12
A mid Covid-19 pandemic, India is all set to be hit by the deadly Swine flu virus (H1N1) with about 2,721 cases and 44 deaths already report- ed this year. Karnataka tops the list with (458 cases) followed by Telangana (443), Delhi (412), Tamil Nadu (253) and Uttar Pradesh (252), as per the data available from the website of the National Control Disease Centre (NCDC), under the Union Health Ministry. Last year, a total of 28,798 cases were registered while 1,218 people had succumbed to the virus. With H1N1 cases on the rise, which had taken shape of pandemic in 2009 world over, officials in the Union Health Ministry are already on their toes even as they struggle to contain Covid-19 which is now reaching nearly 3 million cases. So far over 54,000 people have died due to the deadly novel coronavirus. A senior health official said that symptoms of H1N1 influenza are almost similar to coronavirus — running nose, fever, and cough. Other symp- toms for swine flu are sore throat, body aches and chills much like coronavirus, it too can spread through droplets released in the air due to coughing or sneezing or com- ing in contact with a carrier. However, good thing is that unlike coronavirus, whose vaccine is being worked upon, H1N1 has an existing flu shot to prevent its spread. Incidentally, prevention strate- gies are same as that for the Covid-19. “If a person is sick, it’s bet- ter to stay home as it can be infectious. Washing hands thoroughly and frequently is a must with soap and water. If these are unavailable then one should use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer. Contain your coughs and sneezes. Cover your mouth and nose when you sneeze or cough. Avoid contact,” said the official of the Health Ministry. “The most vulnerable groups include pregnant women, children under five years of age, elderly people and those with co-morbidities),” said the official. Replying to a Lok Sabha query on March 13, Ashwini Kumar Choubey, Minister of State for Health, had said that from January 1, 2020, till March 1, a total of 1,469 cases of the seasonal H1N1 had been recorded, resulting in the deaths of 30 people. M arking a major shift in their propaganda strategy, a newly-floated terror outfit which claimed responsibility for targeting security forces in Baramulla on August 17, uploaded raw footage on Friday showing intense gunfight between them and the jawans of the security forces. Top commander of Lashkar-e-Tayyeba Sajad Mir, alias Haider, along with anoth- er foreign terrorist and a local recruit were eliminated during a 30-hour long operation in the Kreeri area of North Kashmir’s Baramulla district. Five security men, includ- ing two CRPF jawans, two Army jawans and one SPO of J&K police had attained mar- tyrdom during the operation. Responding swiftly on the social media, Jammu & Kashmir Police labeled it as a futile exercise to “glamourise” terrorism. A brief statement posted by the Jammu & Kashmir Police on Friday read, “By releasing video of attack, terrorists want to glamourise terrorism. But they can’t. We replied by actions & killed four top com- manders, Sajjad @ Haider & foreign terrorist Taimur Khan @ Abu Usman (seen in said video/attack) & Naseer @ Sad bhai and foreign terrorist Ali bhai @ Danish within 72 hours”. In the past, the terror out- fits either released a press state- ment or made a claim by dial- ing in offices of local news agencies. It is for the first time a ter- ror outfit has uploaded a video of their attack on security forces. Local police authorities believed the terror outfit, The People’s Anti-Fascist Front, is just an another front of Lashkar-e-Tayyeba and was recently floated to give an impression that local recruits were behind the front and Pakistani agencies and their handlers sitting across the bor- der were not involved in this terrorism movement in Kashmir valley. Defence sources main- tained that ever since Pakistan has been isolated in the global war against terrorism, it is making desperate attempts to overhaul its image and remove sthe scourge that it’s the epi- centre of terrorism in South Asian region. T he Supreme Court on Friday allowed devotees of ‘Shwetamber Jain’ community to offer Paryushan prayers for two days in three temples in Mumbai on the condition of “strict compli- ance” with the standard oper- ating procedures meant to con- tain the Covid-19 pandemic. Making exception for the three Jain temples located at Dadar West, Byculla and Chembur in Mumbai, a bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde said however that the permission for “Ganpati’’ festival will have to be taken on a case-to-case basis from the Maharashtra Disaster Management Authority. A commercial block and a fully-automated multi-level parking facility will be con- structed above an underground metro station that will be built as an interchange facility between two corridors of the phase four project of the DMRC, officials said. The fully-automated facil- ity will be able to accommodate more than 3,000 cars, it said. The station Nabi Karim will be an integrated complex connecting Janakpuri West–R K Ashram Marg corridor and the proposed Inderlok–Indraprastha corri- dor of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation. An MoU was signed for the project on Friday between DMRC’s Managing Director Mangu Singh and NDMC Commissioner Gyanesh Bharti. The ceremony was held in the presence of Delhi Lt Governor Anil Baijal (through video conferencing) and Mayor of North Delhi Jai Prakash, the Delhi Metro said in a state- ment. F ifty people have been arrest- ed on charges, including rioting, after a large crowd barged into a temple and attempted to take out a pro- cession, violating restrictions on the annual ritual due to Covid-19 situation in Koppal district in Karnataka, police said on Friday. The irate locals broke open the gate of the temple under the control of the State Government, attacked police personnel and also damaged a vehicle during the incident in Dotihal village on Thursday. Two cases have been reg- istered: for violating the pro- hibitory orders and another for rioting and 50 people arrested, a police officer said. I n a freak mishap, nine per- sons were killed when fire erupted in the first unit of the Srisailam Left Bank hydel power plant at the remote Domalapenta village in Amrabad Mandal of Nagarkurnool past midnight on Friday, with the resultant fumes engulfing the entire underground power generation station in no time. According to authorities of the Telangana State Power Generation Corporation (TSGenco), 17 people were engaged at the powerhouse when the fire accident took place. However, eight of them managed to come out via three emergency exits in the plant. The trapped personnel, who were not carrying mobile phones (no network as it is an underground unit) could not be contacted by rescue per- sonnel who managed to enter the premises about 10 hours after the fire broke out. A short-circuit is suspected to have caused the fire. Six bodies have been recov- ered so far. The rest were trapped in a thick blanket of smoke that had engulfed the hydro-electric power plant, hampering rescue efforts that could begin only past noon on Friday. Rescue personnel earlier said that they could not enter the premises even through the emergency exits because of the smoke. Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao monitored the rescue work through his cabinet colleague and TS Genco authorities. New Delhi: With the support of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), researchers are developing an aptamer-based affordable diag- nostic kit that will differentiate various types of coronavirus infection, a statement said on Friday. The Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra, Ranchi, with the support of the Science and Engineering Research Board, a body under the DST, has initiated a research with the detection of a target protein using bioinformatics tool against which the diagnostic kit has to be developed. A mid the protest from cer- tain quarters, the Joint Entrance Exam (JEE) for admission to IITs and National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) for admission to med- ical courses will go ahead as per schedule. After a marathon meeting, the Education Ministry said JEE (Main) exam will be held between September 1 and September 6 and the NEET exam will be conducted on September 13 as scheduled. Sources in the Education Ministry said there will be no change as the Supreme Court too has dismissed a petition by students and other stakehold- ers to defer the exams due to Covid-19 crisis. “Admit cards for the JEE (Main) exam has already been issued by the National Testing Agency (NTA) and around 6.5 lakh students (of the nearly 8.6 lakh who had registered) have downloaded them,” said Ministry sources. Government sources also said of total candidates who had registered for the JEE, only 120 had requested a change of cities and examina- tion centre. Several politicians, includ- ing Parliamentarians Subramanian Swamy and Chirag Paswan and former NEET toppers as well as social media influencers and celebri- ties, had requested the Centre and Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the postponement of the JEE and NEET exams cit- ing reasons, including Covid, floods and non-functional pub- lic transport. A head of the Bihar Assembly polls this year, the Election Commission (EC) on Friday issued a new set of guidelines for the conduct of general elec- tions and by-elections keeping the coronavirus pandemic sit- uation in mind. For the first time, the EC has allowed candidates to file their nominations online and has made it manda- tory for registered voters to wear hand gloves and face masks before heading to the electronic voting machines to cast their vote. “Only a group of five people can campaign door- to-door. All voters, polling staff, and security personnel will have to wear masks and thermal scanning will be done at the entry of the poll-related premises. Every voter’s body temperature will be checked before the person is allowed to enter the booth. “If a voter, on the day of voting, shows symptoms of virus or body temperature is found to be more will be checked twice, and if the result remains the same, then they will be asked to visit again in the last hour of polling. Sector Magistrates shall coordinate this in their allocated polling stations,” the guidelines said. It doesn’t mention any- thing on virtual rallies and dig- ital campaigns. The new rules were framed based on the inputs of political parties and chief electoral offi- cers of various States. It has also created an optional facility to fill the nomination form and the affidavit online and sub- mission of the same, after tak- ing the print, before the Returning Officer concerned. To maintain social dis- tancing, the EC said only two people and two vehicles can accompany a candidate if com- ing to the election office to file papers. It restricted convoy for roadshows to five vehicles. The interval between two sets of convoys of vehicles should be half an hour instead of a gap of 100 meters. It said public meetings and roadshows can be organised but must follow Covid-19 con- tainment instructions issued by the Centre or the State. For the public meetings, the district election officer will identify dedicated grounds and put markers to ensure social dis- tancing norms by the attendees with clearly marked entry and exit points. The EC said the number of attendees should not exceed the limit prescribed by the State Disaster Management author- ity. For the first time, the can- didates will have the option to deposit the security amount for contesting the elections online. The EC said sanitizer, soap, water, gloves and thermal scan- ners should be made available at the entry of the premises used for election purposes. T he CBI on Friday began the probe into film actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s myste- rious death and questioned his cook even as the SIT mem- bers collected case diary and other relevant documents from the Mumbai Police that was probing the issue as an acci- dental death under the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC). The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on its part questioned Sushant’s elder sis- ter Priyanka Singh and record- ed her statement in a related money laundering probe. An eight-member CBI team led by its Joint Director Manoj Sridhar, which landed in Mumbai on Thursday evening, hit the ground running in the investigations into the Sushant’s death. The team has divided its various members and assigned them specific tasks in the probe so as to finish the investigations into the sensational case as quickly as possible. The CBI team’s first port of call during the day was the Bandra police station where a case of Accidental Death Report (ADR) had been regis- tered in connection with Sushant’s death on June 14. The team members collected all documents and pieces of evi- dence, including autopsy and forensic reports. The CBI team also collect- ed the 56 statements that the Mumbai Police had earlier recorded during the investiga- tions carried out under section 174 CrPC after the registration of an accidental death report (ADR). It took possession of Sushant’s laptop and mobile phone for investigations. The CBI officials also met Deputy Commissioner of Police Abhishek Trimukhe, who was heading the Mumbai Police probe team. On their part, the Mumbai Police and the Maharashtra Government have offered full cooperation to the CBI, which was entrusted with the inves- tigations in the case by the Supreme Court on Wednesday. Another group from the visiting CBI team brought the late actor’s cook Neeraj Singh to the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO)-the Air Force Guest House at Santa Cruz where they questioned him. Neeraj, who was present at the late actor’s rented duplex flat at Bandra in north-west Mumbai where Sushant was found hanging on June 14, is a cru- cial witness in the case. The CBI officials also ques- tioned late Sushant’s few other staff members. The team collected the case diary of the ADR and other important documents related to the investigation of the case, including autopsy and forensic reports. The vis- cera report is awaited and the SIT is also expected to get hold of Rajput’s phones, the sources said. The team will recreate the crime scene at the spot during the course of investigation, the sources said. Meanwhile, the ED record- ed the statement of Rajput’s sis- ter Priyanka Singh under PMLA here, officials said. The ED is seeking information related to Rajput’s finances, personal and professional deals that Priyanka might be know- ing in order to take the money laundering probe forward. The ED had earlier record- ed the statements of Rajput’s father KK Singh and another sister Meetu. On Thursday, filmmaker Rumi Jaffery’s statement was recorded by the agency in Mumbai. The PMLA case is an off- shoot of the Patna police FIR relating to the abetment to suicide case of Rajput in which actress Rhea Chakraborty, her family members and others are accused. The visiting CBI team has made it clear that it will not arrest anyone in the case unless it has “concrete” evidence against him or her. During the weekend, a few members of the CBI team, including officials from the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL), will visit the late actor’s flat at Mont Blanc building at Bandra’s Carter Road As part of the money angle that is being looked into in the case, the CBI officials will visit the banks where Sushant main- tained his personal and busi- ness accounts and obtain details, and obtain details nec- essary for the case. In a complaint lodged against Rhea Chakraborty and her family members in Patna with the Patna police last month, Sushant’s father KK Singh had alleged that his son’s bank account transaction his- tory showed he had 17 crore in one account, of which 15 crore had been transferred to an account that had nothing to do with him. Sr Singh had also alleged that Rhea had left him and taken away from his son his treatment papers, laptop, cred- it cards, jewellery and cash. He has also said his son did not suffer from mental health issues before his relationship with Rhea. In the coming days, the CBI will record the statements of people connected with the case. Apart from Rhea who has been accused by Sushant’s father and other family mem- bers of having abetted the 34- year-old actor’s suicide, the team will is expected to ques- tion several Bollywood per- sonalities who were associated with either Sushant or Rhea.

