RNI NO.: WBENG/2015/65962

VOL. 7, ISSUE 246 | Wednesday, 8 September 2021 | Kolkata | Pages 12 | Rs 3.00PUBLISHED FROM DELHI | KOLKATA

MILLENNIUMPOST.IN

No Half Truths

‘Issue notice to Centre on Bengal plea against CBI probes’

Bengal says the CBI has no inherent jurisdiction to conduct a probe in any part of the state, including Railway areas, till the time it obtains a prior sanction

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday granted more time to the Centre to decide on filing a further response to a batch of pleas seeking an inde-pendent probe into the alleged snooping of certain people in India through the use of Israeli spyware Pegasus and slated the matter for further hearing on September 13.

A three-judge Bench headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana had issued a notice to the Centre on the pleas on August 17, while making it clear that it did not want the government to disclose any-thing which compromised national security. The Centre had earlier filed a short affida-vit on the matter.

As soon as the matter came up for hearing before the Bench, also comprising Justices Surya Kant and Aniruddha Bose, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Cen-tre, said due to some difficulties he could not meet the officials concerned to take a decision on the filing of the second affidavit and sought listing of the cases either on Thursday or Monday.

“My Lords, I need to take a

call on filing a second affidavit. It could not be decided due to some difficulties. Kindly give me time till Thursday or Mon-day,” the law officer said.

The CJI said the Centre’s affidavit is there.

To this, the law officer said that the Centre was to take a decision on the filing of a sec-ond affidavit in the matter.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for senior journal-

ist N Ram, said that he does not have any objection to the request. List it on Monday, the Bench said. The Centre had earlier filed a limited, short affi-davit in the Apex Court saying that the pleas seeking an inde-pendent probe into the Pegasus snooping allegations are based on “conjectures and surmises or on other unsubstantiated media reports or incomplete or uncorroborated material”.

It said the position on the issue has already been clarified in Parliament by IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw.

With a view to dispelling any wrong narrative spread by certain vested interests and examining the issues raised, the government will constitute a committee of experts, it had said. Continued on P4

SC adjourns hearing till Sept 13 as Centre seeks more time for affidavit

OUR CORRESPONDENT

SRINAGAR: PDP president Mehbooba Mufti was put under house detention on Tuesday and she claimed that the decision of Jammu and Kashmir authori-ties to restrain her movement had “exposed the government’s claims of normalcy”.

She also hit out at the Centre alleging that while the govern-ment was expressing concern for the rights of the people in Afghanistan, the same were being denied to Kashmiris.

“I’ve been placed under house arrest today because according to admin (adminis-tration) the situation is far from normal in Kashmir. This exposes their fake claims of normalcy,” Mehbooba, who is the last Chief Minister of the erstwhile state, tweeted.

“GOI expresses concern for the rights of Afghan people but wilfully denies the same to Kash-miris,” she added. Continued on P4

RAIPUR: The Raipur Police have arrested Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel’s father Nand Kumar Baghel from Delhi in a case registered against him for allegedly making derog-atory remarks against a community, an official said here on Tuesday.

After being brought from the national Capital, Nand Kumar Baghel was produced in a local court which sent him to jail under judicial remand for 15 days, he said.

The CM had strongly disapproved of the objectionable remarks allegedly made by his 86-year-old father and asserted nobody is above law.

“Nand Kumar Baghel was arrested and brought from Delhi to Raipur on Tuesday,” Raipur Additional Superin-tendent of Police Tarkeshwar Patel said.

He was produced in the court of Judi-cial Magistrate First Class (JMFC) Janak Kumar Hidko who sent him to 15-day judicial custody, he added. AGENCIES

Mehbooba says under

house arrest, questions J&K

‘normalcy’

Chhattisgarh CM’s father arrested for

‘derogatory’ remarks

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: The Health department has prepared a new protocol for international travellers mandating them to undergo RT-PCR tests on their arrival at the city airport irrespective of negative test reports or vaccination com-pletion certificates they carry from their countries.

The new norm will be implemented on the travel-lers entering the state from

seven countries — Bangla-desh, South Africa, China, New Zealand, Mauritius, Zimbabwe and Bosnia as new variants have been found in these countries. Passengers have to pay for undergoing RT-PCR tests at the airport. If someone wants to avail free tests, he/she will be sent to Chittaranjan National Cancer Institute (CNCI). The deci-sion was taken at a meeting at Swasthya Bhawan on Tuesday.

If someone is found posi-tive, he/she will be admitted to the Beliaghata ID Hospi-

tal and contact tracing and quarantine will be followed, said a senior health official. The Health department will also prepare a guideline as to how to keep surveillance on foreign travellers. Those com-ing from Bangladesh for treat-ment will have to abide by certain protocols. The Health department may ask the air-port authorities to share the list of foreign travellers and their whereabouts so that they can be tracked. The civic bod-

ies and police stations may be asked to keep an eye on them.

“International passengers coming from the 7 countries will have to undergo RT-PCR tests mandatorily as per the directives of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. It is already applied to pas-sengers from the UK and Bra-zil. The seven countries have been newly added to the list. One can also take a free test at the CNCI,” said Director of Health Services, Dr Ajay

Chakraborty. Meanwhile, India logged

31,222 fresh cases taking the total tally of COVID-19 cases to 3,30,58,843, while the active cases were recorded below four lakh, according to the Union Health ministry data updated on Tuesday.

The death toll has climbed to 4,41,042 with 290 fresh fatalities, according to the data updated at 8 am. The case fatality rate was recorded at 1.33 per cent.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday said that its registry will issue notice to the Centre on the lawsuit filed by the West Bengal gov-ernment alleging that the CBI is going ahead with an inves-tigation without securing the pre-requisite nod from the state under the law.

The Bengal government, in its original civil suit under Article 131 of the Constitu-tion, has referred to the pro-visions of the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act 1946 and said the central agency has been proceeding with investigations and filing FIRs without getting the nod from the state government as

mandated under the statute. Recently, the CBI has

lodged multiple FIRs in cases of post-poll violence

in West Bengal.A Bench headed by Jus-

tice L Nageswara Rao said as per the Supreme Court Rules,

notice has to be immediately issued by the Registry at the time of the filing of the suit.

“Why is this listed before

the court. According to the Supreme Court Rules, notice has to be immediately issued by the Registry at the time of the filing of the suit. Why is it coming before the court? Unlike an SLP, the suit filed under Article 131 automati-cally notice has to go. Interim relief can only be heard only after issuance of notices. We cannot grant ex-parte stay. We will tell the Registry to issue notice,” the Bench, also com-prising Justices B R Gavai and B V Nagarathna, said.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the West Bengal government, said the suit has been filed in wake of multiple FIRs being filed by the CBI and sought a stay. Continued on P4

RT-PCR must for in-bound travellers from 7 countries On arrival in Kol, Covid test mandatory irrespective of -ve test report or vaccination completion certificates

Highlights » Claiming that the agency has been exercising its powers in an “uncon-stitutional manner”, the suit said the registration of cases by the CBI was an encroachment on the legal rights of the state

» The petition demands the annulment of all cases registered by the CBI and to restrain the

agency from lodging any fresh cases

» The state government said that law and order and police have been constitutionally placed under the exclusive juris-diction of the states. As such, the CBI registering cases is illegal because this violates the constitu-tionally distributed pow-ers between the Centre and the states

CityRAINS THROW LIFE OUT OF GEAR 2Nation189 DEATHS IN KERALA 4edit A BIGGER PROBLEM 7internationalCHINA APPOINTS NEW ARMY COMMANDER 8

businessSENSEX ENDS FLAT 10sportDJOKOVIC EXTENDS SLAM BID 11

In today’s paper

...

Modi govt can talk to Taliban, but not to farmers

Randeep Surjewala

SUSHIL MANAV

CHANDIGARH/KARNAL: A large number of farmers squatted at the gates of the district headquarters here on Tuesday, locked in a showdown with Haryana’s BJP-led govern-ment over a police lathi-charge last month.

Farmers have announced that they will stay outside the mini secretariat through-out the night and added that their sit-in will be indefinite till the authorities accept their demands. They further said that arrangements of food for protesters will be made at the protest site.

The gherao began in the evening, several hours after

farmers from Haryana and neighbouring states reached Karnal’s New Anaj Mandi for a mahapanchayat, riding trac-tors and motorcycles.

Marching on foot from the mahapanchayat venue to the mini-secretariat five kilo-metres away, farmers faced a water cannon as they neared the complex. They jumped some barricades, but there was no other serious confrontation with police along the way.

The protesters are demand-ing action over a police lathi-charge in Karnal on August 28.

Before this, the police tried to speak to the farmers to persuade them not to march towards the mini secretariat but in vain.

Farmer leader Yogendra Yadav earlier in the day tweeted that talks with the Karnal dis-trict administration had failed. Continued on P4

Talks fail; ‘gherao of mini-secretariat to continue till demands are met’

Farmer unions have demanded action against officials over lathi-charge against protesters on Aug 28

Durga Puja committees to get Rs 50K; Covid

norms to remain in place

The Red Road Carnival may be held on October 18 if pandemic situation permits

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee speaks during a meeting with different Puja Committees, ahead of upcoming Durga Puja festival, in Kolkata, on Tuesday PIC/MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: The Ben-gal government on Tuesday announced a financial grant of Rs 50,000 to each Durga Puja organiser this year as well to assist them to host the mega festival without facing finan-cial constraints when the econ-omy has slowed down due to the pandemic.

With the second wave yet to ebb, the state govern-ment has also clarified that the Covid guidelines followed last year would be executed this time as well.

However, the Red Road Carnival may get organised on October 18 if the Covid situation permits. “The final decision in regards to holding the Red Road Carnival, which gained immense popularity, on October 18 would be taken later only after assessing the Covid situation,” Chief Min-ister Mamata Banerjee said.

The decision to allow pan-dal hopping at night would also be taken in the first week of October. The Durga Puja begin on October 12 this year — the day of Maha Sap-tami. The Chief Minister has announced that immersion of idols of Goddess Durga and her entourage can be carried out from October 15 to 17.

With the bypoll in Bhow-anipore Assembly segment announced from where Baner-jee is contesting as the Trin-

amool Congress candidate, Chief Secretary HK Dwivedi announced that Rs 50,000 would be given to each of the Puja organisers. There would be a 50 per cent subsidy on power tariff and all license fees to get permission of Fire and Emergency Services depart-ment and local civic bodies or Panchayats to host Durga Puja have been waived off. The state government had provided sup-port of Rs 50,000 last time as well. Continued on P4

Takeaways » The decision to allow pandal hopping at night would also be taken in the first week of Oct » Immersion of idols of Goddess Durga & her entourage can be car-ried out from Oct 15-17 » There would be a 50% subsidy on power tariff and all license fees to get permission of Fire & Emergency Services dept & local civic bodies or Panchayats to host Durga Puja have been waived off » At least 36,000 Durga Pujas, including 2,500 in Kolkata, would get the benefit of the state’s govt’s financial assistance

PEGASUS SNOOPING ROW

It said the position on the issue has already been clarified in Parliament by IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw

PESHAWAR: Mullah Mohammad Hasan Akhund, the chief of the Taliban’s powerful decision-making body ‘Rehbari Shura’, has been named as Afghani-stan’s new head of state by the insurgent group’s top leader Mullah Hebatullah Akhundzada, according to a Pakistani media report.

Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, Chairman of Tal-iban’s Political Office in Doha, and Mullah Abdus Salam will work as deputies of Mullah Hasan in the new Taliban government, which is likely to be announced next week, The News Interna-tional reported, citing multi-ple sources.

Mullah Hasan is pres-ently head of the Taliban’s powerful decision-making body — Rehbari Shura or leadership council — which

serves much like a govern-ment Cabinet running all the group’s affairs subject to the approval of the top leader.

Mullah Hebatullah him-self proposed Mullah Has-san’s name to head the government, the paper said, adding that the issues within ranks of the Taliban regard-ing the formation of the gov-ernment have been resolved.

According to the paper, Mullah Hassan belongs to Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban, and was among the founders of the armed movement. He worked for 20 years as head of Rehbari Shura and remained close to Mullah Hebatullah.

He had served as foreign minister and deputy prime minister during the Tali-ban’s previous government in Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001. Continued on P4

Mullah Hasan to head proposed Taliban

govt, says Pak report Mullah Baradar to serve as deputy

Taliban soldiers walk towards Afghans shouting slogans, during an anti-Pakistan demonstration, near the Pakistan Embassy in Kabul, on Tuesday AP/PTI

City: Pg 3Fatality rate stands at 1.19% for over 30 days, active Covid cases dip by 93

Nation: Pg 6PM launches key edu initiatives, including sign language dictionary

Film: Pg 12Jimin’s fan accounts banned in China for ‘illegal’ funds

JOINT EXERCISE

INS Tabar with ENS Alexandria, a frontline frigate of the Egyptian Navy, during a maritime partnership exercise in the Mediterranean Sea PTI

Around 20,000 farmers gather to attend Kisan Mahapanchayat against the Centre’s farm reform laws, in Karnal PTI

SUPREME COURT TELLS REGISTRAR

SERVING SOCIETY

Minister of Women and Child Development and Social Welfare, Shashi Panja distributed aprons among Anganwadi Workers and Helpers at Suvanya, Saltlake on Tuesday MPOST

Incessant rains throw life out of gear in south & north dists

‘Ensure conduct of vax drive sans political interference’

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: State Transport department has started receiv-ing online application for per-mit of vehicles. The initiative has been taken up to mini-mise the footfall of visitors at all Motor Vehicles offices in the state.

According to the notifica-tion issued on September 3, any application may also be submit-ted online in VAHAN- 4 por-tal either for new permit or for renewal/ cancellation/ transfer of permit in the entire state.

Further, any manual appli-cation for such service will be completely stopped with effect from December 1, 2021, after which only online applica-tions may be made for such services. This will come into effect immediately. The online system, according to the department officials, will also minimise the malpractices by brokers and enable transpar-ency in issuance of the doc-

uments. This apart, the state Transport department is also mulling to adopt the smart

cards soon as a part of ‘one nation one driving license’ and ‘one nation, one vehicle regis-

tration certificate (RC)’ system. In the new system, the driving licenses will include QR codes and a microchip while the fea-tures of the smart cards will remain uniform in all parts of the country.

Now, transport dept accepts online applications for vehicle permit

Manual application will be completely stopped from Dec 1

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: State govern-ment has given a directive to all the district administrations to ensure that only govern-ment employees are involved in the vaccination drive and there should not be ‘any politi-cal interference’.

Chief Secretary H K Dwivedi held a meeting with all the DMs and other officials and issued necessary instruc-tions in this regard.

The Chief Medical Officers of health in all the districts have been asked to ensure that no Covid deaths take place under their jurisdiction.

State government has found that in some districts Covid positivity rate is higher than the state’s average. These dis-tricts have been asked to ensure that Covid infection rate goes down.

It may be mentioned here that a team from Swasthya Bhawan had recently visited Nadia and the report they submitted to the department regarding Covid had not been so satisfactory.

According to sources, Chief Secretary directed the district officials to further strengthen the vaccination drive in rural urban and semi-urban areas.

During the last month the state had received around 1

crore vaccine and in the current month it is expected to receive around 1.4 crore doses.

Meanwhile, Bengal on Tuesday administered 5,25,409 doses across the state and the number of cumulative doses administered so far in the state reached 4,46,52,376 till Tuesday.

State had administered over 7 lakh doses on Monday. On Friday it had also administered over 5 lakh doses.

As per health department figure, first doses have been cumulatively administered on nearly 3.15 crore people so far

and in case of second doses cumulative figure stands at 1.25 crore so far.

As many as 3,725 common vaccination centers (CVC) have been operational throughout the state. Around 3,769 AEFI cases have been reported in the state so far.

Bengal has performed the highest number of doses in August. State had successfully conducted over 5 lakh daily vaccinations over a span of one week in a row. Few days ago Bengal managed to conduct 12 lakh doses in a single setting an example for other states.

YOUTH HELD FROM KARNATAKA FOR CREATING FAKE PROFILE OF CITY GIRLKOLKATA: A youth was arrested from Karnataka for allegedly creating a fake profile in the name of a woman on a dating website. According to police, the accused youth, Sanjay Ballery, had created a fake profile on a dating website using a woman’s pictures and her name. The woman from Lake Town area is studying MBBS in a college at Bengaluru. During Janu-ary this year, she started getting calls from unknown numbers and several people were giving vulgar proposals. On February 1, she lodged a complaint against unknown people for creating a fake profile. During the probe, police tracked the Internet Protocol (IP) address and arrested the youth on September 3. He was brought to Kolkata on Tuesday on transit remand.

ELECTRIC FURNACE AT KASHI MITRA GHAT TO NOT RUN FROM SEPT 15 TO 22KOLKATA: The solitary electric furnace at Kashi Mitra Ghat crematorium in north Kolkata will be closed for emergency repair work from September 15 to 22. The closure will be effective from 8 am on Septem-ber 15 till 4 pm on September 22 after which it is expected to be operationalised.

PROVIDE DETAILS OF HIRING PROCESS: HC ASKS SCHOOL SERVICE COMMISSION KOLKATA: The Calcutta High Court on Tuesday asked the School Service Commission (SSC) to provide de-tails of the recruitment process. Job seeker Govinda Mandal had filed a case in the High Court, alleging irregularities in the recruitment process. He alleged that despite his name being in number 214 of the merit list published in 2016, he did not get a job. However, the candidate at number 252 in the merit list got a job. The case is pending in the Chief Justice’s court.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Two women from Kamarhati in North 24-Parga-nas have died following diar-rhea while around 68 more patients have been undergo-ing treatment in the College of Medicine and Sagore Dutta Hospital. Six patients have been shifted to other hospitals as their health condition dete-riorated, sources in the hospi-tal said.

People mainly from 5 wards under the Kamarhati munici-pality have been affected. The cause of diarrhea is yet to be ascertained.

It was learnt that few patients came to the same hos-pital with abdominal pain and vomiting couple of days back.

The number of patients kept mounting with each passing day, triggering concern among the hospital authorities. Doc-tors from various departments are serving at the emergency department to meet the extra rush of patients. It is suspected that it might have been caused due to drinking water.

An administrator from the Kamarhati Municipality said infection spread rapidly and it might have been caused

from the contaminated water. Local administration has kept a drinking water tank in the area. The civic body officials also contacted the Health department.

They have applied to the Health department for the examination of samples of water which might have trig-gered the situation. The civic body also urged the local peo-ple to be alert and not to cre-ate panic.National Institute of Cholera and Enteric Diseases (NICED) authorities said they had the expertise to find out of the cause of the outbreak by examining the water but no samples were sent to them. NICED also suspects that it might have been cholera as in around 80 per cent of such cases it is found to be cholera, an official claimed.

“Rectal swab and water specimen were collected for the laboratory diagnosis. All required public health mea-sures like water clorination, visit by medical team, halo-gen distribution and health advice was given. The chair-man, Kamarhati Municipality confirmed that the entire situ-ation is under control,” senior health official said.

Diarrhea outbreak: Two dead, 68 ill in Kamarhati

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Incessant rainfall caused due to a low pressure over Bay of Bengal threw life out of gear both in south and north Bengal districts on Tues-day with landslides on National Highway 10 halting the vehicu-lar traffic between Siliguri and Sikkim/Kalimpong.

Water from Bay of Bengal entered into the villages along the coasts.

The Regional Meteorolog-ical Centre on Tuesday pre-dicted that the low pressure may gain some strength and move towards Odisha as a result the coastal districts may receive rainfall in the next 24 hours.

The weather office pre-dicted that Darjeeling, Kalim-pong and Jalpaiguri may receive some spells of heavy rain in the next 24 hours while other districts in the north may witness light to moderate rain-fall accompanied by lightning.

It started raining in Kolk-ata and its surrounding areas around 11 am on Tuesday and incessant rainfall led to inunda-tion in some places.

Some parts of Central Avenue, Thanthania, Bidhan Sarani, Rabindra Sadan and

several other areas remained inundated for some time.

As the lock-gates were closed due to high tide till afternoon, it took some time to discharge accumulated water in some pockets of the city.

The drainage department officials of the Kolkata Munic-ipal Corporation worked on a war footing to discharge the accumulated water.

The highest temperature in the city remained at 33.1 degree Celsius and the low-est temperature stood at 25.8

degree Celsius. Rains brought some relief to the city dwellers from sweltering heat.

Landslides occurred at sev-eral places along the National Highway 10 since early Mon-day morning resulting in complete disruption of traffic initially but the local adminis-tration worked on a war foot-ing and vehicular movement was resumed through one way. Another landslide on Tuesday disrupted vehicular movement. The repair works were under-taken on a war footing and traf-

fic movement was expected to be normal late Tuesday eve-ning. North Bengal districts have been receiving rainfall for the past couple of days.

Water from the Bay of Bengal entered into some of the hotels situated close to the beaches in Digha in East Midnapore.

Locals said tidal waves with

an approximate height of 30 feet hit the guard-wall along the coastline.

Water gushed into several villages along the Shankar-pur-Digha coast. The district administration stepped up efforts to evacuate people from the coastline.

Police teams were kept at each beach so that the visitors did not go to the beaches.

A low pressure that has been created over the Bay of Bengal also contributed to the high tidal wave in Digha and other coastal areas.

Water entered into the mar-ket place in Digha and also to many villages situated along the coast. Local shop owners downed their shutters as the weather turned inclement since Tuesday morning.

The police administra-tion carried out surveillance along the beaches to check any untoward incidents.

MeT office had earlier pre-dicted rainfall in various south Bengal districts on Tuesday. As it was predicted several dis-tricts including Kolkata, North 24-Parganas, South 24-Parga-nas, Howrah, Hooghly received incessant rainfall from Tuesday morning leading to inundation in some pockets.

COASTAL DISTS MAY RECEIVE RAINS IN NEXT 24 HRS: MET

News at a Glance

Highlights » The weather office predicted that Darjeeling, Kalimpong and Jalpaiguri may receive some spells of heavy rain in the next 24 hours while other districts in the north may witness light to moderate rainfall accompanied by lightning » Water from Bay of Bengal entered into the villages along the coasts » Landslides occurred at several places along the National Highway 10 since early Monday morning resulting in complete disruption of traffic

2 millenniumpostCitympWEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021 | KOLKATA

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

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Highlights » The online system, according to the department officials, will also minimise the malpractices by brokers and enable transparency in issuance of the documents » This apart, the state Transport department is also mulling to adopt the smart cards soon as a part of ‘one nation one driving license’ and ‘one nation, one vehicle registration certificate (RC)’ system

ER launches two Krishak

Spl trainsOUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Eastern Railway on Tuesday introduced two new Krishak Special trains.

The trains will run over Gede - Sealdah and Shantipur - Sealdah route and provide loading/unloading facilities at important stations enroute.

The vendors can carry their products on the strength of Monthly Vendor Season Ticket (MVST), Luggage Ticket (LT), Unreserved Ticket (UT) as the case may be.

The regular run of these Gede – Sealdah and Shanti-pur – Sealdah Krishak Special trains will start from Septem-ber 8, 2021. The Gede – Seal-dah Krishak Special train will start from Gede at 8.15 am to reach Sealdah at 11.10 am while Shantipur – Seal-dah Krishak Special train will leave Shantipur at 3.10 pm to reach Sealdah at 5.34 pm. In the opposite direction, Sealdah – Shantipur Krishak Special train will leave Sealdah at 11.30 am to reach Shantipur at 1.52 pm. In the Gede section, the UP train from Ranaghat will leave Ranaghat at 7.00 am to arrive at Gede station at 7.58 am.

