VOL. 13, ISSUE 179 | Friday, 29 June 2018 | New Delhi | Pages 16 | Rs 3.00

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In today’s paper

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Iran the ‘next North Korea’, India should re-think ties

NIKKI HALEY

PROBE INTO ‘INDECENT CLOTHES’ FORCES REPORTER TO LEAVE SAUDI PG11

CM KEJRIWAL AND SISODIA TO BE CHARGED; AAP CRIES CONSPIRACY PG3

‘CONSPIRACY TO KILL JOURNALIST SHUJAAT HATCHED IN PAKISTAN’ PG6

LADY PILOT SWERVED TO AVOID HITTING ANY RESIDENTIAL BUILDING

MPOST BUREAU

MUMBAI: Five persons were killed when a 12-seater aircraft crashed in a crowded Mumbai suburb on Thursday, the second air mishap in Maharashtra in as many days.

Those killed include two pilots and two aircraft maintenance engi-neers on board and a pedestrian in the Ghatkopar area where the plane crashed, police said.

The pilot and flight test engi-neer of a Sukhoi Su-30M aircraft of Hindustan Aeronautics Limited had ejected safely after it crashed near Nashik yesterday.

The plane, which crashed in the Jagruti Nagar locality shortly after 1 pm on Thursday, once belonged to the Uttar Pradesh government and was sold to UY Aviation, an official said.

The King Air C90 12-seater air-craft had taken off from the Juhu airstrip on a test flight, he said.

Civil Aviation Minister Suresh Prabhu has directed the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) to investigate the plane crash, an official said.

A team of DGCA officials rushed to the crash site for a pre-liminary investigation, the official said. It is expected that the detailed enquiry will be made by the Air-craft Accident Investigation Bureau

(AAIB), he added.As reports of the crash came

in, police, fire brigade and disaster

management teams rushed to the spot and bodies of those killed were taken to the nearby Rajawadi hospi-

tal in Ghatkopar, a civic official said.A fire brigade official said, “Our

control room got a call at 1.15 pm informing a plane crash. Our jawans were immediately rushed to the site to launch the rescue opera-tion. Four fire engines and as many water tankers were rushed to douse the fire that occurred after the plane crashed.”

Meanwhile, Prabhu has expressed profound shock over the air crash and directed concerned officials of the ministry to rush to the crash site and extend all pos-sible help and assistance, an offi-cial said.

“The aircraft took off from Juhu airport for a test flight. There were two pilots and two aircraft main-tenance engineers on board. All of them, along with one person on the ground, are dead,” a DGCA offi-cial said.

Moments before a small Beech-craft C 90 crashed at a Mumbai sub-urb Thursday afternoon the pilot swerved to avoid hitting any resi-dential building, saving many lives, tweeted former aviation minister Praful Patel.

The crash site was near to build-ings under construction, so there were very few people there at the time. Praful Patel praised the pilot, saying she had avoided a bigger tragedy at the cost of her own life.

Donations through poll bonds: SBI refuses to share details

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: The State Bank of India (SBI) has refused to disclose details of buyers of electoral bonds, political parties which have redeemed these and the bank’s reports sent to the government on their sales, call-ing it personal information held by it in fiduciary capacity exempted from disclosure, an RTI response shows.

The details provided by the bank shows that in March 2018, it sold bonds worth over Rs 222 crore while in April the number dipped to Rs 114.9 crore.

Mumbai saw maximum enthu-siasm among donors to purchase electoral bonds with Rs 122 crore of bonds being sold from the SBI main branch in the maximum city while in April it saw sales of Rs 53 crore, it said.

Activist Venkatesh Nayak, who filed the RTI application, contested the response of the SBI stating that denial of information about buyers of electoral bonds and receiving political parties is “patently erroneous”.

“The CPIO is treating both the buyers of EBs and the political parties as being in a “fiduciary relationship” with SBI! This is in complete viola-tion of the Master Circular issued by the Reserve Bank of India regarding the basis of customer confidentiality. Para #25 of the July 2015 Master Cir-cular,” he said.

The master circular said the scope of the secrecy law in India has gener-ally followed the common law prin-

ciples based on implied contract. “The bankers’ obligation to main-

tain secrecy arises out of the contrac-tual relationship between the banker and customer, and as such no infor-mation should be divulged to third parties except under circumstances which are well defined,” it said.

Nayak said when the SBI is in a contractual relationship with its cus-tomers, according to the RBI Master Circular, its CPIO cannot claim the protection of “fiduciary” connection which is a trust-based relationship and has nothing to do with the bank-ing business.

“This position has been clearly explained by the Supreme Court of India. More importantly, when the Finance Minister has repeatedly said that EB scheme is ‘engineered’ to make political party funding more transparent, then, is there not a duty to the public to disclose? Nayak said.

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Chartered plane crashes in Mumbai suburb; five killed

Monsoon reaches Delhi one-day early

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Monsoon reached the national capital on Thursday, a day ahead of its scheduled arrival, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said.

It would cover the entire country in next 2-3 days, Additional Director General Mritunjay Mohapatra said, implying that the Southwest Monsoon could cover the rest of the nation a fortnight before its scheduled date.

The usual onset date for monsoon in Delhi is June 29 while it usually reaches Srig-anganagar in west Rajasthan, its last outpost in the country, on July 15.

“Southwest Monsoon has further advanced into some more parts of Gujarat region, most parts of east Rajasthan,

some parts of West Rajasthan, entire Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi, remaining parts of west Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Pun-jab,” the IMD said.

“Conditions are favourable for further advance of South-west Monsoon into remaining parts of north Arabian Sea, Gujarat, Rajasthan and thus the entire country during the next 2-3 days,” the IMD added.

This year, the monsoon reached Kerala on June 28, three days ahead of its nor-mal onset date. It battered the western coast in the first half of the month.

However, after a brief lull, it made a steady advance.

The Southwest Monsoon gives 70 per cent of the rain to the country, where agriculture remains a significant contribu-tor to the GDP.

MOSCOW: The internet turned cruel for Ger-many fans on Thursday as online mockery swept the globe following the defending champions’ shock World Cup elimination.

A stream of memes and jokes flooded social media after a stunning 0-2 defeat to South Korea condemned Die Mannschaft to their earliest exit in 80 years.

“Don’t mention the VAR,” was a common refrain, while Brazilian media gleefully took their revenge for Brazil’s 7-1 humiliation by Ger-many at the last World Cup in 2014.

“AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...” read a tweet from Fox Sports Brasil that ran to 272 characters. In dramatic scenes in Kazan, Kim Young-gwon’s stoppage-time opener was ruled legitimate after intervention from the Video Assistant Referee, before Son Heung-min added the second goal minutes later.

“Germany’s fastest exit from Russia since 1943,” posted one user, while another tweeted a picture of Germany towels reserving all the seats on an empty plane.

Mexico fans were particularly delighted after South Korea’s last-gasp win allowed them to qualify for the last 16 behind Group F winners Sweden -- while Germany finished rock bottom.

Aeromexico offered a 20 percent discount on flights to South Korea, tweeting an image of a plane with doctored “AeroCorea” livery and the slogan, “We love you Korea!” Ryanair tweeted a picture of an unhappy Germany fan, offering “Loew fares” — a reference to German coach Joachim Loew. AGENCIES

German team trolled mercilessly by netizens

after shock WC exit

SAYANTAN GHOSH

NEW DELHI: No trees would be cut in the process of rede-velopment of seven colonies in South Delhi, Union Minis-ter Hardeep Singh Puri said on Thursday, as he also assured that the national capital’s green cover would not be damaged and steps would be taken to enhance it.

The housing and urban affairs minister said the agencies — the NBCC and the CPWD — entrusted to executing the rede-velopment project had been asked to rework and redesign the plans to avoid cutting of trees.

However, some trees may be transplanted at some other loca-tion, and the NBCC has floated

an Expression of Interest for the acquisition of tree re-location/transplantation equipment and engaging services of trained pro-fessional entities in this respect, an official release said.

Puri’s comment came after he held a meeting on the proposed cutting of trees with Delhi LG Anil Baijal, DDA vice-chairman Udai Pratap Singh, NBCC CMD Anoop Kumar Mittal, CPWD DG Abhai Sinha and HUA sec-retary D S Mishra, among others.

I chaired a meeting of all stakeholders where NBCC/CPWD have been asked to rework & redesign the plans. We will also go ahead with a compensatory plan of planting 1 million trees within the next

three months. Citizen groups will be invited to suggest loca-tions for transplantation, he said in another tweet.

Amid a blame game over environment nod for the proj-ect, Puri said all the permissions were earlier granted by the Forest

Department of the Delhi govern-ment on the recommendation of Delhi Environment Minister Imran Hussain.

The government had announced that it would be cutting over 14,000 trees for building over 25,000 flats for government employees in seven colonies of south Delhi. The pro-posal attracted heavy criticism from green activists, politicians and citizens.

During the meeting, a deci-sion was taken to plant more than one million trees, ranging from 8-12 feet height, in differ-ent parts of Delhi with NBCC planting 25,000; CPWD - 50,000; DDA- 10 lakh and DMRC-20,000, an official release said.

No trees would be cut for redevelopment of seven colonies in South Delhi: Puri

NEW DELHI: A day after the US abruptly postponed crucial dialogue with India scheduled in Washington next week citing “unavoid-able reasons”, Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the United Nation, said Prime Minister Narendra Modi “knows exactly why” and the reason had nothing to do with India.

“There is a very good rea-son. PM Modi knows exactly what. The rest of the world will know soon. It has noth-ing to do with India at all,” Nikki Haley told NDTV in an exclusive interview on Thursday.

“Things happen. It will come to light why this has been rescheduled. But the relationship between India and US has never been stron-ger in our eyes, and I hope in the eyes of India it is the same way,” she said.

On Wednesday night, US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo spoke with Exter-nal Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to convey his regret for having to postpone the “2+2 dialogue”, which had been scheduled for July 6. AGENCIES See P6

‘Good reason to postpone talks, PM Modi knows

why’: Nikki Haley

AGENCIES ASKED TO REWORK THE EARLIER PLANSIndian money in Swiss banks rise 50% to over `7000 crore

MPOST BUREAU

ZURICH/NEW DELHI: Money parked by Indians in Swiss banks rose over 50 per cent to CHF 1.01 billion (Rs 7,000 crore) in 2017, reversing a three-year downward trend amid India’s clampdown on suspected black money stashed there.

In comparison, the total funds held by all foreign clients of Swiss banks rose about 3 per cent to CHF 1.46 trillion or about Rs 100 lakh crore in 2017, according to the official annual data released on Thursday by Swiss National Bank (SNB), the central banking authority of the Alpine nation.

The surge in Indian money held with Swiss banks comes as a surprise given India’s continuing clampdown on suspected black money stashed abroad, including in banks of Switzerland that used to be known for their famed secrecy walls for years.

The Indian money in Swiss banks had fallen by 45 per cent in 2016, marking their biggest ever yearly plunge, to CHF 676 mil-

lion (about Rs 4,500 crore) — the lowest ever since the European nation began mak-ing the data public in 1987.

According to the SNB data, the total funds held by Indians directly with Swiss banks rose to 999 million Swiss francs (Rs 6,891 crore) in 2017, while the same held through fiduciaries or wealth managers increased to CHF 16.2 million (Rs 112 crore). These figures stood at CHF 664.8 million and CHF 11 million, respectively, at the end of 2016.

‘SUCCESS HAS NO BEARING ON DEPRESSION PG16

POLL BODY GETS TOUGH

EC asks Facebook to block advt 48-hr before polling

Rupee crashes to lifetime low of 69 against US dollar

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: The Election Commission has asked Face-book to examine blocking of political advertisement during the last 48-hours before polls in the country.

On June 4, at a meeting of the committee constituted by the Election Commission of India (ECI) to study provisions of Section 126 of the Represen-tation of the People Act, 1951, a Facebook representative agreed to examine providing a win-dow or button on the Facebook page for flagging complaints about violation of election laws, according to minutes of the meeting.

The representative also agreed to examine if the num-ber of Facebook reviewers attending to complaints against content posted by users can be increased from current 7,500 persons. The number, he said,

could be augmented during election period if the need arises.

Section 126 of the Repre-sentation of the People pro-hibits displaying any election matter by means, inter alia, of television or similar appara-tus, during 48 hours before the hour fixed for conclusion of poll in a constituency.

The official of the social media giant at the meeting stated that complaints could be lodged against the ‘con-

tent’ on Facebook and these are reviewed as per the global community standards. “If the content is found to be violat-ing community standards, they will be taken off,” he stated, according to the minutes of the meeting.

The action would be promptly taken if a complaint was made by the Commission or its machinery about viola-tion of any provision of the law concerning “contents on Facebook”.

NEW DELHI: The Indian rupee recovered marginally from its lifetime low to trade at 68.95 per dollar in late morn-ing deals on Thursday amid heavy month-end demand for the American currency from

importers and banks. In early trade today, the rupee fell to an all-time low tracking Asian peers, with weakening macro-economic fundamentals on the domestic front also weighing on the currency.

The dollar’s sharp gain overnight coupled with falls in Asian peers caused the drop in early trade, traders said, adding they were hopeful the central bank would step in to prevent further losses. MPOST

qNIFTY 10,589.10 (-82.30) qSENSEX 35,037.64 (-179.47) qDOW JONES 24,025.23 (-92.36) qNASDAQ 7435.33 (-9.76) qRUPEE/DOLLAR 68.79 (-0.18) qRUPEE/EURO 79.67 (-0.09) pGOLD/10GM 31,650 (+80.00) qSILVER/K 40,800 (-80.00)

Girls get drenched during Thursday’s downpour PIC/NAVEEN SHARMA

» Those killed include two pilots and two aircraft maintenance engineers on board and a pedestrian

» The crash site was near to buildings under construction, so there were very few people there at the time

» THE KING AIR C90 12-SEATER AIRCRAFT HAD TAKEN OFF FROM THE JUHU AIRSTRIP ON A TEST FLIGHT

CITY

ACTION AGAINST CBSE 130 TEACHERS 4

NATION

SURGICAL STRIKE: CONG, BJP SPAR 7

EDIT

COOPERATION IN PARLIAMENT 8

INTERNATIONAL

QUEEN ELIZABETH II GETS WAGE HIKE 11

BUSINESS

‘US DIKTAT ON IRANIAN OIL IMPORTS’ 13

SPORT

JAPAN REACH LAST 16 DESPITE LOSS 14

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BEYOND COLOURS 2: DISPLAYING THE RARE COLLECTION OF PAINTINGS

An art exhibition titled ‘Beyond Colors 2’ is going on in the Visual art Gallery, India Habitat Center, Delhi. The five-day exhibition was inaugurated by the interior designer Lipika Sood and senior artist Jiten Hazarika on June 29. Amrita Prakash, a well-known artist, and curator of this exhibition informed that artist from various parts of the country including Kolkata, Raipur, Jodhpur, Bangalore are displaying their best work at the exhibition, which will last until July 3. Water colour paintings, oil paintings, ink wash paintings, pastel color paintings, glass paintings, spray paintings and miniature paintings are the major highlights of the showcase. The main participants include Archana Singh, Harlin Singh, Sullu Mathew Chander Bose, Dr Ritu Jhori, Rashmi Jamwal, Nikita Mishra, and Jyoti Singh.

2 MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018mp around town

UMA NAIR

Uttar Raag is a show that comes as a tribute in mem-ory of Syed Haider Raza by the Raza Foundation and

it opens on July 1, Sunday. “We have chosen works that have been created by Raza Saab during the last few years of his life,” says Sanjiv Choube of the Raza Foundation. At the Shridharani Art Gallery, Triveni Kala Sangam, Raza’s works form an elegiac echo that brims the sacred chants of subtle gentility and tranquility.

The Paris dweller for 60 years, his last few years in Delhi were spent only painting and you see in these works a flashback of his many periods as if he wanted to traverse the terrain once more. Over the years, Raza formed his own subtext for modernism, cre-ating a  repertoire of symbols, colour tonalities, and defined spaces within a vocabulary of global sensibilities. 

In this show, there are hints of his early strokes, the images from nature and specifically the forests of Madhya Pradesh which retained a prominent place in his mind long after he left India in 1950. ‘Aar Paar’ and ‘Tree’ are two works that exemplify that early phase with the thickness and brisk-

ness of the strokes of the brush. Both these works reflect a vast compilation of memories manifested in the balance of both forms as well as formlessness because we know that he maintained a powerful bond with the forests, riv-ers and the parched earth of India. In those last years, with his fragile body, it was a deeply incandescent experi-ence to watch him painting with his long slender fingers not quite as firm as they used to be. In these few works, we see how he evolved from painting expressionistic landscapes to abstract ones and his geometric abstraction in the Bindu series. His experiments were influenced by the new medium of acrylic, with which he began his new approach and experiments on canvas. Tanmay, Arun Vasant and Aabha are three works that belong to his unfor-gettable Shanti Bindu series.

These three works have about them a resonance that speaks to us about dawn and dusk, they are about trans-lating from atmospherics a  unique energy that doesn’t just vibrate with colour but also reflects a subtle soft-ness that is bathed in the dynamism of light.  In his last years his work was deeply representational, the combina-tion of bright scorching colours and soft transparent  brushstrokes succeed

in invoking the vibrancy and spirit of both the sacred spirit of life as it tran-scends time and speaks to us about the life cycle, the  constant emanating core of creation reflected in his search and quest for the eternal Bindu.

In an interview spread over 5 days in 2015, Raza said:  “The Bindu is the seed, the germ, the core, and it gives birth to the fecundity of the world. When I create the black Bindu it is a  cosmic force, the sole energy for the universe or for instance. When you see my Bindu disturbed, it is because of the troubles and tribulations and the disturbance that you see in Purush Prakriti.”

According to Raza, “The point, the bindu, symbolizes the seed-bearing the potential of all life, in a sense. It’s also a visible form containing all the essen-tial requisites of line, tone, colour, ges-ture, and space.” The concentric circle becomes more of a central point rep-resenting concentrated energy as well as rippling of memories and moments that pass through the tide of time. The Bindu that manifested itself in vari-ous forms throughout Raza’s works were the genesis of creation as well as a focal point of meditation. This show is a must visit for art lovers and will run till July 10.

SMELL OF RAIN, JOY OF CHAI...Mister Chai, a first-of-its-kind tea restaurant in the heart of the city presents an all new monsoon menu with scrumptious delicacies to enjoy India’s favorite drink, tea. The menu is a kaleidoscope of regional dishes with a modern twist. The menu is an assortment of sweet to spicy dishes like Kutchi Dabeli, Aloo Tuk, Bun Chapli and more. WHEN: July 7 onwardsWHERE: Lobby Level, Shangri-La’s - Eros Hotel TIMING: 11am – 7pm

ACRYLIC ON CANVASCome and see the amazing artwork by the Manipuri artist, Oinam Dilip. The beautiful set of paintings are being made with acrylic colours and therefore, the exhibition has been titled as ‘Acrylic on canvas’WHEN: July 3-10 WHERE: Art Gallery, India International Centre, Annexe Lodi Estate TIMINGS: 11am- 10 pm

CELEBRATING MONSOONStep out of your home this Monsoon and enjoy the highest selling buffet offer at SMAAASH Cyberhub and Gurgaon Pub Exchange. Now, a wholesome meal and a range of fun games are available at just rupees 549. The mouth-watering buffet includes One Veg Soup, Green Salad Bar, One Compound Salad, Veg Hakka Noodles, One Chicken Curry Indian, Chicken Oriental and a lot more.WHEN: Ongoing WHERE:SMAAASH Cyberhub and Gurgaon Pub Exchange TIMINGS: 12.30pm to 3pm and 7pm to 10.30pm

DAYINDAYOUT What’s on Around TownIn remembrance of Raza

Over the years, Syed Haider Raza formed his own subtext for modernism, creating a  repertoire of symbols, colour tonalities, and defined spaces within a vocabulary of global sensibilities

Arun Vasant, 60x120, Acrylic on Canvas, 2013

Boyhood Days_Oil on Linen_24x24_PSA

Tree, 2014, Acrylic on Canvas, 100x100cms

With monsoon round the corner, bold colours are here to stay. With pas-

tels being a summer trend, the youth is trying different tones in

rainy season. Bold ones being a favourite.

Fashion designers share some tips on colours which can be trendy in this monsoon:4Maroon shade in outfits:

Maroon has been a favourite since time immemorial in all styles but this year maroon can be seen sported in not just the conventional maxi dresses but

also in jumpsuits, off shoulders, ruffles, cold shoulders and short

dresses as well. As today’s youth loves to experiment with fashion so maroon can also be seen sported in daily causal college wear.4Green shade: Green is the colour

of freshness and cool and perfect for monsoon. This colour always looks good

on most complexions. If you are warm toned focus on mustard, khaki and dark

green. If you are cool toned try bright green colour like parrot green. Try to combine green with bright colours like yellow and white. Add some solid colours to your outfit and watch the transformation.

4Peach shades: Peach is the colour which goes with all dark and lighter tones and a very cool choice for monsoon as it’s one classic shade that goes well with almost all styles so it’s here to stay this monsoon and for seasons to come. Extend the theme of the outfit through to your accessories and don’t forget to add wide brim hat in this season.4Cool magentas: The colour donned in

an off shoulder outfit is the best buy this sea-son. The best point about magenta is that it’s

one shade that looks extremely stunning in pictures and also it’s warm bold tone high-lights all the types of complexions very well. Also try magenta lipstick in monsoon which will increase your confidence level and is much prettier than others. Pair magenta dresses with orange, white and dark blue colour.4Chocolate brown: It was once a shade

that was seen generally in trench coats or boots but in today’s scenario it’s rather a trending shade in terms of its appeal with youth. Choco-

late brown maxi party dresses are a very classy coloured option this season.4Prussian blue or denim Ink blue: It

was earlier seen sported in denim attire but in today’s time this shade has become very popular in all styles. This shade can be seen commonly in party outfits or casual. The best styles in this shade apart from denim outfits are maxi dresses, 3D printed skater dresses and all types cold shoulder styles. IANS

Opt for bold colours this monsoon

HARD TO FIND a partner online? Rev up your education levels, as women are more likely to prefer edu-cated partners while dating online, a study of online dating behaviour of over 40,000 people has found.

The findings showed that women in the reproductive age or under 40 are more picky about the education level of men they prefer and seek the same level or higher in a potential mate.

Conversely, men in the middle-aged (above 40) tend to become more picky about their partner’s education level.

“It is quite an amazing way to look at human mating behaviour (internet dating websites like RSVP) because it gives us a really vivid snapshot of such a large and diverse age group (18-80 years) of people in a pretty uniform mate choice setting,” said behavioural economists Stephen Whyte, from the Queensland University of Technology.

While the education level of a potential mate mattered

more for both men and women in the years of peak fertility (18-30 years), mostly women had a clearly higher minimum standard for the educa-tion level they wanted in their mate across all age.

“Evolution favours women who are highly selective about their mates and in many cultures women have been shown to use education as an indicator of quality. This is because it

is often associated with social status and intelligence – both attributes that are highly sought after,” Whyte added.

The study, published in the jour-nal Psychological Science, stems from the largest ever behavioural economic analysis of Australian online dating behaviour, reviewing 219,013 partic-ipant contacts by 41,936 members of online dating website RSVP during a four-month period in 2016. IANS

Education can boost men’s chances of online dating

mp city 3MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Delhi-based Rohini forensic report did not not mention whether the cam-eras were tempered with or the clock was altered around the time of the alleged assault on Chief Secretary Anshu Prakash by AAP MLAs at Chief Minis-ter Arvind Kejriwal’s residence. When the police seized around 47 CCTV cameras, which were installed at Chief Minister’s residence, the time displayed on the CCTV cameras on the night of the alleged attack on CS Prakash was nearly 40 min-utes behind the actual time, a forensic report has con-firmed, ahead of the filing of the chargesheet in the case. A senior police officer privy to the investigation said the foren-sic report was received earlier this week.

On February 23, a police

team examined the CCTV system installed at Kejriw-al's official residence in Civil Lines area and seized the hard disk connected to the system for investigation. Fourteen of the CCTV cameras were run-ning while seven did not func-tion. It was found that there was a time lag of 40.43 min-utes with respect to the time of the alleged attack, the police had said and now the foren-sic report has confirmed. The Delhi Police is expected to file a chargesheet in the case soon. "We are at an advanced stage of investigation and the chargesheet is being pre-pared," the officer said without elaborating.

Chief Secretary Prakash was allegedly attacked during a meeting at Kejriwal's official residence on February 19. The police said Kejriwal was pres-ent when the attack happened.

CCTV cameras at CM’s residence lagged by 40 mins on assault night

CS ASSAULT CASE

ABHAY SINGH AND SAYANTAN GHOSH

NEW DELHI: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his deputy Manish Siso-dia might be charged by the police with criminal conspir-acy over the alleged attack on a top bureaucrat in Febru-ary. Sources say the police are reportedly preparing a charge-sheet based on the evidence and statements of many and it is set to be filed soon.

The Delhi Police is expected to file a chargesheet in the case soon. “We are at an advanced stage of investigation and the chargesheet is being prepared,” an officer said. The police had on February 23, examined the CCTV system installed at Kejriwal’s official residence in Civil Lines area and seized the hard disk connected to the sys-tem for investigation.

Anshu Prakash has alleged that in CM Kejriwal's presence, he was attacked by lawmakers of Delhi's ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). He complained to the police that he was beaten by two legislators as part of a conspiracy between everyone present in the room, a state-ment seen to point at the Chief Minister.

In response to the reports on preparing charge sheet against the CM and Deputy CM, the AAP slammed the Delhi police. "With full respon-sibility, the AAP states that no incident of violence took place on the night of 19th Febru-ary 2018 at the residence of the Delhi Chief Minister," said AAP chief spokesperson Sau-rabh Bharadwaj.

“Delhi Police has been planting all kinds of fictitious stories for last four months, but has been unable to answer a simple question that if the Chief Secretary was assaulted how was it that he was seen in

the CCTV footage normally walking out on his own from the CM residence? The truth is that a conspiracy was hatched to defame the Delhi CM and Deputy CM in a bid to desta-bilise the elected State Govern-ment,” Bharadwaj added.

The opposition Congress said the case is of "serious concern". "The truth of the case should come out and the people should know what is the reality and assault of CS in presence of CM and Dep-uty CM is an issue of serious concern," said Sharmistha Mukherjee, Delhi Pradesh Congress spokesperson.

CM Kejriwal and Sisodia to be charged; AAP cries conspiracy

AAP chief spokesperson Saurabh Bharadwaj said that a conspiracy was hatched to defame the Delhi CM and Deputy CM in a bid to destabilise the elected State Government

ROUSHAN ALI

NEW DELHI: A day after Delhi Power Minister Satyen-dar Jain's strigent warning over the depleting level of coal stock at thermal power plants, a gov-ernment official said the sup-ply of the fossil fuel improved slightly on Thursday but the sit-uation still remains critical. Jain on Wednesday feared a black-out in the city, saying the actual stock of coal for thermal plants at Dadri, Jhajjar and Badarpur could meet the requirements of only 1.63 days. "The situation improved a little over past 24 hours but, it is still critical," a Delhi government official said.

Power department's data showed the stock of coal had come down to 91,129 met-ric ton on Wednesday and increased to 1,01,985 met-ric ton on Thursday. The coal requirement of the three plants is 56,000 metric ton per day. Normally, a stock of 8,40,000 metric ton coal required to meet 15 days' need is main-tained for the three thermal power plants in Delhi-NCR. Jain has sought the Centre's intervention through a letter to the Union Power Minister R K Singh. The combined capac-ity of the three power plants that supply electricity to Delhi is 2,000 MW.