˘ ˇ...2020/08/22  · H1N1 has an existing flu shot to prevent its spread. Incidentally, prevention strate-gies are same as that for the Covid-19. “If a person is sick, it’s

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Page 1: ˘ ˇ...2020/08/22  · H1N1 has an existing flu shot to prevent its spread. Incidentally, prevention strate-gies are same as that for the Covid-19. “If a person is sick, it’s

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Amid Covid-19 pandemic,India is all set to be hit by

the deadly Swine flu virus(H1N1) with about 2,721 casesand 44 deaths already report-ed this year.

Karnataka tops the list with(458 cases) followed byTelangana (443), Delhi (412),Tamil Nadu (253) and Uttar

Pradesh (252), as per the dataavailable from the website ofthe National Control DiseaseCentre (NCDC), under theUnion Health Ministry.

Last year, a total of 28,798cases were registered while1,218 people had succumbed tothe virus.

With H1N1 cases on therise, which had taken shape ofpandemic in 2009 world over,officials in the Union HealthMinistry are already on theirtoes even as they struggle tocontain Covid-19 which is now

reaching nearly 3 million cases.So far over 54,000 people havedied due to the deadly novelcoronavirus.

A senior health officialsaid that symptoms of H1N1influenza are almost similar tocoronavirus — running nose,fever, and cough. Other symp-toms for swine flu are sorethroat, body aches and chills

much like coronavirus, it toocan spread through dropletsreleased in the air due tocoughing or sneezing or com-ing in contact with a carrier.

However, good thing isthat unlike coronavirus, whosevaccine is being worked upon,H1N1 has an existing flu shotto prevent its spread.Incidentally, prevention strate-

gies are same as that for theCovid-19.

“If a person is sick, it’s bet-ter to stay home as it can beinfectious. Washing handsthoroughly and frequently is amust with soap and water. Ifthese are unavailable then oneshould use an alcohol-basedhand sanitizer. Contain yourcoughs and sneezes. Coveryour mouth and nose whenyou sneeze or cough. Avoidcontact,” said the official of theHealth Ministry.

“The most vulnerablegroups include pregnantwomen, children under fiveyears of age, elderly people andthose with co-morbidities),”said the official.

Replying to a Lok Sabhaquery on March 13, AshwiniKumar Choubey, Minister ofState for Health, had said thatfrom January 1, 2020, tillMarch 1, a total of 1,469 casesof the seasonal H1N1 had beenrecorded, resulting in thedeaths of 30 people.

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Marking a major shift intheir propaganda strategy,

a newly-floated terror outfitwhich claimed responsibilityfor targeting security forces inBaramulla on August 17,uploaded raw footage on Fridayshowing intense gunfightbetween them and the jawansof the security forces.

Top commander ofLashkar-e-Tayyeba Sajad Mir,alias Haider, along with anoth-er foreign terrorist and a localrecruit were eliminated duringa 30-hour long operation in theKreeri area of North Kashmir’sBaramulla district.

Five security men, includ-ing two CRPF jawans, twoArmy jawans and one SPO ofJ&K police had attained mar-tyrdom during the operation.

Responding swiftly on thesocial media, Jammu &Kashmir Police labeled it as afutile exercise to “glamourise”terrorism.

A brief statement posted bythe Jammu & Kashmir Police onFriday read, “By releasing videoof attack, terrorists want toglamourise terrorism. But they can’t. We replied by actions & killed four top com-manders, Sajjad @ Haider &foreign terrorist Taimur Khan@ Abu Usman (seen in saidvideo/attack) & Naseer @ Sadbhai and foreign terrorist Alibhai @ Danish within 72 hours”.

In the past, the terror out-fits either released a press state-ment or made a claim by dial-ing in offices of local newsagencies.

It is for the first time a ter-

ror outfit has uploaded a videoof their attack on securityforces.

Local police authoritiesbelieved the terror outfit, ThePeople’s Anti-Fascist Front, isjust an another front ofLashkar-e-Tayyeba and wasrecently floated to give animpression that local recruitswere behind the front andPakistani agencies and theirhandlers sitting across the bor-der were not involved in thisterrorism movement inKashmir valley.

Defence sources main-tained that ever since Pakistanhas been isolated in the globalwar against terrorism, it ismaking desperate attempts tooverhaul its image and removesthe scourge that it’s the epi-centre of terrorism in SouthAsian region.

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The Supreme Court onFriday allowed devotees of

‘Shwetamber Jain’ community to offer Paryushanprayers for two days in threetemples in Mumbai on thecondition of “strict compli-ance” with the standard oper-ating procedures meant to con-tain the Covid-19 pandemic.

Making exception for thethree Jain temples located atDadar West, Byculla andChembur in Mumbai, a benchheaded by Chief Justice SABobde said however that thepermission for “Ganpati’’ festival will have to be taken on a case-to-case basis from the Maharashtra Disaster ManagementAuthority.

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Acommercial block and afully-automated multi-level

parking facility will be con-structed above an undergroundmetro station that will be builtas an interchange facilitybetween two corridors of thephase four project of theDMRC, officials said.

The fully-automated facil-ity will be able to accommodatemore than 3,000 cars, it said.

The station Nabi Karimwill be an integrated complexconnecting Janakpuri West–RK Ashram Marg corridor andthe proposedInderlok–Indraprastha corri-dor of the Delhi Metro RailCorporation.

An MoU was signed for theproject on Friday betweenDMRC’s Managing DirectorMangu Singh and NDMCCommissioner Gyanesh Bharti.

The ceremony was held inthe presence of Delhi LtGovernor Anil Baijal (throughvideo conferencing) and Mayorof North Delhi Jai Prakash, theDelhi Metro said in a state-ment.

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Fifty people have been arrest-ed on charges, including

rioting, after a large crowdbarged into a temple andattempted to take out a pro-cession, violating restrictionson the annual ritual due toCovid-19 situation in Koppaldistrict in Karnataka, policesaid on Friday.

The irate locals broke openthe gate of the temple under thecontrol of the StateGovernment, attacked policepersonnel and also damaged a vehicle during theincident in Dotihal village onThursday.

Two cases have been reg-istered: for violating the pro-hibitory orders and another forrioting and 50 people arrested,a police officer said.

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In a freak mishap, nine per-sons were killed when fire

erupted in the first unit of theSrisailam Left Bank hydelpower plant at the remoteDomalapenta village inAmrabad Mandal ofNagarkurnool past midnighton Friday, with the resultantfumes engulfing the entireunderground power generationstation in no time.

According to authorities ofthe Telangana State PowerGeneration Corporation(TSGenco), 17 people wereengaged at the powerhousewhen the fire accident tookplace.

However, eight of themmanaged to come out via threeemergency exits in the plant.The trapped personnel, whowere not carrying mobile

phones (no network as it is anunderground unit) could notbe contacted by rescue per-sonnel who managed to enterthe premises about 10 hoursafter the fire broke out. Ashort-circuit is suspected tohave caused the fire.