Three Hill hosps to get hybrid critical care unit

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Nabadiganta Industrial Township Author-ity (NDITA) inaugurated four cycle stands in Sector V to encourage IT professionals to use the eco-friendly mode of transport. New Town has bagged ‘Cycle 4 Change Chal-lenge’ award announced by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA).It is the only area in Bengal that has graded cycle path.

The use of cycle has gone up by 50 per cent in New Town. New Town Kolkata Develop-ment Authority (NKDA) gives training to the interested peo-ple in cycling. The cycle-shar-ing scheme is also working fine. Under the scheme, a person can hire a cycle, visit the places and then deposit the cycle at

the stand after making neces-sary payment. Every cycle is fitted with a GPS tracker.

The cycle stands have come up near WEBEL Bhavan, NDITA Bhavan and ground floor of Wipro Building. As many offices in Sector V are still following the work from home model, the traffic move-ment in the area has gone down considerably. It is the ideal time to use cycle to go to the place of work.

NDITA is carrying out an in-depth study of the transpor-tation system in Sector V.

As Sector V will be busy once the East-West Metro and Garia- Airport Metro start operating, the study is required on the management of the transport system of Sec-tor V, which is the biggest IT hub in the state.

NDITA inaugurates four cycle stands in New Town

AMITAVA BANERJEE

DARJEELING: The three hill hospitals namely Darjeel-ing district hospital, Kurseong district hospital and Kalim-pong district hospital will be equipped with 24 bedded Hybrid Critical Care Unit, stated an order from the Direc-torate of Health Services, Gov-ernment of West Bengal.

“The Government of West Bengal has planned establish-ment of 24 bed Hybrid Criti-cal Care Unit (8 CCU and 16 HDU beds) either by setting up new Critical Care Units at some hospitals or augmentation of existing beds in CCUs/ High Dependency Units/Trauma Care Units /Burn Units,” stated the order.

“With the boost in infra-structure, our healthcare sys-tem will be robust and the Hills will benefit from this. We thank Chief Minister Mamata Baner-jee for this initiative,” stated Anit Thapa, former chairman, Board of Administrators, GTA.

The units will be made functional at the earliest to combat surge in Covid-19

cases, if the need arises, stated the order. The facilities will benefit patients in the Hills.

‘With the boost in infrastructure, our healthcare system will be robust and the Hills will benefit from this. We thank Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for this initiative..’

KOLKATA: Tension pre-vailed at Aushgram in East Burdwan on Tuesday after-noon after a Trinamool Con-gress leader, who is the son of a Panchayat Pradhan, was alleg-edly shot dead by BJP-backed miscreants.

According to sources, on Tuesday Shyamal Bakshi, Prad-han of Debshala panchayat

went to the Gerai village to attend a programme at the house of Trinamool Congress block president. Shyamal’s son Chanchal Bakshi accompanied his father to Gerai. When they were returning to Debshala rid-ing a motorcycle, a few miscre-ants surrounded them as soon as they left Gerai village. The miscreants allegedly fired sev-

eral rounds at Chanchal and fled. He was rushed to Jamtara hospital, where doctor declared Chanchal brought dead. TMC leadership alleged that in the Assembly elections, their party gained lead from the Debshala area due to Chanchal’s effort. Thus, he became the target of BJP. However, the saffron party denied the allegations. MPOST

East Burdwan: TMC leader shot dead

Bengal administers more than 5 lakh doses in a day

Incessant rainfall led to inundation in some places in city

Representative Image

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3millenniumpost

FINAL TOUCHES

An artisan giving the final touches to idols ahead of Ganesh Chaturthi

City mpKOLKATA | WEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021

Fatality rate stands at 1.19% for over 30 days, active Covid cases dip by 93

Bhowanipore by-election: Cong not to field candidate; ‘walkover’ for Mamata likely

PRITESH BASU

KOLKATA: In a major achievement, the state owned West Bengal Power Devel-opment Corporation Lim-ited (WBPDCL) has doubled its captive coal production to 6.25 million tonnes in 2020-21 financial year. It was 3.1 million tonnes in the 2019-20 finan-cial year.

This became possible with the WBPDCL authorities becoming successful in oper-ationalising four of its captive coal mines.

The captive coal contri-bution was only 0.081 mil-lion tonnes in April to August period of 2018-19 financial year. With continuous effort, the same has gone up to 4.19 million tonnes in the corre-sponding period of 2021-22 financial year.

The captive coal mines at

Panchwara (N), Barjore (N), Barjora and Gangaramchak have been made operational. At the same time, the fifth captive mine Tara in Bankura would also become operational soon. With the coal mines getting operationalised, the produc-tion has increased to 6.25 mil-lion tonnes in 2020-21 that was 3.1 million tonnes in 2019-20 financial year.

According to the sources in the WBPDCL, the increase in captive coal production is grad-ually making it self dependent

in getting supply of coal.This comes when the work

of the first phase at Deocha Pachami that has an inferred reserve of 2.1 billion tons would start soon.

The situation would com-pletely change once the coal production at Deocha Pachami starts.

It covers an area of 3,500 acres where the mining would take place and a thorough assessment has been carried out identifying that there are around 35 villages with a pop-

ulation of around 4,000. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has announced that the work of the first phase would start soon where there is no settle-ment at all. She has also assured that local people do not have to worry as her government would provide proper rehabili-tation to them.

It needs mention that fol-lowing a directive of the Supreme Court, captive coal production in state was stopped in 2015. However, with sustained efforts of the then Chairman of WBPDCL Santanu Basu, the production again commenced in 2019.

Earlier, setting a new mile-stone, the West Bengal Power Development Corporation achieved a record profit after tax of Rs 252 crore in 2020-21 financial year compared to that of Rs 15.48 crore in 2019-20 fiscal.

WBPDCL doubles its captive coal production to 6.25 million tonnes‘The increase in captive coal production is making it self-dependent...’

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: With the BJP still scouting for a ‘heavyweight’ to take on Trinamool Congress (TMC) chairperson Mamata Banerjee in the Bhowanipore bypolls and the Congress not fielding a nominee for the con-stituency, speculations are rife that the ruling party supremo—who is TMC’s Bhowanipore can-didate—may get a walkover. The last date of filing the nomination is September 13.

The AICC on Tuesday decided not to field any candidate in Bhowanipore Assembly con-stituency and has conveyed its message in this regard to Adhir Chowdhury, PCC chief in Ben-gal. Chowdhury held a Press conference in Murshidabad and announced his party’s stand of not placing any candidate from Bhowanipore in the by-election.

Chowdhury on Monday had said that his party is likely to field candidates from Bhowanipore and names of the nominees would be sent to AICC for its approval.

Dilip Ghosh, president state BJP, said the party would field a ‘heavyweight’ candidate in Bhow-anipore. However, he could not name the candidate as the saf-fron party’s central leadership in Delhi had got some names and they were yet to finalise the candidate. It was learnt from reliable sources that the saffron

party had approached Rudranil Ghosh, who had contested the 2021 Assembly election from the same constituency.

He was defeated by Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay of Trinamool Congress by over 25,000 votes. Sources claimed that Ghosh had refused to contest the bypolls on personal grounds. According to the sources, the state BJP unit had also approached Tathagata Roy, former state president of BJP, to contest the bypolls. “He too refused to become a candi-date,” added sources.

Adhir Chowdhury, PCC president on Monday, had said Congress would field a candi-date in Bhowanipore and some names would be given to AICC

for its consideration. It was learnt that till Tuesday no names had been sent to AICC. The Con-gress candidate, Md Sahadab Khan, got only 5,211 votes in 2021 Assembly election from Bhowanipore.

Meanwhile, Trinamool Con-gress is gearing up to ensure a grand victory for Mamata Baner-jee. Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay, state Agriculture minister—who was elected from Bhow-aniore Assembly seat in 2021 and later resigned to make room for Banerjee— wrote poll graffiti in her favour on Tuesday. He said Banerjee would win by a record margin. Schemes like Duare Sarkar, Paray Samadhan and Lakshmir Bhandar have received overwhelming response from the people. Banerjee will meet the party workers at Ahindra Mancha on Wednesday.

TMC has also announced names of the leaders, who will campaign for Banerjee.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: The State gov-ernment on Tuesday filed an appeal before the Calcutta High Court challenging an order of a single bench that stayed proceedings against BJP MLA Suvendu Adhikari in connec-tion with three criminal cases against him.

The state filed the case in the Division Bench comprising Justice Subrata Talukdar and Justice Kesang Doma Bhutia. The matter is likely to be heard on Wednesday.

On Monday, Adhikari, Leader of the Opposition in the state assembly, did not appear before the Criminal Investi-gation Department (CID) in connection with the investiga-tion into the death case of his former bodyguard Subhabrata Chakraborty.

He sent an e-mail to the CID citing that a hearing was pending at the High Court regarding the cases registered against him. After the hearing, the High Court ordered a stay on proceedings in three cases

against Adhikari.However, there are five

cases against Adhikari in differ-ent police stations of the state.

Justice Rajasekhar Mantha, during the hearing, stayed the probe into the case first regis-tered in Contai, along with one involving a political clash at Nandigram and another of gold chain snatching at Panskura.

Investigation will continue in connection with other two cases - one involving an alleged job scam in Maniktala, Kolkata and another in which Adhikari allegedly threatened a police official over a political meeting held in violation of the Disaster Management Act in Tamluk of East Midnapore.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: The state govern-ment will soon notify a cur-tailed syllabus from class I to IX for the benefit of the stu-dents. Earlier the syllabus of both secondary and higher sec-ondary was reduced by 30 to 35 per cent.

Instructed by the Educa-tion department, the Syllabus Restructure Committee has reduced the syllabus upto the 9th standard by 30 to 35 per cent.

“We have forwarded the details to the concerned Boards. They will approve the same and then notify,” a senior official of the Syllabus Restruc-ture Committee said.

Schools have remained closed since March 2020 due to the pandemic and classes are being conducted in online mode.

The activity task for the stu-dents that are uploaded time to time in the Banglar Siksha portal will also be based on the reduced syllabus.

The curtailed syllabus will be effective for all the subjects taught in different classes.

“It has not yet been decided when schools will reopen. There are chances of reopen-ing them after the Durga Puja but that too will depend on the Covid situation. So we have decided to continue with the reduced syllabus this year too for the benefit of the students,” a senior official of the Educa-tion department said.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: A number of col-leges in the city will soon come out with ‘wish list’ to mop up the undergraduate (UG) admis-sion process.

The move comes with the admission process in some col-leges not picking up its desired pace even after multiple rounds of admission.

“We have already completed three rounds of admission and it has been observed that in some Science and Arts subjects the process has been slower than what we had hoped. So, after September 15, the concerned departments will go for wish list to speed up the admission process,” Siuli Sarkar, Principal of Lady Brabourne College said.

“However, even when con-ducting admission through wish list, merit will be the priority,” Sarkar, added.

In Lady Brabourne seats have remained vacant in Phys-ics, Chemistry in Science while in Arts subjects like Sanskrit, Persian and Philosophy have had few takers. Applicants from the general merit list can express their desire to take admission in a particular subject which will then help the colleges to prepare a merit list from the pool of names on the wish list.

Maulana Azad College is also planning wish list after publish-ing six to seven lists depending upon the vacancies in various subjects. “It has been found that students from ICSE and CBSE

boards have applied in large numbers in English while more students of Higher Secondary Council have sought admission in Science subjects,” Subhasis Dutta, Principal of Maulana Azad College said.

Scottish Church College has completed its admission process on the basis of three merit lists on Monday. The college author-ities have already elicited wish list and will publish its next list on the basis of it.

Seth Anandam Jaipuria Col-lege will go for wishlist from September 8 and the process will continue till September 11.

It has been the practice of leading colleges in the city to adopt wish list after a few admis-sion cycles. The move is aimed at saving time so that they do not continue publishing merit lists with students who are not interested to take admission in that particular college

“We will go for wish list but after completing five to six rounds of admission—may be in the third week of this month. The policy will be adopted in those subjects where we find less inter-est among the students,” Apurba Ray, Vice-Principal of Asutosh College said.

Many colleges to soon start ‘wish list’ to mop up

UG admission process

State files plea in HC challenging court relief to Suvendu

Sadhan Pande critical, may be taken to Mumbai

State curtails syllabus of

classes I to IX

OUR CORRESPONDENT)

KOLKATA: A day after the bodies of a mother and son were found in their flat at Parnashree area, police detained the deceased’s husband. Meanwhile, on Tuesday the Detective Department took over the investigation.

Susmita Mondal (45) and his son Tamojit Mondal (13) were found murdered in their flat. Sus-mita’s husband, Tapan Mondal, who is a bank employee, returned home around 8:30 pm and called her from the ground floor.

When Susmita did not receive the call, Tapan reportedly called his father-in-law to enquire about her. Cops found Tapan’s statement incongruous. Also, his mobile phone was found switched off between 2 pm and 4pm. Sleuths suspect that Susmita and Tamojit were killed between 3 pm and 5 pm. Tamojit was found wear-ing his school uniform as he was attending online classes.

Police on Tuesday went to

the school and questioned the teachers. It was found that the boy was absent in the last period. Meanwhile, cops interrogated the private tutor of Tamojit, who had been to the flat on Mon-day around 5 pm. He claimed that despite ringing the doorbell several times, none responded.

The door was locked from inside. But, Tapan claimed that the door was not locked when he came. Police have also found some marks on the nails and finger ring of Tapan, which is suspected to be of blood.

The samples have been sent for examination. On Tuesday, forensic experts also visited the flat and collected samples.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: The number of active Covid cases in the state on Tuesday dropped by 93 while the fresh Covid cases slightly went up to 601 from 505 on Monday. Active Covid cases stood at 8,387 on Tuesday.

The Covid recovery rate on Tuesday remained at 98.27 percent while the fatality rate stands at 1.19 per cent for over four weeks. The total number of infected people has reached 15,53,177 so far. Out of this,

around 15,26,268 people have so far recovered and released from the hospitals. As many as 687 patients were released from hospitals on Tuesday.

Bengal has seen 7 Covid deaths on Tuesday which is lower than Monday’s figure of 13. Around 18,522 people have so far died of Covid in the state. The percentage of occupancy of Covid beds in the State stood at 3.21 on Tuesday. The positiv-ity rate stood at 1.67 percent on Tuesday.

Around 97 fresh Covid

cases were detected in North 24-Parganas while in Kolkata the number was registered at 105. Darjeeling has seen 41 new cases, South 24-Parganas 46 and Hooghly 44 and How-rah 28. Bengal has so far car-ried out 1,72,72,409 Covid sample tests out of which around 35,882 tests were done in the past 24 hours. Kolkata has seen no Covid death on Tuesday.

North 24 Parganas and South 24 Parganas have seen 2 and 1 death respectively on

Tuesday. Hooghly and Nadia each have seen 2 deaths.

Health department has so far addressed 21,56,159 gen-eral queries so far out of which 2,422 queries were addressed in the past 24 hours. State has so far given telemedicine con-sultations to 8,74,729 people so far out of which 1,245 were given consultation in the past 24 hours.

Around 505 people have been given tele-psychologi-cal counselling in the past 24 hours taking the total number of counselling to 4,25,689 till Tuesday.

The total number of ear-marked Covid beds stands at 23,947 till Tuesday. As many as 2,861 ICU/HDU beds are

functional in the state. There are 200 safe homes in Bengal and around 11,507 beds are functional at these safe homes. Around 7,110 people are cur-rently in home isolation while the total number of patients in hospitals is 1,042. Around 235 patients are still in safe homes. Around 200 safe homes are currently functional across the state. The total number of mucormycosis infected cases reached 102 in the state and the total number of suspected cases reached 204.

The number of confirmed deaths due to mucormycosis in Bengal has remained at 23 while 50 others who have died are still among the suspected cases.

7 COVID DEATHS REPORTED IN A DAY

Covid-19 Stats » Number of deaths in past 24 hours 7 » Total death toll so far 18,522 » Tested COVID positive in the past 24 hours 601 » Total COVID positive cases so far 15,53,177 » Total patients recovered from COVID so far 15,26,268 » Discharged from hospitals in a day 687 » Total sample tested so far 1,72,72,409

Parnashree double murder: Deceased’s husband detained

KMC pulls down at least 40 billboards for non-payment

SOUMITRA NANDI

KOLKATA: The Advertise-ment department of Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) has started cracking the whip on those advertising agencies that have been continuing to evade fees or putting up hoard-ings or flexes beyond the ear-marked size.

In the recent past, the Advertisement department has pulled down 40 hoardings in different parts of the city for non-payment or irregularities.

“We have prepared a list of 40 odd agencies with a history of default in coughing up fees

or putting up banners, flexes or hoardings larger than what was promised in terms and conditions.

They have not paid fees even after the introduction of the waiver scheme in Febru-ary. The crackdown has been implemented on those agen-cies whose dues have crossed Rs 5 lakh-mark,” a senior KMC official said.

The waiver scheme was introduced after it was found that the revenue collection through advertisements had nosedived amid pandemic.

Cent percent remission in advertisement fees was allowed

from the period of April till June 2020, which was followed with 75 per cent waiver for some months and again with 50 per cent remission for some months.

“We started sending bills to the agencies from February. The COVID situation was nor-mal in February, March and half of April when they did brisk business. But they con-tinued taking it for granted that they can go on with such unfair practices. Once, we started act-ing tough, the revenue through advertisements, that had freezed, started to come,” the official added.

‘However, even when conducting admission through wish list, merit will be the priority’

Trinamool Congress workers paint their party symbol on a wall during their campaign for Mamata Banerjee in Bhowanipore PTI

The last date of filing the nomination is September 13

Sleuths suspect that Susmita and Tamojit were killed between 3 pm and 5 pm, on Monday

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Health condition of senior Trinamool Congress leader Sadhan Pande is stated to be critical and he may be taken to the Kokilaben Hospi-tal in Mumbai in an air ambu-lance on Wednesday, sources said.

He has been under treat-ment at a private hospital on EM Bypass with several ail-ments. His neurological con-dition is serious, sources in the hospital said.

He has not been showing any significant improvement. It was learnt that the doctors from the private hospital in the city and his family members have already spoken to the offi-cials of the Kokilaben Hospital in Mumbai.

Pande had been hospital-ized in July with a severe lung infection. His health condition was "very critical" when he was

taken to the hospital. He had been put on ventilator support at the ICU for a long time.

The septuagenarian was rushed to the hospital in a semi-conscious state after he complained of chest pain and breathlessness, the official said. A four-member medical team which includes an endocrinol-ogist had been constituted to treat Pande, who has several comorbidities like Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Dis-ease (COPD) and renal disor-ders, they added.

The saffron party’s hunt for ‘heavyweight’ still on

Time period (April to August)

Captive Contribution (In million tonne)

2018-19 0.081

2019-20 0.46

2020-21 2.351

2021-22 4.19

Sadhan Pande

Representative Image

Rajnath approves increase in financial powers of armed forces

3,898 cases, 86 deaths in Maha

‘ANOTHER BIG STEP TOWARDS DEFENCE REFORMS’

4 millenniumpostNationmpWEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021 | KOLKATA

THIRUVANANTHA-PURAM: After recording 30,000 or more daily cases for several days, Kerala is seeing a gradual decrease in the fresh number of cases since last week and on Tuesday it reported 25,772 new COVID-19 infec-tions pushing the caseload to 42,53,298.

On September 3, the state had reported 29,322 cases after reporting over 30,000 cases for several days and since then the numbers have gradually declined.

With 189 deaths today, the total fatalities till date have reached 21,820, a state govern-ment release said.

The test positivity rate (TPR) has also declined after it reached nearly 20 per cent several days ago.

On Tuesday, the TPR was found to be 15.87 per cent after testing 1,62,428 samples in the last 24 hours, according to the release. With this, 3,26,70,564 samples have been tested till now.

The bulletin also said that since Monday, 27,320 people have recovered from the infec-tion taking total recoveries to 39,93,877 and the number of active cases to 2,37,045. MPOST

MUMBAI: Maharashtra reported 3,898 new corona-virus infections and 86 fatal-ities on Tuesday, taking the tally of infections in the state to 64,93,698 and death toll to 1,37,897, a health department official said. The number of daily cases and fatalities wit-nessed a slight uptick compared to Monday when the state had reported 3,626 new COVID-19 cases and 37 fatalities.

With 3,581 recovered patients discharged from hos-pitals, the total of recoveries climbed to 63,04,336.

There are 3,06,524 people in home quarantine, 2,021 in institutional quarantine and 47,926 active patients.

Maharashtra's case recov-ery rate stands at 97.08 per cent while the fatality rate is 2.12 per cent. The number of coro-navirus tests conducted in the state rose to 5,51,59,364 with 1,59,889 samples tested since Monday evening.

The districts of Dhule, Nandurbar, Hingoli, Akola, Amravati, Yavatmal, Wardha and Bhandara and municipal corporations of Dhule, Parb-hani and Amravati did not report any fresh COVID-19 case on Tuesday. Ahmednagar district reported the highest 657 new infections, followed by Pune district with 424 new

infections. Ahmednagar also reported the highest 18 fatal-ities among districts during the day. Among eight regions of Maharashtra, Pune region reported the highest 1,483 new cases, followed by 776 cases in Mumbai region.

Nashik region reported 767 new cases, Kolhapur 692, Latur 119, Akola 13, and Aurangabad and Nagpur regions reported 24 new cases each. The highest 40 fatalities were also reported in Pune region, followed by 21 deaths in Nashik region.

The Nagpur region did not report any fresh fatality. Kolha-pur region reported 15 deaths, Mumbai five, Latur and Akola regions two deaths each and Aurangabad region recorded one death. AGENCIES

NEW DELHI: A priest can-not be treated as Bhumiswami (owner of land) and the deity is the owner of the land attached to a temple, the Supreme Court has ruled.

A bench of Justices Hemant Gupta and A S Bopanna said the 'pujari', or priest, only holds the land for the purpose of management of the property of the temple.

"In the ownership column, the name of the deity alone is required to be mentioned, as the deity being a juristic per-son is the owner of the land. The occupation of the land is also by the deity which is car-ried out by the servant or the managers on behalf of the deity. Therefore, the name of the manager or that of the priest is not required to be mentioned

in the column of occupier as well," the top court said on Monday.

It added that the law is clear on the distinction that the Pujari is not a Kashtkar Mourushi, (tenant in cultiva-tion) or a government lessee or an ordinary tenant of the maufi lands (land exempted

from payment of revenue) but holds such land on behalf of the Aukaf Department (relating to 'Devasthan) for the purpose of management.

"The Pujari is only a grantee to manage the property of the deity and such grant can be reassumed if the Pujari fails to do the task assigned to him,

i.e, to offer prayers and man-age the land. He cannot be thus treated as a Bhumiswami," the bench said.

"We do not find any man-date in any of the judgments to hold that the name of Pujari or manager is required to be men-tioned in the revenue record, the bench said.

It said that the name of the Collector as manager cannot be recorded in respect of property vested in the deity as the Col-lector cannot be a manager of all temples unless it is a temple vested with the State. The apex court was hearing an appeal filed by Madhya Pradesh chal-lenging an order of High Court which quashed two circulars issued by the state government under the MP Law Revenue Code, 1959 (Code). MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Defence Min-ister Rajnath Singh on Tues-day approved the expansion of financial powers to the armed forces for revenue procure-ment to cut delays in mak-ing purchases for operational preparedness and quickly meet requirements of the field formations.

