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President Ram Nath Kovindon Sunday said he had

never imagined that an ordi-nary village boy like him wouldhave the honour of occupyingthe highest post in the country,and thanked the people of hisbirth place for this.

He was addressing a gath-ering at the Paraunkh village,which is his birthplace, inKanpur Dehat district of UttarPradesh.

The Rashtrapati Bhavantweeted that in a rare emotional

gesture, after landing at thehelipad near his village, Kovindbowed and touched the soil topay obeisance to the land of hisbirth.

This is the first time thepresident is visiting his villageafter taking over his presentassignment. Though he desiredto visit the place earlier, planscould not materialise becauseof the pandemic, an officialstatement had earlier said.

“I had never imagined,even in my dreams, that anordinary village boy like mewould have the honour ofoccupying the highest post in

the country. But, our democ-ratic system made this possi-ble,” Kovind said.

“Wherever I have reachedtoday, the credit goes to the soilof this village, this region, andto your love and blessings,” hesaid.

The president paid tributesto BR Ambedkar, makers of theConstitution and freedomfighters. He also visited MilanKendra and VeeranganaJhalkari Bai Inter College andaddressed a Jan SambodhanSamaroh. “According to myfamily’s ‘sanskaar’ (values), the

Continued on Page 6

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The helicopters of the IAFare believed to be the obvi-

ous target of Sunday’s droneattack on the Air Force Station,Jammu, considered one of themost strategic and valuableassets of the Indian Air Force(IAF), located barely 14 kmsfrom the International Border(IB) with Pakistan.

As the probe into the inci-dent is on, IAF chief RKSBhadauria, who is inBangladesh at the moment, ismonitoring the situation.Defence Minister Rajnath Singhwas also briefed on Sundaymorning about the terror attack.Initial reports suggest that thedrone attack may have been car-ried out from across the border.

Rated to be one of the mostsensitive airbases in the coun-try, the Jammu airfield has asizable number of rotary wing(helicopters) and unmannedaerial vehicles (UAV).

The M-17 helicopters andUAVs are actively used in anti-terrorist operations throughoutJammu and Kashmir (J&K)including detecting infiltra-tion, airdropping and airliftingtroops from encounter sitesand providing real timeIntelligence from the air to theoperational commander on theground. Fighter jets are notbased there.

The security agencies andthe IAF are taking the incidentvery seriously as this was the

second attack on an airbaseafter the Pathankot airfieldincident in 2016. In the last fewmonths, Pakistan has air-dropped small arms includingpistols and AK-47s in knockdown condition along the bor-der in J&K and Punjab.

However, this is the firsttime that a drone was used fora terrorist attack, sources saidadding the security establish-ment will review the anti-dronemeasures to thwart such acts.

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Two back-to-back explosionswere reported from inside

the fortified Air Force Stationin Jammu, past Saturday mid-night as the strategic asset cameunder a drone attack.

Two IAF personnel receivedinjuries while the rooftop of abuilding was damaged in theexplosion which was heard in aradius of over one kilometer. The‘provocative’ attack was aimed attargeting the IAF assets parkedat the Air Force Station.

In a series of tweets theIndian Air Force (IAF)informed that two low-inten-sity explosions were reported inthe technical area of Jammu AirForce Station.

Continued on Page 6

��,��New Delhi: The capability ofdrones to evade radar, wreakdevastation at strategic instal-lations and transport weaponsto terrorists has been a con-tinuous concern for the coun-try’s security establishment,officials said.

The Defence and internalsecurity matrix of the countryhas been talking about threats

posed by small and remote-controlled unmanned vehiclesfor the last two to three yearswith occasional incidents ofPakistan-sponsored armeddrones being neutralised by theBorder Security Force (BSF),the Punjab Police and otheragencies along the India-Pakistan border. A clutch ofMinistries and departments

like that of Home, CivilAviation, Bureau of CivilAviation Security (BCAS), theCentral Industrial

Security Force (CISF) andthe IAF have been working onplans and technologies to checkand combat such attacks at sen-sitive civil airports and otherfacilities.

Continued on Page 6

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To be informated that myproperty no-4/880 ResidingVinay Khand-4 Gomti NagarLucknow Saledeed islaminated of which owner is MrGanesh Shankar Mishra.

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To inform that my allotmentletter which is alloted by LDA,allotment letter HN-MLIG4/687Sector-H Jankipuram SitapurRoad lko has been lost it usedis iligal, Vidya Kumar S/oSohan Lal Jankipuram Ext.Sitapur Road Lucknow.

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Agriculture Minister SuryaPratap Shahi said that the

Uttar Pradesh government hasfulfilled the Bharatiya JanataParty’s pledge for agriculturaldevelopment as well as promis-es made to the farmers asenvisaged in its ‘Lok KalyanSankalp Patra’, which wasreleased ahead of the lastassembly elections over fouryears ago.

“Our endeavour startedwith waiving loans to the tuneof a whopping Rs 36,000 croreof 86 lakh farmers. It was fol-lowed by implementation of the‘Pradhan Mantri KisanSamman Nidhi’ and ‘PradhanMantri Fasal Bima Yojana’ torecognise the progressive &innovative farmers and providean insurance cover for theirproduce, respectively,” he saidin a statement issued here onSunday.

Shahi said UP is continu-ing to set new records in agri-cultural production and foodgrain purchase in the country.

“From laying a strongfoundation for agriculturaldevelopment to making it aprofitable sector and doublingfarmers’ income, the BJP gov-ernment has many achieve-ments to boast of. In the lastfour years, the government hasmade a record payment of Rs1,37,891 crore to 45.74 lakhsugarcane farmers, which istwo times more than the pay-ments made during theBahujan Samaj Party govern-ment and one-and-a-half timesmore than those during theSamajwadi Party government,”he said.

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The Uttar Pradesh governmenthas issued a selection and dis-

trict allotment list of about 6,000primary teachers through theonline software of NIC as verifica-tion and scrutiny of documents ofthe candidates selected for theposts of assistant teachers will starton Monday.

“The recruitment process forthe vacant posts of assistant teach-ers in the council schools of UP hasstarted. It will help in meeting theshortage of teachers,” a governmentspokesman said.

It may be mentioned that in therecruitment of 69,000 teachers, theposts reserved for the General cat-egory and Scheduled Tribes (ST)were left vacant, on which therecruitment is now being done.

According to experts, theseposts could not be filled due to non-

availability of the ST candidates.These posts are to be filled from theSC candidates included in themerit list.

“In order to meet the shortageof teachers in the primary schoolsof the state, the department hadconducted the examinations for theposts of assistant teachers inJanuary 2019. The allotment list forthe vacant posts of assistant teach-ers has been published. The recordsof the candidates will be scrutinisedon June 28 and 29 while theappointment letters will be issuedto the candidates on June 30,” hesaid. The candidates will have toreach the designated counsellingcentre at 10 am on the day of ver-ification along with all the docu-ments required. The UP govern-ment, under Chief Minister YogiAdityanath, has recruited 1.25 lakhteachers during the last four-and-a-half years.

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The Uttar Pradesh govern-ment has proposed a

‘New Ayodhya’ in an area ofaround 900 kilometers withinternational standard facil-ities for tourists and pilgrimsto attract tourists from acrossthe world.

The ‘New Ayodhya’ willbe 873.37 square kilometer ofwhich the Ram temple areawill be around 31.5 squarekilometer.

Uttar Pradesh ChiefMinister Yogi Adityanathmade a presentation called‘Ayodhya Vision 2051’ inwhich the New Ayodya wasproposed. The presentationwas made before PrimeMinister Narendra Modithrough video-conferencingon Saturday.

According to the UttarPradesh government, the

masterplan has been pre-pared for a 133 sq km areawhich will include 4.86 km ofGreenfield Township com-plete with modern amenities.In the ‘New Ayodhya’, therewill be a mega spiritual cen-tre where vedic and tradition-al culture will co-exist.

Ayodhya will get an inter-national airport, a modernbus stand along with thehighest Lord Ram statue onthe banks of Saryu.

Director General ,Tourism, Mukesh Meshramsaid on Sunday that severalprojects are in the pipeline toconvert Ayodhya into themost desired tourist and pil-grimage destination in theworld.

“We have proposed a bigmuseum in Ayodhya, workon which will start soon,”Meshram said.

“The museum will have

the life history of Lord Ramon display and the visitors,with the help of artificialintelligence, will get to knowevery detail of Lord Ram,from his birth to death,” headded.

Meanwhile, the founda-tion laying work of the Ramtemple is underway. The tem-ple will have 1,200 pillarswhich will be 200-feet deepand the temple will be 161-feet tall. The construction ofthe temple is expected to becompleted by early 2024. Thetotal cost of the templepremises is estimated to bearound Rs 1 ,100 crore,including Rs 300 crore for thetemple itself.

The RamjanmabhoomiTeerth Kshetra Trust, taskedwith constructing the Ramtemple, has already collectedmore than Rs 3,100 crore incash donations from people.

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Pragatisheel SamajwadiParty Lohia (PSPL) pres-

ident Shivpal Singh Yadavsaid that only a united oppo-sition could defeat the BJP inthe 2022 Uttar PradeshAssembly elections. Yadavdemanded a high-level probeinto the alleged land purchasescam in Ayodhya.

Yadav was in Ayodhya

on Sunday. He visited theRam Lalla & Hanumangarhitemples and paid obeisance tothe deities. On allegationslevelled against the Ram tem-ple trust, he said people fromacross the country madedonations for the temple andever y penny should beaccounted for.

“The matter should beinvestigated by an impartialagency,” he said while react-

ing to the allegations made bythe Aam Aadmi Party andSamajwadi Party against thetemple trust and BJP.

“ The Uttar PradeshAssembly elections are bare-ly six months away and thecampaign against the BJPmust be intensified. PSPLhad given a slogan two yearsago and if all the parties joinhands, the BJP can be dis-lodged from power,” Yadav

saidAttacking the BJP, he said

that the ruling party amassedhuge wealth, thanks to thedemonetisation. “The BJP isa party with deep pockets, yetthey have taken donations bycampaigning for the Ramtemple,” Yadav said. He alsoaccused the BJP of misusingthe official machinery in abid to win the district pan-chayat chairman elections.

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Lauding the struggle andsustained efforts of UP’s

Priyanka Goswami andShivpal Singh who recentlyqualif ied for the TokyoOlympics, Prime MinisterNarendra Modi urged thecountry to bolster their enthu-siasm. He also termed theirspirit an inspiration for allduring his ‘Mann Ki Baat’ pro-gramme which was aired onSunday.

Talking about the athletesgoing for the Tokyo Olympicsfrom July 23 to August 8, theprime minister picked the lifestories of race walker PriyankaGoswami and javelin throwerShivpal Singh and gave a spe-cial mention to them by laud-ing their determination andperseverance. Goswami(Muzaffarnagar), who will becompeting in the 20km race

walking event, hails from ahumble background and herfather is a bus conductor. “Asa child, Priyanka adored thebag in which the medal win-ners were presented. It was thisfascination that made her par-ticipate in the race walkingcompetition for the first time.Now, she is a big champion,”Modi said.

Highlighting the consistentefforts of Shivpal Singh, whohails from Varanasi, the primeminister said that Shivpal’sentire family has been associ-ated with this game. His father,uncle and brother are all pro-ficient in javelin throw.

“His commitment and anemotional attachment for thesport as it is a part of his fam-ily tradition made him quali-fy for the mega event,” the PMsaid.

Urging people to encour-age the athletes, the PM also

said that all the athletes haveendured years of toil and thecountry should back themwithout putting them underpressure during the TokyoGames next month.

Extending gratitude to theprime minister, Uttar PradeshChief Minister Yogi Adityanathsaid that the state drew inspi-ration from the PM’s encour-agement and support to thesports fraternity and adopteda similar approach to pro-mote and foster the sportsculture by supporting the tal-ented sportspersons.

“The talented sportsper-sons of our state were deprivedof adequate resources for along time, however, our gov-ernment is leaving no stoneunturned to provide all neces-sary assets to them in order topromote sports activities tohelp them shine nationallyand internationally,” Yogi said.

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Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP)supremo Mayawati on

Sunday ruled out any alliancewith the Asaduddin Owaisi-ledAll-India Maljis-e-IttehadulMuslimeen (AIMIM) for the2022 Uttar Pradesh Assemblyelections. Referring to a newschannel report that the BSPand AIMIM would contest theelections together, Mayawatitweeted: “It is absolutely false,misleading and baseless. Thereis not even an iota of truth init and the BSP strongly deniesit.” The BSP chief said that apartfrom Punjab where the partyhas entered into an alliancewith the Shiromani Akali Dalfor the 2022 elections, the BSPwould go it alone in the UP andUttarakhand polls.

The clarification byMayawati came before the cru-cial UP Assembly polls whichare scheduled to be held inearly 2022. It was widely spec-ulated that the BSP wouldforge an alliance with like-minded parties to take on theBJP. The AIMIM has alreadyjoined a front of small politicalparties like ‘Bhagidari SankalpMorcha’, a loose formation ofsmaller outfits led by Om

Prakash Rajbhar, who is thepresident of Suheldev BharatiyaSamaj Party. It includes OBCleaders such as Babu SinghKushwaha, a former BSPleader.

The alliance of the BSPwith the AIMIM was almostclinched and Asauddin Owaisiwas scheduled to visit Lucknowin the first week of July toaddress a joint press conferencewith Mayawati. However,sources said the negotiationbetween the AIMIM and BSPbroke down over seat sharingand apprehensions soundedby the BSP leaders about theloss of base among Muslims.

The AIMIM had enteredthe electoral fray in UP nearlyseven years ago, with the plank

of ‘Meem and Bhim’, the socialalliance of Muslims and Dalits.

The possibility of BSP andAIMIM joining hands hadcaused considerable consterna-tion in the Samajwadi Party.

“The AIMIM-BSP was adeadly political combinationwhich would have directlystruck at the roots of theSamajwadi Party,” a senior SPleader said, adding: “The BSPhas a committed vote bank (20per cent votes of the Dalitcommunity). The alliance didnot have the potential of win-ning many seats in UP but itwas certainly a deadly combi-nation to ensure the defeat ofSP, particularly in the con-stituencies where Muslims arein sizable numbers.”

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Within hours of BahujanSamaj Party supremo

Mayawati ruling out an alliancewith the AIMIM, HyderabadMP Asaduddin Owaisiannounced that his partywould contest 100 seats in the2022 Uttar Pradesh Assemblyelections.

Owaisi also said that hisparty would contest the polls inalliance with SuheldevBharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP)patron Om Prakash Rajbharand the ‘Bhagidari SankalpMorcha’ floated by him.

In a series of tweets, theAIMIM chief said, “We’vedecided to contest 100 seats inthe upcoming UP elections.The party has begun the selec-tion process of candidates. Weare in alliance with OmPrakash Rajbhar’s BhagidariSankalp Morcha. We have nottalked about elections oralliance with any other partyyet.”

In UP, Owaisi has joinedhands with SBSP and eightother parties including KrishnaPatel’s Apna Dal, Jan AdhikarParty and ChandrasekharRavan’s Azad Samaj Party. ThisBhagidari Sankalp Morcha has

announced to contest the 2022UP Assembly elections againstBJP to represent the unheardMuslim-Backward and Dalitvoices.

Ever since the entry ofAIMIM in Bihar elections inOctober last year, small caste-based political parties are try-ing to get the caste arithmeticin their favour in the state, par-ticularly in eastern UP.

Although the BhagidariSankalp Morcha and Owaisi inparticular have been targetingthe BJP, the presence of thisalliance in Azamgarh andadjoining districts will direct-ly affect the Samajwadi Party’sperformance in the region.With the new alliance comingup with a combination of theextreme backward Muslimpopulation, it will primarilydent the vote bank of SP.

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Over 2.5 lakh madrasa stu-dents will be imparted

online education throughsmartphones from the nextacademic session. It has beenmade possible with the effortsby the state government tomodernise and reform themadrasa education and syn-chronise it with the main-stream education system.

UP Madrasa Board mem-ber Zirgamuddin said a propos-al to develop a mobile app hasbeen approved and after thedeclaration of board examresults, its work would be takenup. He said the board wouldmake all possible efforts andarrangements so that studentscould study through the mobileapp from the upcoming session.

Zirgamuddin said thereare around 558 government-aided and about 17,000 privatemadrasas operating in the statewith more than 2.5 lakh stu-dents. The UP government isconstantly making efforts toprovide better education tothese students. The work ofproviding online education inmadrasas has been started inthis session. Keeping in viewthe ongoing pandemic, thestate government is also con-ducting training of madrasa

teachers to make them moreadept at the online mode ofteaching. The board was plan-ning to start online educationfrom this session itself but itwas delayed due to Covid.

Uttar Pradesh StateLanguage Committee mem-ber Danish Azad said thatonline training programmesare being organised for teach-ers in collaboration with theUP Madrasa Board. In thefirst phase, a 15-day trainingprogramme was conductedand teachers of IITs, IIMs andvarious universities impartedtraining to more than 1,000madrasa teachers. In the sec-ond phase, the remainingteachers will be trained.

In the four-year tenure,the Yogi Adityanath govern-ment has been working onreforming the madrasa educa-tion system. In order to providebetter education to the madrasastudents, the Yogi governmenthas introduced NCERT syl-labus for madrasas to enablethe students to participate incompetitive examinations andbring the curriculum at parwith the mainstream education.

To uplift the standard ofeducation in madrasas, anamount of Rs 479 crore hasbeen provided for the currentfiscal 2021-22.

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(��+The ‘CEGR 4th summit on industry-academia collaboration

was held online on June 26. It was organised by Centre forEducation Growth and Research (CEGR) under the aegis of itsmentor KK Agarwal, chairman of National Board of Accreditation.The endeavour was to extend industry collaboration in educa-tion to enhance research and industrial innovations.

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The door-to-door distribu-tion of special medicine kits

with syrups and chewabletablets for children under the‘Corona Ki Jang Mein HarJeevan Anmol’ campaign by theUttar Pradesh governmentkicked off on Sunday with aview to preventing the thirdCovid wave in the state.

“Upgrading its armouragainst the new Delta-plusvariant which has the potentialto stoke the third wave posinga grave threat to children, thestate government has preparedover 50 lakh pamphlets-cum-envelopes in which the medicalkits for children will be distrib-uted by surveillance commit-tees in all 75 districts of thestate,” Director General(Medical and Health) Dr DSNegi said. The kits includesyrups and chewable tablets oflesser dosage than those meantfor adults. There are four kindsof kits — for children between0-1 years, 1-5 years, 5-12 yearsand those aged 12-18 years —which will be provided even inthe remotest regions of UP.

The kits will be provided toevery child showing influenza-like illness (ILI) symptomssuch as cold and cough by over4 lakh members of more than60,500 surveillance committeesin the rural areas.

Dr Negi said that the stategovernment has taken upimmediate containment mea-sures, including preventingcrowds, conducting widespreadtesting as well as increasingvaccine coverage on a prioritybasis in districts closer to thestates where the Delta-plusvariant of coronavirus has beendetected.

Meanwhile, Chief MinisterYogi Adityanath has asked theHealth department to expeditethe process of setting upPICU/NICU beds across thestate. “Top priority should begiven to the establishment ofPICU/NICU beds in all the dis-tricts before the end of thismonth,” he said.

The government has alsoensured that there is an avail-ability of necessary equipment,including BiPAP machines,paediatric ICUs and mobile X-ray machines. The focus is ondirect communication with themanufacturing companies toensure prompt supply. As thework of the first phase of doc-tors and nursing staff has beencompleted, with the help ofthese, other health workersshould be trained, the CM said.

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Continuing with its efforts towork towards student wel-

fare, Lucknow University hasupgraded the ‘Poor StudentAid Fund’ to ‘Chhatra KalyanNidhi’. This integrates multiplestudent-centric schemes for awider outreach and greaterbenefit to students of differentstrata. DSW Poonam Tandonsaid that after providing supportto students under theKarmayogi scheme, LucknowUniversity has effectively com-pleted its second stage of stu-dent support measures by iden-tifying students for financialsupport under the ‘ChhatraKalyan’ scheme.

“The scheme was initiatedas the University of Lucknow isaware and responsible for thefact that it is home to studentsfrom all walks of life. In respectof the bright but economicallychallenged students in the uni-versity, it is observed that theyare facing challenges primarilyrelated to fees, food, accommo-dation, study, and health-relat-ed expenses. Under this

scheme, the students will get Rs15,000 for an academic session.The eligibility criteria for thisscheme is that the total incomeof parents or guardians does notexceed Rs 3 lakh per annum,the student has passed withminimum of 60% marks in theprevious exam, the studentsshould have at least 75% atten-dance in the previous academ-ic semester/year, and theyshould not be receiving anykind of financial assistanceincluding fellowship or schol-arship,” she said.

Tandon said that the uni-versity received 343 applicationsfor this scheme. “A total of 49eligible students have beenselected on a merit basis in theirrespective categories (UG, PG,and PhD) across all the facul-ties for uniform representa-tion,” she said.

LU Vice-Chancellor ProfAK Rai conveyed best wishes toall the selected students andsaid that this scheme would givea boost to the synergic bondingbetween the university and itsstudents and unburden boththe students and their parents.

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Ayouth, who was named in a case ofsexual harassment on April 2, was

arrested on Sunday. Police said that theaccused had gone into a hiding and hisfamily was unaware of his location. Theaccused, identified as Sandeep Kumar akaSultan of Banthra, was named in a caseunder sections 354 (a)/ 354 (b)/504/506(using criminal force with an intention tooutrage modesty, threatening and abusing)on the complaint of the family of a 15-year-old girl. The accused had an evil eye on thegirl, who is also a resident of Banthra.

After the case was registered, theaccused went into hiding. However,sources claimed the police made half-hearted efforts to arrest the accused. OnSunday, the police arrested the accused fol-lowing a tip-off.

Meanwhile, Joint Commissioner(Establishment) Shishir Prakash lodged acase against a person for false informationin a bid to sully the image of the depart-

ment. In the complaint, Prakash said theletter was sent by Vivek Garg on June 22.

“The content of the letter intended tomalign the image of some of the seniorofficials, including Rajesh Pratap Chandel,Ritesh Chaturvedi and myself. TheCommercial Tax commissioner got theallegations probed and later issued instruc-tions for lodging a complaint against thesender of the letter,” he said.

He further said the sender had somemalafide intention and he apparentlywanted to malign his image and that ifother officials. “The allegations leveled by

the sender of the letter are baseless and itseemed that he had been provided infor-mation by some of the staff,” he said. A casewas registered in this connection.

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band, a labourer, left the house in searchof a job in PGI police station area onSunday. Kiran (25) of Kalli Paschim local-ity was all alone after her husbandAbhishek left in search of a job in themorning. As Abhishek did not get anywork, he returned home. However, he didnot find Kiran in the room and wentupstairs. He later found her hanging in thebathroom. Initial investigation revealedthat the couple were going through finan-cial crisis as Abhishek was not gettingenough work due to the pandemic. Policesuspected that the woman ended her lifedue to the financial crunch. A spokesmansaid the woman belonged to Unnao andher family members were informed aboutthe incident.

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Taking a cue from theLucknow police commis-

sionerate, the Lucknow ruralpolice also have launched acampaign against ganglordswho have amassed huge wealth.

The Mall police attachedproperty worth Rs 1.05 crore ofan alleged gangster, WasimKhan of Malihabad. The prop-erty included an SUV, a motor-cycle, a palatial bungalowworth Rs 80 lakh and severalplots registered in the name ofthe accused. The police claimedthat Wasim has been involvedin criminal activities for a longtime and amassed huge wealth.

In another case, the Itaunjapolice slapped the NationalSecurity Act (NSA) on anaccused of cow slaughter on

Sunday. The accused was iden-tified as Niyazuddin of Sitapur.On March 6, the accused hadrun over two people undertheir car laden with cow meat.The victims were identified asAshish and Pravesh, both ofItaunja. Ashish and Pravesh,along with Lalit, Vipin andSantosh, were preparing for acompetition when they wererun over. It later surfaced thatthe accused was carrying cowmeat and was in a hurry toreach his destination.

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withdrew Rs 44,99 from thebank account of a Madiaonresident. Police suspected it tobe a case of ATM cloning andstarted a probe into the case.

Reports said Manish Singh

of Rahim Nagar got a messageregarding deduction of moneyfrom his bank account on June19 night. He later lodged acase.

In another incident, anunidentified miscreant dupeda woman of Rs 1 lakh bypleading monetary help whilemasquerading as a friend ofher father in Gomtinagar.Anamika Sharma of ViramKhand said her father got aWhatsApp message from hisfriend and was requested togive Rs 1 lakh for the heartsurgery of latter’s mother. Shesaid she sent Rs 50,000 to himon the request and got anoth-er message for sending moremoney. “I sent Rs 30,000 andRs 20,000 again from my bankaccount. The miscreants delet-ed his messages later,” she said.

