a game that held a mirror up to our face,” the 2014 World Cup winner said. AGENCIES

Chapecoense win first title since air tragedyRIO DE JANEIRO: Brazil’s Chapecoense defeated Joinville 2-0 in the final of the Sandro Pallaoro Cup to clinch their first title since a devastating plane crash almost wiped out the club team.

Left-back Reinaldo opened the scoring on Saturday before second-half substitute Tulio de Melo doubled the hosts’ lead seven minutes from time, reports Xinhua news agency.

Seventy-one people died — including 19 Chapecoense players and most of the club’s staff — when the chartered plane in which they were trav-elling slammed into a hillside

in Colombia last November.There were only six survi-

vors, including Chapecoense players Alan Ruschel, Helio Neto and Jakson Follmann.

The accident occurred less

than two days before Chape-coense were due to play Colombia’s Atletico Nacio-nal in the first leg of the Copa Sudamericana final.

Chapecoense were later declared winners of the con-tinental tournament at the request of Atletico Nacio-nal, giving the team a direct berth in this year’s Copa Lib-ertadores, South America’s top club competition. AGENCIES

Leverkusen hold Bayern Munich

goalless in BundesligaLEVERKUSEN: A 10-men Bayer Leverkusen held leaders Bayern Munich to a goalless draw that saw the Bavarians’ lead at the top of the Bundes-liga football championship reduced to eight points.

Bayern, who on Saturday saw second-placed Leipzig crush Freiburg 4-0, controlled the proceedings on the pitch but they lacked in accuracy to overcome Bayer Leverku-sen’s well-positioned defense, reports Xinhua news agency.

Carlo Ancelotti’s men should have grabbed the lead after the restart as Leverkusen’s Tin Jedvaj saw his second yel-low card to receive his march-ing order after 59 minutes.

Despite one man down, Leverkusen stood firm and denied Bayern three points as neither Thomas Mueller nor Philipp Lahm were able to tap home one of the plenty opportunities.

With the draw, Bayern stay atop the standings with 69 points, and an eight-point advantage to Leipzig, while Leverkusen jump on the 11th place of the Bundesliga standings.

Leipzig ensured that they will definitely play in the UEFA Champions League next season

as they crushed Freiburg 4-0 to wrap up the 19th victory of the season.

With five games to spare, second placed Leipzig sit 18 points ahead of fifth placed Berlin and have a guaranteed top-four fin-ish, which ensures at least the UEFA Champions League’s play-off round.

Elsewhere, Hoffenheim defended their third place after beating resilient Monchengla-dbach 5-3 thanks to the brace from Adam Szalai. AGENCIES

Singapore Open men’s singles champion B Sai Praneeth (right) and runner-up Kidambi Srikanth pose with their trophies in Singapore on Sunday PIC/PTI

Seventy-one people died when the chartered plane in which they were travelling slammed into a hillside in Colombia last November

FC Barcelona’s Lionel Messi celebrates after scoring during the Spanish La Liga match between FC Barcelona and Real Sociedad PIC/AP/PTI

SPANISH LA LIGA

Bayern, who on Saturday saw second-placed Leipzig crush Freiburg 4-0, controlled the proceedings on the pitch but they lacked in accuracy to overcome Bayer Leverkusen’s well-positioned defense

Indian girls lack self-belief, working on it: Hockey coach

NEW DELHI: The results have been good of late but India’s women’s hockey coach Marijne Sjoerd feels the team lacks self-belief against higher-ranked opponents— a problem he is trying to resolve by keeping the side “busy”.

Sjoerd took charge of team last month and in his maiden assignment, the team won the Hockey World League Round 2 title in West Vancouver recently. The win helped the side advance to the next round — Hockey World League Semifinal -- also a World Cup qualifier.

“What I understood is that Indian girls lack self belief. They sometimes lose a match even before stepping on the turf. I think they consider themselves smaller when they play against a higher-ranked country,” the 42-year-old said in an interview from Hol-land. “I want them to be busy and think about themselves and the team, not about others. Thinking about others will only lead to wrong distractions. I want them to focus on their task and fulfill that in the best possible way,” he said.

India played the likes of minnows Uruguay, Chile and Belarus in Hockey World League Round 2 and Sjoerd refuses to read too much into the side’s successful performance in West Vancouver.