The defence ministry said the delegated financial powers of vice chiefs of the services have been increased by 10 per-cent subject to an overall ceil-ing of Rs 500 crore.

It said the primary focus of the enhanced delegation of financial powers is to empower field commanders and other officials to procure equip-ment and "war-like stores" in a speedy manner for urgent operational necessities and meeting essential sustenance requirements.

A new schedule on the hir-ing of aircraft and associated equipment has been intro-duced for the Indian Air Force which includes the hiring of air-to-air refuellers.

Singh described the deci-sion on expanding the finan-cial powers as "another big step towards defence reforms".

The ministry said the enhanced delegation of finan-cial powers to functionaries in service headquarters and lower formations would result

in quicker decision-making at all levels and ensure bet-ter planning and operational preparedness.

"Another big step towards defence reforms has been to strengthen security infrastruc-ture. Financial powers have been devolved to field forma-

tions with focus on operational preparedness; promote ease of doing business and joint-ness among Services," Singh tweeted.

The last such enhancement at all levels for the defence ser-vices was done in 2016.

"A general enhancement

of up to two times has been approved for the competent financial authorities (CFAs). In certain schedules, this enhancement at field forma-tions is in the range of up to 5-10 times on account of operational requirements," the defence ministry said in a statement.

"Delegated financial pow-ers of vice chiefs of the services have been increased by 10 per-cent, subject to an overall ceil-ing of Rs 500 crore," it said.

The ministry said the finan-cial powers of Chief of Inte-grated Defence Staff to the Chairman Chiefs Of Staff Committee (CISC) as CFA has been enhanced substan-tially and aligned with that of the vice chiefs of the services.

"New CFAs have been added namely Deputy Chief of Army Staff, Master General Sustenance, ADG (Procure-ment)/DG Air Operations/DG Naval Operations, etc in ser-vice headquarters and in the field formations on account of reorganisation/restructuring/functional requirements," the ministry said.

LUCKNOW: BSP president Mayawati on Tuesday assured that her government will not spend its efforts on building memorials and erecting statues if it comes to power, but will focus on changing the face of Uttar Pradesh.

Mayawati, who has been accused in the past of focusing on memorials including those featuring her statues, made the assurance at a meeting aimed at wooing the Brahmin com-munity, ahead of next year's assembly elections.

The meeting at the party's headquarters here marked the end of a month-long series of the BSP's "prabhudh varg sammelans", where she assured that the community will be treated right if her Bahujan Samaj Party forms the govern-

ment in 2022.She said the four BSPs gov-

ernments have honoured lead-ers, who worked for equality, through memorials, museums and statues and now there is no need of constructing more

of them."Whatever needed to be

done, I have done it in bulk," she said, adding that only their maintenance will be looked into.

"Now when a BSP-led

government is formed, my efforts will not go into build-ing memorials, parks and stat-ues. My whole energy will go into changing the face of Uttar Pradesh so that the entire country and world can say that the BSP chief has changed the face of the state," Mayawati said.

She added that her gov-ernment will be open to hon-ouring leaders from "other communities", if they want, and keep their religious senti-ments in mind.

The former chief minister gave a call for forging strong unity among Dalits and Brah-mins so that the results of 2007 could be repeated, when the party had formed a gov-ernment of its own in Uttar Pradesh. AGENCIES

Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh releases Delegation of Financial Powers to Defence Services (DFPDS) 2021, at South Block in New Delhi, on Tuesday. Chief of Defence Staff Gen Bipin Rawat and Chief of Naval Staff Admiral Karambir Singh also seen

Kerala logs 25,772 fresh cases, 189

deaths

A medic incoculates beneficiary with a dose of Covid-19 vaccine at a vaccination centre in Mumbai

No more monuments to build, will focus on governance if elected to power: Mayawati

Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati during the ‘Vichhar Sangosthi’ of Prabudh Sammelan at party office in Lucknow, on Tuesday

SC: Deity owner of land attached to temple, priest can’t be treated as ‘Bhumiswami’

‘Issue notice...The state government, in its plea, sought a

stay of investigation in the FIRs lodged into post-poll violence cases by the CBI in pursuance of the Calcutta High Court order.

The plea added that as the general consent given to the central agency by the Trinamool Congress government has been withdrawn, the FIRs lodged cannot be proceeded with.

The suit, filed through advocate Suhaan Mukerji, also sought stay on any future FIR.

The state said that the CBI has no inher-ent jurisdiction to conduct a probe in any part of the state, including railway areas, till the time it obtains a prior sanction. Claiming that the agency has been exercising its powers in an “unconstitutional manner”, the suit said the reg-istration of cases by the CBI was an encroach-ment on the legal rights of the state.

The petition demands the annulment of all cases registered by the CBI and to restrain the agency from lodging any fresh cases.

The state government has filed the original civil suit under Article 131 of the Constitution under which the top court has original jurisdic-tion to deal with any dispute between the Centre and a state. In the original suit, it has been said on behalf of the state that even after three years of withdrawing the general consent regarding registration of cases related to incidents in West Bengal, the CBI has lodged 12 cases.

The state government said that law and order and police have been constitutionally placed under the exclusive jurisdiction of the states. As such, the CBI registering cases is illegal because this violates the constitutionally distributed pow-ers between the Centre and the states.

Durga Puja...At least 36,000 Durga Pujas, including 2,500

in Kolkata, would get the benefit of the state gov-ernment’s financial assistance. There are around 1,500 Durga Pujas that are held by women. The Chief Minister has also urged organisers of “big Pujas” to support the “smaller ones” and those organised by women. Kolkata Police Commis-sioner Soumen Mitra announced that this year, too, the ‘Ashan’ app would be launched facilitat-ing an online single window system for Durga Puja organisers to apply for Puja permissions.

Stating that Durga Puja is the state’s biggest

festival, the Chief Minister urged both the police and Puja organisers to be alert to avoid any sort of instigation to disturb peace and harmony dur-ing the Puja. “Peace and harmony is the tradition of Bengal. It should not get disturbed at any cost. I would request the police and Puja organisers to be alert so that no one can instigate any untow-ard incident to destabilise the peace. Coopera-tion between the police, local clubs and Puja organisers should be strengthened,” Banerjee said. Banerjee, on Tuesday, attended the Durga Puja coordination meeting organised by the Kol-kata Police and Kolkata Municipal Corporation at Netaji Indoor Stadium in which dharma gurus from all communities and representatives of dif-ferent clubs were present.

In regards to the meeting, Banerjee said: “We need to follow certain norms when the elec-tion process is on. It would have been late if we had organised it after the by-elections as Maha Saptami is on October 12. Today’s meeting has been organised only after taking necessary per-mission.” She also stated that her government has written to UNESCO to include Durga Puja, which leads to a financial transaction of Rs 32,000 crore, in the ‘List of the Intangible Cul-tural Heritage of Humanity’.

Talks failYadav further said that he, along with Rakesh

Tikait and some other farmer leaders, had been detained by the police at Namaste Chowk. They were, however, allowed to go later.

During the talks that lasted for nearly two hours, the 11-member delegation of the farmers insisted on FIR against IAS officer Ayush Sinha, who was the SDM at Karnal when farmers were cane-charged on August 28.

A video had gone viral after the lathi-charge that showed Sinha asking cops to ‘smash the heads’ of protesters breaking down barricades.

Senior leaders of the Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM), including Tikait, Balbir Singh Rajewal, Darshan Pal, Yogendra Yadav and Gurnam Singh Chaduni, were among those who led farmers into the city. Tikait tweeted after the meeting say-ing that the Karnal administration was not ready to listen to their demands. He said either their demands be met or else the government should arrest them.

Deputy Commissioner Nishant Kumar Yadav, Karnal’s Inspector General of Police Mamta Singh and Superintendent of Police Ganga Ram Punia, were among the officials who took part in the talks with the farm leaders.

“Farmers stand determined and resolute, and the government cannot get away with the mur-der. We stand firmly behind the protest, and

condemn the actions of the Haryana govern-ment,” said Yadav. Earlier in the day, an official spokesperson in Chandigarh said ground intelli-gence reports indicated that some elements from Rambha, some from Nissing and adjoining areas have reached the Anaj Mandi, armed with sticks and iron rods. Police and the administration have spoken to the Kisan leaders who have tried to persuade such elements to leave the venue, but they did not pay any heed.

The Karnal district administration and cops have warned these mischievous elements not to take the law in their hands and maintain order.

Mullah Hasan...Mulla Yaqoob, son of the Taliban founder

Mullah Mohammad Omar, will be the new defence minister, the paper said.

Yaqoob was a student of Mullah Hebatullah, who had earlier appointed him as head of the powerful military commission of the Taliban.

Sirajuddin Haqqani, the head of the notori-ous Haqqani network and son of the famous anti-Soviet warlord Jalaluddin Haqqani, is likely to get the portfolio of interior minister, while Mullah Ameer Khan Muttaqi will be the new for-eign minister, according to the Taliban sources.

Sirajuddin Haqqani is a specially designated global terrorist. According to the FBI website, the US Department of State is offering a reward of up to $5 million for information leading directly to the arrest of Sirajuddin Haqqani, who is thought to stay in Pakistan, specifically the Miram Shah area in North Waziristan, and maintains close ties to the Taliban and al Qaeda.

He is wanted for questioning in connection with the January 2008 attack on a hotel in Kabul that killed six people, including an American cit-izen. He is believed to have coordinated and par-ticipated in cross-border attacks against the US and coalition forces in Afghanistan.

He was also allegedly involved in the plan-ning of the assassination attempt on Afghan President Hamid Karzai in 2008, the FBI website noted. Citing the Taliban sources, the paper said Mullah Zabiullah Mujahid, whose name was ear-lier proposed for information minister, will now be the spokesperson for the new head of state.

The Taliban last week postponed the forma-tion of a new government as the insurgent group struggles to give shape to a broad-based and inclusive administration acceptable to the inter-national community.

The development comes days after Paki-stan’s spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Director General Lt Gen Hameed dashed to Kabul on an unannounced visit last week, amidst mounting pressure on the Taliban to form an

inclusive government acceptable to the inter-national community. During his visit, the ISI chief had met Mullah Baradar and Hizb-e-Isl-ami leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and discussed the current situation in Afghanistan. According to reports, the new government in Kabul will be based on the lines of the Iranian leadership, with the group’s top religious leader Mullah Hebatul-lah as Afghanistan’s supreme authority.

Meanwhile, two people were shot dead and eight wounded in a protest in the western Afghan city of Herat on Tuesday, a doctor said. The bodies were brought to the city’s central hos-pital from the site of the protest, the doctor, who asked not to be named out of fear of reprisals, told AFP.

“They all have bullet wounds,” he said. AGENCIES

Mehbooba says...Mehbooba posted pictures of a security

forces’ vehicle blocking the main gate of her Gupkar residence.

According to officials, Mehbooba had expressed a desire to attend a family function in South Kashmir’s highly volatile Kulgam district.

The authorities persuaded her not to go for the function as some anti-nationals were still try-ing to vitiate the atmosphere in the Valley fol-lowing the death of pro-Pakistan separatist Syed Ali Shah Geelani. Mehbooba has been vocal since his death and on Monday she accused the administration of turning the Valley into “an open air prison” where “the dead aren’t spared”.

“A family isn’t allowed to mourn and bid a final farewell as per their wishes. Booking Gee-lani sahab’s family under UAPA shows GOI’s deep-rooted paranoia and ruthlessness. This is New India’s Naya Kashmir,” she tweeted.

However, hours later, the Jammu and Kash-mir Police released videos of the funeral of Gee-lani, who died on September 1 at his home after a prolonged illness. He was 91.

A statement was also released by the police clocking events after his death saying that its officers were made to wait for three hours at the separatist’s home when they went there for his burial. Refuting rumours allegedly being floated from across the border, the Jammu and Kashmir Police also released four videos through its Twit-ter handle to show that Geelani was laid to rest as per rituals in the intervening night of September 1 and 2.

“After the death of SAS Geelani, IGP Kash-mir Shri Vijay Kumar met both of his sons at their residence at 11 pm, condoled them and requested for burial in the night for the larger interest of the general public due to potential major L&O (law and order) situations. Both

agreed and asked to wait for two hours until relatives reached,” the police said on its Twitter handle.

The IGP Kashmir personally spoke to a few relatives and assured them of safe passage, they said. “However, 3 hours later, probably under the pressure from Pakistan and miscreants, they behaved differently and started resorting to anti-national activities, including wrapping the dead body in Pakistani flag, making loud sloganeering in favour of Pakistan and instigating neighbours to come out,” the police said. They added that after persuasion the relatives brought the body to the graveyard and performed all rituals “with due respect in presence of members of Intizamia Committee and local Imam”.

“The refusal of both his sons to come to the graveyard indicated their loyalty to the Pakistani agenda rather than their love and respect for their departed father,” they maintained.

The sons offered Fathia (prayers offered at the funeral) at 11 am on September 2.

SC adjourns hearing Sibal, on behalf of some of the petitioners,

had responded by saying that the security of the state is as important to the citizens of this coun-try as it is to the state.

“We don’t want the state to give us any infor-mation about any security aspect in respect of the use of any device. That is not our intention and that is not even the petition,” he had said.

The top court, while issuing notice on the pleas, had said it did not want the government to disclose anything related to the national security and had asked the Centre what is the problem if the competent authority files an affidavit before it on the issue. It had said divulging information on affidavit on the issue of whether the Israeli firm NSO’s Pegasus spyware was used or not would involve the aspect of national security.

It had said that the bench did not want even a word in the affidavit regarding the defence or national security of the country.

“Our considered response is what we have respectfully stated in our last affidavit. Kindly examine the issue from our point of view as our affidavit is sufficient,” the law officer had told the Bench, adding: “The Government of India is before the highest court of the country.”

The law officer had said if the government of any country divulges information about which software is used and which is not used, then those involved in terrorist activities may take pre-emptive steps. The court is hearing as many as 12 pleas, including the one filed by the Editors Guild of India, seeking an independent probe into the matter.

From Page 1

5millenniumpost Nation mpKOLKATA | WEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021

Modi govt can talk to Taliban, but not farmers: Surjewala

Nitish, Badal and Chautala among many to share dais

HARDLINE HURRIYAT CONFERENCE ELECTS MASRAT ALAM AS CHAIRMAN SRINAGAR: Hardline Hurriyat Conference has elected incarcerated leader Masrat Alam as its chairman fol-lowing the death of Syed Ali Shah Geelani last week.In a statement issued to media on Tuesday, the hard-line faction of the Hurriyat said that the people of Jammu and Kashmir look up to the amalgam’s leader-ship with great expectations. Shabir Ahmad Shah and Ghulam Ahmad Gulzar were elected as vice chairmen.The amalgam said the appointments were temporary till elections are held according to the Hurriyat constitu-tion. Geelani, who died last week, was elected as the lifetime chairman of the amalgam, but he stepped down and dissociated from it last year.

CONG TO HOLD EVENTS TO CELEBRATE 75TH YEAR OF INDEPENDENCE NEW DELHI: The Congress will hold a series of events across the country from October 2 to mark the 75th year of India’s independence where the sacrifices of those participating in the freedom struggle will be highlighted. This was decided at a meeting of a party committee chaired by former prime minister Man-mohan Singh, where it was suggested that those who sided with the British during the freedom movement also need to be exposed. The 11-member committee was constituted by Congress president Sonia Gandhi to plan and coordinate the year-long celebrations of 75th anniversary of India’s independence.

GUJ: CUSTOMS OFFICIAL GETS 3 YEARS IN JAIL IN DISPROPORTIONATE ASSETS CASE AHMEDABAD: A special CBI court here on Tuesday sentenced Devender Sangwan, a former Inspector of Customs and Central Excise, to three years’ rigorous imprisonment in a 2011 disproportionate assets (DA) case. The court also imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 on him and ordered the confiscation of a fixed deposit of Rs.17.64 lakh in his name along with interest. The amount should be transferred to the government exchequer, it said.

‘BJP GOVT HAS LOST THE CONFIDENCE OF THE PEOPLE’

Nation Briefs

NEW DELHI: The Environ-ment Ministry's Regional Empowered Committee (REC) has in-principle approved a proposal for diversion of 8.11 hectares of deemed forest land, where the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA) stood, for the con-struction of three office build-ings under the Central Vista redevelopment project.

The final approval for diversion of forest land is to be granted by the central government.

In August, the Delhi gov-ernment had recommended the proposal for approval of the REC in larger public inter-est subject to the conditions laid by the forest department .

There are more than 250 trees per hectare at the site. Therefore, it was treated as deemed forest and required

approval for diversion for non-forest activity under the For-est Conservation Act, 1980, a Delhi forest department offi-cial said.

Of the existing 2,219 trees at the site, the Central Pub-lic Works Department seeks to transplant 1,734 and retain 485 trees.

The three office build-ings, which will be part of the Common Central Secre-tariat, are to be built at a cost of Rs 3,269 crore, with Rs 139 crore set aside for five years' maintenance.

The REC approved the CPWD's proposal in a meet-ing held on August 24 subject to certain conditions.

It said the land for compen-satory afforestation should be made available to the Delhi Forest Department, free of all the encroachments and

encumbrances, within 15 days of the approval and compliance submitted to Integrated Region Office, Jaipur.

Translocation scheme needs to be submitted before IRO, Jaipur as per species and age classes suitable for trans-location. Forest land will be handed over only after required non-forest land for the project is handed over by the user agency, the minutes of the meeting read.

The CPWD has informed the Delhi Forest department

that it will transplant 1,500 trees at NTPC Eco Park, Badarpur. The location for the remaining trees is being finalised.

According to the agency, there are 1,179 trees, includ-ing the 485 retained ones, in the proposed landscape plan of the project. The CPWD has proposed 8.11 hectares of land near Dhulsiras village in Sector 29, Dwarka for compensatory afforestation.

During an inspection conducted in July, the forest department found the land suitable for CA, according to documents seen by PTI.

However, compensatory afforestation can only be done after pruning of invasive spe-cies of trees on 20 percent of the proposed land , the for-est department has told the CPWD. AGENCIES

Vista project: CPWD proposal for diversion of deemed forest land gets ‘in-principle’ nod

SRINAGAR: Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Gov-ernor Manoj Sinha on Tues-day launched an online portal for time-bound redressal of grievances related to Kashmir migrants' immovable proper-ties. The Kashmir migrants can log in to http://jkmigrantrelief.nic.in/ or http://kashmirmi-grantsip.jk.gov.in to submit their complaints, an official spokesman said.

The application filed on the portal will be disposed of in a fixed time frame under the Public Services Guarantee Act, 2011, by the revenue author-ities under intimation to the applicant, he said.

"The competent authority (Deputy Commissioner) shall undertake survey/field verifi-cation of migrant properties and update all registers, within a period of 15 days and submit compliance report to the Divi-sional Commissioner, Kash-mir," he added.

Speaking on the occasion,

the Lt Governor said the ini-tiative will put an end to the plight of the migrants includ-ing Hindus, Sikhs and Mus-lims, who have been suffering since 1990s.

"I met numerous delega-tions from across the religions in the last 13 months and they unequivocally supported the return of migrants," he said.

It is the responsibility of the present to rectify the mistakes of the past. While laying the foundation for a bright future, this is also the time to heal the old wounds. I request all citi-zens to support the adminis-tration in this effort and set a new example of brotherhood, Sinha said. Nearly 60,000 fam-ilies migrated from the val-ley during the turmoil, out of which approximately 44,000 migrant families are regis-tered with the Relief Organ-isation, J&K, whereas the rest of the families chose to shift to other states and UTs, the spokesman said. MPOST

NEW DELHI: Pitching for a third front, INLD's Om Prakash Chautala will bring together SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, Bihar Chief Min-ister and JD(U) leader Nitish Kumar, former prime minis-ter HD Deve Gowda and SAD supremo Parkash Singh Badal on one stage on September 25, the birth anniversary of for-mer deputy prime minister Devi Lal.

NCP leader Sharad Pawar, TMC president and West Ben-gal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, National Confer-ence leader Farooq Abdullah and RLD leader Jayant Chowd-hury have also been invited for a "huge" political rally on the occasion in Haryana's Jind and their confirmation is awaited, INLD leader Abhay Chautala said. He said Mulayam Singh Yadav, Nitish Kumar, JD(S) leader Deve Gowda and Badal have confirmed that they will attend the 'Samman Samaroh' to mark the birth anniversary of Devi Lal.

"Many like-minded leaders

from non-BJP and non-Con-gress parties will come together on one stage and will raise issues that are close to the peo-ple, especially farmers' issues," Abhay Chautala said.

He said that the people are looking for an alternative to the BJP and the Congress.

By bringing all these lead-ers "our aim is to form the third front for the overall welfare of the country and the people," Chautala said.

INLD spokesperson Rakesh Sihag said Om Prakash Chau-tala has "personally met" Deve Gowda and Mulayam Singh

Yadav and invited them for the rally.

"It will be a huge rally and people from various states will attend it," he said.

Om Prakash Chautala, 86, after his release from Del-hi's Tihar Jail on July 2, had announced that he will con-tact opposition leaders across the country to forge a Third Front at the national level.

The former chief minister of Haryana had been serving a 10-year sentence in a recruit-ment scam.

The INLD patriarch had said that before September 25, which is the birth anniversary of his father Chaudhary Devi Lal, he will try to meet opposi-tion leaders and urge them to come on one platform.

JD(U) leaders Nitish Kumar and KC Tyagi had met Chautala at his residence in Gurugram last month and had termed it a courtesy call.

The parties invited by INLD include those that are either in alliance with the Congress or the BJP. AGENCIES

SIMONTINI BHATTACHARJEE

NEW DELHI: Almost half a year ahead of the Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is slated to visit the poll-bound state on September 14 to inau-gurate, lay the foundation stones of several projects.

Starting with the laying of foundation stone of Raja Mahendra Singh State Uni-versity in Aligarh, PM is also scheduled to lay the foundation stone of a Defence Corridor Unit there, reportedly.

As per the state BJP unit, after getting approval from the Prime Minister's office, the UP CM's office finalised the programme on Tuesday. Reportedly, chief minister Yogi Adityanath and his two lieuten-ants Keshav Pratap Maurya and Dinesh Sharma will also share the stage with PM Modi.

The State University will be built in the Moosepur village and the land for the Defence Corridor has been selected in the Lodha area. Deputy Chief Minister Dinesh Sharma has been given the charge of inspecting both the places from

the day ahead of PM Modi's arrival. Moreover, chief min-ister Yogi Adityanath is also slated to visit the venues on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, the party sources also said that after the hour-long programme, the Prime Minister is also expected to inaugurate the Dhanipur airstrip. The airport to be built here will be named after the former chief minister Kalyan Singh.

PM's first visit to the West-ern UP, after the second wave of COVID hit the nation ear-lier this year, is significant. Raja Mahendra Singh was from the Jat community and the farm-ers' protest has been intensify-ing in this part, which is also a Jat dominated area.

Further, he and his cabinet colleagues will also visit the poll-bound state every month, Millennium Post reported on August 25.

Further, BJP is witness-ing infighting in many places, hence, the central leadership is organising Assembly-wise meetings to get feedback and check the preparation at the grassroots.

PM Modi to visit Aligarh on Sept 14

To lay foundation stones of several projects, including a State University

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Mounting fur-ther attack on the BJP-led gov-ernment for suppressing the voice of the farmers, Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said on Tuesday that the BJP government has lost the confidence and the man-date of the people and it should leave.