Six bodies have been recov-ered so far. The rest weretrapped in a thick blanket ofsmoke that had engulfed thehydro-electric power plant,hampering rescue efforts thatcould begin only past noon onFriday.

Rescue personnel earliersaid that they could not enterthe premises even through theemergency exits because ofthe smoke.

Chief Minister KChandrasekhar Rao monitoredthe rescue work through hiscabinet colleague and TSGenco authorities.

New Delhi: With the supportof the Department of Scienceand Technology (DST),researchers are developing anaptamer-based affordable diag-nostic kit that will differentiatevarious types of coronavirusinfection, a statement said onFriday. The Birla Institute ofTechnology, Mesra, Ranchi,with the support of the Scienceand Engineering ResearchBoard, a body under the DST,has initiated a research with thedetection of a target proteinusing bioinformatics toolagainst which the diagnostic kithas to be developed.

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Amid the protest from cer-tain quarters, the Joint

Entrance Exam (JEE) foradmission to IITs and NationalEligibility cum Entrance Test(NEET) for admission to med-ical courses will go ahead as perschedule.

After a marathon meeting,the Education Ministry saidJEE (Main) exam will be heldbetween September 1 andSeptember 6 and the NEETexam will be conducted onSeptember 13 as scheduled.Sources in the EducationMinistry said there will be nochange as the Supreme Courttoo has dismissed a petition bystudents and other stakehold-ers to defer the exams due toCovid-19 crisis.

“Admit cards for the JEE(Main) exam has already beenissued by the National TestingAgency (NTA) and around 6.5lakh students (of the nearly 8.6lakh who had registered) havedownloaded them,” saidMinistry sources.

Government sources also

said of total candidates whohad registered for the JEE,only 120 had requested achange of cities and examina-tion centre.

Several politicians, includ-ing ParliamentariansSubramanian Swamy andChirag Paswan and formerNEET toppers as well as socialmedia influencers and celebri-ties, had requested the Centreand Prime Minister NarendraModi for the postponement ofthe JEE and NEET exams cit-ing reasons, including Covid,floods and non-functional pub-lic transport.

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Ahead of the Bihar Assemblypolls this year, the Election

Commission (EC) on Fridayissued a new set of guidelinesfor the conduct of general elec-tions and by-elections keepingthe coronavirus pandemic sit-uation in mind.

For the first time, the EChas allowed candidates to filetheir nominations onlineand has made it manda-tory for registered votersto wear hand gloves andface masks before headingto the electronic votingmachines to cast theirvote.

“Only a group offive people can campaign door-to-door. All voters, pollingstaff, and security personnelwill have to wear masks andthermal scanning will be doneat the entry of the poll-relatedpremises. Every voter’s bodytemperature will be checkedbefore the person is allowed toenter the booth.

“If a voter, on the day ofvoting, shows symptoms ofvirus or body temperature isfound to be more will bechecked twice, and if the resultremains the same, then theywill be asked to visit again inthe last hour of polling. SectorMagistrates shall coordinatethis in their allocated pollingstations,” the guidelines said.

It doesn’t mention any-thing on virtual rallies and dig-ital campaigns.

The new rules were framed

based on the inputs of politicalparties and chief electoral offi-cers of various States. It has alsocreated an optional facility tofill the nomination form andthe affidavit online and sub-mission of the same, after tak-ing the print, before theReturning Officer concerned.

To maintain social dis-tancing, the EC said only twopeople and two vehicles canaccompany a candidate if com-ing to the election office to filepapers. It restricted convoy forroadshows to five vehicles.

The interval between twosets of convoys of vehiclesshould be half an hour insteadof a gap of 100 meters.

It said public meetings androadshows can be organisedbut must follow Covid-19 con-

tainment instructions issued bythe Centre or the State. For thepublic meetings, the districtelection officer will identifydedicated grounds and putmarkers to ensure social dis-tancing norms by the attendeeswith clearly marked entry andexit points.

The EC said the number ofattendees should not exceed thelimit prescribed by the StateDisaster Management author-ity. For the first time, the can-didates will have the option todeposit the security amount forcontesting the electionsonline.

The EC said sanitizer, soap,water, gloves and thermal scan-ners should be made availableat the entry of the premisesused for election purposes.

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The CBI on Friday began theprobe into film actor

Sushant Singh Rajput’s myste-rious death and questionedhis cook even as the SIT mem-bers collected case diary andother relevant documents fromthe Mumbai Police that wasprobing the issue as an acci-dental death under theCriminal Procedure Code(CrPC).

The EnforcementDirectorate (ED) on its partquestioned Sushant’s elder sis-ter Priyanka Singh and record-ed her statement in a relatedmoney laundering probe.

An eight-member CBIteam led by its Joint DirectorManoj Sridhar, which landed inMumbai on Thursday evening,hit the ground running in theinvestigations into the Sushant’sdeath.

The team has divided itsvarious members and assignedthem specific tasks in the probeso as to finish the investigationsinto the sensational case asquickly as possible.

The CBI team’s first port ofcall during the day was theBandra police station where acase of Accidental DeathReport (ADR) had been regis-tered in connection withSushant’s death on June 14. Theteam members collected alldocuments and pieces of evi-dence, including autopsy andforensic reports.

The CBI team also collect-ed the 56 statements that the

Mumbai Police had earlierrecorded during the investiga-tions carried out under section174 CrPC after the registrationof an accidental death report(ADR). It took possession ofSushant’s laptop and mobilephone for investigations.

The CBI officials also metDeputy Commissioner ofPolice Abhishek Trimukhe,who was heading the MumbaiPolice probe team.

On their part, the MumbaiPolice and the MaharashtraGovernment have offered fullcooperation to the CBI, whichwas entrusted with the inves-tigations in the case by theSupreme Court on Wednesday.

Another group from thevisiting CBI team brought thelate actor’s cook Neeraj Singhto the Defence Research andDevelopment Organisation(DRDO)-the Air Force GuestHouse at Santa Cruz where

they questioned him. Neeraj,who was present at the lateactor’s rented duplex flat atBandra in north-west Mumbaiwhere Sushant was foundhanging on June 14, is a cru-cial witness in the case.

The CBI officials also ques-tioned late Sushant’s few otherstaff members.

The team collected thecase diary of the ADR andother important documentsrelated to the investigation ofthe case, including autopsyand forensic reports. The vis-cera report is awaited and theSIT is also expected to get holdof Rajput’s phones, the sourcessaid. The team will recreate thecrime scene at the spot duringthe course of investigation, thesources said.

Meanwhile, the ED record-ed the statement of Rajput’s sis-ter Priyanka Singh underPMLA here, officials said. The

ED is seeking informationrelated to Rajput’s finances,personal and professional dealsthat Priyanka might be know-ing in order to take the moneylaundering probe forward.