“We were the favourites in the tournament as we were the top-ranked side but indeed it was a good start. My main target is to reach the quarterfinals in the 2020 Olympics,” he said. “For that we have to think step by step. I always keep the big picture in mind and the girls have to focus on small targets for every ses-sion and tournament. We have to focus on small goals to achieve the big goals,” Sjoerd added. AGENCIES

Chief national coach Pullela Gopichand

The decisive move came in the 29th minute when Man of the Match Jerry Mawihmingthanga beat an offside trap to head past East Bengal goalkeeper Subhasish Roy Chowdhury, dashing their slender hopes of winning the title, which has remained elusive so far

B Sai Praneeth

mp Entertainment16 MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Monday, 17 April, 2017

NEW DELHI: Success has ruined more people than failure, believes actor Sonakshi Sinha, who says she neither shouts from the rooftop when her films do well, nor does she sit in the dark and cry over her movie debacles. “I have been brought up in a way that I treat success and failure in the same way,” the actor said while promot-ing her forthcoming film Noor.

“Somebody once said, ‘success has ruined more people than fail-ure’. So it’s very important to learn from mistakes and not dwell on them. When I had my huge suc-cesses, I never got on to a rooftop and shouted that my films are a hit; and in the case of failures, I don’t sit in a corner and cry about them.

“You move on and do your next film,” added Sonakshi. The 29-year-old, who is the daugh-ter of actor-turned-politician Sha-trughan Sinha and Poonam Sinha, made her debut with Dabangg, a film that starred Salman Khan.

Subsequently, she delivered hits like Rowdy Rathore and Holi-day: A Soldier Is Never Off Duty and a female-driven film like Akira. She also tried her hand at a different genre with Lootera, which gave her a chance to show her range as an actor.

She will next be seen playing a journalist in Noor, scheduled for a worldwide release on April 21. Sonakshi credits her past work for helping her reach a point in Bolly-

wood where she is getting to play title roles. “I feel my journey in Bollywood has been great. Some of the initial roles I did have put me in a position today where I shoul-der a film like ‘Akira’ by myself. I have played two title roles and it is really exciting to be able to do that.

“Honestly, the films that I have done in the past have put me in a position that I can do roles like ‘Noor’ today,” she said. She is also glad that the industry is chang-ing in a way that’s favourable for women.

“We are moving in a direction where films are being made with female protagonists, and it’s really exciting because, finally, good and amazing roles are being written keeping women in mind. I am very happy to be part of this change and to be able to do those kind of roles,” she added. Directed by Sun-hil Sippy, Noor is a crime thriller-comedy adapted from Pakistani novel ‘Karachi, You’re Killing Me!’.

The novel centres on Ayesha Khan, living in Karachi, her mis-adventures and finding a nice lover. However, the film is set in Mumbai. Asked about how this cross-cultural exchange between India and Pakistan can help, she said, “We are just here to entertain people and that’s our purpose.” The message she wants the audi-ence to take is: “Your voices are important. Youth has the power to make a difference.” IANS

I TREAT success,

FAILURE similarly

‘Somebody once said, ‘success

has ruined more people than failure’. So it’s very

important to learn from

mistakes,’ says Noor actor

MUMBAI: From Tanu Weds Manu to Anaarkali Of Aarah, Swara Bhaskar has given many critically acclaimed per-formances but the actor says she still feels like an outsider in Bollywood as it is tough to make a mark in the industry so soon. “It is not easy for anyone to make a mark in this indus-try. I struggle each day to do the work that I am doing. It is extremely difficult, as difficult as it could be in any profession.

“I don’t think I have still made a mark for myself. I still look at myself like as an out-sider. I like it that way. Getting a good role is a tough job,” Swara said. Even though, her acting skills are always applauded, Swara believes commercial suc-cess is as important as critical acclaim.

“It is very important for me because it’s very impor-tant for the producers to back great films. Box office success in a way encourages good con-tent, good cinema.” Swara’s last two films – Nil Battey Sannata and Anaarkali Of Aarah – were women-centric projects and the actor making female ori-ented movies is not a trend but a big change the Indian film industry is seeing. PTI

I still look at myself as an outsider:

Swara Bhaskar

NEW DELHI: Megastar Amitabh Bachchan, who shot for a cameo in the upcoming Akshay Kumar and Sonam Kapoor-starrer Padman, says he will appear as him-self in the movie. Amitabh shot for the R Balki directo-rial at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) – Delhi on Saturday.

“R Balki shoots a film with Akshay Kumar and Sonam at the IIT Delhi, one of the most prestigious insti-tutes of the world reckon-

ing and wishes that I make a small appearance as myself for a few shots,” Amitabh wrote on his blog on Saturday night. The 74-year-old also shared a few photographs from the set in which he can be seen alongside Akshay, Sonam and Balki.

Amitabh and Balki have worked together in films like Cheeni Kum, Paa, Sham-itabh. He also did cam-eos for the director’s other projects English Vinglish and Ki & Ka. IANS

Big B to appear as himself in ‘Padman’

NEW DELHI: Filmmaker Hansal Mehta has praised his Simran star Kangana Ranaut’s unapologetic and strong nature, saying a per-son with an opinion, like the actor, should be respected. Kangana’s unabashed persona may not have gone down well with many in the film industry but Mehta says he is not one of them. The Aligarh director says rather than being threatened by the 30-year-old actor, one must embrace these qualities in her.