Taking a jibe at the Cen-tre, the Congress leader further said that when the government can talk to the Taliban, then why the same government is not talking to the farmers of their own country.

“The Modi government has the time to go Doha for talks with Taliban, but the same government has no time for farmers who are sitting 20-km away from the Prime Minis-ter’s Office at the border of

the national capital for the last 10 months. They are not even allowed to enter Delhi,” he said, adding that PM Modi should leave all his work and call farmers for a dialogue to

resolve the issue.Hitting out at the Haryana

government, Randeep Surjew-ala said that the Khattar gov-ernment is suppressing the voice of farmers by blocking

internet.The Congress leader fur-

ther said that the Haryana government is acting like a dictator as it has deployed multi-layer security at the

place where Mahapanchayat is to be held and internet has been blocked.

“Around 30 battalions, including the central forces, have been deployed to ensure security and to avoid any untoward incident. The gov-ernment has created a war-like situation under which farmers and jawans are fighting with each other,” he said, adding that despite peaceful protest by farmers, the government is suppressing their agitation by using water cannons.

Accusing Haryana CM of police excesses on farmers, the Congress leader demanded res-ignation of Khattar if the Hary-ana CM didn’t talk to farmers and listen to their demands. Khattar and Dushyant Chau-tala have no moral right to stay in the office and both of them must resign, he said.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: There was a 46 per cent rise in complaints of crimes against women in the first eight months of 2021 over the corresponding period of last year, and over half of these were from Uttar Pradesh, the National Commission for Women (NCW) said.

NCW chief Rekha Sharma said there has been a rise in the complaints because the com-mission has been regularly con-ducting awareness programs

due to which the public is now more aware about its work.

The NCW received a total of 19,953 complaints of crimes against women from January to August this year, up from 13,618 in the corresponding period of 2020, it said.

In July, as many as 3,248 complaints were received by the NCW which is the highest in a month since June 2015, it added.

Of the 19,953 complaints, the highest number of 7,036 were recorded under the right

to live with dignity clause, fol-lowed by 4,289 complaints of domestic violence and 2,923 complaints of harassment of married women or dowry harassment, the NCW said.

The right to live with dig-nity clause takes into account the emotional abuse of women.

As many as 1,116 com-plaints have been received regarding the offence of out-raging modesty of women or molestation, followed by 1,022 complaints of rape and attempt to rape and 585 complaints of

cyber crimes.Among states and union

territories, the highest num-ber of complaints was received from Uttar Pradesh (10,084), followed by Delhi (2,147), Haryana (995) and Maharash-tra (974), the commission said.

NCW chief Sharma said the rise in the number of com-plaints is because of increased awareness among women to report crimes.

"Also, the commission has always made it a point to launch new initiatives to help

women. Keeping in line with this, we have launched a round-the-clock helpline number as well to provide support services to women in need where they can also register a complaint," Sharma said.

Akansha Srivastava, founder of the Akanksha Foun-dation which works for edu-cation and empowerment of people by imparting knowledge on cyber safety, said the rise in complaints is due to more awareness among women to reach out for help.

Farmers during their protest march against the central government's three farm reform laws, in Karnal

Of existing 2,219 trees, 1,734 to be transplanted, 485 to be retained

Sinha launches portal for grievance redressal

NEW DELHI: The Covid pan-demic having delayed its shoot-ing, India and Bangladesh now hope to release the biopic on Sheikh Mujibur Rahman by eminent filmmaker Shyam Benegal in March 2022, around the time when Bangladesh will celebrate the 102nd birth anni-versary of its founding father.

During a meeting with his Bangladeshi counterpart Hasan Mahmud here on Tuesday, Union Minister for Informa-tion and Broadcasting Anurag Thakur expressed satisfaction over the production of the film and said a major part of it has been completed, hoping that it will be over by March.

"Thakur expressed satisfac-tion over the production of the movie 'Bangabandhu' on the life and times of Sheikh Muji-bur Rahman and mentioned major part of the production has been completed," the I&B ministry said in a statement after the meeting.

"I expect the produc-tion be over by March, 2022, if the Covid situation so per-mits, so that the movie could be released internationally in March, 2022," the statement

quoted Thakur as saying dur-ing his meeting with Mahmud.

Thakur discussed matters of mutual interest and further "the strong ties" between the two countries in areas of broad-casting and entertainment, strengthening people to peo-ple contact and exploring the potential of soft power inter-face between the two countries, the ministry said.

During the meeting, the two sides agreed to "fast track" the completion of "Bang-abandhu" and also "pro-actively" pursue production of

a documentary film on libera-tion of Bangladesh in 1971, the ministry added.

Discussions also took place on strengthening of ties between the two countries in the areas of digital entertain-ment and screening of films of each other through mutual exchange.

The two ministers dis-cussed the celebration of 'Maitri Diwas' on Decem-ber 6 for which a mutually accepted action plan would be detailed and carried out, the ministry said. MPOST

Production of ‘Bangabandhu’ to be fast tracked for release in Mar

Union Minister for Information & Broadcasting, Youth Affairs and Sports, Anurag Singh Thakur meets Information Minister of Bangladesh, Muhammad H. Mahmud, in New Delhi

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: While under-lining India’s global response to the pandemic at the Fifth World Conference of Speak-ers of Parliament (5WCSP) in Vienna, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on Tuesday said that India has been at the fore-front of undertaking prompt humanitarian assistance and relief operations during the pandemic.

While participating in the General Debate on the topic ‘the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic chal-lenges and multilateralism’s ability to deliver for the peo-ple’, Birla said that India sup-plied vaccines, medicines and other equipments to over 150 countries as a measure of com-mitment to global health and well-being.

Birla further stressed that the post-pandemic global eco-nomic recovery phase requires collaboration and cooperation between member countries, so as to stimulate the revival and rebounding of the global economy.

Birla also highlighted India’s focus on developing indigenous technologies. “We enhanced our production capacity of PPE kits, masks, face-covers, diagnostics, oxy-gen, drugs, ventilators and other accessories to fight the pandemic,” he said.

Mentioning that India reopened its economy in phases after the initial lock-down, Birla informed the delegates that two major eco-nomic stimulus packages were announced immediately to provide much-needed relief to people.

Birla spells initiatives of govt to get

out of Covid effect

The final approval for diversion of forest land is to be granted by the central government

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: As India is cel-ebrating 75th Independence Day with the focus on convert-ing development into a mass movement, TRIFED is work-ing with its roots in ground realities and emphasising the welfare both in design and implementation. With the focus on “Vocal for Local” and building an “Atmanirbhar Bharat”, TRIFED has taken several activities to re-dedi-cate its efforts towards tribal empowerment.

TRIFED has been actively collaborating with several min-istries such as the Ministry of Culture, Department of Pro-motion of Industry and Inter-nal Trade (DPIIT), Ministry of Commerce; India Posts; Min-istry of Tourism and Office of the Prime Minister to take up the cause of promotion of GI tag products along with tribal products and transform them into a brand, symbolising the empowerment of tribal artisans.

In a continuation to its ongoing collaborations,

TRIFED has tied up with the Ministry of External Affairs for setting up an Atmanirb-har Bharat corner in 75 Indian Missions/ Embassies across the world in the next 90 days.

The first Atma Nirbhar Bharat corner has been suc-cessfully inaugurated at the Indian Embassy in Bangkok, Thailand on the occasion of Independence Day, by Ambas-sador Suchitra Durai and Retd Ambassador R Swaminathan. The corner will be an exclusive space to promote GI tagged tribal art and craft products besides natural and organic products.

Catalogues and brochures that showcase the richness and variety of tribal products have also been shared with the Missions and embassies. The 75 countries include Jamaica, Ireland, Turkey, Kenya, Mon-golia, Israel, Finland, France, Canada, Singapore, Russia, the USA, Indonesia, Greece and Cyprus. TRIFED is in the pro-cess of dispatching tribal prod-ucts for the corner in each of these missions.

TRIFED to set up Atmanirbhar Bharat

corners in 75 Embassies

46% rise in complaints in 2021 so far: NCW CRIMES AGAINST WOMEN

Bihar Chief Minister and JD(U) leader Nitish Kumar

MAN HELD FOR FLEEING WITH ORNA-MENTS AFTER PROMISING WOMEN LOANS JALNA: A man who allegedy duped several women by promising them loans and then running away with their jewellery has been held in Jalna in Maharash-tra, police said on Tuesday. Asif Khalil Ahmed Khan, a resident of Aurangabad district, would pose as a person with disability (PwD) to gain sympathy and trust and then cheat women after getting them to fill bank loan forms, a Crime Branch official said. “He would take his women victims to the bank, get them to take off their ornaments for mortgage, ask them to get photostat copies of documents, and then escape with the items. He has cases of this nature in Jalgaon, Washim, Buldhana and Aurangabad,” Crime Branch official Subhash Bhujang said.

MAHA: DOCTOR ASSAULTED IN ROAD RAGE INCIDENT IN NAGPUR NAGPUR: A doctor posted at a government medical college and hospital was allegedly assaulted by three persons in an incident of road rage in Maharashtra’s Nagpur city, police said on Tuesday. The incident took place on the intervening night of Monday and Tuesday, when Dr Sagar Madan Pande (38), posted at Indira Gandhi Government Medical College and Hospital, was heading home in his car, an official said. Three accused were creating ruckus on the road and they brushed past the doctor, who objected to their behaviour, he said. Angered by this, the trio beat up the doctor, the official said, adding that an offence under IPC has been registered in this regard.

SHIKSHAKPARV

GADCHIROLI BLAST

JHARKHAND ASSEMBLYNation Briefs

6 millenniumpostNationmpWEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021 | KOLKATA

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The teaching-learning process has to be constantly redefined and redesigned to make the education sector in the country world-class, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Tuesday.

Noting that the transformations being undertaken in the education sector are not just policy-based but also participation-based, the prime minister launched several initiatives in the education sector which, he said, will play an important role in shaping India's future.

Addressing the inaugural conclave of 'ShikshakParv' through video-conferencing, he expressed confidence that these measures will not only make our education system globally competitive but also make the youth future-ready.

"We have to constantly redefine and redesign our teaching-learning process in order to make our education sector world-class. In this rapidly changing era, our

teachers also have to learn about new systems and techniques rapidly. The country is preparing its teachers for these changes," he said in his address.

"If we are in the midst of a transformation period, fortunately, we also have modern and futuristic new National Education Policy. These transformations in the education sector are not just policy-based but also participation-based, he added.

Prime Minister Modi praised the contribution of academicians, experts and teachers at every stage in the formulation of the National Education Policy and its implementation. He urged everyone to take this participation to a new level and also to involve society in it.

"During COVID, we have all witnessed capabilities of our education sector. There were a lot of challenges, but you solved all challenges swiftly. Online classes, group video calls, online exams - such terms weren't heard by

many earlier," he added.Modi launched the Indian

Sign Language Dictionary (audio and text embedded sign language video for the hearing impaired, in conformity with Universal Design of Learning)and Talking Books (audio books for the visually impaired).

He also unveiled the School Quality Assurance and Assessment Framework of CBSE, NISHTHA teachers' training programme for NIPUN Bharat and Vidyanjali portal for facilitating

education volunteers, donors and CSR contributors for school development.

"Today, on the occasion of ShikshakParv, many new schemes have been started. These initiatives are also important because the country is currently celebrating the 'AmritMahotsav' (75th anniversary) of independence and for making new resolutions on how India will be after 100 years of independence," the prime minister said.

"For the development of any nation, education needs

to be both equitable and inclusive. That is why the country is including talking books and audio books as part of education. Based on UDL, an Indian sign language dictionary has been developed," he said.

People's participation has been a key aspect of the government's decision-making in the seven years, he said and cited programmes like 'Swachh Bharat' and move to boost digital transactions among the poor to assert that such kinds of work could not have been imagined otherwise.

"When the society does something together, then the desired results must be met. Public participation is again becoming the national character of India. In the last six-seven years, due to the power of public participation, such things have been done in India, which no one could have imagined, he said.

The theme of the Shikshak Parv-2021' is Quality and Sustainable Schools: Learnings from Schools in India.

MUMBAI: Saying the funda-mental right to protection of life and liberty guaranteed by Article 21 of the constitution applied to everyone, including prisoners, the Bombay High Court on Tuesday said it will consider alleged Maoist leader Nirmala Uppuganti's plea seek-ing transfer from prison to a hospice "from all angles" per-missible under the law.

A bench of Justices SS Shinde and NJ Jamadar reserved its order on Uppugan-ti's plea seeking such transfer.

An accused in the 2019 Gadchiroli IED blast case, Uppuganti had filed a plea in the HC earlier this month seek-ing that she be shifted from the Byculla women's prison to a hospice as she is terminally ill with cancer. At least 15 secu-rity personnel of the Gadchiroli Quick Response Team and one civilian were killed in an IED explosion triggered by Naxals in Maharashtra's Gadchiroli district on May 1, 2019.

In her plea filed through senior counsel Yug Chaudhry and advocate Payoshi Roy, Uppuganti asked to be shifted to a hospice for palliative care so that she will be "properly

taken care of during her final days".

On Tuesday, Roy told the bench that Uppuganti's had metastatic cancer that had spread to her lungs and other organs. She said that Uppu-ganti, an undertrial, had reached stage four of cancer and deserved adequate medi-cal care in her last days of life.

The state's counsel San-geetaShinde, however, opposed Uppuganti's plea.

Shinde told the HC that Uppuganti was accused of a serious offence. She said Uppu-ganti was able to move on her own and had been provided with the help of two other inmates to take care of her in the prison. The government counsel further said that as per the advice of doctors, the state prison authorities were taking Uppuganti to the Tata Memo-rial Cancer Care Hospital in Mumbai three times a week for treatment.

Roy, however, told the HC that Uppuganti was under-going radiation and chemo-therapy merely to alleviate her suffering and there was no cure for her advanced stage of cancer. MPOST

LUCKNOW: A special PMLA court here has issued summons to former Uttar Pradesh cabinet minister Gayatri Prajapati to face trial in a money launder-ing case linked to possession of alleged disproportionate assets, saying he was the "ultimate beneficiary" of assets acquired out of the proceeds of crime.

In an order issued on Mon-day by the special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court of sessions judge

Sarvesh Kumar, Prajapati has been asked to depose before it on October 4.

The zonal office of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) had filed a charge sheet, also called the prosecution com-plaint under various sections of the PMLA, against Prajapati and others in April.

The agency has been prob-ing the former legislator, who held the mining portfolio in the Samajwadi Party government

led by Chief Minister Akh-ilesh Yadav, on money laun-dering charges in a case linked to alleged possession of dispro-portionate assets.

"There are specific allega-tions against accused Gay-atri Prasad Prajapati that he has expended Rs 2,98,25,511 more against his income from known and legal sources which is exponentially disproportion-ate while he was working as public servant," the court said.

In addition, there are prima facie evidences of acquiring benami properties by him. All the cash deposits in the bank accounts of his family mem-bers and companies wherein they were directors were made on his instance," the court said.

It added that "major deci-sions relating to the affairs of the companies were taken by him and he held a tight con-trol over the day-to-day affairs of the company." AGENCIES

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: There have been "catastrophic consequences" of the prolonged school closure in the country due to COVID-19, with over 37 per cent of students in rural areas not studying at all and 48 per cent not being able to read more than a few words, a recent survey has claimed.

The School Children's Online and Offline Learn-ing (SCHOOL) survey, titled "Locked Out: Emergency Report on School Education", involv-ing nearly 1,400 students from underprivileged households was conducted in August in 15 states and union territories. It was released on Monday.

"The picture that emerges from this survey is absolutely dismal. In rural areas, only 28 per cent of children were study-ing regularly at the time of the survey, and 37 per cent were not studying at all. The results of a simple reading test are partic-ularly alarming: nearly half of

all children in the sample were unable to read more than a few words," it said.

The corresponding figures for students studying regularly, not studying at all, and unable to read more than a few words in urban areas were 47 per cent, 19 per cent and 42 per cent, respectively, the survey claimed.

The main findings of the SCHOOL survey are focused on the relatively deprived hamlets where children generally attend government schools.

Schools and other educa-

tional institutions across the country have been closed for over a year and a half since the onset of the pandemic. Follow-ing a marked improvement in the COVID-19 situation, sev-eral states are reopening the schools in a phased manner from September.

As per the report, the pro-portion of children who were studying online regularly was just 24 per cent and eight per cent in urban and rural areas, respectively.

Lack of money, poor con-

nectivity, or no access to smart-phones were some of the reasons behind the "very limited" reach of online education among sam-pled students, the survey noted.

"One reason for this is that many sample households (about half in rural areas) have no smartphone. But that is just the first hurdle: Even among households with a smartphone, the proportion of children who are studying online regularly is just 31 per cent in urban areas and 15 per cent in rural areas. Smartphones are often used by working adults, and may or may not be available to school chil-dren, especially the younger siblings (only nine per cent of all SCHOOL survey children had their own smartphones)," it explained.

Even among the underprivi-leged households, the figures were "much worse" for Dalit and Adivasi families than for others, be it for online educa-tion, regular study, or reading abilities, claimed the survey.

LUCKNOW: Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Tuesday asked officials to improve surveillance in Firoz-abad and other districts bat-tling outbreak of dengue and viral fever that has claimed over 50 lives.

Adityanath also announced that the government has moved forward to increase the hono-rarium of anganwadi and Asha workers in the state.

"Effective arrangements should be made in Firozabad, Mathura, Agra and other dis-tricts to check the spread of dengue and viral disease. Sur-veillance should be made better and distribution work of medi-cal kits should start," the chief minister said while addressing a meeting here.

He said, in Shikohabad (Firozabad) a 100-bed hospi-tal is ready and it could prove beneficial for those living in nearby areas.

"Additional beds, medi-cine, paramedical staff, doctors, medicines have been made available there and if need it can be further increased," he said. He said unnecessary crowd should be avoided in OPDs and family members of patients should be given health updates and CM helpline' should also reach out to them.

In Firozabad, dengue and viral fever have claimed 51 lives so far. Last week, three Firoz-abad doctors were suspended on charges of laxity.

Firozabad's Chief Medical Officer Neeta Kulshresth was also removed following the spate of deaths, mostly chil-dren, since August 18 due to the viral fever and suspected cases of dengue.

The chief minister had vis-ited the district on August 30 to take stock of the situation.

At the meeting, the chief minister also said corona cur-few' should be between 11 pm to 6 am in view of the improved Covid situation.

"Officials should ensure that all markets are closed by 11 pm," the chief minister said.

At present, the markets remain closed between 10 pm and 6 am. MPOST

MUZAFFARNAGAR (UP): Eight years since the Muzaffarnagar riots of 2013, 1,117 people accused in 97 cases related to murder, rape, robbery and arson among others connected to the violence have been acquitted over lack of evidence.

Seven people were convicted in a single case related to the murder of two youths, Sachin and Gaurav, in Kawal vil-lage in the district. This, together with the stabbing to death of another person, Shahnawaz, on August 27, 2013 by six people had triggered the riots, accord-ing to police.

A special investigation team (SIT) was set up by the state government to look into the riots cases.

According to officials of the SIT, police had registered 510 cases against

1,480 people and filed chargesheets in 175 cases.

An official of the SIT said that over the years, 97 cases have been decided by a court which has acquitted 1,117 people accused in those due to lack of evidence. The prosecution has not filed an appeal in any of these cases, he said.

The seven people convicted in the Kawal village double-murder case were sentenced to life imprisonment.

The SIT could not be file chargesheets in 20 cases under sections 153A and 295A of the IPC since it did not get per-mission for prosecution from the state government.

Meanwhile, the Uttar Pradesh govern-ment has decided to withdraw 77 cases related to the riots, but the court has given permission for withdrawal in just one case which is against 12 BJP leaders, including Uttar Pradesh minister Suresh Rana, BJP MLA SangitSom, former BJP MP Bhar-tendu Singh and Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) leader SadhviPrachi.

SIT officials said 264 accused in the riots cases were facing trial at present. Over 60 people were killed and more than 40,000 displaced during the Muzaf-farnagar riots of 2013. AGENCIES

OUR CORRESPONDENT

RANCHI: Chanting 'Jai Shri Ram' and Hanuman Chalisa, BJP MLAs in saffron outfits trooped into the Well of the Jharkhand assembly on Tues-day in protest over the namaz room, disrupting House proceedings.

As soon as the House assembled for the day, the BJP members began their pro-test over the namaz room and the state's employment pol-icy even as Speaker Rabindra-NathMahto repeatedly urged them to allow the conduct of business. Unrelenting, the members continued to chant slogans during Question Hour, leading to an adjournment till 12.30 pm.

"No disrespect would be tolerated to the chair. If you are angry, beat me but don't disrupt the proceedings," the speaker told the protesting MLAs.

"Please go back to your seats....I am pained. The Chair is not a subject for mockery. Yesterday, you behaved badly...

This is the question of the faith of 3.5 crore people and your conduct gives pain," he added.

In reply, BJP MLA CP Singh said though the Business Advi-sory Committee had decided to take up the employment policy issue, it was changed.

"This is an emotional state-ment. We are also sad. Speaker is supreme in the assembly but it hurts when we see that your behaviour is not impartial," he told Mahto.

Amid the din, the speaker asked BJP MLA BhanuPrata-pShahi to respect Hanuman Chalisa and not to use it for political gains. Mahto said may 'Bajrang Bali' grant wisdom to the agitating MLAs.

Before the start of the day, BJP MLAs sat on the stairs at the entrance of the assembly and chanted Hanuman Chalisa while Deoghar MLA Narayan Das wore a garland made of 'belpatra'.

Ruckus by the opposition BJP over the allotment of a room for offering namaz in the assembly had disrupted pro-ceedings on Monday as well.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

PUNE: NCP chief Sharad Pawar on Tuesday claimed the Enforcement Directorate's actions against various Maha-rashtra leaders were an attempt to encroach on the state gov-ernment's rights and discour-age political opponents.

Notably, the ED is con-ducting a probe into sepa-rate money laundering cases against former state home minister and Anil Deshmukh, NCP leader EknathKhadse. The central agency last week also conducted raids at mul-tiple premises in Maharashtra linked to Shiv Sena MP Bha-vanaGawali in connection with a money laundering case.

The NCP shares power with the Shiv Sena and Congress in Maharashtra.

Talking to reporters here, Pawar said, "Never heard of so many ED's actions in Maharashtra in the past. One action is going on against Khadse, another against Anil Deshmukh, also against Bhawna Gawali. There is an attempt to encroach upon the state government's rights case and discourage the oppo-nents by using these agencies as tools."

To a question on the ED's raids at premises linked to BhavanaGawali, Pawar said the issue is about educational

institutions."When there are allegations

against these kind of institu-tions, the complaints can be lodged before the charity com-missioner. If not the charity commissioner, then there are state government agencies, but here directly the ED was involved," the former Union minister said.

Asked about the pos-sibility of a third COVID-19 wave, Pawar said, "I have seen many events happening where the (COVID-19 preven-tion) protocols are not being followed."

Pawar said since Maha-rashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray has asked political parties to immediately stop agitations, meetings and other events to avoid crowding, he will not attend programmes involving large gatherings

"I will only attend pro-grammes organised indoors with a limited number of peo-ple," he said.

MUMBAI: An inquiry com-mission headed by a retired high court judge on Tues-day issued a bailable warrant against former Mumbai police commissioner ParamBir Singh for not appearing before it.