2)��#��%".��%#�.��*&� �!��#��Lucknow (PNS): A liver trans-plant was performed by aKGMU team led by ProfAbhijit Chandra after a gap of16 months on June 26. It wasthe 11th transplant of KGMU.The team of doctors includedVivek Gupta, Mohd Parvez,Shashank, Neera Kohli, ManojKumar, Tulika Chandra, AmitaJain, OP Singh, Darshan Bajaj,Gaurav Chaudhary, SumitRungta and Ajay Kumar. Thetransplant coordinators werePeeyush Shrivastava andKshitiz Verma.

“Max Hospital team fromSaket (New Delhi) also partic-ipated. It consisted of DrShaleen Agarwal and Dr RajeshDey. It was a living donor livertransplant done on a 43-year-old male patient of Lucknowwho was suffering from achronic liver disease. Liver wasdonated by his 35-year-oldwife,” KGMU spokesperson DrSudhir Singh said.

KGMU Vice-ChancellorDr Bipin Puri congratulated thedepartment of SurgicalGastroenterology and the teammembers involved in livertransplantation.

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Women are not far behindmen in the cluster vacci-

nation approach taken up inGosainganj, Mohanlalganj andNK Road areas under a pilotproject which will be imple-mented across the state fromJuly 1. From June 21 — whenthe vaccinations started inthese clusters — till June 26, atotal of 7,752 women & 7,943men got vaccinated inGosainganj; 5,144 men & 4,747women got jabbed inMohanlalganj; and 6,332 menand 4,955 took the shots in theNK Road cluster. A total of19,419 men and 17,454 womenwere vaccinated in all the clus-ters put together.

Chief Development OfficerAshwani Pandey said it was thestate government’s aim to takethe vaccinations closer tohomes and that was why largenumber of women were vacci-nated. Block DevelopmentOfficer (Mohanlalganj) AjitKumar Singh said the grampradhans were keeping a tab onthe vaccinations.

State Immunisation OfficerDr Ajay Ghai said there aremultiple reasons for morenumber of women stepping outfor vaccination in the clusterareas. “Women do not usuallystep out but due to the clusterapproach, it became easier forthem to get vaccinated.Lactating mothers are alsobeing vaccinated now whichmay have also increased the

numbers. Also, women aremore in contact with theAnganwadi workers which mayhave made a difference,” hesaid. The vaccination drivewill be scaled up to 10 lakh jabsper day from July 1 onwards. Asenior official from theNational Health Mission saidall preparations, including themicro-plans, have been made.

He said that under thepilot project which waslaunched on June 21, betterresults were witnessed in thedistricts which were not per-forming well. “Vaccine hesitan-cy was of two kinds. There were

fears regarding the vaccinesand people had a callous atti-tude towards the importance ofvaccination. We helped suchpeople shed vaccine hesitancyand people got vaccinated,”the official said.

Regarding the shortage ofvaccines at some centres onSaturday, he said: “The doseswere slightly less but more vac-cines will be coming soon.There is some shortage at themoment as UP has already cov-ered a lot of people. However,the issue will be taken care ofsoon”. He said that vaccines arenot being distributed on the

basis of population and thatthey have requested the Centralgovernment to ensure propersupply.

Asked whether Sputnikwould ease shortage, he said itssupply is even lesser.

“A total of 1.5 lakh vaccinedoses are there for the entirecountry and it is a very smallnumber. In Uttar Pradesh,Sputnik is only available at theMedanta Hospital. In Augustwhen the production capacityof the existing vaccines isincreased, there will be morevaccines and it will make a dif-ference,” he added.

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Ahead of President RamNath Kovind’s visit to

Lucknow by train, theCharbagh railway station hasturned into a fortress, with ahuge deployment of securitypersonnel keeping an hawk’seye on the movement of pas-sengers. There is CCTV cover-age across the railway stationand in the circulating area.

The Lucknow division ofNorthern Railways has madeample security arrangementsand has also affected traindiversions for the convenienceof passengers. The entrythrough the main gate willremain restricted and the pas-sengers will have to take theroute through the parceldepartment at the southernend of the railway station (closeto north eastern Lucknow junc-tion railway station) between 8am and 12 noon to reach theplatform number 1 ofCharbagh railway station.

The entry and exit of pas-sengers will be regulatedthrough the second gate at therailway station. The countersfor platform and train ticketswill be open at this second gate.For security reasons, the wait-ing halls of the first and secondclass will remain shut and themain office for tickets willremain closed from 8 am to 12noon.

The president will be arriv-ing at Lucknow by thePresidential Train. The railwayshas been given instructions to

look into the arrangementsand coordinate with the localadministration and police. TheCharbagh railway station willbe under the control of theagencies looking after the secu-rity of the president.

The personnel ofGovernment Railway Police,Railway Protection Force anddistrict police have beendeployed under the securityarrangements.

Circle Officer, GRP(Lucknow), Sanjeev Sinha saidthe teams are continuouslyconducting checking drives atthe platforms and other areasof the railway station in thewake of the president’s visit. He

said the dog squads and detec-tive instruments were also usedin conducting the checkingdrive. “Every corner of therailway station has beenchecked by the security person-nel,” he said.

Ample security arrange-ments have been made for thevisit of the president, he said.

“We will also make surethat common passengers donot have any kind of inconve-nience during the visit of thepresident. No outsider will beallowed but passengers withvalid tickets will be allowed toreach the platforms to boardtheir respective trains,” headded.

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To avoid cancer, it is veryimportant to take a bal-

anced diet, get sufficient sleepand avoid stress, an expert saidwhile speaking at a webinarorganised by KhwajaMoinuddin Chishti LanguageUniversity.

The university’s IQAC cellorganised a webinar on‘Cancer prevention, healthylifestyle and COVID-19’ inassociation with an organisa-tion and KMCU’s internalcomplaints committee organ-ised a webinar on ‘Sexualharassment at workplace’. Inthe webinar on cancer aware-ness, Archana Vermainformed the participantsabout various facts related tothe causes and prevention ofcancer. She said that if thesymptoms of cancer are iden-tified at an early stage, its treat-ment becomes easier.

She also pointed out thatalong with medicines, self-confidence plays an importantrole in fighting cancer and allmembers of the society shouldtry to boost the morale of can-cer patients.

Convenor of the webinarProf Chandana Dey said thatright information can helppeople avoid cancer andawareness among the studentscan play an important role infighting cancer.

Talking about sexualharassment at workplace,keynote speaker SmitaSrivastava said it is a seriousproblem. She said several lawshave been made for protectionof women at the workplace butthere is a need to make womenaware about them. She alsosaid that to ensure respect andsecurity of women at work-place, they must be encour-aged to raise their voiceagainst wrong behaviour.

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When the first consign-ment of jamun for export

from Uttar Pradesh to Londonwas airlifted from the Lucknowairport recently, it encouragedthe exporters and farmers fromthe state tremendously. Forthe first time, the jamun pro-duced in Bithoor (Kanpur)was exported by an APEDAregistered exporter in the firstweek of June.

Giving this information,Central Institute for

Subtropical Horticulture(CISH) director ShailendraRajan said that according toAGM of APEDA CB Singh,UP’s jamun is being welcomedin the London market andthere is a lot of potential for theexport of this fruit in additionto mango.

“In recent years, there hasbeen a surge in the popularityof jamun among Indians andalso those living outside thecountry. Quality fruits andpackaging technology aidedexporters in successfully deliv-

ering the shipment to distantmarkets. Given the demand,there is a plenty of room forproducing and exporting high-quality jamun to Europe andthe Middle East,” he said.

Rajan said that previouslyuninterested exporters are nowplanning to export this one-of-a-kind fruit to European coun-tries where people will be will-ing to pay a premium for sucha rare and exotic produce.

“Jamun is a rare fruit inmost European markets, as aresult of which producers and

exporters will be able to makea reasonable profit, if system-atic export of this fruit isencouraged,” he added.

Rajan said that CISH isworking on jamun orchardingwhich has not yet been organ-ised. “In general, jamun isregarded as an avenue tree,with the majority of the fruitharvest coming from treesfound along the roadside. Onecannot be certain that theseedlings will produce the samehigh-quality fruits as the moth-er tree. CISH began working on

varieties, asexual multiplicationtechniques and canopy man-agement. Because the perish-able nature of the fruit calls intoquestion the sustainability oflarge-scale cultivation, the insti-tute developed value-addedproducts from jamun. Surplusproduction necessitates pro-cessing in order to create value-added products,” he said. Headded that a lot of jamungrows in the wild, but it haspoor eating quality as a tablefruit, but it has exceptionalmedicinal properties.

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COVID-19 is not dangerousfor children and presents

with asymptomatic or mildself limiting illness. Howeverpost-COVID-19 illness canprove detrimental to the livesof children and hence the earlyidentification of its signs holdsutmost importance in theyoung population, senior pedi-atrician Dr Richa Bajaj said.

It has been found thatmost of the children with post-COVID-19 symptoms had noknown history of COVID 19but had contact history with adiagnosed case in the recentpast. This highlights the factthat COVID 19 is not danger-ous for children and presents

with asymptomatic or mildself limiting illness. However,post-COVID-19 illness canprove detrimental to the livesof children, hence, early iden-tification of its signs holdsutmost importance in theyoung population, said DrRicha Bajaj, senior pediatricianat Maharaja Agrasen Hospital,Delhi. She was in the city.

Amid news of the antici-pated third wave of COVID-19,there have been increasingclaims regarding its infectivityto children. However, none ofthe research so far provides evi-dence regarding this fact, DrBajaj said and added, “Thedeadly virus has continuouslyinfected as many children asadults since first wave of the

pandemic but the asympto-matic nature of infection inchildren leads to under-report-ing of this disease in kids.”

Children infected with thevirus do not present with typ-ical symptoms of cough and

fever as seen in adults, she said.“More than 90 per cent of

children infected with thisvirus are asymptomatic and donot require any treatment.Among those who are infect-ed, they have diarrhoea, pain inthe abdomen, vomiting, mildfever, croup, and rarely respira-tory distress and pneumonia.Unlike adults, no specific drughas been claimed for treatmentof COVID-19 in children, pre-dominantly due to the asymp-tomatic and self limiting courseof illness in the pediatricpopulation. Mortality rate dueto COVID-19 is low in childrenas compared to adults,” shesaid.

Dr Richa Bajaj said thatkids predominantly presented

with post-COVID-19 illness,usually 4-6 weeks post infec-tion described as multisysteminflammatory syndrome inchildren (MIS-C). She saidrecently, during the secondwave of the pandemic, an adultvariant of this disease had alsobeen described and this illnesswas highly detrimental andcould infect heart and lungs,thereby prolonging the hospi-tal stay.

She said the condition hadbeen described to cause highgrade fever, rashes, swelling,lymphadenopathy and con-junctivitis as the main present-ing feature and the course ofthis illness could prove highlydangerous if not treated well ontime and could lead to death.

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The unopposed election ofBharatiya Janata Party can-

didate Punam Maurya is nowcertain as she is now the onlycandidate in the election frayfor the post of Varanasi ZilaPanchayat chairperson.

The candidature of theSamajwadi Party candidateChanda Yadav was rejected asher nomination papers werefound invalid after marathonscrutiny for almost sevenhours.

Only the BJP and the SPcandidates had filed the nom-ination papers for this presti-gious seat which is reserved forthe women of Other BackwardClasses (OBC).

The election for the seat isscheduled to be conducted onJuly 3 and the result is also tobe announced the same day.

Amidst the hustle and bus-tle, the BJP and SP candidatesPunam Maurya and ChandaYadav had submitted theirnomination papers on Saturdayfor the post of Varanasi ZilaPanchayat chairperson.

After the nomination byboth candidates, ReturningOfficer/District MagistrateKaushal Raj Sharma startedscrutiny of nomination papersat 3:00 pm on Saturday as perearlier schedule but both can-didates raised objections inwriting on the validity of thenotary advocates of each other.

Both candidates sought a timeof two hours to reply to theobjection and the RO gave thetime to them. The scrutiny ofthe nomination papers of bothcandidates began again at 6:30pm and both candidates puttheir sides before the RO.

After the scrutiny, one setof nomination papers submit-ted by the BJP candidate wasfound invalid while both sets ofthe nomination papers of theSP candidates were foundinvalid.

The oath mentioned bythe SP candidate in the affidavitattached with the both sets ofthe nomination papers couldnot be proved before the com-petent and valid authority andthus, the nomination paperswere found invalid and hernomination was cancelled, theRO said, adding that similarly,the oath mentioned by theBJP candidate in the affidavitattached with one set of thenomination papers could notbe proved but one set of nom-

ination papers was found validand hence, her nominationwas found valid.

One set of the nominationpapers submitted by the BJPcandidate was found valid andhence, the candidature ofPunam Maurya was foundvalid, the RO said adding thatthe candidature of the SP can-didate was cancelled as bothsets of the nomination paperssubmitted by her were foundinvalid.

Both the BJP and the SPcandidates had filed two sets ofnomination papers.

This process took almosteight hours at the Rifle Club inCollectorate and when theinformation about the cancel-lation of the candidature ofChanda Yadav came out, therewas annoyance and dejectionin the SP camp.

However, there was jubila-tion in the BJP camp as it pavedthe way for the unopposedelection of the ruling party can-didate to help it retain the seat.

Both BJP and SP had madethis election a matter of pres-tige and the latter’s leadersaccused the ruling party of foulplay and decided to move thecourt against the rejection ofthe party candidate’s papersafter taking legal consultation.

It is for the first time in thehistory of Varanasi that anycandidate will be elected unop-posed as zila panchayat chair-person.

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There was happiness on the faces ofa large number of devotees a month

before the auspicious Shravan whichwill fall from July 25 to August 22 thisyear, when from Sunday, they wereallowed as per the old system of wor-ship to offer jalabhishek at Shivling ingarbhagriha (sanctum sanctorum) inone of the Dwadasa Jyotirlingas at KashiVishwanath temple. However, they hadto follow all the Covid guidelines.

Like the restrictions imposed in thetemple last year, this time also the entryof the devotees into the temple’s sanc-tum sanctorum was banned whenthere was a peak of coronavirus posi-tive cases during the second wave. FromApril 15, as per the order of the divi-sional commissioner, an RT PCR neg-ative report taken within three days was

mandatory to enter Kashi Vishwanathtemple and nearby Annapurna templepremises. Later, when the pandemic sit-uation started improving, some morerelaxations were given to the devoteesfrom June 8 when they were allowed tooffer prayer from outside the garbha-griha. Last year, during the month ofShravan the devotees were also allowedentry with Covid restrictions and dur-ing all Mondays, the temple had wit-nessed heavy rush of devotees.

Now, the old system of worship hasbeen implemented again and the devo-tees are being allowed to offer jalab-hishek at Shivalinga by following allCovid guidelines. The devotees areasked to wear masks and maintain socialdistance during their entry into the tem-ple premises. They are allowed to enterthere after Mangla Aarti is performedin the early morning hours.

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Banaras Locomotive Works(BLW) achieved yet anoth-

er milestone by successfullyinstalling DPWCS (DistributedPower Wireless ControlSystem) in its two electric loco-motives. First two goods elec-tric locomotives with DPWCSWAG9-41152 and WAG9-41157 were successfully man-ufactured and dedicated to thenation on Saturday. These loco-motives are dispatched toLalaguda Loco Shed underSouth Central Railway (SCR).

This is for the first time thatsuch technology has beeninstalled in electric locomotivesat BLW. The DPWCS is state-of-the-art technology for longhaul operation of freight trainswhich enables multiple opera-tions of freight locomotives

without increasing couplerforces, by placing differentlocos at different locations in atrain formation with synchro-nised operation. It also helps tocontrol the remote locomotivesfrom the leading loco throughwireless communication up tothree kilometres. These locoswill also haul heavy trailingloads in Eastern and WesternDedicated Freight Corridors.

Some of the benefits of

DPWCS are increasing sec-tional throughput, remoteoperation of the locomotive,efficient train management,reduced coupler forces, leadingto eliminate of coupler failure,efficient brake control, elimi-nating chances of brake bind-ing, reduced braking distanceand wear and tear; faster charg-ing and multiple operations oflocomotives with wireless tech-nology.

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North Central Railway is all set tocommence loading of cement from

Dadri (near Noida). The InlandContainer Depot, Dadri (ICDD) wasgiven the status of a private freight ter-minal in March 2021 to enable loadingof commodities in addition to contain-ers. The ICDD is the most importantloading point for NCR and earns sig-nificant revenues for the Railways.

The ICDD of Prayagraj division hasreceived a nod from the Railway Boardto start outward loading of cement,thereby fulfilling a long-standingrequirement of a cement loading pointnear the industrial hub of Noida andGreater Noida.

ICD Dadri has been an importantloading point for NCR with an averageloading of six container rakes per day.Average monthly revenue accrued toRailways from loading of containerrakes is approx Rs 17.5 crore.

In view of demand explored as aresult of aggressive marketing by NorthCentral Railway for loading of othercommodities in addition to the con-tainerised traffic, ICD Dadri was giventhe status of private freight terminalwith facility of inward traffic. Due tocertain technical requirements, outwardloading from the terminal requiredclearance from the Railway Board forwhich NCR made focused efforts. OnJune 23, 2021, the Railway Board gaveits nod for commencing outwardcement loading. The move not only willbring relief to the cement merchants ofNoida and nearby areas, but also willyield significant revenue for IndianRailways. Hitherto, local cement mer-chants used to transport cementthrough roads and now they will be ableto transport their products to far off des-tinations with lesser transit time andreduced transport costs.

Commencing of outward loading ofcement from Dadri is not only a signif-

icant success gained by the businessdevelopment unit of NCR but is alsoexpected to generate additional localemployment in the area.

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The Jhansi division of NorthCentral Railway is achieving newheights in loading despite COVID-19pandemic.

In the month of June 2021, theJhansi division registered a recordloading of fly ash. By now 11 rakes havealready been loaded in the month ofJune, earning revenue of Rs 1,92,73,58The previous best performance in flyash loading during any month wasfive rakes by the division in December2020.

Even after achieving the highestever fly ash loading in any month, sev-eral rake loading orders are in thepipeline. The division is also settingrecords in petroleum loading as well.

A record 108 rakes have alreadybeen loaded from HPTR siding(Rasulpur Gogamau) in June so far andthe Railways has earned revenue of Rs35,20,09,759. The previous best perfor-mance of any month was 107 rakes inDecember 2019, October 2020 andNovember 2020.

Covid protocols are strictly beingfollowed at all loading and unloadingpoints.

The commendable efforts made bythe Jhansi division of North CentralRailway are reflected in these figures.Efforts of administration and rigorousmarketing strategy followed by NCRbusiness development units are result-ing in attracting more and more incre-mental loading by freight customers.

Loading of fly ash is a shiningexample of the untapped potential cap-tured through aggressive marketing. Itis a win-win situation both for Railways,power plants as well as cement loadingplants where fly ash is being despatched.

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Tension gripped Meja in the Trans-Yamuna area of Prayagraj over the

alleged killing of an elderly man.It was alleged that the elderly man

was beaten up by a group of youths foropposing eve-teasing of his daughterand he succumbed to the injuries onSunday morning.

As tension prevailed between twocommunities, the police officers rushedto the spot and somehow pacified thefamily members of the victim and sentthe body for post-mortem.

Police said they were investigatingto find out the facts behind the clashthat led to the death of the elderly man.

In view of the tense situation, apolice force was deployed in the villageand senior officers were monitoring thesituation. SHO, Meja, Arun Chaturvedisaid that the cause of death would beclear from the post-mortem report.

In his complaint to the police,Mumtaz of Meja's Maidniya village said

on Sunday morning his sister had gonetowards the mango orchard wherethree people living in the neighborhoodacted inappropriately with her. He saidwhen his sister came home and narrat-ed the incident, his father Majid Ali andbrother Talib went to the house of the

accused and complained about theincident to their family members. Healleged that Majid Ali and Talib wereattacked by the family members.Mumtaz alleged both were kicked andpunched, and the attackers also tried tostrangle his father to death. Both some-

how escaped from there and Majid fellunconscious soon after reaching hishouse and died.

As the news of Majid’s death spread,people gathered at the house and ten-sion flared up. Superintendent of Police(Yamunapar) Saurabh Dixit and circleofficer reached the spot with a policeforce from several police stations. Thewomen alleged that Majid was beatento death when he protested molestationof his daughter. The cops assured thefamily that the guilty would be arrest-ed after investigation. The police latersent the body for autopsy.

As per the SP (Trans-Yamuna) onthe basis of the written complaint filedby the son of the deceased, an FIR hadbeen registered against eight persons,including Madhav Nishad, Kallu, Golu,Sanju, Pankaj, Sanjay, and three of themwere taken into police custody for ques-tioning. According to the SP, there wasan argument between the two partieslast week and since then a tussle wasgoing on between them.

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The train for Dakshin BharatDarshan by the Indian

Railway Catering and TourismCorporation Limited (IRCTC)will leave on August 24. This isa 12 nights and 13 days pack-age.

Under this package, Rs12,285 will have to be paid perperson. Booking for it hasstarted from Prayagraj.

The Dakshin BharatDarshan Yatra will be of 13days and the Bharat Darshantrain will return on September7. The journey in the train canbe taken up from Gorakhpur,Deoria, Varanasi, Jaunpur,Sultanpur, Lucknow, KanpurNagar and Jhansi.

This train will go to Ujjainwhere the passengers can have

darshan of the Omkareshwarand Mahakaleshwar jyotirlin-ga. There will also be a visit tothe Statue of Unity. The trainwill also halt at Ahmedabad.After visiting the SabarmatiAshram here, it will move toDwarka.

After visiting Dwarkadhishand Somnath jyotirlinga, thetrain will go to Pune. The pas-sengers will visit Grishneshwarand then Trimbakeshwar inNashik and Bhimashankarjyotirlinga in Aurangabad.

The train has sleepercoaches, and the IRCTC willarrange vegetarian food for allthree times, stay in dharamsha-la and local tour by buses.

For booking berths fromPrayagraj, mobile numbers8287930935 and 7081586383can be contacted.

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In a major road accident, a mother-son duowas killed while the father sustained serious

injuries when a speeding truck hit their two-wheeler when they were returning home afterpurchasing medicines.

The mishap took place on the highway inKarnadi village under Rohania police station onSunday. The police sent both bodies for post-mortem and the injured was admitted to a near-by private hospital.

According to reports, Chandrika aliasPintu (30), resident of Akhri in Rohania,along with his wife Priyanka (26) and son Ayush(3) went to Rajatalab on Sunday morning to buymedicines for his ward. After purchasing themedicines, when they were returning home andwere on the highway, a truck coming from thesame side hit the two-wheeler, injuringChandrika, his wife and son. The local villagersinformed the police about the accident. Thecops reached the spot and rushed the injuredto a nearby private hospital where the womanand her son were pronounced dead.

Chandrika was admitted to a hospital incritical condition. His condition was said to bestable.

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Thirteen people tested pos-itive for novel coronavirus

infection during the last 24hours taking the tally of con-firmed cases to 82,250, as perthe figures released by thehealth department on Sundayevening.

With no new COVID-19death, the death toll remainedat 773. Seven COVID-19patients recovered during thepast 24 hours -- four in homeisolation and three in hospitals.With this, 81,332 COVID-19patients have been cured in thedistrict so far – 75,044 in homeisolation and 6,288 in Covidhospitals. The active cases onceagain increased to 145 from139 a day back.

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Anamed FIR has been filedagainst five friends in con-

nection with the murder ofManas Singh (22), son of aretired railway worker, inPreetam Nagar locality ofDhoomanganj.

The father of the deceasedalleged that his son was mur-dered after being called fromhome.

Meanwhile, the police tookthe accused in custody forinterrogation.

The incident took place aday earlier. Late at night, thepolice registered a case againstfive people on the basis of thecomplaint filed by the father ofthe deceased.

Those named in the FIRare Amit Chaurasia, Priyanshu,Zandu, Suraj and Rishi. It isalleged that Amit andPriyanshu called Manas and

took him with them afterwhich he was murdered.

Rishi is the owner of theunder-construction housewhere the murder took place.Suraj works as a painter andwas present there along withhis friend Zandu during theincident.

He was taken into custodyby the police in the night itselfand a pistol was also recoveredfrom his possession by whichManas was killed.

According to policesources, all the accused saidthat the pistol went off acciden-tally and the bullet hit Manas.They also said that none ofthem had any enmity withManas.

However, the police areyet to confirm whether theaccused have been taken intocustody. SP City Dinesh KumarSingh said that investigation isgoing on.