Thermal generation sta-

tions Dadri I & II, Jhajjar and Badarpur have been facing an "acute coal shortage" for many days due to non-availability of transportation rakes, Jain had said in his letter to the Union power minister.

This is the second time that the Delhi government has alleged that the Indian Rail-ways wasn't providing wag-ons for transportation of coal to these plants. In May, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had written to Prime Minister Nar-endra Modi, requesting him to direct the Railways to provide rakes for transporting coal to the power plants. The power demand in Delhi came down on Thursday with the onset of monsoon. The peak power demand was 6,118 MW at 2.57 pm on Wednesday. It came down to 5,671 MW at 3.33 pm on Thursday, State Load Disptach Centre data showed. The peak power demand this year touched an all-time high of 6,934 MW on June 8 and remained consistently above 6,500 MW for past many days.

Coal stock up at NTPC but situation

still critical

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The 9,000-strong non-executive staff of Delhi Metro Rail Cor-poration (DMRC) has threat-ened to go on strike from June 30 while shutting down services completely, if their demands are not met by then. Some of the non-executive staff of the DMRC have been dem-onstrating at a few metro sta-tions, including Yamuna Bank and Shahdara, since June 19 in support of their eight-point demand.

On Human Resource issues pertaining to a section of the employee in Delhi Metro, DMRC spokesperson said, “A meeting was held on Thurs-day at the office of the Regional Labour Commissioner (RLC). All the issues raised by the employees are under discus-sion and all possible efforts are being made to reach a mutually acceptable resolution as early as possible.”

The Delhi Metro Rail Cor-poration Staff Council had given a call to all members to join the agitation but not all have supported the stir. The non-executive workforce includes train operators, sta-tion controllers, operations and maintenance staff and techni-cians, and form a major com-ponent in the operation of the rapid rail network.

Some of the council mem-bers have been protesting over

a number of issues, including pay scale revision, modifica-tion of DMRC Staff Council as an employees union, proper guidelines for sacking of an employee and that too in extreme conditions.

The council said the demands have been sent to Delhi Metro authorities and Union Urban Affairs Minis-try. “Our first demand is that the DMRC Staff Council be changed to a DMRC employ-ees union as the council is not a constitutional body and so, it does not have any teeth. Other demands include implementa-tion of our Industrial Dearness Allowance (IDA) as per the 3rd pay revision scale,” the coun-cil's secretary, Ravi Bhardwaj, said. A senior DMRC official, when contacted, said: "There is a possibility of services shut-ting down if no agreement is reached, but we are hopeful of reaching a resolution."

He also claimed that dur-ing these protests over the

past several days "metro ser-vices have not been affected." Bhardwaj said on the first day of the protest many employees - from drivers to station con-trollers and other staff - wore black armbands to register their protest.

"Subsequently, when the DMRC did not take cognisance of our demands, we went on symbolic hunger strike, when many of our members did not consume food while on duty and demonstrated by sitting on platforms," he said.

"If our demands are not met by June 29, we will go on com-plete hunger strike and work in that condition, and drivers will drive trains in that condi-tion. And, if anything happens to our members or to com-muters then the DMRC shall be responsible for it," Bhard-waj said. "Even then if our voices are not heard by DMRC authorities, we will completely stop work from June 30," he claimed.

9,000 Metro staff threaten strike from June 30, services may be hit

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Delhi Uni-versity Teachers' Association (DUTA) on Thursday con-demned the government's plan to replace the apex edu-cation regulator University Grants Commission (UGC) with a higher education com-mission and said it will result in an increase in direct inter-ference by the governments. It is, however, not clear why this overhaul is necessary and how it will address the needs of higher education in a better way, the body said.

"The present structure is being completely replaced without providing a detailed study of its founding goals, achievements, its shortcomings and their possible reasons and corrective measures taken or required to improve the health of the UGC. Even as the gov-ernment had to shelve proposal of creating HEERA because of the opposition received, dis-mantling of the UGC to cre-ate a new agency looks like

a quick desperate step in the same direction," they said in a statement.

"Under the leadership of PM @narendramodi has embarked on a process of reforms of the regulatory agen-cies for better administration of the HE sector (sic). In a land-mark decision, a draft Act for repeal of #UGC & setting up #HECI (Higher Education Commission of India) has been prepared," Union HRD Minis-ter Prakash Javadekar tweeted on Thursday.

The Higher Education Commission of India would focus solely on academic mat-ters. Monetary grants would be in the purview of the ministry, according to the draft. "Less government and more gov-ernance, separation of grant functions, end of inspection raj, focus on academic qual-ity, powers to enforce compli-ance to the academic quality standards and to order the closure of sub-standard and bogus institutions are some of the highlights of the new Act,"

the draft says.The DUTA said that it is

also not clear how shifting grant functions to the minis-try will result in less interfer-ence. On the contrary, we fear that it will result in an increased direct interference by the gov-ernments, the statement added. "There seems to be an attempt to corporatise education sector by focusing on homogeneous, one-size-fits-all administra-tive models and best practices rather than allowing institu-tions to evolve them over time, based on their specific needs," the statement said.

The HRD Ministry has asked all educationists, stake-holders and the general public to give comments and sugges-tions before 5 pm on July 7 on the draft, which has been released on its website. The new Act is likely to be tabled in Par-liament during the monsoon session. The government was earlier planning a single regu-lator for technical education, national council teachers train-ing and the UGC.

DUTA slams plan to replace UGC with higher education commission

ABHINAV SINGH

NEW DELHI: The increase in mercury in summer times leads to an increase in allergic ailments and one of the routine occurrences is of conjunctivitis, a common reaction of the eyes to dust particles. Due to the escalating pollution levels, this problem seems to be present in the Delhi-NCR area all year round. The onset of monsoon is set to further aggravate the allergic problem.

“Number of patients com-ing with allergic conjunctivi-tis has significantly increased recently. Dust storm, high level of pollution and dry weather are the factors which have led to an increase in the number of patients coming with redness of eyes, with stinging and burning sensation,” said Dr Rohit Sax-ena, Professor, Ophthalmology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) who further elaborated that Children are more prone to allergic conjunc-tivitis during this season.

“We are observing an increase in the number of patients coming with allergic conjunctivitis. The predomi-nant symptom in allergic eye disease is itching which can be associated with redness and watering. Whereas, in viral conjunctivitis, patients usu-ally complain of stickiness of the eyes, burning irritation and redness. So, it is very important to differentiate the two as the treatment is different and also allergic conjunctivitis is not

infectious. Vernal-keratocon-junctivitis (VKC) is a serious condition may further lead to complex diseases like keratoco-nus or limbal deficiency which are dangerous to the ocular surface and may cause per-manent vision loss in extreme cases,” explained Dr Ikeda Lal, another seasoned Ophthalmol-ogist at Delhi Eye Centre and Sri Ganga Ram Hospital.

The allergy can become a serious menace if the symp-toms are overlooked and

proper precautions are not fol-lowed. “Precaution should be taken in order to protect eyes, especially during this season when the weather is hot com-bined with high level of pollu-tion. Avoid long hours in direct sun, use protective eyewear, drink lots of water, wash eyes and consult a doctor if symp-toms persist,” asserted Dr Sax-ena. Talking about the medical treatment of conjunctivitis, Dr Lal said, “Treatment is mostly medical, eye drops may need to be used for a prolonged period. Children are the worst-affected who keep on rubbing their eyes. Therefore, the habit of eye rubbing needs to be replaced with the habit of instilling eye drops."

Dust and pollution push allergic conjunctivitis cases in Delhi-NCR

NEW DELHI: With the arrival of monsoon in the capital, Delhi Lieutenant-Governor (LG) Anil Baijal on Thursday directed local bodies and other agencies to intensify vector-control measures. Baijal also directed authorities concerned to ensure coordination with neighbouring states in order to be prepared to tackle the vec-tor-borne diseases. The direc-tives were issued at a meeting that was chaired by the LG to discuss the status of measures taken to combat mosquito-borne diseases such as Dengue, Chikungunya and Malaria, and seasonal influenza in the city.

The meeting was attended by Delhi Health Minister Saty-endra Jain, North Delhi Munic-ipal Corporation (NDMC) Chairman Naresh Kumar and senior officers of the health and urban development depart-

ments. Three municipal com-missioners, Public Works Department, police, railway and Delhi Metro Rail Corpo-ration officials among others were also present.

The LG was informed that letters along with an advi-sory, including 'Dos & Don'ts', have been sent to various gov-ernment and private offices, buildings and institutions for prevention and control of vec-tor-borne diseases, according to a statement issued by the L-G office. "The LG has directed for intensification of vector-control measures by the field staff of local bodies (domestic breeding checkers or DBCs). "Regular house-to-house visits for checking and eliminating all possible breeding sites should be made, besides regular mon-itoring of DBCs by higher offi-cials," LG office said. MPOST

PIYUSH OHRIE

GURUGRAM: The rain on Thursday evening was set to bring a reprieve for citizens suf-fering from scorching heat and humidity but the city’s infra-structure again failed to cope with a few millimetres of rain. Like always, various parts of the city faced excessive water-logging, traffic jams and long duration of power outages. In a telling statement to city’s crumbling infrastructure, the newly built sector road near the IFFCO Chowk caved in for the second time.

With the works of Bad-shahpur drain not completed this year, the authorities have stationed 40 pumps to chan-nel out the water. Majority of these pumps will be stationed

at National Highway-8 . The Delhi- Jaipur highway bore the brunt of excessive water log-ging on July 29, 2016, when just 46 millimetres of rain stalled the traffic at the busy highway for more than 18 hours.

The Haryana government had planned to expand the

Badshahpur drain that would have allowed the flow of water into the Najafgarh drain. Like the previous year, a large num-ber of police officials will be deployed on the road to man-age the traffic. According to officials, 485 law enforcement officials will be deployed at 26

sites. The Gurugrm Metro-politan Development Author-ity (GMDA) has also set up a control room at Sector -29 where the officials can be con-tacted on 9999395748 for all the waterlogging complaints.

Even as the district admin-istration may be preparing to deal with the challenges expected during monsoon, most of the residents still seem dissatisfied with the work done. “You can understand the level of preparedness when even Golf Course road that is expected to have one of the best infrastructures in the city gets water-logged. While major projects may have their difficul-ties, what is stopping the offi-cials to clean the drains,” asked Rajesh Sethi, a city resident.

The power demand in Delhi came down on Thursday with the onset of monsoon

SAYANTAN GHOSH

NEW DELHI: The Delhi government on Thursday claimed that the green cover of Delhi has increased in the last four years. However, the CAG report has claimed that the green cover in Delhi has decreased over the years. The AAP also alleged that ear-lier Congress and now BJP is responsible for cutting trees in Delhi.

"The whole project of rede-velopment was planned by

Congress govt at the Centre which is now being repackaged by PM Modi as a smart city plan. This project was intro-duced by the Congress Central govt by the then Minister of MoUD Ajay Maken," said AAP chief spokesperson Saurabh Bharadwaj. He added that the Central government is work-ing on a project against which Aman Lekhi, husband of BJP MP Meenakshi Lekhi, had filed a petition in the High Court in 2014 by claiming that it will be extremely harmful to Del-

hi's environment. "Another petition was filed by Rajiv Suri in the NGT which also men-tioned the drawbacks of the project but the NGT straight away dismissed both the petitions by saying that the Environment Clearance was approved in 2012 and the lim-itation period for taking any legal scrutiny has expired," said Bharadwaj.

The AAP leader also said that as mentioned in section 11(a) of DDA, any master plan and zonal development

plan modifications can be executed by DDA. The Cen-tral Government claimed that the work of redevelopment is for the residential use only but the brochures prove that the redevelopment is done for commercial propose. "The res-idential land in Delhi is being used for commercial purpose," he said.

In response to this, BJP MLA and leader of the oppo-sition Vijender Gupta said, "AAP has not only lied to the public, it failed to ensure com-

pensatory plantation before felling of trees. AAP minister is answerable for dereliction of duty and must face conse-quences for failing to do his duty." He added that Delhi Govt paid about Rs 23 crore for raising and maintenance of plantation for 7 years till its successful establishment. The land was allotted by DDA. However, it failed to carry out plantation of 39,950 trees at Narouji Nagar and Netaji Nagar.

The opposition Congress

also said that the AAP is lying about the facts. Congress President Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday accused the BJP and the AAP government in the capital for cutting down thousands of trees in the past four years, calling it "madness".

"In Delhi, the BJP with AAP's approval has hacked down thousands of trees in the past 4 yrs for 'development'. Even children know that trees are critical to our survival and difficult to replace," said Gan-dhi on Twitter.

Green cover in Delhi increased in last three years: Delhi govt

Monsoon woes: Gurugram faces waterlogging, traffic jams

NEW DELHI: Environment Minister Imran Hussain today alleged the police refused to register an FIR in connection with felling of trees in the Net-aji Nagar in violation of a high court order, and wrote to city police chief Amulya Patnaik seeking his intervention.

Hussain had earlier this week said he received a com-plaint from environment activ-ist Vimlendu Jha that trees were being cut at the Netaji Nagar despite the stay by the Delhi High Court till July 4.

He directed the Forest Department to lodge an FIR against the people responsi-ble for it. But Hussain said the police were refusing to file an FIR in the case and sought Pat-naik's intervention in the mat-ter. He has also asked for an appointment with the police commissioner to discuss the matter. The proposal to cut tress was made for re-develop-ment of seven colonies in the South Delhi. MPOST

The onset of monsoon is set to further aggravate the allergic problem

Minister says cops refused to file FIR against cutting of trees

Intensify vector-control measures: LG to agencies

mp city4MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

CBSE orders action against 130 teachers over evaluation errors

Board declared both Class 10, Class 12 results in last week of May

PIYUSH OHRIE

GURUGRAM: There were four cases of rape in a single day including a five-year-old raped by a neighbour and a woman of Kenyan origin gang-raped after being offered a lift at MG road. In the con-text of a foreign organisation deeming India to be the most dangerous country for women, one of the richest cities in the country is definitely not doing any good to improve this dubi-ous image.

In just six months, the Mil-lennium city is all set to break the crime record that was reg-istered in the full year. Accord-ing to the police records, there have been already 59 cases of rape and 107 formal com-

plaints of molestation till June.What is more shocking and

disturbing is an exponential rise in crime against minors. In just six months, the city has witnessed more than 100 cases of sexual assault against minors.

In all, there have been 60 cases of crimes that have been registered under Pro-tection of Children from Sex-ual Offences Act (POSCO) in addition to 40 cases of abduc-tion, human traffickings and forced child labour.

Gurugram along with its counterpart Faridabad is lead-ing in terms of sexual crime against minors. In 2017, there were 106 cases of sexual crimes against minors while in 2016 there were 115. Not

only sexual crimes but the law enforcement officials also have to deal with rising number of human trafficking cases.

In 2017, 154 minors were kidnapped from the city out of which 115 were girls. From 2012 to 2017, over 1,062 chil-dren have been kidnapped out of which 677 are girls. Accord-ing to Gurugram police, the gangs from Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan are highly active in committing such crimes.

Lack of infrastructure like the development of proper helpline has also increased the troubles for the victims. While difficulties of getting through the police helpline number 100 are well docu-mented, a major setback has been the withdrawal of What-

sApp number.Acknowledging that safety

of women in the city is a major law and order challenge, senior officials of Gurugram police said, the manpower is being increased. Most of them will be deployed in the night. Strict instructions have also been issued to pubs and bars in Gurugram to ensure that no illegal activities should be allowed.

The new police commis-sioner of Gurugram, KK Rao, has already stated that he will want his force to be the most visible force present on the city rods than in the police sta-tions. There are also plans to develop six fast-track courts for the speedy trial of sexual crimes against women.

Sexual crime on rise in Gurugram as 4 rape cases reported in a single day

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Anti-Human Trafficking Unit of Crime Branch has arrested a 35-year-old man of Nigerian origin with illegal drugs worth Rs 1.5 crore in the interna-tional market. Police claimed that they have recovered high-grade heroin from his posses-sion. The accused identified as Obinna Fortune who is from Imo State in Nigeria has been arrested under the provisions of the Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act and the Indian Passport Act for not being able to furnish his passport.

According to Joint Com-missioner of Police (Crime), Alok Kumar, on June 25, the accused was arrested on the basis of an information from Vikas Puri. They recovered heroin worth more than Rs

1.5 crore in the International Market.

The team who made the arrest was formed under Surender Kumar Gulia, ACP (Anti Human Trafficking Unit). Obinna revealed that he and his associate and fel-low countryman Charles have been peddling drugs in Uttam Nagar and Janakpuri area for the past four months. "For-tune had arrived in Delhi on a tourist visa about five months ago. While residing in Uttam Nagar, he came in contact with a fellow countryman named Charles who arranged heroin to be supplied in the city," said Kumar. Fortune has not been able to furnish his passport as yet. According to police, the accused's passport was kept by Charles. Efforts are being made to trace Charles and locate the source of the nar-cotic substance.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

GURUGRAM: The Gurugram Metropolitan Development Authority (GMDA) is all set to introduce 200 buses, including air-conditioned buses, for public transportation in Gurugram this Independence Day. At present, there are around 50 Haryana Roadways buses that are operational in the city.

Not only the number of the buses in the city inadequate but also poor maintenance and regular breakdown the buses result in inconvenience to the commuters. The poor transportation system in the city has resulted in the residents relying on shared autos and private local buses. Lack of an effective public transport facility has resulted in the increase of illegal cabs plying in the city.

GMDA has begun preparations to find the bus depots where the buses will be parked. Four bus depots have been chosen by the public officials for this purpose. The areas being considered as bus depots are 13.5 acres in Kadipur, 4.6 acres in Sector 53, 12 acres in Sector 33 and three acres near Central Mall near MG road.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

GURUGRAM: After successful completion of developmental works at Golf Course Road and Sohna road, the Haryana government is all set to invest in Sohna road. The ambitious project that will be key to ensuring connectivity in Delhi-Mumbai corridor will have the investment put in by the state as well as the Central government. The total amount of investment in the projects is slated to be around Rs 1,100 crore. Besides extending the width of the road, there are also plans to build two elevated flyovers at the busy route. The project would be completed in one-and-a-half years and the work is expected to begin in July.

With Gurugram being the major point in the Delhi-Mumbai corridor, this is the third major project where the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) along with the state govern-ment will invest to revamp the city roads. The NHAI has already built a number of flyovers and underpasses at the city’s busiest points along the Delhi- Jaipur highway.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Facing flak over evalu-ation errors in answer scripts of Class 10 and 12 board exams, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has initiated action against 130 teachers in the country. Similar action is likely to be ordered by more regional offices against schools, teachers or coordina-tors where evaluation errors have been found, according to the board's officials.

"Letters of initiating immediate disciplinary action, including suspen-sion, have been issued to schools by the CBSE's Dehradun office in respect of 27 identified teachers or coordinators for the gross mistakes committed by them," the official said. He said action has also been initiated against 14 erring teach-ers in Chennai, 11 in Allahabad, seven in Bhubaneswar, six in Delhi, two in Guwahati and one in Trivandrum, and eight each in Ajmer and Panchkula.

"Five teachers from the Delhi region – three from government schools and two from private schools – are sup-posed to be put under suspension. Schools concerned have been asked to take the prescribed action," he said.

They have been held responsible for

major mistakes in totalling of marks in Class 10 and 12 board exam papers, the official said.

"The re-evaluation saw some stu-dents getting 50-55 marks more than what they had initially got when the results were declared in May this year. A detailed report is being prepared in the matter," the CBSE official said. The

CBSE had, on 1 June, started the pro-cess of re-evaluation for those who had appeared for the Class 10 and 12 board examinations this year.

The board had declared both the Class 10 and class 12 results in the last week of May. However, candidates who were unsatisfied with the marks they were awarded were able to apply for the

re-evaluation process.Maintaining that the most glar-

ing examples of miscalculations in the Delhi region have already been reported, CBSE officials said a detailed report regarding the matter is being prepared. The re-evaluation saw some students in the Delhi region getting 50-55 marks more than what they had initially got when the results were declared in May this year. In one case, a student, who had initially failed in Urdu, passed after re-evaluation.

The Class 12 marks are especially crucial as Delhi University conducts admissions based on the board exami-nation results. While such cases of mis-calculations have been reported in the past too, this is the first time that such action has been initiated.

The CBSE, however, maintained that the percentage of mistakes have come down. For instance, in 2017, a total of 20,162 students from the Delhi region applied for re-evaluation, and in 4.97 per cent cases, the marks were increased after re-evaluation. This year, 11,083 students from the Delhi region applied for re-evaluation, and marks were increased in 3.26 per cent of the cases.

ABHAY SINGH

NEW DELHI: After get-ting misled for several days, Delhi Police was finally able to recover the knife which was used by Major Nikhil Handa to kill the Shailza Dwivedi in Delhi Cantt area. The weapon of offence was recovered near Meerut-Muzaffarnagar High-way. The police also recovered traces of burnt clothes from the spot.

The investigators also found that the accused has deleted his chats, messages that were exchanged with the victim. The phones will be sent for a forensic examina-tion. "Some indecent materi-als were also recovered," said the police sources. Deceased's phone that was broken by the accused will also be investi-gated but the police suspect

that chances of data recovery are quite low since its moth-erboard is badly damaged. A senior officer, privy to the probe, said that a CCTV grab showed that when Handa was going towards Meerut, he had taken a detour on the Meerut-Muzaffarnagar highway. Police also recovered his clothes that he had burnt and will be send-ing them for a forensic exami-nation. The accused person's police custody is ending on Fri-day and the investigators are not likely to seek an extension

of police custody in the court. After killing the woman, Army major Nikhil Handa contin-ued to mislead the investiga-tors even as he was taken to different areas to ascertain the places he visited after the inci-dent. The police claimed that the accused had also planned to flee to Agra after the crime but due to awareness of topog-raphy, he choose Meerut for the hideout.

The victim's body was found with her throat slit near Brar Square in the Delhi Can-tonment area on Saturday. Ini-tially, the police was informed that a woman had died in an accident. But later, when they inspected the body, it was found that her throat was slit. The accused had allegedly run his car over her face and the body in order to make the inci-dent appear as an accident.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Fine quality Fake Indian Currency Note (FICN) has been seized by Delhi Police special cell when a team of Northern Range, Special Cell, arrested two key members of an international FICN racket. They have been identified as Praveen, a resi-dent of East Champaran, Bihar, presently residing at Vijay Enclave in Delhi and Sonu Chaudhary (25), from West Champaran, Bihar.

Fake Indian currency notes amounting to Rs 5 lakh in the denomination of Rs 2,000, have been recovered from the pos-session of the arrested persons. The recovered FICN appears to have been printed in a sophisti-cated printing unit.

Police received information that for last about six months the circulation of FICN has been revived by the members of an International syndicate after demonetization. A police team was deputed to develop the information. Both human and technical surveillance was mounted on the movements of suspected members of this syndicate. During surveillance,

it was revealed that FICN is being brought to India through Bangladesh and Nepal. It is being smuggled into Malda, West Bengal, through Indo-Bangladesh Border and also in bordering districts of Bihar through Indo-Nepal border by anti-national elements.

On June 23, specific infor-mation was received by Spe-cial Cell that a key member of the said syndicate would come near Sector-2, Rohini, to deliver a big consignment of FICN to his contact. A trap was laid that resulted in the arrest of the accused with high-

quality FICN amounting to Rs 4 lakh. Praveen disclosed that he procured FICN from Sonu to circulate it in the busy mar-kets of Delhi.

“On June 27, after an exten-sive search and at the instance of accused Praveen, Sonu was also arrested from West Cham-paran. High-quality FICN amounting to Rs 1 lakh was recovered from his house. He also disclosed that he used to receive the supply of FICN from Bangladesh via Nepal where it is smuggled from Pak-istan,” said Sanjeev Yadav, DCP Special Cell.

Fake currency notes again flushed into India via Bangladesh, 2 held

The accused Sonu Chaudhary and Praveen

ABHAY SINGH

NEW DELHI: Many laws related to the children are in English and sometimes it becomes difficult for the stake-holders like parents, govern-ment officials to understand the language as they are from Hindi background. For making it easy for them, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) is now working to provide the laws in Hindi.

The child rights' body has found that in many cases it is difficult for the stakeholders to understand laws as many of them are not well-versed in English. So, they are translat-ing the laws into a Hindi book-let which they will be sent to

police stations, Child Welfare Committee (CWC) and par-ents in Delhi as well as in other states so that they can under-stand the laws which are meant for the safety of children.

The commission will soon hold a meeting with the con-cerned officials so that they can brief them about the whole process. Yashwant Jain, mem-ber NCPCR, stated that the commission has been work-ing in this regard and soon it will come up with something substantive. The commis-sion had asked Internet Ser-vice Providers Association of India to monitor child abuse contents and stop such videos going on the Internet. A copy of the four-page letter is with the Millennium Post. The letter

stated that the internet service providers showing the identity of the child victim of sexual abuse is violations of JJ Act, POCSO and IT Act.

An official from the child rights' body claimed that many persons without knowing the law share the videos of child abuse on social media as they are unaware of the laws. The POCSO E-BOX of NCPCR has received more than 50 cases regarding Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act. According to the data accessed by the Millennium Post, from August 26, 2016 to December 8, 2017, there were 59 complaints which were reg-istered under POCSO and out of which 46 cases were dis-posed of.

NCPCR translating laws into Hindi for children's safety

NEW DELHI: A man alleg-edly assaulted his wife and his 11-year-old son inside a court-room of the Tis Hazari court on Thursday. The accused has been arrested by the police. Narender Saini (42) and his wife were present in the court-room along with their son for the divorce proceedings. The man assaulted his wife and the son in the courtroom after a heated argument. The immedi-ate provocation is not known.

“The man came to meet his son in one of the meeting ses-sions in the court. It was then he assaulted his wife and his son was also injured in the incident. He probably carried a sharp-edged weapon like a razor,” said a senior police officer.

The injured woman and her son were immediately taken to hospital for treatment. They were later discharged. MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: A Delhi-based journalist was brutally attacked in South Delhi's CR Park area. The victim was beaten up by a man and his relatives who live in the area which resulted in the injury near one of the eyes.

"The incident took place on Thursday afternoon when I was inside the car. They attacked me with the fist," said the reporter.

He further claimed that he had shifted to the place recently.

"They claimed that I delib-erately scratched their vehicle which was completely false and they started beating me merci-lessly," said the journalist. After the attack, the journalist went to the police station to report the incident.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: A man, who pushed his wife down the staircase under the influence of alcohol and injured her severely, has been sent to three-month imprison-ment by a Delhi court, which took a lenient view towards him saying he appeared remorseful.

The court awarded him a sentence of three months and 12 days, the period he has already spent behind bars during trial, for the offence of attempt to commit culpable homicide punishable under section 308 of the IPC con-sidering that the victim and her daughter had separated from him immediately after the incident two years ago.

"Convict has been found guilty for offence punish-

able under section 308 (Part II) of the IPC, which attracts punishment in the form of imprisonment up to seven years... The convict has clean records and it seems that he has mended his ways.

"Further, he appears to be remorseful. Moreover, the complainant and their daugh-ter had already left the com-pany of the convict. This court is of the view that a lenient view is required to be taken against the convict. The con-vict is sentenced to imprison-ment for the period already undergone (3 months and 12 days) by him," Additional Sessions Judge Vivek Kumar Gulia said.

