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12
T he Centre on Thursday cleared the air on the can- celled Class 12 CBSE Board exams’ evaluation criteria say- ing that the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) will be adopting a 30:30:40 for- mula for evaluation of marks based on results of Class 10, 11 and 12 respectively and the results will be declared by July end. The Government informed the Supreme Court that 30 per cent marks will be based on Class 10 board exam, another 30 per cent from Class 11 and 40 per cent marks based on the performance in the unit, mid- term and pre-board tests of Class 12. The Supreme Court accepted the formula of CBSE and CISCE to evaluate the Class 12 students, whose board examinations were cancelled due to the Covid pandemic. The components adopted by CISCE for arriving at the evaluation formula is — marks percentage in Class X board examinations, the project and practical work in the subjects, the performance of the candi- dates in the school examina- tions in the subjects in Classes XI and XII, measured through their best marks obtained in the two years (referred to as raw marks) and the best perfor- mance of the school in the last six years. The Supreme Court also directed the boards to incor- porate provisions for disputes resolution in their assessment schemes themselves for those students who may be dissatis- fied with the marks awarded in the Class 12 board results. CBSE later announced that for such students exams will be conducted on physical mode and the candidates will have to register accordingly. A special bench of Justices AM Khanwilkar and Dinesh Maheshari said, “After perusing the scheme presented by the concerned Boards, prima facie, we have no hesitation in accepting the same and permit the Boards to proceed on that basis”. The CBSE said that for evaluating Class XII students, after their board examinations were cancelled for the academic year 2020-21, it has entered into consultative process with stakeholders to know the fac- tual position of the students and the schools. The board said that consultation process was held with principals of affiliat- ed schools, feedback was obtained from 229 Sahodaya School Complex comprising 7,734 schools and 13-members committee of experts. It said that theory paper evaluation formula will be of 30 per cent weightage, to be given to Class X marks, 30 per cent weightage to Class XI marks and 40 per cent weightage to Class XII marks obtained in unit test/mid- term/pre-board exams. The CBSE said that 20 marks will be given for practi- cal in Class-XII and the result will be declared by July 31.The CBSE scheme further elabo- rated that for Class X 30 per cent marks based on average theory component of best three performing subjects out of main five subjects will be taken. For Class XI, 30 per cent marks based on theory com- ponent of final exam will be taken and for Class XII 40 per cent marks based on unit test/mid-term/pre-board exams will be taken. “The marks of practical/internal assessment of Class XII will be on actual basis as uploaded by the school on the CBSE portal,” the CBSE said, adding that the total marks awarded should be in consonance with the past per- formance of the school in Class-XII board examinations. The board said that each school shall form a result com- mittee comprising five mem- bers (principal of the school as chairperson, two-senior most teachers of the school, teaching class-XII and two teachers from neighbouring senior sec- ondary school teaching class- XII) and it may decide weigh- tage to be given to each exam based on credibility and relia- bility of the assessment. It said that the marks of Class XI and Class XII com- ponent will be awarded at school level; they will strictly not be comparable across schools due to variations in the quality of question papers, the evaluation, standard and processes, the mode of conduct of exams. M aharashtra on Thursday began to gear itself for Covid-19 “third wave”, which the State Task Force appre- hended might be unleashed in the State by a high virulent strain Delta Plus in the next “two to four weeks” if the pan- demic-appropriate norms were not followed by the people. A day after the State Covid- 19 Task Force made a presen- tation before Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray about the possible break out of “third wave” in Maharashtra, the State administration began to mobilise medicines and health equipment to be sent across to both rural and urban areas. This followed a directive it received from the Chief Minister himself. At Wednesday’s meeting, the State Task Force warned the Chief Minister that the cases would double in the coming weeks after a possible advent of third wave in the State. “Uncontrolled crowds and the refusal by the people to follow Covid-19 norms, coupled with the advent of Delta plus vari- ant might trigger a third wave of pandemic in the State,” a senior official who briefed the chief minister about a possible third wave said. The task force told the CM that the lower middle class of people who were not affect- ed the first and second waves of Covid-19 would be hit by the third wave of the pandemic. It advised the Uddhav to increase testing, strengthen infrastruc- ture and increase vaccination. Quantifying the impact of the impact of the “third wave”, the task force officials told the CM that the State would have to contend with 8 lakh “active” cases, out of which 10 per cent would be children. There were as many as 19 lakh Covid patients in the State during the first wave, while the number of patients jumped to 40 lakh dur- ing the second wave. The num- ber of patients would be dou- bled during the third wave. “The children would not be majorly affected by the third wave. The children make up for more than 3.5 per cent of the patient pool in the State,” a senior official said. The impending Covid-19 “third wave” should seen in the context of the five-level relax- ation plan announced by the state government and its decision to relax restrictions in 18 tom 36 districts of the State. T he active caseload of Covid- 19 dropped below the 2,000-mark in Jharkhand on Thursday, while three more patients died, taking the Covid toll in the State to 5,095, figures released by the National Health Mission (NHM) highlighted. As per a bulletin from the NHM, at least 146 people test- ed positive for Covid-19 on the day while 443 patients recov- ered from the infection, bring- ing the active caseload in the state down to 1,946. No Jharkhand district reported a spike of more than 20 cases on Thursday. With 19 fresh cases, Dhanbad reported the highest spike on the day. However, at least 25 patients recovered there, bringing the active caseload down to 119 in the district. At least two districts — Pakur and Dumka — did not report fresh cases of Covid-19 for the second day in a row on Thursday. As per NHM data, there were only two Covid patients in Pakur by the end of Thursday. Bokaro accounted for two of the three Covid casualties on the day, one patient died dur- ing treatment in Ranchi. As per Government records, at least 1,583 people have died of Covid-19 in Ranchi, while the toll in Bokaro was 276. The Covid mortality rate in the State was 1.48 per cent on Thursday, higher than the national average of 1.30 per cent, the NHM stated in its bulletin. As many as 35 Covid recoveries against 14 cases brought the active caseload in East Singhbhum down to 223, the bulletin from NHM high- lighted. Ranchi, the district with highest number of active cases in Jharkhand, reported 11 cases against 189 recoveries, which brought the active case- load here down to 529. Among other districts, Bokaro reported nine cases against ten recoveries, while Hazaribag reported nine cases against 26 recoveries. As many as 11 people were found infect- ed by coronavirus in Godda and four Covid patients recov- ered there. So far, over 3.44 lakh peo- ple have been infected by coro- navirus in the State and 97.95 per cent of them have recov- ered. The doubling rate of cases in the State jumped to 1,566.86 days against the national doubling rate of 419.97 days on Thursday. The State on Thursday tested swab samples of 42,323 residents and less than 0.5 per cent of them were found infect- ed by novel coronavirus. The growth rate of Covid- 19 dropped further down to 0.04 per cent in Jharkhand on the day against the national average of 0.17 per cent, NHM data highlighted. W ith the dedication and commitment of the Government-led by Chief Minister Hemant Soren, the second wave of Covid-19 has been contained in the State, stated a Press release from the Government. With few restrictions in place, the State is moving towards lifting all restrictions. To deal with the expected third wave of the novel coronavirus, the State Government has start- ed preparing its machinery in advance, it added. To understand the nature, impact and preparations need- ed to fight against the antici- pated third wave, Chief Minister Hemant Soren is having regu- lar conversations with experts and doctors from across the nation. Experts anticipate that in the third wave children are at greater risk whereas, this does not give any guarantee of adults being unaffected. Experts suggest that the coronavirus is mutating at a fast pace and any kind of lethargy may lead to serious complica- tions. With the inputs received from the experts, the State Government of Jharkhand is on high alert regarding this matter. Efforts are being under- taken to enhance and up-grade the existing medical infra- structure. The Government is also working on generating awareness among people. Along with the preparedness of the Government to deal with this potential threat, parents are also expected to discharge their responsibilities. As per the detailed infor- mation in the book on Preparation, Prevention and Planning for Covid-19 in the third wave, most children infect- ed with Covid-19 may not show any symptoms or may exhibit very mild symptoms. Common symptoms include fever, cough, short- ness of breath, fatigue, body aches, running nose, sore throat, diarrhoea, loss of taste or smell, etc. Due to the tender age, children are unable to explain their symptoms, but the parents need to be on alert about any such symptom. I t is a proud moment for Jharkhand for the first time in the history of the State; two girls have been selected for Tokyo Olympics-2121. Nikki Pradhan from Khunti and Salima Tete from Simdega have been select- ed in the Indian Olympic Women’s hockey team. Jharkhand Hockey Federation Vice-President, Manoj Konbegi informed that Tete is from Badki Chhapar vil- lage under Sadar block of Simdega district, both father Sulakshana Tete and mother Subhani Tete are farmers, Salima was born on December 27, 2001, her father is also a good hockey player. “Tete was selected for the first time in the junior Indian Women’s hockey team in 2016 and was as Vice-Captain of the junior Indian women’s team for the U18 Asia Cup in the same year, in which the team won the bronze medal, in November 2016 Tete was selected for a competition in the senior women’s team. She was select- ed for and went on tour to Australia, in the 2019 Youth Olympics, she was made the Captain of the junior Indian Women’s hockey team and got the team silver medal. In 2019, she was permanently selected for the senior Indian Women’s hockey team which is now for the Olympics,” Konbegi said. The Federation Vice- President added Nikki Pradhan is from Hesal village under Murhu block of Khunti district and her father Soma Pradhan was police personnel in Bihar and mother Jitini Devi is a housewife, four sisters and one brother. All sisters are hockey players, he added. “For 34th National Games 2011 in Ranchi Nikki was selected as the best player while playing for the Jharkhand team, after that she went to India camp and was a member of Junior Women’s Indian team in 2012 Junior Asia Cup. Indian team won the bronze medal, for her performance she got a job in Ranchi Railway in 2012. She was selected for Indian Women’s hockey team in 2016 Olympics and made history by becoming the first female Olympian hockey player of Jharkhand. Pradhan partici- pated in almost all big events like Asian Games, Commonwealth and others,” Konbegi added. Nikki Pradhan is working as Chief Yard Master in Operations Department of Ranchi Railway Division and Salima Tete is working as TTE in Commerce Department. Divisional Railway Manager Neeraj Ambastha congratulated both the players for their selection in the 16- member Indian Women’s Hockey team at the Tokyo Olympics. In the 16-member women’s hockey team, 13 play- ers are employed in the Indian Railways. A fter mucormycosis or black fungus, another multi-drug resistant similar infection can- dida auris is looming large amidst Covid-19 pandemic. Health experts have sound- ed alarm that Covid-associated fungus Candida auris cases are worsening in India even as it has spread across the globe-from neonatal unit in Venezuela to a hospital in Spain and Brazil where cases of drug-resistant super fungus were reported on Wednesday, leaving the exhaust- ed authorities a worried lot. According to the researchers, death among can- didemia patients infected by C auris can reach 60 per cent. This can happen for some people because fungus enters the bloodstream and causes a systemic infection known as candidemia. They warned that there was enough evidence that suggests that the ongoing Covid-19 crisis may provide ideal conditions for outbreaks of C. auris in hospital ICUs, thus leading to adverse out- comes and additional strain on healthcare resources. The death rate is quite high, they said. The Covid-19 conditions in Brazil have opened the door for the emergence and spread of a relatively new fungus that is quickly showing signs of becom- ing a drug-resistant “superfun- gus,” as reported by a study pub- lished in the Journal of Fungi. India had for long been hotbed for the deadly fungus. In fact, before the SARS-CoV-2 spread its tentacles, C. auris was already considered a major global health threat due to high rates of drug resistance and ease of transmis- sion in hospital settings.

Transcript of $cU 4`gZU hRgV Z_ # hVV\d >RYR dTcR^S]Vd W`c T`gVc

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The Centre on Thursdaycleared the air on the can-

celled Class 12 CBSE Boardexams’ evaluation criteria say-ing that the Central Board ofSecondary Education (CBSE)will be adopting a 30:30:40 for-mula for evaluation of marksbased on results of Class 10, 11 and 12 respectively andthe results will be declared byJuly end.

The Government informedthe Supreme Court that 30 percent marks will be based onClass 10 board exam, another30 per cent from Class 11 and40 per cent marks based on theperformance in the unit, mid-term and pre-board tests ofClass 12. The Supreme Courtaccepted the formula of CBSEand CISCE to evaluate theClass 12 students, whose boardexaminations were cancelleddue to the Covid pandemic.

The components adoptedby CISCE for arriving at theevaluation formula is — markspercentage in Class X boardexaminations, the project andpractical work in the subjects,the performance of the candi-dates in the school examina-tions in the subjects in ClassesXI and XII, measured throughtheir best marks obtained in thetwo years (referred to as rawmarks) and the best perfor-mance of the school in the lastsix years.

The Supreme Court alsodirected the boards to incor-porate provisions for disputesresolution in their assessmentschemes themselves for thosestudents who may be dissatis-fied with the marks awarded inthe Class 12 board results.CBSE later announced that forsuch students exams will beconducted on physical modeand the candidates will have toregister accordingly.

A special bench of JusticesAM Khanwilkar and DineshMaheshari said, “After perusingthe scheme presented by theconcerned Boards, prima facie,we have no hesitation inaccepting the same and permitthe Boards to proceed on thatbasis”.

The CBSE said that forevaluating Class XII students,after their board examinationswere cancelled for the academicyear 2020-21, it has entered

into consultative process withstakeholders to know the fac-tual position of the studentsand the schools. The board saidthat consultation process washeld with principals of affiliat-ed schools, feedback wasobtained from 229 SahodayaSchool Complex comprising7,734 schools and 13-memberscommittee of experts.

It said that theory paperevaluation formula will be of 30per cent weightage, to be givento Class X marks, 30 per centweightage to Class XI marks and 40 per centweightage to Class XII marksobtained in unit test/mid-term/pre-board exams.

The CBSE said that 20marks will be given for practi-cal in Class-XII and the resultwill be declared by July 31.TheCBSE scheme further elabo-rated that for Class X 30 percent marks based on average

theory component of best threeperforming subjects out ofmain five subjects will be taken.

For Class XI, 30 per centmarks based on theory com-ponent of final exam will betaken and for Class XII 40 percent marks based on unittest/mid-term/pre-boardexams will be taken.

“The marks ofpractical/internal assessmentof Class XII will be on actualbasis as uploaded by the schoolon the CBSE portal,” the CBSEsaid, adding that the totalmarks awarded should be inconsonance with the past per-formance of the school inClass-XII board examinations.

The board said that eachschool shall form a result com-mittee comprising five mem-bers (principal of the school aschairperson, two-senior mostteachers of the school, teachingclass-XII and two teachersfrom neighbouring senior sec-ondary school teaching class-XII) and it may decide weigh-tage to be given to each exambased on credibility and relia-bility of the assessment.

It said that the marks ofClass XI and Class XII com-ponent will be awarded atschool level; they will strictlynot be comparable acrossschools due to variations in thequality of question papers, theevaluation, standard andprocesses, the mode of conductof exams.

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Maharashtra on Thursdaybegan to gear itself for

Covid-19 “third wave”, whichthe State Task Force appre-hended might be unleashed inthe State by a high virulentstrain Delta Plus in the next“two to four weeks” if the pan-demic-appropriate norms werenot followed by the people.

A day after the State Covid-19 Task Force made a presen-tation before Chief MinisterUddhav Thackeray about thepossible break out of “thirdwave” in Maharashtra, the Stateadministration began tomobilise medicines and healthequipment to be sent across toboth rural and urban areas.This followed a directive itreceived from the ChiefMinister himself.

At Wednesday’s meeting,the State Task Force warned theChief Minister that the caseswould double in the comingweeks after a possible advent ofthird wave in the State.“Uncontrolled crowds and the

refusal by the people to followCovid-19 norms, coupled withthe advent of Delta plus vari-ant might trigger a third waveof pandemic in the State,” asenior official who briefed thechief minister about a possiblethird wave said.

The task force told theCM that the lower middle classof people who were not affect-ed the first and second wavesof Covid-19 would be hit by thethird wave of the pandemic. Itadvised the Uddhav to increase

testing, strengthen infrastruc-ture and increase vaccination.

Quantifying the impact ofthe impact of the “third wave”,the task force officials told theCM that the State would haveto contend with 8 lakh “active”cases, out of which 10 per centwould be children. There wereas many as 19 lakh Covidpatients in the State during thefirst wave, while the number ofpatients jumped to 40 lakh dur-ing the second wave. The num-ber of patients would be dou-

bled during the third wave.“The children would not

be majorly affected by the thirdwave. The children make up formore than 3.5 per cent of thepatient pool in the State,” asenior official said.

The impending Covid-19“third wave” should seen in thecontext of the five-level relax-ation plan announced by thestate government and its decision to relax restrictionsin 18 tom 36 districts of the State.

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The active caseload of Covid-19 dropped below the

2,000-mark in Jharkhand onThursday, while three morepatients died, taking the Covidtoll in the State to 5,095, figuresreleased by the National HealthMission (NHM) highlighted.

As per a bulletin from theNHM, at least 146 people test-ed positive for Covid-19 on theday while 443 patients recov-ered from the infection, bring-ing the active caseload in thestate down to 1,946.

No Jharkhand districtreported a spike of more than20 cases on Thursday. With 19fresh cases, Dhanbad reportedthe highest spike on the day.However, at least 25 patientsrecovered there, bringing theactive caseload down to 119 inthe district.

At least two districts —Pakur and Dumka — did notreport fresh cases of Covid-19for the second day in a row onThursday. As per NHM data,there were only two Covidpatients in Pakur by the end ofThursday.

Bokaro accounted for twoof the three Covid casualties onthe day, one patient died dur-ing treatment in Ranchi. As perGovernment records, at least1,583 people have died ofCovid-19 in Ranchi, while thetoll in Bokaro was 276. TheCovid mortality rate in theState was 1.48 per cent on

Thursday, higher than thenational average of 1.30 per cent, the NHM stated in itsbulletin.

As many as 35 Covidrecoveries against 14 casesbrought the active caseload inEast Singhbhum down to 223,the bulletin from NHM high-lighted. Ranchi, the district

with highest number of activecases in Jharkhand, reported 11cases against 189 recoveries,which brought the active case-load here down to 529.