The ED had earlier record-ed the statements of Rajput’sfather KK Singh and anothersister Meetu. On Thursday,filmmaker Rumi Jaffery’sstatement was recorded by theagency in Mumbai.

The PMLA case is an off-shoot of the Patna police FIRrelating to the abetment tosuicide case of Rajput in whichactress Rhea Chakraborty, herfamily members and othersare accused.

The visiting CBI team hasmade it clear that it will notarrest anyone in the case unlessit has “concrete” evidenceagainst him or her.

During the weekend, a fewmembers of the CBI team,

including officials from theCentral Forensic ScienceLaboratory (CFSL), will visitthe late actor’s flat at MontBlanc building at Bandra’sCarter Road

As part of the money anglethat is being looked into in thecase, the CBI officials will visitthe banks where Sushant main-tained his personal and busi-ness accounts and obtaindetails, and obtain details nec-essary for the case.

In a complaint lodgedagainst Rhea Chakraborty andher family members in Patnawith the Patna police lastmonth, Sushant’s father KKSingh had alleged that his son’sbank account transaction his-tory showed he had �17 crorein one account, of which �15crore had been transferred toan account that had nothing todo with him.

Sr Singh had also allegedthat Rhea had left him andtaken away from his son histreatment papers, laptop, cred-it cards, jewellery and cash. Hehas also said his son did notsuffer from mental healthissues before his relationshipwith Rhea.

In the coming days, theCBI will record the statementsof people connected with thecase. Apart from Rhea who hasbeen accused by Sushant’sfather and other family mem-bers of having abetted the 34-year-old actor’s suicide, theteam will is expected to ques-tion several Bollywood per-sonalities who were associatedwith either Sushant or Rhea.

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An online national conferenceon ‘sustainable infrastructure

development: innovations andadvances’ (SIDIA 2020) wasorganised at UPES recently.

The event was organised bythe Department of Health, Safety,Environment and CivilEngineering (HSE) and school ofengineering.

Informing about the event theSenior Director of UPES, ArunDhand, said that the conferenceaimed at facilitating an open dia-logue and discussion between thevarious stakeholders in the sphere

of civil engineering.Welcoming the guests and the

participants, the ProgramDirector, HSE and CivilEngineering Department, UPESNihal Anwar Siddiqui highlight-

ed the importance of such eventsas a platform for planning sus-tainable growth in the future.

Addressing the participants,the chief guest, MP Jain empha-sized upon the importance ofsustainability from the civil engi-neering perspective and stressedon the significance of the variousprovisions and frameworks need-ed for engineering activitiesincluding planning and con-struction.

The Vice Chancellor (VC) ofUPES, Sunil Rai congratulated theHSE and Civil Engineeringdepartment for the successfulconference.

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Amaravati: Covid-19 claimed91 more lives in AndhraPradesh while 9,544 more peo-ple tested positive, officials saidon Friday.

The fresh fatalities pushedthe death toll to 3,092 while thenew infections have taken thetally to 3,34,940.

Andhra Pradesh is the thirdworst-affected state in the coun-try after Maharashtra and TamilNadu in terms of the number ofCovid cases.

The mortality rate in thestate, however, is 0.92 per centagainst the national average of1.90 per cent. Officials said thestate's mortality rate is muchlower than that of Gujarat (3.43per cent) and Maharashtra(3.32).

According to the mediabulletin released by the StateCommand Control Room, 16fatalities were reported fromChittoor district, 13 from WestGodavari district and 12 fromNellore. Eleven people suc-cumbed in East Godavari dis-trict, eight in Anantapur, sevenin Kadapa, five in Srikakulamand four in Prakasam. Guntur,

Krishna and Kurnool districtsreported three deaths each.

During the last 24 hours,1,312 cases were reported fromEast Godavari district, 1,131cases from West Godavari,1,103 from Chittoor, 919 fromKurnool, 797 from Prakasam,761 from Nellore, 738 inVisakhapatnam, 704 inAnantapur, and 571 inSrikakulam.

The period also saw 8,827people recovering from thevirus. With this, the cumulativerecoveries rose to 2,44,045. Therecovery rate in the state standsat 72.86 per cent against thenational average of 74.30 percent. The state now has 87,803active cases with maximum16,366 active cases in EastGodavari, followed by 9,932 inChittoor, 7,040 in Kurnool and7,003 in Vizianagaram.

During the last 24 hoursending 9 a.m. Friday, theauthorities conducted 55,010tests including 36,099VRDL/Truenat/NACO and18,911 rapid antigen tests. Withthis the state has so far tested31,29,857 samples. IANS ������ <"%�!#5%8"

With the continuous spikein coronavirus cases,

Haryana on Friday orderedthe closure of shops, exceptthose dealing in essential items,and offices on weekends, start-ing this Saturday.

State Health Minister AnilVij, who also holds the Home portfolio announcedthe partial lockdown across thestate.

In a tweet, he informedthat all offices and shops,except essential, will remainclosed in Haryana on everySaturday and Sunday due toCOVID-19.

The state, which shares itsborder with Delhi, has record-ed over 50,000 cases of coron-avirus and 578 deaths.

However, there will be norestrictions on the movementof people.

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Chief Minister ArvindKejriwal on Friday handed

a cheque of Rs 1 crore to thefamily of Raju, a sanitationworker who died due to Covid-19 while being on duty.

Kejriwal visited Raju's res-idence in the Old Chandrawalarea in Delhi and assured hisfamily of full support in thefuture. Raju was a sanitationworker in the MCD and hadlost his life while he was onCorona duty.

Expressing condolences onhis demise, Kejriwal also saidthat he is proud of all theCorona warriors like Raju whohave laid down their lives whileserving the people of Delhi.

Following his visit, Kejriwalsaid, "Our MCD sanitationworker Raju laid down his lifewhile he was on his duty ofserving the people. He washimself infected from Coronawhile he was on his Coronaduty. I have come here to meetwith his family and have

offered them financial assis-tance of Rs 1 crore”.

“We are proud of all thoseCorona warriors who have laiddown and sacrificed their liveswhile protecting the people ofDelhi. We cannot bring back alost life but we will do whatev-er we can to support his fami-ly," he said.

Kejriwal also tweeted, "OurCorona Warriors have servedthe people by putting their livesat risk.

One of them was our san-itation staff, Raju Ji. Today, hewent home and met the fami-ly and gave financial assis-tance of Rs. 1 crore. I hope thatthis will help his family."

Raju was a sanitation work-er at North MCD’s Hindu RaoHospital and had been appoint-ed on his duty to ensure clean-liness and sanitation forCorona patients in Delhi. Heand his family resided in theOld Chandrawal area in MajnuKa Tilla, Delhi.