“I never felt that she is too opinionated. I think a person with an opinion has to be respected. How many people have a strong opinion and how many people actually talk sense?

“She is somebody who is extremely focused, extremely intelligent. “You embrace a person’s qualities rather than be threatened by it,” Mehta said. Kangana’s co-stars and collaborators have earlier complained that the actor is a difficult person to work with. However, Mehta says she

found the actor to be a wonderful collabora-tor so much so that he is inspired by her talent and brilliance.

“She is the most wonderful collaborators that you can get. I had a great time working with her during ‘Simran’ I can’t talk about oth-ers. I can talk about myself and I embrace her fearlessness. I am inspired by her intelligence, by her talent, her brilliance and her success.” Simranah will release later this year. PTI

A person with an opinion has to be respected:

Hansal

LONDON: Actor Anne Hathaway says she still finds it hard to digest her Hollywood success and feels “baffled”. The Oscar-winning actor says she feels lucky to have received roles like Colossal in her career, reported Contactmusic. “The fact I’m, like, a Hollywood actor – I’m like, seri-ously? Me? OK, I really did not expect any of this. I’m constantly baffled. “It’s not like I’ve been trying to avoid mak-ing these movies (like ‘Colossal’), you just wait for the ones that really speak to you. And I felt very lucky because in my early career I couldn’t have gotten a movie like this made,” Hathaway says.

The 34-year-old star, who has 12-month-old son Jonathan with husband Adam Shulman, always believes in the movies she works on but says she also has other reasons for taking on a project than simply artistic purity.

“I’ve yet to make a movie that I didn’t believe in on some level, but somebody asked me, ‘Do you do it to advance your career or do you do it for love?’ I can’t claim artistic purity.

“I’m very conscious of making movies that will allow me to keep making movies, because I love this and I want to do it for the rest of my life,” she says. PTI

LOS ANGELES: Actor Mark Hamill choked up at several points as he remembered Hol-lywood icon and his friend Carrie Fisher at the Star Wars celebration.

During a special 40th anni-versary convention to celebrate the film series, the 65-year-old

actor recalled meeting Fisher in London ahead of their shoot together for the 1977 ‘Star Wars’, according to The Holly-wood Reporter.

The actor, who died on December 27 at the age of 60 after going into cardiac arrest, was best known for playing Princess Leia Organa in the Star Wars film franchise.

“I was just bowled over by her humour and her wit, how sardonic she was, how dark she was. Within 20 min-utes, she was telling me per-sonal stories about her mother

and father that I wouldn’t have shared with you if I’d known you 10 years,” Hamill said.

“As attracted as I was to her, I thought, ‘I couldn’t handle her as a girlfriend. She’s too much. She’s what you would call a high-maintenance rela-tionship’.” He then emotion-

ally revealed, “Let me tell you, when I go to sleep at night, there’s

never a day so far where I don’t think of her.” PTI

LONDON: Singer Kimberly Wyatt claims she was “made to be like an anorexic alien” when she was in the Pussycat Dolls. The 35-year-old singer and dancer alleges record producers were “constantly watching” the girl group to check they had not gained weight, reported Femalefirst.

“I was so conscious of my weight while in Pussycat Dolls. Record producers constantly watched us to make sure we weren’t putting on weight, and we were made to be like anorexic aliens,” Wyatt says. And it wasn’t just her pop star days that were tough for Kimberly. She added, “I was picked on when I was younger for having a flat chest. The singer, who has daughter Willow with her hus-band Max Rogers, is now worried that her little girl will grow up being fixated about her weight.

“It worries me so much. I saw two girls, who can’t have been older than nine, in gym wear run-ning in the park the other day, and they were talk-ing in detail about calories. It scares me so much, I don’t want Willow to need to worry about it,” she says. PTI

LOS ANGELES: TV host Ellen DeGenres’s wife Portia de Rossi has been cutting her wrists to cope with their marital prob-lems, reports aceshowbiz.com. Last week, the couple were believed to be on the verge of divorce and jealousy was the cause of the couple’s problems. The two are living separately in California.

“Ellen can’t deal when Portia gets attached to anyone else, man or woman. But it works both ways. When Ellen kisses up to her famous friends… Portia becomes consumed with self-doubt,” the source told National Enquirer newspaper.

“Ellen has been in counsel-ing, both solo and with Por-tia. Part of their therapy is to go on more date nights. That’s why they’ve been seen out and about more together lately,” the source added. IANS

Hathaway baffled by Hollywood success

Portia slits wrists over marriage

problems

Kimberly Wyatt was made to look

like ‘anorexic alien’

Hamill pays emotional tribute to Fisher at ‘Star Wars’ reunion