Among other districts,Bokaro reported nine casesagainst ten recoveries, whileHazaribag reported nine casesagainst 26 recoveries. As manyas 11 people were found infect-ed by coronavirus in Goddaand four Covid patients recov-ered there.

So far, over 3.44 lakh peo-ple have been infected by coro-navirus in the State and 97.95per cent of them have recov-ered. The doubling rate ofcases in the State jumped to1,566.86 days against thenational doubling rate of 419.97days on Thursday.

The State on Thursdaytested swab samples of 42,323residents and less than 0.5 percent of them were found infect-ed by novel coronavirus.

The growth rate of Covid-19 dropped further down to0.04 per cent in Jharkhand onthe day against the nationalaverage of 0.17 per cent, NHMdata highlighted.

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With the dedication andcommitment of the

Government-led by ChiefMinister Hemant Soren, thesecond wave of Covid-19 hasbeen contained in the State,stated a Press release from theGovernment.

With few restrictions inplace, the State is movingtowards lifting all restrictions.To deal with the expected thirdwave of the novel coronavirus,the State Government has start-ed preparing its machinery inadvance, it added.

To understand the nature,impact and preparations need-ed to fight against the antici-pated third wave, Chief MinisterHemant Soren is having regu-lar conversations with expertsand doctors from across thenation. Experts anticipate that

in the third wave children are atgreater risk whereas, this doesnot give any guarantee of adultsbeing unaffected.

Experts suggest that thecoronavirus is mutating at a fastpace and any kind of lethargymay lead to serious complica-

tions. With the inputs receivedfrom the experts, the StateGovernment of Jharkhand is onhigh alert regarding this matter.

Efforts are being under-taken to enhance and up-gradethe existing medical infra-structure. The Government is

also working on generatingawareness among people.Along with the preparedness ofthe Government to deal withthis potential threat, parents arealso expected to discharge theirresponsibilities.

As per the detailed infor-

mation in the book onPreparation, Prevention andPlanning for Covid-19 in thethird wave, most children infect-ed with Covid-19 may not showany symptoms or may exhibitvery mild symptoms.

Common symptoms

include fever, cough, short-ness of breath, fatigue, bodyaches, running nose, sorethroat, diarrhoea, loss of tasteor smell, etc. Due to the tenderage, children are unable toexplain their symptoms, but theparents need to be on alertabout any such symptom.

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It is a proud moment forJharkhand for the first time in

the history of the State; two girlshave been selected for TokyoOlympics-2121. Nikki Pradhanfrom Khunti and Salima Tetefrom Simdega have been select-ed in the Indian OlympicWomen’s hockey team.

Jharkhand HockeyFederation Vice-President,Manoj Konbegi informed thatTete is from Badki Chhapar vil-lage under Sadar block ofSimdega district, both fatherSulakshana Tete and motherSubhani Tete are farmers,Salima was born on December27, 2001, her father is also agood hockey player.

“Tete was selected for thefirst time in the junior IndianWomen’s hockey team in 2016and was as Vice-Captain of thejunior Indian women’s team forthe U18 Asia Cup in the sameyear, in which the team won thebronze medal, in November2016 Tete was selected for acompetition in the seniorwomen’s team. She was select-ed for and went on tour toAustralia, in the 2019 YouthOlympics, she was made theCaptain of the junior IndianWomen’s hockey team and gotthe team silver medal. In 2019,she was permanently selectedfor the senior Indian Women’shockey team which is now forthe Olympics,” Konbegi said.

The Federation Vice-President added Nikki Pradhanis from Hesal village underMurhu block of Khunti districtand her father Soma Pradhanwas police personnel in Biharand mother Jitini Devi is ahousewife, four sisters and onebrother. All sisters are hockeyplayers, he added.

“For 34th National Games

2011 in Ranchi Nikki wasselected as the best player whileplaying for the Jharkhand team,after that she went to Indiacamp and was a member ofJunior Women’s Indian team in2012 Junior Asia Cup. Indianteam won the bronze medal, forher performance she got a jobin Ranchi Railway in 2012. Shewas selected for IndianWomen’s hockey team in 2016Olympics and made history bybecoming the first femaleOlympian hockey player ofJharkhand. Pradhan partici-pated in almost all big eventslike Asian Games,Commonwealth and others,”Konbegi added.

Nikki Pradhan is workingas Chief Yard Master inOperations Department ofRanchi Railway Division andSalima Tete is working as TTEin Commerce Department.

Divisional RailwayManager Neeraj Ambasthacongratulated both the playersfor their selection in the 16-member Indian Women’sHockey team at the TokyoOlympics. In the 16-memberwomen’s hockey team, 13 play-ers are employed in the IndianRailways.

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After mucormycosis or blackfungus, another multi-drug

resistant similar infection can-dida auris is looming largeamidst Covid-19 pandemic.

Health experts have sound-ed alarm that Covid-associatedfungus Candida auris cases areworsening in India even as it hasspread across the globe-fromneonatal unit in Venezuela to ahospital in Spain and Brazilwhere cases of drug-resistantsuper fungus were reported onWednesday, leaving the exhaust-ed authorities a worried lot.

According to theresearchers, death among can-didemia patients infected by Cauris can reach 60 per cent.

This can happen for somepeople because fungus entersthe bloodstream and causes asystemic infection known ascandidemia. They warned thatthere was enough evidence thatsuggests that the ongoingCovid-19 crisis may provideideal conditions for outbreaksof C. auris in hospital ICUs,thus leading to adverse out-comes and additional strain onhealthcare resources. The deathrate is quite high, they said.

The Covid-19 conditionsin Brazil have opened the doorfor the emergence and spread ofa relatively new fungus that isquickly showing signs of becom-ing a drug-resistant “superfun-gus,” as reported by a study pub-lished in the Journal of Fungi.India had for long been hotbedfor the deadly fungus. In fact,before the SARS-CoV-2 spreadits tentacles, C. auris was alreadyconsidered a major global healththreat due to high rates of drugresistance and ease of transmis-sion in hospital settings.

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XLRI-Xavier School ofManagement, Jamshedpur

has reached the topmost levelfive (Pioneering BusinessSchools) among 47 participat-ing business schools located infour continents and 21 coun-tries in the second edition ofPositive Impact Rating 2021.Atthe World Economic Forum inL u c e r n e - B u r g e n s t o c k ,Switzerland, the Second editionof the Positive Impact Rating2021 results was released onThursday.

XLRI is the only businessschool in the world to havemoved up from Level 3 (pro-gressing schools) to the topmostLevel 5 (Pioneering BusinessSchools) within a year.

Antonio Haulte, ExecutiveDirector, UN Global CompactSwitzerland, Zurich Switzerlandsaid “Business can be a force forgood, and this is strengthenedby students who are the next

generation of business leaders.The PIR supports businessschools to prioritize responsiblemanagement education – UNGlobal Compact and PRMEprinciples strongly support theseambitions.”

The Positive Impact Rating(PIR) is a rating by students andfor students, measuring the pos-itive impact of business schoolsand how business schools con-tribute to solving societal chal-lenges by energizing the schooland its culture. It addresses thelarger role of business schools,the positive impact of businessschools beyond their contribu-tion to business and the econo-my. It contributes as a lever ofchange for transformation inbusiness schools.

Fr. Paul. Fernandes, S.Jdirector, XLRI - Xavier Schoolof Management, Jamshedpurcommented, “We are delightedto note that XLRI has attainedthe topmost level 5 (PioneeringBusiness Schools) among 47

leading Global BusinessSchools in the second editionof Positive Impact Report 2021.Positive Impact Rating guidesbusiness schools from being thebest in the world to striving tobe the best for the world. Forover seven decades, XLRI hassteadfastly held on to its mission of proffering world-class education and ethics-dri-ven teaching while nurturing responsible global leaders for the greater commongood and a sustainable future.The PIR rating inspires us towork more diligently towardsattaining our Vision andMission.”

“The millennial B-Schoolstudents across the world havegot a unique opportunity toevaluate their own businessschools on how it is solvingsocietal and sustainable chal-lenges, and how they perceivetheir institution’s positiveimpact on the community andsociety at large,” he added.

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The first rain of the seasonhave exposed the dhanbad

municipal corporation(DMC)of its failure in cleaning chokeddrains within the municipallimits. Several low line areashave flooded with rain waternot only in the main town butin Sindri, Katras and Jharia cir-cles of the corporation owingto blockage of drains.

The failure of the corpora-tion in cleaning the chokeddrain ahead of monsoon hasnot only flooded road and lowline areas with rain water butso has affected movement oftraffic in such areas.

Besides common personswho pay both the property taxas well as user tax for lifting ofgarbage the MLA of Dhanbadand former ward councillorstoo have complaints of delay indrain cleaning.

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The Rotary Club ofDaltonganj has extended a

big hand of help for the edu-cation of the orphaned childrendue to coronavirus.

The assistant district gov-ernor of the Rotary AnugrahNarain Sharma said we havedecided to give free educationup-to class 12 to all such chil-dren who got orphaned in thiscoronavirus.

Sharma said a letter of ourcommitment to this effect hasbeen handed over to the divi-sional commissioner JataShanker Chowdhury.

He said we have two setups of the Rotary school herein Daltonganj.

One is at the station roadwhile the other is in theChainpur block.

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The fire brigade of Hazaribagis running in a very bad sit-

uation. There are five dousingvehicles but only three vehiclesare functional. There is noarrangement to fill the water inthe vehicles in the campus.After getting the message of firethe vehicles go to HazaribagLake to fill water then leave fordousing the fire.

The employees of the firebrigade office said that if theyget four or five calls of fire at a one time, they will beable to control the fire in onlythree spots.

Sources said that 10 yearsago a deep boring was done bythe department, but it workedonly for a year. After that itwent defunct.

����� �.7 �.

Damodar River continues toflow near the danger mark

in Bokaro as the incessantrainfall since past couple ofdays across Bokaro districtincreased the water levels intoseveral water bodies, dams andrivers. The officials havewarned all residents living closeto the riverbanks to move tosafer and higher places,

As the water level increas-es in the reservoir of TenughatDam, huge amounts of waterare released. Two gates ofTenughat Dam were opened, inwhich about 3500 cusecs ofwater is being discharged,informed Nodal Officer, FloodControl Cell, Tenughat DamDivision, Tenughat.

Hazaribag: The district admin-istration has decided to installan oxygen plant in the campusof Sekh Bhikari MedicalCollege and Hospital very soon.The administration has alsotaken the decision to purchasethe essential medical equip-ment and other essentialmachines for daily use in thehospital. Hazaribag DC AdityaKumar Anand said that duringthe second wave of COVID-19,the Corona affected patientsfaced the problem of oxygen inthe COVID ward of the hospi-tal. To avoid such a situation infuture, we have decided tosolve the problem.

He added a meeting of thedistrict purchase committeewas convened. The members ofthe committee have fixed therates of the items. The civil sur-geon said in the meeting thatfor the smooth treatment of thepatients in children’s ward,adult ward and general wardmedical equipment need to bepurchased for each and everyward as well as the other hos-pitals of the district. PNS

Jamshedpur: Police havearrested four persons, includ-ing two women who hadabsconded after being chargedwith molestation by Telcopolice on June 6. They werearrested from Singroli districtof Madhya Pradesh.

The four identified asHarpal Singh Thapar (46), wifePushpa Rani Turkey (45),Geeta Kaur (45) and son AdityaSingh (20) have been broughthere from Singroli to the steelcity on transit remand onWednesday. All the fouraccused are residents ofSamsher Tower at

Kharangajhar in Telco.Revealing about the break-

through, superintendent ofpolice (City) Subhash ChandraJat at a press conference said thatThapar and wife Pushpa wouldrun an NGO, Mother TeresaWelfare Trust, at Kharangajharwhere minor homeless girlswere being given shelter. “Theincident came to light when twoof the minors, about 16-years-old each had on June 6 allegedThapar to have been molestingthem. Later during investiga-tion, the involvement of threeothers had come to light,” saidthe SP (City). PNS

Dhanbad: Fresh hope of expan-sion of Gaya Bridge underpasshas arisen once again after a gapof three years with the deputycommissioner (DC) directingthe East Central Railway (ECR)to provide the fresh detailed pro-ject report so that the work maybe completed.

Chairing a meeting heretoday DC Uma Shankar Singhfurther decided to get theunderpass constructed from

DMTF fund. Giving detailsSingh said, the ECR had award-ed work of DPR to RITES in2018 but it still has not beenprovided to the district admin-istration till now.

The expansion of the afore-mentioned underpass is need-ed to remove traffic congestionas well as checking pollutionemitted by the stranded vehi-cles due to traffic congestion,he said. PNS

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Health Minister BannaGupta on Thursday

launched State’s first vaccina-tion drive against pneumoniaand claimed that the immuni-sation programme for infantswill work as a protective shieldagainst Covid-19, whichaccording to researchers, waslikely to affect children duringa feared third wave.

“The vaccination driveagainst pneumonia will prove

to be a milestone in our State’sfight against Covid-19. Byadministering PneumococcalConjugate Vaccine (PCV) toinfants, we will protect sever-al children from pneumonia,which causes fatal respiratorydisfunctions,” Gupta said whilelaunching the statewide immu-nisation programme.

Gupta claimed that patientsof pneumonia and Covid-19showed similar symptoms, andin some cases, Covid patientsdeveloped pneumonia, whichproved fatal. The vaccination,he added, would boost immu-nity of the children and protectthem from several bacteria-borne diseases as well.

The Government will pro-vide PCV doses to children freeof cost under its Universal

Immunisation Programme inJharkhand. So far, beneficiarieshad to pay �1,600 for each doseof the Pfizer-made vaccineavailable in the market, whichmounted financial pressure onthe people from ruralJharkhand.

After launching the vacci-nation drive, the health minis-ter urged Jharkhand residentsnot to panic if their infants hadmild fever or body pain afterthe immunisation.

“Mild fever or body acheare common side effects of anyvaccine. Please do not panic ifyour child has mild fever afterthe dose. Remember that thevaccine will protect them frommany severe diseases,” he said.

Health Secretary ArunKumar Singh said that pneu-

monia was transmitted fromone person to another throughcoughing and sneezing.Breathing trouble, coughing,fever and body ache were someof the common symptoms ofpneumonia, which were alsocommon in Covid patients, he added.

“At least 8 lakh people dieof pneumonia every year glob-ally and the toll is 1.27 lakh inIndia. This immunisation pro-gramme will certainly prove tobe a major step towards pro-tecting our children and ensur-ing a healthy life for them,”Singh said.

As per data with the healthdepartment, at least 77,200doses of PCV have been dis-tributed among the 24 districtsto run the immunisation pro-

gramme. The three doses of thevaccine will be administered toinfants at the age of six weeks,14 weeks and nine months.

The vaccine doses will beadministered at all govern-ment hospitals, Primary HealthCentres (PHCs), CommunityHealth Centres (CHCs) andother vaccination camps set upby the Government. Parents ofthe beneficiaries will have tocarry their Mother ChildProtection (MCP) cards to thevaccination centres and getthe jabs free of cost. Jharkhandwill be the seventh Indian stateto launch this immunisationprogramme.

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Less than 2 per cent of the eligi-ble population in the State has

received both the doses of vaccines,even as several smaller States suchas Tripura, Sikkim and ArunachalPradesh have done much better.The vaccination pace in Jharkhandis running at snail’s speed, a thingwhich is worrying for Governmentand health experts.

As per the figure availablefrom National Health Missiondaily data, so far only 11.69 percent of the eligible population inthe State has received the first doseof the vaccine, while 2.16 per centhave received both the doses.Those who have taken both thedoses, their vaccination is consid-

ered complete. The present estimated population of Jharkhandis 3.77 crore.

So far only 44,07,139 peoplehave received the first dose, while8,15,958 people have received bothdoses. In the age category of 18-44years, the vaccination of whichstarted late, only 7 per cent of peo-ple in this category have receivedfirst dose, while the population inthis category which have receivedboth the doses is less than one percent, which is only 0.99 per cent.

In the age category above 45years, the vaccination percentagecomes out to be around 32.50 percent of those, who have receivedfirst doses, while those who havereceived both the doses the per-centage comes out to 5.32 per cent.

Dr Ashok Mishra of IndianMedical Association said, “Theslow vaccination is a worrying fac-tor. We are lucky that pandemic

speed has come down, but effortsshould be made so that large sec-tions of society are vaccinated asvaccines are the best defenceagainst viruses.”

District wise vaccination fig-ures if considered than only threedistricts in State have receivedmore than 10 per cent vaccination.The three districts where vaccina-tion is more than 10 per cent areSimdega, Lohardaga and Khunti.Simdega and Khunti are two dis-tricts where 11 per cent vaccina-tion has been made, whileLohardaga is the district, whichtops in vaccination in the Statewith around 12 per cent of eligi-ble population vaccinated.

Sources said Lohardaga is thedistrict, which is ahead in vacci-nation from other districts but stilllarge sections of tribal and minor-ity communities are not muchenthusiastic about vaccination.

Lohardaga DC Dilip Kumar Topposaid, “The district administrationthrough various mediums is cre-ating awareness about vaccinationand in this connection we have alsotaken the help of village heads andlocal religious leaders.”

Sources said the main reasonbehind slow vaccination is rumourin villages.

Villagers in Latehar are sayingthat taking the vaccine will makethem impotent. This rumour hasspread in many villages of the dis-trict. Rumours have spread inmost of the rural areas of the Stateincluding Chatra, Simdega, Gumlathat the vaccine will lead to death.

The Government is now run-ning a public awareness campaignto dispel these rumours. Sahiya-sahayaks are conducting surveys in villages. Villagers arebeing told that vaccines do notcause any disease.

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The para-teachers ofJharkhand agitating from

the past few years for regular-isation of their service andproper pay scale have onceagain started exerting pres-sure on the government tofulfill the promises.

Notably, Minister JagarnathMahto who from the last eightmonths was under treatmentfor Covid 19 and lung trans-plant; has finally returned toRanchi and he is expected totake charge of the educationdepartment.

“We are hopeful to get jus-tice from the Hemant Sorengovernment. In June last year,a joint meeting had taken placewhere the government hadbroadly agreed on some points.But nothing happened afterthat,” said Sanjay Dubey ofEkikrit Para ShikshakSangharsh Morcha.