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Allahabad (PNS): The Naini police station waswaterlogged by a brief spell of showers that lashed thecity on Sunday afternoon.

During the rainy season, the Naini police stationis often submerged with water and people are unableto file complaints. After several hours, when the situ-ation becomes normal, the complainants are able toreach the police station. This is because the police sta-tion premises get waterlogged only in light rains everytime.

The policemen of Naini police station, whoremove the problems of the people, are themselves sur-rounded by problems. For the last three decades, thisproblem has remained in the Naini police station dur-ing the rainy days. No effort is being made by thedepartment concerned to solve the problem of water-logging in the police station.

About 50 residential houses have been built in theback side of Naini Kotwali, in which the families ofpolicemen live amid the problem of drainage and water-logging.

The drains of the residential complex are chokedwith mud. During the rainy season, the drains over-flow and the area soon gets waterlogged. Sometimeswater even enters the office. In such a situation,the policemen sit on the chair for hours with their feetup.

Varanasi (PNS): In accordance with thedirectives given by the director of UttarPradesh National Health Mission to all dis-trict magistrates and chief medical officersfor observing World Population Day on July11 at all places except the containment areasor buffer zones while following the Covidprotocol, the couple contact fortnight start-ed on Sunday would continue till July 10,CMO Dr VB Singh said, adding that the daywould be followed by the World PopulationStability Fortnight which would continue tillJuly 31. According to the CMO, during thecouple contact fortnight, ASHA workers willidentify eligible couples in the population oftheir respective work areas. The target cou-ples will be informed about the basket ofchoices for family planning.

“The help of tele-counselling will also betaken if required,” he said, adding that thereshould be a gap of at least three years betweenthe birth of two children to reduce mater-nal mortality by 30 per cent and infant mor-tality by 10 per cent.

“Vasectomy is simple and safe, so the eli-gible beneficiaries should come forward and

choose this method and take advantage.There is a need to change the behaviour ofpeople regarding family planning. Wide pub-licity should be given to contraceptivemeans,” said Dr Singh.

ACMO and nodal officer of family plan-ning programme, Dr Rajesh Prasad, said thatduring the fortnight, the message of familyplanning would be widely publicised and dis-seminated through mobile publicity vans inthe district, including all the blocks and vil-lages. “In this programme, full help of digi-tal platforms like WhatsApp, SMS etc will betaken. Along with this, contraceptive pills andcondoms will be distributed for two monthsto the eligible beneficiaries. In the meantime,adoption of Antara contraceptives and IUCD(Intrauterine Contraceptive Device) will beencouraged. There will also be a facility of pre-registration for male or female sterilisation forevery interested beneficiary,” the ACMOsaid. A specialist of Uttar Pradesh TechnicalSupport Unit said that to encourage peopleto adopt contraceptives, various incentiveswould be given to the male and female ben-eficiaries as well as ASHA workers.

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Minister of State for HigherEducation Neelima Katiyar,

while presiding over the distribu-tion of medicine kits for childrenand infants at the Kanpur NagarNigam auditorium on Sunday, saidthe Uttar Pradesh government wascommitted to protecting childrenand improving their health.

She said there was an encour-aging reduction in child mortalitybut there was enough room for fur-ther improvement. The ministersaid in view of the expected third

wave of COVID-19, the state gov-ernment was making all arrange-ments to tackle the deadly novelcoronavirus and prevent loss oflives. Katiyar said the UP govern-ment had prioritised the health ofmother and children and this alsoincluded good health and nutrition,protection from pandemic threatsand access to opportunities tolearn and grow.

She said the UP governmenthad improved the rural medicalinfrastructure and in event of anycrisis it would now be smoothlymanaged. She said investing in chil-

dren was one of the most impor-tant things a society could do tobuild a better future.

Katiyar said good personalhygiene would help children stayhealthy, ward off illnesses, andbuild better self-awareness. Sheadvised people to regularly washhands, wear masks and maintainphysical distancing. She said it wasnever too early to start teachinghygiene to the children.

Others present on the occasionwere Mayor Pramila Pandey, SDPachauri, officials of Kanpur NagarNigam and several others.

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The Russian vaccine Sputnik V is to reach KanpurNagar soon and with it the people of the city will

have three options for Covid vaccination -- the indige-nous Covaxin and Covishield vaccines and theSputnik V.

The Sputnik V vaccine has already reachedLucknow and will reach Kanpur on July 3, 2021 forwhich the necessary cold chain has already beenmaintained. Naraina Medical College, which hadplaced an order for 10,000 doses of Sputnik V, hasalready been informed that the vaccine will reachthem on July 3, 2021.

It may be mentioned here that the private hos-pitals had taken up the issue of Covid vaccines withthe government and asked it to simplify their avail-ability through a special portal. The governmentagreed to it and now even the payment for the pur-chased vaccines can be done online. This has madethe availability of the vaccine smooth and easier.

Currently thousands of people are trying theirlevel best to get a slot to get vaccinated but to no avail.Some people have been trying for a slot for the lastone month but have failed and the vaccination cen-tres return them as they have not registered andbooked a centre.

The Sputnik V will be available at a price of Rs948 + Rs 47 GST and vaccination charge of Rs 150which works out to Rs 1,145 for a single dose.

The centres which have placed orders for the vac-cine have been directed to ensure that they have acold storage facility where the vaccines can be storedat -20 degree Centigrade temperature so that its coldchain can be strictly maintained.

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The head of business man-agement department at

Amity University, Dr AlkaMaurya, while addressing avirtual session at JIManagement College onSunday, said the Governmentof India had worked out a strat-egy to make technical changesfor a better export and importpolicy.

She said this would giveIndia an edge to seek for bet-ter support prices of variousproducts.

She said the strategy cur-rently faced teething troublesbut very soon it would prove tobe the key driver for India toachieve the USD 5 trillion-mark.

Dr Alka Maurya said thiscould be done by systematical-ly addressing domestic and

overseas constraints related tothe policy, and regulatory andoperational framework for low-ering transaction costs. Shesaid it could also enhance theease of doing business andcreate a low-cost operatingenvironment through efficientlogistical and utility infrastruc-ture.

She said improvements inthe operations of the domesticmanufacturing and servicessectors in combination withefficient infrastructure sup-port by the governmentwould result in correcting theimbalances within India andfeed into the trade policy.

Advising the students, DrAlka Maurya said a career ininternational trade had tremen-dous potential with employ-ment opportunities multiplyingin export-import firms with therapid globalization of markets

and the dismantling of tradebarriers under the new WorldTrade Organisation (WTO)regime.

She said it was highlyrewarding and job opportuni-ties were becoming available toprofessionals trained in export-import or foreign trade man-agement.

She said employmentopportunities were also multi-plying in marketing, docu-mentation, shipping, andpackaging departments ofexport-import firms and inthe export divisions of businessfirms.

She told the students thatto successfully affect businesstransactions beyond nationaland cultural boundaries wasvery challenging.

She said it was just likewalking a tightrope because itrequired success in internation-

al markets while workingwithin the bureaucratic con-straints of the domestic envi-ronment.

She said even though inter-national trade was mainlytransacted by private sectorexporters and importers, thissector took specialised stu-dents of international tradeto help manage the myriad offi-cial procedures associated withit.

Dr Maurya said a formalstudy course in export-import

management familiarised thestudent with the fundamentalsof international business suchas international marketing,banking, forex (foreignexchange) management,export-import policies, exportcommerce, shipping documen-tation, marine and cargo insur-ance etc.

The programme was con-ducted by Pratima Gupta andthe vote of thanks was pro-posed by university director DrDivya Chaudhary.

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The Chhatrapati Shahu Ji MaharajUniversity, Kanpur has decided

to expand the scope of Englishstudies in the university underwhich other regional languages willalso be given equal importance.Reading habits has to be promotedand this can be done successfully bytranslating the interesting literaturefrom different languages into Englishso that students of undergraduateand postgraduate levels can be ben-efited.

This was stated by Prof BDPandey. He said it had been decid-ed to translate the Hindi literatureinto English to ensure that studentsfrom other states had access to it aswell. He said the university haddecided to include this literature inEnglish course both at undergrad-uate and postgraduate levels.

Prof Pandey said the Board ofStudies of the university had alreadygiven a green signal to theproject. He said with this the stu-dents of different states wouldhave access to not only Indian liter-ary books but also literature ofAfrica, Australia, German and otherforeign countries.

Explaining the decision to takeup this move, he said literature wasundeniably a timeless piece of artthat never failed to entertain in theform of a poem, a novel, or a dramaand had the power to stimulateimagination. He said no matterwhat genre of literature one enjoyedreading or exploring, one couldalways find a reflection of age andsociety it was written in if one readbetween the lines.

Prof Pandey said it was beyonddoubt that diversity of cultures,languages, ethnicities, etc. was whatmade this world an interesting placeto live in.

He said reading foreign literaturecould help in inculcating love andacceptance for the diversity of thisworld.

He said literature could be a funway to increase knowledge aboutvarious historical events and tolearn more about the global calami-ties from a fresh perspective.

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The Crime Branch of city police bust-ed a gang of hi-tech cyber crooks with

the arrest of three persons on Saturday.They were duping people by fraudulent-ly withdrawing money from their bankaccounts with the help of AadhaarEnabled Payment Services (AEPS).

During the past few months, the ganghad withdrawn lakhs of rupees after steal-ing their data from the registry office.

Two of the accused are BA pass whilethe third is a student of ITI.

According to ADCP (Crime) DeepakBhuker, during investigation on an FIRlodged with the Govind Nagar policeunder the Information Technology Act,three persons were arrested after tracingtheir mobile phone and bank accountnumbers.

They were identified as ShivamKumar and Abhay Pandey of Sagra vil-lage in Fatehpur, and Saurabh of Nimdhavillage of Sajeti. Shivam is the leader ofthe gang.

Police recovered Rs1,04,000 cash, 43thumb biometric plastic, three PANcards, three Arogya cards, seven Aadhaarcards, seven Paytm cards, 16 debit cards,36 Fino payment bank cards, six pass-books, seven cheque books, six mobilephones, three laptops, one printer and

biometric fingerprint scanner. The ADCPsaid the accused used to steal data of peo-ple by hacking the website of the registryoffice. With the help of a biometric scan-ner, the accused used to prepare fakeAadhaar, PAN cards and rubber stamps.Thereafter, they used to withdraw moneyfrom the bank accounts of targeted cus-tomers by enrolling themselves as bank-ing correspondents. The ADCP said abanking correspondent was authorised toverify one's Aadhaar card and pay up toRs 10,000.

So far, fraudulent withdrawal ofaround Rs 50 lakh from bankaccounts had come to the fore andinvestigations were on in the matter, theADCP said.

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The Kalyanpur police have worked outa purse-snatching case with the

arrest of two minors on Sunday.The police recovered a part of the

looted cash and valuables from theaccused and also the scooty used by themin committing the crime.

It may be recalled that on Thursday,miscreants had snatched the purse of awoman in Awas Vikas Colony nearKDMA school in Kalyanpur. The pursecontained Rs 5,000 cash and goldeneartops. Out of the looted cash, policerecovered Rs 1,600 from the accused.

Addressing media persons, DCP(West) Sanjiv Tyagi said when HarishKumar Dwivedi of Satyam Vihar wasgoing to attend some work with hismother on a Bullet motorcycle onThursday, two teenagers on a scootysnatched the purse from his mother. Thevictims had identified the miscreants inCCTV footage and thereafter both werearrested from their New Ashok Nagarhouse in Kalyanpur.

As the accused were minors, theywere sent to juvenile probation house, theDCP said.

The police team which worked outthe case comprised SHO Veer Singh,Inspector Sudhakar Singh, Sub-

Inspectors Chhatrapal Singh, DeviSharan Singh, Vikas Gupta, head consta-bles Lalit Kumar Yadav and ManojKumar Yadav, and constables Manpreet,Ankit Kumar, Sanjay Kumar andMunnalal.

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A legal literacy camp was organisedby the District Legal Service Authority(DLSA) for the inmates inside the dis-trict jail on Friday. DLSA SecretaryAnshu Shukla said the camp wasorganised in compliance withthe directives of District Judge RPSingh. He apprised the inmates of theirrights and threw light on many othertopics.

The prison inmates were informedthat in the absence of any counsel torepresent on their behalf in the court,they could write to the DLSA throughthe jail superintendent to get a lawyer.Activist RK Jaiswal, the jail superinten-dent and other officials were present inthe camp.

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will be organised on July 10. In abid to make the Lok Adalat a grand suc-cess, a meeting of the District LegalServices Authority was held underthe chairmanship of National LokAdalat Nodal Officer Prabhakar Rao onFriday.

The nodal officer directed themembers to issue notices and summonsfor speedy disposal of the cases. He alsoasked the judicial officers to dispose ofthe maximum number of cases in theNational Lok Adalat by following thestrict Covid protocol.

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The Jayant Project ofNorthern Coalfields

Limited (NCL), a Miniratnacompany of the Government ofIndia, once again distributedcompensation of about Rs 3.06crore to 62 land-holders ofMedhauli village.

General Manager of JayantArea RB Prasad handed overthe compensation cheques toall the land-holders. On theoccasion the General

Manager, Jayant, heard theproblems of the local peopleof Medhauli village and gave

an assurance to them for mak-ing all possible efforts for theirspeedy redressal.

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The railway administrationwill for the convenience of

passengers run the 02099/02100 Pune-Lucknow Jn-Puneweekly superfast special trainfrom Pune from July 6 toOctober 26 on every Tuesdayand from Lucknow Jn from July7 to October 27 on everyWednesday for 17 trips till2021. All coaches in thesetrains will be of reserved classand the passengers travelling inthem will have to follow theCovid-19 prevention guide-lines, Chief Public RelationsOfficer (CPRO) Pankaj KumarSingh said.

PUNE-LUCKNOW JN SFWEEKLY: The 02099 Pune-Lucknow Junction weeklysuperfast special train departfrom Pune at 11.30 hrs, fromDaund Chord Line at 12.25 hrs,from Kopargaon at 16.15 hrs,from Manmad at 17.25 hrs,from Bhusaval at 19.50 hrs,from Khandwa at 23.10 hrs,from Itarsi on the second day

at 02.00 hrs, from Bhopal at03.45 hrs, from Bina at 05.35hrs, from Jhansi at 07.55 hrs,from Orai at 09.10 hrs, fromKanpur Central at 11.35 hrsand reach Lucknow Junction at13.15 hrs.

LUCKNOW JN – PUNEWEEKLY SPECIAL: In thereturn journey the 02100Lucknow Junction – Puneweekly superfast special trainwill leave Lucknow Jn at 16.20hrs, from Kanpur Central at17.55 hrs, from Orai at 19.35hrs, from Jhansi at 21.40 hrs,second day from Bina at 01.05hrs, from Bhopal at 03.05 hrs,from Itarsi at 04.40 hrs. fromKhandwa at 07.20 hrs, fromBhusaval at 09.10 hrs, fromManmad at 12.00 hrs, fromKopargaon at 12.55 hrs, fromDaund Chord Line at 17.00 hrs.and will reach Pune at 18.00hrs. A total of 22 coaches,including two of SLRD, two ofgeneral second class, 11 ofsleeper class, four of air-condi-tioned (AC) third class andone of air-conditioned second

class will be attached in thetrain.

Meanwhile for the conve-nience of the passengers therestoration of the followingunreserved express specialtrains will be done by the rail-way administration from June29 till further advice, CPRO PKSingh said.

BAREILLY CITY -PILIBHIT SPL: The 05339Bareilly City - Pilibhit unre-served express special trainwill be restored from June 29,

PILIBHIT - BAREILLYCITY UNRESERVED SPL:The 05340 Pilibhit - BareillyCity unreserved express specialtrain will be restored fromJune 29.

PILIBHIT-TANAKPUREXPRESS: The 05341 Pilibhit-Tanakpur unreserved expressspecial train will be restoredfrom June 29.

TANAKPUR - PILIBHITEXPRESS: The 05342Tanakpur - Pilibhit unreservedexpress special train will berestored from June 29.

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Additional Chief Secretary(ACS), Health, Amit

Mohan Prasad, on Saturdayinspected the divisional hos-pital regarding preparationsin view of the possibility ofthe third wave of Covid-19infection. In the evening heinspected divisional hospitaland became aware about thearrangements f rom SICKamal Kumar. Inspectingthe oxygen plant he told theSIC that the capacity was notadequate as per the bed. TheSIC apprised him that apartfrom the plant additionalarrangement through cylin-ders and concentraters werealso available. On the occa-sion the ACS inspected theL-2 hospital and said that hehad come to see the arrange-ments to face the possiblethird wave of Covid-19.About the doctors he said thegovernment was going to

recruit 3,600 specialist doc-tors, including the paediatri-cians. During the visit theACS was accompanied byChief Development Officer(CDO) Sri laxmi VS andAdditional Director HealthDr RP Pandey.

A R R E S T E D : K a t r aKotwali police arrested anaccused carrying a reward of�15,000 on his head onSaturday. According to areport Station House Officer(SHO) Katra KotwaliSwaminath Prasad duringroutine patrolling was tippedoff by an informer about thepresence of the accused nearBathua locality. Thereafterthe police raided the placeand arrested the accused whowas involved in severalcrimes. The SHO was himselfinvestigating a case whichwas registered under theGangster Act. As the criminalremained at large since thecase was registered the

Superintendent of Police (SP)had declared a reward on hishead for his arrest.

The accused was identi-fied as Arpit Yadav, a residentof Mavaiya village underChilh police station. As perthe police, cases had been reg-istered against the accused indifferent police stations too.

MAN RUN OVER BYTRAIN: In a tragic incident,an aged man was run over bya train under Katra Kotwalipolice station here recently.According to a reportreceived here, Sajid Ali (65),a resident of Sankatha PrasadKi Gali Sabari under KatraKotwali police station, wascrossing the railway track atSabari gate when he was runover by the train. On gettinginformation about the inci-dent the area police reachedthe spot and took the body ofthe deceased into custody forcompleting the necessarylegal formalities.

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The on-spot Covid-19 vacci-nation of porters, vendors

besides the contractual work-ers working at GorakhpurJunction railway station andtheir family members willbegin from June 29 (from 10.00am to 03.00 pm) at DieselLobby here. Under it 150 per-sons will be vaccinated daily.Besides, Covid-19 vaccinationawareness programme will also

be organised on June 29 at10.00 hrs in Diesel Lobby,Gorakhpur, Chief PublicRelations Officer (CPRO)Pankaj Kumar Singh said.

Vaccination will be doneon Monday, Wednesday andFriday of those in the agegroup of 18 to 44 years and onTuesday, Thursday andSaturday of those above 45years of age. In order to ensure100 per cent vaccination ofemployees, all the departments

have been requested to preparea department-wise list andsend the railway personnel tothe vaccination centre so thatthe work of vaccination of allthe employees can be complet-ed in a phased manner.However, the vaccination pro-gram in Lalit Narayan MishraRailway Hospital, MechanicalWorkshop and Railway HealthUnit, Gorakhpur Cantonment,will continue as before, theCPRO added.

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Northern Coalfields Limited(NCL), Kakri area, under

Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR), distributed nutritious

food in four Anganwadi centersof Rehta gram panchayat withthe help of Anganwadi work-ers. In the distribution pro-gramme organised keeping theCovid protocol in mind, nutri-tious food was distributed forpregnant women, mothers andnewborn babies of the village.On the occasion Staff Officer(Personnel) SK Shah and nodalofficer (CSR) Abhay Kumar

Singh were present During the programme the

people present were advised toget themselves vaccinatedagainst Covid-19, wash theirhands thoroughly with soap,

apply mask and follow socialdistancing guidelines.

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Limited (NCL), a Miniratnacompany of the Government ofIndia, under Corporate SocialResponsibility (CSR) organ-ised a camp for distribution ofassistive articles and equip-ment for Divyangjans at Nehru

Shatabdi Chikitsalya (NSC)recently. Assistive devices likemotorised tricycles, smartcanes, hearing aids besidesprostheses at a cost of Rs 50lakh were provided to as manyas 233 Divyangjans during thecamp. Along with it informa-tion was given by the expertsfor proper use and mainte-nance of assistive devices andprosthesis. Following Covidprotocol Singrauli MP RitiPathak, Singrauli MLARamlallu Vaish, Devsar MLASubhash Ramcharit Verma,Singrauli Collector RajeevRanjan Meena, CMS, NCL,Dr SK Bhowal, Chief Manager(Personnel), NSC RameshSingh and other dignitarieswere present. Notably NCL, incollaboration with anotherGovernment of India under-taking, Artificial LimbsManufacturing Corporation ofIndia (ALIMCO), had identi-fied 233 Divyanjans inSingrauli and Sonbhadra dis-tricts for distribution of pros-thesis and equipment. ALIM-CO and district administrationhad a special contribution inorganising the camp.

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It turned out to be a Sunday with adifference in Madras Regimental

Centre, Wellington, the IndianArmy’s prime camp atop Nilgiris, inthe Western Ghats. Officers andmen paid rich tributes to the mem-ory of Field Marshal SamManekshaw, the legendary com-mander of the Indian Army who wasalso the country’s first Field Marshal.

Field Marshal Sam HormusjiFramji Jamshedji Maekshaw, SamManekshaw to friends and colleague,breathed his last on this day in 2008at Nilgiris and he was cremated withfull military honours in the ParseeCemetery near the military estab-lishment.

Sam Manekshaw had chosenNilgiri as his native town to spend hispost-retirement life. He had built acastle (Stavka) with his own planningand design atop the Blue Mountainoverlooking the hillock and valleys.The Sunbeam Rapier car lies in theporch of Stavka, expecting its mas-

ter to take it out anytime forma drive.The Field Marshal driving around theSunbeam Rapier was one of the reg-ular sites in Wellington even in early2000.

Amidst the sounding of bugles,wreaths were laid at the tomb onbehalf of the Chief of Defence Staff,the three Service Chiefs, the StationCommander and the Commandantof the elite Defence Services StaffCollege, where the Field Marshal wasthe commandant for many years. Theentire establishement had been dec-orated with the military colourswhich were of special liking to SamManekshaw.

The year 2021 turned out to bethe Golden Jubilee year of India’s vic-tory over Pakistan of the 1971 warthat led to the formation ofBangladesh. Filed MarshalManekshaw was India’s chief of armystaff who planned and executed theoffense and defence strategies of thecountry against Pakistan, who hadunleashed series of attacks againstIndia.

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Hours after bomb attacks onJammu Air base, Congress

leader of Lok Sabha AdhirChowdhury on Sundayslammed the UnionGovernment and Amit Shahfor failing to provide a fool-proof security system that theHome Minister had promisedtwo years ago apparently dur-ing abrogating Article 370 andspecial status for Jammu &Kashmir.

“We saw how the Centreand Home Minister Amit Shahproudly assured the entirenation about bringing securi-ty and peace in Jammu &Kashmir … He said that therewould be no terror incident ordrug racket … he said thatpeace will return in these areas… but after two years there isno improvement in the groundsituation as reports of securitybreaches are coming in everyday … there are terror attacks,drugs and explosives are beingsmuggled … so where ispeace… want peace be restored

as promised … we want peacebe restored at the earliest,”Chowdhury said.

Demanding a thoroughprobe into the incidentChowdhury said that theGovernment should concen-trate on making arrangementson the ground instead of talk-ing big and loud in public.

Speaking on the Centre’soutreach programme to Jammu& Kashmir leadershipChowdhury had earlier saidthat he would not jump to formany conclusion about PrimeMinister Narendra Modi’s talkswith Jammu & Kashmir lead-ers last week.

He said that he had no faithin the BJP Government’s abil-ity to bring peace and instillconfidence among the people.

“I don't have any great expec-tation from it. Two years ago,they had promised that anyIndian citizen can reside in theunion territory. Did that hap-pen? Brahmins (Kashmiri pan-dits), till date, are scared toreturn to the Valley. Also, ter-rorist activities continueunabated,” the senior Congressleader who is also the BengalPradesh Congress presidentsaid.

Reminding how manyleaders who were invited to thePrime Minister’s meeting wereplaced under house arrest afterArticle 370 was repealed. “Nowthe leaders who were onceequated with secessionists arebrought out of jail for talks,” hesaid.

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Apparently taking lessons from theMukul Roy episode the BJP is

planning a bigger role for itsOpposition Leader Suvendu Adhikariwho had crossed over to the saffronparty from the Trinamool Congressmonths before the Assemblyelections.

“The BJP leadership is planning toafford Suvendu Adhikari a statusequal to that of State president DilipGhosh … this will be made officialafter a party meeting next week,” asenior leader said adding he will nowbe given a greater say and control overthe party affairs.