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AAP Chief Spokesperson SaurabhBhardwaj on Friday appealed to thecitizens of Delhi to hand over theresponsibility of the municipal cor-porations to Chief Minister ArvindKejriwal to build a cleanliness modelfor Delhi like that of education andhealth implemented in the Capital bythe AAP Government.

The Aam Aadmi Party on Fridaylashed out at the BJP-led municipalcorporations in Delhi over poor rank-ing in Swachh Survekshan 2020announced by the Minister forHousing and Urban Affairs onThursday.

Referring to the cleanliness sur-vey in which SDMC ranked 31, NorthMCD 43 and EDMC was ranked 46,he said that the BJP-ruled MCDs had

opened all the toilets for only one weekto improve its rank in the survey.

Showing pictures of locked toiletsof the SDMC, he said SDMC openedthe closed toilets only in the wake ofcleanliness survey but despite suchfraudulent act they have performed sopoorly in the survey.

“Most unfortunately, the EDMCis at the second last position in thecleanliness survey that means that theEast district of Delhi is the dirtiest andthis is very shameful for every citizenof Delhi," he said.

"We have seen that in the reportthe cities like Indore, Navi Mumbai,Surat have performed great but thesecities have the same kind of popula-tion as Delhi. We all know that the BJPhas made Delhi the capital of garbageand for the past 15 years, the situationhas remained the same. Today on

behalf of the AAP, I want to requestthe citizens of Delhi that in theupcoming MCD election give achance to the party by bringing us inthe power of MCDs," Bhardwaj said.

"The AAP government in Delhihas changed the education system andlaunched a revolution which hasmade the Delhi model of education aprime model across the world. Delhischools have shown a 98 per centresult and across the world, people arediscussing this model of education.The government also revolutionisedthe health model of Delhi,” he said.

“If the AAP voted to power in theupcoming municipal election, wewill build up a cleanliness model forthe national capital like the govern-ment has done to reform the educa-tion sector than the health sector," hesaid.

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Ghaziabad city slipped six position to fin-ish at the 19th spot in Swachchh

Survekshan 2020 announced by the Ministryof Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) onThursday.

On a State level too, the city slipped fromthe top position to third, with Lucknow andAgra gaining ground.

Ghaziabad was evaluated among othercities that had more than 1 million popu-lation.

Piedan slid down. Ghaziabad ranked19th this time in ranking Found while lasttime was 13th.

Although Muradagar municipality hasgot first place. Mayor Asha Sharma very dis-appointed with this ranking And she hassaid that the main reason for the slipping isdumping in Ghaziabad Ground is missing.Now better together with MunicipalCommissioner of Municipal Corporation Alot of effort will be made to do thework.Municipal Corporation Ghaziabad atnational level 19 in Cleanliness Survey 2020Was place and 3 places have been obtainedin the state. Mayor Asha Sharma Regardingthis, she has issued a statement in which shesaid that in this result This is the importantreason why Ghaziabad could not get prop-er place.

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Two more residents suc-cumbed to Covid-19 as

Chandigarh reported yetanother spike of cases on Fridaywith 116 fresh infections.

The total tally of casesjumped to 2631 including 1170active cases in the city. Thedeath toll reached 33 till theevening.A day before,Chandigarh had witnessed itsrecord daily spike in numberswith 119 positive cases.

The city has seen a rapidsurge in positive cases in themonth of August with 1583cases reported so far.“Two res-idents died due to Covid-19 inthe city. The deceased includ-ed a 66 years old female resi-dent of Burail and 67 years oldmale resident of Sector 45,”stated Chandigarh HealthDepartment’s evening bulletin.

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Chandigarh: Continuing with the trend now formore than a fortnight, Punjab once again regis-tered 1000-plus fresh cases of the novel coron-avirus on Friday pushing the state’s Covid-19 tallycloser to 40,000-mark while the death toll is justshort of the 1000-figure.

A total of 1,513 fresh Covid-19 positive casesand 34 deaths were reported from the state’s all22 districts, taking t he Punjab’s tally to 39,327and death toll to 991.

Ludhiana, with 242, reported the highestnumber of infections, followed by Patiala with201, Jalandhar (169), SAS Nagar (143), Sangrur

(102), Bathinda (90), Amritsar (80), Kapurthala(70), Ferozepur (69), Gurdaspur (49), Moga (43),39 each in Barnala and Fatehgarh Sahib, Muktsar(27), Pathankot (26), SBS Nagar (25), Ropar (20),Faridkot (19), Fazilka (18), Mansa (16),Hoshiarpur (15), and Tarn Taran (11).The state’smortality rate has gone up to 2.52 percent with34 more deaths reported in the past 24 hours —including eight from Ludhiana, five from Patiala,four from Kapurthala, three from Amritsar, twofrom Moga and one each from Barnala, Faridkot,Fatehgarh Sahib, Ferozepur, Gurdaspur, Mansaand SAS Nagar (Mohali). PNS

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Bhubaneswar: The Odishagovernment has asked the dis-trict collectors to formulatearea-specific strategies to con-tain the Covid-19 spread, saidan official on Friday.

Taking a district-wisereview meeting, chief secretaryAsit Tripathy asked them toidentify the exact cause of thespike in Covid positive casesand roll out area specific strate-gies to contain the pandemic.

"The rate and cause of thespread in disease differ fromone area to the other. Thenature of spread in rural areabecomes different from that ofthe urban and city area. Theborder areas with neighbouringstates also have their ownuniqueness," said Tripathy.

He said the collectors mustrework their own district spe-cific strategies and should keepon updating the approach withthe changing situation.

He ordered that the spikein cases in rural areas should becontained within a week.

Development commis-sioner Suresh ChandraMohapatra said, "Since theCovid positive patients with co-morbidity are more vulnerableto developing serious healthcomplications, each districtmust have a robust strategy totake them to the hospitals at anearly stage for proper treat-ment."

Pradeepta KumarMohapatra, additional chief

secretary in the health depart-ment, said an expert body withexperienced medical profes-sors is now functioning in thestate for providing critical careadvice to the doctors.

The treating physicians indifferent districts should be inactive contact with the expertsteam for containing the mor-tality rate, he added.

Special ReliefCommissioner Pradeep KumarJena advised encouraginghome isolation of asympto-matic or mild symptomaticpositive cases instead of bur-dening the Covid care centresand hospitals.

The chief secretary direct-ed that the Covid hospitalsshould be kept free for treatingthe patients requiring criticalcare.

The total Covid positivecases have increased to 72,718with the detection of 2,698 newcases.

The virus claimed 10 morelives in the last 24 hours as thedeath toll reached 390 inOdisha. IANS

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Mangaluru: Despite being infected with coro-navirus, two Karnataka students rocked with theiracademic performance in the Karnataka CommonEntrance Test (KCET), securing top ranks, an offi-cial said on Friday.