However, last year MinisterMahto had scheduled to holdthe next meeting on September28 but on the day of the meet-ing his health suddenly deteri-orated after which he was flownto Chennai for further treat-ment. Chief Minister HemantSoren had to take charge of theeducation department.

In the June meeting theGovernment had agreed�5,200-�20,000 as the basicpay band for such para teach-ers who have passed Teachers’Eligibility Test’ (TET). But, thenumber of such teachers is notmore than 12000 whereas thereare around 6,50,000 para teach-ers across 24 districts ofJharkhand.

The law department aswell as the office of the

Advocate General of Jharkhandhad opined that remainingteachers must also possess TETcertificate to avail benefit ofrevised pay band. Besides, thepara teachers’ welfare fundwas also to be set-up.

But due to the prevailingcondition of Covid 19 therewas no follow-up of the Junemeeting. However, the minis-ter has assured that the gov-ernment will fulfill its com-mitments towards para teach-ers. He said that he will reviewthe progress made during thelast eight months.

Para teachers are the partof the centrally sponsoredSarva Siksha Abhiyan (SSA)and their appointments aredone on contractual basis assupporting teaching staff forprimary and middle schools.

Para teachers are broadlydivided in three categories:trained para teachers possess-ing Teachers’ Eligibility Testcertificate, trained anduntrained. Their monthly hon-orarium structure differsaccording to their qualificationand the honorarium wasrevised in the past also. In theprevious government headedby Raghubar Das; para teach-ers had carried massive agita-tion and they had activelyopposed the BJP during the2019 Assembly election.

����� � ���

The Jharkhand High Courton Thursday directed SSP

of Ranchi Surendra Kumar Jhato provide adequate security tofamily members of deceasedassistant sub inspector ofJharkhand Police Rupa Tirkey,who according to police hadcommitted suicide. The fami-ly stays in Ranchi.

The court gave this direc-tion while hearing a criminalwrit petition filed by DevanandTirkey; father of the deceased.Tirkey has accused that hisdaughter was forced to commitsuicide by a person named asPankaj Mishra. He hasdemanded a CBI probe into thematter. The bench of JusticeSanjay Kumar Dwivedi, while

hearing the case, also directedthe State Government to file acounter affidavit in the nextfour week.

The court fixed July 29 asthe next date of hearing.

The heating was donethrough video conferencing.The lawyer appearing on behalfof the State governmentinformed the court that the gov-ernment has appointed retiredchief justice of Jharkhand Highcourt Justice Vinod KumarGupta to investigate the deathcase of Rupa Tirkey. On this thecourt observed whether a pro-vision of parallel probe exists inthe CrPC.

In another development;Jharkhand High courtexpressed displeasure overtransfer of ADG Anil Palta

from CID of Jharkhand police.The court expressed its dis-pleasure while hearing the caseof blackmarketing ofRemdesivir medicine. This caseis being investigated by CID.

The court wanted to knowas to why Palta was trans-ferred without asking the highcourt at a time when the highcourt is monitoring the inves-tigation. The court orallyobserved that if the police con-tinue with such an attitude thenthe high court will have to referthe investigation to CBI.

However, the advocate gen-eral said that CID is investi-gating the case in a professionalmanner and his transfer is aroutine matter and also he wasnot the investigating officer ofthe case.

����� � ���

Ranchi DeputyCommissioner, Chhavi

Ranjan on Thursday reviewedthe cases of mutation pending formore than 30 and 90 days. Hedirected that the cases of muta-tion pending for more than 30days be disposed of at the earli-est without any objection.

While reviewing the demar-cation cases, the DC directed tocomplete the pending cases atthe earliest. He said that all thecircle officers should execute allthe pending demarcation casesbefore the next meeting.

While reviewing theencroachment on GM land,

Ranjan said that all the CircleOfficers (CO) should give areport regarding encroachmenton GM land within a month. Hesaid that after visiting the field,dedicate a light-wise report. Hedirected all the COs to submitthe report on priority basis.

While reviewing the inter-departmental land transfer, theDC directed all the COs totransfer the land identified forthe Sub Health Center, School,Electricity Department andother proposals, taking neces-sary action at the earliest. TheDC directed to maintain theregister for GM land in the dis-trict. He directed theAdditional Collector and

District Land AcquisitionOfficer to prepare the formatfor the available GM land in thedistrict. He asked the COs ofthe four circles of the city,Namkum, Nagdi and Ormanjhito provide the report in the for-mat within a month. He saidthat where GM land is availablein the district, keep informa-tion about it so that timelytransfer of land can be done.

In the meeting, Ranjanalso reviewed the matters relat-ed to land acquisition. Hereviewed the updated status ofland acquisition related toNational Highways Authorityof India (NHAI) and Statelevel projects.

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The State BJP unit has onceagain raised the issue of ris-

ing atrocities against ScheduledCaste members in State.

The State BJP in this con-nection will knock GovernorDroupadi Murmu’s door onFriday, highlighting the recentatrocities against scheduledcaste members.

State BJP SC Cell presidentAmar Kumar Bauri addressinga press conference said thatatrocities against SC commu-nity have gone up in theJMM/Congress regime.Highlighting some cases, Baurisaid that in Sahibganj district,one Pankaj Mishra has grabbedthe land of one Dinesh Paswan.

When Paswan approacheddistrict administration withhis plea, police refused to lodgethe case as Paswan is close totop JMM leadership in State.

Similarly, he said last monthmembers of the SC communi-ty were badly beaten up bymembers of the minority com-munity for trivial reasons atMajhgoan in Chaibasa district.

The SC community mem-bers, who are sweepers werebeaten up as they didn’t turn upfor cleaning work. The localpolice who were supposed totake action against the peoplewho were behind the incidentwere indulged in suppressingthe matter, he said.

The SC community mem-bers on Thursday visited StateBJP president Deepak Prakash

and informed about the incident.Bauri, the former Minister,

also said several Turi familiesof Chirudih in Jamtara werealso part of the minority com-munity. The minority com-munity who constitute a largechunk of population are alsoinvolved in land grabbingsprees of Turi members.

The BJP leader said that SCMorcha leaders informed theNational Commission forScheduled Castes about theincident. The commissionteam, which visited the site,found the matter to be true.The district administration hadensured the arrest of culpritsbehind the incident, but tilldate the main accused RamzanMian and other accused havenot been arrested. At present,the victim’s family is forced tolive in the night shelter.

Bauri demanded the gov-ernment to take action in allthe cases along with the secu-rity of the SC community in theState. He also said that Morchawill fight for the rights and pro-tection of the SC community inthe State.

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Development Commissionercum Additional Chief

Secretary, Health, Arun KumarSingh made a surprise inspec-tion of RINPAS on Thursday.He went to OPD and tookinformation about the numberof patients admitted in theinstitute. The Additional CSinspected the Department ofPathology and instructed toinstall the TrueNat machinethere to facilitate Covid test.

In order to remove seepageand others in the corridor ofthe main administrative build-ing, the Executive Engineer andSDO of the building construc-tion department were instruct-ed by Singh to make repairs.Along with this, the kitchenwas also asked to be repaired sothat the workers would not faceany problem by him.

The Additional CS alsodirected to prepare a new mapof the buildings of the old anddilapidated OccupationalTherapy Department becausecracks have occurred in manyplaces in these buildings and

patients work here. Singh sawthe living arrangements ofpatients in male ward numberone. Instructions were given tomake their rooms more illumi-nated and to arrange for addi-tional clothes by him and infor-mation was also obtained fromthe patient regarding the diet.

He also looked after thesecurity arrangements andcleanliness in the institute anddirected them to make thearrangements. He directed touse New Academic Blockbuilding for training workalong with this, instructionswere given to fix the seepageand others.

Singh also directed toinstall solar water heaters in allthe wards. Director in-chargeof RINPAS, Dr Subhash Soren,Senior Accounts Officer, AlokKumar Tapasvi, Dr Sujit KumarMishra gave complete infor-mation. NHM Director RaviShankar Shukla and other offi-cials were present during theinspection.

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“We want our forest land tobe cleared,” the Supreme

Court made it clear onThursday as it refused to stayits direction asking theHaryana Government and theFaridabad MunicipalCorporation to remove allencroachments, consistingaround 10,000 residential con-structions, in the Aravali forestarea near Khori village.

The bench of Justices A MKhanwilkar and DineshMaheshwari asked the Stateand the civic body to complywith its June 7 direction in thisregard, observing “land grab-bers cannot take refuge of ruleof law” and talk of “fairness”.

The Bench had also soughtthe compliance report from theState government officials afterremoving all encroachmentsfrom forest land near Khori vil-lage in Faridabad district with-

in six weeks. During the hear-ing conducted through video-conferencing, advocate AparnaBhat, appearing for the peti-tioners who have sought a stayon demolition of these struc-

tures, said there are around10,000 families in the village.

“Please don’t give us num-bers. It makes no difference. Wewant out forest land to becleared,” the bench said,

adding, “We have given enoughtime. The notification wasissued but you continued thereat your own risk”.

“This is forest land. This isnot ordinary land,” the bench

observed. Bhat argued aboutrehabilitation and said that theState authority has not taken upthe issue of eligibility and iden-tification process has not beendone. The bench referred to itsApril 5 order, passed in a mat-ter related to the issue, and saidthe civic body will take steps inaccordance with law. “You haveto evict them in accordancewith law. You have to givebenefit of scheme (of rehabili-tation) to those who are eligi-ble,” the bench told the coun-sel appearing for the municipalcorporation.

The bench, while askingwhether the petitioners havegiven additional documents tothe corporation for verification,observed that enough timewas already given earlier. “Lookat these people and their situ-

ation. They are migrant labour-ers. There are children,” Bhatsaid and also referred to theCOVID-19 pandemic situa-tion. “That is for the state to do.We are only concerned withvacation of forest area. Wehave given enough time earli-er,” the bench observed.

The apex court observedthat people there can producetheir documents for identifica-tion and rehabilitation to thecorporation. When Bhatreferred to global guidelines fornon-eviction during pandemic,the bench said, “We are not con-cerned with global guidelines.This issue is going on for long.”

The bench said that noindulgence can be shown at thisstage. It noted that petitionerswere obligated to produce doc-uments before the corporation

for the rehabilitation schemeand they have failed to do so.The bench said that clearanceof encroachment on forest landwould be done by following thedue process of law. It said thatlarger issues related to the mat-ter are pending and it wouldtake up the plea on July 27.

The Judges also rejectedHaryana Government’s argu-ments of violence, stone pelt-ing during demolitionattempts. “You know what youhave to do. We don’t want to sayon this. We want our order tobe complied with,” the benchsaid. It had said thatSuperintendent of Police,Faridabad, shall be personallyresponsible for ensuring ade-quate logistical support andpolice protection to the officialsof corporation.

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It’s almost three months thatRajeev Chaudhary (54) has

been declared Covid-19 nega-tive. But he is still reelingunder the post-Covid syn-drome, which the doctors call‘long Covid’.

“My sugar level has shotup. I feel fatigued whole day asif there is no strength in mybody. At times, I feel verydepressed while anxiety lingerson,” the Delhi government offi-cial shares the trauma he’sgoing through daily.

Chaudhary is not the onlyone who is grappling withpost-Covid health issues.According to a study, among allpatients infected with the coro-navirus disease, more than 23percent continued to sufferfrom one or more health issueseven a month after being diag-nosed with Covid-19.

Patients with such post-Covid conditions are various-ly referred to as having long-haul Covid, long Covid orpost-acute sequelae of Covid-19 (PASC), said the study by anNGO FAIR Health which hadanalysed private health careclaim records for nearly 2 mil-lion people diagnosed withCovid last year. The people inthe study ranged in age frombabies to the elderly; some 53percent were female and 47percent were male.

The five most commonpost-Covid conditions acrossall ages were pain, breathingdifficulties, hyperlipidemia,malaise and fatigue, and hyper-tension. Pain, breathing diffi-culties and intestinal issueswere the top conditions amongthe paediatric population (0-18). More than 25 per centyoung individuals agedbetween 19 and 29 showed car-diac inflammation post-Covid.

As per the study, 50 per-cent patients hospitalised with

Covid-19 infection developeda post-Covid condition, whileamong the symptomaticpatients not hospitalised, 27.5per cent developed long Covid.However, post-Covid symp-toms were also present among19 per cent patients whoremained asymptomatic.

Further, anxiety was asso-ciated with the highest per-centage of patients after Covid-19 in all age groups. It was fol-

lowed by depression, adjust-ment and tic disorders.

“The odds of death 30days or more after initial diag-nosis with Covid-19 were 46times higher for patients whowere hospitalised with Covid-19 and discharged thanpatients who had not been hos-pitalised. Among Covid-19patients with preexisting con-ditions, intellectual disabili-ties were associated with the

highest odds of death 30 daysor more after initial Covid-19diagnosis,” said the study.

Dr Pankaj Solanki fromthe Dharamveer SolankiMultispeciality Hospital inDelhi said that these casesneed to be addressed on urgentbasis and the Governmentshould also focus on workingon their rehabilitation throughmulti-disciplinary post-Covidclinics.

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Russia’s Covid-19 vaccine —Sputnik V — is finding

takers in the private sectorwith hospitals likeIndraprastha Apollo, FortisHealthcare and MadhukarRainbow Children’s Hospitalstarting administering the jabto people.

Dr Reddy’s Laboratorieshas started inoculation withSputnik V, as part of the softlaunch in India after itobtained regulatory clearancefrom the Central DrugsLaboratory. In April, SputnikV received an emergency useauthorization in India.

Reddy’s administered thefirst dose of the vaccine inIndia in Hyderabad under alimited pilot on May 14. Thevaccine is currently priced at$12.9 (Rs948) plus tax forone dose in India. This priceis expected to reduce afterlocal supply commences.

Dr Reddy’s Laboratoriesco-chairman and managingdirector G V Prasad said:“With the rising cases in India,vaccination is our most effec-

tive tool in our battle againstCovid-19.

Fortis Memorial ResearchInstitute, Gurugram and FortisHospital, Mohali have decid-ed to launch it as part of a lim-ited pilot roll-out from June,19 2021. The two-dose vac-cine will be available at twohospitals -. In the comingdays, the vaccine will be avail-able at more Fortis hospitalsacross 11 cities as part of thephase-wise pilot project.

Dr AshutoshRaghuvanshi, MD and CEO,Fortis Healthcare, said, “Tilldate, our units were only pro-viding Covaxin and

Covishield. We are the first toprovide a third vaccine option,at Fortis Memorial ResearchInstitute and Fortis HospitalMohali, with the dual objectiveof expanding and scaling upthe vaccination drive and low-ering the infection risks tofuture mutations of the virus.”

Sputnik V has been devel-oped by Russia’s GamaleyaNational Research Instituteof Epidemiology andMicrobiology. Hyderabad-based Dr. Reddy’s Laboratorieshas partnered with RussianDirect Investment Fund(RDIF) for the roll out of thetwo-dose vaccine in India.

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There was a 63per cent drop

in domestic airtraffic in Maycompared to Aprilas the Covid-19second wave rav-aged the entire country. Innumbers, around 21.15 lakhdomestic passengers travelledby air in May compared to57.25 lakh who travelled inApril.

According to theDirectorate General of CivilAviation (DGCA), 78.22 lakhpeople travelled within thecountry by air in March. AirIndia, GO FIRST (previouslyknown as GoAir), Vistara andAirAsia India carried 4.29lakh, 1.38 lakh, 97,000 and64,000 passengers respective-ly in May, the data showed.

It was due to the secondwave of the Covid-19 pan-demic that had badly hit thecountry and its aviation sector.While IndiGo carried 11.69lakh passengers in May, a55.3-per cent share of thedomestic market, SpiceJet flew1.99 lakh passengers, account-ing for a 9.4-per cent share ofthe market, according to datashared by the DGCA.

The occupancy rate orload factor of the six majorIndian airlines was between39.3 per cent and 64 per centin May, it stated. The occu-pancy rate at SpiceJet was 64per cent in May, the DGCAnoted.

The occupancy rates forIndiGo, Vistara, GO FIRST,

Air India and AirAsia Indiawere 51.2 per cent, 40.9 percent, 63.3 per cent, 39.3 percent and 44.4 per cent respec-tively, it added. India resumeddomestic passenger flights onMay 25 last year after a gap oftwo months due to the coro-navirus pandemic.

June and July, 2020, hadseen 19.8 lakh and just over 21lakh domestic flyers, respec-tively, as per DGCA data. Asthe second wave unleashed itsferocity, the numbers firstdropped to 57 lakh in Apriland then crashed to 21.1 lakhin May, 2021 — a figure seenin the first two months afterdomestic flights’ resumptionon May 25, 2020.

Indian airlines are allowedto operate a maximum of 50per cent of their pre-pan-demic domestic flights. TheDGCA data mentioned thatin May, IndiGo had the beston-time performance of 98.7per cent at four metro airports-- Bengaluru, Delhi,Hyderabad and Mumbai.

Vistara and AirAsia Indiawere at the second and thirdpositions at these four airports in May with 98.1percent and 97.4 per centon-time performance respec-tively, the DGCA said.

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The possible third wave ofCovid-19 is unlikely to

affect children much, accord-ing to a multi centric commu-nity based serosurvey studyconducted by AIIMS, Delhi,thus contradicting apprehen-sions that a future Covid-19wave may disproportionatelyhit kids.

The survey revealed thatinfection rates among kids andadults in five cities in differentparts of the country, in bothrural and urban areas, weresimilar. The data also showedthat irrespective of the agegroups, rural sites had lowersero-positivity compared tothe urban sites.

Citing the findings, theresearchers associated withAIIMS in Bhubaneshwar andGorakhpur, apart from Delhi,JIPMER, Puducherry,Translational Health Scienceand Technology Institute,Faridabad and Agartala gov-ernment medical college andWHO have ruled out the pos-sibility that Covid-19 surgesahead are likely to hit childrenharder than before.

Blood samples were col-lected from 4,509 individuals,700 aged 2-17 years and 3,809aged 18 and above betweenMarch 15-June 10 to check forthe antibodies against SARScoV 2 for the study.

Of the participants testedfrom Delhi, Faridabad,Bhubaneshwar, Agartala andGorakhpur, 55.7 per cent kids

and adolescents had antibod-ies against the COVID-19virus, while in adults the sero-prevalence was found to be63.5 per cent.