The Maharashtra govern-ment in March this year formed a one-member commission of Justice (retd) Kailash Uttam-chandChandiwal to conduct a probe into corruption allega-tions levelled by Singh against the then state home minister Anil Deshmukh

The commission had issued summons to Singh multiple times to appear before it, but he failed to do so, Hence, the panel issued a bailable warrant against him, a government law-yer said.

Earlier, the commission had thrice imposed fines on Singh - Rs 5,000 in June and Rs 25,000 on two occasions last month - for failing to appear before it.

Days after he was shunted out as Mumbai police com-missioner and transferred to the Home Guards in March, Singh claimed in a letter to Chief Minister Uddhav Thac-keray that Deshmukh used to ask police officers to collect money from restaurant and bar owners in Mumbai. AGENCIES

PM launches key edu initiatives, including sign language dictionary

‘ED’s actions against Maha leaders bid to subdue state govt’

Warrant against

Singh for not appearing

before panel

HC reserves order on accused’s plea for transfer to hospice

2013 Muzaffarnagar riots cases: 8 yrs on, over 1,100 acquitted, just 7 convicted

UP CM seeks improved surveillance in districts

battling dengue outbreak

Money laundering case: Prajapati summoned

Beat me but don't disrupt proceedings: Speaker amid ruckus over namaz room

37% students in rural areas, 19% in urban not studying at all: Survey

‘Proportion of children who were studying online regularly was just 24 per cent and eight per cent in urban and rural areas, respectively’

Modi expresses confidence that these measures will not only make our edu system globally competitive but also make youth future-ready

7 people convicted in the Kawal village double-murder case were sentenced to life imprisonment

‘During COVID, we have all witnessed capabilities of our education sector. There were a lot of challenges, but you solved all challenges swiftly. Online classes, group video calls, online exams - such terms weren't heard by many earlier’

PM Narendra Modi addresses the inaugural conclave of 'Shikshak Parv', through video conferencing, in New Delhi on Tuesday PIC/PTI

Sharad Pawar

UP CM Yogi Adityanath

7millenniumpost Editorial mpKOLKATA | WEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021

Grotesque profits

Flowing for water

A greed-driven vaccine market, backed by rich countries’ frivolous rush for booster doses, has deprived poor countries of their share of jabs

Low availability of water, coupled with livelihood prospect, remains a prominent reason for people from distressed regions migrating to Delhi

The pandemic has made us obsessive about figures. The number of COVID-

19 cases; the grim statistics on fatalities; and the prog-ress of the deadly virus across regions, states, districts and vil-lages have all been of fright-ening fascination since early 2020. As every new wave of the pandemic hit different parts of the world, the figures have had a way of overwhelming indi-vidual tragedies. The numbers were always too big, not least in India.

But in the midst of the worst pandemic in 100 years, where the tragedy of lost lives and economic ruin still deep-ens, come a set of figures that can only be described as gro-tesque: The revenues accrued by the leading developers of a new kind of vaccine to fight the virus. The top earners are Pfizer Inc and Moderna Inc, whose revenues have rocketed in the first half of this year with their messenger RNA or mRNA vaccines that were pro-duced in record time and have turned the vaccine business on its head.

Market caps of even rel-atively unknown companies with COVID-19 vaccines have zoomed, as have their reve-nues and profits. As for the marquee names, it has been a dream run that is unlikely to end any time soon. In July, Pfizer raised its fore-cast of sales for the year by 30 per cent to USD 33.5 billion (nearly Rs 245 crore). That has turned out to be an extremely conservative estimate; that figure was surpassed in the first half of this year itself with the company reporting over-all revenues of USD 33.6 bil-lion, a 68 per cent jump over the tally for the same period last year.

The case of Moderna is more spectacular. It had no approved product in its port-folio before the pandemic struck. Now its market cap is an astronomical USD 149.7 billion, pushing a number of big pharma companies into a black hole. For the first half of this year, Moderna’s total rev-enue zoomed to USD 6.3 bil-lion from just USD 75 million in the corresponding period of 2020.

In early August, both com-

panies jacked up the price of their vaccines, with their shots now costing between USD 23.15 and USD 25.50 a jab. With the US administra-tion recommending that citi-zens get a booster shot after the two doses, the outlook couldn’t be rosier for these two vaccine makers.

But there is a telling ineq-uity here. AstraZeneca plc, which is the largest supplier of COVID-19 vaccines — it has shipped one billion doses glob-ally and is hoping to double if not treble production this year — has reported revenues of only USD 1.2 billion in the first half of 2021. What accounts for this anomaly?

AstraZeneca’s vaccine is the cheapest of the major COVID-19 vaccines, costing just USD 2.15 a shot in the EU and slightly over USD five else-where, because it has prom-ised to hold the price line till the pandemic lasts. But this is set to change. The chief execu-tive of the company, who has been slammed by investors and market analysts, appears to be throwing in the towel. Prices will be raised sometime in the future, he says, because “we cannot be a non-profit forever.” However, he promises to not seek large profits.

Should we be appalled at this state of affairs? Corporate greed has been long encour-aged by rich countries; British

Prime Minister Boris Johnson recently paid tribute to the "greed is good" philosophy of the 1980s when he told his party members that “the rea-son we have the vaccine suc-cess is because of capitalism, because of greed my friends.”

It is the old shibboleth that is trotted out every time cor-porate greed breaks new bar-riers. Without patents and other intellectual property (IP) rights, there would be no incentive to innovate.

It’s a view that conve-niently ignores what is widely known these days, thanks to a relentless campaign by Nobel Prize winners, academ-ics, health activists and unbi-ased IP experts: Invariably it is research conducted in public institutions that has provided the scientific breakthroughs exploited by the pharmaceu-tical industry. In the case of mRNA vaccines, it was Hun-garian-born scientist Kata-lin Kariko and her dedicated colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania who did the hard slog on harnessing the power of synthetic mRNA to fight disease.

If biotech companies are making money hand over fist on the vaccines, is the world getting vaccinated any faster? The global vaccination atlas shows little change. The bright spots where 50 per cent and more of the population has

been vaccinated remain the same — the rich countries — while a large swathe of the developing world remains dark.

Many of the poor countries have been unable to access any vaccines at all. The Joe Biden administration's decision in mid-August to push booster shots in the US in September will only exacerbate the vac-cine inequality. Scientists and health experts have slammed the decision because they say there was no compelling data to show booster shots were necessary; the two-dose vac-cine regime is still holding up well against the possibil-ity of severe infection and hospitalisation.

Among the sharpest critics of the US measure has been the World Health Organiza-tion (WHO), which empha-sises that there is no evidence to support the idea that people who are fully vaccinated will need additional doses so soon. WHO chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan thinks boosters may be required after a year or two; but not at this point, just six months after the pri-mary dose.

WHO is urging the coun-tries that are promoting the booster shot to reconsider their decision because it would sharply reduce the already strained supply of vaccine. It calculates that if 11 high- and

upper-middle income coun-tries decide to go for a booster for their populations or even subgroups, this will require an additional 800 million doses. This means the most vulner-able groups worldwide that need the vaccine — front-line health workers and older people — will have to wait far longer.

Global vaccine inequity is needlessly prolonging the pan-demic, says an opinion piece in the latest issue of BMJ, better known as the British Medical Journal. It argues that the ineq-uity is a direct consequence of commercial greed and political self-interest. It reads: “Corpo-rations aided by their politi-cal allies are once more doing what they do best: making a killing.” As a result, prevent-able deaths and illness are rife across Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The authors, signa-tories to the People’s Vaccine Campaign, have no doubt what is causing this: a free market, profit-driven enterprise based on patent and IP protection, combined with a lack of polit-ical will.

This is reflected in the stasis at the World Trade Organiza-tion, where the proposal for a limited waiver of IP protection has not moved since October 2020. DTE

The author is an independent journalist. The views expressed

are strictly personal

LATHA JISHNU

RICHARD MAHAPATRA

Log on to write letters to the editor or send them to letter2editor.mp@gmail.com. You can also send your comments to The Editor,

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

DearEditorAgainst the backdrop of an inadequate number of women judges in courts across the country, the Chief Justice of India (CJI) on Saturday, said that he would prefer at least 50 per cent representation of women in the judiciary at all levels. The CJI acknowledged that it was only with “great difficulty” that the Supreme Court (SC) had achieved a “mere” 11 per cent representation of women on the bench. Out of the sanctioned strength of 34 judges, the SC has four women judges — Justices Indira Banerjee, Hima Kohli, BV Nagarathna and Bela M Trivedi, three of whom were elevated recently. This is the highest-ever number of women judges in the apex court’s history. And out of 677 sitting judges in both the SC and high courts, only 81 are women, a disappointing 12 per cent. While there is greater gender representation at the lower levels of the judiciary, there is a trend of the proportion of women judges decreasing as one moves up the tiers of the court. This is due to various reasons — women have to negotiate multiple obligations; it is harder to meet the minimum criteria of seven years of continuous practice to be eligible to be a district judge; fewer women are in legal profession, reducing the pool from which women judges can be selected; and, perhaps most importantly, the collegium system suffers from inherent legacy. Expectedly, higher numbers and greater visibility of females in courts can give women the necessary confidence to seek justice and enforce their rights through the courts. Beyond gender, this holds true in the case of other marginalised segments too, whose representation must increase.

Delhi’s labour mar-kets have become populated in recent weeks. These mar-

kets of informal workers are a barometer of weather condi-tions in nearby states, particu-larly the Bundelkhand region of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.

This monsoon season has seen a lot of uncertainty. The increase in the number of informal workers in Del-hi’s markets is a sure sign of an impending drought.

“Lack of water.” That is the usual reason people cite for their migration to Delhi in the middle of the agricul-ture season. Tracking these labour markets and the pas-senger flow in major railway stations in migration-ori-gin states like Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, one can easily perceive the live-lihood crisis.

At the core of this distress migration is always the avail-ability of water. This reacti-vates our ancestral memory — some 4,00,000 years ago, a dry spell in East Africa forced our ancestors to migrate out in search of water-rich geography.

As they say, as humans, we have been chasing water since then, more than food and shel-ter as it is that central to us. An Odia’s trail of migration to far-away Kerala can be traced to, or attributed to, a water cri-sis back at home, resulting in multidimensional livelihood

crises.The collapse of traditional

water harvesting systems led to agriculture failures which, in turn, resulted in distress migration from the Bun-delkhand region.

While we sought water for settlement in ancient times, the lack of access to it has led to the contemporary out-migration to places that offer both easy access to water and also liveli-hood options. In ancient times, agriculture and hunting were primary survival occupations while we have added many more over the time.

Will the world witness another such transformational

migration due to lack of water? There is impeccable evidence of a severe water crisis. Cli-mate change has aggravated this. Various estimates suggest that 66 per cent of the plan-et’s land areas are losing water. Populations facing extreme drought might double by the late 21st century.

A recent World Bank report titled ‘Web and Flow: Water, Migration and Devel-opment’, analysed the “largest dataset on internal migrants” assembled from 64 coun-tries and 189 censuses during 1960-2015.

It argues that water scarcity is a major reason for internal

migration in the contempo-rary world. While the inher-ent human affiliation to a water body as the capital for settle-ment and societal evolution remains unchanged, the recent anthropogenic changes have made us more prone to water scarcity than five million years ago.

This massive analysis of data establishes that low rain-fall events accounted for 10-11 per cent of the increase in migration between 1970 and 2000.

“Strikingly, dry shocks have five times the effect on out-migration than wet shocks have — the impact of

wet shocks is more muted. This suggests that local adap-tive capacity may be signifi-cantly constrained in the event of repeated dry shocks,” the report says. The water scarcity-driven waves of migration have been more eminent in devel-oping and poor countries.

There are various reasons for migration, like looking for better economic opportunities, seeking higher education, con-flicts and also major disasters.

While dry spells or lack of water ranked just below educa-tion as a reason for migration, in many countries, this has become a more decisive driver of migration. Climate change has added to these woes.

In the last three decades, an average 25 per cent of the world’s population suffered abnormal rainfalls annually. Such shocks have immense economic impacts on people, which are reasons for migra-tion anyway.

But increasing dry spells, as predicted in a changed cli-mate scenario, would add on to this, thus fastening out migration. But the World Bank report finds that the poorest in a region would be left behind to fend for themselves in areas ravaged by deficit rainfalls.

It says that 80 per cent of the poorest population would not be able to migrate out even though left with no adequate water as migration involves costs and also certain skills. DTE

Views expressed are personal

Biden administration's decision to push for booster shots in the US in September will exacerbate vaccine inequality

— KHOKAN DAS, KOLKATA via email

Dry spells have become a decisive driver of migration in many countries

EDITORIALA bigger problem

To the relief of Keralites, samples of the eight of the 11 symptomatic individuals who had been in contact with the 12-year-old deceased, Moham-med Hashim, have been found to be negative.

Thanks to the quick and prompt steps by the authori-ties, the situation seems somewhat in control. The state has been dealing with the Nipah outbreaks since 2018 when the virus first took the state off-guard. The situation this time around is compounded by the fact that Kerala is already reeling under COVID-19 crisis — reporting around 60 per cent of the national cases daily. The admin-istrative and financial burden on the state can be imag-ined at this point in time. In the larger perspective also, recurrence of Nipah outbreak in Kerala is an unwelcome sign. It is intriguing as to why the virus that was first spot-ted in Malaysia way back in 1998 — killing 105 of the 265 infected persons — has become so active in Kerala after two decades. The reasons are not very difficult to fig-ure out if we go by what health experts around the world have been suggesting. Since Nipah is a zoonotic virus, it certainly has a correlation with animal sources — fruit bats to be precise — and other animal carriers. Back in 1998, Malaysia had to cull a large number of pigs to con-tain Nipah virus. But as animals have been around us for the most part of our history, there must be some other third element that is prompting more frequent and dan-gerous virus outbreaks over the past few decades. That missing element is human’s interaction with the envi-ronment and climate. The Malaysian Nipah outbreak is largely attributed to the destruction of forests — the home and fruit reservoirs of the fruit bats. Consequently, these bats made their way to farms and orchards — infesting fruits and other eatables, enabling Nipah to make inroads in human territories. Though epidemics and pandem-ics are not new phenomena for the human race, it is an observable fact that frequency and intensity of viral out-breaks have increased significantly, rather threateningly. Currently, we are losing human beings in unprecedented numbers despite having progressed massively in medicine and healthcare, unlike in the case of centuries-old out-breaks. The most frightening thing about Nipah is its fatal-ity rate. When Kerala first saw the Nipah outbreak in 2018, 17 out of the 18 infected persons had lost their lives. This is quite different from the SARS-Cov-2 virus where the fatality rate lingers around one per cent. This effectively means that chances of survival after being infested with Nipah virus is relatively much lower if there is laxity in diagnosis. The extreme manifestations of the Nipah infec-tion are encephalitis and myocarditis and the symptoms resemble each other as well. Given the frequent pattern of viral outbreaks, a ready frame of mind among health-care workers has to be developed earliest possible, which will prevent them from being confused in recognizing the symptoms. A laxity was clearly visible in the current case in which the boy who died on Sunday was taken to four healthcare institutions — including the government Medi-cal College Hospital — before he died at a private hospital. Clearly, there was a massive delay which not only cost the boy his life, but also ended up endangering the safety of more than 250 people, of which 129 are healthcare work-ers. The region also had to temporarily halt its vaccina-tion drive for the time being. Now this is too much of a cost to be paid for laxity and negligence. It is needless to say that viral infections have gone on to become one of the most threatening realities in the present world. It has to be in our thinking and we need to be suspicious all the time for the sake of safety. The Kerala government has stepped up its efforts to control the situation. Of the samples from 11 symptomatic persons, eight (those which were sent to Pune Institute of Virology) have been found negative. The samples from the remaining three persons are being tested at the Medical College Hospital, Kozhikode. Apart from this prompt response, certain long-term measures should be considered. Firstly, extensive research exploring the correlation among growth-guided human behavior, envi-ronment and animal habitats and feeding habits would be highly appreciable at this juncture, as zoonotic viral out-breaks are no more once-in-a-century phenomenon; these pervade our daily lives. For Nipah, the efforts towards pre-paring a vaccine should be ramped up. Nipah, along with other viral outbreaks, need to be seen in a larger picture — as a function of human behavior vis-a-vis natural habitats of animals.

WHO chief scientist, Soumya Swaminathan, thinks boosters may be required after a year or two; but not at this point, just six months after the primary dose

Some 4,00,000 years ago, a dry spell in East Africa forced our ancestors to migrate out in search of water-rich geography

millenniumpost.in

RIGHT THINKING

8 millenniumpostWorldmpWEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021 | KOLKATA

China appoints new army commander to head

troops along Indian borderBEIJING: Chinese Presi-dent Xi Jinping has appointed Gen Wang Haijiang as the new Commander of the Peo-ple's Liberation Army's West-ern Theatre Command, which oversees the borders with India, official media here reported.

Xi, who also heads the rul-ing Communist Party of China (CPC) the Central Military Commission (CMC), has pro-moted Wang and four other military officers to the rank of General, the highest rank for officers in active military ser-vice in China, the state-run website chinamil reported on Monday night.

The Central Military Com-mission (CMC) is the overall high command of the People's Liberation Army (PLA).

Gen Wang is the fourth commander to head the West-ern Theatre Command after the eastern Ladakh standoff began in May last year.

The tensions have eased to some extent with troops from both sides moving out from the Galwan Valley, Pangong Tso and Gogra but the disengage-ment has not been completed from other friction points like Hot Springs and Depsang in eastern Ladakh.

China's Western Theatre Command oversees the Xinji-ang and the Tibet Autonomous Regions, as well as the border with India, making it the larg-est geographical area under one command in the PLA.

Xi, 68, presented certificates

of order promoting them to the military rank of General, the online report said.

The promoted officers are Commander of the PLA West-ern Theater Command Wang Haijiang, Commander of the PLA Central Theater Com-mand Lin Xiangyang, Com-mander of the PLA Navy Dong Jun and Commander of the PLA Air Force Chang Dingqiu and President of PLA National Defence University Xu Xueq-iang, it said.

Xi in July had promoted Gen Xu Qiling to head the PLA's Western Theatre Com-mand. It is not yet clear what will be his new role.

Gen Xu, 59, was the third General to head the Western Command after the Ladakh tensions began in May last year. Earlier Gen Zhang Xudong was appointed on December 19 last year to head the com-mand, replacing 65-year-old Gen Zhao Zongqi who retired from the PLA. AGENCIES

Blinken says US working with Taliban

on flightsDOHA: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken says the State Department is working with the Taliban to facilitate addi-tional charter flights from Kabul for people seeking to leave Afghanistan after the American military and diplo-matic departure.

Blinken was speaking on Tuesday at a joint news confer-ence with Qatar's top diplomats and defence officials.

He said the U.S. has been in contact with the Taliban in recent hours to work out arrangements for additional charter flights from the Afghan capital.

Blinken said the Taliban have given assurances of safe passage for all seeking to leave Afghanistan with proper travel documents. He said the United States would hold the Taliban to that pledge.

Blinken said the United States believes there are some-where around 100 American citizens still in Afghanistan who want to leave. The State Department had previously put that estimate at between 100 and 200.

Blinken and U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin are in Qatar to thank the Gulf Arab state for its help with the transit of tens of thousands of people evacuated from Afghanistan after the Tali-ban took control of Kabul on August 15. AGENCIES

UK PM Johnson unveils new tax to fund health, social care costs

LONDON: British Prime Min-ister Boris Johnson on Tuesday unveiled a new tax that will fund the country’s mounting health and social care costs in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

A new UK-wide 1.25 per cent health and social care levy from April 2022 will begin as a hike in the compulsory National Insurance (NI) contributions by taxpayers, a move that breaks Johnson’s election manifesto pledge to not hike taxes.

However, he defended his so-called social care package as the “biggest catch-up pro-gramme” for the state-funded National Health Service (NHS) and pointed out that the pan-demic had rendered the mani-festo pledge impossible.

No Conservative govern-ment ever wants to raise taxes, and I will be honest with the House, I accept yes I accept this breaks a manifesto commit-ment, which is not something I do lightly, said Johnson in his statement to the House of Com-mons to announce the plans.

But a global pandemic was in no-one’s manifesto. I think the people in this country understand that in their bones and they can see the enor-mous debts this government/ the Treasury has taken, he said.

The plan, to be voted on in Parliament later this week, was signed off by ministers at a Cabi-net meeting earlier on Tuesday and came after days of anger from Conservative Party back-benchers opposed to tax rises.

The 1.25 percentage point increase is expected to raise

about 12 billion pounds which, in the early years, will mainly be used to fund dealing with the NHS.

The new Health and Social Care Levy is the necessary and responsible thing to do to pro-tect the NHS, sharing the cost between businesses and individ-uals and ensuring those earning more pay more, said UK Chan-cellor Rishi Sunak, one of the key ministers behind formu-lating the plans.

We’re tackling the NHS backlog and taking decisive action to fix our broken social care system, he said.

From 2023, the new levy will become a separate tax on earned income, calculated in the same way as the current NI contribu-tions and will be paid by both employees and employers.

Johnson said to ensure

everyone contributes fairly, all working adults, including those over the state pension age, will pay the levy and the rates of dividend tax will also increase by 1.25 per cent to help fund this package.

Some will ask why we don’t increase income tax or capital gains instead.

But income tax isn’t paid by businesses, so the whole bur-den would fall on individuals, roughly doubling the amount that the basic rate taxpayer could expect to pay, Johnson told MPs.

Instead, our new levy will share the cost between individu-als and businesses, and every-one will contribute according to their means, including those above State Pension Age, so those who earn more will pay more, he claimed. AGENCIES

China: Report of Taliban's plan to hand over Bagram

airbase to it ‘fake news’BEIJING: China on Tuesday termed as pure fake news a report that the Taliban plans to hand over Afghanistan's key Bagram airbase vacated by the US troops to it.

I can tell you this is pure fake news, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told a media briefing here when asked about a report that Taliban plans to hand over Bagram air force base to China and the Kanda-har airport to Pakistan.

In July, the US military left Bagram Airfield - its key base in Afghanistan - after nearly 20 years. At its height, Bagram base was home to tens of thousands of US troops. The airbase played a key role in US military con-ducting its land and air opera-tions against rebels in its war on terrorism in Afghanistan, which formally ended last month with the complete withdrawal of American and NATO troops and Taliban seizing power in the war-torn country.

America's former envoy to

the United Nations Nikki Haley has also said recently that China was trying to take over Bagram Air Force facility.

We need to watch China because I think you are going to see China make a move for Bagram Air Force Base," Haley said in a recent television inter-view. "I think they are also mak-ing a move in Afghanistan and trying to use Pakistan to get stronger to go against India. So, we have got a lot of issues," the Indian-American Republican leader said. AGENCIES

Germany’s Merkel seeks to boost party before

vote, clashes with deputyBERLIN: Outgoing Chancel-lor Angela Merkel painted a rosy picture of her government's record on Tuesday and assailed the possibility of a future left-wing administration, seeking to boost her struggling party's candidate as she addressed what is expected to be the German parliament's last session before the Sept. 26 election.

Merkel also clashed openly with her deputy, who is a rival party's candidate to succeed her and is currently leading polls, over a comment in which he described people who have been vaccinated against COVID-19 as guinea pigs.

It was an unusually parti-san speech by Merkel, who has largely stayed out of the cam-paign on the grounds that out-going leaders should hold back, and appeared to reflect mount-

ing concern over her center-right Union bloc's prospects under would-be successor Armin Laschet.