Before quitting the outfit, Roy, aformer national vice president of theBJP, had expressed dissatisfactionabout his being ignored in the party.His supporters openly claimed thatdespite playing a big role in the BJP’sgood show in the 2019 general elec-tions when the BJP got 18 seats andlost a couple of more seats by a waferthin margin Roy was increasinglypushed to a corner in the party.

Meanwhile, with Roy exiting theBJP its lesser leaders and workers con-tinued to quit the outfit in various dis-tricts of Bengal.

While at least 3,000 BJP men and38 local leaders from Asansol in WestBurdwan district on Sunday joined theTrinamool Congress accusing the saf-fron leadership of “deviating from its

principles,” many more party men quitthe outfit in Nadia district.

“I had been a BJP member sincethe year 2000 … I joined the partythen with great hopes and relied on itsprinciples but now things havechanged … The BJP has become athoroughly corporatised party wheremoney speaks,” said one of the blockleaders who joined the TMC onSunday alleging how tickets were soldbefore the elections for lakhs.

“� six lakh was demanded for giv-ing nomination ticket in the State elec-tions … there were many instances ofsuch sale of tickets taking place,” theleader said adding further that theparty also made an unwritten rule notto give tickets to no-Bengali candi-dates. “It was strange that the non-Bengali candidates were ignored dur-ing distribution of tickets … It wasstrange that the non-Bengali voterswould be expected to cast their votesfor the BJP but when it would cometo distribution of tickets they would beignored … this is a simple use andthrow politics … so we thought it bet-ter to join the TMC where MamataBanerjee does not go back on herworks.”

However, refuting his statementsdistrict BJP president Laxman Ghoruisaid “BJP never took money for tick-ets … it can be proved by the fact thata daily-wager’s wife was given ticket atSaltora in Bankura and she won theseat from there.”

Kolkata: A NHRC committee, which wasconstituted on the direction of the CalcuttaHigh Court to look into allegations ofhuman rights violations in the wake of post-poll violence in West Bengal, would receiverepresentations from complainants startingSunday, an official said.

The members of the committee wouldmeet the victims/complainants from 4 pmon Sunday and 10 am on Monday at theStaff Officer Mess of the CRPF at Salt Lake,he said.

The panel members and several otherteams of the National Human RightsCommission “have been touring variousplaces of West Bengal and enquiring intothe veracity of these allegations,” the offi-cial said. A five-judge bench of the highcourt had on June 18 directed the chair-person of NHRC to constitute a commit-tee to examine all cases with regard toalleged human rights violations in the stateas a result of post-poll violence.

The bench had sought a comprehen-sive report about the present situation.

It had on June 21 dismissed a prayer ofthe West Bengal government for recallingthe order passed in respect of PILs alleg-ing displacement of people from their res-idences, physical assault, destruction ofproperty and ransacking of places of busi-ness owing to post-poll violence in the State. PTI

Amaravati: The Andhra PradeshGovernment has come under severecriticism from the Opposition for itsclaims of having filled up more thansix lakh job vacancies in differentGovernment departments, in the lasttwo years.

Political parties including the TDPhave also accused the Jagan MohanReddy-led dispensation of “cheating”unemployed youth in the State byreleasing an employment calendar tofill just 10,000 positions, after makingtall promises to give lakhs of jobsbefore coming to power.

On June 18, Jagan had released the'job calendar,' fixing the schedule forrecruitment of 10,143 posts over thenext nine months.

During the event, the CM claimedthat 6,03,756 jobs were created by hisGovernment in the last twoyears.

Also, he said 51,387 posts in thenewly created Public Transport depart-ment were filled while it was nothingbut absorption of the State RoadTransport Corporation employees intothe government.

Through the AP Public ServiceCommission, 2,475 regular posts werefilled but the process began during theprevious TDP regime in 2017-18.PTI

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From Page 1oldest woman in the village

is given the status of mother andthe oldest man is given the sta-tus of father, irrespective of casteor community. Today, I feelhappy that this tradition of giv-ing respect to the elders in ourfamily is still continuing,” Kovindsaid. He said that the scent of soilof the village and the memoriesof its residents always remainetched in his heart. “For meParaunkh is not only a village, itis my ‘maatribhoomi’ (mother-land) from where I get inspira-tion to serve the country,” Kovindsaid. “This inspiration has mademe reach from high court to theSupreme Court to the RajyaSabha. From the Rajya Sabha, Imoved to the Raj Bhavan andfrom there to the RashtrapatiBhavan,” the president said.

The president said all peopleare from equal backgrounds.“There have been a number ofprime ministers from UP, but thisis the first time that the state hasgiven a president to the country.Now, the path for the people ofUP to become president hasalso opened up,” he said.

The president said that anattempt is being made to promotefitness during the Covid period.“Get yourself vaccinated andinspire others as well. I will per-sonally arrange for villagers to seethe Rashtrapati Bhavan. Youpeople can come and see it,” hesaid. He praised Uttar PradeshGovernor Anandiben Patel andChief Minister Yogi Adityanathfor taking effective steps to han-dle COVID-19 pandemic in thestate. ‘Pucca’ houses have beenbuilt in the village and it is niceto see the Rohaniya market, the

president said, adding that hemisses his classmates JaswantSingh, Chandrabhan Singh,Dashrath Singh.

Kovind on Sunday morningreached Paraunkh village wherehe was welcomed by Patel, andAdityanath. He took a round ofthe village along with them.Kovind, along with his wife anddaughter, also visited the PathriDevi temple where they offeredprayers. While delivering a wel-come speech, the governor saidthat the president did a lot ofwork for the Scheduled Castesand always stayed away from dis-putes. He is quite knowledgeableabout parliamentary traditionsand has struggled for down-trodden people all his life. He hasdone a lot of work for the devel-opment of the area in tribal vil-lages, she added. On the occasion,Adityanath said, “India’s ancienttraditions lead us onwards withself-reliance and discipline, andgive us a specific identity in theworld. It is said that there is nosubstitute for a mother andmotherland, I have also come tothis village for the first time.”

“Our current president is aresident of Kanpur Dehat andPrime Minister Narendra Modi’sparliamentary seat is Varanasi. Itis our honour that we have madesome plans for the developmentof president’s ancestral village,”Adityanath said and announcedthat a medical college will be con-structed in Kanpur Dehat.

On Monday, the presidentwill board a train at KanpurCentral railway station to reachLucknow for his two-day visit tothe state capital. On June 29, hewill return to New Delhi on aspecial flight.

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As Delta Plus cases continue to risewith 12 States in India reporting

51 cases, the head of India’s coron-avirus working group said that theDelta Plus variant of Covid-19 hasgreater affinity for lung tissues as com-pared to other strains, but it does notmean that it will cause severe diseaseor is more transmissible.

Talking about the new variant ofcoronavirus identified on June 11,chairman of Covid-19 Working Groupof the National Technical AdvisoryGroup on Immunisation (NTAGI) DrNK Arora said it has been found thatthe Delta Plus variant has more affin-ity for lung tissues as compared toother strains of the virus, but clarifiedthat it does not mean the variant willcause more severe disease or is moretransmissible.

“Delta Plus has greater affinity forthe mucosal lining in the lungs. It ishigher compared to other variants, butif it causes damage or not is not clearyet. It also does not mean that this vari-ant will cause more severe disease orit is more transmissible,” Arora toldPTI in an interview.

Arora said the impact of the DeltaPlus strain will become clear only asmore cases are identified but it appearsthat the disease is generally mild in allthose who have got either a single ordouble dose of the vaccine.

“We need to keep a very closewatch and look at its spread so that itwill give us transmission efficiency,” he

said. Arora said the number of casesidentified of the Delta Plus variant maybe more as there may be many asymp-tomatic individuals also — those whodo not have any Covid-19 symptomsbut they are carrying the virus and spreading it.

“But the important point is thatour genomic surveillance componenthas picked it up rightly and earlyenough. Now that States have alreadybeen told that it is a variant of concernand it requires action which meansthat several States have already start-ed making micro plans for the districtswhere the virus is identified so that thespread can be contained. Obviouslyvaccination will have to be increasedin these districts,” he said.

Responding to a question if the

Delta plus variant can trigger the thirdwave of coronavirus, Arora said it isdifficult to assess that as of now.“Waves are linked to new variants ornew mutations so there is a possibili-ty as this is a new variant, but whetherit will lead to a third wave it is diffi-cult to answer as it will depend upontwo or three things,” he said.

“The first thing is we had a fero-cious second wave in the last threemonths and it is still going on, we areseeing for the last 8-10 days the num-ber of cases are stuck at 50,000, whileat some places cases continue to comeso that wave has not settled down,” hesaid.

He said the second wave willinfluence the community’s response toanother variant and the third wave willdepend upon what proportion of thepopulation got infected in the secondwave. “If a large proportion is infect-ed then in the next wave people candevelop a common cold like illness butmay not develop a serious or fatal ill-ness,” he said.

“Secondly, another thing that isimportant is vaccination - the rapidi-ty with which we vaccinate...Evensingle dose is effective and the way weare planning, if we rapidly immunisethen possibility of third wave becomesvery less because vaccine plus infectionplus Covid appropriate behaviour willsave us from next wave, mitigate thenext wave and the third wave will notbe able to cause the damage as wascaused in the first two waves,” headded.

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The Delta variant of theCoronavirus has been found

to be a major factor for break-through infections — Covid infec-tion in persons who have receivedone or both doses of the vaccine.This was found among healthcareworkers at the Institute of Liverand Biliary Sciences (ILBS) inSouth Delhi.

Vaccination of the hospital’s1,800 employees began onJanuary 16, the first day of India’sinoculation campaign, and byApril-end ILBS had adminis-tered the jab to nearly 1,600.Despite the Covishield injection,hospital officials said, nearly 10per cent of the staff tested posi-tive for the infection.

The infection rate was sig-nificantly higher in doctors andnurses than in other hospitalstaff, possibly due to higher expo-sure. The worrisome observationhas come amid warnings fromexperts, including from the WorldHealth Organisation who havemaintained that vaccination alongwith safety measures are necessarywhen it comes to fighting theDelta and Delta Plus coronavirusvariants.

“Vaccination plus masks,because just a vaccine is notenough with ‘Delta’. We need tomake an effort over a short peri-od of time, otherwise there wouldbe a lockdown,” said Melita

Vujnovic, WHO representative toRussia, on a news channel.

When a genomic analysis ofthe swab samples of the infect-ed healthcare workers was com-pleted recently by Dr RajeshPandey and Dr Anurag Agarwalat the Institute of Genomics andIntegrative Biology (IGIB), theyfound that 70 per cent of theinfections were caused by theDelta variant (B.1.617.2), a vari-ant of concern that became thepredominant cause of Covidcases in Delhi from Marchonwards.

Before that, Alpha andKappa variants of the virus werethe dominant strains.

Doctors caution that thestudy shows that the variants canbreach the antibodies generatedby the vaccines and the vaccinescurrently being administeredmay not offer sufficient protec-tion against new mutant strains.

It was also found that infec-tion in the Delta variant patientswas more severe and the virusremained in the infected subjectsfor longer periods.

Unvaccinated and singledose recipients had a higher riskof infection compared with thosewho had received both the doses,said Dr Pratibha Kale, associateprofessor, department of micro-biology, ILBS. She added thatfully vaccinated staff were betterprotected with higher humoralimmune response.

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From Page 1The central police think

tank called the Bureau ofPol ice Research andDevelopment (BPRD) hasalso held a few multi-stake-holder national conferenceson the subject to find out themost effective methods, bothtechnology-wise and mone-tarily, to jam and neutralisethese threats.

“We are still to get themost suitable technology tothwart armed drones alongthe border. The interceptionsmade till now has beenbecause of the vigilance oftroops on duty,” a senior BSFofficer said.

He said multiple inci-dents of arms and drugs car-rying drones and quad-copters being flown fromPakistan into the Indian sidein Jammu and Punjab havebeen noticed in the last fewyears and all of them havebeen thwarted.

However, a senior homeministry officer said that

there have been incidentswhen drones were used forsur vei l lance of Indian border assets and positions.But as soon as they were spotted and react ion mounted, the floaters rushedback to base where either terroristelements or Pakistan militarysoldiers could be handlingthe remote, the officer said.

Both the InternationalBorder and the Line ofControl (LoC) region alongPakistan have had their shareof such incidents which havebeen flagged by the Army.Deep inside the country, thetarmac and the city-side ofcivil airports are vulnerablewhen it comes to droppingbombs or surveillance bydrones.

A proper standard oper-ating procedure (SOP) is inthe making with the IAF sup-posed to be the first respon-der and the snipers of theCISF and the commandoforce, National Security

Guard (NSG), desired to chipin case

of an emergent threat.“We need a comprehen-

sive plan and plan of actionto check the menace ofdrones. Every agency, be it atthe borders or in cities or air-ports, needs to have specificresponsibility along withrequired technology tools,” asenior officer in the securityestablishment said.

A data estimation studyconducted by multiple secu-rity agencies in 2019 statedthat over six lakh unregulat-ed drones, of various sizesand capacities, are present inthe country and any of themcan be used for launching anefarious act by disruptiveelements.

The agencies are lookingat specific anti-drone tech-niques like sky fence, dronegun, ATHENA, drone catch-er and Skywall 100 to inter-cept and immobil ise suspicious and lethal remote-controlled aerial platforms.

From Page 1The review is likely to

take place within the next twoto three days, they said.

Meanwhile, Western AirCommand chief Air MarshalVivek Ram Chaudhari trav-elled to Jammu to take stockof the situation. Rajnath ,who is on a three-day visit to Ladakh, spoke to IAFVice Chief Air Marsha HSArora.

On the use of drones totarget the helicopters, theysaid the hangars at the

Jammu base are located farfrom the outermost perime-ter wall.

Therefore, it makes itvery difficult for the terror-ists to launch an assault fromthe ground as they will haveto face many layers of thedefence mechanism, includ-ing barbed wires and closecircuit televisions (CCTVs),they said.

After the Pathankot air-base attack, a committeeheaded by Lieutenant-General Philip Campose

(Retired) reviewed the secu-rity set-up of military instal-lations, including airbases ofthe IAF and the Navy besidesArmy camps.

Besides installation ofCCTVs and other ultra-mod-ern gadgets to secure thesensitive installations, theCampose Committee alsorecommended an periodicaudit of the security at theairbases and Army camps.

The Campose panel ,which submitted its report tothen Defence Minister

Manohar Parrikar in mid-May of 2016, undertook acomprehensive audit andformulated upgraded stan-dard operating procedures(SOPs) for all Defence instal-lations to prevent fidayeenattacks.

The recommendationsrange from the urgent need toinstall modern “access-con-trol, perimeter security-cum-intrusion detection systems”to providing new weapons,bullet-proof jackets andnight-vision devices to per-

sonnel guarding the bases.Defence officials say sev-

eral steps are being taken toaddress the issues raised inthe report, which includesfunds to upgrade security atthe bases. An over Rs 8,000-crore security plan for the 54major airbases, for instance,was finalised.

A proposal to raise a spe-cial unit of 20,000 retired butphysically fit soldiers wasalso mooted for guarding theDefence installations. It wasalso under active considera-

tion of the Government. The proposed unit will be

part of the Defence ServiceCorps (DSC), which securesDefence establishments allover the country.

The CamposeCommittee recommendedmaking available better ver-sions of AK-47 rifles insteadof self-loading rifles (SlR) tothe DSC teams besides fast-moving vehicles, bullet proofjackets and night visiondevices. The DSC recruitsretired Services personnel.

From Page 1According to official

sources, the first explosiontook place around 1.40 a.m andthe second at 1.46 a.m.

One of the blasts causedminor damage to the roof of abuilding while the otherexploded in an open area.There was no damage to anyequipment, the IAF said.

An investigation into thematter is in progress alongwith civil agencies, it added.

Director General of Jammuand Kashmir (J&K) PoliceDilbagh Singh labeled it a “ter-ror attack.” He also confirmedthat the payload was droppedusing drones.

“Drones with payloadwere used in both the blasts atthe Jammu airfield,” he said.

The attack on the vital AirForce Station coincided withthe three-day-long visit ofDefence Minister RajnathSingh and Army Chief GeneralMM Naravane to Ladakhwhere they are expected toreview India’s operational

readiness and to interact withtroops in the backdrop of a pro-longed stand-off with China.

Five years ago, on January2, 2016 the Pathankot AirForce base had also comeunder terror attack in whichseven security personnel werekilled in action.

The J&K Police registereda First Information Report(FIR) under the UnlawfulActivities (Prevention) Act afterthe attack. FIR NO 170/2021u/s 3/4 explosive act,13/16/18/23 ULA 120 B IPCact registered at PS Satwari,Jammu.

Meanwhile, J&K Policeaverted another tragedy byrecovering an IED from thecustody of a local residentfrom Banihal.

“This IED was received byLeT (Lashkar-e-Taiba) opera-tives and was to be planted atsome crowded place,” the DGPsaid. The IED with 5/6 kgexplosives was found in theNarwal area of Jammu fromNadeem Ul Haq, a 22-year-old

resident of Banihal, who hasbeen arrested, he added.

During the day, a high-level IAF investigation teamaccompanied by the officers ofthe National InvestigationAgency (NIA), NSG comman-dos, special forces, local policeauthorities, landed in Jammu togather the crucial forensic evi-dence to nail the perpetratorsbehind the attack.

Senior Air Force officersfrom the Western Commandwere also camping in Jammu tosupervise the investigations.

To begin with, the secu-rity forces were trying toascertain the flight path of thetwo drones that crashed intothe high-security Indian AirForce station. . Soon after theattack, a high alert was alsosounded a long theInternational Border acrossthe Jammu frontier to preventrepeat of such strikes.

Security of vital Defenceinstallations was also beefed upand patrolling in and aroundthese areas was enhanced.

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Contrary to AIIMS DirectorRandeep Guleria’s asser-

tions a few days ago about thethird wave of Covid-19 comingin just 6-8 weeks, an ICMRstudy has said that it is likely tocome late, maybe after 6-8months.

NK Arora, the chief of theCentre’s Covid-19 workinggroup of the National TechnicalAdvisory Group onImmunisation (NTAGI), onSunday said that the thirdwave of coronavirus could bedelayed until December thisyear.

Quoting the ICMR studyin this regard, Dr Arora said,“We’ve window period of 6-8months to immunise every-body in the country. In thecoming days, our target is toadminister 1 crore doses everyday.”

The Delta Plus new variantof Covid-19, which has creat-ed fresh concerns across thecountry, cannot be yet linked toa third wave of the pandemic,Dr Arora said.

However, he asserted thatas variants are linked to newwaves, the possibility cannot bedismissed at all.

“Waves are linked to newvariants or new mutations sothere is a possibility as this is anew variant, but whether it willlead to a third wave it is diffi-cult to answer as it will dependupon two or three things,” DrArora added.

India’s first wave ofSARSCoV-2 infection began inlate January last year with apeak attained in mid-September. This phase was rel-atively mild compared to thesecond wave that followed,from mid-February 2021onwards, exhibiting a moreexplosive spread across thenation.

A major factor driving thissecond wave is the emergenceof more infectious variants ofSARS-CoV-2, principallyB.1.1.7 (Alpha variant) andB.1.617.2 (Delta variant), ofwhich the latter has played adominant role in the last fewmonths.

Third waves have emergedin other countries such as theUK and the USA and are dri-ven by a range of factors, thestudy adds.

The results suggest that athird wave, if it should occur,is unlikely to be as severe as thesecond wave, given the extentof spread that has already takenplace in India, it said.

AIIMS Chief Dr Guleria onSaturday had, however, saidIndia could see a third wave ofcoronavirus in six to eightweeks if Covid-appropriatebehaviour is not followed andcrowding is not prevented.

He said that as many stateshave eased Covid-relatedrestrictions, it was also neces-sary for stricter surveillanceand area-specific lockdowns incase of a significant surge.“Covid-appropriate behaviourneeds to be followed aggres-

sively until a big chunk of thepopulation is vaccinated.

“If Covid-appropriate

behaviour is not followed, thethird wave can happen in six toeight weeks. We need to work

aggressively to prevent anoth-er large wave till vaccinationkicks in,” Guleria said.

New Delhi: Prime MinisterNarendra Modi on Sundaypointed towards the strength-ening of special strategic andglobal partnership with Japan.

Informing about the Japanplus mechanism in the PrimeMinister’s Office (PMO), thePrime Minister elaborated onhis common understandingwith the current JapanesePrime Minister YoshihideSugathat in this period ofCovid pandemic when India-Japan friendship has becomeeven more important for glob-al stability and prosperity.

“Current challengesdemand that our friendshipand partnership gets evendeeper,” stressed the PrimeMinister while inaugurating aZen Garden and KaizenAcademy at AMA,Ahmedabad via video confer-ence.

Modi also called for furtherspread of Kaizen and Japanesework culture in India andasked for more focus on busi-ness interaction between Indiaand Japan.

Terming the dedication ofthe Zen Garden and KaizenAcademy, as a symbol of easeand modernity of India-Japanrelationship, the PrimeMinister thanked leaders ofHyogo Prefecture specially theGovernor Toshizo Ido andHyogo International associa-tion for their contribution inthe establishment of the ZenGarden and Kaizen Academy.

He also praised Indo-Japan

Friendship Association ofGujarat for giving new energyto India-Japan relations.

Pointing to the similaritiesbetween ‘Zen’ and Indian‘Dhyan’, the Prime Ministerdwelled on the emphasis oninner peace along with outerprogress and growth in the twocultures.

Indians will f ind theglimpse of the same peace,poise and simplicity in this Zengarden, which they experi-enced in Yoga through theages.

Buddha gave this ‘Dhyan’this enlightenment to theworld, said the Prime Minister.Similarly, he highlighted bothexternal and internal meaningsof Kaizen which not onlyemphasizes ‘improvement’ but‘continuous improvement’.

The Prime Minister,recalled that, as Chief Minister,he implemented Kaizen inGujarat administration. “It wasintroduced in administrativetraining in Gujarat in 2004 anda special training camp wasorganized for the top civil ser-

vants in 2005. Continuousimprovement was reflected inrefinement of processes, lead-ing to positive impact on gov-ernance.”

Continuing with theimportance of governance innational progress, the PrimeMinister informed that, afterbecoming Prime Minister, hebrought Kaizen related experi-ence of Gujarat to PMO andother Central governmentdepartments.

This has led to simplifica-tion of the processes and opti-mization of office space, saidModi. “Kaizen is being used inmany departments, institutionsand schemes of the CentralGovernment, said the PrimeMinister.”

The Prime Minister alsoexpressed desire to create amodel of schools in Gujaratbased on school system ofJapan. He underlined his appre-ciation of blend of modernityand moral values in the schoolsystem of Japan and remem-bered his visit to TaimeiElementary School in Tokyo.

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Citing the example of him-self and his mother, “who

is about hundred years old”and got vaccinated, PrimeMinister Narendra Modi onSunday asked people, partic-ularly those in rural India, toget inoculated by shedding‘vaccine hesitancy’ and “notbeing carried away byrumours”.

Speaking in his latestepisode of ‘Mann Ki Baat’ , thePrime Minister also spoke ofthe upcoming TokyoOlympics, the Indian partici-pants and the need to supportthem even as he rememberedthe late Indian OlympianMilkha Singh who diedrecently due to post-Covidcomplications.

The Prime Minister toldpeople that he and his moth-er have both taken the twodoses of vaccines and askedthem too to get vaccinated,cautioning them that thethreat of COVID-19 was stillaround. He asked people notto believe in rumours andtrust science and Indian sci-entists.

The PM pointed out thata record number of 86 lakhdoses, the highest in a singleday, were administered onJune 21 at the beginning of thenew phase of vaccinationunder which all adults arebeing given free jabs.

Modi also spoke to resi-dents of Dulariya village inBetul district of MadhyaPradesh and advised them to

take the COVID-19 vaccineamidst their reservationsabout the government’s vac-cination drive.

“The threat of COVID-19remains, and we have to focuson vaccination as well as fol-low COVID-19 protocols,” hesaid.

The Prime Ministershouted three-cheers for theIndian Olympic contingentand reminded that manyIndian sportspersons havemade it to the Olympic gamesthe hard way and despite hav-ing a poor economic back-ground.

He gave the example ofDeepika Kumari, the aceIndian archer from Ranchi,Jharkhand, being the daugh-ter of an auto-rickshaw driver.

“Every athlete who isgoing to Tokyo has workedhard. They are going there towin hearts. It must be ourendeavour to support ourteam and not put pressure onthe team,” said the PrimeMinister.

Though mainlyfocussing on containingCovid-19 by way of vacci-nation, the Prime Minister

also spoke of water conser-vation as the Monsoon isalready underway. He citedmany novel individualexperiments like digging ofpits or building mud wallsto conserve ground water.

Modi spoke to a cross-section of people in villagesand urged them to spreadthe right awareness aboutvaccines and how safe theyare for everyone.