According to the prosecu-tion, an FIR was registered on the complaint of the victim alleging that on April 16, 2016, her husband started abusing

her under the influence of liquor and when she resisted his behaviour, he kicked and punched her.

Before her daughter could rescue her, her husband pushed her off the stairs, due to which she suffered multi-ple fractures and injuries in her hands, face and head. The incident took place at his resi-dence in Dabri area of south-west Delhi.

The man had denied all the allegations claiming he had a verbal altercation with his wife, after which she acciden-tally slipped from the stairs.

The court, while holding him guilty, relied on the sole testimony of the victim saying she answered all the material questions "convincingly and no inconsistency, discrepancy or contradiction cropped up during her deposition."

Police recover knife which killed Major's wife

Nigerian held with drug worth Rs 1.5 cr

The weapon of offence was recovered near Meerut-Muzaffarnagar Highway

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Lt. Gover-nor Anil Baijal on Thursday stressed upon a structured mechanism for interaction between police officers and principals of girls' colleges/schools, and deployment of more security guards in and around such institutions to generate a greater sense of security among them.

While chairing a law and order meeting of the Delhi Police, Baijal stressed the need to have a structured mecha-nism of interaction between the Station House Officers (SHOs) and the heads of the girls' institutions for a prompt response in cases of need.

He also advised the Edu-cation Department to deploy more security guards in and around schools during girls' shift to make them feel safer.

The LG also reviewed the measures being taken by the police to curb the menace of mugging and other street crimes, among other things.

The Delhi Police made a detailed presentation on the preventive measures taken by them like identification of hot spots of crime, enhanced vis-

ibility of police in field and enhancement of community participation.

According to the police, 174 anti-snatching teams have been constituted and 877 snatchers have been appre-hended in 2018.

Baijal also stressed upon intensification of beat patrol-

ling on motorcycles as it serves the dual purpose of increased police visibility as well as greater area coverage in a short span of time. He suggested that community engagement initiatives like Eyes and Ears Scheme, YUVA, Sashakti, Neighbourhood Watch Scheme and Prahari be inten-sified to get optimum results.

On the safety of senior citi-zens residing alone, he directed that the police must register such people through an out-reach programme and conduct regular surprise checks.

The meeting was attended by the Delhi Chief Secretary, Principal Secretary (Home), Delhi Commissioner of Police, Director (Education), Direc-tor (TTE), Commissioner (Excise), Special Commis-sioner (Transport), and Spe-cial and Joint Commissioners of Police.

LG orders enhanced security at girls’ schools/colleges

Lt. Governor Anil Baijal

Man walks away with lenient sentence for pushing wife off stairs

Delhi-based scribe attacked

Man attacks wife with razor inside

Delhi Court

200 buses for public transportation in

Gurugram on Aug 15

Works on Sohna road expressway

to begin in July

mp nation 5MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

OUR CORRESPONDENT

SANT KABIRNAGAR (UP): Invoking 15th century poet-saint Kabir Das, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday accused the opposition of cre-ating unrest in society and joining hands for petty politi-cal interests.

“Those who imposed Emergency and those who were against it are now trying to forge alliances,” he said at his public meeting.

Modi was on a first ever visit by a prime minister to the non-descript Maghar town where Kabir Das, who preached against caste and religious dif-ferences, attained salvation.

“The lust for power is such that those imposing Emergency and those who had opposed it then are today walking shoul-der-to-shoulder, and searching for an opportunity to snatch power, he said.

They are not bothered about the welfare of the coun-try or society, but are con-cerned about their own welfare and their family’s interest,

Modi said at the event which marked Kabir’s 500th death anniversary.

“They want to deceive the poor, the oppressed and the deprived to fill their pockets, build bungalows worth crores and make their relatives own-ers of properties worth crores,” he said. “They think if there is unrest they will benefit politi-cally, he said.

Those who always talk of ‘samajwad’ and ‘bahujan’ are extremely selfish, he said in an apparent reference to BJP’s key rivals in Uttar Pradesh - the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Samajwadi Party.

Referring to the recent con-troversy over former chief min-isters being served notices to vacate their bungalows in com-pliance with a Supreme Court order, he said, “Those people had developed an attachment to their luxurious bungalows.”

He criticised the approach of the previous government in Uttar Pradesh when his BJP government at the Centre launched the Pradhan Man-tri Awas Yojana. Our govern-

ment repeatedly wrote letters but they did not give the num-ber of houses to be constructed for the poor. It was a govern-ment which was interested in its own bungalows,” he said.

“After Kabir, it was Raidas, Mahatma Phule, Mahatma Gandhi and Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar who

showed the way to eradicate social inequalities existing in society, he said.

Unfortunately, today an attempt is being made to politi-cise the names of these great personalities for vested inter-ests and to divide and break up society,” he added.

He also raised the issue of

instant divorce. “You have seen the approach of these people on triple talaq. Modi said Muslim women demanded removal of triple talaq despite threats. But political parties that indulge in vote bank politics for power were creating hindrances in the passage of the triple talaq bill in the Parliament.

They want a weak society for their own vested interests, and do not want to see a soci-ety free from evils.”

Lauding Kabir, the prime minister said he envisaged Lord Ram as an ideal king. Modi described Kabir’s imagination as democratic and panth nir-peksh (secular, denomination-neutral). Unfortunately some families claim themselves to be the `bhagya vidhaataa (sav-iours) of the people, and are hell-bent on contradicting the preaching of Kabir Das ji.” “In the name of poverty alleviation, they forced the poor to remain dependent on vote bank poli-tics. In the last four years, we have made utmost efforts to change this through various schemes,” he said.

Opposition creating unrest in society, cut off from reality: PM

PM Narendra Modi offered Chadar at Sant Kabir Mazaar and paid homage to the great saint and poet, Kabir, at Maghar, in Sant Kabir Nagar district of UP on Thursday PTI

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Six non-BJP parties may have attended the swearing-in ceremony of HD Kumaraswamy as Karnataka Chief Minister to present a united opposition face, but it does not mean that they will contest together in all states in 2019 Lok Sabha polls, JD(S) supremo HD Deve Gowda sug-gested on Thursday.

However, he favoured for-mation of a third front to take on the BJP at the earliest, saying there were clear “signals” from Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the ruling party to their cadres in states to be ready for Lok Sabha polls as early as in November-December.

“It is not necessary that the parties -- which attended the swearing-in ceremony of Kumaraswamy as Karnataka CM -- will fight together in all states,” Gowda told reporters. He was here to attend a meet-ing of a parliamentary panel on defence issues which got postponed.

Presenting a united front, top leaders of the Congress, TMC, BSP, AAP, CPI (M) and TDP had attended the cere-mony last month in Bengaluru.

Gowda said the Samajwadi Party and BSP are discussing sharing 40 seats each in gen-eral elections in Uttar Pradesh.

“In Karnataka, we will fight with the Congress despite hav-ing small issues with them,” he said. However, Gowda refused to comment when asked about remarks made by former CM and Congress-JD(S) coordi-nation committee chairman Siddaramaiah that the current Karnataka government will survive for only an year. “It is his feeling,” he added.

The seat-sharing for 2019 Lok Sabha polls has not yet been decided though there are rumours that Congress will fight from 18 seats and the JD(S) will get the rest 10 in Karnataka.

“So far, there has not been any discussion on this issue... Congress chief Rahul Gandhi and Kumarswamy will discuss and finalise that,” he said.

Gowda also said his party was willing to give away one Parliamentary seat in Karna-taka to its ally BSP. “In return, I will ask BSP to give one seat in Uttar Pradesh to Danish Ali (who is JD-S Secretary Gen-eral). In Kerala, LDF will give one seat to us,” he added.

The JD (S) leader said he will be meeting non-NDA leaders in “coming days”.

Noting that Modi and BJP President Amit Shah are indi-cating about holding simulta-neous polls, Gowda said there is a need to form a third front at the earliest.

Parties that attended HDK swearing-in may not contest together: Gowda

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Union Minis-ter of State for Parliamentary Affairs Vijay Goel on Thursday met former prime minister and senior Congress leader Man-mohan Singh to seek his party’s support to make the Monsoon Session constructive.

The session is set to begin on July 18 and end on August 10. The triple talaq bill is among the legislative items topping the central government’s agenda during the session.

When contacted, Goel said it is very important to have the Opposition’s support during the session, which will have 18 sittings with 68 bills pending in Lok Sabha and 40 in Rajya Sabha.

Out of the 68 bills in Lok Sabha, 12 are very important and of 40 in Rajya Sabha, nine are very important, Goel said.

The minister said he has requested Singh for Congress support to run Parliament smoothly during the Monsoon Session.

Goel said Singh welcomed the government initiative for reaching out to opposition par-ties and said it was the respon-

sibility of both the ruling and the opposition parties that Par-liament function efficiently.

Goel said the Budget Ses-sion was a complete washout as the productivity in Lok Sabha was 4 per cent and 8 per cent in Rajya Sabha.

He said this was “not a time for raising allegations” on each other but to think about maxi-mising the session’s output.

Goel said he will meet lead-ers of other opposition parties to seek their support.

Parliamentary Affairs Min-ister Ananth Kumar has said the triple talaq bill, passed by Lok Sabha and pend-ing in Rajya Sabha, would be among the priorities of the government.

He had said the govern-ment would push for consti-tutional status for the National Commission for OBCs. The National Commission for Med-ical Education Bill and the transgender persons bill would also be taken up.

Goel meets Manmohan Singh, seeks Cong support for Monsoon Session OUR CORRESPONDENT

BENGALURU: Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister G Parameshwara on Thursday said that differences between the ruling coalition partners, if any, would be discussed and resolved at a Congress-JD(S) coordination committee meet-ing, which is likely to be held here on July 1.

On the raging controversy over former Chief Minister Sid-daramaiah’s remarks doubting the longevity of the coalition government, Parameshwara, who is also the Pradesh Con-gress chief said, the issue was left to the party high command.

“There is a possibility that the coordination committee will be meeting on July 1, and anything related to the differ-ences between the two parties’ leadership will be discussed, and we will resolve all those issues to strengthen the pres-ent coalition government,” he told reporters here.

Stating that no discussion took place regarding any state-ments by anybody including “our leader” Siddaramaiah at his meeting today with Con-gress ministers, he said, “All that is left to the party high command...”

A video showing Siddara-

maiah purportedly expressing doubts over the longevity of the JD(S)-Congress govern-ment had surfaced on Tues-day, adding to the strains in the coalition.

Parameshwara also accused the BJP of attempting to desta-bilise the coalition government and said, “It is not going to be possible.”

He said, “Whatever lit-tle murmurs (are there in the coalition), the BJP is trying to magnify it and trying to desta-bilise our coalition. I can tell them, it is not going to be pos-sible for them. We are very strong in our coalition. Initial little hiccups will be there... we will resolve them.”

“It (differences) is not something on policy matters... it is something about issues, and we will resolve it. I can assure the people of Karnataka of a strong coalition govern-ment,” he added.

Discordant voices have emerged from the Congress and the JD(S) on a host of issues, including presentation of the budget, as Siddaramaiah who held finance portfolio in the previous government, had recently said there was no need for a fresh budget and insisted that a supplementary budget would do.

A video also had surfaced on Sunday, purportedly show-ing Siddaramaiah expressing his displeasure to a few Con-gress MLAs over presentation of a fresh budget.

Parameshwara said the main objective of both the Congress and the JD(S) coming together was to provide good governance and carry on pro-people programme, including the farm loan waiver.

He said the budget would be presented on July 5 and any new programmes or alloca-tion of funds for them would be decided then.

Parameshwara rejected the view that Siddaramaiah’s meet-ing with several MLAs and leaders was a show of strength, pointing out that he too had visited him at the nature cure hospital and discussed the party matters.

Asked about the next round of Cabinet expansion, he said it

has to be discussed at the high command level and with the Chief Minister, and six vacan-cies from the Congress and one from the JD(S) would be filled at the earliest.

Prior to the expansion, posts in key boards and cor-porations would be filled up with legislators, discussions on which have already begun.

Parameshwara also said as the party president, he has given instructions that no one other than those holding responsible positions, whether in the government or the party, should make any statements.

“Siddaramaiah is our leader, he is the coordination com-mittee chief, also CLP leader. Whatever statements he makes, he makes it with the responsi-bility. Let others not make any statements twisting his state-ments... as it may give different meaning,” he added.

On his meeting with min-isters, Parameshwara said they held discussions about prepa-ration for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, strategies to be adopted, finding a suitable candidate and also to coordinate between dif-ferent levels of the party.

Ministers have suggested that the district in-charge min-isters had to be immediately decided.

‘Cong-JD(S) ‘differences’ would be resolved’

JATIN TAKKAR

PURULIA: Lashing out at Tri-namool Congress government in West Bengal for “unleash-ing violence” on political rivals, BJP chief Amit Shah on Thurs-day said sacrifice of his party workers will not go waste and it will win 22 of the state’s 42 Lok Sabha seats in 2019.

Addressing a rally here, he said if people of Bengal “want to stop the illegal immigration from Bangladesh then they have to dethrone the Mamata-led TMC government.”

Shah attacked the state government for unleashing violence in the state and said that the people who are used to listening Rabindra sangeet are now hearing the noise of bombs.

“Violence has never been the culture of Bengal. This is a state of great personalities such as Gurudev Rabindra Nath Tagore, Bankim Chan-dra Chattopadhya among oth-ers. And you all can see what Mamata has done to this state.”

Shah, who earlier in the day visited the families of the BJP workers who were alleg-edly killed in the political vio-lence, said their sacrifice will not go waste.

“More than 20 of our party workers were killed in the state in recent past. Their sacrifice will not go waste. I challenge Mamata Banerjee that we will dethrone you in coming days,” he said. He said the next gen-eral elections will lay the foun-dation stone for change in the state and the party will win 22 Lok Sabha seats. PTI

BJP will win 22 Lok Sabha seats in West Bengal: Shah

OUR CORRESPONDENT

LUCKNOW: BSP chief May-awati on Thursday accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of indulging in “politics of vote bank” by remembering Saint Kabir Das ahead of 2019 gen-eral elections.

“When the Lok Sabha elec-tions are just round the corner, the prime minister is remem-bering Kabir Das... Is it not petty politics of vote bank,” the BSP president said.

Mayawati ridiculed Modi’s visit to the ‘nirvan sthal’, the mausoleum of Kabir in Maghar earlier in the day where he held a public rally and laid the foun-dation stone of an academy

named after 15th century mys-tic poet. “Kabir Das is in the hearts of people... BJP should desist from indulging in poli-tics for gaining cheap public-ity,” the BSP chief said.

The former UP chief min-ister further alleged that mas-sive funds were spent on Modi’s event at Maghar, where Kabir breathed his last and was buried.

“For laying the foundation stone of the Kabir Das acad-emy to be set up at a cost of Rs 24 crores, almost as much money was spent on the func-tion and its publicity by the BJP,” she said.

The programme was an effort to hoodwink the people

of the backward eastern region of the state, she added.

“What happened to the big dreams of achchey din and promises specially made by Narendra Modi before the last Lok Sabha elections,” she asked.

Mayawati said that it was her government which had created a new district in hon-our of Kabir and proposed the idea of dividing the state into four parts to ensure overall development.

Development of the state’s eastern region was not possible without the creation of a sepa-rate eastern part for which her government had got a resolu-tion passed which is still pend-ing with the Centre, she said.

PM invoking Saint Kabir for political gains: Mayawati

OUR CORRESPONDENT

BHUBANESWAR: The Odi-sha Police on Thursday said “some people” had breached the security cordon during President Ram Nath Kovind’s visit to the Puri Jagannath Tem-ple with his wife on March 18.

The statement by Puri Superintendent of Police Sar-thak Sarangi comes a day after the state government denied receipt of any letter from the Rashtrapati Bhavan regard-ing the alleged misconduct of servitors in the 12th century shrine. A section of the media had reported that the Rash-trapati Bhavan wrote to the temple administration, alleg-ing inappropriate behaviour by servitors outside the sanctum sanctorum of the temple

Sarangi said the district collector of Puri, ahead of the President’s visit, was asked to ensure that no servitor goes close to the First couple or requests them to sign on any book during their visit to the temple. “Though the temple administration had informed the servitors about the instruc-tion, some people tried to go close to the President by breaching the security cordon.

We had submitted a report to the temple administration in this connection,” Sarangi said.

However, the minutes of the temple management com-mittee’s March 20 meeting, which had been in circulation on social media, mentioned that the Rashtrapati Bhavan expressed displeasure over the conduct of servitors.

It also said some servitors allegedly milled around Savita Kovind, while she was offer-ing prayers inside the temple’s sanctum sanctorum, leading to occasional jostling.

Sources in the tem-ple administration, in their defence, said the March 20 meeting might have dis-cussed the matter, based on a police report, which suggested that the security cordon was breached during the First cou-ple’s visit. The president of the Suar-Mahasuar Nijog (servi-tors’ organisation), Damo-dar Mahasuar, on Thursday lodged a complaint at the Sing-hadwara PS against Puri Col-lector Arvind Agarwal and former Shree Jagannath Temple Administration (SJTA) chief Pradeep Jena, accusing them of trying to defame the servi-tors of the temple.

‘Security cordon was breached during First Couple’s visit to Puri’

NEW DELHI: Congress chief Rahul Gandhi on Thurs-day hit out at the BJP and the AAP over felling of trees in the national capital for a redevel-opment project and called for fighting this madness .

Taking to Twitter, he said even children know the impor-tance of trees in life and urged people to stand by the Con-gress against it. In Delhi, the BJP with AAP's approval has hacked down thousands of trees in the past 4 years for development. Even children know trees are critical to our survival ...Stand with the Con-gress and together let's fight this madness, he said. MPOST

Rahul hits out at AAP, BJP over redevelopment project in Delhi

NEW DELHI: The Minis-try of External Affairs (MEA) on Thursday said it has not received any “formal request” for Congress President Rahul Gandhi’s visit to Kailash Man-sarovar in China’s Tibetan region.

“We have not received any formal request for his visit to the Tibetan Autonomous region in China,” MEA Spokes-person Raveesh Kumar said.

Last week, the Congress had said that Gandhi was yet to receive a response from the government to his request to undertake the Kailash Mana-soravar Yatra.

Addressing a rally here on April 29, Gandhi had announced that he would go on

a pilgrimage to Kailash Mansa-rovar after the May 12 assembly polls in Karnataka.

He had made the announce-ment three days after an air-craft in which he was travelling from Delhi to Karnataka devel-oped technical snag. Kumar said Gandhi can visit Kailash Mansarovar either through the MEA-organised route or through a private route.

He said the MEA has not received any communication for the second option as well.

Known for its religious val-ues and cultural significance, Kailash Manasarovar Yatra, organised by the Ministry of External Affairs, is undertaken by hundreds of people every year. MPOST

Kailash Mansarovar visit: ‘No formal request from Rahul’

K J M VARMA

BEIJING: A Chinese military delegation will shortly visit India, as a major follow up to the informal summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping, a defence ministry spokesper-son said here on Thursday.

The delegation of the Chi-nese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) will be headed by Major General Liu Xiaowu, Deputy Commander of China’s West-ern military region, Defence spokesman Colonel Wu Qian said. He said both sides were currently finalising the dates for the visit, adding that Gen-eral Liu would also be visiting

Pakistan. “During the visit, he will have meetings with mili-tary leaders of both the coun-tries and relevant leaders concerning border defence and controls and as well as coop-eration at the theatre level,” he said. The newly-formed West-ern Theatre Command of the PLA guards the 3,488-km long Line of Actual Control (LAC) with India. About the impact of the Wuhan summit on military ties, Colonel Wu said China and India are neighbours set by nature.

He said the friendly coop-eration between the countries can be traced back to the intro-duction of Buddhism to China and travel of famous Buddhist

monk Xuanzang to India.“The militaries of India and

China are willing to imple-ment the important agreement reached between the two lead-ers in the development bilat-eral relations,” he said. “We are willing foster strategic mutual trust with India and promote win win cooperation to manage differences and disputes of the borders,” he said. China had on June 1 announced the visit of its military delegation to India, the first since the 73-day military standoff at Dokalam last year, that caused major disruption in relations. Subsequently both sides made efforts to improve ties leading up to the Wuhan summit. PTI

Chinese military delegation to shortly visit India: Official LUCKNOW: UP Congress

chief Raj Babbar on Thursday said in order to defeat the BJP in the 2019 Lok Sabha elec-tions, division of opposition votes must not take place in the state.

On speculation of Congress forming an alliance with the Samajwadi Party (SP) in Uttar Pradesh, Babbar said: “Our party believes that for defeat-ing the BJP, division of votes should not take place. We tried this in Gorakhpur and Phool-pur (bypolls).” “In Kairana, we never sought any cooperation despite the fact that we had 2.5 lakh votes. Our aim was to defeat the BJP. We moved a step backward and never took credit for it,” he added.

However, Babbar noted that

the experiment had failed in the 2017 Assembly polls.

“In the 2017 UP Assembly polls it was an experiment with the aim of defeating the BJP. The experiment was not suc-cessful,” he said.

Babbar stressed that the final decision on the alliance will be taken by the party high command which will be acceptable to party workers in the state and across the coun-try. Meanwhile, convenor of the communication depart-ment of the Congress Priyanka Chaturvedi accused UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath of attempting to stoke a contro-versy for refusing to wear a cap offered to him at the mau-soleum of Saint Kabir Das in Maghar last evening. MPOST

‘Must prevent division of votes to defeat BJP in 2019’

MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

KAMALA MILLS: FIRE OFFICER GETS BAILMUMBAI: The Bombay High Court on Thursday granted bail to a Mumbai Fire Brigade officer, who was arrested in the Kamala Mills fire case. Fire Of-ficer Rajendra Patil was arrested, along with others, following the blaze at two roof-top restaurants in the Kamala Mills compound in central Mumbai in Decem-ber last year.

COMMISSION AGENT SHOT DEADLUDHIANA: A commission agent was shot dead al-legedly by a motorcycle-borne youth at Salem Tabri locality here on Thursday, police said. According to an eyewitness, the incident took place when Gharnjit Singh Chaudhry was sitting in a shop. Chaudhry was rushed to the Christian Medical College and Hospital, where he was declared brought dead, police said.

ED FILES PROSECUTION COMPLAINTMUMBAI: The Enforcement Directorate on Thursday said it has filed a prosecution complaint before a special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court here against Gitanjali Gems owner Mehul Choksi in connection with the multi crore Punjab Na-tional Bank (PNB) fraud case, the agency said.The complaint charged Choksi and 13 others - eight individuals and five companies - under section 4 of the Act for the offence of money laundering.

MINOR RAPED AFTER BEING ABDUCTEDMANDSAUR (MP): An eight-year-old girl was al-legedly raped by a man, who abducted her from outside her school here, police said on Thursday. The incident took place on Tuesday evening and the accused, identified as Irfan alias Bhaiyu (20), was arrested late last night, a police official said.

4 HELD FOR ‘KILLING’ PC’S KINCOIMBATORE: Four persons, arrested in connection with the killing of a relative of former Union minister P Chidambaram, were on Thursday sent to a 15-day judicial custody by a court in neighbouring Tirupur. Gouthaman, Vimal, Manibharathi and Murthy were arrested for abducting and killing C Sivamurthy, a Tirupur-based knitwear exporter, near Vellore.

`50K FOR INFO ON ABDUCTED COPSKHUNTI: The Khunti district administration on Thurs-day announced a reward of Rs 50,000 for those giving information about the whereabouts of three policemen, who were abducted from BJP MP Karia Munda’s residence at Anigada-Chandihdih in the district recently. We are continuing with the search operation, Aswini Kumar Sinha, SP of Khunti, said.

NATION BRIEFS

mp nation6

AIRCEL-MAXIS CASE

OUR CORRESPONDENT

SRINAGAR: Srinagar, Jun 28 (PTI) Cracking the case within a fortnight, the Jammu and Kashmir Police on Thursday said it had “tangible evidence” to establish that conspiracy to kill veteran journalist Sujaat Bukhari was hatched by cad-res of Lashkar-e-Taiba terror outfit in Pakistan and executed by its terrorists based in Kash-mir which included Naved Jatt, who escaped from police cus-tody in February.

Giving details of the evi-dence collected, Inspector Gen-eral of Police (Kashmir range)

Swayam Prakash Pani told reporters that the killers were identified as Jatt, a Pakistani national, Muzzafar Ahmad and Azad Malik, residents of south Kashmir, who had carried out the plan to kill Bukhari on June 14 when he was coming out of his office. The IGP said dur-ing investigations, it was found that there was a series of social media campaign in which online platforms were used which were intimidating at times. “Investigation has estab-lished that there was campaign in certain social media plat-form against Shujaat Bukhari spreading hate campaign, mali-

cious and intimidating content against him like ‘Kashmirfight.wordpress.com’ and facebook account ‘Kadwa such Kashmir’ and twitter handler ‘Ahmad Khalid’, ahmadkhalid@313.

“During investigation with the cooperation of service pro-viders tangible evidence has been collected to establish that individuals behind it belong to Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist organisation and all the con-tent on social media was posted from Pakistan,” Pani said.

The person running these two social networking sites has been identified as Sajjad Gul, who had managed to flee India using passport that had been “fraudulently” obtained by the accused. Gul, a resident of Sri-nagar, had earlier been arrested

by Delhi police in 2003 and he had served sentence also. Later, he resumed his eduction and completed Master’s in Business Administration from Jaipur before returning to Srinagar. He was arrested by Kashmir police in 2016 for another ter-ror related case and was subse-quently released on bail.

“We will be approaching the Interpol for a Red Cor-ner Notice against Gul after obtaining a non-bailable war-rant against him from the local court,” he said.

Immediately after the killing of Bukhari, a Special Investigation Team headed by Deputy Inspector General (Central Kashmir Region) V K Birdi, was tasked to carry out the probe under the overall

supervision of the IG Kashmir.Pani said the investigation

has so far established that this “terror crime” was committed by “proscribed terror organisa-tion LeT. The conspiracy was hatched in Pakistan and exe-cution was done by the three accused” and added it was an important case and the investi-gators are going to focus on all the evidence they have.

“There will also be a situ-ation where transfer of evi-dence has to be done through the mutual legal assistance treaty,” he said. Asked about the involvement of another sus-pect Zubair Qayoom, who was arrested two days after the 14 June incident, the IGP said at this stage his role is also being investigated.

‘Conspiracy to kill journalist Shujaat hatched in Pakistan’

The suspects in senior journalist Shujaat Bukhari’s murder case PTI

Inspector General of Police SP Pani addresses a press conference to release the identity of four LeT cadres in Srinagar on Thursday PTI

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: A confidential memo signed by a senior officer of the Cabinet Secretariat, con-taining “very sensitive materi-als”, has prompted the Supreme Court to give a free hand to the Centre to look into the “serious” allegations against ED’s Joint Director Rajeshwar Singh, who is probing the Air-cel-Maxis deal case.

A vacation bench of Jus-tice Arun Mishra and Sanjay Kishan Kaul observed that the memo, placed before it by the Centre in a sealed cover yester-day, has “given rise to at least a conclusion that the allegations are serious in nature”.

“However, it has been averred that very sensitive

materials have come into the possession of the Government for which leave was sought to place the same in a sealed cover before this court, which is in the form of a memo dated June 26,

2018 duly signed by the Joint Secretary of Cabinet Secretar-iat,” the bench said in its order which was uploaded on the apex court’s website on Thursday.