Recent polls have shown the Union slipping into sec-ond place, while the center-left Social Democrats have moved into the lead thanks to the rel-ative popularity of Vice Chan-cellor Olaf Scholz, who is also Germany's finance minister. They put the environmentalist Greens, whose co-leader Annal-ena Baerbock is making the par-ty's first run for chancellor, in third place. They suggest a wide variety of governing coalitions could emerge. As the Union's poll ratings have declined, its leaders have issued increasingly frequent warnings that Scholz and the Greens would bring the hard-left opposition Left Party into government. AGENCIES

Hundreds attend anti-Pak rally in Kabul, chant ‘death to Pakistan’

PESHAWAR/KABUL: Hun-dreds of Afghan protesters, including women, took to the streets of Kabul on Tuesday, chanting "death to Pakistan" and denouncing Islamabad's interference in Afghanistan and airstrikes by its jets in Pan-jshir province in support of the Taliban, according to a media report.

The Taliban on Monday said they have seized Panjshir, the last province not in their control, after their takeover of the US-backed Afghanistan government last month. The protesters claimed that Paki-stan Air Force jets conducted airstrikes in Panjshir province, Khaama news reported.

Chanting "death to Paki-stan", "Freedom", "Allah Akbar" and "we do not want captivity" among many other slogans, the protesters gathered at the gate of the Pakistani embassy in Kabul and asked its staff to leave Afghanistan, it reported.

"Pakistan, Pakistan, Leave Afghanistan, "a slogan on a huge banner read.

The agitators said they do not want a puppet government in Afghanistan and asked for an inclusive government, it said.

The Taliban fighters report-edly fired gunshots in the air to disperse the protestors but they were still agitating, the report added.

Several Afghan journalists covering the demonstration

were arrested, witnesses and Afghan media outlets said.

Afghanistan's TOLO news reported that the Tali-ban detained its cameraperson Wahid Ahmadi and confiscated his camera.

The Taliban forces pre-vented some journalists from filming the protest, it added.

The demonstrators gath-ered after Ahmad Masoud, the co-leader of the resistance front in Panjshir province, in a voice clip called on people of Afghanistan to resurrect against the Taliban.

According to the report, people in Blakh and Dai-kundi provinces also took to the streets on Monday night and chanted slogans against Pakistan.

Iran has also reacted to the airstrikes in Panjshir and the foreign ministry has asked for investigations over what he called the interference of foreign jets. AGENCIES

Typhoon hits eastern Philippines, causing power outages

MANILA: A strong typhoon on Tuesday slammed into the eastern Philippines, bringing high winds that caused power outages in several provinces.

Typhoon Conson carried sustained winds of 120 km (74 miles) per hour with gusts of up to 150 kph (93 mph), first making landfall at the coastal town of Hernani in Eastern Samar province, before hit-

ting the nearby Samar prov-ince early Tuesday, the state weather service said.

As of Tuesday morning, the eye of the typhoon was in the vicinity of Masbate prov-ince's Dimasalang town.

We only have minor damage here, thank God, Eastern Samar Governor Ben Evardone said in a text message.

He said work had been sus-pended in government offices.

Power systems opera-tor National Grid Corpora-tion of the Philippines said some transmission lines were affected. Power out-ages were reported in East-ern Samar, Samar and Leyte provinces. Local officials reported some flooding in Tacloban City. AGENCIES

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson takes part in an activity, during a visit to Westport Care Home in Stepney Green, east London, Tuesday PTI

Xi Jinping

BLOSSOM

A woman takes a photo in a sunflower field at Grinter Farms, near Lawrence, Kanses. The field, planted annually by the Grinter family, draws thousands of visitors during the weeklong late summer blossoming of the flowers PTI

Afghan women shout slogans during an anti-Pakistan demonstration, near the Pakistan embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, Tuesday PTI

America's former envoy to the United Nations Nikki Haley has also said recently that China was trying to take over Bagram Air Force facility

Taliban blocks hundreds of people from leaving Afghanistan

MAZAR-E-SHARIF: An Afghan employee of an Amer-ican organization in Afghan-istan says the Taliban are blocking her and hundreds of other people from boarding charter evacuation flights out of Afghanistan.

The woman spoke to The Associated Press anonymously Tuesday, saying she feared for her safety if she is singled out by the Taliban.

The US organisation, Ascend, has worked for years with Afghan women and girls. The woman is among several hundred people, reportedly including American citizens and green card holders, who say they have been waiting in large residence halls and hotels for more than a week for per-mission to board waiting char-ter flights out of the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif.

"We think we are in some kind of jail, the woman told the AP.

She says the American citizens she has met in the group are vulnerable people in their 70s, parents of Afghan Americans in the United States.

Taliban officials say they will let people who have the proper passports and other

documentation leave.Secretary of State Antony

Blinken on Tuesday denied claims from Republican law-makers that the situation in Mazar-e-Sharif amounted

to a hostage-taking, after the US government pulled its last troops and diplomats from the country last week.

The Afghan woman who talked to AP says her group has

proper passports and visas, but the Taliban are blocking them from entering the airport.

She says she went fleeing to the women's side of her hotel last week when word spread that the Taliban were search-ing the would-be evacuees, and had taken some away.

"I am scared if they split us' up 'and not let us leave, she said. If we can't get out of here, something wrong will happen. And I am afraid of that." AGENCIES

Pakistani Taliban warns

journalists against calling them terrorists

Taliban officials say they will let people who have the proper passports and other documentation leave

PESHAWAR: The banned Tehr eek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), an umbrella organi-staion of armed Islamist groups, has warned the coun-try's media and journalists against calling them a "ter-rorist outfit" or they will be treated as "enemies".

TTP spokesman Moham-mad Khurasani, in a state-ment on social media on Monday, said his organisation was tracking media coverage which branded the TTP with epithets such as terrorists and extremists.

Using such terms for TTP showed a partisan role of media and journalists, the Dawn newspaper quoted the online statement by the TTP.

"Such labels on the TTP meant the media professionals were dishonest towards their duty and would create enemies for itself," Khurasani said.

Therefore, the media should call them by the name of Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan, Khurasani said. AGENCIES

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid speaks during a press conference in Kabul, Afghanistan Tuesday PTI

The Afghan woman who talked to AP says her group has proper passports and visas, but the Taliban are blocking them from entering the airport

9millenniumpost Business mpKOLKATA | WEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021

FACELESS ASSESSMENT

VIDEOCON INDUSTRIES CASE

MUMBAI: In a bid to ensure security of card data, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has enhanced the scope of tokenisa-tion and permitted card issuers to act as token service provid-ers (TSP).

Under tokenisation services, a unique alternate code is gen-erated to facilitate transactions through cards.

The RBI on Tuesday extended the device-based tokenisation to card-on-file tokenisation (CoFT) services, a move that will bar the mer-chants from storing actual card data.

Card-on-file refers to card information stored by payment gateway and merchants to pro-cess future transactions.

“...card issuers have been permitted to offer card tokeni-sation services as token service providers. The tokenisation of card data shall be done with explicit customer consent requiring additional factor of authentication (AFA),” the RBI said in a statement while extend-ing device-based tokenisation framework to CoFT services.

It said the decision will rein-force the safety and security of card data while continu-ing the convenience in card transactions.

The RBI said that citing the convenience and comfort fac-tor for users while undertak-ing card transactions online, many entities involved in the card payment transaction chain store actual card details.

Some merchants force their customers for storing card details.

Availability of such details with a large number of mer-chants substantially increases the risk of card data being sto-len. In the recent past, there were incidents where card data stored by some merchants have been compromised/ leaked.

Any leakage of CoF data can have serious repercus-sions because many jurisdic-tions do not require an AFA for card transactions, the RBI said adding that stolen card data can also be used to perpetrate frauds within India through social engineering techniques.

The RBI in March 2020 had stipulated that authorised payment aggregators and the merchants onboarded by them should not store actual card data with a view to minimise vulnerable points in the sys-tem. On a request from the industry, it extended the dead-line to end-December 2021 as a one-time measure. PTI

NEW DELHI: The Centre on Tuesday said it has constituted a task force and expert committee to prepare a road map for coal-based hydrogen production.

This is aimed at contribut-ing to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's agenda of a hydrogen-based economy in a clean manner.

"Ministry of Coal has con-stituted 2 Committees today, one to oversee the program and another of experts to give guid-ance to the Ministry," the coal ministry said in a statement.

The task force has been constituted under the chair-manship of Coal Additional Sec-retary Vinod Kumar Tiwari. Its broad terms of reference include monitoring of activities towards achieving coal-based hydrogen production and usage and coor-dination with Coal Gasification Mission and NITI Aayog. The broad terms of reference of the expert committee include iden-tifying experts in India and co-opting as members, desk-based review of progress in hydrogen technology and also reviewing ongoing research projects in hydrogen technology. PTI

PV retail sales increase 39% in AugFADA warns of lacklustre festive season for passenger vehicles due to semiconductor shortageNEW DELHI: Automobile dealers' body FADA on Tues-day expressed concern that the chip shortage issue could derail passenger vehicle (PV) retail sales during the festive season, as automakers are struggling with an adequate supply of vehicles to dealers due to pro-duction challenges.

Terming semiconductor shortage as a "full-blown cri-sis", the industry body warned of a lacklustre festive season, especially for the passenger vehicle dealer fraternity, with low inventory levels and non-availability of the fast-moving model variants ahead of the peak festive period.

"Auto dealers are facing the most challenging phase of their business career as COVID-19 after-effect continues to play spoil-sport. Until last year, when demand was a challenge, supply is becoming a bigger problem currently due to short-age of semiconductors, even though there is high demand for passenger vehicles," FADA President Vinkesh Gulati said in a statement.

Every dealer by now starts planning for a bigger offtake in anticipation of a bumper festive

season, but due to supply issues, inventory levels are at the low-est levels during this financial year, he added.

"With OEMs drastically cutting down productions due to unavailability of semicon-ductors and ABS chips, short-age of containers and high metal prices, customers for the first time may not get a vehicle of their choice and lucrative schemes during this festive sea-son. The ultra-frequent price increase is also keeping entry-level buyers at bay," Gulati noted.

He added that customers especially at the bottom of the pyramid were trying to save instead of buying articles like two-wheelers.

"This will hence keep demand for two-wheelers a concern. Though, with educa-tional institutions slowly open-ing up, a ray of hope can be seen for an improved demand in coming months," Gulati said.

FADA thus sees that the near term outlook will con-tinue to remain a mixed bag with PVs witnessing demand-supply mismatch and two-wheeler segment facing a demand crunch, he noted.

Average inventory at the end of July for passenger vehi-cles stood between 25-30 days, while in the two-wheeler space it ranged between 20-25 days, Gulati said.

The usage of semiconduc-tors in the auto industry has gone up globally in recent times, with technological advancements and new mod-els coming with more and

more electronic features such as Bluetooth connectivity and driver-assist, navigation and hybrid-electric systems besides the engine control unit.

However, the auto industry accounts for about 10 per cent of the overall semiconductor demand, with the rest coming from the electronic appliances and gadget industry, such as mobile phones and laptops, among others.

FADA on Tuesday reported a 39 per cent year-on-year rise in passenger vehicle retail sales in August to 2,53,363 units.

According to the Federation of Automobile Dealers Associa-tions (FADA), PV sales stood at 1,82,651 units in August 2020.

Similarly, two-wheeler sales rose 7 per cent to 9,76,051 units last month, as compared to 9,15,126 units in the year-ago period.

Gulati noted that the two-wheeler market, which is highly price-sensitive, continues to remain subdued with multiple price hikes by OEMs and an increase in fuel cost.

"Customers continued to fight financial battles due to COVID related health issues and hence remained away from

dealerships resulting in low enquiry and lower sales.

This has its impact on the entry-level segment which con-tinues to face the biggest brunt," he said.

Commercial vehicle sales surged 97 per cent to 53,150 units against 26,851 units in August last year.

"While SCV's had already shown good recovery due to intra-city goods movement, M&HCVs are picking up pace only in specific geographies where the Government is roll-ing out infrastructure projects. Acquisition cost post-BS-6 implementation along with financers keeping away from the segment and high fuel cost continues to restrict recovery in CV demand," Gulati said.

Three-wheeler sales saw a rise of 80 per cent to 30,410 units last month from 16,923 units in the same period last year.

The total sales across cate-gories increased by 14 per cent to 13,84,711 units in August as against 12,09,550 units a year ago. FADA represents over 15,000 automobile dealers hav-ing 26,500 dealerships across the country. PTI

Two

Wheelers

Three

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Private

Vehicles

Tractors Commercial

Vehicles

KBK graphicsInfo

Aug 2020: 12,09,550

Aug 2021: 13,84,711

Vehicle Registration in India

6.66% 79.70% 38.71% 5.50% 97.94%

14.48%

Figures do not include data for Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Telangana,

and Lakshadweep as they are not yet in centralised Vahan 4

Source: Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations

Data gathered from 1,313 out of 1,527 RTOs

9,7

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1

NEW DELHI: The finance ministry on Tuesday said electronic records submitted through registered account of taxpayers in the income tax portal shall be deemed to have been authenticated by the tax-payer by electronic verification code (EVC).

The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) amended income tax rules on Monday to ease authentication of records submitted in faceless assess-ment proceeding.

The ministry said the amended rule provides that electronic records submitted through registered account of the taxpayers in the income tax department's portal shall be deemed to have been authen-ticated by the taxpayer by elec-tronic verification code (EVC).

"Therefore, where a person submits an electronic record by logging into his registered account in designated portal of the income tax department, it shall be deemed that the elec-

tronic record has been authen-ticated by EVC...," it said.

The ministry said this sim-plified process would also be available to companies, or tax audit cases and they are man-datorily required to authenti-cate the electronic records by digital signature.

"In order to provide the benefit of the simplified pro-cess of authentication by EVC to these persons (such as com-panies, tax audit cases, etc.) , it has been decided to extend the simplified process of authenti-cation by EVC to these persons also," the ministry added.

Hence, assessees who are mandatorily required to authenticate electronic records by digital signature shall be deemed to have authenticated the electronic records when they submit the record through their registered account in the Income tax department's por-tal. Legislative amendments in this regard would be brought in due course. MPOST

FinMin eases rules for authentication of

e-records submission

NEW DELHI: Stressing on quality assurance of domestic products, Consumer Affairs Secretary Leela Nandan said that the Centre is planning to introduce wider testing facil-ity for quality assurance of toys, helmets, air condition-ers and several other consumer products.

She further said that National Test House (NTH) has planned to develop a nano material testing laboratory that will help in assessment of the risks associated with consumer

products containing nano material, especially in cosmet-ics, electronic consumer items and digital appliances used in homes. “There is a vast market of nano materials expected to be developed and used in con-sumer industry especially, cell phones, electronic appliances, microwaves etc, whose qual-ity testing work and assurance reporting NTH proposes to tap in the coming years,” the sec-retary said, adding that a com-plete food testing laboratory is planned in Kolkata. MPOST

‘Testing facility for quality assurance of consumer products’

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal has been appointed as India's Sherpa for the G20, an influential grouping that brings together the world's major economies.

Making the announcement, the Ministry of External Affairs said on Tuesday that India will hold the G20 presidency from December 1, 2022, and will con-vene the G20 leaders' summit in 2023 for the first time.

The next G20 Summit is scheduled to take place from October 30 to 31 under the Ital-ian presidency.

"Piyush Goyal, Union Min-ister for Commerce and Indus-try, Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, and Textiles, has been appointed as India's Sherpa for the G20," the Ministry of External Affairs said.

Prime Minister Modi has been leading India's representa-tion at G20 summits since 2014.

India has been a member of the G20 since its inception in 1999. "India will be holding the G20 presidency from December 1, 2022 and will convene the G20 Leaders' summit in 2023 for the first time," the MEA said.

"India will be part of the G20 Troika (preceding, cur-

rent, and incoming G20 Presi-dencies) from December 1, 2021 till November 30, 2024," it said in a statement.

G20 brings together 19 of the world's leading economies and the European Union, with its members accounting for more than 80 per cent of global GDP, 75 per cent of global trade and 60 per cent of the global population, according to MEA.

The G20 member nations are Argentina, Australia, Bra-zil, Canada, China, Germany, France, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey, the United King-dom and the United States.

Nirlep Singh Rai becomes new CMD of NFL

NEW DELHI: State-owned fer-tiliser firm NFL on Tuesday said Nirlep Singh Rai has been ap-pointed as Chairman and Manag-ing Director of the company. In a regulatory filing, NFL informed that Nirlep Singh Rai, Director (Technical), has been appointed as Chairman & Managing Director, on the Board of the company with effect from date of his assumption of charge i.e. September 6. Rai, who was born in August 1962, is a B.E (Instrumentation & Control) from Thapar University. MPOST

India to host G-20 summit in 2023; Goyal appointed Sherpa

RBI enhances scope of tokenisation to ensure security of card data

Govt forms task force on coal-based hydrogen

production

NEW DELHI: The National Company Law Appellate Tri-bunal (NCLAT) on Tuesday adjourned till September 20 the hearing on a batch of petitions challenging the approval for the takeover of bankrupt-Videocon Industries by Anil Agarwal's Twin Star Technologies.

Through an interim order on July 19, the appellate tribu-nal had stayed the implementa-tion of the resolution plan for Rs 2,962.02 crore-takeover of 13 Videocon group companies.

The plan was approved through the corporate insol-vency resolution process under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC).

A two-member NCLAT

bench comprising Justice J K Jain and A K Mishra said the interim order would continue till the next date of hearing, that is September 20.

On July 19, NCLAT directed to maintain "status quo ante".

The appellate tribunal adjourned the hearing on the matter following a request from Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who appeared for the Commit-tee of Creditors (CoC).

"Ld. Solicitor General sub-mits that he has advised the SBI, therefore, the appeals may be adjourned to some other date. Ld. Counsels for the Opponents have no objection, therefore, we are adjourning the matter," NCLAT said. PTI

NCLAT adjourns hearing; stay on resolution plan to continue till September 20

ICA- T11133(2)/2021

ICA- T11138(3)/2021

ICA- T11142(3)/2021ICA- T11159(3)/2021

ICA- T11164(3)/2021

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGAL

The Executive Engineer, Bdn Divn, H. Dte. has invited open Tender against eNIT No. 07 of 2021-22 for Construction of two new RCC under Ground Reservoir PH I and II with boundary wall along with dismantling of two dilapidated Overhead Reservoir PH I and II at IHE Bidhannagar, Durgapur. T.ID.No 2021_HSD_342728_1. Bid submission closing date (online) on 29.09.2021 up to 6.10pm. For details please visit website:

TENDER NOTICE

http:// wbtenders. gov. in. further corrigendum if any may be required will be published in the website only. Sd/- Md. A. kalam, Executive Engineer, Burdwan Division, Housing Dte.

ICA- T11166(2)/2021

ICA- T11171(4)/2021

ICA- T11179(3)/2021

KMDA TENDER NOTICE e-NIT No: 02/SE(WC)/W&S/KMDA

of 2021-2022 e-Tenders are invited by the Superintending Engineer, West Circle, W&S Sector, KMDA, Padmapukur W.T.P. Campus, Shibpur, Howrah-711109, from eligible and resourceful contactors, for the work, Sl. No., Item of Work, Quantity, Unit, (i) Supplying and delivery of high strength calcium hypochlorite granules (available chlorine 60% to 70%) at different UGR’s for making solution by mechanical stirring system and directly charged on line throughout the supply hours to achieve the residual chlorine of 0.5 to 0.6 ppm at generating point with following specifications: The chemical should be white to off white in colour, free from all foreign matter decomposing at 177̊C in wa ter & alcohol, non hygroscopic, practically clear water solution at saturation level permissible limit of 8% within 2% moisture content. The granular size should pass through 100 RSS mesh 1.5% max. The brand & make of the chemical must be stated and certified by AIIH&PH/similar Govt. organization not earlier than 2011 stating the stability, strength, health safety and use of the product for drinking water chlorination. (For one year)., 43613.00, KG, (ii) Providing and using mechanical stirring system for making solution of water and calcium based granules in a dosing tank of 100 to 200 lit. capacity, high pressure single head gear adjustable dosing pump including stand by pump complete with all accessories (three times operation per day) with necessary fixtures for direct on line injection by mechanically regulated dosing pump during supply hours to achieve residual chlorine @ 0.5 to 0.6 ppm at generating point including all labours, operational, supervision charges etc and documentation of required testing charges all complete, 1825.00, Man/Day, (iii) Supplying, fitting & fixing of mechanical stirring system including dosing tank, functional & stand by pumping arrangement, mixing arrangement including electrical connection all complete as per site requirements, 5.00, Per Set, Last date & time of Online Bid submission: 27.09.2021 upto 18.50 hrs. For details contact the above office or visit both websites. www.kmdaonline.org (KMDA-339) www.wbtenders.gov.in

ICA- T11183(3)/2021

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGAL BIRBHUM ZILLA PARISHAD

SURI, BIRBHUMAbridged e-Auction Notice

No. BHM-A-01/2021-22Memo no:-1671(48)/2(1)/BZP. Dated:-03/09/2021

Additional Executive Officer, Birbhum Zilla Parishad invites e- Auction for collectin of tol on one (01) No of road. Details information available from the website www.eauction.gov.in.

sd/-Additional Executive Officer, Birbhum Zilla Parishad

Memo No- 229/1(4)/Inf/(Adv)Bir, Dated:07.09.2021

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ICA- T11198(3)/2021

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGALCooch Behar Zilla Parishad Cooch Behar

Notice Inviting Tender (in Brief) Following E-Tender (s) are hereby invited on behalf of Cooch Behar ZillaParishad for Construction of Bituminous Roadsvide NIT No. WBZP/99/ DE-ET/COB/2021-22to WBZP/102/ DE-ET/COB/2021-22 for which the last date of submission of Technical & Financial bid – 22.09.2021 (up to 6.00 p.m.).For details the website https://wbtenders.gov.in may be accessed. Sd/-

Additional Executive Officer Cooch Behar Zilla Parishad

Cooch Behar

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGALWEST BENGAL HOUSING INFRASTRUCTURE

N. I. T No.- 24 of A. G.M. (E)-II of 2021-2022 Sealed Tendersare invited for above NIT for maintenance work hav-ing experience in similar nature of works from any Govt. Organiza-tion. Last date of receiving application- 13/09/2021 upto 2:00 P.M. All other information and details may be obtained from the office of the A. G.M. (E)-II, WB HIDCO at HIDCO BHABAN, 35-1111, Biswa Bangla Sarani, New Town, Kolkata. Detailed may be seen in our website at www.wbhidcoltd.com.

Addl. General Manager (Engg.)-II WB HIDCO

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGALWEST BENGAL HOUSING INFRASTRUCTURE

N.I.T No.51 of AGM(Engg)-IV of 2021-2022 Sealed tenders are invited from bonafied, resourceful, experienced outsiders hav-ing experience in execution of similar nature of works from any Organization for the work- “i)Ilumination of 2 nos. Pump house & internal pathway at Urban forest, Newtown, Kolkata. (Phase-I) (ii)Supply and Fixing of Pole and Light at Urbun For-est, New Town, Kolkata. (Phase-I) (iii)Supplying and Installation of LPG Distribution System including air calculation system (Fresh Air & Exhaust Air) for café Ekante Res-taurant (Karipata on the go) at 1st Rotary Bus Stand in New Town, Kolkata.” Last date of receiving application 14.09.2021 upto 12.00 P.M in the office of Addi-tional General Manager (Engg)-IV, WB HIDCOO

Additional General Manager (Engg)-IV WB HIDCO

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGALWEST BENGAL HOUSING INFRASTRUCTURE

N. I. T No.- 19 (2nd Call)of A.G.M (E)-II of 2021-2022 WB HIDCO invitesonline item rate open tender in two bid system for “Col-lection of Parking fees from temporary car parking area of Eco Urban Village in New Town, Kolkata. (For 12 months)”for resourceful bonafide Govt. Contactors and eligible outsiders in the manner as described in the detailed tender notice available onhttp://wbtenders.gov.inon and from 08.09.2021 at 11.00 A. M.Corrigendum / Addendum, if any to this e-tender would appear only on above Website and not be published.