Modi during his radioaddress read out a post of aChennai resident GuruPrasad who said that hehad brought out an e-bookcomprising all of PM’s com-ments on Tamil languageand Tamil Nadu in his‘mann ki baat’ episodes.Prasad requested the PM toupload the e-book on NaMoapp. Modi expressed happi-ness about Prasad’s letterand described Tamil as theoldest language of the worldof which everyone should beproud of.

Modi assured theChennai resident that his e-book would be uploadedon the NaMo app at the ear-liest.

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Ahead of the hearing onJune 30, the Centre has

filed an affidavit before theSupreme Court claiming thatit aims to receive deliveries of186-188 crore vaccine dosesby end of 2021 to inoculate theentire eligible population of93-94 crore people above theage of 18 years.

In its 380-page affidavitwith many documents on thevaccination policy and guide-lines and procedures, theCentre said it changed itspolicy on June 7 after consid-ering the request of 13 ChiefMinisters. Out of the 186-188crore doses, 51.6 crore doseswould be made available byJuly 31 and rest of the 135crore Covid vaccine doses willbe made available betweenAugust and December 2021,said the estimation given tothe apex court, which earliercame down heavily on theCentre’s “arbitrary” vaccina-tion policy.

As per the affidavit, thepurchase from Augustonwards will be 50 croreCovishield, 40 crore Covaxin,and 10 crore Russian-madeSputnik V vaccine. Another 30crore will be Bio E Sub unitvaccine while 5 crore will beZydus Cadila DNA vaccine,the affidavit filed by theGovernment said. However,both these vaccines are yet toget the approval. The Centresaid that the approval will hap-pen in near future. The affi-davit also said that betweenJanuary 2021 and July 31,2021, 51.6 crore vaccine doses

will be available. The Centre also said that

vaccination will get a boostwhen its attempts to procurevaccine brands like Pfizer,Johnson & Johnson, Modernaetc from abroad materialises.“Efforts are at an advancedstage. It is neither desirablenor possible to give compre-hensive details of these facts,”it said.

Giving details of expen-diture for purchase of vac-cines, the Centre said thataround 5803 crore ( exactfigure Rs.5802.825 crore)would be spent purchasingCovishield and Covaxin tillJuly 2021 stock.

In the first lot fromJanuary, Covishield was pur-chased for Rs.200 +GST perdose and Covaxin was pur-chased Rs.295 + GST perdose. Later from March, bothvaccines were purchased atRs.150 + GST per dose.Though price was not men-tioned, Centre said that 31.5lakh doses of Sputink have been received ason date.

The Centre said it

changed the vaccination strat-egy on June 7 followingrequests from 13 ChiefMinisters and several HealthMinisters highlighting prob-lems faced by the States inobtaining vaccines. TheCentre justified the role ofincluding private hospitals inthe vaccination saying that thetie-up with private playerswill enlarge the scope of vac-cination to prevent Covidpandemic.

To the question of theapex court on the digitaldivide and non-practicalnature of Cowin App regis-tration remote areas, theCentre said that now walk-in-registration has started byestablishing vaccinationcamps across the country butdoor to door vaccination isnot planned as there would beproblems in monitoring thevaccine recipients for sometime after vaccination.

The Centre said that near-to- home vaccination by estab-lishing vaccination centreswith walk-in-registration ispractical than a door-to-doorvaccination policy.

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Two doses of Covid-19 vac-cine are not enough to

develop antibodies in recipientsof organ transplants like heartand kidney, patients of chron-ic immunosuppression andauto-immune disorders,experts have said while stress-ing on giving a booster dose toenhance their immunityagainst the virus.

However, the patients inthe sector in India are at a lossas the COWIN portal does notallow slot facility for the thirdbooster at present. It has slotsfor only two doses.

Dr Rahul Bhargava,Director-Bone MarrowTransplant Program, FortisMemorial Research Institute,Gurgaon, makes a case for athird booster for such patients“as they don’t respond very wellto the vaccines because theirimmune system is suppressed”.

But there are now studiesthat are suggesting, at least inorgan transplants, if they get athird dose, their system may betriggered to produce protectiveantibodies, Dr Bhargava saidadding that it’s high time theGovernment update theCOWIN portal to allow suchpatients, who have taken twodoses of vaccines, to availbooster shot.

A recent study publishedthis week in the ‘Annals ofInternal Medicine’ has shownthat nearly half of organ trans-plant recipients failed to showany antibody response evenafter two doses of the Pfizer or

Moderna vaccine.And even in transplant

recipients who showed anantibody response to vacci-nation, that response wasoften more muted than inpeople with healthy immunesystems, said researchers fromJohns Hopkins School ofMedicine who tracked 30organ transplant recipientswho got a third dose of Covid-19 vaccines.

They found that one-thirdof the patients who previous-ly had no detectable antibod-ies showed an increase intheir antibody levels after athird dose.

And all of the patientswho previously showed lowlevels of antibodies after twovaccine doses showed highlevels of antibodies after theirthird dose.

“So for all involved, [theseare] encouraging findings thatwe might be able to ultimate-ly really reach protectiveimmunity in immunosup-pressed people,” said Dr DorrySegev, a transplant surgeon at

Johns Hopkins Medicine andan author of the study.

Similarly, yet anotherreport published in The NewEngland Journal of Medicinesaid that a weak response totwo doses of vaccine againstCovid-19 has been observedin recipients of organ trans-plant. However, administra-tion of a third dose of themRNA vaccine BNT162b2(Pfizer-BioNtech) to solid-organ transplant recipientssignificantly improved theimmunogenicity of the vac-cine, with no cases of Covid-19 reported in any of thepatients.

The researchers said if thefindings are replicated in larg-er studies, they may have impli-cations for some other types ofimmunocompromised patients.

In fact, in France, healthofficials already recommendthat severely immunocompro-mised patients, including organtransplant patients, dialysispatients, and others, receive athird dose of the Pfizer orModerna vaccine.

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With members of the legalfraternity creating con-

troversies, of late, by their actsof criticism of the judiciary,courts and judges among oth-ers, the Bar Council of India(BCI) has amended its Rulesstipulating that any statementmade by a lawyer which isindecent or derogatory, defam-atory, motivated, malicious ormischievous against any court,judge, State Bar Council or theBCI, would be a ground forsuspension or cancellation oflicence to practise law.

The new notification saysthat any derogatory or defam-atory comment of advocatepublished in print, electronic,social media would invite vio-lation and action by the BCI.

Two new provisions havebeen inserted in this regard inthe BCI Rules.

“An Advocate shall con-duct himself/herself as a gen-tleman/gentle lady in his/herday to day life and he/she shallnot do any unlawful act, he/sheshall not make any statement inthe Print, Electronic or SocialMedia, which is indecent orderogatory, defamatory ormotivated, malicious or mis-chievous against any Court orJudge or any member ofJudiciary, or against State BarCouncil or Bar Council ofIndia,” said the new rule.

“Any such act/conductshall amount to misconductand such Advocates would beliable to be proceeded withunder Sections 35 or 36 of the

Advocates’ Act, 1961,” it said.Section 35 prescribes pun-

ishment for misconduct whichcan be suspension from prac-tice or disqualification. Anywillful violation, disregard ordefiance of any resolution ororder of the State Bar Councilor Bar Council of India willalso be construed as miscon-duct, the amendment furthersaid.

The second provisioninserted was Section VA. It laysdown that no member of anyState Bar Council or of BarCouncil of India shall be per-mitted to publish anything orto make any statement orpress-release in print, elec-tronic or social media againstany resolution or order of con-cerned State Bar Council orBar Council of India or tomake/use any derogatory orabusive language/comment/s/word/s against the Bar Councilor its office-bearers or mem-bers. Violation of the samewould also result in suspensionor disqualification.

As per the four-pageGazette of India published onSaturday, criticising or attack-ing any decision of any StateBar Council or Bar Council ofIndia on public domain willalso amount to “misconduct”,which could attract disqualifi-cation or suspension.

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The Confederation of AllIndia Traders (CAIT) on

Sunday urged Prime MinisterNarendra Modi to ensure thatthere is no dilution in the draftof the e-commerce rules underany pressure of foreign-fundedonline firms. The CAIT said ithas been observed that voicesof terming the rules as stringentare being created.

A large number of foreignand domestic investors andother business entities, whohave either invested in variouse-commerce platforms or aredoing business with them, arealso said to be wary of certainproposed rules, including ‘fall-

back liability’, flash sales, ordeep discounting and datasharing.

Meanwhile, non-BJP ruledstates mostly have expressedapprehensions about the new e-commerce rules proposed bythe Ministry of ConsumerAffairs to check mis-sellingand fraudulent discounts asthey fear there could be a neg-ative impact on jobs and mar-ket access to small and medi-um enterprises.

“In the wake of expectedpressure tactics of foreign fund-ed e-commerce companiesagainst the draft of e-com-merce rules...(we urged) him(prime minister) to ensure thatno dilution is made in the draft

of e-commerce rules underany pressure,” CAIT said. Thedraft rules after examining thesuggestions and objectionsshould be notified without anyfurther delay, it added. Italleged that unethical and lawviolating business practices offoreign funded e-commercecompanies has forced closure ofa large number of shops in thecountry.

“Traders of India are notagainst e-commerce but are ofthe considered opinion that e-commerce is the most promis-ing business avenue of thefuture, and traders should alsoadopt it as a stream of theirbusiness besides conductingbusiness activities in their phys-

ical shops,” it said.Officials of the ministry

of consumer affairs statedthat non BJP ruled states planto suggest strong safeguardmeasures in the proposedrules to ensure that anychanges in the ConsumerProtection (E-Commerce)Rules, 2020 do not hampertheir economic growthengines and revenue collec-tions.

A senior official of a bignon-BJP-ruled state said thereis a view that the proposedrules can disturb the state’sbusiness ecosystem, especial-ly with regard to MSMEs andsmall entrepreneurs and willalso limit the choices for con-

sumers, rather than safe-guarding their interest.

He pointed out thatMSMEs contribute almosttwo-thirds of the annual rev-enues generated on just twomajor platforms -- Amazonand Flipkart -- and that itselfruns into thousands of croresof rupees, while there is a bigchain involved comprising ofbusinesses, self-employedindividuals, warehouses,farmers etc and these plat-forms have created lakhs ofjobs in the recent years.

Among the key amend-ments, the government hasproposed a ban on mis-sellingof goods and services offeredon such platforms.

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other lighter baggage. I wastoo tired to carry the rifle, yetthe Cadet Sergeant insisted.I begged of him to let mecarry a can of things and notthe rifle which was a WWII.303 standard model.Eventually, the Sergeant tookpity on a young tired boy of15 and let me off the rifle. Inthe forces, one neither begsnor argues; one just obeys.Those carrying baggage weresent by the first truck whilethe cadets with rifles followeda few minutes later.

Halfway through a seniorcadet in our truck, who hap-pened to be standing, noticedthat the second truck hadfallen to the side of the road,10 feet or so lower in thefield. The cadets were in aheap; our colleague shoutedabout the accident and askedthe driver to turn back. Wereached the spot in a fewminutes; everyone jumpedout to help; I was asked tostand in one place in caseanything was required fromour vehicle. The scene wasworse than a one-sided bat-tle. My heart went out ourinjured colleagues; for no

rhyme or reason so manywere hurt. They were takento hospital in our vehicle.

After five days, we wereallowed to visit the hospital tosee our injured colleaguesfor a total of five minutes. Allexcept one had recoveredquickly enough. The one wasDinesh Pai who was still notconscious and the nurse hint-ed that he may not survive.And he died in a few days, wewere informed upon ourreturn to Mumbai. We all feltsad but that is all. We took thedeath as a professional hazardof a soldier. This was a lessonI have remembered through-out my life. Once on a trip toDibrugarh, my four-engineSkymaster ran into a violentcyclone. For 35 minutes, theplane did everything con-ceivable except break either ofits wings and that is why itdid not crash, I was later told.At one stage, the planedropped in a 900-feet deep airpocket but fortunately cameup again. Many of the passen-gers were crying, screaming,vomiting and what-not. Theperson next to me was pray-ing loudly and vomiting alter-

nately. Two passengers hadfainted. I kept recallingDeolali, consoling myself thatone can die accidentally alsoas Cadet Pai did.

When the Chinese invad-ed Arunachal Pradesh, I hadno hesitation in volunteering.The question of death did noteven occur to me. By being inthe NCC, one quite uncon-sciously gets committed tothe country above all. Thespirit of discipline survivesright through one’s life. Plusthe lesson that the team isgreater than the player,always.

As has been said, theBattle of Waterloo was wonon the playing fields of Eton(an English boarding schoolfor boys). So also, the defeatand death of Tipu Sultan.The National TabaccoCompany, the second biggestafter ITC, could not havebeen revived but for my NCCexperience: The workers’recalcitrance by 2400 had tobe overcome.

(The writer is a well-known columnist and anauthor. The views expressedare personal.)

�� Sir — As per a study conducted by theIndian Council of Medical Research(ICMR) and the Imperial College,London, the potential third wave ofCOVID-19 is unlikely to be as severe ordevastating as the second wave.

The prognosis is buttressed by natu-rally-developed immunity (some expertsput the number of people who haveimmunity from a prior immunitybetween 55 per cent and 60 per cent) andvaccine-induced immunity (close to fiveper cent of people) in the population andthe variants not becoming very severe ordeadlier.

The Union Government has raisedthe alert on the Delta Plus variant andissued an advisory to States urging themto keep an eye on how it behaves andspreads and take proactive steps to pre-vent an outbreak and emphasising theneed for testing more samples for epi-demiological correlations. Delta Plus isfound to be the most transmissible of allthe SARS-CoV-2 variants, to bind morestrongly to receptors of lung cells and toreduce monoclonal antibody response. Itis considered as a “variant of concern” inview of these characteristics.

G David Milton | Tamil Nadu

�� Sir — Recently the farmers marked theseven-month anniversary of their protestagainst three farm laws. The anguishedfarmers have once again joined hands forholding protest against the Governmentfor not taking back the “anti-farmer” laws.

Singhu border will be remembered inthe history of Indian agriculture forever.The farmers from various parts of thecountry make the border their home; stillthis urgent matter is not solved. The waitfor the farmers has been long. They all hadfaced extreme winter, the first and the sec-ond COVID-19 wave.

The seven-month duration has forcedthem to face many odd things. Still theirdemands are ignored by the Government.It is an irony that the Government getfailed to develop any positive consensus

with them. Now since the farmers areplanning to arrange a new sit-in to marktheir protest forward, the Governmentmust consider their demand as a genuinematter for urgent discussion. The farm-ers demands can’t be ignored, it is there-fore urgent for the Government, too, toend the farmers’ distress. Consensusbuilding between farmers and theGovernment with participatory talks is theonly way forward.

Kirti Wadhawan | Kanpur��Sir — The Delta Plus variant, currentlya variant of concern, has increased trans-missibility, stronger binding to receptorsof lung cells and potential reduction inmonoclonal antibody response. Doctorsacross India have also cautioned againstany relaxation in adherence to COVID-appropriate behavior in view of variantssuch as the Delta Plus cropping up.

There is a noticeable increase in hospital-isation, ICU admissions, mortality andmorbidity for people affected with thisvariant. The doctors add that COVID-19,being an RNA virus, has a tendency toundergo rapid mutations and there is aneed to step up the vaccination driveacross the globe.

The vaccination drive would obvious-ly get a boost if the Government of Indiasucceeds in its attempts to procure vaccinesavailable outside India such as Pfizer,Johnson & Johnson, Moderna, and so on,it is a boon for the public. Virus mutationssuch as the Delta Plus variant continue toremain a big cause of concern and the vac-cination remains the best weapon to dealwith the virus in the long term.

CKR Nathan | Ghaziabad

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As many as 114 of ouruniversit ies havedecided not only tointroduce National

Cadet Corps (NCC) but alsoallow the cadets exemptionfrom one subject. In short, treatNCC as part of the curriculum.I believe this is a sterling step forbuilding national character andshould be extended to seniorschool students, too.

The experience inculcatedat NCC contributes to one’scharacter which remains untilthe end of one’s life. I was in theartillery wing during my collegedays and the gun which was thefocus of our training was theSecond World War standardgun, the immediate predecessorof the Bofors. Our gun wascalled the 25 pounder becausethe shell weighed 25 pounds. Itwas operated by six cadets.

In artillery, the base unitwas called the battery whichhad 60 gunners or cadets, andit was commanded by a Major.There were two officers underhim and several junior commis-sioned officers who began asjawans and could rise to therank of Subedar Major. TheseJCOs were the spine of trainingus NCC cadets. Once in uni-form, we forgot who was whatexcept cadets of the SecondBombay Battery and that oneday we might be called uponhave to fight for India. We didnot think of death but as luckwould have it, one occurredduring our December camp ofa fortnight at Deolali, which wasthe country’s artillery centre.One day was selected for gunfiring; the range was severalkilometres away. We were takenin two three-tonne trucks, usu-ally used by the Army also fordragging the guns. Every gun-ner team of six cadets got toactually work a gun and everycadet got one chance to pull thetrigger to send a 25 poundershell flying away. The hope wasthat it would land on the target.

A Major sat on a tree aheadof us to guide us where to aim.The entire exercise took overfour hours and it was thentime to return. I was one of thecadets given to carry a rifle;some others were given some

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Officers in the field have yetagain demonstrated their com-mitment and efficacy in crisismanagement during the

Covid-19 pandemic. There are manyofficers like Iqbal Singh Chahal inMumbai andDr. Rajendra Bharud in aremote area of Nandurbar inMaharashtra who made us all proudwiththeir visionary leadership. I hadtweeted that the "challenge, however, isto keep this enthusiasm and commit-ment going amidst the 'dark woods'".Civil servants, unfortunately, are per-ceived differently. Why do civil servantsenjoy the image they have? There are sev-eral officers who are doing a fabulous jobon the ground but they go largely unno-ticed.

Is it purely a problem of perception?Or is there something fundamentallywrong? Or is it a combination of both?Is there a way out?

The perception about civil servicesis determined by the experience ofthose who come into contact with them.Gurcharan Das was so put off that hewrote: "Today, our bureaucracy hasbecome the single biggest obstacle to thecountry's development. Indians think oftheir bureaucrats as self-servers, rent-seekers, obstructive and corrupt." Manyshare this opinion of the bureaucracy.There arenot many who would concurwith Montek Singh Ahluwalia: "Peoplehave a wrong impression. The topbureaucracy is highly disciplined, and itis not obstructive when there is clarityat the top."

Why is this perception so? I hadraised this and other similar questionsin my book, "Ethical Dilemmas of a CivilServant" which was published last year.Why donot the deeds of officers like MN Buch, Julius Ribiero,Yogendra Narain,B K Chaturvedi and Anurag Goeldefinethe civil servant? There is no doubt thatcivil servants do face dilemmas in deci-sion-making throughout their careers.The tasks they have to perform, amidstrising expectations, are tough. On anumber of occasions,the civil servant'sside of the story never gets to be known.There are instances when the politiciansdisown decisions that are subsequentlyfound to be unpleasant.

Bureaucracy, like any other seg-ment of society, has its share of the good,the bad, and the ugly ones. What mat-ters is who amongst these get recognisedby the decision-makers. There are offi-cers who are efficient and honest, butthere are also thosewho are dishonestand inefficient. There is another catego-ry of dishonest but efficient officers. Thechoice rests with the decision-maker. Ifefficiency and integrity are the criteriato select officers, they will perform.However, if the choice is for a convenientand pliable officer, the civil servants willbe perceived as those who bend overbackward and are spineless. It is difficultto believe that honest and efficient

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Acomprehensive climatestrategy requires transi-tioning carbon-inten-

sive industries to sustainablepractices. Investors may fawnover green bonds but transi-tion bonds are what will savethe planet.

One piece of the financialasset puzzle that has attractedmuch innovation in recentyears is the market for fixed-income securities or bonds.And if we want to save theworld, we need investors topush for a particular class ofthese securities: transitionbonds.

The global market for cor-porate bonds - debts issued bycompanies to raise cash forbusiness operations - is wortharound $41 trillion. Thesemarkets are today facing areckoning: We face an

impending climate crisis, anda new generation of asset own-ers - millennials, increasinglydiverse and, yes, woke - aredeciding where capital gets toflow. So, the fixed incomecapital markets have had toadapt. Much attention isfocused specifically on greenbonds, a class of securitiesdesigned for issuers (usuallycorporations) toborrow sumsof money specifically to facil-itate 'green' projects such as thedevelopment of environment-friendly technologies, invest-ments in sustainable resourcemanagement, and so on. In2021, overall global bondissuances declined by three percent. Meanwhile, green bondissuances grew to a recordhigh.

On the face of it, thisseems promising. Can green

bonds transform the debt cap-ital markets? Can they turn thetide of corporate borrowingtowards sustainability?

Unfortunately, no. Evenat their record last year, thesebonds constituted about one totwo per cent of all issuances.Itis not difficult to see why: Mostcompanies cannot undertake'green' projects; it simply doesnot make sense for their lineof business. Companies in tra-

ditionally carbon-intensiveindustries such as oil and gas,manufacturing, and heavyindustry, will struggle to cre-ate projects that meet the'green' bond standard. Wecancancel Exxon Mobil(deservedly) for hiding climatescience from the world. Wecan blame it for fuelling bothclimate change and climatedenial. We cannot, however,make it disappear. We cannotcancel its 75,000 employees.And importantly, we cannotsimply remove itfrom the debtcapital markets.

This is where transitionbonds come in. Transitionbonds allow companies in'brown' industries - ones thattypically generate significantemissions - to raise funds tofinance their transition to moresustainable business models.

For manufacturing firms, forinstance, this could look like abond issuance tied to improvedrecycling, longer productlifestyles, or general invest-ments in energy efficiency. Forboth industry and fossil fuelcompanies, transition issuancecould help raise proceeds forinvestments in promising newtechnologies such as carboncapture and storage. Whilerewarding 'green' companies iscertainly important, progressmust also be encouraged inhigh-carbon sectors.

Unfortunately, 'brown'companies increasingly face adearth of capital raising oppor-tunities and muted investorinterest. We need to provide allcompanies, even the historicalpolluters, means to evolve. Thisis especially true in emergingmarkets like India. Over a

quarter of all economic activi-ty in the country arises frommanufacturing and heavyindustry and if it is not made,cleaner, greener, and more effi-cient, it can threaten the reali-sation not just of domestic, butalso global environmental goals.

A scorched-earth approachto 'brown' industries is likely tolead to, well, scorched earth.Starving companies of capitalwill slow down, and not hasten,the green transition. Of course,this theory of change is notwithout its challenges. Greenbonds today are certifiedaccording to a standard devel-oped by the Climate BondsInitiative (CBI), a non-profit.No equivalent frameworkexists for transition bonds;without one, these bonds caneasily turn into another plat-form for meaningless corporate

sustainability advertising.When does security make theleap from being a regular bondto one that is tangibly facilitat-ing transition? What can we doto ensure that transition bondsare not simply swindlinginvestors to continue busi-ness-as-usual? Those are the40-trillion-dollar questions.

Hope, however, is on thehorizon. The CBI recentlypublished a white paper ontransition bonds with CreditSuisse, and the EU's taxono-my, a key aspect of theEuropean Green Deal, out-lines the stages of transitionand applicable activities.These new frameworks mustinform a new era of sustain-able capital markets, andinvestors must support thissea change with a robustappetite for transition bonds.

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(The author is a formerIAS officer. The views

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views expressed are personal.)

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police officers were not availablewhen two such officers werebeing considered for the top postsin the CBI a couple of years ago.However, convenient officers wereput in position and then dumped,giving a bad name to police offi-cers in general, many of whom aredoing commendable work. Thereare many such examples. It is gen-erally believed that the back-ground of such officersis thor-oughly examined before they areassigned such positions. Who ismessing up with these criticalpositions? Who has designedsuch a process, including themuch-touted 360-degree assess-ment that still leaves so manyangles uncovered? If the decision-makers are determined to get onlyconvenient officers, then whyshould the entire civil service bearthe cross of carrying the disreputewhen these convenient officersturn into rogue officers or fallfrom grace?

It takes two to tango. The civilservants cannot be absolved of theresponsibility for the current stateof affairs. If the civil servantdoesnot allow himself or herselfto be used, he or she cannot bemisused or abused. More oftenthan not, there is a quid pro quo.It is the expectation of a reward

from the politician that makes thecivil servant weak. There is a priceto be paid either way. Some civilservants choose immediaterewards. They end up paying aprice subsequently. More than apersonal price, it damages theinstitution of the civil service,bringing a bad name to the ser-vice as a whole. There are indeeda number of officers who wouldgo any distance to provide neces-sary comforts to the politicaldecision-maker. Unfortunately,they suit the politics of the politi-cian.