“It is averred in the affidavit (by the Centre) that the com-plaints need further and thor-ough investigation. There is allegation of amassing wealth by respondent no. 3 (Singh) in the names of relatives. Same is required to be investigated. The

averment casts serious cloud over respondent no.3 (Singh),” the bench noted.

The apex court modified its earlier order in which it had said that no action should be initiated against Enforcement Directorate (ED) officer Singh by any other authority.

The Centre, in its affidavit, told the court that certain alle-gations were made against him on earlier occasions which had resulted in “discreet enquiry”, but the matter was later closed.

“Suffice it to say at this stage that we would not like to com-ment on that material placed before us. On perusal of the same, it has given rise to at least a conclusion that the allegations are serious in nature,” the court said in its order.

“We are of the view that faced with the aforesaid mate-rial (not really material in the petition), it would be appro-priate to direct that the gov-ernment is free to look into the material found against the third respondent (Singh) and the same can be inquired into by the government despite the interim orders of this court dated May 1, 2014 and Novem-ber 1, 2017 and to that extent, the interim orders stand modi-fied,” it said.

The bench also said that since a charge sheet has already been filed in the Aircel-Maxis case, “it will be the call of the government authorities” as to whether Singh has any further role to play in the matter or in the probe and trial.

Memo containing sensitive materials prompted Apex court to pass order

Amarnath Yatra begins from both Baltal, Pahalgam routesOUR CORRESPONDENT

SRINAGAR: The annual Ama-rnath Yatra to 3,880-metre high cave shrine in south Kashmir Himalayas started from both Baltal and Pahalgam routes on Thursday after delay of several hours due to heavy rain in the morning.

“The yatra began from Baltal base camp as the first batch of pilgrims made their way towards the holy cave,” a spokesperson of the Shri Ama-rnath Shrine Board (SASB) said.

The yatra also commences from the traditional Pahal-gam route as 59 pilgrims from Chandanwari were allowed to proceed towards the cave shrine, she said

Heavy rainfall in the morn-ing delayed commencement of annual Amaranth Yatra.

Amid tight security, the first batch of nearly 3,000 Amarnath pilgrims from Jammu reached the twin base camps at Baltal and Pahalgam in Kashmir last evening.

After getting road clear-ance, the second batch of 3,434 pilgrims left Bhagwati Nagar base camp from Jammu for Kashmir in the early hours today, officials said, adding they are expected to reach the base camps of Nunwan-Pahalgam and Baltal in the valley later in the day.

Over two lakh pilgrims have so far registered for the 60-day yatra which is sched-uled to conclude on August 26 coinciding with the ‘Raksha Bandhan’ festival.

A total of 2.60 lakh pilgrims offered prayers at the shrine last year.

The government is for the

first time using radio frequency (RF) tags to track Amarnath-bound vehicles, while the CRPF has introduced motor-cycle squads with cameras and various life-saving equipment.

The security has been heightened for this year’s yatra in view of the militant attack on a bus carrying Amarnath pilgrims last year that left eight of them dead and 18 others injured.

Around 40,000 security personnel from the Jammu and Kashmir Police, paramilitary, National Disaster Response Force and the Army, have been deployed for this year’s pilgrimage.

Considering the carrying capacity of the existing tracks and other available infrastruc-ture in the pilgrimage area, the SASB has decided to allow 7,

500 pilgrims on each route daily.

While the pilgrims per-forming the yatra via shorter

Baltal route usually return to the base camp within a day, those taking the traditional Pahalgam route have to trek

42 kms, with an overnight stay at one of the halting stations before they can pay obeisance at the cave shrine.

First batch of Amarnath pilgrims arrive at the base camp at Baltal, in Ganderbal district of central Kashmir PTI

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Kalesh-waram Lift Irrigation Proj-ect (KLIP), which is claimed to be the country’s biggest of its kind, may prove to be a ‘game changer’ for the fortune of Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekar in the run-up to simultaneous Lok Sabha and Assembly polls in 2019, who is leaving no stone unturned to partly begin its operations by August 2018.

The massive KLIP, consid-ered crucial for the prospects of ruling Telangana Rash-tra Samiti in the 2019 Lok Sabha and assembly elections, is expected to become partly operational from August this year, an official statement said.

The ambitious project will provide irrigation facilities to farmers of 20 out of 31 dis-tricts of the state besides drink-ing water to the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad and water for industrial use in many cities.

The Rs 80,000-crore proj-ect on the Godavari river com-prises three barrages, a series of pumphouses and storage tanks. The mega irritation project is being built by Megha Engineer-ing & Infrastructure Limited under the supervision of its director B Srinivas Reddy.

Telangana Chief Minis-ter K Chandrashekar Rao had recently met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and sought Rs 20,000 crore for the project. A press statement cited Telangana Irrigation Minister T Harish Rao as saying that KLIP will become partly operational from August 2018.

“After completion, this proj-ect will give a new direction to irrigation in the country and

will also begin a new era for the farming community,” he said, adding that the project was conceived in 2007-08 but actual work started after the Telangana Rashtra Samiti gov-ernment assumed office.

“During our movement for the separate state, we had focussed on three main issues - water, funds and employment. These were the main concerns before the people. We decided to take up the irrigation issue on priority. After completion of the project in 2022, we will be able to irrigate 37.08 lakh acres of land of 20 out of the 31 districts of Telangana. With the completion of its first phase it will be able to irrigate 18.82 lakh acres of land,” Rao said.

‘T’gana’s Kaleshwaram project to be partially operation by yr-end’

The ambitious project will provide irrigation facilities to farmers of 20 out of 31 districts

NEW DELHI: The External Affairs Ministry on Thurs-day said the police verifica-tion report on the passport of Tanvi Seth, who had accused a Lucknow passport official of humiliating her and her hus-band over their inter-faith mar-riage, is under examination.

In its report, the Uttar Pradesh Police has said that Seth had not been living in Lucknow for the past one year. According to the police verification report sent to the Regional Passport Office (RPO), Seth has been residing in Noida.

“Police verification report in respect of Tanvi Seth has been received. We are examining the report. Our passport officers are empowered to take necessary action as per the Passport Act,” MEA Spokes-person Raveesh Kumar told reporters in response to a question. MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Centre has moved the Delhi High Court against its single judge order quashing suspension of the State Trading Corporation’s CMD against whom the CBI has lodged a case of cheating for allegedly causing a loss of Rs 2,112 crore to the government-run entity.

A vacation bench of justices Vinod Goel and Rekha Palli, before whom the petition was listed, said it would be heard by the appropriate bench on July 4.

The plea, filed through Central government stand-ing counsel Arun Bhardwaj, has contended that the single judge erred in quashing the November 2016 order of sus-pension against the chairman-cum-managing director of the corporation.

The single judge on May 18 had said in his order that the

prolonged suspension of the official without deciding his representation for review of the action taken against him was “wholly unjustified”.

The single judge had said the Supreme Court has mandated that a suspension order should not extend beyond the period of three months and during this period, the charge-sheet should be served upon the delinquent officer.

“Undisputedly, no charge-sheet has been served upon petitioner (CMD) and in view of the protracted suspension of the petitioner, I find that there is no justification to fur-

ther prolong his suspension for an indefinite period, as till date, charge-sheet has not been served upon him,” the single judge had said.

Challenging the May 18 order, the Centre in its plea has contended that the single did not take into account the fact that the CBI has lodged a case against the CMD, Khaleel Rahim, and others for alleged “abuse of official position, cheating, fraud, criminal con-spiracy, breach of trust and mis-appropriation of stock to cause financial loss to the tune of Rs 2,112 Crore (as on February 28, 2017) to the corporation”.

Centre in High Court against order quashing suspension of STC CMD

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Punjab’s former finance minister Surinder Sin-gla died on Thursday at the All India Institute of Medical Sci-ences (AIIMS) here, after he was rushed there complaining of breathlessness.

According to family sources, Singla (78) breathed his last around 6 am at AIIMS following multiple medical complications. He was rushed there at 4 am after he com-plained of breathlessness.

He had not been keep-ing well for a few years now and was last month admitted to AIIMS for the treatment of pneumonia. He had only returned home last fortnight, but was not keeping very well, the family said.

Singla was a senior state Congress leader and belonged

to Samana town in Patiala district.

He was a former Rajya Sabha member from Pun-jab. He last represented the Bathinda Assembly constitu-ency and was Punjab’s finance minister during the previous

Congress government of Ama-rinder Singh.

Singla’s cremation would take place tomorrow at the

Lodhi Crematorium at 11 am.He is survived by his wife,

a son and a daughter. Both the children are living abroad.

Punjab Cong leader Surinder Singla passes away

CHANDIGARH: Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Thursday mourned the death of former finance minister Surinder Singla, describing it as a big loss for the Congress party.

As a mark of respect to the departed soul, the chief minis-ter declared a holiday on Fri-day for all government offices.

Singla, 78, passed away in the early hours of Thursday at AIIMS in Delhi, where he was rushed after complaining of

breathlessness. In a statement issued here Thursday, the chief minister said he would miss Singla, who made outstanding contribution to the stabilisa-tion of the state’s economy as finance minister in his previous stint as chief minister.

He also recalled Singla’s development works for his constituency Bathinda, and added the able administrator and economist had left a void in the Congress and in hearts of the people he served. MPOST

Punjab CM Amarinder mourns Singla’s death

Surinder Singla

NEW DELHI: Dubbing Iran as a "threat" and "the next North Korea", US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley on Thursday said her country will encourage India to rethink its relationship with Iran and decide whether it wants to continue doing busi-ness with it.

Her remarks assume sig-nificance as they come after the US told India and other coun-tries to cut oil imports from Iran to "zero" by November 4 or face sanctions, making it clear that there would be no waivers to anyone. Haley, here on her first visit after becom-ing the US Ambassador to the UN, said in an address that Iran is a "theocratic dictatorship" that abuses its people, funds terrorism, and spreads conflict throughout the Middle East. The Tehran regime is the hid-den, and sometimes not-so-hidden, force behind most of the conflict in the region, she said. Replying to questions after her address, the 46-year-old Indian-American said she had

discussed the issue of India's business with Iran with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

"We do have this in terms of our dialogue because I think that India also recognises the threats of Iran. We understand the logisitics becoming a play with Iran but we have to always make sure that the priority is peace and security," Haley said.

Later, in an interview to NDTV, she said India should rethink its relationship with Iran, as the US gets set to impose sanctions against those doing business with Tehran.

"All of us have to rethink who we choose to do business with. I think as a friend India should also decide, is this a country they want to continue doing business with. So, yes I had that conversation with PM Modi. It was a constructive conversation.

"I think for the future of India, future of resources ,we would encourage them to rethink their relationship with Iran," Haley said. MPOST

Iran the ‘next N Korea’, India should re-think ties: Haley

Police verification report on Seth’s passport under

examination

mp nation 7MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Congress on Thursday sparred with the BJP over the release of purported video clips of the Army’s surgical strikes in Pak-istan-occupied Kashmir with the opposition party accusing it of using soldiers’ sacrifice for votes.

Hitting back, the BJP claimed that the Congress was behaving more like a fringe player than a mainstream party by “questioning” the armed forces.

Several TV channels on Wednesday showed video clips reportedly of the surgical strikes which were carried out on terror launch pads across the border in September 2016. The defence ministry or the Army has not offered any com-ment on the footage.

Addressing a press confer-ence, Congress chief spokes-person Randeep Surjewala said while on the one hand the Modi government is seek-ing credit for the sacrifice and valour of the armed forces, on

the other it has failed to provide a direction and vision to deal with Pakistan.

The blood and sacrifice of the country’s brave soldiers cannot be a political vote- gar-nering tool, he said, accus-ing the government of giving a step-motherly treatment to the armed forces by not provid-ing them with state-of-the-art equipment and slashing their budgetary allocation.

Union minister Ravi Shan-kar Prasad, fielded by the BJP to counter the opposition

charge, accused the Congress of repeatedly making state-ments that questioned the commitment and bravery of the armed forces, and lowering their morale.

Such comments make it clear that the Congress is no longer a mainstream party but a fringe player in the national politics, he said, adding it does not look like the same party which ruled the country for over 60 years.

Terrorists and their patrons in Pakistan would be the hap-

piest with the Congress’ stand, which has given them a “cam-paign handle” against India, Prasad said.

The Congress’ only aim seems to be directed at break-ing the morale of the armed forces, he said and asked it to answer if it considers the video real or not and approves of the surgical strikes or not.

Prasad said that the opposi-tion party has become so des-perate with its repeated losses in elections that it has been repeatedly questioning the commitment and courage of the armed forces.

If the BJP wanted to draw political mileage, then a video purportedly showing the Army’s operation in PoK would have been released during polls in states such as Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat or Karnataka, he said.

Earlier, Surjewala said the September 2016 surgical strikes were shamelessly politicised by the BJP for the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections in March last year.

Let the ruling dispensa-tion remember that the blood

and sacrifice of our brave sol-diers cannot become a politi-cal vote-garnering tool for the Modi government and the BJP, he told reporters.

By making public the videos of the strikes, has the govern-ment not somehow endangered lives of armed forces personnel who participated in the action as also civilians living along the Line of Control, he asked.

“The government has utterly failed to provide a direction, vision and policy for dealing with Pakistan and checkmate Pak-sponsored ter-rorism, he said.

Surjewala said the “apathy” and “incapacity” of the Modi government has resulted in the sacrifice of 146 soldiers, more than 1,600 ceasefire violations by Pakistan and 79 terrorist attacks post-September 2016.

The doublespeak of the Modi government and the BJP stands reflected in the step- motherly treatment of our armed forces, both in terms of providing for security appara-tus as also in slashing the bud-getary allocation.

Surgical strike video clips: Cong, BJP take potshots at each other

Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad addresses a press conference at BJP headquarters in New Delhi on Thursday NAVEEN SHARMA/MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

GUWAHATI: With Assam on the edge ahead of the publi-cation of the final draft of the National Register of Citizens (NRC), Chief Minister Sar-bananda Sonowal on Thurs-day said names of all “genuine Indians” will be incorporated in the list of the state’s citizens.

Sonowal also ruled out any possibility of violence after the publication of the NRC saying adequate forces were deployed across the state to deal with any situation.

“Names of all genuine Indian citizens will be included in the final draft. There should be no apprehension over it,” he said.

The chief minister said the state government has pro-vided all assistance to the NRC authorities and people too have been extending full cooperation to the entire exercise, which is being undertaken under the direct supervision of the Supreme Court.

“The central government has provided additional forces fol-lowing our requests. Both the central and the state govern-ments are working as a team. We hope that the people will

cooperate with us like they did in the past,” he said.

Meanwhile, NRC state coor-dinator Prateek Hajela said the final draft of the NRC in Assam will not be released on June 30, as scheduled, due to floods in Barak Valley.

The current wave of floods in the state has affected more than five lakh people in seven districts. As many as 25 people have also lost their lives in the floods.

The part draft of the NRC, a list of the state’s citizens, was published on the intervening night of December 31 and Janu-ary 1 where names of 1.9 crore people out of the 3.29 crore applicants were incorporated.

The massive exercise aimed at identifying illegal immigrants in the state that borders Ban-gladesh is being carried out in Assam following a decision in

2005 after a series of meetings between the central and state governments and the influen-tial All Assam Students’ Union (AASU).

Assam, which faced influx of people from Bangladesh since the early 20th century, is the only state having an NRC, first prepared in 1951.

The current exercise, started in 2005 under the then Congress regime, got a major push only after the BJP came to power in the state with illegal immi-gration from Bangladesh as a poll plank.

The Supreme Court, which is monitoring the entire process, had ordered that the first draft of the NRC be published by December 31 after completing the scrutiny of over two crore claims along with that of around 38 lakh people whose docu-ments were suspect.

Of the 3.29 crore applica-tions submitted, there was con-fusion over the inclusion of 29 lakh people who had submit-ted certificates issued by ‘gram panchayats’ as proof of iden-tity, after a Gauhati High Court order in February had deemed ‘panchayat’ certificates invalid, another official said.

Names of all ‘genuine Indians’ to be included in NRC: Assam CM

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Senior bureau-crat Bhushan Kumar Sinha has been appointed as Joint Secre-tary in Department of Finan-cial Services (DFS) as part of a bureaucratic reshuffle effected by the government.

Sinha, a 1993 batch officer of Indian Economic Service (IES), has been appointed to the post for five years, an order issued by Personnel Ministry said.

He has been appointed in

place of IAS officer Lok Ran-jan, who is the central govern-ment’s nominee on the board of ICICI Bank. Ranjan was in May transferred to the Person-nel Ministry.

IAS officer NK Sudhansu has been appointed as Profes-sor (Economics) in Lal Baha-dur Shastri National Academy of Administration (LBSNAA), Mussoorie.

Sushma Taishete, a 1988 batch officer of Cen-tral Secretariat Service, has

been named Joint Secretary in Department of Justice, the order said.

Saurabh Endley will be Joint Secretary, Ministry of Development of North East-ern Region. He is 1990 batch officer of Indian Railway Ser-vice of Mechanical Engineers (IRSME).

Kalyani Chadha, also an IRSME officer, has been appointed Joint Secretary in Department of Social Justice and Empowerment, it said.

Bureaucratic rejig at Centre: Bhushan Kumar Sinha appointed as JS, DFS

LALIT K JHA

WASHINGTON: The US on Thursday did not spell out the “unavoidable reasons” that forced the postponement of the first 2+2 dialogue with India again, a development that India watchers here say was “unfor-tunate” and “more than a little embarrassing” for the Trump administration.

One observer noted that President Donald Trump’s pre-occupation with Russia could have led to the postponement.

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman were to travel to Washington to take part in the meeting with US Secretary of State Michael R Pompeo and Secretary of Defence James Mattis on July 6.

This new dialogue format was agreed upon between the two sides during the visit of PM Narendra Modi to Washington in June 2017. It was seen as a vehicle to elevate the strategic relationship between the two countries with special focus on bolstering strategic, security, and defence cooperation.

Safe to say that US-India relations have taken their “big-gest tumble” in quite some time, tweeted Michael Kugelman from the Wilson Center.

“In the Trump era, no US relationship is foolproof,” he said. “This is really big. 2+2

could have been used to reset a relationship experiencing grow-ing tensions on the econ side,” he said in another tweet.

A State Department spokes-person said External Affairs Minister Swaraj and her Ameri-can counterpart Pompeo dur-ing a phone call on Wednesday agreed to reschedule the 2+2 dialogue as soon as possible at a mutually convenient time, location. Pompeo spoke over phone with Swaraj on June 27 to discuss further strengthening US-India cooperation. Pompeo conveyed to Swaraj “his regret at the postponement” of the 2+2 dialogue previously sched-uled to take place on July 6, the spokesperson said.

“The Secretary and Minister Swaraj agreed the 2+2 dialogue would be rescheduled as soon as possible at a mutually con-venient time and location,” the State Department spokesperson said, hours after MEA spokes-person Raveesh Kumar tweeted that during the call Pompeo expressed his “regret and deep disappointment” at the US hav-ing to postpone 2+2 Dialogue for “unavoidable reasons.” PTI

US mum on reason for postponement

of 2+2 dialogueAIZAWL: The Mizoram Assembly on Thursday unani-mously adopted an official res-olution, expressing opposition to the Citizenship (Amend-ment) Bill, 2016.

The bill, introduced in the Lok Sabha to amend the Cit-izenship Act 1955, proposes to make illegal migrants of six communities -- Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians -- eligible for Indian citizenship after six years of res-idence in the country.

The official resolution,

moved by state home minis-ter R Lalzirliana, impressed upon the Centre that the Bill, if enacted, would be harmful to states like Mizoram where a large number of illegal Bud-dhist migrants from Bangla-desh resided.

Lalzirliana said the Bill, seeking to make illegal migrants eligible for Indian citizenship on the basis of religion, was against the principles of secularism and “amounted to patronage of some religions”. MPOST

Mizoram adopts resolution against Citizenship Bill

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The National Commission for Women said on Thursday the alleged gan-grape of five NGO workers at gunpoint in Jharkhand’s Khunti district was pre-planned, and it questioned the role of the man-ager of the school from where the women were abducted.

The five women had gone to Kochang village in the district to create awareness on migra-tion and human trafficking on June 19, when they were alleg-edly abducted from R C Mis-sion School and later gangraped at gunpoint.

The NCW, which had sent a three-member team to Khunti, cast serious doubts over the con-duct of Father Alfonso Aiend, the school manager who report-edly failed to inform authori-ties about the abduction of the ‘nukkad natak’ team members.

“He also persuaded the vic-tims to not disclose the facts to anyone. It is, therefore, consid-ered that he has definitely acted contrary to the legal require-ments and possibly connived with the accused in commit-ting the crime,” the NCW said.

Khunti gangrape incident pre-

planned: NCW

JAMSHEDPUR: Four youths, including a minor, have been arrested in connection with the alleged gangrape of a girl in Jharkhand’s Palamu district, a senior police officer said on Thursday. The 16-year-old girl, in her complaint, had said one of the four youths, an acquain-tance, had on Tuesday taken her to an isolated place, where the other three joined him in raping her, Palamu Superin-tendent of Police Indrajeet Mahatha said. MPOST

4 held for raping minor in J’khand

Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority

Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority

ABRIDGED-e-NIT

e-NIT ref. no.

Name of work Estimated Amount Last date of Bid submission

NIT-28 OF2018-19

CONSTRUCTION OF CLASS-ROOMS OF FALAKATA COL-LEGE BUILDING (G+2) FALAKATA IN THE DISTRICT OF ALIPURDUAR

Rs. 3,07,27,202.00 23/07/2018upto 15:00Hours

Sd/- Superintending Engineer North Bengal Development Department

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

Government of West Bengal North Bengal Development Department

Branch Secretariat Uttarkanya, Fulbari, Jalpaiguri

ABRIDGED –-NIQ

NIQ ref. No.

Name of work Last date of Bid submission

15 of 2018-19

Preparation of Preliminary ProjectReport (PPR) for proposed“Construction of AlipurduarEngineering College at Alipurduarin the District of Alipurduar”.

13/07/2018 up to 14.00 hours

Sd/- Executive Engineer North Bengal Development Department

Details can be seen in the Official Website www.wbnorthbengaldev.gov.in

Government of West Bengal North Bengal Development Department

Branch Secretariat Uttarkanya, Fulbari, Jalpaiguri

Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority

Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority

Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority

Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority

mp editorial8MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

NITYA CHAKRABORTY The monsoon ses-sion of Parliament, beginning on July 18, is expected to

witness a sharp confrontation between BJP and the Congress-led opposition, preventing the smooth functioning of pro-ceedings of both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. Right now, the political temperature is so intense that any talk of coop-eration mentioned by the rul-ing party is being dealt with contempt by the opposition leaders. Congress President Rahul Gandhi is in the foulest mood and he is looking for any opportunity to hit back at the PM. Modi and other senior BJP leaders are known to extend open diatribe against the Gan-dhi family, which has widened the area of confrontation and, in all possibility, the coming Parliament session will be a victim too.

The BJP-led government is worried about passing key economic bills which were earlier issued as ordinances as the government leadership believed it needed emergency action and the official legisla-tion formalities could be taken up later in the monsoon ses-sion. These include the Insol-vency and Bankruptcy Code (Amendment) Bill replacing the ordinance and the Fugi-tive Economic Offenders Bill replacing the ordinance. The IBC Bill amendment recog-nises home buyers as financial creditors and allows promot-ers of MSME to bid for their stressed firms if they are not willing defaulters. Minister Arun Jaitley fought hard to pro-mulgate the ordinance. Though he is recuperating now and the Finance Ministry is being man-aged by Piyush Goyal, Jaitley is making all efforts along with the PMO to ensure that both these bills are approved by the Parliament since the provisions were given immediate effect via ordinances.

The worry for the govern-

ment is that any failure by the Parliament to pass these two bills during the monsoon ses-sion will make a mess of gov-ernment decisions. The winter session of the Parliament gen-erally meets in the second half of November and, this year, the Prime Minister is in such a frame of mind that he might opt for preponing the Lok Sabha poll from April/May 2019 to November/December this year. The Finance Ministry does not want to take any risks about these two bills and there are desperate efforts underway to persuade the opposition to support the two bills at least in the coming monsoon session.

All indications suggest that Congress and the other oppo-sition parties are not ready to allow smooth sailing for these two bills in the Rajya Sabha where they enjoy the majority. Even before the bills are con-sidered, the ruling party and the opposition will confront on the issue of election of the Rajya Sabha’s Deputy Chairman. The current Deputy Chairman PJ Kurien’s term expires before the session starts and BJP is plan-ning to put up a candidate of the ruling combination for the Deputy Chairman post know-

ing that NDA has no majority in Rajya Sabha. Congress is now in a mood for total opposition unity and the Congress Presi-dent is ready to support a can-didate of any other opposition party who will be the common candidate of the opposition. There is every possibility that the entire opposition will opt for a senior Rajya Sabha mem-ber of the Trinamool Congress as the opposition nominee. If there is total unity of the oppo-sition, it is difficult for the rul-ing BJP to have its candidate elected in a contest.

Amidst this atmosphere of confrontation, the talk of gov-ernment leaders including the Prime Minister for coopera-tion from the Congress and the opposition in passing the vital two bills, will not cut any ice. The monsoon session of the Parliament, which will have 18 sittings, will also consider the triple talaq bill, and a Consti-tutional status for the National Commission for OBCs. Since the campaign for the Lok Sabha elections is already underway, all the political parties will look at the issues from their respective political mileage. As regards the triple talaq bill, the situation is very compli-

cated and the BJP is directly trying to win over the educated and forward-looking Muslim women through its stance. The Congress, as a part of its strat-egy, will not allow the BJP to make political mileage out of its actions just a few months ahead of the crucial Lok Sabha polls.

The last Budget session turned out to be the least pro-ductive in 18 years due to serious political differences between the ruling and the opposition parties. BJP should have tried to mend fences with the opposition by not contest-ing the Deputy Chairman’s post in Rajya Sabha. There is still time, if the NDA parties decide to give the post to the opposition candidate as a ges-ture of goodwill, the ground could have been prepared for a smoother monsoon session, but the aggressive stance of BJP and the Government has ruled out that possibility. The situa-tion in the monsoon session might be far worse compared to the Budget session.