Addl. General Manager (Engg.)-IIWB HIDCO

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGALWEST BENGAL HOUSING INFRASTRUCTURE

N. I. T No.28 of A.G.M (Engg-III) of 2021-22 Sealed Tenderisinvited for the work Engagement of Security guard & Security Supervisor in Alipore Central correctional home in Kol-kata for 3 months. having experienced in from any Govt. Organiza-tion. Last date of receiving application- 16.09.2021upto2.00 P.M. All other information and details may be obtained from the office of the A.G.M (Engg).-III, WB HIDCO at Eco Park Office, Gate No.-6, New Town, Kolkata

Sd/- Addl. General Manager (Engg.-III)WB HIDCO

ICA- T11206(3)/2021

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGAL

4(W)X5.06(H)CM

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGAL

Tender Notice of I & CA Deptt

Memo No. of NIT 3395-ICA(N) dt. 07/09/2021 and Tender ID 2021_ ICAD_342954_1 e-Tender is hereby invited from intending bidders for “the work related to the Selection of Durga Pujas under Biswa Bangla Sharad Samman 2021” .Bid submission closing date: 21/09/2021 at 1:30 pm. Other details may be seen from the website: https:// wbtenders. gov.in and office notice board. Sd/-Director of Information, Information & Cultural Affairs Deptt., Govt. of West Bengal ICA-T11207(3)/2021

STORY PAGEEPCES ASKS GOVT TO COVER SEZS UNDER RODTEP SCHEME NEW DELHI: The Export Promotion Council for EOUs and SEZs (EPCES) on Tuesday urged the government to extend the benefits of tax refund scheme RoDTEP to the sector and grant infrastructure status to enable priority lending at cheaper rates. EPCES Chairman Bhuvnesh Seth also said that exports from special eco-nomic zones (SEZs) are increasing and are expected to touch Rs 8 lakh crore in 2021-22 from Rs 7.55 lakh crore in 2020-21.

HDFC BANK SIGNS PACT WITH NSIC TO PROVIDE CREDIT SUPPORT TO MSMEsNEW DELHI: HDFC Bank on Tuesday said it has signed a pact with the National Small Industries Corporation (NSIC) for providing credit support to the micro, small and medium enterprise (MSME) sec-tor. Under this, the country's largest private sector bank will also provide MSMEs with a set of specially-tailored schemes to enhance their competitiveness. "HDFC Bank has signed a memorandum of under-standing with National Small Industries Corporation to offer credit support to MSMEs across the country," the bank said in a statement.

Business Briefs

10 millenniumpostBusinessmpWEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021 | KOLKATA

NEW DELHI: Capital markets regulator Sebi on Tuesday intro-duced T+1 settlement cycle for completion of share transactions on optional basis in a move to enhance market liquidity.

Currently, trades on the Indian stock exchanges are set-tled in two working days after the transaction is done (T+2).

The regulator has decided to provide flexibility to stock exchanges to offer either T+1 or T+2 settlement cycle for com-pletion of share transactions, according to a circular.

The stock exchange may choose to offer T+1 settlement cycle on any of the scrips, after giving an advance notice of at least one month, regarding

change in the settlement cycle, to all stakeholders, including the public at large, and also dissemi-nating the same on its website.

After opting for T+1 settle-ment cycle for a scrip, the stock exchange will have to mandato-rily continue with the same for a minimum period of six months.

Thereafter, in case the stock exchange intends to switch back to T+2 settlement cycle, it will do so by giving one-month advance notice to the market.

Any subsequent switch (from T+1 to T+2 or vice versa) will be subject to mini-mum period and notice period as mentioned by the regulator.

The decision has been taken based on discussions with mar-

ket infrastructure institutions like stock exchanges, clearing corporations and depositories.

"There shall be no netting between T+1 and T+2 set-tlements," the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) said. The settlement option for security will be applicable to all types of transactions in the secu-rity on that stock exchange. For example, if a security is placed under T+1 settlement on a stock exchange, the regular market deals as well as block deals will follow the T+1 settlement cycle on that bourse.

The new framework will come into force with effect from January 1, 2022, the regulator said. PTI

BEIJING: China’s import and export growth accelerated in August despite disruptions due to the spread of the coronavirus’s delta variant.

Exports rose 25.6% over a year earlier to 294.3 billion, up from July’s 18.9% growth, customs data showed Tues-day. Imports rose 33.1% to 236 billion, up from the previous month’s 28.7%.

That came despite lingering disruptions in industrial pro-duction chains due to last year’s global economic shutdown and

a renewed rise in infections in the United States and some other markets that have damp-ened consumer sentiment.

China has so far defied fore-casts that demand for its exports would level off as anti-disease

controls eased and entertain-ment and other service indus-tries reopened. Exports and imports were much stronger than anticipated last month thanks to buoyant demand, even as the data point to some lingering supply shortages, said Sheana Yue of Capital Econom-ics in a report. This year’s trade figures are distorted by compari-son with 2020. Global demand plunged in the first half after governments shut factories and shops to fight the pandemic. Chinese exporters reopened

after the ruling Communist Party declared the virus under control in March, while foreign competitors were hampered by anti-virus curbs.

China’s August exports to the United States rose 15.5% over a year earlier to 51.7 bil-lion, accelerating from July’s 13.4% growth despite US tariff hikes imposed in an enduring battle over Beijing’s technology ambitions. Imports of Ameri-can goods increased 33.3% to 14 billion, up from the previ-ous month’s 25.5% gain. AGENCIES

MUMBAI: The BSE Sensex surged to yet another all-time high but closed modestly lower on Tuesday as investors offloaded IT, pharma and bank-ing stocks at higher levels.

A sharp drop in the rupee, which lost 32 paise against the US dollar, further weighed on market mood, traders said.

Snapping its three-day rising streak, the 30-share BSE bench-mark settled 17.43 points or 0.03 per cent lower at 58,279.48. Intra-day, it touched a fresh life-time high of 58,553.07.

On similar lines, the broader NSE Nifty fell 15.70 points or 0.09 per cent to 17,362.10. It scaled an all-time peak of 17,436.50 during the session.

Sun Pharma was the top lag-gard in the Sensex pack, sliding 1.81 per cent, followed by Tech Mahindra, Axis Bank, HCL Tech, Infosys, TCS and L&T.

In contrast, HDFC led the gainers' list with a jump of 2.56 per cent. Bharti Airtel, IndusInd Bank, ITC, UltraTech Cement, Nestle India, Reliance Industries and Asian Paints were among the other winners. Sector-wise, BSE realty, IT, utilities, oil and

gas and power indices tum-bled up to 2.24 per cent, while telecom, consumer durables, FMCG and energy finished in the green. In the broader mar-kets, the BSE midcap and small-cap indices fell as much as 0.73 per cent.

On the global markets front, Asian equities rallied after China posted robust exports data for August.

Bourses in Shanghai, Tokyo and Hong Kong ended with gains, while Seoul settled in the red. Equities in Europe were

trading on a negative note in mid-session deals.

Meanwhile, international oil benchmark Brent crude rose 0.54 per cent to $72.61 per bar-rel. The rupee plunged by 32 paise to close at 73.42 against the US dollar on Tuesday, tracking a strong American currency in the overseas market.

Foreign institutional inves-tors (FIIs) were net sellers in the capital market as they offloaded shares worth Rs 589.36 crore on Monday, as per provisional exchange data. PTI

NEW DELHI: UK-based Cairn Energy PLC on Tuesday said it will drop litigations to seize Indian properties in countries ranging from France to the US, within a couple of days of get-ting a $1 billion refund resulting from the scrapping of a retro-spective tax law.

The firm, which gave India its biggest onland oil discovery, termed "bold" the legislation passed last month to cancel a 2012 policy that gave the tax department power to go back 50 years and slap capital gains levies wherever ownership had changed hands overseas but business assets were in India.

The offer to return money seized to enforce retrospective tax demand in lieu of dropping all litigations against the govern-ment "is acceptable to us," Cairn CEO Simon Thomson told PTI in an interview from London.

Cairn will drop cases to seize diplomatic apartments in Paris and Air India airplanes in the US in "a matter of a couple of days" after the refund, he said adding Cairn's shareholders are in agreement with accepting the offer and moving on.

"Some of our core share-holders likes BlackRock and Franklin Templeton agree (to this). Our view is supported by our core shareholders (that) on balance it is better to accept and move on and be prag-matic. Rather than continue with something negative for all parties which could last for many years," he said.

Seeking to repair India's damaged reputation as an investment destination, the gov-

ernment last month enacted new legislation to drop Rs 1.1 lakh crore in outstanding claims against multinationals such as telecom group Vodafone, phar-maceuticals company Sanofi and brewer SABMiller, now owned by AB InBev, and Cairn.

About Rs 8,100 crore col-lected from companies under the scrapped tax provision are to be refunded if the firms agreed to drop outstanding litigation, including claims for interest and penalties. Of this, Rs 7,900 crore is due only to Cairn.

"Once we get to final resolu-tion, part of that resolution is us dropping everything in terms of litigation. We can do that within a very short period of time, just a matter of a couple of days or something," Thomson said. "So we are preparing on the basis of getting this resolution quickly, all these cases being dropped, and putting all this behind."

He said all enforcement pro-ceedings brought because of the Government of India's refusal to

honour an international arbitra-tion award asking it to return the value of money seized to enforce the retrospective tax demand, will be dropped.

"Everything will be dropped. There will be no more litigation, that will be it. It will clear the matter up," he said.

Cairn in its half-yearly report on Tuesday said it will return up to $700 million out of the Rs 7,900 crore ($1.06 billion) it is supposed to get from the Indian government, to "share-holders via special dividend and buyback."

Asked if the company would make a comeback to India, Thomson said India will become another potential investment destination once the issue is closed.

"If there is right opportunity, why not," he said.

Cairn, he said, has had a "good, open and transparent line of communications with the Government of India" on finding a resolution to the retro

tax issue. "Our aim was to get to a resolution... something which would be acceptable to our shareholders."

"We were pleased when the Government of India made what we thought was a pretty bold move, in terms of enact-ment of the legislation," he said. "The intention of the govern-ment, we are obviously aligned with it, is to get this resolved as quickly as possible. Hopefully, that means within the next few weeks. It is good not only for us and our shareholders but also importantly for India."

The resolution will bury the ghost of retro tax and help move on. "We are keen to get back to Cairn being talked about in terms of success in Rajasthan. I think moving on from this will allow us to do that," he said referring to the prolific oil dis-covery the firm made in Barmer.

In accepting the terms of the new legislation in India, Cairn would be required to withdraw its international arbitration

award claim, interest and costs and to end all legal enforcement actions in order to be eligible for the refund.

"It will mean we will forego interest and penalty in terms of the original arbitration award. The important thing for us is it returns the value that was taken from us. From our perspective it is the right thing to do, be pragmatic, put this behind us, move on," he said adding this would help wipe away a factor negatively impacting investment for many years to come.

The 2012 legislation was used to levy a cumulative of Rs 1.10 lakh crore of tax on 17 entities including UK telecom giant Vodafone but nearly 98 per cent of the Rs 8,100 crore recovered in enforcing such a demand was only from Cairn.

An international arbitra-tion tribunal in December over-turned a levy of Rs 10,247 crore in taxes on a 2006 reorganisa-tion of Cairn's India prior to its listing, and asked the Indian government to return the value of shares seized and sold, divi-dend confiscated and tax refund withheld. This totalled $1.2 bil-lion-plus interest and penalty.

The government initially refused to honour the award, forcing Cairn to identify $70 billion of Indian assets from the US to Singapore to enforce the ruling, including taking flag carrier Air India Ltd to a US court in May. A French court in July paved the way for Cairn to seize real estate belonging to the Indian government in Paris.

All these litigations will be dropped, he added. PTI

$1 bn refund offer acceptable, to drop cases within days: Cairn

Asked if company would make a comeback to India, Cairn CEO said India will become another potential investment destination once issue is closed

Sensex snaps 3-day winning run; IT, pharma stocks weigh

KBK graphicsInfo

Intra-day on September 7, 2021

9am 10 11 12 1pm 2 3 4 9am 10 11 12 1pm 2 3 4

Previous close:

17,377.80

NSE NIFTYIntra-day on September 7, 2021

BSE SENSEX

High:

17,436.50

High:

58,553.07Open:

58,418.69

Open:

17,401.55

Previous close:

58,296.91

-17.43(-0.03%)

Close:

58,279.48

Low:

58,005.07

Close:

17,362.10

-15.70(-0.09%)

Low:

17,287.00

NEW DELHI: India Post Payments Bank (IPPB) has joined hands with LIC Hous-ing Finance for selling housing finance products of the latter to its 4.5 crore customers, a state-ment said on Tuesday.

Through its robust and extensive network of 650 branches and more than 136,000 banking access points, IPPB will make LIC Housing Finance Ltd's (LICHFL) home loan products accessible to its customers pan-India, the state-ment said.

Under the strategic partner-ship, credit underwriting, pro-cessing, and disbursement for all home loans will be handled by LICHFL, while IPPB will source the loans.

The alliance with LICHFL is part of IPPB's strategy to expand its range of products and services, and to cater to the banking and financial needs of diverse customers, especially unbanked and underserved, across the country.

IPPB already distributes general and life insurance prod-ucts through partnerships with insurance companies. Credit products are natural extension for the customers at the last mile, the statement said.

IPPB has an on-ground workforce of nearly 200,000 postal employees (postmen and Gramin Dak Sevaks) equipped with micro ATMs and biomet-ric devices for doorstep bank-ing. This will play a significant role in offering LICHFL's hous-ing loans.

LIC Housing Finance MD & CEO Y Viswanatha Gowd said the strategic MoU with IPPB will help the company to further deepen the market pen-etration. PTI

IPPB, LIC Housing tie

up to sell home loans

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: The Union Cabinet is likely to approve on Wednesday a production linked incentive (PLI) scheme for man-made fibre segment and technical textiles with a financial outlay of Rs 10,683 crore over five years to boost domestic manufacturing and exports from the sector, an offi-cial said.

The proposal is expected to come up before the Union Cabinet meeting on Wednes-day, the official added.

The Cabinet had ear-lier approved PLI schemes in 13 key sectors for enhancing India's manufacturing capabili-ties and exports.

After the approval, the textiles ministry would come with detailed guidelines of the scheme for these sectors.

The prime objective of the scheme is to make manufac-turing in India globally-com-petitive by removing sectoral disabilities, creating economies of scale and ensuring efficien-cies. It is designed to create a complete component ecosys-

tem in India and make India an integral part of the global supply chains.

The scheme is expected to attract global investments, gen-erate large scale employment opportunities and enhance exports substantially. It will also help Indian firms to grow

into global champions.India's export of man-made

fibre (MMF) garments consti-tutes only 10 per cent of its total apparel exports, which was about $16 billion in 2019-20.

Former President of Feder-ation of Indian Export Organ-isations (FIEO), S K Saraf, said that both MMF and the techni-cal textiles sectors need support from the government because at present their exports' share in the world market is low.

"PLI will help in boosting manufacturing and exports. This push is required," Saraf said. Sharing similar views, Apparel Export Promotion Council (AEPC) Chairman A Sakthivel said that the coun-cil has requested the govern-ment for the PLI scheme for both these segments as it would help in increasing India's share in world trade.

"India is doing 80 per cent cotton and 20 per cent MMF, while the world is doing is other way round. We need to promote these sectors and PLI is a welcoming step in that direction," he said.

Cabinet may approve PLI scheme for MMF, technical textiles on Wed

Sebi introduces T+1 settlement cycle on optional basis

China’s trade accelerates in AugustCustoms data shows exports rise 25.6% while imports rise 33.1%

NEW DELHI: The finance min-istry on Tuesday said income taxpayers can file applications before the interim board for settlement of pending tax cases at the Income Tax Settlement Commission (ITSC) level by September 30. The Finance Act, 2021, has amended the provi-sions of the Income Tax Act, 1961, to provide that the ITSC shall cease to operate with effect from February 1, 2021. Further, it has also been provided that no application for settlement can be filed on or after February 1, which was the date on which the Finance Bill, 2021, was laid

before the Lok Sabha.To dispose of the pend-

ing settlement applications as of January 31, 2021, the government had constituted the Interim Board for Settle-ment. The taxpayers, in the pending cases, have the option to withdraw their applications within the specified time and intimate the assessing officer

about such withdrawal. Following this, the ministry

had received representations that a number of taxpayers were in the advanced stages of filing their application for settlement before the ITSC as of February 1. Further, some taxpayers have approached high courts request-ing that their applications for settlement may be accepted. In some cases, the high courts have given interim relief and directed acceptance of applications of settlement even after Febru-ary 1. 2021. This has resulted in uncertainty and protracted litigation, the ministry said. "In

order to provide relief to the taxpayers who were eligible to file an application as on January 31, 2021, but could not file the same due to cessation of ITSC vide Finance Act, 2021, it has been decided that applications for settlement can be filed by the taxpayers by September 30, 2021, before the Interim Board," the ministry said in a statement. This would be, however, subject to the condition that the assessee was eligible to file the applica-tion for settlement on January 31, 2021, for the assessment years for which the application is sought to be filed. MPOST

CBDT allows taxpayers to file applications by Sept 30 for settlement of pending cases

NEW DELHI: The Confedera-tion of All India Traders (CAIT) on Tuesday criticized the Guja-rat government for signing a pact with Amazon, alleging the US-based e-commerce giant indulges in anti-competitive practices.

Amazon has said it has inked an agreement with the Indus-tries and Mines Department of Gujarat to help drive e-com-merce exports from the state.

As part of the Memoran-dum of Understanding (MoU), Amazon will train and onboard MSMEs from the state on Ama-zon Global Selling, enabling them to sell their unique Made in India products to millions of Amazon customers across over 200 countries and territories.

"Beside the traders of Guja-rat, the traders across the coun-try felt cheated at the hands of the Gujarat Government for shaking hands with a known law

offender Company. The CAIT will oppose such MOU," CAIT said in a statement.

On one hand the Centre's statutory bodies like the Com-petition Commission of India (CCI) and Enforcement Direc-torate (ED) are conducting investigation against Amazon for anti-competitive practices and violation of e-commerce rules, while the Gujarat gov-ernment is shaking hands with them for boosting sales, it said.

"It is highly regretted that the lawyers of the Central Gov-ernment are exposing Ama-zon in various Courts including Supreme Court but on the other hand the State Government of Gujarat is entering an MOU with Amazon," it added.

The confederation said it will raise the issue with BJP Pres-ident J P Nadda and Union Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal. PTI

CAIT criticizes Guj govt for signing

MoU with Amazon

India Ratings maintains stable outlook on banking sector in FY22

MUMBAI: Domestic rating agency India Ratings on Tuesday maintained a stable outlook on the bank-ing sector for 2021-22 while it expects an increase in stressed assets in retail and MSME segments by end-March. It estimates gross non-performing assets (GNPA) of the banking sector to be at 8.6 per cent and stressed assets at 10.3 per cent for fiscal 2021-22. "We have maintained a stable outlook on the overall banking sector for the rest of FY22, sup-ported by the continuing systemic support that has helped manage the system-wide COVID-19 linked stress," the rating agency said in its mid-year banks outlook released on Tuesday. PTI

India's export of man-made fibre (MMF) garments constitutes only 10 per cent of its total apparel exports, which was about $16 billion in FY20

NEW DELHI: JSW Steel on Tuesday posted nearly 5 per cent year-on-year (y-o-y) growth in its crude steel output at 13.77 lakh tonne (LT) during August 2021. The company had pro-duced 13.17 LT steel in the cor-responding month last year, JSW Steel said in a statement.

During August 2021, the company said production of its flat-rolled products fell by 8 per cent to 8.99 LT, from 9.80 LT in August 2020.

"Production of rolled flat products was lower due to planned shutdown taken for one of the converters at Vijay-anagar Works," it said.

Its output of long-rolled products registered a growth of 30 per cent at 3.01 LT, as against 2.32 LT in August 2020. PTI

JSW Steel output grows

Highlights » “Some of our core shareholders likes BlackRock and Franklin Templeton agree (to this). Our view is supported by our core shareholders (that) on balance it is better to accept and move on and be pragmatic. Rather than continue with something negative for all parties which could last for many years,” he said. » Cairn in its half-yearly report on Tuesday said it will return up to $700 million out of the Rs 7,900 crore ($1.06 billion) it is supposed to get from the Indian government, to “shareholders via special dividend and buyback.” » The 2012 legislation was used to levy a cumulative of Rs 1.10 lakh crore of tax on 17 entities including UK telecom giant Vodafone but nearly 98 per cent of the Rs 8,100 crore recovered in enforcing such a demand was only from Cairn.

11millenniumpost Sport mpKOLKATA | WEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021

Djokovic extends Slam bid; 1st time no US players in Open QF

NEW YORK: For 1 1/2 sets, including one particularly compelling and competitive 24-point game, Novak Djokov-ic's fourth-round opponent at the US Open Jenson Brooksby, the last American left in sin-gles gave him fits amid a rau-cous atmosphere at Arthur Ashe Stadium.

That let Djokovic, above all, and everyone else, know that Brooksby a 20-year-old wild-card entry from California who is ranked 99th and never before had been on this sort of stage belonged.

And then, not surprisingly, Djokovic showed why he is who he is and how he's managed to move within three victories of the first calendar-year Grand Slam in men's tennis in 52 years.

Settling in and sending mes-sages, to the fans with roars and to Brooksby with some staredowns, the No. 1-ranked Djokovic improved to 25-0 in majors this year by winning 1-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-2 on Monday night.

He extended his pursuit of a true Grand Slam and a record-breaking 21st major champion-ship, while also making this the first time in the history of the U.S. Open, an event that dates to the 1880s, with zero men or women from the host country in the quarterfinals.

Was a good finish. It wasn't a good tart, said Djokovic, who

hopes to add a fourth U.S. Open title to a collection that's been boosted by his ninth at the Aus-tralian Open in February, sec-ond at the French Open in June and sixth at Wimbledon in July.

He next meets No. 6 Matteo Berrettini of Italy in a rematch of the final at the All England Club.

One key to Monday's turn-around: Djokovic broke in Brooksby's initial service game in each of the last three sets.

I wanted to wear him down, Djokovic said, and it worked.

Affected by a left hip that bothered him earlier in the tour-

nament, Brooksby was visited by a trainer after the second set and again after the third. Still, for someone who never had set foot on Ashe's blue court until about two hours before the match, when he got a chance to practice there, Brooksby never seemed overwhelmed by the setting or the circumstances.

We're going to see a lot of him in the future, said Djokovic, who would be the first man since Rod Laver in 1969 to win all four Slam trophies in one year.

I mean, he has the means.

Now, obviously a lot of things have to come together. But he has a bit of an unorthodox game. Does a lot with the feel. He's smart. He knows how to win points.