“Hence, it is unlikely thatany future third wave by a pre-vailing COVID-19 variantwould disproportionatelyaffect children two years orolder,” the report has said.

Within the rural sites,children had slightly lowersero-positivity compared toadults. However, this differ-ential prevalence was notobserved in the urban sites.

It was also seen that theprevalence in children wasslightly more among femaleparticipants compared to male(58.6 per cent versus 53.0 percent) but there was no statis-tically significant difference insero-positivity between maleand female.

The researchers foundthat children aged 2-4 yearsand 5-9 years had almostidentical sero-positivity rate(42.4 per cent and 43.8 percent) which was lower thanthe rate observed for childrenaged 10-17 years (60.3 percent)

The higher seropositivityrate in children aged 10-17years may be reflective oftheir higher mobility andindependence compared tothe younger children, thestudy noted adding that asreported in the literature, alarge proportion of children(50.9%) had an asymptomaticCOVID-19 infection.

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The Left parties and theirtrade unions on Thursday

condemned the corporatisa-t ion plan of OrdnanceFactories under the DefenceMinistry. CPI general secre-tary D Raja and CITU gener-al secretary Tapan Sen saidthis is a clear move to sell thefactories under Company Lawand later sell to private play-ers.

“Some 44 OrdnanceFactories operating underOrdnance Factories Boardunder Ministry of Defencewill be split in seven piecesand seven corporations will beformed under Companies Act.More than seventy five per-cent requirements of ourdefence forces are being suc-cessfully and timely producedand supplied by our OrdnanceFactories with incomparableefficiency and assured quali-ty.

Countr y’s OrdnanceFactories network is anunquestionable example of“Atmanirbhar Bharat”, thephrase being so much noisily

touted by the Modi Govt, inthe respective areas of pro-duction and services. Thereis absolutely no valid rationalefor such drastic alteration ofthe existing structure of theOrdnance Factories network,”said Sen in a detailed state-ment, supporting protest ofthe factory staff on June 19.

“And present move forcorporatisation of OrdnanceFactories, that too beingpushed through in the midstof 2nd wave of pandemic, is ingross violation of the under-standing and assurances givenby the Government to theunited platform of Defenceworkers’ federations in theface of their decision to go infor indefinite strike from 12thOctober 2020,” said Sen.

CPI general secretary Rajatermed the corporatization as“ill-designed move.”

“At least five ministers inthe past including lateManohar Parrikar, formerdefence minister of the BJPgovernment had given writtenassurances to the work forcethat the Ordnance Factorieswould not be corporatised.

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With varying protocolsbeing adopted by differ-

ent States for management ofCovid-19 and allowing personsin their respective jurisdic-tion, the CRPF has issued adetailed set of guidelines for itspersonnel entering or reportingfrom leave from minimum

seven days quarantine in caseof negative test report and forpositive cases, action as perexisting guidelines.

The move comes after thestatus of Covid-19 wasreviewed by the CRPF direc-torate and it was observed thatthe number of patients andpositivity rate has declinedconsiderably and the overall sit-uation has improved and the

overall situation has improved.However, due to caution, carehas been maintained in theCRPF for consolidation of thewhole process of Covid-19management.

The State governments arefollowing different practices inrespect of persons coming torespective State jurisdiction.

In Jammu and Kashmir,there is a provision for manda-

tory antigen test and no quar-antine is required if the testreport is negative. In Punjab,five-day mandatory quaran-tine is in place. In Rajasthan,no quarantine is required if a

negative RTPCR report of notless than 72 hours is there orinstitutional quarantine for15 days or till a negative testreport is received. InRajasthan, no RTPCR test

report or quarantine isrequired if an individual isvaccinated with both the dosesof vaccine 28 days prior toarrival in the State.

Likewise, in Delhi, noquarantine/restriction is inplae for inter-State movement.In Haryana and Chandigarh,no institutional quarantine isrequired for asymptomaticpassengers.

In view of the differingCovid protocols in vogueacross the States, the CRPFissued the detailed instructionsfor strict compliance.

The CRPF has directedthat if the test report is nega-tive or where the test ismandatory as per local admin-istration norms, the personnelwill undergo seven-day quar-antine at respective unit/estab-lishment locations.

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The Centre on Thursdayextended the validity of

motor vehicle documents like

driving licence (DL), registra-tion certificate (RC) and per-mits till September 30, 2021, inview of the ongoing COVID-19pandemic. Simultaneously, theMinistry of Road Transportand Highways (MoRTH) alsonotified to make the PUC(Pollution Under Control) cer-tificate for all vehicles uni-form across the country andalso to link the PUC databasewith the National Register.

Keeping the Covid proto-cols in mind, the MoRTH said

it has advised the enforcementauthorities that the validity offitness, permit (all types),licence, registration or anyother concerned document(s)may be treated to be valid tillSeptember 30, 2021.

“This covers all documentswhose validity has expiredsince Feb 1, 2020, or wouldexpire by September 30, 2021.This will help out citizens inavailing transport related ser-vices, while maintaining socialdistancing,” it said.

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Trees, some of them areknown as Royal Trees,

worth �1,50,000 crore hasbeen looted from Kerala dur-ing the last two years alone,according to leading environ-mentalist JohnPeruvanthanam who knowsthe forests of the State like theback of his hand.

Sir, as he is known acrossKerala had toured the districtsfrom where he got informationabout the illegal tree fellingbraving his own life and what hesaw was massive robbing offorests by the axis consisting ofpoliticians-bureaucrats andtimber mafia.

“Rose Wood, which is alsoknown by the name the RoyalTree, costs more than �twolakh per cubic feet. Thousandsof such trees have been choppedaway by this cartel. Most of thetrees cut down were taken awayfrom the country in cargo air-craft and ships. These are usedin the construction of castles,palaces and ranch houses inEurope and USA,’ said John Peruvananthanam, theunofficial forester of the State.

He said that trees whichwere more than 1000 years oldwere cut down and taken awayby the mafia. The environmen-tal and ecological values pro-vided by these trees were thou-

sand fold more than the�1,50,000 crore that the exche-quer lost by the illegal felling ofthese trees. This is the biggestanti-national activity scene inKerala,” he said.

Kerala’s Leader ofOpposition V D Satheeshanmade a startling disclosure onThursday that the bureaucrat-politician-forest poachers cartelhas swindled the entire forest inthe State.

“They have cut down allrare species of trees from areaswhere there was semblance togreen cover in the State. Weunderstand that forest land ineight districts were slaughteredby the Pinaryi VijayanGovernment that has been rul-ing the State since 2016,”Satheeshan told reporters afterleading a team of Oppositionparty leaders to areas whichwere cleared off forests by thetimber mafia.

The opposition party lead-ers visited the entire forestranges in the State from treeswere cut down indiscriminate-ly. “

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Following the SupremeCourt’s acceptance of the

CBSE and CISCE class 12 boardresults’ evaluation formula, theCBSE Controller ofExaminations SanyamBharadwaj explained the30:30:40 formula for the mark-ing criteria for Class 12 exams,saying “40 per cent marks willbe based on Class 12 pre-boards, midterm exams, andunit test, 30 per cent marks willbe based on Class 11 finalexams, and 30 per cent markswill be based on based of best-of-three Class 10 marks”.

Bharadwaj said, “CBSE isalso developing a software onthe basis of which schools cancalculate marks for Class 12exams.” He mentioned that thestudents who wish to takeexams can appear once the sit-uation get normal. “The processof exams for students who wantto take will be initiated afterresults,” he said adding theClass 10 Board results will bedeclared by July 20.

On its part, the CICSEmentioned that performanceof the candidates in the schoolexaminations in the subjects inClasses 9 and 10, measuredthrough their best marksobtained in the two years(referred to as raw marks) andthe best performance of theschool in the last six years willbe evaluated. “The first two fac-tors measure the subject profi-ciency of the candidates, whilethe last is a measure of the gen-eral quality of the schools thecandidates are appearing from,”CISCE official statement said.

The assessment schemereleased by the board includes

student’s marks in Class 10board exams, project, practicalwork in subjects, best marksobtained in school exams inClasses 11 and 12, and best per-formance of the school itself inthe last six years. The CISCEarrived at this after consideringdata from 2015 to 2020.

The CISCE's Class 12 ISCresult formula was devised by acommittee of three experts whoare statisticians and "six in-house members". The panelanalysed data for one lakh stu-dents from across 1,200 schoolsfor the Class 12 ISC result and2.2 lakh students from 2,500schools for the Class 10 ICSEexam.The evaluation formula,however, has evoked mixedreaction from experts with somehailing the criteria while othersterming it to be unfair move forstudents who will step intotheir higher education system.

“In my opinion, moreweightage should have beenincluded for internal examsconducted in class 12 as stu-dents become serious aboutacademics after joining class 12.They tend to take class 11 lessseriously as it is not a Boardclass. Also including weightagefor class 10 is not very wise asit includes many subjects whichstudents don't pursue at thesenior secondary level and hasno relevance at this stage,” saidMeenu Kanwar, Principal ofthe Amity International SchoolMayur Vihar, New Delhi.

However, Vikas Ojha,Principal of Foundation School,Buxar, appreciated the decisiontaken by the CBSE on the eval-uation process given the oddprevailing circumstances thathas affected the education sys-tem equally.

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The Kerala High Court on Thursday dismissed a petitionfiled by a local activist challenging the Lakshadweep

Administration’s reform measures including the move to intro-duce Lakshadweep Development Authority Regulation 2021which envisages development of towns on inhabited islandsand the Prevention of Anti-Social Activities Act (PASA).

A bench consisting of judges S V Bhatti and MuraliPurushothaman ruled that the so called LDAR 2021 was amere draft of the administrative reform proposal and not afinal order.

Discontentment was brewing in the archipelago in theArabian Sea for the last two weeks over the move by theadministrator of the Union Territory to bring in reforms inthe islands and make the atolls as developed as Maldives. Thepublic interest litigation challenging the move by the admin-istrator was a reflection of the public ire towards the reforms.

The judges observed that the observation of the legalityof the draft regulation which was under the active consider-ation of the administration was completely premature.Because of the draft administrative reforms which wereopposed by the inhabitants of the islands, the BJP unit is get-ting isolated. Every day hundreds of party workers are leav-ing the Hindutwa brigade for good though there are hardly150 party activists in the islands.

Earlier in the day, Aisha Sultana, a struggling film artist,who had accused the Centre of using bio weapon againstthe Lakshadweep population , was granted interim anticipatorybail by a single judge bench of the Kerala High Court. JudgeAshok Menon while disposing of a petition filed by the artistasked her to appear before the Kavaratti Police for interro-gation on June 20 in connection with a notice served on herunder Section 41A of the Code of Criminal Procedure.

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In an urgent bid to avert aTMC overreach in Tripura,

BJP rushed Party leadersincluding its General SecretaryBL Santosh to Agartala who onThursday held marathon meet-ings with party MLAs to workout a reconciliation betweenthe Chief Minister BiplabKumar Deb and the Dissidentgroups in the State.

BJP State president DrManik Saha, accepted "differ-ences" saying "we are a family,and in a family it happenssometime and has been sortedout." He, However, skirtedanswer to the query on TMC'sattempt to poach BJP MLAs inTripura.

BJP is apprehending thatMukul Roy back in the rulingTMC fold in West Bengal mayorganise defections of MLAsfrom the faction-ridden BJP inthe state. BJP's fears are notunfounded as it was Roy in theBJP who had facilitated defec-tions of six Congress MLAs tothe BJP in 2016.BJP centralleadership rushed Santhoshand its organisation secretaryfor the Northeast,Ajay Jamwal,to Agartala a daybefore and met with ChiefMinister and MLAs including'rebels'.

Santosh reportedly held aclosed door one-to-one meet-ing at Agartala with several BJPleaders to understand the dif-ferences and address the griev-ances and differences.

BJP General Secretary haddiscussion with MPs PratimaBhowmik and Rebati Tripura,Deputy Chief Minister JishnuDebbarman and dissidentMLAs. Tripura BJP in-chargeVinod Kumar Sonkar, whowas also to arrive here, had tocancel his visit on account of afamily issue.Dissident MLAslike Sudip Roy Barman, RamPrasad Paul, Ashish Das,Sushanta Choudhury andAshish Kumar Saha went to theparty office to meet Santhosh.

Sources said he also metDeputy Chief Minister, twoMPs, four Ministers and theMLAs who were called in sixseparate groups. Dissidentsdemanded replacement of statepresident Dr Manik Saha,expansion of Cabinet and cer-tain changes in the organisa-tion.

BJP leaders here, however,denied rebel activities inTripura BJP saying seniorleaders are in the state to dis-cuss assembly poll preparationswhich are though two-yearsago.

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Camping in New Delhi forthe past two days apparently

to seek a redress for the deteri-orating law and order situationin Bengal, Governor JagdeepDhankhar on Thursday lodgedhis first complaint withPresident Ram Nath Kovinddrawing his attention towardshow human rights was beingviolated in the State, post polls.

The Governor who report-edly met the President for about45 minutes submitted a notedetailing his observations on thedeteriorating law and orderand human rights, State repres-sion of opposition workers,persecution of them by the rul-ing Trinamool Congress andwhat he called a “stunningsilence” of the powers that betowards the ongling bloodshedand loot.

In the note the Governorhas raised the issue of a preju-diced administrative systemwhere the police and the admin-istration allegedly worked tofurther the interests of the rul-ing political party.

The Governor is alsoreported to have given detailed

reports on every district andsub-division where such vio-lence was taking place and theplaces he recently visited toacquire a firsthand experienceof the alleged torture beingperpetuated on the people,requesting presidential action.

Dhankhar who also metHome Minister Amit Shah onThursday evening had onWednesday called on NationalHuman Rights CommissionChairman Justice Arun Mishraseeking his intervention in thepresent state of affairs in theState.

Sources said that theGovernor briefed the HomeMinister about the “retributiveviolence” being perpetrated onthe people in a planned mannerwith the State Governmentturning a blind eye on the sit-uation. He is also known to haveraised issue of latest “sectarian”attacks that took place atChandannagore in Hooghlydistrict and Tiljala area right inthe heart of Capital Kolkata.

Earlier Bengal OppositionLeader Suvendu Adhikari toohad complained about aBasirhat-Dhulagarh like com-

munal attacks being organizedin these too places.

On whether Dhankhar hadsuggested any “constitutionalmeasures” was not clear butTMC leaders in Kolkata saidthat the party was prepared ofany such step with a ministerfrom North Kolkata adding“whole State will erupt if theCentre dares impose Article356.”

The Governor who was ona 3-day trip to the nationalCapital earlier met UnionMinisters Prahlad Singh Pateland Prahlad Joshi before tweet-ing “… had useful interactionwith Union Minister of Coaland Mines and Parliamentary

Affairs...” Sources reporting onthe “useful interactions” saidtalks also featured on investi-gations into the multi-crorecoal scam from Bengal ---involving some of TMC’s topleadership.

Earlier complaining on thealleged “retributive post pollviolence” Dhankhar said howthe State Government was turn-ing a blind eye to the incidents

that had rendered thousands ofpeople homeless and propertiesworth cores looted anddestroyed.

Later before flying to Delhihe wrote to Chief Minister howdespite four Cabinet meetingshaving taken place in the pastsix weeks … not a single wordwas been spent on the post pollviolence … and no minister orofficer visited the affected areas

and no compensation wasdeclared.”

“I told the Chief Minister toupdate me about the situationbut … there was no response onher part … it seems that thepolice have forgotten its work …the police and the HomeDepartment must rise abovepartisan politics … (or else) Ishall not overlooked the matter,”the Governor said.

Kolkata: Bengal Chief Ministeron Thursday chose to ignoreGovernor Jagdeep Dhankhar’svisit to Delhi saying “speech issilver and silence is golden.”

Instead of directly attack-ing the Governor --- a usualtactic that she would adopt forthe past couple of years ---Banerjee focused on the “polit-ical gimmicks” of the BJP tocreate a “perspective” for someulterior motive.

She would not refer to theGovernor but say “you canrebuke a child into silence butyou cannot make a personwith bad eyesight to see rea-sons.” Pointing at the alarming

state of affairs in the BJP-ruledStates she said how the saffronparty was not bothered aboutthe situations in UP, MP,Gujarat etc where “people aredying like animals and theirbodies floating in the rivers.”

Refuting charges of post-poll violence Banerjee said, “asjournalists you must have bet-ter information about the so-called violence … but have youseen violence anywhere? …some incidents happened dur-ing election, but at that time, theElection Commission was incharge …,” reminding how theBJP was “trying to create a per-spective… But it is not true…

I don’t support violence and Ihave asked my police to takestern action against those whowill try to break law and orderin the state.”

In an apparent reference tothe Governor’s visit to Delhishe said “whatever you arewitnessing now is nothing buttheir (BJP leaders) gimmick. Itis a part of their pre-plannedmove after facing a defeat in thepoll which they cannot accept.”

She said instead of dis-turbing Bengal “they (BJP)should look at UP, MP bandGujarat where the law andorder situation is deterioratingevery day.” PNS

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Union Home Minister Amit Shah onThursday launched a national helpline

(155260) and reporting platform for preventingfinancial loss due to cyber fraud.

The national helpline and reporting platformprovides a mechanism for persons cheated incyber frauds to report such cases to prevent loss of their hardearned money.

“The facility empowers both the banks andthe police, by leveraging new-age technologiesfor sharing online fraud related information andtaking action in almost real time. The loss of

defrauded money in online cheating cases canbe stopped by chasing the money trail and stop-ping its further flow before it is taken out of thedigital ecosystem by the fraudster,” the MHA saidin statement.

Currently, the helpline and its reporting plat-form has all the major public and private sec-tor banks onboard. The notable ones include –State Bank of India, Punjab National Bank, Bankof Baroda, Bank of India, Union Bank, IndusInd,HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, Axis, Yes and KotakMahindra Bank. It also has all major wallets andmerchants such as PayTM, PhonePe, Mobikwik,Flipkart and Amazon linked to it, said MHA.

Jaipur: Notwithstanding thedifficult times brought about bythe Covid-19 pandemic, thetribal-dominated Dungarpurdistrict in Rajasthan has script-ed history by becoming the firstplace in the state and second inthe country to build 93,128houses under the PradhanMantri Awas Yojana.