Of the 40 odd bills listed for consideration in the Bud-get session, only two were approved by Lok Sabha without discussion. The key pending bills which could be taken up

in the monsoon session include also the Prevention of Corrup-tion (Amendment) Bill 2013 which requires investigating agencies to get more sanction of the appropriate authority in the government to investi-gate officials including retired ones. Another key pending bill is the Financial Resolution and Deposit Insurance Bill, 2017, under which a bail-in clause has been proposed as one of the resolution tools in case of insolvency in a bank wherein depositors will have to bear a part of the cost of the resolu-tion by a corresponding reduc-tion in their claims. This bill has been flayed by the experts as also the depositor organisations and the bank unions. Though the Finance Ministry is claim-ing that there is no threat to the security of deposits, experts are saying that the bank depos-its have been put at a risk due to the provisions of the bill. There will be severe opposition attack against the provisions of this bill. The ad hoc Finance Minister will have a tough task in justifying this bill in Parliament. IPA

(The author is Editor-in-Chief, IPA. The views

expressed are strictly personal)

Cooperation in ParliamentEDITORIAL

Restrained cooperation between the ruling and opposition parties will hinder crucial resolutions

All indications point that Congress and other opposition parties are not ready to allow smooth sailing for these two bills in Rajya Sabha where they have a presence in the majority. Even before the bills are considered, the ruling party and the opposition will confront on the issue of election of Rajya Sabha’s Deputy Chairman

After three years, BJP president Amit Shah is head-ing to Bihar where NDA partner JD(U) is show-ing signs of discomfort with being in the alliance. Recently, JD(U) Chief Nitish Kumar did not turn

up at the International Yoga Day events in the state. After NDA partner Shiv Sena, which has been consistently criti-cising the NDA government at the Centre for the past four years, it is the JD(U) that is now playing the hardball. Other NDA partners in Bihar like Ram Vilas Paswan’s Lok Jan-shakti Party (LJP) and Upendra Kushwaha’s Rashtriya Lok Samta Party (RLSP) are also sending indications that they would seek a more equitable share in the seat distribution for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections in 2019. And, not so long ago, another important NDA partner, the Telugu Desam Party led by Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chan-drababu Naidu deserted the alliance, accusing the BJP-led Central government of not fulfilling the promise of accord-ing the state the special category status after its bifurcation in 2014. Shah is expected to hold parleys with all the three NDA partners in Bihar as well as his own party members to chalk out a common plan for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. In his two-day visit to the state, he would review the poll preparedness of his party in alliance with the NDA members. In the last Lok Sabha election, BJP had won 22 seats out of 40 in the state while JD(U) had won six seats, Lok Janshakti Party six seats and Rashtriya Lok Samta Party three seats. Given the fact that JD(U) has 71 seats, against BJP’s 53, out of 225 in the state Assembly, it is likely to seek a larger share of the seats in the upcoming Lok Sabha elec-tions. Also, the regional parties and NDA members in the state are of the view that BJP is no longer a strong force in the state and, therefore, it should spare more seats for the alliance partners. BJP winning an unprecedented 22 seats in Bihar in the last Lok Sabha election was attributed to its alliance with the regional parties which ensured that the votes in favour of the alliance were not divided. To repeat the success of the last Lok Sabha election this time around, BJP will have to keep the alliance with caste-sensitive regional parties intact and going. But that’s not easy in view of the over-assertiveness of the alliance partners and the chang-ing dynamics of the state politics in which Lalu Yadav’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has regained much of its lost ground. Realising this, Nitish Kumar is said to have once again opened a channel of communication with the party. Similarly, BJP has also stopped being excessively critical of RJD. Lalu Yadav, who was serving a jail term in Ranchi in the cases related to fodder scam, has been shifted to a hospi-tal in Mumbai and some NDA ministers at the Centre have visited him there. Though RJD has been opposing the Modi government since the very beginning and has been steady in its alliance with Congress, a change in its stance in favour of BJP cannot be ruled out. In view of all these possibilities, Shah’s Bihar visit assumes greater significance. RJD is in a resurgent mode in Bihar and it has the necessary support base to emerge as the most potent political force in the state. BJP, which has been carrying along with lesser political enti-ties such as JD(U), LJP and RLSP, cannot be oblivious of the rising stars of RJD. In the last Lok Sabha election, Narendra Modi was the chief election campaigner for the BJP. Attired in colourful dresses, he travelled the length and breadth of the country and delivered emphatic speeches that com-pelled people to attend his public rallies in large numbers. He promised a new era of governance that would focus on development, fight corruption and bring back Indian black money stashed up abroad. He piled up charges of corruption and inefficiency on Congress-led UPA, which surprisingly lacked spirit and enthusiasm to counter Modi’s offensive. Though BJP-led NDA won a landslide victory in the elec-tions, commentators attributed the victory to Modi, who came to assume a larger than life image in Indian politics. Cut to the upcoming 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Modi is still the BJP’s most sellable face but his appeal and aura look somewhat eclipsed by the setbacks in the recent by-polls, especially in Kairana, Phulpur, and Gorakhpur. In these elections, the Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party joined hands and fielded common candidates that resulted in the defeat of the BJP. Now, this phenomenon is being taken as a template by the opposition parties to take on the BJP in the nationwide Lok Sabha elections of 2019. Now, it is worth watching how the Modi-Shah combine turns the table on the united opposition.

The African continent has, indeed, emerged as the one living in extreme poverty. The findings based on a projection by the World Poverty Clock and compiled by Brookings Institute, show that more

than 643 million people across the world live in extreme poverty, with Africans accounting for about two-thirds of the total number. In Nigeria, as with other countries on the continent, that figure is projected to rise. “By the end of 2018, in Africa as a whole, there will probably be about 3.2 million more people living in extreme poverty than there are today,” the researchers write. Despite being the largest oil producer in Africa, Nigeria, for instance, has struggled to translate its resource wealth into raising living standards. A slump in oil prices and a sharp fall in oil production wit-nessed the country’s economy slide into recession in 2016. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that although growth was again beginning to rise, “more needs to be done to reduce unemployment and address poverty”. But, while the numbers of Nigerians falling into extreme pov-erty grows by roughly six people every minute, poverty in India continues to decrease. At present, an estimated 5.3 per cent of Indians or 71.5 million people, live below the poverty line. The researchers note that 14 out of 18 countries where poverty is rising are in Africa, adding that if current rates persist, 90 per cent of the world’s poorest will be liv-ing on the continent by 2030. Bangladesh and Indonesia are the only other non-African nations to feature among the list of 10 worst affected countries, with an estimated 17 million and 14.2 million people living in extreme pov-erty, respectively. Other nations in Africa to feature on the list of 10 worst affected countries include the Democratic Republic of Congo, with 60 million people; Ethiopia with 23.9 million people; Tanzania with 19.9 million citizens; Mozambique, with 17.8 million people; Kenya, with 14.7 million people; and Uganda with 14.2 million. Data com-piled by the World Poverty Clock was drawn from both household surveys and new projections on country-wise economic growth from the International Monetary Funds’ World Economic Outlook. Researchers noted that between January 1, 2016, and July 2018, the world has seen about 83 million people escape extreme poverty, owing in part to the introduction of internationally agreed UN Sustainable Development Goals, intended to “end poverty” by 2030. “The task of ending extreme poverty by 2030 is becoming inexorably harder because we are running out of time. We should celebrate our achievements, but increasingly sound the alarm that not enough is being done, especially in Africa,” the researchers observe.

Mission Bihar

Africa’s depth of poverty

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millenniumpost.inDISREGARD FOR RULES IN ONGOING DDCA ELECTIONSDear

EditorA bizarre situation came to light on the first day of DDCA elections wherein morning radio (107.2 Radio Nasha) unveiled fresh remark of Rajat Sharma’s ardent run for the post of president in the same. This remark amounts to an effective part of campaigning that, as per the DDCA guidelines, should culminate prior to the start of this year’s polling i.e., on 26.06.2018. Strangely, the first day of polling was carried out without any sort of action taken on the same thereby conflicting the body’s regulations. Taking note of such a breach of regulations set by the DDCA raises a question on the efficacy of these polls. Such infringement could jeopardise the sanctity of the authority, let alone the principles itself. ROHAN CHANDRA Via email

Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods

Quote martial

H. L. MENCKEN

We are at the mid-point of 2018. The chance to attend an infra-

structure conference at this juncture would provide the perfect opportunity to reflect on and re-examine the issues confronting the Indian econ-omy today. A bevvy of distin-guished delegates ideated on the next significant steps to finance Indian infrastructure at the annual meeting of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank in Mumbai. There are some crit-ical takeaways from the meet-ing, allowing us to revisit some interesting themes.

The success of the National Highways Authority of India’s (NHAI) toll-operate-transfer model and the ability of the gov-ernment to create infrastruc-ture assets effectively once again brought to the fore the advan-tages and need for “asset recy-cling” done well.

Attracting long-dated patient capital such as pension funds and insurance companies into greenfield infrastructure projects will be challenging, given that such funds are not adequately equipped to under-take construction risk. There-fore, a significant method to finance new infrastructure will be through government par-ticipation in the construction phase – and mobilisation of the capital pool through asset monetisation after that. This asset monetisation will pro-vide the government with the capital with which to create new

infrastructure. Covered bonds as a financing instrument made for an interesting discussion. Despite the relatively smaller bond market in India, the cre-ation of a covered bond mar-ket framework here is one that merits attention. In common parlance, one can think of cov-ered bonds as those that have recourse both to an issuer and a pool of assets. Covered bonds in Europe, especially Germany have been a game-changer for over a hundred years. It would be prudent to see what poten-tial they have in India.

It was also interesting to note the emphasis placed by experts on the potential for bet-ter contract design to help cre-ate more financing. While we have made significant strides in contract design for infra-structure projects, the Non-Performing Assets (NPAs) at banks demonstrate that more work needs to be done to align

equity sponsors’ interests with those of the lenders.

Better contracts that reward equity holders for well-exe-cuted projects and hold them accountable (by penalising and locking in their cash-flows) if project execution suffers, can help create better project struc-tures, instead of lenders who are left stranded with heavily-lever-aged projects. A better contract design ensures that as the cash flows from a project decline and the project is unable to meet specific pre-determined finan-cial ratios, the equity sponsor is unable to withdraw any cash from the project.

If the project returns can meet the financial ratio con-ditions again, then the equity sponsor will not have the money “locked-up”. Such a contract design, as correctly pointed out by a distinguished panellist, also helps ensure, to some degree, that bidding for

projects isn’t aggressive above and beyond financially viable levels. A contract design that ensures that equity sponsors have more “skin in the game” leads to a better financing mar-ket for infrastructure.

One issue that certain pub-lic infrastructure assets such as metros (rapid transit system) have faced is financial viability due to low revenues from the asset relative to the investments required. In projects such as metro train networks or indus-trial corridors, it is essential to realise that to ascertain the monetary value creation from the asset, merely looking at the cash flows from the asset itself is insufficient.

A metro train network or an industrial corridor project has significant value creation in the surrounding areas through increased connectivity, resulting in substantial increase in prop-erty prices. Designing mecha-

nisms that can capture some of the upsides in the property value to finance the infrastruc-ture asset can be crucial. Design of such an arrangement will take time but is well worth the effort. The Hong Kong Mass Transit Railway provides an excellent template that can teach us a lot.

The biggest takeaway from the conference was the need for various stakeholders in the infrastructure ecosystem to engage and work together. The multilateral institutions, the export credit agencies, and the government can work together to create mechanisms to boost infrastructure financing. Export credit agencies, along with the multilateral institutions, can play a significant role in both providing capital and, more importantly, in lowering the cost of capital for infrastruc-ture projects. Given the fact that infrastructure projects tend to have an essential component of long-dated debt, the ability of multiple institutions to coop-erate and fill in the financing gaps is critical.

Discussions around infra-structure and finance always point towards the large size of the infrastructure gaps and the vast pool of global capital. The ideas above might pro-vide valuable insights into solv-ing the infrastructure finance paradox. IANS

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

expressed are strictly personal)

In projects such as metro train networks or industrial corridors, it is essential to realise that to ascertain the monetary value creation from the asset, merely looking at the cash flows from the asset itself is insufficient

Indian infrastructure must be oriented to the possibility of creating a robust ecosystem involving all stakeholders

Building India’s tomorrow

The Hong Kong Mass Transit Railway provides an excellent template that Indian Metro can adopt (Representational Image)

The Parliament’s monsoon session is expected to witness several roadblocks

TAPONEEL MUKHERJEE

MARK GRUENBERG

AVIKAL SOMVANSHI

9mp in focusMILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

At what temperature do we feel ‘comfortable’? When I was in New York, my roommate and I could

never settle on an answer. His defi-nition of comfortable temperature (21-22 degree-C) left me shivering, and my preferred 27-28 degree-C made him sweat.

Is there more to thermal comfort than what feels right? Who decides what is comfortable for everyone? The question seems benign at the surface but its answer has far-reach-ing ecological consequences.

Murky science defining comfortEven shuffling a degree to suit

our comfort considerably alters the energy demand. Cooling appliances such as air conditioners, fans and coolers already account for 10 per cent of all global electricity con-sumption according to the recently released, The Future of Cooling report, by the International Energy Agency.

This is likely to rise significantly in the future. In India, cooling-related energy demand is expected to soar from 90 terawatt hour in 2016 to 1,350 terawatt hour in 2050, says the report. Need I elaborate on the environmental and socioeconomic fallout it can cause for a country where almost 80 per cent of rural households are still waiting to be electrified?

In order to check the energy cooling demand, governments and industry have been pushing for energy-efficient variants of centuries-old technologies. Many are playing around with the definition of ther-mal comfort to address the impend-ing crisis.

In the course of my investiga-tion into the science and business of keeping it cool, I realised the science around ‘comfort’ and standards that shape it are quite murky.

Air conditioners: From industrial to commercial

Since the invention of mechani-cal means, especially air condition-ing, to control indoor environment, scientists have been striving to find the thermal sweet-spot that would make indoors comfortable for all. This quest has been primarily sup-ported and promoted by the Heat-ing, Ventilation and Air-Condition (HVAC) industry, which was origi-nally set up to improve the perfor-mance delivery of their products.

The first modern air conditioner was built by Willis Carrier at Buf-

falo, New York in 1902, as a solution to improve manufacturing process control in a printing plant based in Brooklyn, New York. Temperature and humidity control was necessary to maintain paper dimensions and ink alignment. Over a period of time, this invention for industrial applica-tion expanded to improve general workplace productivity and, ulti-mately, the comfort at homes.

In the 1890s, a meeting on space heating and ventilation in New York led to the formation of a professional association that would play a piv-otal role in defining thermal comfort standards globally. This association was renamed the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) in 1954, as it expanded its horizons to include air conditioning and refrigeration.

Thermodynamic explanationsScientific investigations into the

thermal behaviour of the human body were enabled by the develop-ment of thermodynamic theory in the 19th century. The hypothesis is that if a human body is a thermo-dynamic engine, then it ought to achieve a state of maximum produc-tivity (at work) or comfort (at leisure) in a state of thermal equilibrium.

Our bodies generate heat through metabolic activities. In order to maintain internal temperature at 37 degree-C, the body employs vari-ous means to dissipate additional heat. An average human body is esti-mated to dissipate the same amount of energy as a 100-watt light-bulb.

The human body is constantly trying to establish some sort of thermal equilibrium with its sur-roundings, a process that is highly dependent upon the surroundings’ ability to absorb the heat dissipated by the human body. If the surround-ings are unable to absorb the heat, then one feels hot and if it absorbs

too much then one feels cold.Thermal comfort discussions and

scientific enquiry vis-a-vis laws of thermodynamics gained momen-tum in the 1930s. These led to the creation of ANSI/ASHRAE Standard 55 (Thermal Environmental Condi-tions for Human Occupancy stan-dards) in 1966.

Scientific definition of ‘comfortable’A breakthrough was achieved

in 1970 when a Danish professor PO Fanger declared he had found a mathematical equation to define human thermal comfort. In a series of studies conducted at Kansas State University and Technical Univer-sity of Copenhagen, Fanger surveyed subjects in a climate chamber where the indoor conditions could be con-trolled. Fanger developed the Pre-dicted Mean Vote (PMV) model on the basis of this survey and com-bined a human variable of activity and clothing with the environmen-

tal variables, such as air temperature, mean radiant temperature, relative humidity and air velocity to define human thermal comfort. PMV was complimented by the Predicted Per-centage of Dissatisfied (PPD) – a measure of the percentage of people who will not be comfortable with given temperature conditions.

The most interesting aspect of Fanger’s study was that it stated that there is no significant difference in the expectations of comfort con-ditions between his American and Danish students, between students and the elderly or between males and females. Fanger discussed the effect of body build, menstrual cycle, ethnic differences, food, circadian rhythm, crowding and colour, and concluded that these do not appear to have any significant influence on the comfort conditions for low lev-els of activity.

In 1974, this PMV/PPD model was adopted in the revised Standard

55 as a tool to define thermal com-fort requirement for buildings. This got global acceptance in 1984 when it was made a part of ISO 7730, set by the International Standards Organ-isation and CEN CR 1752, design criteria for the indoor environment mandatory for EU members.

Could science be wrong?Going by Fanger’s conclusions,

I had no ground to justify my war-ring with my roommate. But what if science was wrong about the homogeneity of human body and expectations?

It is well established that popu-lations residing in specific geogra-phies have gradually developed a distinct morphological and physio-logical makeup to adapt to the local climate. They also develop a unique response to heat or cold on the basis of culture.

A heterogeneous adaptation to climate is seen in a population’s heat tolerance or how they choose to define uncomfortable weather. For instance, in Sweden, a heat wave is if the daily maximum temperature crosses 25 degree-C for three days running. The US, on the other hand, pegs the number at 32.2 degree-C. The Indian Meteorological Depart-ment (IMD) has different thresh-old temperatures for declaring heat wave for the three major geograph-ical regions: plains (40 degree-C), coastal (37 degree-C), and hills (30 degree-C).

Simply put, people in different regions have different standards for uncomfortable weather. In general, legal definitions of heat wave sug-gest people in tropical climates have higher heat tolerance than people in temperate regions.

This flies in the face of Fanger’s theory and could be a possible expla-nation for the difference in my com-fort from my roommate’s. There is a 7.8 degree difference in the defini-tion of heat wave between my home-land, the Indo-Gangetic plains and his home, California, US.

But, is the technical measure of thermal comfort same or correlated to the limit of heat tolerance? Plati-num and silver melt at 1,770 degree-C and 961 degree-C, respectively, but it doesn’t mean both aren’t com-fortably solid at room temperature. DOWN TO EARTH

(The author is Programme Manager, Sustainable Cities

Programme, Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi. The views

expressed are strictly personal)

In news that US workers won’t like to hear, particularly those in Midwestern industrial states that witnessed their jobs and plants

decamp south of the border, some two-thirds of Mexicans support a new North American Free Trade Agreement. Some of that support seems to be com-ing from people in that country who are so angry at President Trump that they are inclined to back whatever it is that he opposes. Also, in support of a new NAFTA is Mexico’s leading Presiden-tial contender, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, known by his initials, AMLO.

Mexican hatred for Trump spans the political spectrum there, ever since he started his US Presidential bid in 2015 by fanning the flames of hatred for immigrants from that country. Trump denounced Mexican migrants to the US as rapists and murderers and promised to build “a big beautiful wall” at the US-Mexico border – and get Mexico to pay for it. Mexican politicians of all stripes resolutely refused and denounced him. AMLO is no fan of Trump’s wall either. Nor are the organised labour or US con-gressional Democrats.

Mexican opinion polls give the progressive Lopez Obrador, the candi-date of his self-founded Morena Party, a 20-percentage point lead over each of the next two contenders, from two traditional parties, the conservative National Action Party (PAN) and the currently ruling Institutional Revolu-tionary Party (PRI). AMLO currently gets 47 per cent of those polled.

And, political coattails still matter more in Mexico. The analysts at the discussion, sponsored by the Wilson Center in DC, agreed that AMLO could sweep Morena majorities into office with him in both houses of Mexico’s Congress and in governorships of its most-populous states.

The current PRI government of Enrique Pena Nieto is renegotiating NAFTA, facing off against the Trump administration and the Canadian government of Liberal Prime Minis-ter Justin Trudeau. Trump repeatedly

threatens to pull out of the talks and dump NAFTA, unless the two other countries agree to his demands.

The labour movement in the US wants to see changes in NAFTA but focuses on the push for higher wages for Mexican workers. Better conditions for Mexico’s workers would reduce the incentive that US industries now have to pick up and move to Mexico where they exploit much cheaper labour. Pena Nieto has resisted demands for higher wages and increased labour rights in Mexico.

Canada’s Prime Minister Trudeau initially supported requiring stronger US labour laws, including the repeal of all the so-called right-to-work laws, but has since soft-pedalled that stand. Trudeau also wants to keep the busi-ness-slanted secret trade court, the Investor-State Dispute System, in NAFTA. Organised labour in both the US and Canada has opposed the secret trade court.

The US labour movement, in a long analysis of what the US should seek in the “new NAFTA” talks, says Trump’s trade negotiator, Robert Lighthizer, should push for higher wages in Mex-ico, and a lot more.

US unions also urge Lighthizer to

stand strongly for – among other goals — enforceable worker rights and inde-pendent trade unions in Mexico and curbs on how far unsafe Mexican trucks, driven by tired truckers, can roam over US roads. The current NAFTA now lets them roll everywhere in the US, after a long, and sometimes-success-ful campaign by the Teamsters to limit the trucks to within 20 miles north of the border.

The Economic Policy Institute cal-culated that since it took effect a quar-ter of a century ago, NAFTA cost the US between 770,000 and one million industrial jobs as corporations ranging from GM to Mondelez – Oreo cookies – headed south of the border to pay lower wages, escape unions and avoid envi-ronmental rules. The Communications Workers add NAFTA also prompted US firms to shift call-centre jobs away from union workers in the US, export-ing them to Mexico, the Philippines and India.

And, independent analysts point out that NAFTA is responsible for a share of the undocumented people crossing the US border since it passed. That’s because NAFTA opened the Mexican market to cheap mass-produced US farm goods, principally corn, decimat-

ing the Mexican agricultural economy. Despite all that, especially the loss of farm jobs, many Mexicans view NAFTA as good for them because they have switched views over the last quarter of a century from being producers to being consumers.

Poor and working people in Mex-ico, like their counterparts in the US, have small incomes with which to meet a large number of needs. The lower prices available in outlets like Walmart, regardless of the role they play in the world economy, are something peo-ple need.

Younger and more educated people, including those who are a bit better off economically, are also shifting to Lopez Obrador, the panel said. And, unlike in the past years, when AMLO ran from the left, even the upper, educated classes don’t see him as a threat. One point which changed their views, according to panelists: Lopez Obrador’s success-ful pragmatic mayoralty of Mexico City.

During his time in the mayor’s chair, AMLO continued his nationwide repu-tation for grassroots organising while using the slogan “For the good of all, the poor first” to promote old-age pensions, financial support for single mothers and the jobless, investments in urban redevelopment, infrastructure and education.

Mexican voters of all classes are more disgusted with the performance – or the lack of it – in this century. They fault Pena Nieto and PRI in the last six years in failing to combat crime, cor-ruption and allowing rampant drug trafficking, along with prior failures in those fields by PAN’s two presi-dents in the 12 years before that. Left unsaid: Until 2000, PRI ruled Mexico for decades as a virtual one-party state, since the end of the second Mexican Revolution in 1929.

AMLO is an outsider “compared to his PRI and PAN presidential foes” and Morena is a new party. They (Mexicans) like that. IPA

(The views expressed are strictly personal)

The human body is constantly trying to establish some sort of thermal equilibrium with its surroundings, a process that is highly dependent upon the surroundings’ ability to absorb the heat dissipated by the human body. If the surroundings are unable to absorb the heat, then one feels hot and if it absorbs too much then one feels cold

Mexican opinion polls give the progressive Lopez Obrador, the candidate of his self-founded Morena Party, a 20-percentage point lead over each of the next two contenders, from two traditional parties, the conservative National Action Party and the currently ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party

Keeping your coolThe debate of arriving at a universal ‘comfortable temperature’ has far-reaching

consequences for the well-being of our ecosystem

Mexico gears for changeMexico is poised for a regime change on July 1 as anti-Trump

Obrador is touted to emerge victorious

tweetRETWEET

FLAGS OF HONOUR @FlagsOfHonour

#RememberAndNeverForget #Braveheart Naib Subedar Chuni Lal, #AshokChakra(P), #VirChakra, #SenaMedal (Gallantry) 8 JAK LI, who made the supreme sacrifice for the Nation fighting terrorists in Kupwara #onthisday 24 June in 2007. #ServingOurNation @adgpi @HQ_IDS_India

RAMACHANDRA GUHA @Ram_Guha

The bigotry of the Puri priests well predates the formation of the BJP. They did not let Indira Gandhi in because she had married a Parsi; and they abused Mahatma Gandhi because he sought to abolish Untouchability.

OMAR ABDULLAH @OmarAbdullah

There is nothing to be gained from debating whether the #SurgicalStrikes took place. What we should be objectively discussing is what the strikes changed on the ground.

RAMESH SRIVATS @rameshsrivats

I think that even if I criticise the weather, some people will think that I am criticising the-weather-under-the-current-government, and rise to defend it.

For Mexicans exhausted with corruption and hateful towards Trump, Obrador seems to be the clear winner

Identifying a suitable universal comfortable temperature is a challenging task (Representational Image)

mp world10MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

‘Pak Hizbul, JeM recruited, used children in Kashmir’

UNITED NATIONS: Paki-stan-based banned terror out-fits Jaish-e-Mohammed and Hizbul Mujahideen recruited and used children in Jammu and Kashmir during clashes with security forces last year, according to a UN report on Thursday.

The annual report of the UN Secretary General on Children and Armed Con-flict, covering the January-December 2017 period, said globally, over 10,000 children were killed or maimed in con-flict last year while more than 8,000 were recruited or used as combatants.

The report covers 20 coun-tries, including war-torn Syria, Afghanistan, and Yemen and also the situation in India, the Philippines and Nigeria.

On the situation in India, the report of UNSG Antonio Guterres said children contin-ued to be affected by incidents of violence between armed groups and the government forces, particularly in Chhat-tisgarh, Jharkhand and dur-

ing tensions in Jammu and Kashmir.

Noting "grave violations", it said three incidents of recruit-ment and use of children by the two terror outfits were reported in Jammu and Kashmir during clashes with the security forces.

"One case was attributed to Jaish-e-Mohammed and two to Hizbul Mujahideen," the report said, adding that "unver-ified" reports also indicate use

of children as informants and spies by the security forces.

The UN said it continued to receive reports of recruitment and use of children, including by the Naxalites, particularly in Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand. "Naxalites reportedly resorted to the use of a lottery sys-tem to conscript children in Jharkhand," it said, adding chil-dren continued to be killed and injured during operations of

security forces against armed groups.

Citing government data, the report said 188 civilians were killed in Naxal-affected regions, but no disaggregated data on children were available.

In March this year, a 15-year-old boy was killed dur-ing clash between the security forces and Lashkar-e-Taiba ter-rorists in Padgampora village of Pulwama district.

Guterres asked the Indian government to put in place measures to hold perpetrators of child recruitment and use to account and engage with the UN to end and prevent viola-tions against children.

In Jharkhand, the report said, suspected Naxalites attacked a school in Khunti district, partially destroying it.

With regard to military use, the occupation of over 20 schools was documented by the Central Reserve Police Force in Srinagar, Kashmir, in April.

"Increased tensions in

Jammu and Kashmir report-edly also led to closure of school for varying periods, including in Rajouri (65) and Poonch (76) districts," it said.

In Pakistan, the report said, the UN continued to receive reports of the recruitment and use of children, including from madrassas, also, the alleged use of children by armed groups for suicide attacks.

In January, Tehrik-e-Tali-ban Pakistan released a video showing children, including girls, being instructed how to perpetrate suicide attacks.

The report said while age-disaggregated data on civilian casualties were limited, inci-dents of children killed and injured in attacks in Paki-stan by armed groups were reported.

It cited a suicide attack in Sehwan, Sindh Province in February in which at least 75 people, including 20 children, were killed. Also eight attacks on educational facilities and students, including four target-ing girls' schools. AGENCIES

PIO Amul Thapar in Trump's list of judges to fill US SC vacancy

WASHINGTON DC: Amul Thapar, an Indian-American legal luminary, is among the 25 shortlisted judges US President Donald Trump could nominate to replace Supreme Court Jus-tice Anthony Kennedy, accord-ing to American media reports.