"Chirag S Rao and Harsith Reddy were Covidpatients but emerged as top rankers in the KCETexamination," said an official.

Rao secured 214th rank in the engineeringstream while Reddy bagged the 615th rank in thesame. "Inspite of all these difficulties I haveachieved so much and success has no limits," Raotold IANS about his feat.

He was the only Covid positive student whowrote the exam at the National Institute ofTechnology Karnataka (NITK), Surathkal wherea special examination centre was created for him. IANS

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The number of patients ofnovel Coronavirus (Covid-

19) in Uttarakhand jumped to14083 on Friday with the statehealth department reporting447 fresh cases of the disease.

Deaths of five patients werealso reported on the day whichincreased the death toll to 192in the state.

The authorities discharged243 patients from differenthospitals after their recovery onthe day and the state now hasa total of 9676 recoveredpatients which puts the recov-ery percentage at 68.71 percent.The doubling rate of the diseasein Uttarakhand is at 25.86days.

Three patients of the dis-ease were reported dead at AllIndia Institute of MedicalSciences (AIIMS) Rishikesh.Here a 60 year old male, a 55year old male and a 45 year oldmale were reported dead onFriday. In Government DoonMedical College (GDMC) hos-pital, a 60 year old male and 40year old male succumbed to thedisease.

The authorities reported106 fresh cases in UdhamSingh Nagar district on Friday.Similarly 101 patients werereported in Haridwar, 95 inDehradun, 50 in Nainital, 41 inUttarkashi, 14 in Almora, 11 inPauri nine in Champawat, sixeach in Pithoragarh and Tehri,five in Chamoli, two in

Bageshwar and one inRudraprayag district werereported positive on the day.

The health department dis-charged 78 patients inHaridwar, 53 in Udham SinghNagar, 30 in Dehradun, 23 inNainital, 21 in Tehri, 13 inBageshwar and eight patients inRudraprayag district on Friday.Similarly five patients eachwere discharged in Pauri andChampawat districts on the

day. Four patients in Almora,two in Chamoli and one inUttarkashi were discharged onFriday.

The state now has 4164active patients of the disease.Haridwar district is maintain-ing its top position in the tableof active cases with 983 activepatients.

Haridwar is followedclosely by Udham Singh Nagarwhich now has 981 active cases.

Dehradun is in third positionwith 791 active cases followed

by Nainital with 643 cases.Uttarkashi has 177, Chamoli

92, Champawat 87, Pauri 82,Rudraprayag 54, Almora 49,

Pithoragarh 48 and Bageshwar20 active cases of the disease.

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Dehradun: The spurt in the conta-gion of Covid-19 in provisional statecapital Dehradun has started takingits toll on the functioning of the stategovernment. On Wednesday sevenemployees working in the head officeof National Health Mission (NHM)were found positive.After this office was made out of

bounds for outsiders and all publicdealing here was closed till August 23.The NHM office is located on thethird floor of the building of the statehealth directorate. It is located on thesame floor where the state controlroom for the Covid-19 is situated. OnFriday an officer of the health depart-ment and his wife were found posi-

tive for Covid-19. The Panchayati Rajdirectorate too would remain closedon Saturday after the husband of anemployee of Uttarakhand Rural Roaddevelopment authority was foundpositive for the disease. The office of this authority is locat-ed in the building of the PanchayatiRaj department. The secretary anddirector of Panchayati Raj, H CSemwal said that on Saturday andSunday the entire building would besanitised. Earlier this month, theMunicipal Corporation of Dehraduntoo had to be closed to the publictwice for a few days after positivecases were detected among its offi-cials. PNS

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In an indicator of the increase in contagion inUttarakhand, the infection rate in the state has

witnessed a jump of one percent in the last onemonth. The infection rate in the state is now at 5.16percent while it was 4.18 percent on July 1. Thefounder of the social development for communi-ties’ foundation, Anoop Nautiyal said that Nainital,Haridwar, Udham Singh Nagar and Dehradun hada maximum increase in the infection rate in thelast month. Nainital district has the highest infec-tion rate in the state. Here 8.53 percent of the totalsamples tested have tested positive.

Haridwar has an infection rate of 7.43 percentwhile Udham Singh Nagar has an infection rate of6.50 percent. Rudraprayag has an infection rate of1.70 percent which is lowest in the state.

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Aseparate policy should bemade for agriculture in

mountain states, suggestedchief minister Trivendra SinghRawat. He said this whileattending a video conferenceheld by the Union Agricultureand Farmers Welfare MinisterNarendra Singh Tomar withthe CMs and AgricultureMinisters of various states.

Tomar said that the Centreis consistently taking varioussteps to double the income offarmers. State governments havealso contributed to this effort.

Stating that the govern-ment’s aim is to ensure privateinvestment in the agriculturesector reaches the farms andvillages, he said that the Rs onelakh crore package for agricul-ture infrastructure will prove tobe a major step.

The Union minister saidthat to boost this programme,the states should organise aseminar to discuss scope fordevelopment of agriculture

infrastructure. A survey shouldbe conducted to find gaps inthe sector and schemes shouldbe drafted to address these.

The government has set atarget for establishing 10,000farmer producers organisa-tions (FPOs), said the minister.

Tomar further said thatthe fund announced by thegovernment will also help indeveloping post harvestinginfrastructure and ending therole of middlemen. It will alsobe used for developing infra-structure including cold storageintegrated pack houses, supply

chain services, communityfarm machinery, refrigeratedtransportation and communi-ty drying yard.

Through self-reliant agri-culture, the government wantsto make entrepreneurs out offarmers. All states should pro-vide their plans to the ministryby March 31, 2021, he added.

Speaking in the confer-ence, CM Trivendra SinghRawat said that the scheme tomake farmers self-reliant willprove to be a milestone inefforts aimed at doubling theirincome.

He said that the State willmeet the target of establishingtwo FPOs in each district intime. “The conditions inUttarakhand are different com-pared to other plain states.Most of our state’s geographi-cal area is mountainous and hasvaried climatic conditions,”said Rawat, while advocating aseparate policy for mountain-ous states. Stating that there isconsiderable scope for unsea-sonal fruits and vegetables inUttarakhand, he said thatfocusing on these can increasethe income of farmers.

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While experts with acade-mic degrees and varied

experience, senior officials andpoliticians go about one oftheir tasks of commiserating onproblems and finding solu-tions for them it is very oddthat little is being done to capitalise on one of our biggest assets.

According to a study, Indiareceives about 400 millionhectare metres (mham) of rainand snowfall apart from 20mham more flowing in as sur-face water from outside ourgeographical boundaries. It iscalculated that harvesting evena fraction of this quantity

through rainwater harvestingwill greatly enhance the avail-ability of clean water and resultin other benefits.