The Dakshin Dinajpur dis-trict in West Bengal occupiesthe top position in the nation-al list, while Hooghly in the

same state is placed third.As per the list released on

Wednesday, Chhattisgarh'sRajnandgaon is placed fourth,followed by Kanker in thesame state.

The list took many para-meters into consideration anddeclared Dungarpur as thefirst district in Rajasthan tobuild over 93,000 houses underthe PM Awas Yojana in the lastone year, officials confirmed.

District Collector Suresh

Kumar Ola said that differentteams under Anjali Rajoriya,Chief Executive Officer, ZilaParishad, Dungarpur, workedhard at the ground level toaccomplish the feat.

Rajoriya said that as manyas 1,00,054 houses wereapproved under the scheme inthe district of which 93,128were completed.

Officials said that besidesfighting the Covid crisis, thedistrict officials also focused on

ensuring that people do notmigrate for employment andhave their own roofs over theirheads before the monsoon setin. Keeping this in mind, theymonitored the constructionworks across the district andensured that the set goal wasachieved. They also ensured thegeneration of a significantnumber of man hours for thejobs besides creating employ-ment opportunities underMNREGA. IANS

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The Covid-19 deaths droppedto 636 in Maharashtra on

Thursday, even as the infectionscame down to 9,830 in the State.A day after Maharashtra logged1,236 deaths and 10,107 freshcases, the daily deaths camedown by nearly half, while theinfections dropped marginallyby 277.

With 636 deaths reportedon Thursday, the Covid-19 tollin the State jumped from1,15,390 to 1,16,026.

With 9,830 fresh infections,the total infections in the staterose from 59,34,880 to59,44,710.

As 5,890 patients were dis-charged from the hospitalsacross the state after full recov-ery, the total number of peopledischarged from the hospitalssince the second week of Marchlast year increased from56,79,746 to 56,85,836. Therecovery rate in the statedropped from 95.7 per cent to95.64 per cent. The total “activecases” in the state climbed from1,36,661 to 1,39,960. The fatal-ity rate in the state went up from1.94 per cent to 1.95 per cent.

Pune with 18,887 casescontinued to be remain first inthe state in terms of maximumnumber of “active cases” in thestate, while Mumbai with 18,417stood second, followed byThane (14,088), Kolhapur(13,485), Sangli (11,490),Ratnagiri (7483) Satara (7298),Sindhudurg (5581),Ahmednagar (4829) and Raigad(4810), Nagpur (4742) andNashik (4355).

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The Army top brass onThursday began a three-

day brainstorming session toreview the situation on theLine of Actual Control(LAC)in Ladakh and the Lineof Control(LOC) and its oper-ational preparedness to meetany challenge.

Incidentally, the ArmyCommanders’ Conferencecomes a year after the GalwanValley clash in EasternLadakh.

The face-offs began inMay last year from thePangong Tso(lake)in Ladakh.

The Chinese stopped anIndian patrol leading to ascuffle in which several sol-diers from both the sidesreceived injuries. Soon, standoffs erupted at some otherpoints including Hot Springs,Gogra and the Depsang valley.

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As face-offs continue at theLine of Actual Control

(LAC) in Ladakh, DefenceMinister Rajnath Singh onThursday cautioned China thatIndia is a peace loving nationbut will hit back strongly if pro-voked. He also paid tributes tothe 20 Indian army personnelincluding the commandingofficer who were killed in abrawl with the Chinese troopsin the Galwan valley a year ago.

Dedicating 12 strategical-ly important roads built by theBorder RoadsOrganisation(BRO) to thenation in the north east, par-ticularly Assam and ArunachalPradesh, on Thursday, Rajnathsaid India is a priest of worldpeace but any serious distur-bance to peace and tranquilityin border areas would haveadverse implications.

“We seek world peace (but)if someone shows us an aggres-

sive attitude, we will respond,”Singh said, adding the “newroads will help secure interna-tional borders”.

The defence minister said,“Last year in Galwan Valley, oursoldiers displayed exemplarycourage and valour in line ofduty. I salute all brave soldierswho laid down their lives fight-ing for the nation.”

Highlighting the signifi-cance of the 12 roads including10 in Arunachal Pradesh andone each in Ladakh and Jammuand Kashmir, he said they willnot only give a boost in connectivity but wouldfacilitate faster movement oftroops along the internationalborder.

He made these observationsin an event organized inLakhimpur district of Assam.The defence minister dedicatedthe roads virtually in the pres-ence of Assam and ArunachalPradesh chief ministersHimanta Biswa Sarma andPema Khandu respectively.

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Active Covid cases dropped below the 70,000 mark to reach69,831 on Thursday in Andhra Pradesh, even as 6,151 new

Covid infections have been reported.With the new cases, Andhra Pradesh's Covid tally crossed

18.3 lakh.On a positive note, 7,728 more people recovered from the

disease in the past 24 hours, increasing the total number of recov-eries over 17.5 lakh.

Bucking the daily trend of an average 10,000 recoveries, thesouthern state witnessed fewer recoveries on Thursday.

East Godavari district reported the highest number of casesat 1,244, followed by Chittoor (937), West Godavari (647),Prakasam (554), Kadapa (478), Krishna (424), Anantapur(359), Guntur (331), Nellore (274), Srikakulam (264),Visakhapatnam (237), Kurnool (203) and Vizianagaram (199).

Except for Krishna and Vizianagaram, all other districts inAndhra Pradesh have now reported more than 1 lakh Covid cases,however, Krishna district is also inching towards the 1 lakh mark,just shy of 3,000 cases.

With 1.02 lakh more tests conducted in the past 24 hours,the total number of tests carried out in Andhra Pradesh hascrossed the 2.08 crore-mark.

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bring political stability in Israelby shielding the Governmentfrom the Knesset’s longevity.However, the failed idea, foundlittle favour with Knesset com-mittees mostly in the hands ofNetanyahu’s opponents.

Despite Netanyahu’s bestefforts a motley “Parliamentarygrouping” has been able to dis-lodge him from the PrimeMinister’s post. His 12 years inthe august office from March31, 2009 have finally come to anend. Will this be a politicalrequiem of 71-year-oldNetanyahu, as many people feeland want? The man himselfdisagrees. Son of a centenarianand historian father, the lateBentzion Netanyahu, he per-haps feels life and history willboth be on his side.

Naftali Bennett, the newPrime Minister of Israel, hasimpressive credentials. A com-mando by training, he servedin reserve duty of the SayeretMatkal. In 1999, he founded ahigh-tech company Cyota, spe-cialising in information securi-ty. He also served as CEO, ofSoluto, which he later sold foraround $100 million.

In 2005, destiny broughthim close to Netanyahu, whenthe latter was Leader ofOpposition in the Knesset. Hebecame the head of

Netanyahu’s general staff, andhelped him formulate the edu-cation reform plan. Soon afterNetanyahu came to power in2009, Bennett was appointed asDirector-General of the YeshaCouncil, an umbrella organisa-tion of municipal councils ofthe Jewish settlement in WestBank. He led a fight to lift thefreeze on fresh settlement activ-ity of Jews in West Bank. TheJews view the West Bank (orriver Jordan) as Judea-Samariaof the Old Testament. Thesame year he co-founded the‘My Israel Movement’ whichfought campaigns to boycottIsrael, post-Zionist movements,and the boycott of Israel. Hisentrepreneurial achievementscatapulted his name to thepages of Forbes magazine in2012. In November, 2012 hewas appointed as the chairmanof the HaBayit HaYehudi, thenational religious party. In2013- in the elections to the19th Knesset, he led his partyto a historic tally of 12 seats.This time Netanyahu appoint-ed him as the Minister ofEconomy, Minister of ReligiousServices and Minister ofJerusalem and Diaspora Affairs.In elections to the 20th Knesset(2015), Bennett’s party woneight seats. He was made theMinister of Education and

Minister of Diaspora Affairs inthe 34th Government.

Did Bennett realise that hewould come to lead the 36thGovernment? The credit great-ly goes to the fissiparous poli-tics of Israel, which can throwup impossible coalitions as thecurrent one. The true creditgoes to Yair Lapid, a formerjournalist and boxer, who leadsthe Yesh Atid party, who con-vinced Bennett to form ananti-Netanyahu coalition thatcan seize power. While Lapid isavowedly secular, Bennett is ademonstratively religious Jew.Contrary to speculationMansour Abbas has notbecome a Deputy PrimeMinister. His United Arab Listitself is a divided house on join-ing the Government. This wasapparently after the bad Pressthey got in the neighbouringArab countries on their plansto join the Government.

With Bennett being pro-settlement, he is likely to followa hawkish policy vis-à-vis WestBank. The two-State solution,defunct anyway since 2007,after Fatah and Hamas irre-trievably split, will elude the lib-erals again.

(The writer is an author andindependent researcher based inNew Delhi. The views expressedare personal.)

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��������������Sir — There is a difference between the con-stitutionally-guaranteed right to protest andterrorist activity, said the Delhi HighCourt, as it granted bail to three studentactivists arrested more than a year ago inconnection with riots in northeast Delhithat followed protests against the contro-versial citizenship law. The three studentsfrom Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU),were arrested under the Unlawful Activities(Prevention) Act (UAPA), and for this thecourt was sharp in its criticism of the DelhiPolice. It noted that the UAPA, an anti-ter-ror law, could not be casually applied topetty criminal acts or protests by citizens.

In its anxiety to suppress dissent, in themind of the State, the line between the con-stitutionally-guaranteed right to protest andterrorist activity seems to be getting blurred.The High Court remarked that thechargesheet lacked any specific, particu-larised, factual allegations that would makeout the ingredients of offences under theUAPA. In the absence of an actual caseagainst the offenders, the process thenbecomes the punishment. Scathing judg-ments by courts are notable, but unfortu-nately not a solution to the problem. It istime to uphold the right to protest else, Indiawill no longer remain a true democracy.

CK Subramaniam | Navi Mumbai

��� ���������������Sir — Blood is thicker than water is a well-known saying. This aptly suits the country’spolitical system. Both at the national andthe regional level fathers, sons, daughters,uncles and nephews have influenced India’spolitics from a long time. Earlier, politicswasn’t a profession; it was a passion. Thedecline in political discourse of the coun-try began with the onset of dynastic poli-tics. Not that the political families alwaysprospered in the process as affection andamicability often gave way to bad blood,betrayal and belligerence. Chirag Paswanwill know better because he is “shellshocked” by the action of his unclePashupati Kumar Paras who “rebelled”against his nephew for “disrespecting”

him. Disgruntlement with Chirag’s style offunctioning had come to the forefront whena couple of LJP’s senior leaders switchedsides some time ago. Instead of introspec-tion, the young leader’s detached lookappeared to have surprised his supporters.Nothing succeeds like success, and failureis an orphan. The LJP’s poor showing inthe Assembly elections seem to haveemboldened his rivals in the party. All thissaid, all is not lost for Chirag. He has a longpolitical journey ahead. Bihar politics ismost likely to open up sooner than later.Nitish Kumar cannot hold his own forev-er. Chinks in his armour have repeatedlybeen exposed. Lalu Prasad is still in thebackground. Undoubtedly, Tejashwi andChirag are the men to look out for.

Ganapathi Bhat | Akola

��������������Sir — The Central Board of Secondary

Education (CBSE) has decided to go for a‘30:30:40 formula’ — 30 per cent from Class10 Board, 30 per cent from Class 11 exam,and 40 per cent from Class 12 assessment— to tabulate Class 12 results this year, theBoard informed the Supreme Court whichgave its green signal. The Council for IndianSchool Certificate Examinations (CISCE)has also decided to go for a similar formu-la as the CBSE, except they have decided totake the average of the last six years.

The apex court said there was no ques-tion of rolling back the decision of not hold-ing exams. Students who are not satisfiedwith the result will be given an opportuni-ty to appear in examinations when condi-tions are conducive for it. This is a gooddecision and a fair one for all. This is thebest the powers that be can do right now.

Bhagwan Thadani | Mumbai

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Israel has got a new PrimeMinister after 12 years, anexceptionally long period inthe history of the Zionist

country with splintered politics.Not even David Ben-Gurion,Israel’s first Prime Minister, hadserved so long continuously in anyof his two stints i.e 1948-54 and1955-63 as did BenjaminNetanyahu in his second inningsbefore being ousted by NaftaliBennett recently. Interestingly,both Netanyahu and Bennettcame from the prestigious Israelicommando unit Sayeret Matkalalso called Unit 269. Its motto –“Who dares, wins” is likely to playout in Israeli politics in the daysahead. The fragile coalition ofYamina, Yesh Atid, New Hope,Blue and White, Yisrael Beitenu,Meretz and Labour parties form-ing the 36th Government is anaudacity of hope that might godown the quicksands of a divid-ed Knesset anytime. With Likudstill the single-largest party, onlyone vote (60-59) differentiates theruling “Parliamentary Grouping”from the Opposition.

Way back on May 17, 1999Netanyahu was dislodged fromthe prime ministerial post for thefirst time. His then rival was anIsraeli Defence Forces’ Generalwhose moving elegy onNetanyahu’s late brother YonatanNetanyahu (1946-76) formed apart of the school curriculum inIsrael. Yonatan was martyred inOperation Thunderbolt, or Israel’sdaring commando mission torescue Israeli passengers from thehijacked Air France flight fromEntebbe Airport in Uganda onJuly 4, 1976. The author of theelegy was Ehud Barak, the manwho became the 10th PrimeMinister of Israel, by defeatingNetanyahu convincingly.

For a brief period between1996 and 2001, Israel had exper-imented with direct prime min-isterial elections in a bid to arrestpolitical instability. It was, howev-er, soon junked after Ehud Barak’sincumbency lasted less than twoyears, due to vicissitudes of Israelipolitics, despite the fact that theKnesset completed its normalfour-year term. Exactly 20 yearslater, it was interesting to findNetanyahu pitching for a revivalof the system. He argued it could

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Several States in India have started to openup, with their respective lists of permittedand restricted activities. While there is con-cern about the undercounting of cases and

deaths in some States, the overall trend of a reced-ing second wave is not being disputed. The fre-netic rush and public anguish, which marked thefrequently futile search for hospital beds thatbecame the painful images of the second waveare no longer the dominant themes of Indian orinternational media reports. That, in itself, pro-vides assurance that the second wave is ebbing.

However, it would be unwise to assume thatthe turbulent waters of the second wave havestilled and the boat is set on a safe course ahead.We still need to see whether there will be arebound when the lockdown eases. There arealready reports of people rushing to tourist spotsand holiday resorts. Malls and restaurants arecrowded. These represent the more affluent sec-tions, but the signals they send can misguide therest of the population. Desire to live life to the fullis understandable after lockdowns but wisdommust caution against abandonment of safe-guards against a virus which still poses an activethreat. Common sense tells us that if some care-less revellers start prancing around when the boathas just left the rough sea, it can still capsize,putting everybody in danger.

Even as we steady the boat, when it sails outof choppy waters, we must watch the charts andstudy the signals to see when it might be rockedagain by a third wave. Considerable speculationhas already commenced in the media about thetiming and contours of such a wave. Predictionshave been made, by mathematical modellers andsome epidemiologists, that we may be rocked bythe third wave in November this year. While theaccuracy of such predictions is uncertain, sincethey are based on several assumptions, we do needto be well prepared to meet such a threat when-ever it arises.

Several elements will determine the severityof a third wave: the nature of variants in circu-lation; the number of persons who have acquiredimmunity from vaccination or recent infection;the number of susceptible people who are avail-able for the virus to infect and cause symptomaticillness; adherence of people to public health advi-sories on wearing masks and avoiding crowds;ability of public authorities to prevent super-spreader events and the preparedness of ourhealth systems to ensure timely case detection,supportive home care or assured hospitalisationwith competent service provision.

Our surveillance systems must be sharpened,to detect the levels of circulating variants andemergence of new forms. Case detection will needto be based on both testing and clinical featuresgathered by healthcare teams visiting homes. Falsenegative results from tests can be compensatedby adding clinical criteria (syndromic surveillance,as used for other infectious disease outbreaks).Genomic analysis of 5-10 per cent of all positivetest samples would be needed, with higher lev-els of scrutiny for virus samples recovered frominternational travellers. Since testing would posemore challenges in rural areas, symptom-basedsurveillance and contact-based quarantine wouldhave to be followed, along with the use of rapidantigen tests for spot diagnosis and mobile lab-oratories to carry samples for RT-PCR testing toauthorised laboratories.

Home care would be appropriate and ade-

quate for 80-85 per cent of all symp-tomatically infected cases. Primaryhealth care teams must be trainedin providing supportive care andmonitoring. Symptoms, pulseoximetry readings, temperatureshould be part of daily monitoringof such home-managed persons. Ifthe person is a diabetic, blood sugartoo should be monitored with a glu-cometer. Telemedicine facilitiesshould be scaled up and standard-ised, to support home management.Prior planning should be done toensure timely transfer of a personunder home care to an intermedi-ate or advanced care facility whenthe need arises.

Sub-district, district and med-ical college hospitals should beequipped to handle a possible surgeof the third wave. It is difficult topredict how severe it would be, asit depends on the behaviour of thevirus and its different variants, aswell as the behaviour of people inadhering to public health advisorieson masks, ventilation and avoidanceof crowding. However, strengthen-ing of the healthcare infrastructureand health workforce at various lev-els of care is long overdue.This is anopportunity to reduce the existingdisparities of healthcare provisionsbetween states and districts as wellas between urban and rural areas.

There is speculation in themedia that children will be moreaffected in a third wave. It is pos-sible that more children will beexposed in an open society thanduring the first wave when they

were mostly sheltered or even dur-ing the second wave when theywere still partly guarded. Numbersof susceptible adults may alsodecrease by that time as several ofthem would have been vaccinatedor infected by then. Nevertheless,adults will still be far more likely tohave severe infection than childrenwhere the vast majority will haveasymptomatic or mild infections.Even so, expanding hospital ser-vices for children, including inten-sive care capacity, will still serve auseful purpose by strengtheningpaediatric care for many serious ill-nesses.

Vaccination must be speededup, with accelerated domestic pro-duction and international procure-ment. The number of vaccinationcentres must be increased.Vaccination in rural areas willrequire careful planning of logistics,sensitive communication for confi-dence building, support for over-coming technology barriers to reg-istration and availability of close-to-home vaccination centres. TheDelta variant poses challenges withhigh infectivity and capacity for vac-cine evasion, at higher levels thanthe wild virus or the Alpha variant.However, there is reassuring evi-dence that the variant responds wellto two doses of all available vaccines.So, we need to provide both dosesof vaccines to vulnerable persons,identified by age and co-morbidi-ties. Even pregnant women nowneed to be regarded as candidatesfor priority vaccination.