Justice Kennedy, 81, announced his retirement from the US Supreme Court on Wednesday. He met Trump at the White House last after-noon soon after he told his col-leagues in the Supreme Court that July 31 would be his last day at the apex court.

Thapar, 49, is one of the 25 shortlisted judges on Trump's Supreme Court List. Trump told reporters that his nomi-nee to replace Judge Kennedy would be from this list com-piled by the Heritage Founda-tion and the Federalist Society.

Multiple American media outlets later identified Thapar from Kentucky as one among the shortlisted judges.

Last year, Trump appointed Thapar, who sits on the 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals and a former United States Attorney, for the District of Kentucky and District Judge.

The son of Indian-Ameri-can immigrants, Thapar is the Nation's first Article III judge of South Asian descent. He was confirmed by the Senate 52-44.

Thapar began his legal career in private practice, after clerkships with Judge S Arthur Spiegel of the District Court for the Southern District of Ohio and Judge Nathaniel R Jones of the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.

He received his BS from Boston College in 1991 and his JD from the University of California, Berkeley.

According to 'The Washing-ton Post', seven judges could be on Trump's mind to replace Kennedy on the Supreme

Court and Thapar as among one among them.

"Thapar is a favourite of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, and as a candidate, Trump said he would consider Thapar as a Supreme Court pick," it said.

"He was interviewed by Trump for the Supreme Court vacancy last year," the report said.

"Kennedy's resignation reopens the door for Thapar's consideration," said Courier Journal.

McConnell, who called for a nominee who will interpret the law fairly and apply it even-handedly, has praised Thapar in the past. AGENCIES

Koreas hold talks on connecting roadwaysSEOUL: North and South Korea held talks on Thursday on estab-lishing roadways to run across their border -- part of the initia-tives agreed between their lead-ers to forge closer ties.

South Korea's Moon Jae-in and the North's Kim Jong Un agreed to a broader plan to re-connect or newly establish railways and roadways between the two countries in a landmark summit held in April.

Linking the transport sys-tems of the two Koreas will require the modernising of the impoverished North's age-ing and crumbling roadway infrastructure.

Officials who met at the bor-der on Thursday to hammer out details chose two routes along the peninsula's western and eastern coasts for the first-phase modernising works, according

to a joint statement released by the South's government.

One will connect the South's eastern border county of Gos-eong with the North's major eastern port of Wonsan and

the other will run between the North's western city of Kaesong and the capital Pyongyang, said the statement. The joint "field research" on the routes will begin in early August, it added.

The agreement came two days after the two Koreas held similar talks on connecting the railways running across the bor-der. The two sides then agreed to conduct a joint-study "at an early date" on modernising the railways -- originally built by Japan in the early 20th century but left to crumble for decades after the 1950-53 Korean War resulted in the division of the peninsula. AGENCIES

North Germany home explosion leaves 3 deadBerlin: German authori-ties say three people have been killed in a massive explosion on the upper floor of a row house in the northern city of Bremen. Police told the dpa news agency that rescue crews had found the bodies of a 41-year-old woman and her sev-en year old son, as well as that of a 70-year-old neighbor after the explosion this morning. Investigators were still trying to determine the cause of the explosion, which destroyed most of the home. Around 70 firefighters were able to put out the blaze that followed the explosion but investigators were still waiting on the rubble to cool before beginning their work. AGENCIES

It’s official: First Trump-Putin summit at Helsinki on July 16

WASHINGTON DC: U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet on July 16 in Helsinki, the Kremlin and the White House said on Thursday, a first official summit that will be closely watched by nervous U.S. allies in Europe and critics of Russia in America.

The two countries announced the details simul-taneously a day after striking a deal on holding the meet-ing following a visit to Mos-cow on Wednesday by U.S. national security adviser John Bolton.”The two leaders will discuss relations between the United States and Russia and a range of national security issues,” the White House said in a statement.

Trump and Putin have met twice before on the sidelines of international gatherings.

Their summit could irritate U.S. allies who want to isolate Putin, such as Britain, or who are concerned about what they see as Trump’s overly friendly attitude toward the Russian leader.

It is also likely to go down

badly among critics who ques-tion Trump’s commitment to the NATO alliance and who have been concerned about his frictions with longtime allies such as Canada and Germany over trade.

Trump has long expressed a desire for better relations with Moscow, even as Washington tightens sanctions.

Hanging over relations with Russia since Trump took office in January last year is the conclusion of U.S. intelli-gence community that Moscow sought to interfere in the 2016 presidential campaign to tilt the election in Trump’s favor.

Moscow has long denied any meddling. A special coun-

sel is investigating possible col-lusion by the Trump campaign with Russia, which Trump has denied.

Bolton told reporters in Moscow he expected Russian meddling in U.S. politics to be discussed at the summit.

He said he did not rule out Trump discussing Russia rejoining the Group of Seven industrialized countries to make it the G8 again.

After Trump and Putin met briefly in Vietnam in Novem-ber 2017, Trump was criticized in the United States for saying he believed Putin when the Russian president denied accu-sations that Russia meddled in the 2016 election. AGENCIES

DGIPR/2018/2019/1552

CENTRAL PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENTNOTICE INVITING e-TENDERS

GOVERNMENT OF MAHARASHTRA Office of the Executive Engineer,

Public Works Division , Nagar Road Beed-431122 Email: beed.ee@mahapwd.com Phone : 02442-222474

E-TENDER NOTICE NO. 10 YEAR-2018-19 Online B-2 e-Tender for the following works are invited by Executive Engineer,Public Works Division, Beed from the Contractors Regis-

tered with Govt. of Maharashtra in P.W.D. in appropriate class; Tender documents may be downloaded from website http://mahaetenders.gov.in or http://maharashtra.etenders.in. Right is reserved to reject any or all tenders without assigning any reason thereof.

Period of download of bidding document :- As per online Tender schedule E-Tender Opening :- As per online Tender schedule All information about E-tender is available on the following Portal. 1. http://mahapwd.com 2. http://mahaetenders.gov.in or http://maharashtra.etenders.in (Changes if any will be intimated over above portal)

Sd/- EXecutive EngineerDGIPR 2018/2019/1548 Public Work Division Beed

mp worldMILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

11

India votes against OPCW draft on chemical weaponsTHE HAGUE: India has voted against the draft deci-sion on addressing the threat from chemical weapons use at a special conference of the Organisation for the Prohi-bition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) here, citing "incom-plete consultations".

Speaking at the confer-ence, India's Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the OPCW, Venu Rajamony, said the country is against the use of chemical weapons under any circumstances and believes those who indulge in such "abhorrent acts" must be held accountable.

"We have studied this draft very carefully and have con-sulted widely including with the drafters and the main co-sponsors of the draft decision. However we believe that on an issue of such grave importance, the consultations conducted by the sponsors remain incomplete. It has been India's view that the draft decision of such far reach-

ing importance and implications should be the end result of a comprehensive and extensive consultation," he said, explain-ing India's vote on the draft deci-sion on 'Addressing the Threat from Chemical Weapons Use'.

"As our concerns have not been addressed by the draft decision, India has decided to vote against the draft decision," Rajamony said.

"However, India remains willing and open for discus-sions with States Parties to find

ways and means to strengthen the Convention and its effective implementation including on the present issue of timely attri-bution to the extent, provided it is strictly within the framework of the Convention. The inter-national community has high expectations of the Chemical Weapons Convention and it is incumbent on all States Parties to rise up to this expectation by preserving and protecting the Convention" he said.

He said India expresses

its deepest sympathies to the victims of chemical weapons attacks and their families.

The conference has been called by the UK, the US and the West to have discussions on upholding the global ban against the use of chemical weapons.

The UK has reportedly pro-posed to consider empower-ing the OPCW to identify the organisation or government responsible for chemical attacks in addition to its existing power of carrying out the investigation into such cases.

"It has been India's consis-tent position that the use of chemical weapons anywhere, at any time, by anybody, under any circumstances, cannot be justified and the perpetrators of such abhorrent acts must be held accountable," Rajamony said. The use of chemical weap-ons is in complete disregard of humanity, and is reprehensi-ble and contrary to the provi-sions of the Chemical Weapons Convention as well as accepted

international legal norms. It is important to maintain the cred-ibility and integrity of the Con-vention, he said.

All investigations of the alleged use of chemical weap-ons should be conducted in an impartial and objective manner and strictly in accordance with the provisions of the Conven-tion, the ambassador said.

He urged that all provisions of the Convention be utilised to address these concerns, accord-ing to a statement issued on Thursday by the Indian Embassy at The Hague. Rajamony said while there was unity on the goal, there are strong differences on how to achieve this goal.

"India attaches the highest importance to this organisa-tion and has therefore always emphasised the importance of consensus and the need for all decisions to be taken by the members of OPCW in consulta-tion with each other, taking on board different points of view," he said. AGENCIES

Pak SC ousts Sharif man Aziz from polls with contempt of court ruling

ISLAMABAD: A prominent Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz leader and loyalist of former premier Nawaz Sharif, Daniyal Aziz was on Thursday disquali-fied by the Supreme Court from contesting general elections for five years, weeks ahead of the July 25 polls.

The apex court had on Feb-ruary 2 issued a contempt of court notice to Aziz, the then Federal Minister for Privati-sation, for making derogatory and contemptuous speeches and

statement against the judiciary during television shows last year. Aziz, a PML-N candidate from Narowal NA-77 seat for the gen-eral elections, was indicted on March 13 and the judgement was reserved on May 3.

Justice Musher Alam, of a three-member bench of the apex court, read out the judgement, which pronounced him guilty and ordered him to custody till the rising of the court.

The court's verdict rendered him disqualified to contest elec-

tions for a period of five years, the Dawn reported.

According to Article 63 (1) (g) of the Constitution, a person shall be disqualified from being elected or chosen as, and from being, a member of the Majlis-e-Shoora (Parliament), if he has been convicted by a court of competent jurisdiction...unless a period of five years has elapsed since his release, it said.

Following the verdict, Aziz's counsel said that his cli-ent would file a review peti-

tion in the Supreme Court, the report said.

Aziz, while addressing a press conference in September last year, had accused Justice Ijazul Ahsan of summoning NAB authorities in Lahore for preparing corruption cases against Sharif, his family mem-bers and former minister Ishaq Dar.

Later, in December, the firebrand PML-N leader had hurled accusations against Jus-tice Ahsan. AGENCIES

Queen Elizabeth II gets 13% hike in tax

payer-funded ‘wages’LONDON: Queen Elizabeth II got a 13 per cent hike in her Brit-ish taxpayer-funded allowance ahead of extensive repairs to Buckingham Palace, estimated to cost around a whopping 369 million pounds.

The 92-year-old monarch's accounts released on Thursday showed the public funds used by her for official expenditure and duties went up from 41.9 million pounds to 47.4 million pounds.

More than 4 million pounds of that hike was spent on the ini-tial phase of palace modernis-ing, including the removal of old wiring, while 21.4 million pounds went on staff payroll costs and the rest on travel and other maintenance costs over the previous year.

Large-scale refurbishment work on Buckingham Palace's east wing will begin in April 2019, which is expected to cause years of upheaval for the royal family at their traditional Lon-don residence. The removal of nearly 10,000 treasures from the Royal Collection installed in the wing will begin in the coming months. Priceless antique fur-niture, paintings and tapestries will be moved to other wings, transferred to other palaces, lent to exhibitions or placed in commercial storage, the Palace announced. A spokes-person said that disruption to

royal events would be kept to a minimum.

"The programme addresses the urgent need to overhaul the Palace's essential services, some of which have not been updated since the 1950s. These important works will help avert the very real danger of a catastrophic building failure such as a flood or fire," said Sir Michael Ste-vens, keeper of the privy purse (in charge of royal accounts).

The Queen's official expen-diture is met from public funds in exchange for revenue from the Crown Estate -- or the extensive property owned by the monarch. The "core" Sov-ereign Grant, or expense allow-ance, is usually based on 15 per cent of the net surplus of the Crown Estate. However, from this year the total grant is based on 25 per cent of the surplus, an increase intended to meet the costs of refurbishing Bucking-ham Palace. AGENCIES

Ex-Pak PM Abbasi moves HC against disqualification to contest election

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan's for-mer prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi on Thursday moved the Lahore High Court against an election tribunal's decision barring him from con-testing the July 25 general elec-tion from Rawalpindi.

Questioning the tribunal's jurisdiction to disqualify a can-didate, Abbasi's counsel Kha-waja Tariq Rahim urged the high court to set aside the ver-dict. Observing that Abbasi was guilty of concealment of facts and withholding of complete information from his voters , a single-member tribunal of Justice Ibadur Rehman Lodhi on Wednesday disqualified the former prime minister from contesting the general election from Rawalpindi and declared that he was not Sadiq' (truthful) and Ameen' (righteous).

Abbasi had filed nomina-

tions for NA-53 Islamabad and NA-57 Rawalpindi seats. Initially, election officials had rejected his nomination from Islamabad but accepted his bid from Rawalpindi.

He had challenged his rejec-tion from the capital in a special election tribunal of the Islam-abad High Court, where his plea was accepted by judge Mohsin Akhtar Kayani on Tuesday.

Abbasi's rival candi-

date from NA-57 (Murree in Rawalpindi), Masood Abbasi had challenged his candida-ture in the tribunal led by Jus-tice Lodhi. He had accused the former premier of tampering with the nomination papers and illegally occupying forest land in his native Murree city near Islamabad, and certain other objections including not declar-ing the exact worth of a house in Islamabad. AGENCIES

Market fire kills 15 in Kenya capital

NAIROBI: A fire at Nairobi's Gikomba market killed 15 peo-ple on Thursday, a government official said, less than a year after a blaze to destroyed much of the Kenyan capital's largest open-air market.

"We have lost 15 people from this tragedy this morning," said regional coordinator Kangethe Thuku. "We're yet to establish the cause of this fire," he said, which is believed to have started in a timber yard.

The pre-dawn blaze left over 70 people injured and destroyed many of the market's wood and tarp stalls where second-hand clothes, shoes and vegetables are sold on the eastern side of the city. A police officer at the scene said emergency services contin-ued to search the area. "We are still trying to get to some cor-ner [of the market] which has heavy smoke, because part of the area has not been accessed due to live electric wires," the officer said. Witnesses heard explosions as gas canisters were swept up in the inferno. Nine of the dead were in an apartment block next to the market while six others -- including four chil-dren -- died of their injuries in hospital. AGENCIES

Korean Air Chairman Cho Yang-ho questioned on suspicion of embezzlement... apologisesSEOUL: Korean Air's chairman has apologized before being questioned by prosecutors investigating alleged wrongdoing by him and his family. Cho Yang-ho said "Sorry" and bowed his head before entering a Seoul pros-ecutors' office on Thursday. Cho joins his wife and two daughters who were questioned by authorities since April on a variety of charges including tax eva-

sions, obstruction of business and violat-ing an immigration law. Prosecutors are investigating the 69-year-old leader at the South Korean flag carrier on suspicions of embezzlement and breach of trust. Local media said prosecutors are also looking into Cho's alleged eva-sion of inheritance taxes but an official at a Seoul prosecutors' office did not confirm. AGENCIES

Probe into ‘indecent clothes’ forces reporter to leave Saudi

RIYADH (SAUDI ARABIA): Saudi authorities have launched a probe after a female TV pre-senter wore "indecent" clothes while reporting on the end of a decades-long woman driv-ing ban, triggering outrage on social media.

Shireen al-Rifaie, a Saudi presenter with Dubai-based Al Aan TV, appeared in a widely-circulated video wearing a loose headscarf and a partly open gown that revealed her trousers and a blouse. The clip sparked a torrent of criticism from arch-conservatives on social media, with the Arabic hashtag "naked woman driving in Riyadh" gain-ing traction. The kingdom's General Authority for Audio-visual Media on Tuesday said they had referred Rifaie to inves-tigators, accusing her of "violat-ing regulations and instructions" by wearing "indecent clothes". Rifaie has dismissed the charge, telling news website Ajel that she was wearing "decent clothes". Ajel reported that Rifaie left the kingdom after the contro-versy erupted.

The outrage also prompted light hearted banter on social

media, with many Saudis mock-ing hardliners for describ-ing a fully clad woman as "naked".

On Sunday, women cele-brated taking the wheel for the first time in decades as the ultra-conservative kingdom over-turned the world's only ban on female motorists.

The conservative petro-state has some of the world's toughest restrictions on women, who are required to wear body-shroud-ing abaya robes in public.

Earlier this month, Saudi Arabia sacked the head of its

entertainment authority, fol-lowing a conservative backlash against a circus featuring women wearing skintight leotards.

In April, Saudi sports authorities shut down a female fitness centre in Riyadh over a contentious promotional video that appeared to show a woman in figure-hugging gym clothes.

Later that month, the sports authority apologised over a pro-motional video of a WWE event that showed scantily clad female wrestlers drawing euphoric cheers from men and women alike.

Earlier, Saudi women cele-brated taking the wheel for the first time in decades today as the kingdom overturned the world’s only ban on female motorists, a historic reform expected to usher in a new era of social mobility.

The much-trumpeted move is part of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s plan to modernise the conservative petrostate -- but it has been dented by the jailing of female activists who long opposed the driving ban. AGENCIES

mp business12MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

NEW YORK: Walt Disney Co won US approval to buy Twenty-First Century Fox Inc entertainment assets for $71.3 billion on condition it sell Fox’s 22 regional sports networks, the Justice Department said on Wednesday, giving Disney an edge over Comcast Corp’s competing bid.

The Fox movie franchises and TV shows have been the subject of a bidding war between Disney and Comcast, both of which want to expand their own entertainment busi-nesses to compete with fast-growing digital rivals Netflix Inc and Amazon.com Inc.

The deal does not include the nationally broadcast Fox News, Fox Business or Fox Sports networks.

If Disney prevails over Comcast, the combination would expand Disney’s unri-valed portfolio of some of the world’s most popular charac-ters, uniting Mickey Mouse, Luke Skywalker and Marvel superheroes with Fox’s X-Men, “Avatar” and “The Simpsons” franchises.

Disney owns ABC, Pixar, Marvel Studios and “Star Wars” producer Lucasfilm, plus an array of theme parks. The Fox assets being acquired include a cable group that includes FX Networks, National Geo-graphic and 300-plus inter-national channels plus Fox’s stake in Hulu.

Disney, which also owns sports network ESPN, has agreed to divest all of Fox’s regional sports networks, which provide sports pro-gramming for regional and local markets, such as Fox’s YES Network, which airs New York

Yankees baseball games around the New York metro area.

Together, Fox’s regional sports networks have about 61 million subscribers and have rights to broadcast live games of 44 of 91 US profes-sional sports teams in three of the four major sports leagues.

The Justice Department said that without the divesti-tures, “the proposed acquisition would eliminate the substantial head-to-head competition that currently exists between Dis-ney and Fox and would likely result in higher prices for cable sports programming.”

Disney’s agreement with the government could be a set-back for Comcast, which has yet to respond to Disney’s lat-est offer for Fox, unveiled last week. Comcast, whose offer is worth $65 billion, declined to comment.

Fox also declined to comment.

Disney said it was “pleased” with the agreement reached with the Justice Department and said it looked forward to creating “even more compel-ling consumer experiences.”

Analysts have antitrust con-cerns about Comcast’s com-peting bid, which would add Fox’s movie and TV studios to Comcast’s NBC Universal. Chief Executive Brian Rob-erts had said that Comcast was willing to offer the same condi-tions as Disney and promised to fight for the deal in court if necessary.

The sports networks could attract a variety of bidders among technology and media companies looking to get their hands on live sports, sources said. AGENCIES

US gives Disney approval to buy Fox ... amid bidding war with Comcast

SAN FRANCISCO: Apple and Samsung have ended a years-long patent battle over copied iPhone design with an undisclosed settlement, according to a US court filing on Thursday.

The world's two biggest smartphone makers reached a truce in their seven-year-old court battle a month after a federal court jury ordered Samsung to pay Apple some 539 million for copying pat-ented iPhone features.

That award was seen as a victory for Apple, which had argued in court that design was essential to the iPhone.

Financial terms of the set-tlement were not revealed and neither company elaborated on the brief court order which dismissed the litigation dating back to 2011.

"Whereas the court has been advised by the parties that the above-entitled action has been settled, all remaining claims and counterclaims in this case are hereby dismissed with prejudice," US District Court Judge Lucy Koh wrote.

When contacted by AFP

for comment, Apple referred to a statement released last month after the jury announced the damages award.

"This case has always been about more than money," the statement read.

"It is important that we continue to protect the hard work and innovation of so

many people at Apple.South Korea-based Sam-

sung declined to comment.Apple's lawsuit claimed

Samsung, now the world's big-gest handset maker, copied the design and other features of the iPhone as the smartphone market was exploding.

The case was keenly

watched as a precedent for whether design is so important that it could actually be con-sidered the "article of design" even in a product as complex as a smartphone.

The case had been sent back to the district court fol-lowing a Supreme Court deci-sion to revisit an earlier 400

million damage award.The jury had been asked

to determine whether design features at issue in the case are worth all profit made from Samsung smartphones that copied them -- or whether those features are worth just a fraction because they are components.

The three design patents in the case apply to the shape of the iPhone's black screen with rounded edges and a bezel, and the rows of colorful icons displayed.

Two utility patents also involved apply to "bounce-back" and "tap-to-zoom" functions.

An original trial find-ing that Samsung violated Apple patents preceded a lengthy appellate dueling over whether design features such as rounded edges are worth all the money made from a phone.

The retrial regarding dam-ages was one element of a 548 million penalty — knocked down from an original 1 bil-lion jury award — Samsung was ordered to pay for copying iPhone patents. PTI

NEW DELHI: India is among the 5 countries which are least vulnerable to currency pres-sures amid strengthening of the US dollar, because of low dependence on external capi-tal inflows, Moody's Investors Service said on Thursday.

In a report on the impact of strengthening of the US dollar on other sovereigns, Moody's said the appreciation of $has prompted a sharp currency depreciation and/or a signifi-cant decline in forex reserves in a number of emerging and frontier markets.

However, India, China, Brazil, Mexico and Russia are among the "least vulnerable" to currency pressures, it said.

"Large savings channelled through the financial sec-tor allows these economies to largely fund themselves domes-tically, thereby lowering expo-sure to volatile portfolio flows," Moody's said.

The Indian rupee col-lapsed to a lifetime low of 69.10 against the US dollar in early trade on Thursday as ris-ing crude oil prices deepened concerns about the country's current account deficit (CAD) and inflation dynamics.

Moody's said although India's CAD has widened,

driven in part by the recent rise in oil prices, it remains mod-est as a percentage of GDP and is largely financed by equity inflows, including foreign direct investment.

"India's significant build-up of foreign exchange reserves in recent years to all-time highs provides a support buffer to help mitigate external vulner-ability risk," said the US-based rating agency.

India's foreign exchange reserves in the week to June 15 stood at $410.07 billion.

CAD, which is the differ-ence between the inflow and outflow of foreign exchange, jumped to $48.7 billion, or 1.9 per cent of GDP, in 2017-18 fis-

cal. This was higher than $14.4 billion, or 0.6 per cent, CAD in 2016-17 fiscal. Moody's said India's large and relatively sta-ble domestic financing base limits external vulnerability.

"India's limited exter-nal vulnerability is supported by a large and relatively sta-ble domestic financing base for government debt, which contributes to the economy's resilience by sheltering it from abrupt changes in external financing conditions," it added.

Although India's debt affordability is relatively weak, the average maturity of debt is close to 10 years and over 96 per cent of it is in local cur-rency. PTI

‘India least vulnerable to strengthening of $’

US Apple, S Korean Samsung end 7-year iPhone patent war

NEW DELHI: To improve transparency and credibility to the spot price polling mecha-nism in commodities, Sebi has proposed to make it compul-sory for exchanges to accredit an independent polling agency and bring such agency under its purview.

The capital markets regula-tor has come out with a con-sultation paper on ways to enhance efficiency in the poll-ing methodology adopted for determination of spot price for commodities. The availability of correct and transparent infor-mation about the spot price of any commodity is essential for arriving at the expected futures prices of the commodity.

This is necessitated as any divergence in the linkages between the two prices could lead to adverse impact on the price in two markets -- deriv-atives and spot, the regulator noted. Under the consulta-tion paper, Sebi has proposed to make it compulsory for exchanges to accredit an inde-pendent polling agency for spot price polling, which can do the job independently for all the exchanges on a specific commodity.

"This is necessitated because of the fact that the universe of the polling participants is limited and the same partici-pants are being called many times in a day especially where same contract is listed on more than one exchange or the same participant deals in multiple commodities.

"As a result, many a times these polling agents do not answer the calls from the exchanges," the regulator said in

the paper issued on Wednesday.The Securities and

Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has proposed for uni-formity in approach amongst the exchanges on the process of price polling methodology.

Further, the regulator has recommended bringing the independent polling agency, conducting polling of spot prices, as well as the partici-pants (price submitters) under its purview by registering and supervising them.

Also, Sebi has suggested pro-viding incentive to the polling participants for submitting the spot prices and requiring polling agencies or exchanges to enter into a legal contract with the polling participants for obtain-ing their services.

The move may put necessary contractual obligations on the polling participants for submis-sion of spot prices.

The regulator has sought public comments till July 27 on the proposal and a final regulation will be put in place after taking into consideration views of the stakeholders. There should be alternate means for collection of the quotes from

polling participants like e-mail, app, specific web-based applica-tion, which could supplement the present system of telephonic conversations, Sebi suggested.

"The strengthening of the process of dissemination of spot prices of a commodity may strengthen the conver-gence and integration of spot and future prices of a commod-ity thereby enhancing efficiency of both spot and derivatives market," it noted. In the draft proposal, it has been suggested that exchanges should consider increasing the time slot for col-lection of price from polling participants.

Besides, it proposed to increase the frequency of col-lection of the prices from the polling participants so that the polling agency can obtain reli-able spot prices throughout the day. "Instead of asking for per-ception of polling participants about the price of specific grade of a commodity, exchange or polling agency may poll them on the actual traded prices of the commodity with detail of the quality and grade of those commodities traded by them," it added. PTI

Sebi mulls ways for transparency in spot price polling mechanism

NEW DELHI: Rural demand has seen some traction in recent months and, going for-ward, adequate procurement as well as minimum support price (MSP) increases could push up rural incomes this fiscal, says a report.

According to a research report by HDFC Bank, the extent of pick up in rural demand is dependent on a number of factors, as a good monsoon alone will not do the trick.

"Adequate procurement and the effectiveness of MSPs to act as a floor for crop prices will be crucial. Even if MSPs are increased substantially, the actual income realisation of farmers will be determined by what percentage of crops will be bought at these prices," the report said.

Moreover, revival in rural wages will be essential for a sustainable recovery in rural demand.

"The most important leg of the rural demand puzzle is that while rural demand indica-tors are looking up, rural wage

growth on the other hand has seen a decline. Nominal rural wage growth has been moder-ating since the middle of 2017," the report said.

As per the report, wage growth declined to 3 per cent in February 2018 from over 7 per cent in April last year. Also, real wage growth has seen a secular decline over the last year and has now turned negative.

Moreover, both agri and non-agri wages have declined. Agriculture wage growth declined from close to 9 per cent in April 2017 to 2.3 per cent in February 2018 with non-agricultural wage growth also moderating from 5 per

cent to 3.7 per cent during the same period.

The report further noted that the increase in rural infla-tion, uptick in construction activity some and of the decline in rural wage growth is likely to be reversed.