Brooksby's 6-foot-4 strides and reach, his anticipation, his variety that includes a well-dis-guised two-handed backhand slice, his think-steps-ahead point construction, his com-mitment to patterns drawn up by his coach at home in Sacra-mento since age 7, Joe Gilbert all left Djokovic a tad discom-bobulated early. AGENCIES

The No. 1-ranked Novak Djokovic improved to 25-0 in majors this year by winning 1-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-2. He extended his pursuit of a true Grand Slam

NEW YORK: Veteran Indian tennis player Rohan Bopanna and his Croatian partner Ivan Dodig fought their hearts out before los-ing their men's doubles third round to fourth seeds Rajeev Ram and Joe Salis-bury at the US Open here.

Bopanna and Dodig, seeded 13th, lost 7-6(4) 4-6 6-7(3) to the Australian Open runners-up in a gru-elling contest that lasted two hours and 30 minutes on Monday night.

With this defeat, India's challenge has ended at the last Grand Slam of the sea-son. Sania Mirza lost her both women's doubles and mixed doubles first rounds and Ankita Raina also lost in the women's doubles.

Prajnesh Gunneswaran, Sumit Nagal and Ramku-mar Ramanathan could not qualify for the singles main draw, falling in the Qualifiers. AGENCIES

Buttler, Leach return to England squad for final Test

MANCHESTER: Wicket-keeper-batsman Jos Buttler and left-arm spinner Jack Leach on Tuesday returned to the Eng-land squad for the fifth and final Test against India as the hosts gear up save the series.

Buttler had missed the fourth Test due to the birth of his second child. India lead the series 2-1 after a famous win at The Oval on Monday.

"Batsman Sam Billings, who was included in the fourth Test squad, has returned to Kent," the ECB said in a statement.

England, who have not lost a Test series to India at home since 2007, are under pressure to save the five-match rubber here.

There is a good chance that pacer Mark Woods will return to the playing eleven in place of James Anderson, who could be rested after featuring in four games. "He's (Wood) certainly someone who comes back into

contention. We have got some aching bodies, I'm not going to deny that, so we obviously have to keep an eye on that.

"He could come back and if he does, he will obviously add that pace for us. If the pitch is abrasive as it usually is at Old Trafford there should be reverse swing. He's certainly

back in contention," said head coach Chris Silverwood.

On Anderson, he added: "It'll be a discussion that he and I will have together. He will have input into that, with-out a shadow of a doubt. James knows his own body.

"We have got a bit of time now between this game and the next one. I know what it's like, he won't want to miss any cricket. We have to make sure we look after him. Although there is a gap between the final Test and what's in front of him. He's certainly someone I want to make sure is looked after."

England squad: Joe Root (c), Moeen Ali, James Ander-son, Jonathan Bairstow, Rory Burns, Jos Buttler, Sam Curran, Haseeb Hameed, Dan Lawrence, Jack Leach, Dawid Malan, Craig Over-ton, Ollie Pope, Ollie Robin-son, Chris Woakes and Mark Wood. AGENCIES

BCCI to ratify sexual harassment policy, Ranji compensation to be discussed again

APEX COUNCIL MEETING

NEW DELHI: The BCCI will ratify its Prevention of Sexual Harassment Policy and deliber-ate on the much-delayed com-pensation package for domestic cricketers at its Apex Council meeting to be held on Septem-ber 20.

Until now, the board did not have a specific policy to deal with complaints of sexual harassment. It had formed an internal committee after sex-ual harassment allegations sur-faced against then CEO Rahul Johri, who eventually resigned.

Like the last meeting on June 20, the meeting agenda

also includes discussion on the compensation package for domestic cricketers for the COVID-19-hit 2020-2021 sea-son when Ranji Trophy was not held for the first time, dealing a financial blow to the players.

The BCCI had formed a working group to figure out a compensation package but the committee is yet to meet. It can finally meet before the Apex Council meeting and the cricketers will be hoping the board comes out with a deci-sion at the earliest.

Interestingly, the compen-sation will be also be consid-

ered for women cricketers for loss of games last season.

"Discussion on compensa-tion to be given to first-class cricketers (men and women) for the 2020-21 Season," read item number three on the agenda.

The meeting will be held virtually once again since the office-bearers are expected to be in the UAE for the IPL resuming September 19.

Also up for discussion will be the "infrastructure subsidy claims submitted by the state cricket Associations which are more than two years old".

Stock of preparations for the T20 World Cup, to be held in the UAE after the IPL from October 17, and the 2021-2022 domestic season will also be taken.

The BCCI has pushed the Ranji Trophy start to January as state units wanted it to hap-pen after the white-ball tour-naments -- Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy and Vijay Hazare Trophy.

The T20 event will be staged from October 27 to November 22 while the one-day competi-tion will run from December 1 to 29. AGENCIES

Tokyo Olympians set to skip National Boxing

ChampionshipsNEW DELHI: The upcoming national men's boxing champi-onship is unlikely to feature any of the five pugilists who com-peted at the Tokyo Olympics, ruling them out of contention for next month's world cham-pionships in Serbia as well.

Amit Panghal (52kg), Manish Kaushik (63kg), Vikas Krishan (69kg), Ashish Chaud-hary (75kg) and Satish Kumar (+91kg) had competed at the Tokyo Games. All of them lost in the preliminary rounds bar-ring Satish, who went down in the quarters.

Of these, Vikas, Satish and Ashish are nursing injuries and have withdrawn. There is no word yet on what Amit and Manish would do but a source said they might also skip the tournament due to "lack of practice time".

"They have opted out of the Nationals because they haven't been able to train well since coming back from Tokyo. One or two might still consider it closer to the tournament but in all likelihood, they wouldn't compete," a source close to the boxers said.

The Nationals are due to be held from September 15 in Bel-lary, Karnataka.

The Boxing Federation of India has stated that only the gold-winners from the national championships will make the squad for the world event scheduled to start on October 26 in Belgrade, Serbia.

Vikas is already out of con-tention because of a shoulder injury that he sustained during the Olympics.

He underwent a surgery last month to fix the major breakdown and it would keep him away from the ring till November.

Satish too has withdrawn after the cut he sustained above his eye during the Olympics caused an infection.

"There was severe swell-ing because of that infec-tion and I have only recently started recovering from it. I have started light training but it wouldn't be enough for the Nationals," Satish said.

Ashish, on the other hand, is recuperating from a wrist injury.

"The problem is in both my wrists and doctors have rec-ommended rest for the time being," he said when contacted.

The source said the box-ers would have preferred the Nationals to happen after the world championships.

"The boxers would have preferred the Nationals to be held after the world champion-ships. There could simply have been trials for the worlds. So many boxers feel that they are struggling to be in their pre-ferred weight because of lack of training and the little time in hand," he said.

"Only Haryana, I think, has managed to conduct state championships, rest are doing trials to pick teams for the Nationals," he added. AGENCIES

Shafali Verma retains no. 1 spot in T20I batting rankings

Devine jumps to joint top among all-roundersDUBAI: Indian teen star Shafali Verma maintained her number one position among women's T20 batters while New Zealand's Sophie Devine is the new joint top-ranked all-rounder in the latest ICC rankings issued on Tuesday.

Verma is holding onto her top rank with 759 rank-ing points, ahead of Australian Beth Mooney (744) and India T20 vice-captain Smriti Man-dhana (716).

Another Australian Meg Lanning is at fourth spot with 709 points while Devine also gains a place in the batting chart to jump up to number 5 with 689 points. Devine showed her class in the third T20I against England at Hove, scoring 50 runs with the bat while also

returning with figures of 2/26. This has enabled her to jump up a spot and be the joint top-ranked all-rounder alongside England's Natalie Sciver.

Other gainers in the all-rounders rankings include India's Deepti Sharma, Aus-tralia's Ellyse Perry and West Indies' Hayley Matthews, who

all gain a spot to jump to no 4, 5 and 6 respectively. Stafanie Tay-lor of the West Indies dropped down three spots to seventh.

In the batting rankings, South Africa's Lizelle Lee was the big gainer, jumping up three spots to the eighth spot in the chart.

In the bowling list, Austra-lia's Megan Schutt gained two spots to reach no 2 in the rank-ings. Jess Jonassen of Australia also gained a spot to reach no 4.

India's Deepti Sharma also moved up to no 6 while Poo-nam Yadav remained at eighth.

Hayley Matthews, who was the joint-highest wicket-taker in the T20I series against South Africa, has gained seven places to break into the top 15 among bowlers. AGENCIES

Boxing Federation seeks three-month extension for foreign coaches; review after that

NEW DELHI: The Boxing Federation of India has sought a three-month extension for its foreign coaches, whose contracts were expiring this month, saying a review will be done after the World Champi-onships for men and women later this year.

Indian boxing has two for-eign recruits in men's High Performance Director Santiago Nieva of Sweden and his wom-en's team counterpart Rafaelle

Bergamasco from Italy. Both of them came on board in 2017 and their contracts were to end after the Tokyo Olympics.

"We have sought a three-month extension (from the Sports Authority of India) for both of them. The men's World Championship is due next month and the women's one is scheduled some time in December, we want continuity," Boxing Federation of India Sec-retary General Hemanta Kalita

said.The decision was taken at

the BFI's Executive Commit-tee meeting recently.

"Our review of the Olympic performance is still an ongoing process and we would take a decision on any further exten-sion after the two World Cham-pionships," Kalita explained.

"This is going to take some time. An extension will ensure that our preparations are not disrupted. There is very little

time in hand," he said.An unprecedented nine

Indian boxers, five men and four women, qualified for the Tokyo Games of which only Lovlina Borgohain (69kg) could finish on the podium with a bronze medal.

Among the men, only Satish Kumar (+91kg) could reach the quarterfinals, while four others, including world number one Amit Panghal (52kg), lost in their opening

round bouts.BFI President had backed

both the boxers as well as the coaching staff, saying that he he cannot overlook the unpar-alleled results of the past four years which included two medals for the first time at the men's World Championships and never-before-seen hauls in the Asian and Commonwealth Games. Both Nieva and Ber-gamasco have expressed the desire to continue. AGENCIES

Credit to India, they know how to fight back, says Silverwood

LONDON: "The Indians know how to fight back," said Eng-land head coach Chris Silver-wood as the Virat Kohli-led side bounced back to stun the hosts in the fourth Test despite conceding a 99-run first innings lead.

India went on to make 466 in their second effort to set England a stiff 368-run target and scripted a sensational 157-run victory on the back of their stupendous attack.

Silverwood said a lead in the vicinity of 200 would have given them the perfect oppor-tunity to put India under the pump.

"If we're being truthful, I would like to have gone further past them at that point, that's going to be the opportunity to really put pressure on the Indi-ans," Silverwood was quoted as saying by ESPNCrininfo.

"We failed to do that so it's something we'll reflect on in

the dressing room and talk about amongst ourselves.

"It would have been great to go maybe 190 past them and really pile the pressure on, but again credit to the Indians, they know how to fight back," Sil-verwood added.

Rohit Sharma produced a hundred, his first in abroad, and sensational half-centuries by Rishabh Pant and Shardul Thankur put India in a com-manding position. AGENCIES

Novak Djokovic, of Serbia, returns against Jenson Brooksby, of the United States, during the fourth round of the US Open tennis championships, in New York PTI

Pelé says apparent colon tumor removed but feels well

SAO PAULO: Pelé has had an apparent tumor on the right side of his colon removed in an operation.

Albert Einstein Hospital in Sao Paulo said on Monday the 80-year-old football great is in an intensive care unit and will be transferred to a regular room on Tuesday.

The operation was a "great victory, Pelé said on his social media channels on Monday.

He went to the hospital for routine exams last week when the tumor was found. The hos-pital said in a statement the tumor was identified during routine cardiovascular and lab-oratory exams. It added it col-lected samples to be analyzed for pathologies.

I thank God for feeling very well and for allowing Dr. Fabio and Dr. Miguel to take care of my health," Pelé said.

"Last Saturday I underwent surgery to remove a suspicious lesion in the right colon. The tumor was identified during the tests I mentioned last week.

Fortunately, I'm used to cel-ebrating great victories along-side you. I will face this match with a smile on my face, a lot of optimism and joy for living surrounded by the love of my family and friends."

Edson Arantes do Nasci-mento, globally known as Pelé , was hospitalized last Tuesday. He used his social media chan-nels to deny he was in poor health.

Guys, I didn't faint and I'm in very good health. I went for my routine exams, which I had not been able to do before because of the pandemic. Let them know I don't play next Sunday, he joked in the tweet.

Pelé , the only male player to win three World Cups, has had mobility problems since a failed hip replacement surgery

in 2012. He has been forced to

use walkers and wheelchairs in public. He has also been admitted to hospitals in recent years for kidney and prostate procedures.

Pelé won the 1958, 1962 and 1970 World Cups, and remains Brazil's all-time lead-ing scorer with 77. AGENCIES

The 80-yr-old football great went to the hospital for routine exams last week when the tumor was found

Chennaiyin FC rope in Indian midfielder NinthoiCHENNAI: Two-time Indian Super League champions Chennaiyin FC on Tuesday signed young Indian midfielder Ninthoi Meetei for a three-year deal.

"I am really feeling very happy to be a part of this club (CFC). This team has that energy and spirit through all these years. I am looking for-ward to giving the team my best and I am very much excited to kick off with Chennaiyin FC," the 20-year-old was quoted as saying in a press release.

The Imphal-born footballer was part of the Indian team that participated in the FIFA U-17 World Cup hosted by India in 2017. In 2019, Meetei won the Best Player Award as India

bagged its maiden SAFF U-18 Championship title.

CFC co-owner Vita Dani said, "We are very happy to bring in someone like Ninthoi. He is young but already has 24 ISL appearances under his belt and should help the team for years to come."

A product of the AIFF Elite Academy, the right-winger started his professional career with Indian Arrows FC in 2017 and spent two years with the I-League club, making 27 appearances including two in the Super Cup.

Meetei made his ISL debut with NorthEast United FC and has 24 appearances for The Highlanders in a two- year spell. AGENCIES

Wicketkeeper-batsman Jos Buttler PTI

Bopanna and Dodig pair goes down fighting

in US Open

12 millenniumpostLeisure

Entertainmentmp

WEDNESDAY, 8 SEPTEMBER, 2021 | KOLKATA

Bollywood celebrities like Salman Khan, Akshay Kumar, Farhan Akhtar, Ajay

Devgn and many others got in big trouble as a complaint was recently filed against them for allegedly revealing the identity of the 2019 Hyderabad rape victim. This com-plaint got reportedly filed in Delhi’s Tis Hazari court. 38 big names got involved in this matter.

Advocate Gaurav Gulati alleged that revealing the name of a rape victim on social media is a criminal offence, so he had demanded an

FIR against Salman Khan, Akshay Kumar, Ajay Devgn and others. He also demanded an arrest warrant for the stars.

Gaurav filed a written com-plaint against all the stars in the Sabzi Mandi police station under section 228A. The police regis-tered a case and further investi-gation is underway. According to reports of a leading entertainment site, in the complaint, Gulati cited the tweets of the celebrity alleging that all these revealed the identity of a rape victim from Hyderabad and that this is a violation of the Supreme Court’s guidelines.

Apart from Salman, Ajay, Akshay and Farhan, the people against whom the FIR was regis-tered also include Abhishek Bach-chan, Anupam Kher, Armaan Malik, Karamveer Vohra, Bolly-wood film director Madhur Bhan-darkar, South actor Ravi Teja, Allu Sirish, cricketer Harbhajan Singh, Shikhar Dhawan, Saina Nehwal, Parineeta Chopra, Dia Mirza, Swara Bhaskar, Rakul Preet Singh, Zareen Khan, Yami Gautam, Richa Chadha, Kajal Aggarwal, Shabana Azmi, Hansika Motwani, Priya Malik, Mehreen Pirzada, Nidhi Agarwal, Charmi Kaur, Ashika

Ranganath, Radio Jockey Saima and others. AGENCIES

Angelina Jolie recently opened up about her divorce from Brad Pitt

and more in a recent inter-view with ‘The Guardian’. The actor also spoke about her ill encounter with disgraced Hollywood producer Har-vey Weinstein when she was 21. According to the actor’s recent statement, she recalled an incident while working on ‘Playing by Heart’ in 1998 and stated that Harvey attempted to abuse her.

Speaking to ‘The Guard-ian’, Jolie said, “If you get your-self out of the room, you think

he attempted but did not, right? The truth

is that the attempt and the experience of the attempt is an ‘assault’ and I had warned other industry women about not accom-panying him alone.”

Ange-lina called her own experience with Wein-stein from her youth as ‘beyond a pass’ in the

interview.Reacting to

her claims, the dis-graced producer released a statement.

As per ‘TMZ’, he denied Jolie’s accusations and said, “It is brazenly untrue and click-bait publicity. You are Angelina Jolie and I’m sure that every male and female in the world shows interest in you. Is the whole world assaulting you?”

The statement further maintained that Weinstein ‘never’ assaulted or attempted to assault Jolie.

In her recent interview, Angelina also opened up on passing on projects such

as ‘The Aviator’ because of Weinstein’s involvement in it. She further maintained that it ‘hurt’ her when ex-husband Brad Pitt worked with Harvey on ‘Killing Them Softly’ and revealed that she even fought with him about it.

Angelina’s recent interview turned out to be an explosive one as she opened up on sev-eral things including her book ‘Know Your Rights’ to its con-nection to her real-life experi-ences and more. AGENCIES

The Chinese social media ‘Weibo’ banned a fan club of popular South Korean K-pop

band ‘BTS’ from posting for 60 days, claiming that the club had raised funds illegally, days after photographs of a customised airplane funded by the club went viral on social media. The plane was part of the club’s plans to celebrate band member Jimin’s 26th birthday in October.

“‘Weibo’ firmly opposes such irra-tional star-chasing behaviour and will deal with it seriously,” read the statement of ‘Weibo’.

The fan club account, which has around 1.1 million followers on ‘Weibo’, was focused on Jimin and his birthday on October 13. The fans had begun raising money in April to prepare for his birthday celebra-tions, according to the state-owned media ‘Global Times’, with over 1 million yuan (150,000 dollars) raised in the first three minutes of the fund-raising activity and 2.3 million yuan (360,000 dollars) in the first hour. The club also wanted to run adver-tisements celebrating Jimin’s birth-day in newspapers, like the ‘New York Times’.

The restrictions imposed on the fan account came as Beijing attempts to cleanse the entertainment indus-try and clamp down on ‘irrational

behaviour’ exhibited by fans. According to ‘South Morning China Post’, Chi-na’s state-owned news agency ‘Xin-hua’ said that the cyberspace watch-dog removed 150,000 examples of ‘harmful’ online content and pun-ished more than 4,000 fan-club-related accounts. The banned fan accounts focused on other K-Pop bands, including ‘Blackpink’, ‘EXO’ and ‘NCT’. AGENCIES

Despite being just a few films old, Bollywood star Ananya Panday

has gained a massive follow-ing and made her mark in the film industry. In a recent inter-view with a leading news agency, Ananya spoke about her career and life. She said she is not afraid of failing or making mistakes and instead wants to accept them and move on.

“Success, as well failure, is a part of the journey. There will be successes and there will be failures. I strongly believe that if there is a down, there will be an up and if there is up, there will be down,” she said.

Ananya Panday made her acting debut with ‘Student of the Year 2’ in 2019 and appeared in ‘Pati Patni Aur Who’ in the same year.

The 22-year-old further said, “When I entered show-biz, there was nothing about the industry or the experiences that I was prepared for. Every-thing was new to me and every experience has been a new one for me.”

The actor continued by shar-ing her thoughts on fashion and how she aims to influence

younger people. She stated that she is less conscious now.

“Because I know that there are a lot of younger people out there looking who look up to me and try to dress like me. That is why I started putting out this messaging to come as the way you are, dress the way you want to and wear what makes you comfortable and makes you happy,” said Ananya.

Ananya recently wrapped up Shakun Batra’s untitled film, in which she will be seen along-side Deepika Padukone and Sid-dhant Chaturvedi. AGENCIES

Salman Khan, Akshay Kumar & several others are mentioned in the FIR

‘Success and failure are a part of the journey’

FIR filed against actors for revealing rape victim’s name

OUR CORRESPONDENT

Senco Gold & Diamonds, one of India’s largest jewellery retail chains

announced their foray into the Phygital Gold business with the launch of its own online gold transaction platform named DG Gold (https://mydigigold.com/)

Gold has always been regarded as the most trusted investment instrument across generations in India. With the growing consumer preference towards the use of technol-ogy, DG Gold by Senco Gold & Diamonds is the most reli-able and transparent option for investing in 24K Gold of 995 Purity.

Consumers with a valid PAN Card/Form 61 and a Bank Account in their name are eligible for DG Gold trans-

action. They can start their online gold savings journey with a purchase value of as low as Rs 250. The DG Gold platform gives consum-ers the flexibility to convert their online gold purchase

into physical gold in the form of jewellery at 116+ retail outlets of Senco Gold & Diamonds across India, at the time of redemption. Consumers can also sell the gold online on the DG Gold portal/website as per the prevailing rates from any-where, anytime.

Speaking on the occasion, Suvankar Sen, CEO, Senco Gold and Diamonds said, “We at Senco Gold & Diamonds are proud to introduce online gold transaction system to our esteemed consumers through our own platform DG Gold- mydigigold.com. The new platform gives our consumers

the flexibility to create value and wealth which is secure and simple.”

DG Gold provides right pricing with guaranteed purity. Purchased gold will be stored securely with a reputed Custodian with 100% insur-ance coverage, managed by a recognized Trustee. Customer can purchase and enjoy this hassle free gold transaction from mydigigold.com and redeem at any time at any of the Senco Gold stores across India.

‘You are Angelina Jolie and I’m sure that every male and female in the world shows interest in you,’ he said

In her recent interview, Angelina also opened up on passing on projects such as ‘The Aviator’ because of Weinstein’s involvement in it

The restrictions came as Beijing attempts to cleanse the entertainment industry and clamp down on ‘irrational behaviour’ exhibited by fans

Harvey Weinstein denies assaulting Angelina Jolie

OUR CORRESPONDENT

The first poster of the much-awaited movie ‘Antim: The Final

Truth’, a ‘Salman Khan Films’ production, was released on September 7. The poster gives a sneak peek into what one can expect from the movie. Actors Salman Khan and Aayush Sharma can be seen

in an eye lock and this will be the fight till the end.

The poster design is intense and shows an epic clash between the two leading men. The plot of the movie primarily revolves around a cop and gangster with differ-ing ideologies. A two-hero film, ‘Antim’ brings two pro-tagonists from entirely two divergent worlds and ideolo-

gies in a face-off, leading to a ravening and a nail-biting finale. This is the first time that Salman Khan and Aay-ush Sharma will be seen shar-ing screen space.

Presented by ‘Salman Khan Films’ banner house, ‘Antim: The Final Truth’ is produced by Salma Khan and directed by Mahesh Manjrekar.

Jimin’s fan accounts banned in China for ‘illegal’ funds

Consumers with a valid PAN Card/Form 61 and a Bank Account in their name are eligible for DG Gold transaction

Ananya Panday made her acting debut with ‘Student of the Year 2’ in the year 2019

Ananya recently wrapped up Shakun Batra’s untitled film, in which she will be seen alongside Deepika Padukone and Siddhant Chaturvedi

Advocate Gaurav Gulati alleged that revealing the name of a rape victim on social media is a criminal offence

First look of ‘Antim: The Final Truth’ revealed

Senco Gold & Diamonds forays into Phygital Gold business

The retail chain launched its own online gold transaction platform named DG Gold