The period of relative calm willalso give us time to build partner-ships between and among govern-ment services, local bodies, non-governmental organisations, schoolpersonnel, trade unions, industryrepresentatives, community groupsand citizen volunteers. Capacity-building for concerted actionamong these groups will give us thecollective strength to respond moreeffectively to the third wave.Whether to promote Covid-appro-priate behaviour or to reduce vac-cine hesitancy, local networks inthe community are vital.Community based surveillancesystems can also give early alerts ofrising cases.

We should also utilise thisopportunity to enhance healthand nutrition literacy to increaseimmunity. Healthy diets and phys-ical activity are vital for bothinnate and adaptive immunity tofight the virus and also for preven-tion and control of non-communi-cable diseases which are the pre-dominant co-morbidities that pre-dict poor outcomes in Covid infec-tion. Promotion of healthy livinghabits using the Covid platform,will help foster future health andwell-being.

We need to prepare well for acompetent and concerted responsethat can anticipate, avert or atten-uate future public health emergen-cies. By being forewarned andforearmed, we can restrict thethird wave to a ripple rather thana tidal wave.

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The period betweenApril 1 and June 5found 30,071 childrenin need of care of pro-

tection as 26,176 of them losteither parent, 3,621 children lostboth parents and 274 childrenwere abandoned. Many of themare ‘Covid Orphans.’ Of them15,620 are boys, 14,447 girls andfour transgenders; 11,815 are inthe 8-13 age group and 5,107 inthe 4-7 age group. Nearly all ofthem are in the care of aguardian, a family member ora surviving parent while the restare in shelter homes, orphan-ages or with "special adoptionagencies."

The number of out-of-home care children in need ofcare and protection in India isestimated to be about 2.4 croreand the number is continuous-

ly on the rise. Several financialsupport measures have beenannounced for orphaned chil-dren from the PM Cares Fund,Ministry of Women and ChildDevelopment and by States.However, the issue remainsthat these orphans’ needs interms of permanent homesand settlement have to be takencare of as a priority.

Juvenile Justice (Care andProtection of Children) Act,2015 is primary legislation forensuring the safety, security,dignity and well-being of chil-dren. The orphans need to beproduced before ChildrenWelfare Committees (CWCs)which decide whether the childcan be kept with the extendedfamily, in foster care with sup-port or at State-run centres. TheAct also lays down procedures

for their adoption. However, inpractice, it has been found thatthe courts are heavily cloggedwith arrears and the adoptionproceedings take years. In 2015,the Government instituted acentralised online system CAR-INGS (Child AdoptionResource Information andGuidance System) to facilitateadoption primarily to checkabuse of adoption proceedingsby NGOs. Only prospective

parents registered on CAR-INGS portal managed byCentral Adoption ResourceAgency (CARA) can adoptchildren. CARA prefersorphans under kinship care,with shelter homes being thelast resort. A child under twoyears is considered ‘legally free’to be adopted if no oneapproaches the shelter home fortwo months. The waiting peri-od is four months for older chil-dren. As many as 5,693 childrenwere adopted in 2010 and 5,964in 2011. After the institution ofCARA and CARINGS in 2015,the pace of adoption has dis-tinctly slowed down to 1881 in2015-16, 3,210 in 2016-17and2,160 in 2020-21. The pandem-ic has slowed down the adop-tion process further as it alsoaffected functioning of courts.

There is a bias towardsadoption of infants. Over 80 percent of adoptions are of childrenbelow two years. Litigation andchallenges end up delaying theadoption process. In the lastthree years, 174 cases ended indisruption — termination ofadoption proceeding beforefinalisation — and five casesended in dissolution — termi-nation after finalisation.

Hundreds of adoption casesare still pending in courts. Anamendment to the concernedAct to transfer powers vested incourts to District Magistrates inorder to speed up adoptionsprocess is awaiting Rajya Sabhaapproval. The amendment alsoseeks to give a prominent roleto District Magistrates in super-intendence of Child CareInstitutions, mostly run by

NGOs supposedly under theoversight of the Social WelfareDepartment. It is found that theNGOs are interested in gettingfunding without properly pro-viding even basic facilities offood, hygiene and sanitation.There have also been seriouscomplaints of abuse of inmatesin some of NGO-run facilities.

The 2015 law had usheredin the concept of foster care inIndia in which the child isplaced with a caregiver runninga residential child care facilityor in a private home of a fosterparent. They receive financialsupport from Government.

The system provides per-sonalized parental care in afamily-like environment to agroup of unrelated children ina community setting. It is con-sidered suitable for street chil-

dren who pass through a wean-ing period prior to their place-ment in individual foster care orany other form of family-basedcare. In the broader interest ofthese children, there is a case forevolving newer, more flexiblemechanisms that are less strin-gent than full-scale legal adop-tion or a formal foster-carearrangement. One mechanismis that of sponsorship charitiesrun by NGOs, which can beadopted by the Government toconnect a donor/sponsor witha particular child. It allows forfinancial and emotional supportwithout the legal implicationson succession. Not only thechildless seeking adoption butpersons of means with childrencan come forward under aGovernment-managed systemto support children.

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POINTCOUNTERPOINT

The writer, a cardiologistand epidemiologist, is

president, Public HealthFoundation of India. The views expressed

are personal.

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The writer is formerSpecial Secretary,

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Nepal’s embattled PrimeMinister KP Sharma Oli

on Thursday defended hisGovernment’s controversialdecision to dissolve the Houseof Representatives and toldthe Supreme Court that it is notup to the judiciary to appointa premier as it cannot under-take the legislative and theexecutive functions of the state.

President Bidya DeviBhandari, at the recommenda-tion of Prime Minister Oli, dis-solved the lower house for thesecond time in five months onMay 22 and announced snapelections on November 12 andNovember 19.

Prime Minister Oli is head-ing a minority Governmentafter losing a trust vote in theHouse.

On June 9, the apex courtissued a show-cause notice tothe Office of the PrimeMinister and the President’s

Office to furnish a writtenresponse within 15 days.

Furnishing a written replyto the Supreme Court onThursday as demanded by theConstitutional Bench, Oli saidthe court cannot appoint aPrime Minister as it cannotundertake the legislative andthe executive functions of thestate.

The apex court receivedOli’s response via the Office ofthe Attorney General.

“The Court’s duty is tointerpret the Constitution andthe existing laws, it cannotplay the role of the legislativeor the executive bodies,” 69-year-old Oli said in hisresponse.

“Forming governments onthe basis of parties is the fun-damental characteristic of theparliamentary system and theConstitution does not imagineparty-less practices,” he added.

Oli also defended theinvolvement of the President in

this whole issue, saying Article76 of the Constitution grantsthe sole right to appoint aPrime Minister to the Presidentonly.

“Appointment of a PrimeMinister is absolutely a politi-cal and an executive process,”he underlined.

“As per Article 76 (5), thereis no such provision of a per-son gaining or losing a vote ofconfidence in the House beingexamined by the legislative orthe judiciary,” he said.

On May 21, Nepali

Congress President SherBahadur Deuba had submittedsignatures of as many as 149lawmakers before PresidentBhandari, requesting her toappoint him the new primeminister as per Article 75 (6).As many as 29 members of theMadhav Nepal faction of theCPN-UML had provided theirsignatures showing support toDeuba.

However, Oli too laid claimto the government, saying hehad support of 153 lawmakersincluding 32 Lawmakersbelonging to Janata SamajwadiParty.

But President Bhandarisaid both claims by Oli andDeuba were insufficient. Soonafter the move, the Oli gov-ernment recommended thedissolution of the House andmidterm elections forNovember.

As many as 30 writ peti-tions, including by theOpposition alliance, have been

filed in the Supreme Courtagainst the dissolution of theHouse, which they said was“unconstitutional”.

The Supreme Court hasstarted hearing on the case.Regular hearings on the casewill resume from June 23.

Nepal plunged into a polit-ical crisis on December 20 lastyear after President Bhandaridissolved the House andannounced fresh elections onApril 30 and May 10 at the rec-ommendation of PrimeMinister Oli, amidst a tussle forpower within the ruling NepalCommunist Party (NCP).

In February, the apex courtreinstated the dissolved Houseof Representatives, in a setbackto embattled Prime MinisterOli who was preparing forsnap polls.

Oli repeatedly defendedhis move to dissolve the lowerhouse, saying some leaders ofhis party were attempting toform a “parallel government”.

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Presidents Joe Biden andVladimir Putin of Russia

spent more than three hoursdiscussing issues Wednesday attheir summit in Geneva.

They ticked through theirrespective lists so quickly andin such “excruciating detail,”Biden says, that they looked ateach other and thought, “OK,what next?”

The most pressing issuesthe leaders discussed:

AMBASSADORSBiden and Putin agreed to

return their respective ambas-sadors to Washington andMoscow in a bid to improvebadly deteriorated diplomaticrelations between their coun-tries.

Russia’s ambassador to theUnited States, AnatolyAntonov, left Washington inMarch amid a row after Bidencalled Putin a killer in a tele-vision interview and imposednew sanctions on Russia overits treatment of opposition fig-ure Alexei Navalny.

John Sullivan, the U.S.Ambassador to Russia, flew outof Moscow in April after pub-lic suggestions from Russianofficials that he should leave tomirror Antonov’s departure.Both ambassadors were presentat Wednesday’s summit.

Putin also said the Russianforeign ministry and the U.S.State Department would beginconsultations on other vexingdiplomatic issues, includingthe closures of consulates inboth countries and the employ-ment status of Russian citizensworking for U.S. Missions inRussia.

A senior Biden adminis-tration official said Sullivan islikely to return to Moscownext week. A different senioradministration official saidboth governments had begundiscussing consulate and local

staff issues and the hope was anagreement could be reached inthe next two months.

Neither administrationofficial was authorized to com-ment publicly by name andboth spoke on condition ofanonymity.

CYBERSECURITYNo breakthroughs on this

issue were announced, but theleaders agreed to at least talkabout what has become a majorsource of conflict between theU.S. And Russia.

Biden said he and Putinagreed to have their expertswork out an understandingabout what types of criticalinfrastructure would be off-limits to cyberattacks. He saidthe U.S. Presented Russia with16 specific types of infrastruc-ture, including energy, elec-tions, banking and water sys-tems, and the defense industry.

The agreement comesamid a flood of ransomwareattacks against U.S. Businessesand government agencies,including one in May that dis-rupted fuel supplies along theEast Coast for nearly a week.The disruption was blamedon a criminal gang operatingout of Russia, which does notextradite suspects to the U.S.

Other serious incidentsinclude the SolarWinds intru-sion discovered last year inwhich hackers, believed by

U.S. Authorities to be Russian,penetrated multiple U.S.Government networks andprompted Biden to imposeadditional U.S. Sanctionsagainst Russia.

Biden said the U.S. AndRussian governments wouldfollow up on certain criminalcases, an apparent reference tocybercriminals operating

with impunity fromRussian territory.

Putin agreed there ismutual interest in the subject.

Biden also made animplicit threat against Russia,saying the U.S.

Has “significant cybercapability” it could use againstRussia if it were to interferewith U.S. Critical infrastruc-ture.

NUCLEAR WEAPONSBiden and Putin instruct-

ed their diplomats to begin lay-ing the groundwork for a newphase of arms control.

The “strategic stabilitydialogue” would be a series ofdiscussions designed to set thetable for a negotiation by sort-ing out what exactly should benegotiated. More broadly, itwould aim to reduce the risk ofwar between the world’s twolargest nuclear powers.

Biden said the goal is towork with Russia on “a mech-anism that can lead to controlof new and dangerous andsophisticated weapons that arecoming on the scene now, thatreduce the time for response,that raise the prospect of acci-dental war.” He said this wasdiscussed in detail.

No date was announced forthe start of talks.

The basic idea is to identi-fy and sort out the many areasof disagreement over what afuture arms control treatyshould address. It also wouldaddress ways to avoid unin-tended or accidental movesthat could trigger war.

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There is evidence of China’sincreasing use of “aggres-

sive” means to “coerce” states toback their position or theircandidates towards a steadyacquisition of key official posi-tions in multiple multilateralorganisations, a report by aninfluential UK parliamentarypanel warned on Thursday.

The House of CommonsForeign Affairs Committee(FAC) said its evidence spokeof an increasingly “bullying”stance of China in its dealingwith organisations such as theUnited Nations and WorldHealth Organisation (WHO).

In its ‘In the room: the UK’srole in multilateral diplomacy’

report, the committee callsupon the UK to take a moreproactive role in combating theinfluence of countries whoseek to manipulate and under-mine multilateral organisa-tions and mobilise the softpower of the Foreign,Commonwealth andDevelopment Office (FCDO)to strengthen democracies.

“The report found evi-dence of China’s increasinguse of aggressive means,including exploiting bilateraleconomic leverage, to coercestates to back their position ortheir candidates and then usingthe organisations to shift poli-cies away from the cooperationthe organisations were createdto promote,” the FAC notes.

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Iran’s tattered nuclear dealwith world powers hangs in

the balance as the country pre-pares to vote on Friday for anew president and diplomatspress on with efforts to get boththe US and Tehran to reenterthe accord. The deal representsthe signature accomplishmentof the relatively moderatePresident Hassan Rouhani’seight years in office: suspend-ing crushing sanctions inexchange for the strict moni-toring and limiting of Iran’suranium stockpile.

The deal’s collapse withPresident Donald Trump’s deci-sion to unilaterally withdrawAmerica from the agreement in2018 spiralled into a series ofattacks and confrontationsacross the wider Middle East. Italso prompted Tehran to enrichuranium to highest purity lev-els so far, just shy of weapons-grade levels.

With analysts and pollingsuggesting that a hard-linecandidate already targeted byUS sanctions will win Friday’svote, a return to the deal may

be possible but it likely won’tlead to a further detentebetween Iran and the West.

“It’s certainly not as com-plex as drafting a deal fromscratch, which is what the sidesdid that resulted in the 2015deal,” said Henry Rome, asenior analyst focusing on Iranat the Eurasia Group.

“But there’s still a lot ofdetails that need to be workedout.” He added: “I think there’sa lot of domestic politics that gointo this and an interest fromhard-liners, including thesupreme leader, to ensure thattheir favoured candidate winswithout any significant dis-ruptions to that process.”

The 2015 deal, which sawIranians flood into the streetsin celebration, marked a majorturn after years of tensionsbetween Iran and the West overIran’s nuclear programme.

Tehran has long insistedthat its programme is for peace-ful purposes. However, USintelligence agencies andInternational Atomic EnergyAgency say Iran pursued anorganised nuclear weaponsprogramme up until 2003.

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Hong Kong police used asweeping national securi-

ty law Thursday to arrest fiveeditors and executives of a pro-democracy newspaper oncharges of colluding with for-eign powers — the first time thelegislation has been used againstthe press in yet another sign ofan intensifying crackdown byChinese authorities in the citylong known for its freedoms.

Police said they had evi-dence that more than 30 arti-cles published by Apple Dailyplayed a “crucial part” in whatthey called a conspiracy withforeign countries to imposesanctions against China andHong Kong.

Jerusalem: Israeli prosecutors on Thursdaycharged a border police officer with recklessmanslaughter in the deadly shooting of an autis-tic Palestinian man in Jerusalem’s Old City last year.

The indictment came just over a year after theshooting of Eyad Hallaq. Hallaq’s family had pre-viously criticized Israeli authorities’ investigationinto Eyad’s killing, and had called for muchtougher charges. The officer, who remains uniden-tified in the indictment submitted to the JerusalemDistrict Court on Thursday, was charged withreckless manslaughter, and if convicted could faceup to 12 years in prison. AP

Jerusalem: The Palestinian health ministrysaid Thursday that a Palestinian teenager whowas shot by Israeli troops in the West Bank aday earlier has died of his injuries.

The Israeli military said Wednesday thata soldier stationed near a wildcat settler out-post near the West Bank city of Nablus saw agroup of Palestinians approaching, and thatone “hurled a suspicious object at him, whichexploded adjacent to the soldier.”

The army said that the soldier fired in theair, then shot the Palestinian who threw theobject. AP

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Three Chinese astronauts onThursday entered the

country’s new space stationafter their spaceship success-fully docked with it, just overseven hours after the launchfrom the Gobi Desert, in amajor milestone for theCommunist giant’s space explo-ration plans and its bid to

become a leading space power.

According to the ChinaManned Space Agency(CMSA), Shenzhou-12manned spaceship successful-ly docked with the space stationcore module Tianhe onThursday afternoon andentered the orbital capsulefrom the return capsule of thespaceship.

After a series of prepara-tions, the astronauts opened thehatches of the node and theTianhe module and entered theTianhe module one by one, sig-nifying that for the first timethe Chinese have entered theirown space station, the CMSAsaid.

The trio will carry out rel-evant work as planned, it saidin a statement here.

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Microsoft’s India-born CEOSatya Nadella has been

appointed as the technologygiant’s new Chairman, an addi-tional role in which he will“lead the work to set the agen-da for the board.”

Microsoft Corp onWednesday announced thatthe board’s independent direc-tors unanimously electedNadella to the role of boardchair, and unanimously elect-ed John W Thompson as thelead independent director, arole he held previously from2012 to 2014.

“In this role, Nadella willlead the work to set the agen-da for the board, leveraging hisdeep understanding of thebusiness to elevate the rightstrategic opportunities andidentify key risks and mitiga-tion approaches for the board’sreview,” the company said in astatement.

Nadella, 53, succeedsThompson, who as the leadindependent director, willretain significant authorityincluding providing input onbehalf of the independentdirectors on board agendas,calling meetings of the inde-

pendent directors, setting agen-das for executive sessions, andleading performance evalua-tions of the CEO, the technol-ogy giant said.

Nadella, who has served aschief executive since 2014, hashelped ntransform the compa-ny into a leader in cloud com-puting in recent years, result-ing in blockbuster earningsand a market cap of close toUSD 2 trillion, CNN reported.