"Looking ahead, given the expected pickup in the non-farm sector with manufactur-ing activity showing signs of revival, GST related disrup-tions fading away, and con-tinued push to construction by the government the fall in agri wages might moderate and overall wage growth outlook might improve," the report said. PTI

‘Adequate procurement, MSP increases are critical for rural demand to pick up’

NEW DELHI: HDFC Asset Management Company, the country's largest mutual fund firm, has received Sebi's go-ahead to float an initial pub-lic offer.

The company had filed draft papers with Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) in March and received its "observations" on June 22, as per the latest update with the markets watchdog. Sebi's observations are necessary for any company to launch public issues like rights issue, initial public offer (IPO) and follow-on public offer (FPO).

Going by the draft papers, the proposed IPO offers up to 2.54 crore equity shares of the fund house through an offer for sale of 85.92 lakh shares by HDFC and up to 1.68 crore shares by Standard Life.

The offer comprises a net offer to public of up to 2.21 crore equity shares, a reservation of up to 3.20 lakh shares for purchase by eligible HDFC AMC employ-ees. Besides, 24 lakh shares have been reserved for eligible HDFC shareholders. PTI

HDFC Mutual Fund gets Sebi

nod for IPO

NEW DELHI: India has flagged serious concerns with Austra-lian authorities on the taxation issue on Indian IT companies providing off-shore software services to their Australian clients.

"Australian authorities have stated that they would look into the matter," an official said.

The issue was raised during the recent visit of Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh

Prabhu to Canberra and Sydney.As per global trade norms,

Australia can tax only on-shore activities of Indian IT firms and not off-shore services rendered from India.

Certain Indian companies have approached Australian courts also on the matter but the courts have passed orders against them.

Indian IT firms earn the highest amount by providing

off-shore services to the US companies.

The Indian side have also asked for greater market access for it fruits and vegetables including potato, tomatoes, onion, okra and cucumber to increase exports.

"We have also raised the issue of investment proposals of certain Indian mining com-panies which are stuck there," the official added.

During his visit, Prabhu has sought investments from Australian superannuation or pension funds in sectors includ-ing industrial corridors, ports, smart cities, airports and rail-way projects.

The bilateral trade between India and Australia increased to $18 billion in 2016-17 from $14.11 billion in the previous fiscal. Trade balance is highly in favour of Australia. PTI

India raises worries on Oz taxation of IT firms

NEW DELHI: Bids have been invited from consultants to advise on the proposed merger of three public sector general insurance firms as announced in this year's budget.

There is a proposal by the government to merge three public sector general insur-ance companies (PSGICs) -- National Insurance Company Ltd, Oriental Insurance Com-pany Ltd and United India Insurance Company Ltd.

"PSGICs invite expression of interest (EoI) from compa-nies/firms interested to pro-vide consultancy services for the merger of the three firms into one strong single entity, creating enterprise value and shareholders worth for better listing," a public notice said.

As on March 31, 2017, PSGICs together had more than 200 insurance products with a total premium of Rs 41,461 crore and a market share of around 35 per cent.

The combined net worth of three companies is Rs 9,243 crore with total employees' strength of around 44,000 spread over 6,000 offices.

The consultant is expected to advise on organisational restructuring, rationalisation of human resources, manage-ment of operational issues, reg-ulatory and compliance issues, it said.

The consultant is expected to handhold the management of all the three companies, throughout merger process till the new organisation is formed and set in place, it said.

The last date for submission of bids is July 16. PTI

Bids invited for advice on

merger of 3 PSU general insurers

ZURICH/ NEW DELHI: Banks in Switzerland saw their profits rise about 25 per cent to CHF 9.8 billion in 2017, even as their foreign customer depos-its fell amid a global crack-down taking down their famed secrecy walls.

The rebound follows the Swiss banks' profits nearly halv-ing to CHF 7.9 billion earlier in 2016.

The overall customer deposits rose marginally by 1 per cent to about CHF 1.8 tril-lion, despite the dip in money deposited by their foreign cli-ents, according to data released on Thursday by the Swiss National Bank (SNB).

The domestic customer deposits were up CHF 57.6 billion to CHF 1,193.4 billion, while foreign customer depos-its were CHF 40.5 billion lower at CHF 594.7 billion.

A factor contributing to this divergence was big banks' transfer of financing trans-actions to Switzerland from abroad, accounting for around CHF 17 billion. In 2016, both domestic and foreign customer

deposits had increased.As in 2016, fiduciary funds

administered by banks rose, by about 15 per cent to CHF 138.2 billion. While domes-tic fiduciary funds registered a slight increase of CHF 0.9 bil-lion to CHF 22.7 billion, there was a significant rise in depos-its from abroad, which were CHF 16.9 billion higher at CHF 115.6 billion.

A breakdown of fiduciary deposits from abroad showed the developing countries accounting for 36 per cent, off-shore centres of 42 per cent and developed nations of about 22 per cent.

Among individual coun-tries, Saudi Arabia accounted for 8.6 per cent of such funds, UAE (5.9 per cent), the UK (5.6 per cent) and Turkey (1.9 per cent).

Of the 253 banks in Swit-zerland, 229 recorded a profit in 2017, while the remaining 24 institutions recorded loss.

The number of banks in Switzerland declined again, from 261 at the end of 2016.

The aggregate balance sheet total rose by 4.8 per cent to CHF 3,249.4 billion.

Against the backdrop of regulatory requirements, the big banks transferred in-house

services, together with the staff concerned, to non-banking group companies.

Since these companies do not have banking licences, the staff who work for them are not included in the bank statistics, the SNB said.

This led to a significant reduction in staff numbers at banks in Switzerland, falling by 10,427 to 1,10,413 staff in terms of full-time equivalents. In the domestic component, the total number of staff decreased by 7.7 per cent to 93,554, while the number abroad declined by 13.4 per cent to 16,858.

Meanwhile, money kept by Pakistani nationals in Swiss banks fell by over 21 per cent to a record low of CHF 1.115 bil-lion (Rs 7,700 crore) in 2017, even as the same from India rose after three straight years of decline.

The Pakistani money in Swiss banks had fallen by 6 per cent to CHF 1.4 billion (about Rs 9,500 crore) in 2016. Before that in 2015, these funds had risen 16 per cent from CHF 1,301 billion at 2014-end. PTI

Black money paradise Swiss banks enjoy 25% profit growth

mp business 13MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

The Institution of Engineers (India), West Bengal State Centre organised a commemorative lecture at R N Mookerjee Hall on the occasion of 165th Birthday of Sir Rajendra Nath Mookerjee. Dr Arup Roy Choudhury, Chief Commissioner, Right to Public Service Commission, West Bengal delivered the lecture on the topic “Engineers are the flag bearers ofCorporate Ethics and Culture”

The 5th unit of NTPC-Rihand, continuously producing for 385.6 days, managed to make the new record. The Rihand project has become a 3000 MW production company today. Meeting of media representatives concluded with Group General Manager AK Mukherjee (Rihand)

CORPORATE KALEIDOSCOPE

MUMBAI: Petroleum minis-ter Dharmendra Pradhan on Thursday reacted cautiously to the US demand to stop crude imports from Iran, saying the government "will go by the national interest".

Oil imports from Iran surged to about 705,000 bar-rels per day in May, the highest since last October, according to industry data, despite the threats of fresh US sanctions against Tehran after the US president Donald Trump had on May 8 unilaterally withdrew from the nuclear deal that his predecessor Obama had sewed up with Tehran.

In May the volume rose 10.2 per cent over the previous month and about 45 per cent over the same month last year.

While India is the second largest crude customer for Iran behind China, Iran is the third largest source of crude for the country after Iraq and Saudi Arabia. It supplied 18.4 mil-lion tonne crude in the April 2017-January 2018 period.

With around 200 million barrels per annum,India is the third largest consumer of fos-sil fuels after the US and China and is one of the few markets that has a steady demand growth.

"We will go by our own interests," Pradhan quipped

cautiously when asked about his views on the latest US direc-tion to the government to stop crude imports from Iran from November 4 or face economic sanctions.

The minister, who was here to attend the final leg of the roadshows for the ninth round of the city gas distribution auc-tions, further said, "Our source markets have widened mas-

sively in recent years."In fact, there is not a sin-

gle oil producing country from where we don't buy crude today. We have even placed contracts with Brunei. So there is no threat of supply disrup-tions because of the latest threat of US sanctions."

It can be noted that Trump withdrew the US from the Iran nuclear deal on May 8 to pur-

sue a maximum pressure cam-paign against Tehran's nuclear bomb programme. At that time, he gave foreign compa-nies either 90 or 180 days to wind down their business with Iranian counterparts, depend-ing on the type of commercial activity.

It can be noted that India has increased oil purchases from Iran to nearly pre-2012

levels after sanctions were lifted in 2015, and in May 2016, India agreed to transfer to Iran about $6.5 billion that it owed for Ira-nian oil shipments but which was held up for payment due to sanctions.

Following the latest Amer-ican threat, the State Bank, which was facilitating pay-ments to Iran, had last week said it would not continue with the job.

In 2010, the Reserve Bank ceased using a Tehran-based regional body, the Asian Clear-ing Union,to handle transac-tions with Iran. In January 2012, Iran agreed to accept rupee payments to settle nearly half of its sales to India.

Meanwhile, Pradhan said the new city gas distribution contracts, which will begin on July 10, if successful, will add nine more Maharashtra dis-tricts including Aurangabad, Kohlapur, Satara and Sindhu-durg, among others, to the gas pipeline network. Currently six districts are covered by gas pipelines in the state.

The minister also said he has asked the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board to work towards laying gas pipelines along the proposed Mumbai-Nagpur expressway, which if done will add 20 more districts. PTI

US tells us to stop Iran oil buys ... We'll go by national interest NEW DELHI: India's larg-

est port developer and part of Adani Group APSEZ on Thurs-day said it has inked a pact to acquire Marine Infrastructure Developer for Rs 1,950 crore.

Marine Infrastructure Developer Private Limited (MIDPL) is the operator of Kat-tupalli Port.

Of the Rs 1,950 crore, Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Limited (APSEZ) will be paying Rs 1,562 crore towards settlement of dues of MIDPL.

"It has executed Share Pur-chase Agreement between Larsen and Toubro Limited, Marine Infrastructure Devel-oper Private Limited, L&T Ship-building Limited and Adani Kattupalli Port Private Limited to acquire 97 per cent shares of Marine Infrastructure Devel-oper Private Limited (MIDPL). MIDPL is the developer and operator of Kattupalli Port," APSEZ said in a statement.

Kattupalli Port is one of the most modern ports in India, emerging as new gateway for EXIM trade in Chennai / Ban-galore region and provides a whole new dimension of ser-vices with speed and sophisti-cation, the company said.

"We are going to start our construction to diversify the cargo of the port and will be adding 40 million tonne of new capacity in next 3 years. We are confident that with our supe-rior infrastructure and efficient handling of cargo we will be

able to reduce logistics cost of industries in the region and be one of the engines of growth," APSEZ CEO Karan Adani. MIDPL is engaged construc-tion, maintenance, development and operation of Kattupalli Port. The company is likely to com-plete the acquisition in a week, APSEZ said. The company in a regulatory filing to the BSE said the acquisition will be "Rs 1,950 crore enterprise value of which Rs 388 crore is the con-sideration for the acquisition of shares and the balance Rs 1,562 crore is towards settlement of liabilities of MIDPL".

APSEZ said the acquisi-tion will enable the company to develop container terminal operation to increase market share and provide container, bulk terminal operation and marine services.

About governmental or reg-ulatory approvals, it said the Tamil Nadu government vide an order dated February 29,

2016, had granted approval for the transaction.

MIDPL was incorporated on January 22, 2016, and had Rs 98.64 crore revenue in 2016-17, the filing said. APSEZ said with backup area of 322 acres, Kattu-palli port provides ample space for future expansion of port to facilitate trade requirements.

APSEZ plans to transform Kattupalli into a multi commod-ity port to handle cargoes like containers, automobiles, break bulk, general cargo, liquid cargo and project cargo.

Presently the port has capacity to handle 1.2 Million TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent unit) per annum. APSEZ said amongst the many advantages of Kattupalli port is its unique loca-tion - it is located 30 kilometers towards north of Chennai and has connectivity with hinterland of North Tamilnadu, Chennai, Bangalore and South Andhra Pradesh - locations which are highly industrialised. PTI

Adani group's APSEZ to buy Kattupalli port for ̀ 1,950 cr

TOKYO: Feeling uncer-tain about life? Need a bit of guidance? A Japanese firm is launching a new service allowing you to talk to a smart speaker and receive a sermon from Buddhist monks.

Tokyo-based Yoriso said today its new feature would enable users to listen to three-minute sermons via a smart speaker given by four monks depending on their mood.

A three-minute sermon is often given at religious ser-vices to commemorate the anniversary of a loved one's death in Japan.

Users can talk to a smart speaker developed by Japan's messaging app giant Line and decide how they are feeling: uncertain, angry or sad.

The speaker will then choose a sermon randomly from 12 talks.

"We hope that people will feel close to Buddhist monks"

through the new service, Ayaka Takada, spokeswoman for Yoriso, told AFP.

Buddhism and Shintoism are the two major religions in Japan but attachment to reli-gion has dropped.

As the population ages and rural communities shrink, some 30 per cent of Japan's 75,000 Buddhist tem-ples are at risk of closing by 2040, according to Kenji Ishii, a professor of Kokugakuin University in Tokyo.

The new service will be launched late next month. PTI

Zensational biz! Japan firm starts Buddhist

sermon serviceNEW DELHI: SBI managing director B Sriram has resigned from the country's largest lender after his appointment as chief executive of IDBI Bank, sources said.

The development assumes significance amid reports that insurance behemoth LIC is mulling acquiring a majority stake in the debt ridden state-owned bank.

The government last week appointed Sriram as manag-ing director and CEO of IDBI Bank for a temporary period of three months.

He has put in his papers and his resignation from the board of SBI has been forward to Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for acceptance, sources said, adding the competent author-ity will take a final call on the matter.

Sriram took charge of IDBI Bank on June 22 following M K Jain demitting office to take over

as Deputy Governor of RBI. The ACC approved the

appointment of Sriram as MD and CEO of IDBI Bank for three months with effect from M K Jain's demitting office, said an order issued last week by the Department of Personnel and Training.

LIC is looking to enter the banking space by acquiring majority stake in IDBI Bank as the deal is expected to provide business synergies despite the lender's stressed balance sheet.

A possible scenario would be the insurance major mak-ing IDBI Bank a subsidiary on the lines of its housing finance and mutual fund businesses. PTI

NEW DELHI: The total mar-ket capitalisation of the top 100 global companies has increased by 15 per cent since last year to $20 trillion, as the US retained the leading position with 54 companies in the list, says a survey.

According to PwC's Global Top 100 ranking, released on Thursday, the total capital-isation of the top 100 global companies has grown on a year-on-year basis, since the global financial crisis.

Amazon is the strongest performer in terms of absolute increase in market capitalisa-tion, gaining $278 billion or

66 per cent in value compared to 2017.

It's followed by two Chi-nese companies - Tencent, up by $224 billion or 82 per cent, and Alibaba, rising by $201 bil-lion or 75 per cent. The next three highest performers in absolute terms are all from the US Microsoft, Alphabet and Apple.

Others in the top 10 in terms of absolute increase in market capitalisation include Ping An Insurance (up by $90 billion), ICBC (up $89 billion), Boe-ing (up $85 billion), Berkshire Hathaway (up $81 billion).

As per the report for the

fourth year running, the US accounts for more than half of the top 100 (54 companies, down from 55 in 2017). It also weighs in with 61 per cent of the overall market capitalisation, down from 63 per cent last year.

"48 per cent of growth in the past year has been contributed by US companies, on the back of strong economic conditions and their pre-eminent position in the technology sector," the report said.

Meanwhile, the market capi-talisation of the companies from China in the top 100 leaped by 57 per cent compared to 2017, with 12 Chinese companies making the top 100, up from 10 last year. Hong Kong also contributed another two com-panies, up from one in 2017.

No Indian company made it to the list.

Meanwhile, despite com-ing sixth in terms of absolute growth in value, Apple retained pole position in terms of mar-ket capitalisation for the seventh year in a row.

Apple has also returned more cash to shareholders

than any other company, hand-ing back another $31 billion to investors in dividends and share repurchases in calendar year 2017 (having distributed $29 billion in calendar 2016), the report said.

Sector-wise, technology remains ahead of the financial sector in market capitalisation for the third successive year, with consumer goods in third place.

The global top three are still technology companies Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft followed by Tencent in fifth position and Facebook in eighth, down from sixth last year, the report said. PTI

Top 100 global cos' market cap gallops by 15% to $20 trillion

KANPUR: President Ram Nath Kovind on Thursday felic-itated students from underpriv-ileged sections of society who cleared the JEE IIT Advance 2018 examination after inten-sive coaching under GAIL (India) Limited’s Corporate Social Responsibility initiative GAIL Utkarsh.

The felicitation programme was held at the Indian Insti-tute of Technology (IIT) cam-pus here. Also present on the occasion were GAIL officiat-ing Chairman and Managing Director Dr Ashutosh Kar-natak and Center for Social Responsibility and Leadership (CSRL) Director S K Shahi.

The students, who are from the ninth batch of ‘GAIL Utkarsh’, were provided one

year of free residential coaching under this CSR project. GAIL was the first PSU to start the coaching centre at Kanpur for talented but underprivileged students in 2009-10.

Conducted in partnership with CSRL, ‘GAIL Utkarsh’ started with just 23 students, which expanded to 100 stu-dents from 2011-12. Since its inception, 679 students were enrolled in the initiative, out of

which 591 secured admission in IITs/NITs and other reputed engineering colleges. The suc-cess rate of the project is 87 %.

This year, 99 out of 100 stu-dents qualified in JEE Main, out of which 52 students quali-fied in IIT Advance, including six girls.

The students are selected on the basis of written test, interview and strict eco-nomic criteria. Most of them come from rural background and their parents have small sources of income. They can-not afford to pay costly fees of private institutes. So far, more than 150 students have got job placements in reputed compa-nies, thus completing the ‘Pro-cess of Transformation’ for them. MPOST

Kovind hails GAIL Utkarsh students who cleared JEE IIT Advanced exam

Bhel in pact with South Korean firm for emission control toolsNEW DELHI: BHEL on Thursday said it has inked a pact with South Korean firm NANO Co Ltd for design and manufacture of emission controlling devices for coal-based power plants. The Tech-nology Collaboration Agreement with NANO Co is for design and manufacture of SCR Catalysts for De-NOx application in coal-fired plants. PTI

NEW DELHI: Jindal Steel and Power Ltd (JSPL) will restruc-ture the liabilities of its South African business and develop a plan to make it profitable, according to a regulatory filing.

The company has decided to take the 'Business Rescue' route in efforts to revive the South African business, which primar-ily consists of Anthracite coal mine. "With a view to protect the interests of various stake-holders and with a long-term vision of turning it profitable and sustainable, the company has taken the strategic decision to take the Business Rescue (BR) route," the company said.

Under the BR plan, JSPL will engage a business rescue practitioner who will look to restructure the liabilities - both operational and financial - as well as develop a plan to make the business profitable.

"The management is confi-dent that by opting for the BR route, it can revive the business in South Africa and be able to increase its enterprise value in the long run," it added. PTI

JSPL to rejig liabilities of SA business

MUMBAI: Times Internet (TIL), the digital venture of the Times of India group, has bought majority stake in local video platform MX Player for over Rs 1,000 crore, as part of its plans to enter the video over-the-top (OTT) space.

MX Player is investing aggressively into premium, original, digital-first content, with an emphasis on high qual-ity Hindi and regional produc-tion, a release said on Thursday.

"TIL has invested over Rs 1,000 crore to acquire a major-ity stake, to build a digital-first video streaming platform atop MX Player's 350 million install base in India," the release added.

The company has installed over 500 million devices

globally.Times Internet chief exec-

utive officer Gautam Sinha said India presents one of the biggest digital entertainment opportunities in the world with over 400 million Internet users.

"We are building a con-tent experience with the qual-ity of mainstream media, but designed specially and exclu-sively for Indian millennial that are digital-first," he added.

The platform will launch with more than 20 original shows, and over 50,000 hours of premium content across all languages, according to the release.

MX Player will continue to support its offline video play-back features that are currently available. PTI

NEW DELHI: Wipro, the country's third largest IT ser-vices firm, on Thursday said it has completed the divestment of its data centre business in Germany and the UK along with Wipro Data Centre and Cloud Services, Inc for a con-sideration of $399 million.

In March, the Bengaluru-based company had said it will divest its hosted data centre services business, consisting of Wipro Data Centre and Cloud Services, Inc (United States of America), a portion of data centre business in Germany and UK, and certain employees in India who support the said operations to Ensono for $405 million. PTI

Air India to now operate four Delhi-Tel Aviv flights a week

NEW DELHI: Air India is set to increase the frequency of its Delhi-Tel Aviv flights from three to four per week from July 14 to cater to the growing tourist flow between India and Israel, said an Israeli tourism ministry official on Thursday.

The Indian national carrier will now fly a 256-seater Boeing 787 Dreamliner every Saturday, in addition to those presently being operated on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays, it said in a statement.

At present, besides the Air India, Israeli carrier El Al oper-ates flights between Mumbai and Tel Aviv.

The ministry said another Israeli airline 'Arkia' too has also showed interest to operate direct flights between Israel and India to cater to the significant rise in the air traffic volume between the two countries.

"We are pleased with the Air India's move to increase weekly flight frequency in light of the significant rise in tourist arriv-als from India. The outbound numbers to Israel have grown

exponentially in the last few years and this introduction will help meet the growing demand from India.

"India is an important mar-ket for us and I am delighted to say that it has been one of the best performing markets in Asia with a 31 per cent growth last year over 2016 and 31 per cent between January and May 2018 over 2017," Director of Israel Ministry of Tourism for India and Philippines Hassan Madah said in a statement. Israel has also reduced its visa fees for

Indian citizens to Rs 1,100 from Rs 1,700 to encourage Indian travellers visit Israel, he said.

With one way duration of 7 hours and 10 minutes, Air India is currently the fastest nonstop flight between India and Israel taking a straight route between the two countries, overflying Saudi Arabia.

The Delhi-Tel Aviv AI 139 flight made its maiden jour-ney on March 22 this year and since then the occupancy rate has gone up from 60 per cent to over 80 to 83 per cent. PTI

Sriram resigns as SBI MD... in midst of IDBI Bank stake sale buzz

Times Internet buys majority stake in MX Player for ̀ 1K cr

Wipro finishes divestment of data centre biz in Germany, UK

mp sport14MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

Swiss through to last 16 but lose captain Lichtsteiner

NIZHNIY NOVGOROD: Switzerland moved through to the World Cup last 16, after a draw over Costa Rica but will be without captain Stephan Lichtsteiner because of suspension.

A 93rd minute own goal by the unfortunate keeper Yann Sommer from a Bryan Ruiz penalty gave the central Ameri-can side a deserved 2-2 draw on a night of late drama in Nizhny Novgorod. That wiped out a Swiss lead which had lasted only two minutes after substi-tute Josep Drmic slotted home to apparently give the Swiss an undeserved victory.

Earlier, Blerim Dzemaili had thumped home in the first half to give Switzerland the lead against the run-of-play in the 31st minute against the team who finished bottom of Group E. That goal was cancelled out by Kendall Waston’s header in the 56th minute, the cen-tral Americans first goal of the tournament.

The draw ensured Swit-zerland finished second in the group behind Brazil.

But Switzerland will be left counting the cost after yellow cards for experienced defend-ers Lichtsteiner and Fabian Schaer means they will miss the game against Sweden in Saint Petersburg on July 3.

Lichtsteiner received a yel-low card for a late tackle on

Daniel Colindres in the 37th minute.

It was the Arsenal player’s second yellow of the tourna-ment after being booked in the opening game against Brazil. He was one of three players who had escaped a ban going into the match after the con-troversial “double eagle” goal celebrations in the fevered 2-1 victory over Serbia. AGENCIES

Mina winner sends Colombia

through as rowdy Senegal exit

SAMARA: A powerful header from Barcelona’s Yerry Mina fired Colombia into the last 16 of the World Cup with a 1-0 win over Group H rivals Sen-egal, who crashed out due to a poorer disciplinary record than Japan.

Colombia and Japan will play either England or Bel-gium, who were playing later on Thursday.

The South Americans, looking to reach the latter stages after reaching the quar-ter-finals in Brazil, risked going out of the tournament at the first hurdle.

But after seeing the video assistant referee come to their rescue in a disappointing first half, Colombia were handed a last-16 lifeline 13 minutes from the end when Mina rose to meet a corner from the right and direct a header into the roof of Khadim Ndiaye’s net.

Poland’s 1-0 consolation win over Japan meant the Asians finished level with Sene-gal, who were agonisingly elim-inated because they were issued six yellow cards in the compe-tition, two more than Japan.

In Samara, Colombia coach Jose Pekerman kept faith with the attacking front line that thumped Poland 3-0, with midfielders Juan Quintero, James Rodriguez and Juan Cuadrado providing the sup-port for striker Radamel Fal-cao up front.

But by the end of an enter-taining first half, Pekerman was forced to tinker when Rodri-guez was forced off with an injury problem and replaced by Luis Muriel.

Before then, Senegal had shown attacking potency but, all too often, failed to threaten David Ospina’s goal. AGENCIES

Brazil win to set up last-16 tie against Mexico

Japan booed off but reach last 16 despite Poland loss

Shock Germany win ‘shook South Korea upside down’

MOSCOW: There were no World Cup shocks in Moscow as Brazil secured a 2-0 win against Serbia to progress to the knockout stages as Group E winners.

After Germany’s surprise exit from the competition earlier on Wednesday all eyes turned to Bra-zil, another World Cup heavyweight with its progress not yet secured and one keen on making amends for their 7-1 World Cup semi-final thumping to the Germans four years ago on home soil.

The minimum needed from the Brazilians at the Spartak Stadium to make sure of their place in the next round was a draw. Goals in either half from Paulinho and Thiago Silva ensured the five-time champions added three points to their tally to top the group and set up a last-16 tie against Mexico.

Serbia had their moments, but Brazil had too much creativity and firepower in the final third to put their continued participation in this competition in doubt.

The Serbians were far from over-whelmed in the first half and while the attacking triumvirate of Neymar, Philippe Coutinho and Gabriel Jesus occasionally threatened, they did not terrorize. Instead, defensive errors proved to be Serbia’s downfall.

In the 35th minute, a delightful Coutinho pass over the top of Serbia’s defence found Pau-linho galloping through the middle and the midfielder converted from close range for his first goal of the competition.

It was a strike which eased Bra-zilian nerves and left Serbia needing two goals if they were to stay in the competition. The Serbians looked dangerous on the counterattack and in the second half they had oppor-tunities against a sometimes uncon-vincing Brazilian defense.

Aleksandar Mitrovic, whose overhead kick in the first half sailed over the crossbar, headed a rebounded Alisson save straight at

Silva when in the six-yard box.The striker had another opportu-

nity in the 64th minute, but his close range downward header was caught comfortably by Brazil’s goalkeeper.

Mitrovic’s profligacy proved to be costly. Despite Serbia being in the ascendancy, Brazil doubled their advantage when Silva headed Ney-mar’s corner in at the near post.