How can this be corrected? Itmay be difficult to evolve a fool-proof mechanism for selection toregular posts in a democracy.However, a mechanism for selec-tion to sensitive posts and post-retirement engagement can bedevised. It is necessary to do sobecause officers manning suchposts can make or mar the repu-tation of many. They can destroyinstitutions. Moreover, if a trans-parent and credible system isdevised, the officers will not belured into making 'sacrifices' tooccupy such positions. It is perhapsincorrect to say that officers shouldnot be given post-retirementengagement. Why should the tal-ent and experience of officers be

wasted just because they havereached a particular age? However,it would be unbecoming of an offi-cer to apply for a position. Histrack record should be goodenough for him to be consideredfor such positions. For this, therewill need to be a transparent andcredible way of selecting such anofficer.Institutions like the UPSCcould play a role. Officers will thenget selected on merit and not onthe basis of personal affiliation.

Civil servants are indeed con-fronted with huge dilemmas dur-ing their careers and they will con-tinue to do so. However, the inspi-ration for a change, for any correc-tion or improvement, will have tocome from within. This inspirationcan be sought from such officersas have managed to succeed andserve the country and its peopledespite these dilemmas. The onuslies on the civil servant to resolvethese issues with his or her digni-ty and self-respect intact. Theofficers have to acquire self-con-trol. They have to focus onthem-selves. They have to evolve in amanner that those who want tocorrupt them arenot able to musterthe courage to do so. Their con-science and ethics must be theirfirewall. It is difficult but it hasbeen done. Hence, it can be done.

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The Insolvency andBankruptcy Board of India

(IBBI) “inadvertently” put outon its website Aadhaar andPAN details of creditors,including workmen, of somecompanies undergoing resolu-tion process, and the issues areexpected to be sorted out in thenext few days.

A senior official said thedetails came into the publicdomain “inadvertently” as theregulator is working on a betaproject to host the informationof creditors of companiesundergoing CorporateInsolvency Resolution Process(CIRP) and liquidation.

The IBBI, a key institutionin implementing theInsolvency and BankruptcyCode (IBC), is working on theproject to ensure and enhancetransparency with respect toCIRP and liquidation process-es, the official said, addingthat the matter will be sortedout in the next few days.

The details that were inad-

vertently put out have beenremoved, the official added.

It could not be immediatelyascertained as to such details ofhow many creditors were putout.

There was no official com-ment from the IBBI.

Under the IBBI regula-tions, details about creditors,including workmen, of com-panies undergoing CIRP orliquidation should be disclosedon the websites of the compa-nies (corporate debtors) con-cerned. The details requiredinclude name of the creditorconcerned, amount claimedand amount admitted.

In case of a CIRP, thesedetails have to be disclosed bythe resolution professional con-cerned while in liquidationprocesses, the respective liq-uidator would make these dis-closures.

Such details have to be putout on the websites of thecompanies concerned.

With instances wheremany small companies do nothave or are unable to maintaintheir websites, the IBBI isworking on a project to host

these details on its websitefor easy access of the creidtors.The work started a few daysback.

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The Government on Fridaysaid it has extended the sec-

ond phase of FAME Indiascheme by two years till March31, 2024, for faster adoption ofelectric mobility and develop-ment of its manufacturingecosystem in the country.

The second phase of FAME(Faster Adoption andManufacturing of ElectricVehicles) India scheme focus-es on supporting electrificationof public and shared trans-portation.

A notification of thedepartment of heavy industrysaid that the scheme is pro-posed to be implemented overa period of three years fromApril 1, 2019.

“Now with the approval ofthe competent authority, it isdecided that FAME IndiaPhase II scheme is extendedfor a period of two (2) yearsi.E. Up to 31st March 2024,” itsaid.

With an aim to promoteeco-friendly vehicles, the gov-ernment had launched theFAME India scheme (FasterAdoption and Manufacturingof (Strong) Hybrid and ElectricVehicles in India) in 2015.

Commenting on thedevelopment, industry cham-ber Ficci said the extension willhelp the industry in capturingthe deferred demand for elec-tric vehicles (EVs).

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About 30 farmer producerorganisations (FPOs) in

three states, including WestBengal, reported more thantwo-fold increase in theirannual turnover in the lasttwo years after a pilot inter-vention to make them viable,Small Farmers Agri-BusinessConsortium (SFAC) said onSunday. SFAC, an autonomousbody promoted by the UnionAgriculture Ministry, collabo-rated with Grant ThorntonBharat in 2018 to introducemultiple interventions on 30select FPOs in West Bengal,Karnataka and MadhyaPradesh for two years.

“A gamut of interventionswere undertaken by way ofinput, credit, common facilitiesand market linkages, in addi-tion to capacity-building andtraining of the Board ofDirectors (BoDs) on businessplanning. Notably, almost all ofthe FPOs were credit-linked foreither working capital or termloan,” said SFAC ManagingDirector Neelkamal Darbariin a statement. According toSFAC, the impact assessment ofthe interventions showed thatthe average turnover of 30 tar-geted FPOs increased from�44 lakh to over �118 lakh perannum in a span of two years.The underlying purpose of thepilot project was to collec-tivise and energise FPOs oper-ating at various levels acrossthese states and increase farm-ers’ income.

&+�� 6+60#*

Reeling under the impact ofthe pandemic, ground

handling operators have soughtgovernment support, includingan at least two-year moratori-um on interest charges onbank loans and instructions toairport operators not to chargeconcessions and rental fees tillnormalcy returns, to help tideover the current crisis.

The industry, which is esti-mated to have incurred a lossof �800-900 crore in the lastfinancial year due to no inter-national operations thataccount for around 70 per centof its total business, also wantsthe government to reopen theoverseas flights in a plannedand restructured manner.

In a representation to thecivil aviation ministry recent-ly, industry body GroundHandling Association of India(GHIA) said the last manymonths have been “challeng-ing” for the industry and giventhe situation, the governmentneeds to come up with con-siderations and support mea-sures to help it survive thischallenging phase.

“The civil aviation ministrymust consider advising thebanks to provide a moratoriumon interest charges on loans fora period of at least two years.

“It should also considerinstructing the AirportsAuthority of India (AAI) not toenforce operations, manage-ment, development agreement(OMDA)-related royalties on

the airport operators and fur-ther instructing airport opera-tors to translate the same downthe line to all stakeholders,including ground handlers,”GHAI said in the representa-tion. The association compris-es players that are into groundhandling activities across majorairports in the country. Theseinclude Turkish aviation firmCelebi , Indo Thai AirportManagement Services, Air AsiaSATS, and Bhadra GroundHandling Services.

It has also sought a stim-ulus to sustain salary paymentand allow subsistenceallowances to minimiseretrenchment. The associationsaid the ground-handling com-panies have taken a lot ofeffort to build skills sets and itwill be unfortunate if the indus-try is pushed to go throughmassive retrenchments.

It also said the civil avia-tion ministry should considerinstructing airport operatorsnot to charge concession andrental fees until normalcy ofoperations is achieved whileurging it to relook at the “high-ly-regulated” environmentunder which the industry oper-ates.

“Despite being on a lighttouch evaluation, the processhas become increasingly chal-lenging when it comes tobonafide tariff revisions,” itstated. The association saiddeferring the commencementof regular commercial inter-national flight services month-after-month is not helpful.

&+�� -&/��&�)*

State-owned power giantNTPC on Sunday said it has

set a taget to install 60 gigawatts(GW) of renewable energy(RE) capacity by 2032.

NTPC has become India’sfirst energy company to declareits energy compact goals as partof the UN High-level Dialogueon Energy (HLDE), accordingto a statement.

“NTPC has set a target toinstall 60 GW of renewableenergy capacity by 2032,” itadded.The country’s largestpower producer is also aiming10 per cent reduction in netenergy intensity by 2032.

NTPC is among the feworganisations globally todeclare its energy compactgoals. Further, NTPC hasdeclared that it will form atleast 2 international alliances tofacilitate clean energy researchand promote sustainability inenergy value chain by 2025.

The targets were unveiledin the recently held ‘MinisterialThematic Forums for theHDLE’ event. The commit-ment from NTPC has beenmade public on UN’s websiteas well.

&+�� 6+60#*

Seeking to accelerate its gen-eral awareness campaign,

the Reserve Bank of India(RBI) has started looking for anentity that can develop multi-media publicity material in 14languages.

The pan-India campaignto educate the general publicabout the essential rules andregulations will be launched inHindi, Assamese, Bangla,Gujarati, Kannada, Malayalam,Marathi, Oriya, Punjabi,Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu and Urdubesides English.

The media mix, accordingto an RBI document, willinclude traditional as well asnew media. Besides newspa-pers, magazines, radio, televi-sion channels and cinema

halls, the campaign willalso cover digital media, webportals and social media, theRBI said while inviting appli-cations from advertising agen-cies for designing the creativesfor the awareness campaigns.

“The public awarenesscampaigns of RBI will be full-fledged multimedia, multilin-gual, pan-India level cam-paigns. The objective of thecampaigns is to create general

awareness among citizens ofIndia about the RBI regulationsand other initiatives,” said therequest for proposal (RFP) inthis regard.

Financial inclusion andeducation are two importantelements in the RBI’s develop-mental role.

Towards this, the centralbank has created a critical vol-ume of literature and hasuploaded on its website in 13languages for banks and otherstakeholders to download anduse. As per the RBI website, theaim of the initiative is to createawareness about financialproducts and services, goodfinancial practices, going dig-ital and consumer protection.

The central bank runs amedia campaign ‘RBI KehtaHai’, is an initiative to educatethe public about its regulationswhich are aimed at enhancingthe quality of customer servicein banks.

The number of followers ofthe Reserve Bank’s Twitter han-dle @RBI surpassed the onemillion mark touching 1.15million as of March 31, 2021,signifying the “largest follow-ing among the central banks”of the world, said the RBI’sannual report.

&+�� -&/��&�)*

India registered a 46.9 percent year-on-year growth in

its crude steel output at 9.2 mil-lion tonnes (MT) in May,according to Worldsteel data.

The country had produced5.8 MT steel in the same montha year ago.

“The production of the 64countries reporting to theWorld Steel Association(worldsteel) was 174.4 MT inMay 2021, a 16.5 per centincrease compared to May2020,” the global industry bodysaid in its latest report.

China remained the glob-al leader in the production ofsteel in May, registering 6.6 per-

cent year-on-year growth inoutput at 99.5 MT during themonth.

According to the worldsteeldata, China had produced 92.3MT of steel in the same monthlast year.

Last month, Japan’s outputincreased to 8.4 MT from 5.9MT in May 2020. The US pro-duced 7.2 MT steel in themonth under review. Its outputwas at 4.8 MT in May 2020.While Russia’s output lastmonth was at 6.6 MT, SouthKorea produced 6 MT,Germany 3.5 MT, and Iran 2.6MT.

Turkey and Brazil bothproduced 3.2 MT of crudesteel each in May 2021.

&+�� -&/��&�)*

Inching a step closer to pri-vatisation of two public sec-

tor banks, a high-level panelheaded by the cabinet secretaryrecently held a meeting tothrash out various regulatoryand administrative issues sothat the proposal could beplaced with the group of min-isters on disinvestment orAlternative Mechanism (AM)for approval.

Pursuant to the announce-ment made by FinanceMinister Nirmala Sitharamanin her 2021 budget speech, theNITI Aayog has suggested acouple of bank names for pri-vatisation to the Core Group ofSecretaries on Disinvestmentheaded by Cabinet Secretary inApril, sources said.

The meeting of the high-level panel deliberated on therecommendation of the NITIAayog on Thursday June 24,sources said, adding the panelwould after tying up all looseends will send the names of theshortlisted PSU banks to AMfor consideration.

Headed by the cab-

inet secretary, the members ofthe panel include secretaries inthe departments of EconomicAffairs, Revenue, Expenditure,Corporate Affairs and LegalAffairs, as well as the secretaryof administrative department.The panel also has theDepartment of PublicEnterprises, Department ofInvestment and Public AssetManagement (DIPAM) secre-tary as its member.

According to sources, thepanel also examined issuespertaining to protection ofinterests of workers of bankswhich are likely to be priva-tised.Following a clearancefrom AM, it will go to theUnion Cabinet headed by thePrime Minister for the finalnod. Changes on the regulato-ry side to facilitate privatisationwould start after the cabinetapproval.

� �(�� 6+60#*

The Government has clari-fied that it has issued no

directive on resumption ofDearness Allowance forCentral Government employ-ees and Dearness Relief forCentral Government pension-ers from next month.

Citing a picture of an“office memorandum” whichhas been doing the rounds onsocial media and confirmed theresumption of DA and DRfrom next month, the FinanceMinistry tweeted: “A docu-ment is doing rounds on socialmedia claiming resumption ofDA to Central Governmentemployees & Dearness Relief toCentral Government pension-ers from July 2021. This OM is#FAKE. No such OM has beenissued by GOI.”

Last year, the Ministryannounced a freeze on thehike in DA and DR till July2021.

On Saturday, the Congressaccused the UnionGovernment of adopting amalevolent approach towardsscores of Central Governmentemployees, Army staff andpensioners with regard to thepayment of dearness allowance(DA) and demanded immedi-ate repayment of arrears.

Addressing a press confer-ence here, Congress spokesper-son Abhishek Manu Singhvihad said that on April 23,2020, the Government hadkicked the people’s stomachs bycutting �37,500 crore.

� �(�� -&/��&�)*

As many as 478 infrastruc-ture projects reported a

cost overrun of over �4.40lakh crore as of June 1, 2021.

The Flash Report for cen-tral sector projects for Mayreleased by the Ministry ofStatistics and ProgrammeImplementation showed that525 projects are runningbehind schedule.

Out of the 1,768 projects,10 projects are ahead of sched-ule, 238 are on schedule, thereport showed.

“Total original cost ofimplementation of the 1,768projects was �22,86,955.18crore and their anticipated

completion cost is likely to be�27,27,220.47 crore, whichreflects overall cost overruns of�4,40,265.29 crore (19.25 percent of original cost),” it said.

The expenditure incurredon these projects till May 2021is over �13.30 lakh crore, whichis 48.79 per cent of the antici-pated cost of the projects.

Out of 525 delayed pro-jects, 100 (19.05 per cent) pro-jects have overall delay in therange of 1 to 12 months, 124(23.61 per cent) projects havedelay in the range of 13 to 24months, 182 (34.67 per cent)projects have delay in the rangeof 25 to 60 months and 119(22.67 per cent) projects inrange of 61 months and above.

� �(�� -&/��&�)*

Petrol price increased by 35paise per litre for the second

day in a row in the nationalcapital to � take it to �98.46 alitre.

Similarly, the price of thefuel in the other key metrosalso continued the upwardtrend with petrol being sold at�99.49 per litre in Chennai.

In Mumbai and Kolkata,the fuel was sold for �104.56and �98.30 per litre, respec-tively.

With the rise, petrol pricehas reached very close to hit-ting the century mark all acrossthe country extending thescope of historic high pricesthat had already made the fuelrate cross the �100 per litre-mark in certain cities andtowns of Maharashtra, MadhyaPradesh, Rajasthan, Telangana,Andhra Pradesh.

Across the country as wellpetrol and diesel pricesincreased on Saturday but itsretail prices varied dependingon the level of local taxes in dif-ferent states.

Petrol prices in three othermetros apart from Mumbaihave also reached closer to�100 per litre-mark and OMCofficials said that if interna-tional oil prices continue tofirm up, this mark could also bebreached in other places in thenext few days.

� �(�� 6+60#*

Although the second wave ofthe Covid-19 pandemic

again brought businesses andeconomic activities to a stand-still, Chairman of the StateBank of India (SBI), DineshKumar Khara has expressedhope that the country’s econo-my would recover in the ongo-ing financial year.

The Chairman noted thatthe global economy contractedby 3.3 per cent in 2020 with thepandemic causing significantloss of lives and livelihood.

The GDP in India con-tracted by 7.3 per cent inFY2021 and the country expe-rienced a second wave of infec-tions with cases rising rapidlysince March 2021, he saidwhile addressing the 66thAnnual General Meeting of thebank. He, however, said thatpolicy measures and the coor-dinated efforts of the ReserveBank of India (RBI) and theCentre were directed towardsenabling growth on a moredurable basis during these dif-ficult times.

“Notwithstanding the sec-ond wave of Covid-19, Indianeconomy, through its resilience,is poised for a recovery in

FY2022,” the SBI chief told theshareholders of the bank.

Speaking on the perfor-mance of the bank in FY21, hesaid that although the last fis-cal was an exceptionally chal-lenging year for the entireworld, the state-run bank wasable to function against allodds with minimal disruptionfor the customers.

“The business continuityplans that were chalked outhave worked well for the Bankand this is reflected in variousparameters of the Bank’s per-formance in FY 2021.”

Notably the bank hasachieved high level of digitiza-tion with share of Alternate

Channels in total transactionsincreasing to 93 per cent inFY2021, thereby converting achallenging situation into anopportunity, the Chairmansaid. He said that in the currentfinancial year, SBI will contin-ue to accelerate its digital agen-da, adding that the scope andreach of YONO will be expand-ed further.

“With the rollout of pre-package insolvency for resolu-tion, resumption of courts andformation of National AssetReconstruction Company,efforts will be in full force tokeep the momentum instressed asset recovery in thecurrent financial year.”

� �(�� -&/��&�)*

The Government may grad-ually end the cross-holding

structure existing in the oil sec-tor as it looks to further con-solidate operations of publicsector enterprises and go aheadwith its privatisation plan bygetting a fair valuation of assets.

Official sources said thatthat all oil sector PSUs may beasked to exit from their invest-ments made in equity shares ofother State-owned entities. Thiscould be done in phases,depending on the market con-ditions, so that the shares getmaximum valuation.

The cross-holding struc-ture among oil PSUs was builtin the late 1990s as theGovernment sold its shares inOil India Ltd (OIL), Oil andNatural Gas Corporation(ONGC), Gas Authority ofIndia Ltd (GAIL) and IndianOil Corporation (IOC) in a bidto raise funds.

Consequently, while GAILand IOC hold 7.84 and 2.45 percent stake respectively inONGC and OIL hold 14.20 and5.16 per cent stake respective-ly in IOC. Also, IOC andONGC hold 2.47 and 4.94 percent stake respectively in GAILIndia, and BPCL (2.47 per

cent), HPCL (2.47 per cent)and IOC (4.93 per cent) togeth-er own partial equity in OIL.

Estimates suggest that if thegovernment divests its stake bytaking the entire proceeds fromsale of shares cross-held by oilPSUs, it could mobiliseupwards of �40,000-�50,000crore.

However, it is likely thatcompanies may plough backthe money raised through equi-ty sale to the Government bydeclaring a special dividend.

“The Government wants toend cross-holding in the oilsector as its consolidation andprivatisation roadmap wouldcreate two to three large inte-grated entities. This would cre-ate a situation where cross-holding could be seen as anti-competitive and aiding conflict

of interest,” said one of thesource quoted above.

Analysts also believe thatoffloading listed investmentscould make sense even forstrategic investors looking tobuy into Bharat PetroleumCorporation Ltd (BPCL) as itwould reduce the risk of anyfuture Government interven-tion. None of the PSU oil com-panies now hold any equity inBPCL and only LIC has 5.66per cent stake in the privatisa-tion bound refiner valued atcurrent share price of � 470.55at �5,775 crore.

Sources said that whileprivatisation plan for IOC,GAIL, ONGC, OIL has notbeen drawn as of now, underthe roadmap finalised by theGovernment it would keepbare minimum.

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1��H<?IM��@��% ��65503��Indore (PTI): Around Rs 4,700 crore has been paid against morethan two lakh death claims filed under the Pradhan Mantri JeevanJyoti Bima Yojana (PMJJBY) in the last financial year which wit-nessed COVID-19 leaving a trail of death, according to an RTIreply.

The information regarding death claims under the PMJJBY,given by the Department of Financial Services to Neemuch dis-trict based RTI activist Chandrashekhar Gaur, do not mentionthe cause of deaths.

According to the reply, payment of Rs 4,698.10 crore wasagainst 2,34,905 death claims under the PMJJBY in the last fis-cal, Gaur said.

As many as 2,50,351 death claims were filed under the PMJJ-BY, and of them, 13,100 were dismissed in 2020-21. The remain-ing 2,346 claims were being examined.

According to the reply, under PMJJBY, death claims of Rs3,563.78 crore in 1,78,189 cases were settled in 2019-20; Rs2,704.24 crore in 1,35,212 cases in 2018-19.

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Classified documents fromthe UK Ministry of

Defence (MoD) containingsecret information about awarship and the British militarywas discovered at a bus stop insouth-eastern England, accord-ing to a media report onSunday.

The MoD said an employ-ee reported the loss of the doc-uments last week, which werediscovered by a member of thepublic in a soggy heap behinda bus stop in Kent early onTuesday morning, the BBCreport said.

One set of documentsreportedly discusses the likelyRussian reaction to HMSDefender’s passage throughUkrainian waters off theCrimea coast on Wednesdayand another lays out plans for

a possible UK military presencein Afghanistan after the US-ledNATO operation there endsthis year.

“It would be inappropriateto comment further,” an MoDspokesperson said, as it wasconfirmed an investigation hasbeen launched into the inci-dent.

A member of the public,who wishes to remain anony-mous, found the 50-odd pagesof documents and contactedthe BBC when he realised thesensitive nature of the contents.The BBC believes the docu-ments, which include emailsand PowerPoint presentations,originated in the office of asenior official at the MoD.

The documents relating tothe Royal Navy’s Type 45destroyer, HMS Defender,show that a mission describedby the MoD as an “innocent

passage through Ukrainian ter-ritorial waters”, with guns cov-ered and the ship’s helicopterstowed in its hangar, was con-ducted in the expectation thatRussia might respond aggres-sively.

On Wednesday, more than20 Russian aircraft and twocoastguard ships shadowed thewarship as it sailed about 19-km off Crimea’s coast.Moscow’s defence ministry saida patrol ship fired warning

shots and a jet dropped bombsin the destroyer’s path but theUK government rejected this

account, denying any warningshots had been fired.

The mission, dubbed “Op

Ditroite”, was the subject ofhigh-level discussions as late asMonday, the documents show,

with officials speculating aboutRussia’s reaction if HMSDefender sailed close toCrimea.

The bundle of documentsalso includes updates on armsexports campaigns, includingsensitive observations aboutareas where Britain might finditself competing with Europeanallies.

And there are briefingnotes for last Monday’s sessionof the UK-US DefenceDialogue, including observa-tions on US President JoeBiden’s first months in office.

Most of the papers aremarked “official sensitive”, a rel-atively low level of classificationused, according to the govern-ment, “where there is a clearand justifiable requirement toreinforce the ‘need to know’”.

But one document,addressed to UK Defence

Secretary Ben Wallace’s privatesecretary, and marked “SecretUK Eyes Only”, outlines high-ly sensitive recommendationsfor the UK’s military footprintin Afghanistan, following theend of Operation ResoluteSupport, the NATO operationcurrently winding down in thewake of President Joe Biden’sdecision earlier this year towithdraw American forces.

The document discusses anAmerican request for Britishassistance in several specificareas, and addresses the ques-tion of whether any British spe-cial forces will remain inAfghanistan once the with-drawal is complete.

Due to the sensitivity of thedocument, the BBC said it hasdecided not to report detailswhich could endanger thesecurity of British and otherpersonnel in Afghanistan.

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The UK Government said onSunday that it will launch

an investigation into howfootage from inside a depart-mental office was leaked andended in Matt Hancock resign-ing as Health Secretary tomake way for Sajid Javid.

The Department of Healthand Social Care (DHSC) willlook into how the formerhealth secretary came to bevideoed kissing one of hisaides, Gina Coladangelo, whohas also resigned from herDHSC role of non-executivedirector in the wake of thescandal.

There had been growingcalls for a probe after questionswere raised about the reasonsbehind the presence of a cam-era inside a smoke alarm inHancock’s former office andsecurity concerns over footagefrom it being accessed.

“The Department ofHealth will be investigatingquite rightly to understandhow this was able to happen,”UK Northern Ireland SecretaryBrandon Lewis told the BBC.

“We have got to be con-cerned about the fact thatsomeone was able to secure arecording from inside a gov-ernment building… We have tounderstand how that happenedand how we deal with that,” hesaid.

‘The Sun’ newspaper,which had published images ofthe illicit kiss that broke theCovid-19 lockdown rules inplace at the time in early May,said the images came from “aconcerned Whitehall whistle-blower”.