In addition to these rolechanges, the board declared aquarterly dividend of USD 0.56per share. The dividend ispayable September 9, 2021, toshareholders of record onAugust 19, 2021.

Nadella succeeded SteveBallmer to become Microsoft’sCEO in 2014.

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IT industry body Nasscom onThursday said the sector

continues to be a net hirer ofskilled talent, and that the top5 Indian IT companies areplanning to add over 96,000employees in 2021-22.

The statement comes in thebackdrop of a report by Bankof America that said domesticsoftware firms are set to slash3 million jobs by 2022 asautomation gains pace acrossindustries, especially in thetech space.

“With the evolution oftechnology and increasingautomation, the nature of tra-ditional IT jobs and roles willevolve overall leading to cre-ation of newer jobs. The indus-try continues to be a net hirerof skilled talent, adding1,38,000 people in FY2021,”Nasscom said in a statement.

It asserted that players haverobust hiring plans for 2021-22with the top 5 Indian IT com-panies planning to add over

96,000 employees.“The industry is upskilling

more than 250,000 employeesin digital skills and has hiredmore than 40,000 fresh digi-tally-trained talent, indicatingat its commitment and invest-ment towards rapid enhance-ment of workforce capabili-ties...With one of the strongestdeal pipeline, and strong busi-ness outlook, the industry is ontrack to meet its vision of USD300-350 billion revenues by2025,” Nasscom said.

It added that the industrywill continue to be a net creatorof jobs and is “committed topeople-centric innovation,relentless talent focus”, anddelivering a superior transfor-mative customer experience.

Nasscom pointed out thatthe business process manage-ment (BPM) sector in India,which has been called out asthe sector ripe for automation,employs over 1.4 million peo-ple (excluding domestic and in-house) and not 9 million as thesaid report suggested.

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Sebi has barred Shri ResearchServices and its proprietor

Gourav Kumar Gour from thesecurities markets for at leasttwo years and has asked themto refund the money that wascollected by providing unau-thorised investment tips toinvestors.

In addition, a penalty of �5 lakh has been imposed onthem. They have to pay the finewithin 45 days, Sebi said in itsorder passed on Wednesday.

Sebi noted that ShriResearch Services and its soleproprietor Gour carried outinvestment advisory activitieswithout obtaining a certificateof registration from the regu-lator. This violated the provi-sions of Investment Advisers(IA) Regulations.

The regulator said that atotal of �14.63 lakh was cred-ited in their accounts for theJanuary-July, 2018 period.However, it could not be con-firmed whether such amountswere received only frominvestors for unregisteredinvestment advisory services.

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Domestic equity bench-marks retreated for the

second straight session onThursday, mirroring weaknessin global markets after the USFederal Reserve surprisedinvestors by signalling faster-than-expected rate hikes.

A sharp drop in the rupee- which plunged 76 paiseagainst the US dollar - alsosapped risk appetite, traderssaid.

The 30-share BSE Sensexended 178.65 points or 0.34 percent lower at 52,323.33. Thebroader NSE Nifty declined76.15 points or 0.48 per centto 15,691.40.

Banking and finance stocksaccounted for most of the loss-es, while the IT pack saw briskbuying, fuelled by a weakrupee.

IndusInd Bank was the toploser in the Sensex pack, shed-ding 2.91 per cent, followed byDr Reddy’s, NTPC, Maruti,Bajaj Auto, Axis Bank, BhartiAirtel and HDFC.

On the other hand,UltraTech Cement, AsianPaints, TCS, Infosys, TechMahindra and HCL Tech wereamong the major gainers,spurting up to 1.86 per cent.

“Domestic equities traded

weak today on account of weakglobal cues led from theFOMC meeting outcome asinvestors focused more on theUS Federal Reserve raising thecountry’s economic growthforecast while noting its pro-jection to hike interest ratessooner than expected.

“The Fed raised the USgrowth forecast to 7 per centthis year, while officials movedtheir first projected rateincreases from 2024 into 2023and opened talks about whento pull back on the USD 120billion in monthly bond pur-chase program,” said VikasJain, Senior Research Analystat Reliance Securities.

Vinod Nair, Head ofResearch at Geojit FinancialServices, said a fast normalisa-tion of the US economy andstrong job market can lead tothe Fed tapering its bond buy-ing.

“This can lead to tighten-ing of bonds yields which willimpact the pricing of equityasset,” he added.

Sectorally, BSE power,metal, realty, industrials andutilities indices ended up to2.38 per cent lower, while IT,teck and FMCG indices closedwith gains. Broader BSE mid-cap and smallcap indices fell upto 1.29 per cent.

Elsewhere in Asia, bours-es in Shanghai and Hong Kongended on a positive note, whileSeoul and Tokyo were in thered.

Stock exchanges in Europewere also trading with losses inmid-session deals.

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Boards of companies cannow approve annual finan-

cial statements and mattersrelated to mergers, among oth-ers, at meetings held throughvideo conferencing and otheraudio-visual means.

Amid the coronaviruspandemic resulting in the shiftfrom physical meetings to vir-tual ones, the Ministry ofCorporate Affairs (MCA) hasamended rules pertaining to‘meetings of board and itspowers’ under the CompaniesAct, 2013.

Nangia Andersen LLPPartner Sandeep Jhunjhunwalasaid the Companies Act alwayspermitted conducting meetingsthrough video conferencingbut key matters such as approv-ing the financial statements,board’s report and prospectusrequired physical meetings.

“Acknowledging the diffi-

culty always caused by theongoing pandemic, the MCAhas eliminated the list of mat-ters that could be conductedthrough audio-visual means.

“This step would go a longway in ensuring that the hur-dles faced by companies arereduced and business can becarried on smoothly with theaid of technology,” he noted.

Earlier, the rules specifi-cally mentioned a list of mat-ters that cannot be dealt withby a company’s board throughvideo conferencing or otheraudio-visual means. Approvalof the annual financial state-ments, board’s report, prospec-tus, matters relating to amal-gamation, merger, demerger,acquisition and takeover, andholding of the audit committeemeetings for consideration ofaccounts, were not permitted.

With the latest amend-ment, the list has been doneaway with.

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Khadi sales contracted by 16per cent year-on-year to �

3,527.71 crore in 2020-21, asspinning and weaving activi-ties across the country impact-ed due to the Covid-19 pan-demic, the MSME ministrysaid on Thursday. The overallproduction in the Khadi sectoralso declined to �1,904.49 crorein 2020-21, as compared to�2,292.44 crore in 2019-20, itadded.

The production and salesin the Khadi sector, however,slightly declined as spinningand weaving activities acrossthe country took a major hitduring the pandemic, the min-istry said. “The overall pro-duction in the Khadi sector in2020-21 was recorded at�1,904.49 crore as compared to�2,292.44 crore in 2019-20,while the overall Khadi salesstood at �3,527.71 crore ascompared to Rs 4,211.26 crorein the previous year,” it added.

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In order to ensure the cuts inGST rates of essential Covid-

19 drugs and other medica-tions is passed on to con-sumers, the NationalPharmaceutical PricingAuthority has directed all phar-ma manufacturing and mar-keting companies to revisethe maximum retail price(MRP) on drugs and formu-lations immediately takinginto effect the reduced taxrate.

The move from the phar-ma pricing regulator isexpected to ensure that thetax cuts benefits consumersby way of low cost of drugsand medications in the cur-rent difficult period of thepandemic.

The office memorandumissued by NPPA said that thechange in GST rate has animpact on fixation of MRP ofitems attracting tax.

As the MRP of drugs andformulations is inclusive of tax,therefore, any downwardchange in tax/GST ratesshould be reflected in MRPand the befit of this reductionshould be passed on to theconsumers, it said.

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Walmart Incs Flipkart andAmazon.com Inc have

filed legal challenges against theresumption of an antitrustinvestigation into their businesspractices, a global news wirereported.

The CompetitionCommission of India (CCI)launched an investigation inJanuary last year after a com-plaint accused Flipkart andAmazon of promoting selectsellers on their e-commerceplatforms and using deep dis-counts to stifle competition.

The companies havedenied wrongdoing and near-immediate legal challengesfrom the pair stalled the inves-tigation for more than a yearuntil a court last week ruled itcould resume, having dis-missed arguments that the CCIlacked evidence.

The fresh appeal fromFlipkart filed on June 16, arguesthat decision by the Karnatakacourt to allow the probe toresume was erroneous andmust be put on hold, the reportsaid.

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The Government’s produc-tion-linked incentive (PLI)

schemes for key raw materialssuch as bulk drugs and formu-lations, with a total incentiveoutlay of �210 billion will helpthe country becomeAatmanirbhar, ratings agencyICRA said.

As per a note by theagency, PLI scheme willreduce import dependenceand boost domestic produc-tion of high-value products;and increase the value addi-tion in exports.

High value-added phar-maceutical products are gen-erally R&D intensive and dif-ficult to manufacture and theseinclude products such as com-plex generics, patented prod-ucts, and biologics among oth-ers.

Further, the GoI has alsoannounced the promotion ofthe bulk drug parks schemewith a financial outlay of Rs 30billion for three select states,which will provide infrastruc-ture assistance to the activepharmaceutical ingredient(API) players.

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Declining for the eighthconsecutive session, the

Indian rupee tumbled 76 paiseto close below the 74-markagainst the US dollar onThursday, tracking a stronggreenback overseas after theUS Federal Reserve surprisedthe market by signalling ratehikes sooner than expected.

At the interbank forexmarket, the domestic unitopened weak at 73.65 againstthe American currency, thenlost further ground and final-ly closed at 74.08, showing afall of 76 paise over its previ-ous close.

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To look at artist Krishen Khanna’s band-wallahs, at the Grosvenor online show

in London, is to understand both sensitiv-ity and sensibility. The colours, the con-tours, and the charisma of life are whatlooks back at you in this series called —Paintings In My Sitting Room.

Most of Khanna’s work is figurative; hechose to not explore the abstraction thatmost of his contemporaries were delvinginto. In an interview with Saffronart, hesays, “I used to do abstracts earlier and Ihave now moved on to human forms. Ithought that the person or the individualis being neglected; the person in a partic-ular situation who is influenced by the con-ditions around. I want to now emphasisethe human beings caught up in their par-ticular condition.”

Khanna’s exploration of bandwallahsbegan in the early 1970s, these membersof local brass bands engaged to play at wed-dings and other public ceremonies caughthis eye for their uniforms and their devo-tion to the occupation. Speaking of how hecame to paint his first portraits of thesemusicians, Khanna explains that once,while driving out of his Delhi studio, thepath was blocked by the marching band ofa wedding procession. The image of thesemusicians dressed all in red with their bigbrass instruments wrapped around themstill remains as powerful for the artist todayas it was that day in Delhi.

Khanna’s suite of works this timerange from carefully created controlledcompositions to gestural, spontaneousworks created last year and this year.Between a few monochromatic drawingsand coloured paintings, his deployment ofcolour and strokes that evoke the humansituation is deeply heartwarming. Hisbandwallas series captures not just the quietenergy of a few musicians. In his manymonochromatic works, one sees the ener-gy in the frenzy of lines and tension in thetight compositions, with the overall picturepulsating with the interplay of formal ele-ments. Through a lack of physical detail;Khanna’s paintings aspire towards qualityof timelessness and universality. As anartist, he defies categorisation as he simul-taneously occupies multiple roles — as anarrator, as a formalist, an artist who cap-tures precious moments as a narrative ofinsight and in-depth understanding.

Using a palette dominated by red, yel-low and green, Khanna paints thebandwallah as a tragicomicrepresentative of the subalternand a symbol of urban life inmodern India. Though the artistportrays these men in red —practicing, playing or at rest — ascheery, their cheer is only part oftheir job. Their celebration is notspontaneous; it is just another modeof survival in the city. He propels usto think of the aftermath of the livesof these humble musicians. When onduty, they play into the night and must alsoplay early morning before twilight hoursfor the departure of the bride to her newhome.

Khanna says, “The sitting room is hard-ly a sitting room per se; my wife Renu readsa lot so has all her books around. It is partlibrary and part studio with furniture thathas to be moved from time to time. It is acompletely new experience moving awayfrom my usual studio in the basement. Ihave to look for paints on the ground which

are all mixed up and improvise butit’s all a part of the game in the end.”

“In this current atmosphere,one can become very depressed,but fortunately, for me, there arethe bandwallas who are stillmaking noise. When I’m paint-ing them, I have to concentratefully on them. The bandwal-las take prime position in mylife right now,” he adds.

Khanna is known for histhematic sensibility, ranging from

everyday domestic scenes, moments of his-torical importance, scenes from mythsand poetry to portraits of people from hislife and his love for literature. He has con-tinually worked with the contrasts betweenthe mundane and the sublime, the ordinaryand the epic dimension. Constantly oscil-lating between the banal and the spectac-ular, for Khanna, the personal relativity isthe fulcrum of his artistic ferment. The clos-est friend of the progressives still paints andis happy to create in his own home inGurugram.

Afather is someone you look up to nomatter how tall you grow. Growingup we all have a fixed notion of how

dads usually are. Or at least are perceivedto be a certain way. In 2020, the pandem-ic changed everything and saw mostdads take on an array of chores. Fromworking from home, lending a helpinghand in daily chores to hanging out withthe kids and juggling zoom calls at thesame time, we have seen new-age dads doit all. While they love chilling in theirtracksuits and tees at home, this Father’sDay give them the fashion boost heneeds. Fashion designer Kunal Tannacurates a few quirky, stylish and fun looksfor your lockdown dad! Check it out:

The last few months havenot been easy by any

stretch of the imagination.And if you own a vehicle, theincreased cost of fuel has onlyadded to your headaches. Sure,those of us who have been dri-ving around in the lockdownhave found emptier roads thanusual, but exactly a ton ofplaces to visit. Then again,some of us have driven aroundmore than most, take me forexample, finding myself in asituation where I had to makea few long-distance journeys toKanpur from Delhi.

At the start of the lock-down, I found myself with aHyundai Verna IVT, the‘Intelligent VariableTransmission’ variant which iswhat Hyundai-Kia call theirContinuously VariableTransmission or CVT. Now,CVTs are not new in cars, andthey have been around intwo-wheelers for decades.They are perfect in lowerpower output scenarios, butnowadays, with better machin-ing and easier manufacturing,manufacturers have been fit-ting CVTs in cars with higherpower and torque outputs.Honda, which pioneered theuse of CVTs on their two-wheelers (remember the old

Kinetic Honda)brought CVTs ontothe last generation ofthe City and the cur-rent generation car gets one aswell. As costs for such gearbox-es fitted in cars have comedown, vehicles such as theNissan Magnite are also get-ting CVT boxes. In fact, it maybe only a matter of time beforeCVT gearboxes replace theslow Automated ManualTransmission (AMT) gear-boxes.

However, truth be told, I’dnever spent time with a CVTvehicle for an extended peri-od or made regular highwayruns in such vehicles. Butthese last three months withthe Verna have been illuminat-ing, to say the least. CVTs havetheir flaws, they are notdesigned for drivers who pushthe pedal to the metal. It is noteasy to explain the way theywork without diagrams, butyou can think of two cones atthe end of two shafts — onefrom the engine and the dri-veshaft that is connected by aband, in-car CVTs this is usu-ally a metal chain and well, thecones move back and forthgiving an infinite amount ofratios between the engine shaftand the drive shaft, thus the

name CVT. Well, in practicalapplications, there are usuallya few steps, in the case of theVerna IVT, eight steps whichyou can consider as ‘fixed’ratios. This is best explained bya diagram, and you can watchan explainer I have out onYouTube under my ExcuseThe Beard series.

Hyundai-Kia have bothbeen really aggressive in push-ing their Dual-ClutchTransmissions (DCT) vehi-cles from the i20 to the Seltos.That is a totally different typeof automatic technology wherethere are two clutches, one forodd gears and one for even(and the reverse) gears.Because of that gear shifts inDCT vehicles is lightning fastand they are far more orient-ed to the enthusiastic driver. Inthe i20 DCT I kept over twomonths earlier this year, it wasa blast to drive. The IVT carsare not so much fun to drive,being far more sedate.

However, as petrol pricescross �100 in some states andmight even cross �125 in acouple of months, the IVTcomes into its own when it

comes to fuel econ-omy. The Verna Idrove delivered over18.5 kilometres per

litre on the highway and eveninside the city delivered over15 kilometres per litre onlonger drives. The Verna is nota small car, it is well-equippedand being summer, the air-con was on all the time as wasthe seat cooling. I did notdeliberately drive economical-ly, keeping the car at thespeed limit of the express-ways, albeit on cruise controland the IVT always kept the1.5 litres naturally aspiratedpetrol engine is a very sweetspot. Delhi to Kanpur is nearas makes no difference 500kilometres, and there aresome bad patches towards theend. But it was still superb.Put on a podcast, there aresome excellent ones to listento and drive this car, andyou’ll be surprised. Not just athow nice it is, but also how lit-tle fuel it drinks to get the jobdone.

Dinosaur juice is gettingexpensive folks, and the IVTon the Verna and otherHyundai-Kia cars as well ason the Honda City and NissanMagnite might have a majorace up their sleeve.

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A formal shirt and pant havealways been the go-to attire for work-ing dads. This time lets up the stylequotient and try out some layering.Try on this classic light blue shirt andthrow on a comfortable melangebeige knit. To add that final dapperlook for zoom call meetings, you canlayer it with a tone-on-tone thread tex-tured reversible bandi jacket.

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For all the social media dadsout there, your Sunday Brunchis incomplete without the perfectInsta pic. So, make brunch funwith this off-white turtleneckknit teamed with a lazy rainy daygray thread textured cardiganstyle jacket.

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Sharing householdchores has become a normduring the lockdown. Well,you can make runningerrands look stylish in thesebeige sketchy checks printpolo tunic. Pair it withbeige shorts to keep itcool and breezy for every-day chores.

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Does your dad love to playchef? Then spruce up his look inthis blue mesh print tunic teamedwith shorts. Also, remind yourMasterChef Dad to wear anapron.

So, this Father’s Day giveyour #SuperHeroDad the stylishlook he deserves.

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With everyone at home, spend-ing time with kids during the lock-down is definitely an unscheduled

activity now. If you will be indulging infun games etc, then your attire needs

to be fun too. Opt for this blockyprint trousers with a white sideseam placket polo tunic. Make

sure your kids don’t havepaint on their hands.