The header punctured Ser-bia’s hopes and from there on it was a question of how many Bra-zil would score and were it not for Vladimir Stojkovic twice saving efforts from Neymar at point-blank range it could have been a heavier defeat for the Serbians whose World Cup is now over. AGENCIES

VOLGOGRAD: Japan and Poland were booed from the pitch in Vol-gograd after a farcical end to their final Group H match which saw the Blue Samurai qualify for the last 16 despite a 1-0 defeat.

Japan went through by the slim-mest of margins — their fair play record — after the last 10 min-utes were played out like a train-ing match as both sides settled for the result.

They will meet either Belgium or England after reaching the knock-out stage for the third time in their history. When Jan Bednarek scored his first international goal in the 60th minute for already eliminated Poland, the score between Colom-bia and Senegal stood at 0-0 mean-ing Japan were going out.

But once news filtered through of Yessy Mina’s 74th minute goal for Colombia the match changed for the worse. The strike meant Colombia would win the group and Japan were ahead of Senegal despite identical points, goal differ-ence and goals scored, because they had received fewer yellow cards.

A cacophony of boos rang out

as hardly any tackles were made in the last 10 minutes as Poland decided any sort of win would be enough and Japan decided not to risk any yellow cards Japan coach Akira Nishino made six changes including bringing in attacking pair Shinji Okazaki and Yoshinori Muto for his World Cup debut.

And it was they who fashioned the first real opening in the 12th

minute of a game played at sedate pace in 36 Celsius temperatures.

Bednarek played a blind pass across his penalty area straight to Muto who shifted it to Yuto Naga-tomo motoring down the left flank.

His whipped cross was met by a diving Okazaki header which flashed wide.

Moments later Muto won pos-session again outside the box and

his fierce shot was parried out of harm’s way by goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski, one of five changes in Poland’s starting line-up.

The Polish captain Robert Lewandowski is renowned as a world-class goal scorer for Bay-ern Munich but, as in the rest of Poland’s sorry World Cup campaign, he was seeing little of the ball. AGENCIES

SEOUL: South Korean fans rejoiced on Thursday and called for national service exemptions after their team went out of the World Cup in a blaze of glory, eliminating defending cham-pions Germany with a shock 2-0 victory.

In one of the great World Cup upsets, Kim Young-gwon and Son Heung-min both scored in injury time to condemn footballing superpower Germany to their first opening-round exit in 80 years.

South Korea were pelted with toffees, a Korean insult, when they returned winless from Brazil 2014 and although they again leave early, after defeats to Mexico and Sweden, they finished above Germany on goal dif-ference in Group F.

“We didn’t make it to the round

of 16... but we sent the world number one packing,” said a headline in Seoul’s major Dong-A daily.

“We are so proud of you,” the newspaper said on its front page,

adding the game “shook South Korea upside down”.

Germany went into the game knowing that a win by two clear goals would have seen them into the last 16.

But instead it was Sweden and Mexico who advanced after the Scandinavians romped to a 3-0 win in the group’s other match.

The Taeguk Warriors, semi-final-ists in 2002, brought the defending champions “down with them”, Yonhap news agency said, adding that Ger-many “unceremoniously bowed out of the tournament”.

South Korean social media were flooded by tens of thousands of mes-sages from fans expressing joy and astonishment over a victory that had seemed utterly implausible before the match.

“This is far more shocking than our advance to the semi-final at the 2002 World Cup,” one commenter said.

“Who cares we won’t make it to

the round of 16? We defeated Ger-many, the world number one!” added another.

“It was an honourable exit.”Prime Minister Lee Nak-yeon

joined them, tweeting on Thurs-day: “Reality beat our imagination today” and praising the South Korean footballers.

South Korean players swept the most-searched terms on major portals and dozens of online petitions were launched on the presidential web-site, urging Moon Jae-in to exempt star players, including Tottenham Hotspur forward Son and goalkeeper Cho Hyun-woo, from their manda-tory two-year military service.

“They gave us so much hope,” said one petitioner. “Their talent should not be wasted in the military!” AGENCIES

Argentina train before World Cup clash with FranceBRONNITSY (RUSSIA): Argentina practiced at the national team’s training camp in the Russian town of Bronnitsy on Thursday, two days ahead of their FIFA World Cup second-round game against France. Head coach Jorge Sampaoli led the session with 22 available players, while midfielder Enzo Perez, who started in Argentina’s previous two group match-es against Croatia and Nigeria, worked out in the gym due to a hip injury, reports Efe. In its Group D clashes, Argentina tied 1-1 with Iceland, lost 3-0 to Croatia and won 2-1 over Nigeria. Argentina are to take on France on Saturday, the opening day of the knockout round, at Kazan Arena. Perez has not been ruled out for that clash. AGENCIES

Switzerland’s Blerim Dzemaili celebrates after scoring his side’s first goal during the group E match against Costa Rica on Wednesday AP/PTI

Brazil’s players celebrate after Thiago Silva score in Moscow AP/PTI

England, Belgium face off in a game neither may really want to winWITH top spot in group G on the

line, a bizarre situation has arisen in which neither Belgium or England may want to actually win their final game and therefore top the group.

Here’s the situation: England and Belgium are locked

together with two wins apiece at the top of Group G heading into their final encounter on Friday morning (AEST).

Conventional wisdom would sug-gest that winning the group should pro-vide the “easiest” possible passage to the latter stages of the tournament.

At this World Cup though, conven-tional wisdom has been turned on its head. With a clear disparity in strength between teams on opposite sides of the draw, winning the group might not be all it’s cracked up to be.

The path to the final for the team that wins Group G looks like this:

Round of 16: Colombia, Japan or Senegal.

Quarter-finals: Mexico or Brazil.

Semi-finals: Uruguay, Portugal, France or Argentina.

A daunting prospect, particularly owing to a potential quarter-final match-up with either five-time cham-pions Brazil or perennial under-achiev-ers Mexico.

By finishing runner-up, the route — on paper at least — looks a lot more manageable.

Round of 16: Colombia, Japan or Senegal.

Quarter-finals: Sweden or Switzerland.

Semi-finals: Spain, Russia, Croatia or Denmark.

Additionally, the team that finishes runner-up will have an extra 24 hours to prepare for its next match — a key factor to consider midway through a lengthy

tournament that offers little time off between games. With an “easier” path ahead of the team that finishes second, there will surely be a temptation to engi-neer a favourable result with the bigger picture in mind.

With both teams safely through to the knockout stages, each coach has suggested they will make changes — as many as 10 have been mooted for Bel-gium whilst Gareth Southgate will also shuffle his English pack in Kaliningrad.

For Belgium coach Roberto Marti-nez, at least one of those changes will be enforced after top-scorer Romelu Lukaku suffered a minor ankle injury, with disciplinary factors also coming into effect with key players Jan Vertong-hen and Kevin de Bruyne both sitting precariously on one yellow card. AGENCIES

KAZA ARENA: South Korea coach Shin Tae-yong hailed the unfancied Asians’ momentous 2-0 World Cup victory over holders Germany on Wednes-day but admitted it left him feeling “a little bit empty”.

A pair of late goals from Kim Young-gwon and Totten-ham forward Son Heung-min, combined with a superb display from goalkeeper Jo Hyeon-woo helped South Korea create one of the greatest shocks in the his-tory of the tournament.

Germany, the 2014 cham-pions, Confederations Cup champions and FIFA’s top-ranked team, were eliminated

at the first hurdle for the first time since 1938.

Unfortunately for South Korea, who had been given no hope following defeats to Mexico and Sweden, it was not enough to secure their passage to the last 16 for the first time since 2010.

In 2002, the Asians joint-hosted the tournament with Japan and finished in fourth place.

“I feel great but at the same time I feel a little bit empty, so I feel a little bit ambivalent,”

Shin said when asked to put his side’s historic feat into context. AGENCIES

KRATOVO: Portugal defender Bruno Alves said Saturday’s World Cup last-16 clash with Uruguay will be more than simply a battle between Cris-tiano Ronaldo and Luis Suarez.

The European champions will face Uruguay in Sochi for a place in the quarter-finals after finishing as runners-up behind Spain in Group B.

Uruguay won all three of their group matches, beating hosts Russia 3-0 in their last outing, and are the only team yet to concede a goal at the tournament.

Real Madrid forward Ron-aldo has scored four of Por-

tugal’s five goals so far, while Barcelona star Suarez net-ted against Saudi Arabia and Russia.

“I don’t think it will be a duel between Suarez and Ron-aldo,” Alves said on Thursday.

“It’s a match between the two teams, Portugal and Uru-guay, and we’ll do everything we can to win.”

Portugal survived a late scare against Iran on Monday, as Ronaldo missed a penalty and was fortunate to escape a red card for an elbow.

“At this stage we still believe we have room for improve-ment,” Alves said. AGENCIES

KAZAN: France and Argentina took different paths to the knockout stage but have much in common at this World Cup. Both teams are filled with big-name players, both like to play an entertaining style and both have failed to impress so far.

Forty years after their last meeting at soccer’s biggest tournament, the former champions meet on Saturday in Kazan for a spot in the quarter-finals, needing their best players to come to the fore. With its armada of star players, France qualified unbeaten from its group but has yet to find the right rhythm. In three matches, coach Didier Deschamps’ team has lacked ambition and intensity. The poor form of striker Antoine Griez-mann has been a concern. Argentina had a shakier path to the knockout stage and coach Jorge Sampaoli has been heavily slammed. AGENCIES

Historic Germany win leaves S Korea coach feeling ‘empty’

Portugal-Uruguay more than Ronaldo v Suarez, says Alves

Argentina, France hope to reach potential in World Cup clash

AP/PTI

Japan lose to Poland but have reached the last 16 by having a better disciplinary record than Senegal

mp sport 15MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

Second T20I vs Ireland: Few changes for India

DUBLIN: Fresh from a 76-run win in the opening match, India will look to ring in a few changes as they attempt to finish off their assignments in Ireland on a win-ning note during the second and final T20 International here on Friday.

India were runaway winners in Wednesday’s opening T20I, scoring 208/5 in their 20 overs, with Rohit Sharma and Shikhar Dhawan contributing 97 and 74 runs, respectively before wrist spinners Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal shared seven wickets between them to restrict Ireland to 132/9.

It indicated that India’s first-choice eleven was functioning properly after a break of three months, and tuning itself for the England tour.

The big question is of bench strength and chances for the likes of Lokesh Rahul, Dinesh Karthik and Umesh Yadav.

Going into the second match, Kohli had hinted at making a few changes in the middle order to give everyone game-time so they could acclimatise to the conditions.

India will have an advantage from the fact that the pitch for the second T20I is expected to play much in the same fash-ion as on Wednesday.

Kohli’s mantra of giving chances to those sitting on the bench could be extended to the bowling line-up as well, where both Umesh Yadav and Siddarth Kaul are raring to go and longing for game time. Leaving out all-rounder Har-dik Pandya for three full-time pacers and two spinners still gives Kohli five bowling options, enabling him to leave out Suresh Raina and Manish Pandey and bring in both Rahul and Karthik.

On the other hand, Ireland will need to work on their batting, which fell like nine pins to India’s wrist spin twins -- Yuzvendra Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav.

Barring opener James Shannon’s 60 off 35 balls, none of the Irish batsmen could apply themselves and all they could afford was the dull sweep shot against the

Indian spinners.While an upset looks improbable, Ire-

land are more than capable of springing a surprise or two on home soil. AGENCIES

All-round India hammer Ireland by 76 runsDUBLIN: India rode on an all-round effort to kick off their English summer with a 76-run thrashing of minnows Ireland in the first of the two-match T20I series here on Wednesday. Put into bat, the visitors posted a commanding 208/5, thanks to brilliant half centuries from seasoned openers Rohit Sharma (97 off 61 balls; 4x8, 6x5) and Shikhar (74 off 45 balls; 4x5, 6x5) before the bowl-ers sprung into action to restrict the hosts for a meagre 132/9. Ireland’s chase surrounded around opener James Shannon’s (60 off 35; 4x5, 6x4) half century as all the other batsmen faltered in reading India’s wrist spin twins — Yuzvendra Chahal (3/38) and Kuldeep Yadav (4/21). Ireland batsmen’s weakness against quality spin bowling was clearly exposed as wickets started to crumble one after the other as soon as skipper Virat Kohli employed Cha-hal and Kuldeep. AGENCIES

Srikanth, Sindhu win; Saina

crashes out of Malaysia Open

KUALA LUMPUR: Star shut-tlers P V Sindhu and Kidambi Srikanth notched up straight-game wins to progress to the quarterfinals but it was cur-tains for Saina Nehwal in the $700,000 Malaysia Open world tour super 750 tournament here on Thursday.

Olympic and world cham-pionship silver medallist Sindhu brushed aside the chal-lenge of Malaysia’s Ying Ying Lee 21-8 21-14 to set up a clash with Olympic champion and former world no 1 Carolina Marin. The 22-year-old Indian has a 5-6 head-to-head record against the Spaniard.

In men’s singles, fourth seed Srikanth saw off Chinese Taipei’s Wang Tzu Wei 22-20 21-12 in 36 minutes to take his head-to-head count to 3-0.

The 25-year-old from Gun-tur, who had briefly become world no 1 in April, will clash with France’s Brice Leverdez tomorrow. The Indian had beaten the world no 22 French in three games at All England Championship this year.

Earlier, Saina’s run at the Malaysia Open ended with a straight-game loss to Japan’s Akane Yamaguchi.

Saina, a two-time Com-monwealth Games gold med-allist, went down 15-21 13-21 to world no 2 Yamaguchi in 36 minutes at the Axiata Arena in Bukit Jalil, a suburb in Kuala Lumpur. This is Saina’s sixth straight loss to the Japanese in seven meetings. The only time Saina had defeated Yamaguchi was in the 2014 China Open.

World No. 3 Sindhu hardly broke any sweat as she first opened up a 6-4 lead and then reeled off eight straight points to jump to 14-4.

In the second game, Sindhu again held an 8-7 lead before moving to 13-7. Lee tried to make a comeback but Sindhu was always ahead as she com-fortably sailed into the quarters.

In the men’s singles, Srikanth zoomed to a 11-3 lead at the break after dominat-ing the proceedings right from the start. AGENCIES

As team wanes, DC United welcomes WayneWASHINGTON: After weeks of speculation, former England captain Wayne Rooney swapped football for soccer on Thursday, arriving in Washington to join beleaguered Major League Soc-cer side DC United.

While the club remained tight-lipped, it was a not-so-cryptic tweet that confirmed the rumors: the 32-year-old on a flight, grinning with thumbs up, his photo captioned by an American flag emoji. Everton and United later officially con-firmed the transfer news.

“Everton and Wayne Rooney have reached an agreement for the player to join MLS (Major League Soccer) side DC United

on a permanent transfer,” said a statement from the English club.

“Rooney will complete the formalities of his move when the MLS transfer window opens on July 10.

“From everyone at Everton, we thank Wayne for his service to the club and wish him every success in the next 3 1/2 years with DC United.”

The former England captain and Manchester United star was expected in the US capital to tie up the details of a contract that reports have said will be worth 13 million.

Rooney, 32, will be sidelined until the MLS transfer window opens on July 10, and avail-

able for 20 league matches this season.

However, the Washington Post reported the club hopes he could start training with the struggling side as early as the end of this week in order to be match ready in time for the opening of their new stadium, Audi Field, in mid-July.

DC United sits at the bottom of the MLS Eastern Conference but coach Ben Olsen this week said new additions to the side would be “exciting.”

“If and when additions come, it will be exciting. I think the additions that we will bring in will help this club in a whole bunch of different ways,” he

said. Rooney, a record goal-scorer at both club and inter-national level with Manchester United and England, comes to the MLS as one of the biggest names to ever grace the league.

Once England’s youngest-ever player — and still their youngest-ever goalscoarer — a 17-year-old Rooney whet fans’ ever-present appetite for a superstar-in-the-making at the 2004 European Championships.

The hype at fever pitch, that same year he joined another teenage whiz kid, Cristiano Ronaldo, at United for the first of 13 seasons at the club, during which he racked up 253 goals in all competitions. AGENCIES

Chhattisgarh Rural Roads Development Agency VIKASH BHAVAN, CIVIL LINES, RAIPUR (C.G.)

E-Procurement Tender Notice NIT No. 350 /TC-T/CGRRDA/2018 Dated /06/2018

The Superintending Engineer / Convener (Tender Cell), CGRRDA on behalf of Governor of Chhattisgarh invites the percentage rate bids on SOR of PMGSY 22/02/2018 amended till date in electronic tendering system for construction of roads under Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana PMGSY Batch-I Year 2018-19 for the district of Rajnandgaon of 11 number of roads with 6 Package, Length 48.89 Km, Total Estimated Cost of Rs 2777.29 Lacs (Including 12 % G.S.T.) as per B.O.Q. including their routine maintenance for five years from the eligible contractors registered with unified registration system ( e-registration). Date of release of Invitation for Bids through e-procurement: 30. /06/2018

Availability of Bid Documents and mode of submission: The bid document is available online and should be submitted online in https://eproc.cgstate.gov.in. The bidder would be required to register in the web-site which is free of cost. For submission of the bids, the bidder is required to have a valid Digital Signature Certificate (DSC) from one of the authorized Certifying Authorities. The bidders are required to submit (a) original bid security in approved form and (b) original affidavit regarding correctness of information furnished with bid document as per provisions of Clause’4.4 B (a) (ii) of ITB with Superintending Engineer / Convener, Tender Cell, CGRRDA, Vikash Bhawan, Civil Lines, Raipur C.G. on a date not later than three working days after the opening of technical qualification part of the Bid, either by Speed/ Registered post, failing which the bids shall be declared non-responsive.

Last Date/ Time for receipt of bids through e-procurement as per time schedule. For further details please log on to https://eproc.cgstate.gov.in. In future any related corrigendum would be seen in the notice section of the website.

Sd/-Superintending Engineer convener(Tender Cell) Chhattisgarh Rural Road Development Agency

Civil Lines, Raipur (C.G.) Samvad 87372/5 E-mail : pmgsyrc4@yahoo.co.in

HARYANA ROADWAYS ENGINEERING CORPORATION LIMITED (A GOVERNMENT OF HARYANA UNDERTAKING)

REGD. OFFICE & FACTORY: 6th MILE STONE, JAIPUR HIGHWAY BEHRAMPUR ROAD, KHANDSA, GURUGRAM (HARYANA)

TEL.0124-221560, TEL-FAX-0124-2215389 (GSTN -06AAFH8157K1Z6) EMAIL ID: gm.hrec@gmail.com CIN-U34101HR1987SGC029904)

NOTICE FOR INVITING E-TENDEROnline E. Tender are hereby invited for fabrication of bus bodies and allied job work in TATA and Ashok Leyland Chassis in HREC as per AIS:052( Bus Body Code).

Tender documents can be downloaded online from the Portal: http://haryanaeprocurment.gov.in by the firms/ individual registered on the Portal. The tender can be download from 29.6.18 at 11:00 Hours and the last date submission of online e tender is 20/07/18661 upto 17:00 Hours. As the Bids are to be submitted online and are required to be encrypted and digitally signed, the Bidders are advised to, obtain Digital Signature Certificate (DSC) at the earliest. For any clarification bidder may contact Help Desk: 1800-180-2097(Toll Free Number) 0124-2215660.

PRDH-Advt. No:-1263/11/84/1819/67828 General Manager, Dated: 28.06.2018 Hr. Roadways Engg.Corpn.Ltd., Gurugram

annum in same two

CANTONMENT BOARD AGRA114 F.S.ROAD, SADAR, AGRA CANTT.

NOTICE INVITING TENDERS Tenders are invited from contractors through the Government e-procure-

ment portal http://eprocure.gov.in/cppp/ by the Cantonment Board Agra for outsourcing of teaching, non- teaching, instructor, technical and auxiliary staff on contract basis forCantonment Board Schools including Rainbow Public School and Skill Devel-opment Center. The period of contract will be for minimum two year from the date of commencement and it may be extended in future The Board reserves the right to cancel orwithdraw the tenders without any notice and the Board’s decision in this regard will be final. Terms/conditions, eligibility criteria and connected details may be seen in the office during working hours or in the above portal.Earnest Money Deposit Rs. 1,00,000=00Cost of Tender :Rs. 1000=00

Note :1. Tender applications not accompanied by requisite cost of tender will be treated as rejected. Each applicant has to deposit cost of tender. Tender cost is non-refundable.2. Date of opening of Cover-2(Financial Bid) will be informed online and the same will be opened only in respect of qualified and eligible contractors who fulfill eligibility criteria according to their bid submitted in Cover-1(Technical Bid).3. Uploading of bid does not constitute any guarantee for opening of Financial Bid (Cover-2) of the tenderer.4. For submission of e-tender, the bidders are required to get themselves registered with eprocrement.gov.in website along with class II/III digital signa-tures certificates issued by authorized Organisation under IT Act, 2003.5. Any change/modification in the Tender Inquiry/NIT will be intimated through above said website only. Bidders are requested to visit the above men-tioned website regularly to keep themselves updated.

Sd/-M.Venkat Narshimha Reddy

No.7/School/Contract/CBA/2018 . Chief Executive Officer,Telephone : 0562- 2227379 Cantonment Board, Agra

millenniumpost NO H ALF TR U THS

millenniumpost.in

I, Nadeem S/o Abdul Rasheed R/o 34-A/1, Khureji Khas, Krishna Nagar Delhi-110051, do hereby solemnly affirm and declare that i have changed my name from Nadeem to Nadeem Ansari for all Purposes. that Nadeem and Nadeem Ansari are one and the same person.

CHANGE OF NAME

mp Entertainment16 MILLENNIUM POST | New Delhi | Friday, 29 June, 2018

DEPRESSION

‘SUCCESS HAS NO

BEARING ON ‘

Bollywood star Deepika Padu-kone believes that mental health has “nothing to do with how successful you are”. In an

interview with ES Magazine, the Pad-maavat star recalled her battle with depression at the time when her career was at the peak.

“There was a lot happening (in 2014) - people thought professionally it was one of the best years of my life. I was on a career high but that’s the thing about depression – there are no warn-ing signs,” Deepika said.

“It just comes and it has nothing to do with how much money you have or how successful you are... It can affect literally anyone,” she added.

Deepika said she recovered through “lifestyle changes and medication” and went on to set up the Live Love Laugh Foundation. 

“There are a lot of people who come and say that they contemplated com-mitting suicide and after seeing (what) I’ve done, they understand what they were going through and their lives have changed,” she said. 

“And that was the entire purpose of doing what I did. So I’m happy I made that decision to come out,” she added. Deepika also revealed the advises she got early in her career.

“To get a boob job, do the beauty pageants. They felt it was the right way to be picked up by a director, or a producer. It might be an easier way to achieve what you want to achieve. But I haven’t been that person. I’ve always followed my gut,” she said. PTI

Deepika recalls how people

thought that 2014 was one of the best years of her life in

terms of career but no one noticed

her battle with depression

The Padmavat actor says that doing beauty pageants might be an easy way to be picked up by directors and producers, but she has never been that kind of a person

‘Karwaan, a journey of emotions, adventures and chaos

LONDON: Irrfan Khan has described his upcoming film Karwaan as a journey full of “emotions, adven-tures and chaos”.

The 51-year-old actor took to Twitter to share the first trailer of his film. “Emotions. Adventures. Chaos. Experience all of these as you get on board! #KarwaanTrailerOut-Now,” Khan wrote, sharing the link in the tweet.

The National Award-winning actor is currently recuperating from Neuro Endocrine Tumour.

Karwaan, a dark comedy, revolves around three odd-balls from differ-ent walks of life who are thrown together on a bizarre journey. Directed by Akarsh Khurana, the film marks the Bollywood debut of Southern star Dulquer Salmaan and webseries actor Mithila Palkar.

Salmaan and Palkar also shared the trailer on the microblogging site and wrote, “You never know what life has in store for you! Get onto this journey of a lifetime with us!” The film is set to release on August 3. It has been produced by Ronnie Screwvala in association with Ishka films. PTI

Karwaan, a dark comedy, revolves around three oddballs from different walks of life who are thrown together on a bizarre journey

MUMBAI:  Actor Ishaan Khat-ter, who is all set for the release of his forthcoming film Dhadak, has said that his film is unique in its own way.

“I really hope when audience watch the film, they realize that it is a sincere adaptation and it’s a unique film in its own way. We have been really honest while making this film and we have sacrificed our blood, sweat and tears while making it. So, I hope our efforts will connect with the audience,” said Ishaan.

Sharing his feeling while launching most anticipated song ‘Zingaat’ from his film Dhadak, Ishaan Khatter said, “I am feel-ing really happy to launch this song as it comes at very impor-tant juncture of the story in the film and to get an opportunity to dance on this song was really amazing experience. I am a huge

fan of this song especially, the way Amitabh Bhattacharya has written the lyrics of this song. I hope audience will have same amount of fun while watching this song as much as we had while shooting it.”

On being asked about how he feels when comparison are drawn between Sairat (the orig-inal film) and Dhadak, and between the common factor of both the film – ‘Zingaat’ song –, he said, “Comparisons are bound to happen with Sairat because our film is official adaptation of that film.”

Dhadak is a romantic drama film directed by Shashank Khai-tan, produced by Dharma Pro-ductions and Zee Studios which is starring Janhvi Kapoor and Ishaan Khatter in lead roles.

The film is scheduled to be released on July 20. IANS

‘Dhadak’ is unique in its own way: Ishaan

Actor Scarlett Johans-son has trashed a report claiming that she audi-tioned to date superstar

Tom Cruise. A former Scientolo-gist had claimed that the Avengers: Infinity War star was one amongst the listed women to audition to date Cruise following his split from Nicole Kidman years ago.

“The very idea of any person auditioning to be in a relation-ship is so demeaning,” Johans-

son said in a statement to The Hollywood Reporter.

“I refuse for anyone to spread the idea that I lack the integrity to choose my own rela-

tionships. Only a man aka Brendan Tighe would

come up with a crazy story like that,” she added. 

Tighe, a former Scien-tologist, recently appeared on

NBC’s ‘Megyn Kelly Today’ and revealed that during his time as a part of Cruise’s Scientology secu-rity unit, he saw reports of women who auditioned to date the actor.

Tighe explained that the reports were accidentally sent to his printer and he only remem-bered Johansson because he rec-ognised her name.

“Another actor, Erika Chris-tensen, had to disconnect from Scarlett Johansson because it didn’t go well. That was in that report,” Tighe had said. PTI 

Actor Evan Rachel Wood says she was afraid to tell her sexual abuse experi-ence, but she pushed herself to open up about it.

Earlier this year, the actor shared her domestic violence and sexual abuse experi-ence with the House Judiciary Committee as part of an effort to secure a bill of rights for sexual assault survivors in the US.

“Amanda Nguyen, who wrote the Bill con-tacted me, just as a fellow survivor, and reached out. She said,‘We have passed this on a federal level, but it still has to be implemented in all

states, and we need to bring more awareness to it’,” Wood said.

“And I was like, ‘Well, I have really only told my story to about five people, I can count on one hand, so to go from that to everyone, to the world knowing, it was overwhelming. I don’t know a world in which everyone knows this about me, and it

was terrifying to think about what that would mean, and what people would think. But, the fact that I was so afraid to tell my story, and ashamed, just made me want to do it more, because I felt like that it was wrong, and I shouldn’t feel like that, so I said yes,” added the actor. IANS

Scarlett Johansson didn’taudition to date Cruise

Wood was afraid to tell her sexual

abuse storyEvan recently shared her sexual abuse experience with the House Judiciary Committee