Hancock issued an apolo-gy for breaking the rules onsocial distancing with someoneoutside his household bubbleon Friday, which was acceptedby Prime Minister BorisJohnson who backed him tostay on as a Cabinet minister.But his position as HealthSecretary soon became unten-able as not only the Oppositionbut even his own ConservativeParty colleagues began speak-ing out against his actions,saying they undermined pub-lic trust in the lockdown rules.

“Those of us who makethese rules have got to stick by

them,” Hancock said in his res-ignation on Saturday, as hepromised Johnson his full sup-port as a backbench Tory MP.

According to UK mediareports, he had ended his 15-year marriage to wife Marthaon Thursday – after he knewhis affair with his close friendand aide was to hit the head-lines on Friday. Both Hancockand Coladangelo are marriedwith three children each. Thepair are now believed to be sep-arated from their respectivespouses and plan to start a newlife together.

Meanwhile, Javid praisedhis predecessor for all that hehad achieved in the fightagainst the pandemic as hestepped into his new role backon the Parliament frontbenchwith a pledge to return the UKback to normal “as quickly aspossible”.

“I was honoured to take upthis position. I also know thatit comes with huge responsi-bility, and I will do everythingI can to make sure that I deliv-er for the people of this greatcountry,” Javid told reporters onSunday.

“We are still in a pandem-ic and I want to see that cometo an end as soon as possible,and that will be my mostimmediate priority to see thatwe can return to normal assoon and as quickly as possi-ble,” he said.

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As China’s rulingCommunist Party is set to

celebrate its centenary on July1, experts warn that the poten-tial of President Xi Jinping’scontinuation in power, unlikehis predecessors, could poten-tially be “very destabilising” forit in the future in the absenceof a successor.

Ironically, in its 100th year,the Communist Party of China(CPC), as it is officially called,relies on Xi just as it depend-ed on its founder leader andprincipled ideologue‘Chairman’ Mao Zedong, whoheld a vice-like grip on it untilhis death in 1976 after the partywas established in 1921.

On the brink of collapseafter his disastrous ideologicalexperiments like the 1958“Great Leap Forward”, massmobilisation of labour toimprove agricultural andindustrial production butended with a string of poorharvests resulting in famine,and the 1966 ‘CulturalRevolution’, which resulted inthe deaths of over 1.5 millionpeople, the party was revivedby moderate “paramountleader” Deng Xiaoping.

Deng, who won the bitterpower struggle against the‘Gang of Four’ headed by Mao’swidow Jiang Qing and guidedthe party till 1997 had over-turned Mao’s hardline

Marxism, replacing it with apragmatic ideology of“Socialism with ChineseCharacteristics” and undoingthe harm caused by Mao thathelped China to unleash thepotential of the world’s mostpopulous country to emerge asthe second-largest economy.

Deng’s other politicalinvention of collective leader-ship structure which kept theparty intact accommodating allgroups and sections of the 90million-strong member CPCafter his death in 1997 has goneback to one leader party withthe emergence of Xi at the helmin 2012.

China in 2018 approvedthe removal of the two-termlimit on the presidency, effec-tively allowing Xi, 68, to remainin power for life.

While Xi’s supporters pro-jected his leadership as theneed of the hour for Chinawhich is facing global adversi-ty, analysts warn that his con-tinuation in power after twoterms unlike predecessors is

potentially destabilising.It was normal practice that

a successor to the GeneralSecretary of the CPC is namedduring the second tenure of theparty leadership.

With no clear successor insight, observers expect Xi toremain as a paramount leaderduring the reshuffle of theparty’s governing bodies as thetwice-a-decade Party Congressnext year will shed light on howhe plans to tackle successionand avoid a crisis within theparty.

It could prove to be hisbiggest challenge and will shapethe party for decades to come,the Hong Kong-based SouthChina Morning Post said in itsreport on Friday.

Xi has said that one way toevaluate a political system is tosee whether the leadership suc-cession is “law-abiding andorderly”.

But unlike his predeces-sors, Xi did not endorse a suc-cessor at the end of his firstterm in 2017, and observers donot expect one to emerge in thenew leadership line-up nextyear as well.

That could spell trouble forthe party, according to SteveTsang.

“When succession finallylooms, it can potentially be verydestabilising if the structureand/or process is not clear andwell defined,” Tsang told thePost.

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Iran will not negotiate end-lessly over the revival of the

2015 nuclear deal, a top officialsaid here, while also urging theUS to abandon the “failed lega-cy” of former President DonaldTrump.

The remarks were made onSaturday for Foreign Ministryspokesman Saeed Khatibzadehin a tweet, reports Xinhuanews agency.

Iran has actively partici-pated in the Vienna talks aimedat the revival of the nuclearagreement, also known as theJoint Comprehensive Plan ofAction (JCPOA), which the UStried to “destroy”, Khatibzadehadded.

Since April 6, Washingtonand Tehran have had sixrounds of indirect negotia-tions in Austria’s capital Vienna

aimed at reviving the nucleardeal.

A US State Departmentofficial said last week that thetwo countries still have seriousdifferences “over a host ofissues, whether it’s the nuclearsteps that Iran needs to take,the sanctions relief that the USwould be offering or thesequence of steps that bothsides will be taking”.

The official suggested thata deal between the two sidesremains possible, saying the USteam would attend the seventhround of talks “sometime in thenot too distant future”.

The US government with-drew from the JCPOA in May2018 and unilaterally re-imposed sanctions on Iran.

In response, Iran gradual-ly suspended parts of itsJCPOA commitments fromMay 2019.

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Never before seen case files,photographs and other

records documenting the inves-tigation into the infamous slay-ings of three civil rights work-ers in Mississippi are now opento the public for the first time,57 years after their deaths.

The 1964 killings of civilrights activists James Chaney,Andrew Goodman, andMichael Schwerner in NeshobaCounty sparked national out-rage and helped spur passage ofthe 1964 Civil Rights Act.

They later became the sub-ject of the movie “MississippiBurning.” The previously sealedmaterials — dating from 1964to 2007 — were transferred tothe Mississippi Department ofArchives and History from theMississippi attorney general’soffice in 2019.

As of last week, they arenow available for viewing bythe public at William F WinterArchives and History Buildingin Jackson. The records includecase files, Federal Bureau ofInvestigation memoranda,research notes and federalinformant reports and witnesstestimonies.

There are also photographsof the exhumation of the vic-tims’ bodies and subsequentautopsies, along with aerialphotographs of the burial site,according to an announce-ment from the MississippiDepartment of Archives andHistory. The collection is beingstored in three catalog records:Series 2870 houses the attorneygeneral’s research files, Series2902 houses the FBI memosand Series 2903 houses thephotographs.

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The Russian DefenceMinistry said that its Black

Sea Fleet was tracking the USguided-missile destroyer Ross,which entered the waters for amultinational exercise withUkraine.

The Arleigh Burke-classdestroyer will join 31 otherships to participate in the mar-itime portion of Exercise SeaBreeze 2021 starting next week,the US Navy 6th Fleet said onSaturday.

Ross’ participation in thisyear’s drills is “a tangibledemonstration of US supportfor Ukraine” and part of theenduring commitment madeby Washington and the NorthAtlantic Treaty Organization

(NATO) to enhance maritimesecurity in the Black Sea,Xinhua news agency quotedCharge d’Affaires KristinaKvien at the AmericanEmbassy in Ukraine as saying.

However, Russian ForeignMinistry spokesperson MariaZakharova said on Saturdaythat the NATO-Ukraine drillsare aimed at causing “endless”destabilisation near the Russianborders and transferringweapons and equipment toUkraine.

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Former US president DonaldTrump on Saturday reprised

his baseless election grievancesand painted a dystopian pictureof the country underDemocratic control in his firstcampaign-style rally since leav-ing the White House.

His mission, in part, was toexact revenge on one of theRepublicans who voted for hishistoric second impeachment.

Trump’s event Saturdaynight at Ohio’s Lorain CountyFairgrounds, not far fromCleveland, was held to supportMax Miller, a former WhiteHouse aide who is challengingRepublican Rep. AnthonyGonzalez for his congression-al seat. Gonzalez was one of 10GOP House members whovoted to impeach Trump for hisrole in inciting the deadly Jan.6 insurrection at the Capitol

building.Trump wants them to pay.In his remarks, Trump

revisited some of the falseclaims familiar from his fruit-less challenges of President JoeBiden’s election victory.

“On the evening of Nov. 3the election was over and thenall of a sudden things startedclosing down all over,” he saidof election night. “We took amassive victory, they did, into

something that should never beallowed.”

In fact, Trump was describ-ing a legitimate vote countingprocess that saw Biden take thelead as the night wore on, asDemocratic-leaning cities inkey states and results frommail-in ballots were reported.Trump administration elec-tion officials and top electionofficials in Republican-ledstates affirmed the validity ofthe election outcome.

In another echo of thepast, the crowd chanted “Lockher up” at the mention ofHillary Clinton, the Democrathe defeated in 2016.

Traffic was backed up fromthe fairgrounds into town,where pro-Trump signs dottedresidents’ lawns. On street cor-ners, vendors sold “Trump2024” flags and other mer-chandise as supporters arrived.

The rally, held five months

after Trump left office under acloud of violence, marks thebeginning of a new, more pub-lic phase of his post-presiden-cy. After spending much of histime behind closed doorsbuilding a political operationand fuming about the last elec-tion, Trump is planning a flur-ry of public appearances in thecoming weeks. He’ll holdanother rally in Florida over theJuly Fourth weekend unat-tached to a midterm candidateand will travel to the southernborder in the coming week toprotest President Joe Biden’simmigration policies.

The rally also came asTrump faces immediate legaljeopardy. Manhattan prosecu-tors informed his companyThursday that it could soonface criminal charges stem-ming from a wide-ranginginvestigation into the formerpresident’s business dealings.

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Hush-hush diplomacy. In-person visits. And a very

public no-surprises agreementon Iran. US Secretary of StateAntony Blinken and IsraeliForeign Minister Yair Lapidwill meet in Rome on Sundayas their new governments lookto turn the page on formerPresident Donald Trump andformer Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu, whoseclose alliance aggravated par-tisan divisions within bothcountries.

Now, with Trump side-lined in Florida and Netanyahuleading the opposition,President Joe Biden and PrimeMinister Naftali Bennett are

focused on pragmatic diplo-macy rather than dramatic ini-tiatives that risk fomentingopposition at home or dis-tracting from other priorities.

That means aiming forsmaller achievements, such asshoring up the informal cease-fire that ended last month’s warwith Gaza’s militant Hamasrulers and replenishing Israel’sIron Dome defence system. Amajor push to revive the long-dormant peace processbetween Israel and thePalestinians could unsettle thedelicate balance.

“Nobody thinks it’s a goodidea to start charging throughon a major new peace initia-tive,” said Ilan Goldenberg, aMideast security expert.

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When Mike Noriega heardthat part of the condo-

minium tower where hisgrandmother lived had col-lapsed, he rushed with hisfather to the scene. Theyarrived at a nightmarish 30-foot pile of pancaked concreteand mangled metal, theremains of her 12-story build-ing — and no sign of 92-year-old Hilda Noriega.

But among the flyingdebris, they stumbled acrossmementos that bore witness toHilda’s life on the sixth floor inChamplain Towers South: anold picture of her with her latehusband and their infant son,

and a birthday card that friendsfrom her prayer group sent twoweeks earlier with the acronym“ESM,” Spanish for “hand-delivered,” scrawled across theyellow envelope with a butter-fly etching.

“There was a message inthe mess of all this,” Noriegasaid. “It means not to give uphope. To have faith.”

Days after Thursday’s col-lapse, Hilda remains amongmore than 150 people unac-counted for in Surfside, northof Miami Beach, with five con-firmed dead and authoritiesand loved ones fearing the tollwill go much higher.

As scores of rescuers con-tinue to use heavy machinery

and power tools to clear therubble from the top and tunnelin from below, the Noriegafamily still have hope she willbe found alive.

“Some miracles are verybig, others are small,” saidMike, 36, who last spoke toHilda the day before the disas-ter. They described Hilda as afiercely independent and viva-cious retiree — in Mike’s words,“the youngest 92-year-old Iknow ... 92 going on 62.”

Hilda Noriega had calledChamplain Towers South homefor more than 20 years. But sixyears removed from her hus-band’s death, she was ready toleave. The condo was up forsale, and her plan was to move

in with family.She had loved living near

the ocean and friends, but“when you lose a spouse, youwant to be surrounded by fam-ily ... And she wanted to spendmore time with her family andgrandchildren,” said SallyNoriega, Hilda’s daughter-in-law.

Sally called Hilda a sweet,loving person who built a lifewith her husband and raised afamily after coming to the USfrom Cuba in 1960.

“She was just one of thosepeople who from the first timeshe met a person she instantlyloved that person, and that per-son instantly loved her,” Sallysaid.

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�� At birth, Black Widow (aka Natasha Romanova) is

given to the KGB, which grooms her to become itsultimate operative. When the U.S.S.R. breaks up, thegovernment tries to kill her. It releases on July 9 onDisney+.

�� An inspiring story about an orphan boy from the

streets of Dongri, who grows up to become a local goonof his area. His life changes after he meets Ananya, whoguides him towards the right path and makes him realizehis true calling - boxing. It releases on July 16 onAmazon Prime Video.

�� Time travelers arrive from 2051 to deliver an urgent

message: 30 years in the future, humankind is losing thewar against a deadly alien species. Its only hope for sur-vival is for soldiers and civilians to be transported to thefuture and join the fight. It releases on July 2 on AmazonPrime Video.

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Ever since the second wave of the pan-demic hit, everyone has been waiting

for the lockdown restrictions to be liftedto enjoy a much-needed vacation. Afterwhat seemed like a long wait, restrictionshave been relaxed and we can finally packup for that long due vacay! And ladies,when you pack your bags, don’t forget oneof the most important things: your skin-care essentials.

In most cases, skincare at home is abreeze. You can use all products and orga-nize them in a way that you understand.However, while heading for a vacation, wegenerally lose track of things we take careof daily. That is the point of a vacation, afterall. However, we should bear in mind thata lot of factors such as pollution, lack ofsleep and irregular access to a healthy dietmay affect your skin while travelling andit may lose its elasticity.

While on a vacation, it becomes dif-ficult to keep up with the same skin-careroutine, hence it would be best to devisea list of skincare requisites that can beadded to the list of travel essentials toensure your skin remains supple anddamage-free throughout your holidaywhile you unwind and relax. Here are someof the must-haves you should add to yourtravel kit right away:

�Face cleanserOne should never travel without their

face cleanser. A natural face cleansercomprising ingredients like aloe vera orrose water can keep the skin soft andhydrated. It gently exfoliates and nourish-es the skin, thereby, keeping the naturalglow intact.

�Make-up removal wipesAn absolute essential that will come in

handy at all times. Gone are the days whenyou carried cotton pads and remover sep-arately. These make-up removal wipesallow you to take off your makeup any-where, anytime.

�Anti-frizz sprayA holiday for some might indicate that

they might not have a ‘good-hair day’ asmuch as they want it to be. With an anti-frizz spray, you can keep your hair man-ageable as per your preference and youenjoy your vacation without any worries.

�Sunscreen lotionSunscreen is used to protect the skin

from the harmful effects of sunlight. Theyhelp prevent sunburn and premature age-ing (such as wrinkles, rough skin). Theactive ingredients in sunscreens workeither by absorbing the sun's ultraviolet(UV) radiation, preventing it from reach-ing the deeper layers of the skin, or byreflecting the radiation. So lather up onsunscreen and go out to explore the cityor the beach.

�PrimerWorried about your open pores ruin-

ing your holiday pictures? Pack a goodmatte primer and bid adieu to open poresand patchy skin for prolonged hours.

�Night serumThroughout the day, while travelling,

a lot of impurities might stick to your face.After your nightly routine, do apply a nightserum, so that your skin heals while yousleep.

�Sheet maskSheet masks infused with soothing

ingredients such as algae, tea tree oil, aloevera, and salicylic acid help in control-ling oil secretion, clearing pores, remov-ing dirt, and preventing breakouts. Theycan help keep your skin hydrated andglowing during vacations.

�Facial mist sprayWhether you are on a weekend get-

away or a long vacation, a facial mistspray will keep your skin refreshedthroughout the trip. It will also add extramoisture to the skin.

�Eye creamWhile on a vacation, there are

chances that one might miss out on theirbeauty sleep and wake up with dark cir-cles. To avoid those, one must include eyecream in their travel kit.

�Dry shampooYour hair might look oily and greasy

in two days, and it might not be possi-ble for you to wash your hair on a holi-day. Taking along a pack of dry shampoomay come in handy during these times.

�Hand creamOne might have to encounter

changes in temperature while travellingfrom one place to the other and your skinmight also have to deal with differenttypes of water. To avoid any bad effectsof changing weather or water on yourhands, a good hand cream can come tothe rescue.

�Lip sleeping maskThe skin of your lips is thinner than

facial skin and might get affected by tem-perature variations and change in water.A lip sleeping mask will keep your lipshydrated, provide SPF protection andhelp your lips look more supple.

(The author is the founder and CEOof an organisation that crafts groomingproducts for women.)

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Language. Any thought, any emotion,any object; when was it first given a

sound, I wonder,” shares Shabana Azmi,as a beaming Farhan Akhtar looks on,in an interactive talk with participantsof Anubhav 2021

The pandemic has seen the Societyof Promotion of Indian Classical Musicand Culture Among Youth (SPICMACAY) making an effort to connectyouth with the living legends of classi-cal music, dance, and other folk art formsover the internet. This move was givenlife last year with the objective of givingthe young citizens of our country holis-tic exposure to our rich cultural heritageand providing them with a creative out-let.

Anubhav 2020 witnessed widespreadparticipation from students, not onlyfrom India but across the world. Therewere more than two lakh registrations forthe event which was inaugurated by anaudio-video message from PM NarendraModi on June 1, 2020.

Picking up from where Anubhavconcluded last year, SPIC MACAYorganised the second edition of the inter-active series from June 21 to yesterday,June 27.

Some of the notable names who werea part of SPIC MACAY’s Anubhav 2021include Ustad Amjad Ali Khan, PanditShivkumar Sharma, Shyam Benegal,Rajit Kapur, Shabana and Akhtar.

Sitting at home and following anashram-like routine, the participants

received an opportunity to connect withsome of the most renowned gurusthrough various activities, talks anddemonstration on a wide range of dis-ciplines such as classical music anddance, yoga, theatre, film screenings,folk arts and crafts, cultural heritage andenvironmental interactions, connectingthem with Indian and world heritage.Select students also received an oppor-tunity to participate in the virtualworkshops under the mentorship ofesteemed gurus. The last two eveningswitnessed concerts by India's classicalmusic gurus.

In the backdrop of COVID-19, theeducation sector has seen some majorroadblocks with the mental state ofyoungsters being affected. The need forvalue-based, creative and touching ele-ments such as arts, yoga and meditationhas never been felt more strongly. SPICMACAY’s Anubhav 2021 is yet anoth-er effort in this direction to spread hopeand positivity among the you duringthese difficult times.

The second wave of the COVIDpandemic has reinforced theneed to stay at home to ensure

the well-being of ourselves and ourfamilies. This continued reliance onstaying indoors has opened up newavenues to renovate our homes withoutdoor spaces being a special focus.Whether it is to host a rooftop partyor to enjoy some quiet me-time,people are now focussing on revamp-ing their terraces, balconies and evenwindow-side settings as a safe outletto interact with the outside world. Anopen outdoor space can be trans-formed into various settings like amini-nursery for flora lovers, a cosycorner to spend quality time withloved ones and a formal setting toentertain your friends. Furnitureexperts at Flipkart suggest these sim-ple tips that can help you redesignyour open spaces with some simpleadjustments.

�Choose your throneYour outdoor space is like a

blank canvas and you can decorate itas per your requirement. Depending

on the utility of the space, you can addfurniture that fulfils your purpose. Ifyou wish to use it for quality solitarytime, you can add a comfortable ham-mock, bean bag chairs or a nice swingto enjoy the cityscape while sippingyour coffee. If you wish to entertainfriends and family, add a comfy sofaset to enjoy the vibe. You can also addhigh rise chairs and an elegant barcabinet if you wish to entertainguests.

�Outdoor dining areaRooftop dining is an exciting

experience. So, if you have a terraceor a spacious balcony, add an elegant

solid wood dining table to enjoy thehustle-bustle of the city from a dis-tance while spending time with yourloved ones. Install a surround soundmusic system to enjoy the music ofyour choice. You can also invest in aneconomical trolley to help you presentand serve food.

�Light it upA rooftop setup requires proper

lighting. Add warm lights that not justprovide adequate illumination butalso brightens up your space. Go forled fairy lights or floor lamps for asocial gathering and table lamps fora solitary session. If you wish to set

up a full-fledged party ambience, youcan even add wall/floor mounteddisco lights.

�Plant your loveAn outdoor space without plants

and flowers will look too gloomy. So,make sure you have ample vegetationin your nook. Flora helps brighten upthe place and brings you closer tonature. Plants are also known to

boost productivity, help lighten themood and enhance creativity, makingyou feel happier and healthier!

�Don’t forget your pets Just like us, our pets also enjoy the

city view from the outdoors. Whetherit is to observe the cars passing by orthe birds flying around, our pets loveto engage with the outside world. Toensure their comfort, add a nice bedthat lets them enjoy the vibe.

Outdoor furniture also requiresextra love and care. Here are some tipsto prolong life and keep the furnitureas good as new.

Wood: The best way to take care

of outdoor wood furniture is to sim-ply brush off the dust particles and thenwipe using a damp cloth with water ora mild soapy solution.

Metal: Aluminium and steel arehighly suitable for outdoor use due totheir resistance to rust and great struc-tural strength. To maintain steel andaluminium furniture, all you have to dois wash with a soap and water solution,before rinsing off with clean water. Forwrought iron furniture, if rust devel-ops, brush the patchy orange spots witha DIY mixture of vinegar and water.

Plastic: Cleaning and caring forplastic furniture by rubbing alcohol willsuffice in many cases. It’s important thatone immediately rinses these agentsaway once cleaned. Extended exposureto the chemicals can fade plastic andshorten the aesthetic lifespan of yourfurniture.

Wicker: To clean wicker furnitureuse milder techniques. First, remove theloose dirt by vacuuming. Then, use amild soap mix, a lint-free rag and anold toothbrush for the hard-to-reachplaces. Too much water will weaken theweave of the furniture. It is veryimportant to let the wicker complete-ly dry before using it again because itmay take several days to regain its fullstrength.

Upholstered outdoor furniture:The go-to remedy for cleaning outdoorupholstery and pillows is solution-dyedacrylic as it’s resistant to water, mould,and UV rays while providing a finishthat looks as luxurious as any indoortextile. To keep outdoor fabrics look-ing fresh, brush off loose dirt before itsets in and wipe up spills as soon as theyhappen. You can spot-clean outdoorfabric with a mix of mild soap andwater.

(The author is Senior Director offurniture, beauty, personal and baby careat Flipkart.)

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Many of our scriptures areknown to have described

the golden age, heaven, the gar-den of Eden, paradise, in detailas a period of peace, prosper-ity, and happiness, which is saidto have existed thousands ofyears ago. However, if this istrue, then a practical questionthat comes to mind is that if thegolden age was such a goodperiod, then why and how didit come to an end? Why do wenow find ourselves in a worldfull of misery? Well, to beginwith, there are several opinionsas to whether there ever exist-ed something called paradise,is it a mere figment of wishfulimagination or reality, is it anabstract blissful experience, ora concrete world of human andmaterial perfection.

There are people whobelieve that paradise is nothingbut a utopian dream, a merefantasy that tired humans takerefuge in. In reality, such aplace is unachievable as griefand suffering are a part andparcel of life. Then there arethose who believe that bothheaven and hell co-exist at thesame time. According to them,a person is in heaven when allis fine and can be in hell thevery next moment. Secondly,when one is basking in heav-enly pleasures, others couldsimultaneously be bearing thewrath of hellish suffering. Thenthere is a third category, therich and the accomplished,who feel that heaven is righthere, right now because thereis no comfort beyond theirreach.

Religions describe heavenas a world of unrivaled bliss cre-ated by God, where humanswere in their most powerfulstate and were completely obliv-ious of unrighteousness andlived in perfect harmony withother living beings and nature.So, the above three opinionsabout the existence of paradisebecome contrary to its definingcharacteristics. As, in the firstcase, if heaven were a mereutopia, and sin and sufferingwere there right from the begin-ning, the internal urge ofhumans to regain that world ofpeace and happiness cannot beexplained. Another questionthat arises here is that — didGod in the first place create animperfect world order? If we arein heaven at one moment andin hell at the other, then heav-en is reduced to a transient state.The rich arrive at their conclu-sion after comparing their qual-ity of life with the other needyand distressed lot. Again, hereheaven is reduced to a relativeterm when it is actually a placewhere everyone exists simulta-neously in a state of perennialbliss, a place where suffering isknown to none and not whereit is known to some. Secondly,even the rich are not free fromthe fear of untimely death thatlooms large on everyone’s face.