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If your dad is a true-blue romantic. Then thisdark blue shirt tunic with agray mock layered collarworn with dark blue Mattytrousers will set the fashionmood for date night.

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Being economical in a time of extravagance

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Every wedding isincomplete without thebaraat and its baraatis. Ifyour dad was looking for-ward to attending one suchwedding and the lockdownkilled his enthusiasm?Then, this salmon andbeige patched kurta pairedwith an asymmetrical over-lapped long bandi jacket isexactly what he needs.Complete this look with acontrasting blue jute silktrouser. After all, he needsto make a dhamakedaarentry as the online weddingbaraati.

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While soups are common-ly made in our house-

holds during the the chillywinter months, here are somereasons that will make youroast, stew, and later pureeyour tomatoes to prepare abowl of rich, creamy soupevery day.

A single bowl of tomatosoup consists of several nutri-ents that include vitamins A,C, E, and K besides importantminerals and antioxidantsthat are beneficial for youroverall health.

3��������The vitamin K and calci-

um in tomato soup help youget healthy bones. Lycopenein tomato soup boosts bonemass which helps counteringosteoporosis. Consumingtomato soup daily decreasesthe blood levels of TNF alphaby approximately 34 per cent.A deficiency in lycopenecould increase oxidative stressin the bones and causeunwanted changes in the tis-sues. You can keep theseissues at bay by making toma-to soup a daily part of yourmeal.

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As stated before, tomatosoup is rich in lycopene, thepigment that provides thefruit its bright color. Processedtomato has more lycopenethan raw ones. Lycopene neu-tralises the oxidative damagethat occurs due to free radi-cals, a molecule that assistsageing. A diet r ich inlycopene helps fight chronicdiseases and prevents stroke.A cup of tomato soup gives13.3 milligrams of lycopene.That’s sufficient to keep yourbody fit.

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The high amount of vit-amin C in tomato soup givesarterial protection. It bol-sters the heart and protects itfrom problems like blockageof arteries and helps preventthe r isk of a stroke. Itdecreases the deposition offats in the blood vessels,decreasing bad cholesterol.Tomato soup also helps pre-vent the clumping of plateletcells in the blood.

3������ ������ ��Selenium present in

tomato soup improves bloodcirculation which preventsanaemia which is one of it’stop benefits. A single servingof tomato soup gives 7 micro-grams of selenium, providing11 per cent of the daily rec-ommended intake.

� ��� ��Tomato soup is a rich

source of vitamins A and C.Vitamin A is needed for tis-sue development. It activatesthe genes of the new cells,helping them to grow intomature tissue. A bowl oftomato soup gives nearly 16per cent of the daily recom-mended quantity of vitaminA. Vitamin C is needed tomaintain healthy tendonsand ligaments. Tomato soupgives 20 per cent of the daily-recommended quantity ofvitamin C, helping you tokeep your body healthy.

So, what are you waitingfor? Prepare your bowl oftomato soup right away!hav-ing a bowl of tomato soupevery day helps to keep thebody healthy.

(The author i s a nutritionist, wellness coach,certified diabetes educatorand the founder of a diet andnutrition brand.)

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Chef Udit Maheshwari alwayswanted to open a restaurant,right from the moment he

started training at the Le CordonBleu, London. And he was finallyable to do so amid a raging pandem-ic. Not waiting for a more convenienttime, he launched Pitaara Kitchen asa delivery kitchen around Diwali,2020. He plans on converting it intoa full-fledged restaurant as soon asthe COVID-19 situation subsides.

We decided to project our con-sciousness to his kitchen with someahead-of-its-time fictional technol-ogy so that we could interact withhim while tasting some choice dish-es from Pitaara Kitchen. And hisofferings were anything but simple.

Right off the bat, the chef pre-sented a set of what looked like pur-ple tinted kebabs. Since we were fam-ished, we did not wait on customarychit chat and simply picked one upto bite into it. Right from the firstbite, we are hooked and we can’t helpbut marvel out loud, “What is thisdeliciousness?!”

The chef laughed and told us thisis a starter called the Purple shikham-puri. These grated beetroot kebabswere stuffed with hung curd and justmelted in our mouth. We weretempted to bite into one, as it tick-led our taste buds, and found out thatit was better to let the kebab work itsmagic as it slowly melted andrevealed some subtle flavoursbetween our tongue and palate.Along with the creamy, slightlysweet taste there was the slight hintof an intriguing earthy flavour to the

kebabs. Seeing us rubbing our tummy,

chef Udit produced a platter ofkulchas with a f lourish. Heannounced that these are the Baconand Kalimpong cheese kulchas. Aswe munch on one, we catch a whiffof the smoky flavour of the kulchaswhich were stuffed with desi baconand indigenous Kalimpong cheese.While serving us a heap of their spicytomato chutney along with somepudina chutney, the chef sharedthat these were cooked in the tan-door. We finished them off in a jiffy,and couldn’t wait to see what’s nextin store.

The chef is running a tight ship,and we couldn't help but feel that thePitaara Kitchen is an extremelysuccessful venture as he seemedto be on his toes all the time.However, for the next dish,he sat down with us andserved us some Dogrimeat curry and askedhis staff to pass on somebajra rotis. He explainedthat this is a traditionalmeat curry from theDogri community ofJammu. The mutton wascooked with some choicespices and had a some-what sweet taste to it, onaccount of the sour-driedmango powder it has beenfinished in, which also lend-ed some viscosity to the gravy.

In between some bites, chefUdit shared, “With the pandemic infull swing, everyone in the food

industry has been forced to focus ondelivering. Let’s see what the future hasin store for us. However, one goodthing that has come out of this messis that everyone is innovating thesedays.”

And we had to agree when wewere served the next dish. Aptly, andquite simply, named Tinda!, it com-prised tindas (or the Indian squash)stuffed to the brim with cottagecheese and dry fruits. As we dug intothe dish with some garlic and kalon-ji naans, we were thinking that wewould never have guessed that this wasthe humble tinda if the chef had nottold us. Cooked well in the tandoor,the slight sourness of the vegetablecombined well with the stuffing. He

encouraged us to try it with the twochutneys and we were over-

whelmed by this rich, whole-some dish.

As we smacked our lips,we caught a glimpse of thestaff packing some ready tobe delivered orders.Spotting us trying to spy,the chef guided us insideand explained that theyonly use eco-friendlypackaging. He furtherelaborated, “Right fromthe preparation of the food

with ingredients sourcedfrom across India to the

delivery, this is our source ofinnovation. We spare no effort

to ensure the wholesome experi-ence of each customer. All members

of my staff have been vaccinated,including the people who deliver. And

that’s right, we don’t rely on third par-ties for deliveries so as to not risk con-tact with someone who is infected;these are uncertain times after all.”

As the chef led us back to ourtable, we saw the next dish alreadyset in place. We helped ourselves tothe Chemmeen manga (literally tran-lates as ‘prawn with mangoes’ inMalayalam) curry as he served ussome of their in-house Malabarparotta. The prawns cooked incoconut milk curry with pearl onionsand raw mangoes brought backsome vivid memories of Keralabackwaters. The parottas were not aslumpy as the usual ones served inmalayali hotels across Delhi and wedelightfully finished the dish. Bitinginto a soft pearl onion, we couldn’thelp but wonder whether this wasbetter than Tinda! before we remem-bered the wise man who said that‘Comparison is the root of all mis-ery…’

We were rubbing our tummies incontentment when the chef unveiledthe mango tart. And we were left wish-ing that we should not have scarfeddown as much. The thick, lusciousmango curd, topped with roasted pis-tachios, was complemented by thebajra tart shell it was served in.

We stifled several burps as we bidadieu to the chef. We hope that last bitis enough to convey that you shouldgive the Pitaara Kitchen a chance if youwould like to treat yourself to sometweaked regional specialties.

(The delivery kitchen caters in andaround South Delhi and you can orderfrom https://pitaarakitchen.in.)

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Italy became the first team toreach the knockout stage ofEuro 2020 as midfielder

Manuel Locatelli scored twice ina 3-0 win over Switzerland inRome on Wednesday.

The Azzurri, now unbeatenin 29 matches and having wontheir last 10 games without

conceding a goal, sit first inGroup A and are guaranteed atop-two finish and last-16 berth.“We played well, we wanted to

win at all costs,” Italy coachRoberto Mancini told RAI.“They started well, it was noteasy to win a second game in

five days.”Mancini’s men, looking to

win Italy a second Europeantitle after their sole success in

1968, host Wales in their finalgroup game on Sunday, with topspot up for grabs.

A new star shone for Italyat the Stadio Olimpico, wherethey had brushed aside Turkey3-0 in the tournament’s openingmatch last week, as Sassuolo’sLocatelli scored twice beforeCiro Immobile’s late third.

Captain Giorgio Chiellinihad an early effort ruled out byVAR for handball, before the 36-year-old defender was forced offwith what appeared to be athigh injury.

But the hosts always lookedthe more dangerous side andtook the lead in the 26th minute.

Locatelli played a wonder-ful volleyed pass to his Sassuoloteammate Domenico Berardion the wing, who powered tothe byline and picked outLocatelli for a simple tap-in.

The three points and aplace in the knockout phase forthe fourth straight EuropeanChampionship were all butsecured less than seven minutesafter the interval, when a flow-ing move ended with Locatellidriving a left-footed shot intothe bottom corner from outsidethe box.

Immobile had wasted acouple of earlier chances butdid grab his second goal of thetournament in the 89th minute,curling a low effort past Swissgoalkeeper Yann Sommer.

Switzerland will now like-ly have to beat Turkey in Bakuon Sunday to reach the nextround.

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Sergio Ramos broke downin tears, saying leaving Real

Madrid was one of the mostdifficult moments of his life ashe bid farewell on Thursdayafter 16 years at the club.

The defender played 671games for Real Madrid andwill be remembered as one ofthe club’s greatest ever players,having won five La Liga titlesand four Champions Leagues.

The 35-year-old, whostruggled for fitness and formlast season, was unable toagree an extension to his con-tract and will become a freeagent on July 1.

Ramos and Real Madridpresident Florentino Perezdelivered short speeches in apresentation room at the club’straining ground, with Ramos’family in the audience.

“The moment has come,one of the most difficult in mylife, because you are neverready to leave Real Madrid,”Ramos said.

“The fans supported mein the good moments and thebad. I would have liked to saygoodbye in the stadium.

“A wonderful stage is clos-ing, one that has been uniquein my life, but an exciting newchapter begins and I go intoit with a lot of desire to show

my quality for many years tocome.”

Ramos said he wants to“add more titles” to his recordand added “this is not a good-bye but a see you later becausesooner or later I will return toReal Madrid.”

Perez said it was “not aneasy day”, remembering howhe signed Ramos, aged 19,from Sevilla for 27 millioneuros in 2005.

“He arrived wanting totake on the world,” said Perez.“You are undoubtedly one oflegends of Real Madrid. Youhave grown as a player hereand been our iconic captainfor years.”

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Turin: Goalkeeping legendGianluigi Buffon has returnedto Parma two decades afterleaving the Italian club whowere relegated last season.

“He is back where hebelongs, he is back home.Superman returns,” the clubsaid on Twitter along with ashort video in which 43-year-old Buffon said: “OK Kyle

(Krause) I’m in. I’m back.” Clubowner Kyle Krause replied:“Great news, welcome home.”Buffon holds the record forSerie A matches played with657, since his first with Parmain 1995 as a 17-year-old. Sincethen, Buffon has played just oneseason in Serie B when Juventuswere demoted in 2006-2007 forthe ‘Calciopoli’ match-fixing

scandal. The former WorldCup winner announced lastmonth he was leaving Juventus,the club he had played forsince moving from Parma in2001, apart from one seasonwith Paris Saint-Germain in2018-2019. Former Italy captainBuffon is an iconic figure inItalian football, one of the starsof the Azzurri’s 2006 World

Cup triumph who racked up arecord 176 caps for his country.

Buffon won 10 Serie Atitles with Juventus, as well asfive Italian Cups with the cluband second-tier Serie B in 2007.

He also won Ligue 1 withPSG in 2018-2019 beforereturning to the Turin giants.He won he UEFA Cup back in1999 with Parma.

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Andriy Yarmolenko scoredone goal and set up

Roman Yaremchuk for anoth-er as Ukraine defeated NorthMacedonia 2-1 to boost theirlast-16 hopes at Euro 2020 onThursday.

The West Ham forwardgrabbed the opener on 29minutes in Bucharest and thenteed up Yaremchuk with abrilliant first-time pass to dou-ble the lead five minutes later.

Ezgjan Alioski pulled agoal back for North Macedoniajust before the hour as he con-verted the rebound from hismissed penalty, while Ukrainemidfielder Ruslan Malinovskyialso saw a late spot-kick saved.

Andriy Shevchenko’s sideare now level on three pointswith Austria and theNetherlands in Group C afterUkraine ended a six-match los-ing run in the competition.

Major tournament new-comers North Macedonia havelost their first two games and

will be eliminated if the Dutchavoid defeat to Austria inAmsterdam, where victory foreither side will secure a spot inthe knockout phase.

Ukraine’s 3-2 loss to theNetherlands last weekend sawthem match the longest losingrun in tournament history, arecord shared with Yugoslavia,but they reignited their last-16bid with a deserved victoryover the Macedonians.

Yarmolenko edged closerto Shevchenko’s all-time lead-

ing mark of 48 Ukraine goals,striking for the third game ina row as he slotted in frompoint-blank range afterOleksandr Karavaev’s cleverflick at a corner.

Yaremchuk had beenguilty of wasting an excellentearly chance when cleanthrough on goal, but the Gentstriker made no mistake whenYarmolenko’s brilliant pass puthim in the clear, squeezing theball between Stole Dimitrievskiand his near post.

Copenhagen: Danish starChristian Eriksen, who suf-fered a cardiac arrest during hiscountry’s Euro 2020 opener lastweekend, will have a heartdefibrillator implanted, theDanish Football Union (DBU)announced on Thursday.

“After Christian has beenthrough different heart exam-inations it has been decidedthat he should have an ICD(heart starter),” the Danishfootball body said in a state-ment on Twitter.

The device, which is animproved variant of a pace-maker, is “necessary after a car-diac attack due to rhythm dis-turbances,” it added.

DBU provided no detailson the potential consequencesfor the 29-year-old Inter Milanplayer’s future career.

Eriksen “has accepted thesolution” and it had also been“confirmed by specialistsnationally and internationallywho all recommend the sametreatment,” DBU said. AFP

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Virat Kohli carries theexpectations of a billion

while cricket romantics willpin their hopes on KaneWilliamson when India andNew Zealand engage in a bat-tle to create a lasting legacy inpristine whites in the inau-gural World TestChampionship final startinghere on Friday.

For the connoisseurs ofthe glorious game, Test crick-et is the ultimate format anddespite its aura, the 144-year-old history needed afacelift along with a contextwhich the World TestChampionship provideddespite various bottlenecks,including the Covid-19 pan-demic.

For Kohli, India’s mostsuccessful Test captain, a tro-phy-less cabinet doesn’t dojustice to the champion per-former that he has been fora decade.

Kohli needs a global tri-umph. Every captain needs itbut perhaps the Indian cap-tain wants it more.

It’s how history willremember him just like itremembers Dhoni with a lotof respect and utmost fond-ness for those heroic Worldtitle wins.

Williamson stands in hisway with a bunch of finecricketers and the most ami-able set of players that onewould come across inInternational cricket.

They are India’s rivals butwhen Williamson hits thosecover drives, Devon Conwayteases a RavichandranAshwin or Ravindra Jadeja,Trent Boult gets one bananainswinger aimed at RohitSharma’s bootlaces, the crazyfans of a cricket-mad nation

wouldn’t possibly be able tohate them.

These are ‘GentlemenCricketers’ who have grownon the fans bit by bit withtheir cricket and their con-duct. It’s difficult not to lovethem, especially after theirgut-wrenching World Cupdefeat at the Lord’s two sum-mers back.

If Williamson happens tostand with the ICC Test Maceon the Hampshire Bowl bal-cony, one might just smileand think that perhaps “Niceguys don’t always finish last”.

But after two years andhalf a dozen series later, a bat-tle-hardened Indian teamwill give its all in a match,from which the winningteam will also walk awaywith a $1.6 million windfall.

There are a number ofcricketers, who wouldn’tpractically have a shot at anyother global trophy and forthem it’s their ‘World Cup’which they want to lay theirhands on.

Cheteshwar Pujarawould be ready to take morebruises on his body if NeilWagner starts bowling short.Ajinkya Rahane has grown instature after a series for theages and he will squeeze thatextra ounce of energy tomake it count.

Ravichandran Ashwin isunlikely to play a white ballWorld Cup again and would-n’t mind one bit if he can foolWilliamson, Ross Taylor orthe dogged Henry Nichollswith a carrom ball or a slid-er.

Ishant Sharma has grown14 years older since that epicWACA spell to Ricky Pontingand India’s senior-most play-er deserves to win a WorldChampionship as much asanyone else.

Man to man, there is verylittle to choose between thetwo teams even though play-ing New Zealand in condi-tions that aid seam and swingisn’t the easiest of tasks.

A final has its own set ofpressures and no one wouldfeel it more than RohitSharma and Shubman Gill,who would have the hardestjob currently in Test cricket.

They would face themost under-rated but per-haps the best new ball pair inthe business in Boult andSouthee, who would makethe new ball jag around andthe old ball talk.

Kyle Jamieson hasn’tplayed against England inEdgbaston but Williamsonknows what kind of a night-mare he was with his steepback-of-length bounce gen-erated from his 6 feet 9 inchframe. If that’s not enough,Wagner will pound it in withstuff aimed at rib-cage entic-ing the batters to go for thehook and pull shots or takeit on the body.

TEAMSIndia: Virat Kohli (C), RohitSharma, Shubman Gill,Cheteshwar Pujara, AjinkyaRahane, Rishabh Pant (wk),Ravindra Jadeja,Ravichandran Ashwin, IshantSharma, Mohammed Shami,Jasprit Bumrah. New Zealand : KaneWilliamson (C), TomBlundell, Trent Boult,Conway, de Grandhomme,Matt Henry, Kyle Jamieson,Tom Latham, Nicholls, AjazPatel, Tim Southee, RossTaylor, Neil Wagner BJWatling and Will Young.

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