Now let us look at theworld today and find out if weare living in heaven or havebeen banished to hell. With the

number of mounting globalproblems, irresolvable nationalissues, and uncountable emo-tional upheavals, the presenttimes in no way qualify to becalled heaven. Since this worldis certainly not heaven, it mustbe the veritable hell. Isn’t it? Soif this is hell, where is heaven?It must exist somewhere ormust have been there onceupon a time. It is only God, whocan reveal the truth about theworld ‘he’ first created. God tellsus that Earth was first a paradisewhere humans with sixteencelestial qualities lived andenjoyed the riches of the mostbountiful nature. After severalrebirths, these souls lost theiroriginal sheen and power andate the forbidden fruit of body— consciousness. This openedPandora’s box and humanweaknesses in the form of lust,anger, greed, attachment, andego became a part of the orig-inally virtuous human nature,which further gave rise to sin-ful actions. It caused sufferingin return and with the passageof time, suffering became sounbearable that souls started tolong for salvation. It is, at thistime, that the Almighty makesthis revelation that ‘he’ is onceagain here to re-create the per-fect world order — the paradise.

That day is not far when wewould see a world of purity andvalues, where every being wouldbe divine and would co-exist inharmony with nature. Therewill be no form of violence, beit physical, mental or emotion-al. Every person will be anembodiment of truth and divinevirtues. People will enjoy perfecthealth, natural beauty, and along lifespan and there will nosign of sickness or untimelydeath. Everybody will be happyand contented.

One would question: Isthis all a myth? No, not real-ly! We need to understand thatthe golden age or the newworld is the harvesting periodfor the fruits of pure actionsthat are performed by us in thepresent age. It is actually nowthat we get an opportunity tocreate our best destiny. Oncewe conquer the vices such aslust, ego, and attachment, weregain our divine nature and ithelps transform the entiresociety into a new divineworld. So, do not ever thinkthat heaven is a myth. It’s,indeed, a reality that’s as closeas tomorrow.

Katudevi Peetharam, thesarpanch of Darbari, a

newly formed panchayat in thefar-flung desert district ofJaisalmer in Rajasthan, is quitebusy these days. After causingdestruction in urban regions,when the second wave ofCOVID-19 entered ruralIndia, this electedrepresentative became quitevigilant. She now takes regularrounds in every village thatfalls under her gram panchayatensuring that the protocols arefollowed in each village. Shealso distributes masks if shenotices someone loweringtheir guard. Katudevi hasstepped up her efforts tomanage the Covid situation inthese times of gloom anddespair to safeguard herpeople.

Why is she focussing somuch on the awareness drivethis time? “Once bitten, twiceshy,” she says adding that, “Ourpanchayat had COVID-19cases in the first wave, and wedon’t want the second wave tohit again.” The villagers need tobe reminded constantly. Sheorganises regular meetings toensure that people followCOVID-19 appropriatebehaviour. Her grampanchayat has urged thevillagers to immediately reportif anyone has fever orsymptoms of the virus.

A responsible leader,Katudevi ensured that all therevenue villages and hamletsfalling in her jurisdiction wereduly fumigated with sodium

hypochlorite and that therewas no violation of lockdownnorms. The panchayat alsotook care to distribute rationkits to the needy. As herpanchayat is yet to develop itsown medical infrastructure,they are dependent upon theneighbouring Dablapanchayat.

Katudevi is joined byseveral other grassrootswomen leaders in this fightagainst COVID-19. TheJalpaka panchayat in theRishabhdev sub-division ofUdaipur district has alsosuccessfully managed to keepthe villagers safe from thevirus. The panchayat has fourrevenue villages and apopulation of nearly 6,000. Inthe past 13 months, not asingle Corona case has beenreported in the panchayat. Thesuccess mantra lies in theperformance of the youngteam formed by the SarpanchRamila Meena and her wardmembers. She regularlymonitors her teams’ efforts inensuring COVID-19appropriate behaviour in thevillages.

“The village vigilance

committees have worked quitewell in the panchayat. Whenthe migratory folks returnedhome from Maharashtra andGujarat, they were quarantinedin the fields before beingallowed entry to the village,”the SDO Govind Singh Ratnusaid.

While marriages are beingperformed strictly as perCOVID-19 protocol, villagershave restricted observance ofdeath rituals too. The usualcongregation of the wholevillage during funerals, third-day obituary meetings, and12th-day rituals has now beencurbed.

In another district of theMewar region, the womensarpanch of Gadola inChittorgarh district, RasaliDevi was quick to anticipatethe impending COVID-19crisis in the village. When thevillage witnessed three deathsand nearly 90 positive patientsin the village, she approachedthe administration toimmediately open a CovidCare Centre in the villageschool campus. She alsoensured the availability ofoxygen to avoid panic in hervillage.

Since it is a bare necessityto fetch water from the well,

she made arrangements fordoor-to-door delivery ofdrinking water to make surewomenfolk were not forced tostep out of the house andassemble at the panghat (well)in groups.

The fear of the virus hadled to a situation where peoplehad started avoiding theCOVID-19 test. Generatingawareness and preparing themto cooperate in testing was achallenge but Rasali’s efforts toensure timely tracking, testing,and the treatment worked. Astrict lockdown was observed,and with the help of theadministration, she ensuredthat no one violated thegovernment guidelines. Soon,the village was free from thevirus.

Bhuribai Gameti, the tribalsarpanch of Kanpur panchayat,well utilised the lockdownperiod to work towards villagesafety, particularly of womenand schoolgirls. “Apart fromeffective COVID-19management, the panchayathas performed well on otherfronts as well,” said Gehri Lal,ex-ward panch.

“I feel happy that theCOVID-19 period could beutilised to install CCTVcameras and proper lights inthe panchayat. The women willfeel safer stepping out whenthe lockdown comes to an end.We also started garbagecollection from doorstepbecause good hygienicconditions are essential forgood health,” Bhuribai shared.

For Santosh Kanwar, thesarpanch of Badoda village, theCOVID-19 period has beenquite a challenging experience.Several villages of thispanchayat are not yet wellconnected by road to thepanchayat headquarters. Thevillage witnessed over twodozen deaths during thesecond wave. This gaveSantosh a tough time as hetried to contain the pandemicand take necessary measures todiffuse panic among thevillagers. Now her priority is towork with the administrationto upgrade healthinfrastructure in the village.

In the tribal-dominatedBanswara district, allpanchayats have performedwell, many of them led byseveral women sarpanch andward panch. Out of the 11panchayat samitis in thedistrict, there are 934 villagesin the district which havesuccessfully kept Coronavirusat bay.

Not restricted by anyboundaries this time, theCOVID-19 virus has spreadwider and deeper in this wave.Every region — urban, rural ortribal has been impacted by it.These gram panchayats, led bystrong women leaders, areleaving no stone unturned tofight the pandemic. They arethe beacon of hope and thesewomen at the helm of affairs inthese panchayats have surelyexhibited their crisismanagement ability.

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Before modern medicine, ourancestors were already wellequipped with wisdom and

various techniques in Ayurveda totake care of the body as well as themind. Immortality and anti-ageingto maturing can appear to becomparable in their essentialobjective, yet it is total inverse in itsoutcome. The progression indiagnostic methods, symptomatictechniques, current treatment, andcareful mediation has brought aboutan expanded life expectancy forpeople.

From the point of view ofAyurveda, the skin’s surface andappearance likewise change as westart growing up through thevarious phases of life. Maturing isthe cycle of degeneration of cells asyou grow old. It is unavoidable, yetone can postpone this with the vastwisdom of Ayurveda. Ayurveda isknown to be the craft of everydayliving in the concordance and thelaws of nature. In Ayurveda,Rasayana is a rejuvenation therapythat helps in the maintenance and

promotion of health. It essentiallymeans nutrition at all levels frommacro to micro-cellular level.

Ayurvedic medicine is based onthe idea that the world is made up offive elements — aakash (space), jala(water), prithvi (earth), teja (fire),and vayu (air). A combination ofeach element results in threehumours or doshas, known as vata,kapha, and pitta. These doshas are

believed to be responsible for aperson’s physiological, mental andemotional health.

While everyone possesses acombination of these doshas, eachone of the doshas dominates a keyperiod of a human’s existence,paying little heed to your essentialconstitution. Kapha is the hour ofyouth and pre-adulthood when youare young, graceful and succulent;

pitta ascends in late puberty andprovides energy through middle age;and vata, which is dry and cold,ascents after age 50. This is thereason why those who are old are soinfluenced by obstruction, gas andaffected by cold weather. When thedoshas are in balance, your well-being is acceptable, yet on the offchance that at least one leavesbalance, different side effects orailments can emerge. Experts agreethat keeping your doshas in balancepermits you to traverse through lifewithout any body-related concerns.

The concept of healthy ageingDiet is vastly explained in

Ayurveda. The ideal diet changesaccording to different seasons, and itis explained that Ayurveda very welltells us about the daily consumptionof the food. To slow down ageing,the remedies that are given inAyurveda: Eating one amla or takingan Ayurveda tablet daily. Takingvasti/basti therapy in the rainyseason can keep you healthy.Ayurveda explains that it is very

necessary to eat before sunset. Startintake of ghee every day with yourmeal. Take snehan (oleation therapy)daily before bath. Daily practise ofpranayama is also extremely crucialto one’s well-being. Using ubtan (apowdered mix of Ayurvedic herbsand natural ingredients) whilebathing can slow down the ageing ofyour skin. These things werepractised by our ancestors to avoidageing and aid longevity of life.

Abhyanga is a subtype of bahyasnehan (outside knead), which is apart of Panchakarma treatment.Abhyanga is the blessing of the bodywith oil. Oil is implanted with spicesand is typically warm; the oil iskneaded into the whole body beforewashing. This cycle permits the oilto go through minute diverts in thebody and enter profound layers oftissue.

Advantages of Abhyanga: �Bestows non-abrasiveness and

strength the body.�Diminishes the impacts of

maturing.�Sustains the body.�Benefits skin tissue.�Builds life span.�Reinforces the body’s

resilience.�Placates vata and pitta.

Swedana is a full-body steamtreatment and is controlled as partof Panchkarma. It is the way towardsinducing sweat with the assistance ofsteam, produced from cured naturaldecoctions. It is the pre-usablemethodology in different Ayurvedicdetox treatments where the goal is towiden the channels of the body totake out poisons from the tissues.Ayurvedic fomentation is generallygiven after an oil rub.

Advantages of Swedana:�Separates toxins; lessens

aggravation.�Soothes sore muscles.�Expands dissemination.�Renews and revives the skin.�Diminishes deadness,

solidness, inflexibility.�Follows up on fat tissues.�Mitigates pressure.�Eliminates daze.�Improves absorption.

These age-old practices still finda place in the world today and thesemethods help you slow down yourbody’s natural ageing processwithout any side effects.

(The writer is an expert workingat a wellness and treatment centre,which specialises in Ayurveda.)

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Substitutes Federico Chiesaand Matteo Pessina struckin extra-time as Italy beat

battling Austria 2-1 to reachthe quarter-finals of Euro 2020at Wembley on Saturday.

The two teams were lockedat 0-0 after 90 minutes inLondon, with Italy enjoying thebetter of the first half andAustria coming back stronglyin the second period.

But Chiesa made the cru-cial breakthrough early inextra-time and another goalfrom Pessina set up a quarter-final against the winners ofSunday’s tie between Belgiumand holders Portugal, despite

late drama.“We knew we had to suf-

fer because Austria are the typ-ical side who do not allow(you) to play well,” said Italyboss Roberto Mancini.

“The substitutes made thedifference for us, but every-body gave their best tonight.

I’m happy because the ladsgave everything to win evenwhen we were tired.”

Having emerged as GroupA winners with a 100 percentrecord after playing all three oftheir games in Rome, Italywere on the road for the firsttime in the tournament.

Mancini made sevenchanges from the side that beatWales as Marco Verratti start-ed instead of Manuel Locatelliin midfield, while GiorgioChiellini again missed outwith a hamstring injury.

After belting out a rousingrendition of their national

anthem with ample backingfrom the largely Italian crowd,the Azzurri made a lively start.

But for all their possession,Italy lacked the cutting edge tokill off the Austrians.

VAR DENIES AUSTRIAMarko Arnautovic thought

he had given Austria a shocklead in the 65th minute whenhe nodded home from DavidAlaba’s header, but the formerWest Ham striker was ruled tobe marginally offside after alengthy VAR review.

The sides were locked at 0-0 at the end of normal time butit did not take long for Italy tomake their mark in extra-time.

The impressive Spinazzolacrossed from the left andChiesa controlled the ball andrifled home with his left footfive minutes into the extra half-hour.

“It’s never too late to comeon from the bench,” saidChiesa after the match. “Thecredit goes to the coachbecause everyone is alwaysready, we’re a squad of 26starters.”

Italy effectively ended thetie 10 minutes later whenFrancesco Acerbi shepherdedthe ball to Pessina, who fin-ished superbly before racingtowards the corner flag andthrowing himself on the turf.

But there was still time forlate drama when Austria’s SasaKalajdzic stooped to head theball in at the near post from acorner with a little over fiveminutes to go.

That was the first goalItaly had conceded sinceOctober 2020, ending a run of1,168 minutes without conced-ing. But ultimately they didenough to win and in theprocess set a new nationalrecord of 31 games unbeaten.

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India head coach for the tour of SriLanka, Rahul Dravid, on Sunday said it

is unrealistic to expect that all the young-sters picked for the limited-overs assign-ment will get a game as they try to makean impression ahead of this year’s T20World Cup.

The series marks the coaching returnof Dravid, who is based in Bengaluru asthe chief of the National Cricket Academy.The second string squad, led by ShikharDhawan, has six uncapped players.

“...I think it’s probably going to beunrealistic to expect us in a short tour likethis with three games, or three one-day-ers to give everyone an opportunity...Andthe selectors will be there as well,” Draviddeclared in the pre-departure press con-ference.

Among the players who are fightingfor a place in the T20 squad for this year’sWorld Cup are the capped trio of IshanKishan, Suryakumar Yadav and SanjuSamson. The Sri Lanka series starts withthe ODIs from July 13, followed by T20sfrom July 21.

The three T20s in Sri Lanka hold moreimportance than the ODIs as it will be thelast set of International games India playbefore the marquee event.

“There are a lot of people in this squadwho are pushing for places or looking tocement their places in the World Cup com-ing up, but I think the key goal of every-one in the squad and in the team...is to tryand win the series,” the former India cap-tain said.

“These are the only three games

before the World Cup. I am sure that youknow the selectors and managementwould have a pretty fair idea by now as towhat is the kind of squad that they arelooking for.”

Dravid has stated in the past that oneof the reasons for his success as an IndiaUnder-19 and A coach was the strategy togive every travelling player a game to buildtheir confidence.

“There is an opportunity for may be oneor two places that, maybe, the team man-agement or the selectors might be lookingfor, spots that they might want to fill, andgive them a few more options,” he said.

“That would be the goal probably overthe next three T20s and to win the series.

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Skipper Mithali Raj’s fighting half-centurywent in vain as England Women rode on

Tammy Beaumont and Nat Sciver’s aggres-sive unbeaten fifties to beat a below-par IndiaWomen by eight wickets in the first ODI ofthe three-match series here on Sunday.

Mithali led from the front with a patient72 to guide India Women to a modest 201for eight after being put in to bat.

Mithali held India’s innings together fol-lowing two early dismissals. She shared twocrucial partnerships — 56 runs with PunamRaut (32) and 65 with Deepti Sharma (30)— to help India go past the 200-run mark.

But England Women cantered homewith 91 balls to spare, thanks to openerBeaumont (87 not out off 87 balls) andSciver’s (74 off 74) unbroken 119-run third-wicket partnership that came off just 19 overs.

Earlier, India’s start was far from impres-sive as the visitors lost both the openerscheaply. Touted as the next big thing in Indianwomen’s cricket, teen sensation ShafaliVerma’s much-anticipated ODI debut lastedjust 14 balls from which she scored 15 runswith the help of three fours.

Shafali, who became the youngest Indiancricketer to make debut across formats onSunday, perished in search of too many bigshots when she miscued a Katherine Brunt(2/35) delivery to Anya Shrubsole at mid-onin the fifth over.

Smriti Mandhana (10) followed soonwhen Shrubsole (2/33) went through herdefence before Punam and Mithali resurrect-ed the innings.

After the early dismissals, both Punamand Mithali played cautiously but did not hes-itate to punish the bad balls.

When the partnership was just startingto flourish, Punam departed by handing asimple catch to Sophie Ecclestone off Kate

Cross.India vice-captain Harmanpreet Kaur's

(1) poor form continued as he didn’t trou-ble the scorers much, sneaking one to AmyJones off Ecclestone (3/40).

It was a struggle for experienced cam-paigner Mithali early on. She found bound-aries hard to come by, notching up her fiftyin 95 balls with a four off Shrubsole.

Together with Deepti, Mithali thenadded 65 runs for the fifth wicket before theformer was dismissed, LBW to Shrubsole.

But soon after Deepti’s dismissal, Mithalichanged gears and hit three boundaries in anover, slicing and lofting Shrubsole to amass15 runs off the 44th over.

Just when Mithali was looking danger-ous, Ecclestone got rid of her in the 46th overas India slumped to 180 for 6.

Shikha Pandey (3) and Jhulan Goswami(1) remained unbeaten to help India get pastthe 200-run mark.

London: Serena Williams onSunday said that she will notcompete at the Tokyo Olympicsnext month, joining fellowGrand Slam legend Rafael Nadalin withdrawing from the Games.

“I’m actually not on theOlympic list, so... Not that I’maware of. If so, then I shouldn’tbe on it,” the 39-year-oldAmerican revealed her decisionat her pre-Wimbledon pressconference.

She refused to divulge thereasons for her decision.

However, a ban on foreignfans as well as family membersat the Olympics would havemeant Williams being separat-ed from her daughter AlexisOlympia.

“There’s a lot of reasons thatI made my Olympic decision,”she said.

“I don’t feel like going intothem today. Maybe another day.Sorry.”

Williams is the joint mostsuccessful Olympian in tennis

history in terms of Gold medalsalongside sister Venus havingwon one Gold medal each insingles and three in doubles.

Venus edges the medalcount slightly as she also wona Silver in mixed doubles in2016 in Rio. Serena, who is bid-ding to equal Margaret Court’srecord of 24 Grand Slam singlestitles at Wimbledon, added shehad not really thought aboutwhat it would mean to miss theGames. AFP

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Star archer Deepika Kumariled the show with supreme

authority to grab a hat-trick ofGold medals as India made anunprecedented clean sweep atthe World Cup Stage 3 here onSunday for a perfect build-up tothe Tokyo Olympics in less thana month’s time.

In the absence of the world

number one Korea, the Indiansfaced little challenge to win thewomen’s individual, team andmixed pair events with Deepikaa constant in each of them, play-ing back-to-back four matchesin less than five hours.

India’s Gold rush beganwith the women’s recurve teamof Deepika, Ankita Bhakat andKomalika Bari notching up acomfortable win over Mexico.

Eyeing their first-ever Goldmedal together, Deepika andhusband Atanu Das, who areIndia’s best medal hope inarchery in the Olympics,bounced back from a 0-2 deficitto down the Netherland’s Sjefvan den Berg and GabrielaSchloesser 5-3.

Deepika blanked 17thranked Russian Elena Osipova6-0 to cap a perfect three out ofthree in the recurve women’ssection, her fourth individualWorld Cup Gold medal.

The World No 3 had won itin Guatemala City 2021, SaltLake City 2018 and Antalya2012. Overall, she has nineGold, 12 Silver and seven Bronzemedals in the World Cup.

“This is the first time I’vewon all three medals in a WorldCup. I’m really happy but at thesame time, I’ve to continueimproving as we have some very,very important competitionslined up,” Deepika said.

Spielberg: Max Verstappen tightened his grip on theFormula One driver standings as he cruised to victory inthe Styrian Grand Prix on Sunday with his closest chal-lenger Lewis Hamilton a distant second.

The Dutchman started from pole in his Red Bull andled throughout to finish more than 35 seconds head ofBritish reigning champion Hamilton in his Mercedes.

Finn Valtteri Bottas was third for Mercedes, chasedhome by the second Red Bull of Mexican Sergio Perez.

Verstappen led from start to finish for the third timethis season as he increased his lead over Hamilton to 18points while Red Bull, sponsored by an Austrian compa-ny, increased their lead in the constructor’s championship.

“Unbelievable. The car was on fire,” Verstappen onteam radio at the finish. “Another win at home feels real-ly good.” “It’s looking really good.” he said after climbingout of his car. “We just have tokeep pushing really hard and I’mconfident we can doa really good jobagain.”

Hamilton spent muchof the race expressing frus-tration on his inability tocut into Verstappen'slead as once againMercedes was notquite as quick asRed Bull, althoughhe did pick up abonus point for thefastest lap time. AFP

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It’s a new challenge, said Shikhar Dhawanas he geared up to captain an India senior

team for the first time in his career, confi-dent that the positivity and excitement inthe squad would ensure a successful lim-ited-overs tour of Sri Lanka.

Ahead of the squad’s departure onSunday, Dhawan said the two-week quar-antine has helped the bonding among theplayers and hoped that it will reflect in per-formances on the ground.

“This is a very good team. There is pos-itivity, confidence in our team and every-body is confident that we will do well. There

is a lot of excitement,” Dhawan said at thevirtual press conference.

“It is a new challenge but at the sametime it is a great opportunity for all of usto show our talent. Everybody is waiting (forthe tour to begin),” he added.

Talking about the composition of theside, Dhawan said: “The boys are doingsmart work and are looking forward tothese matches. The players have already per-formed well.

“The team is a nice blend of experienceand youth,” said the left-handed opener.

Dhawan also said that his focus is oncreating a positive atmosphere and get thebest out of the players.

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Gareth Bale has ruled outspeculation he could have

played his last match for Walesor even retire from football.

The Welsh captain walkedout of a TV interview afterSaturday’s 4-0 defeat toDenmark ended his side’s run atEuro 2020 in the last 16.

Bale said at the end of hisone-season loan spell atTottenham from Real Madridlast month that he knows wherehis future lies, but claimed itwould ‘cause chaos’ if he revealedit before the EuropeanChampionship.

However, he quashedrumours that could be retiringfrom the sport as he set his sightson Wales’ first appearance at aWorld Cup since 1958.

“I want to continue to play,”

Bale told Welsh TV channel S4Cshortly after terminating a pre-vious interview when askedabout his international future.

“People ask stupid ques-tions all the time but I obvious-ly love playing for Wales.

“I will play for Wales until

the day that I stop playing foot-ball.”

Wales’ World Cup qualify-ing campaign resumes inSeptember with a double-head-er away to Belarus and at hometo Estonia.

They look set for a battlewith the Czech Republic for sec-ond in the group behindBelgium, which would guaran-tee a playoff for the finals inQatar in 18 months’ time.

“We’ve just started theWorld Cup campaign and wewere saying in there now weneed to take this experience intothere,” added Bale.

“I feel we have a very goodway of playing when we playwell.

“We just need to keep thatconfidence high, keep playingfootball, and I think we can qual-ify for the next World Cup.”

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Pula: Croatia forward IvanPerišic tested positive for thecoronavirus and will miss thematch against Spain in theround of 16 of the Euro 2020.

Perišic will have to self-iso-late for 10 days, the Croatianteam said in a statement.The rest of the squad andcoaching staff tested neg-ative.

“Medical staff isolatedIvan from the other mem-bers of the national team,”the Croatian teamsaid, “and immedi-ately and thor-oughly informedcompetent epi-demiologica la u t h o r i t i e sabout the situa-

tion, providing evidence ofcomplying with all the neces-sary measures aimed at protec-tion against the spread of coro-navirus.”

The quarantine period willalso sideline Perišic if the 2018

World Cup finalists reachFriday’s quarterfinals andthe semifinals on July 6.

Croatia has returnedto its home country fromGlasgow. The Euro 2020

squad, without Perišic,is scheduled to fly

from Pula toCopenhagen onSunday to faceSpain the nextday. AP

�� Bucharest: France andSwitzerland will play their Euro2020 last-16 clash in front of upto 25,000 people at the NationalArena in Bucharest, UEFAannounced, doubling the pre-viously announced attendance.

“We can confirm that theNational Arena Bucharestcapacity was increased toaround 50 percent. The avail-able capacity will be approxi-mately 25,000,” UEFA con-firmed in a statement ahead ofMonday’s match.

European football’s gov-erning body added that theadditional seats made availablewere sold ‘only to fully vacci-nated people’. AP

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