Without very expensive orfancy technology, our ancestorsworked out sensible and aes-thetically pleasing measures toharvest rainwater for drinking,irrigation and other purposes.Not very long ago when themachinations of short sightedpeople with narrow aims hadnot ruined Dehradun, this citytoo had its system to collectrainwater.

The natural depressionswhich used to act as reservoirsof rainwater have been filled toconstruct buildings which havedisrupted the natural waterdrainage system. The networkof nalas and khalas which carrywater to such depressions and

rivulets has also been takenover by encroachments. Thisalong with constructions on thebanks and even the beds ofrivers results in waterlogging invarious areas during the mon-soon. A few months later, manyareas face shortage of water.Imagine if the natural reser-voirs had been preserved andmaintained, there would havebeen lakes and smaller pondsin the city and these would notonly be a source of water butalso enhance the environmentand surroundings making itmore profitable for all includ-ing even those in the real estatebusiness.

Harvesting rainwater hasadvantages not limited to theseaspects alone as its effect wouldalso benefit agriculture andother activities boosting the

income of people. An exampleof how such opportunities aretreated can be seen in theDefence Colony which alsohouses the private home of thecurrent chief minister. Theplanners thought of ‘develop-ing’ a water body in the colonyinto Gaura Devi water park.

A couple of crores ofrupees was also reportedlyapproved some years ago anda foundation stone wasunveiled. Plans had been madeto build a restaurant, joggingtrack, provide boating andparking facility. Some timeago, a large ground adjoiningthis lake, where youngstersused to play volleyball and afew cattle used to graze wascovered by homes constructedwith impressive swiftness. Thelake now holds more flora

than water even during themonsoon.

Water is not the onlyresource we have been wastingto our detriment. The mannerin which we allow water to gowaste also affects another majorresource- soil. Reading an oldbook about the Himalayanregion long ago, one learnt thatsoil is the most valuable item inthe mountains as it is in limit-ed quantity compared to theplains.

See how this preciousresource is treated during con-struction of roads or otherprojects in the mountains- theexcavated earth material issimply dumped. So, while wesupposedly move forwardtowards greater heights ofprogress we continue treatingtwo of our most precious

resources with dangerous dis-dain. Some expensive projectsare also planned or alreadyunderway to systematicallywaste these resources.

Next time when heavyrains result in water loggingand other problems, the newsand authorities will be focusedon this not just here but inmany parts of India includingthe national Capital. The samewill happen in the next mon-soon and a few months afterthat many areas will face watershortage. However, the rainscannot be blamed for theseproblems. Nature provides usassets and it is we who haveturned these into liabilitiesusing our special skill whichcauses more damage to us thangood while making us thinkotherwise.

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Continuing his hectic political activ-ity, the former chief minister and

general secretary of All India CongressCommittee (AICC) Harish Rawat hasdecided to hold a fast on September 1.He would hold the day long fast at hisresidence in Dehradun to highlight theplight of the unemployed. In a face-book post the former CM said that itis depressing that about one Crore peo-ple have lost their jobs and the num-ber of unemployed in Uttarakhand isalso very high.

“The Covid-19 pandemic gener-ated unemployment has broken thebacks of people and depression prevailsamong the youth. Many young menhave committed suicide in recenttimes,’’ he said. Criticizing the stategovernment Rawat said that it is doingnothing to fill the vacant posts and theMukhyamantri Self employmentscheme is failing to get implementedon ground.

He said that after the fast, he wouldhold a foot march in the areas ofRanipur and Sitarganj SIIDCULs to create an environment of awareness againstunemployment.

On Independence Day Rawat hadundertaken a Triranga Yatra on a bul-lock cart in Haridwar district. For thisYatra, the former CM travelled onDhandera- Luxar road to highlight thepathetic condition of the roads ahead

of the Kumbh of next year. Three Congress MLAs from

Haridwar district, Qazi Nizamuddin,Mamta Rakesh and Furkan Ahmedaccompanied Rawat in the Yatra whichdrew a very good response.

The former CM and his support-ers even planted paddy in the potholedroad to underline the condition of theroads.

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Following complaints that severalpeople are refusing to accept small

one rupee coins during transactions,the Dehradun district magistrateAshish Kumar Shrivastava stated that no one can refuse to accept the cur-rencies issued by the Government ofIndia.

For the last several months, manypeople including shopkeepers, con-sumers and three-wheeler drivers arenot accepting one rupee coins citing thereason that others are not taking it too.It has become like an unauthorised banon small one rupee coins by some localswhich is continuing.

“Initially, a local grocery storeowner refused to accept small onerupee coins claiming that such coins arefake. Probably that was a rumour hemight have heard somewhere or maybehe just made it up but the same thingstarted in other places too.

Everyone from bus conductors,autorickshaw drivers to dairy employ-ees, nobody accepted these coins.Everyone has the same reason that oth-ers are not accepting it too. This thing has become like an unoffi-cial demonetisation of small one rupeecoins,” said a local teacher, SapnaNegi.

Meanwhile, some people alsoclaimed that since most of the banksallow only the limited submission ofone rupee coins, they have to face prob-

lems while spending such coins. “I didnot stop taking small one rupee coinsdue to any rumour but I stopped tak-ing them because no one was ready totake it from me.

The customers refuse to accept it,some shopkeepers also do not take itand when I went to deposit these coinsin the bank, they said I cannot depositmore than 20 coins at a time. I havethousands of such coins, where shouldI spend them when no one is takingthem from me. That is why I havestopped accepting them too,” said alocal grocery store owner, DigvijayRawat.

On being asked about why nobodycomplaints to the authorities, peoplesaid that they feel that the authoritieswill either dismiss the matter consid-ering it a trivial issue or will not evenlook into it seriously. Rawat said, “Asimilar kind of situation occurred a fewyears ago with the Rs 10 coins too butit got settled gradually.

Also, we do not want to involvepolice just for one rupee coins. It is awell known matter for months, if theauthorities considered this as an impor-tant issue, they would have issued somedirections against this unofficial ban onone rupee coins.”

However, the DM stated that it isan offence to refuse the currenciesissued by the government and anyonewho faces such a situation can complainto the local authorities and action willbe taken against the culprits.

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The members of theC o m m o n w e a l t h

Parliamentary Association(CPA) discussed the situation ofCovid-19 pandemic in theirrespective countries in its meet-ing executive held on Friday. Thespeaker of Uttarakhand assem-bly Premchand Agarwal attend-ed the virtual meeting as repre-sentative of India region of CPA.

The chairperson of theexecutive council of CPA andMember of Parliament (MP) ofCameroon, Amelia Lefaka,deputy chairperson John Aajkafrom Australia, the treasurer ofthe association, S Scunder, mem-

ber of House of Commons ofCanada Anthony Rota and oth-ers participated in the meeting.In the meeting, it was decided toappoint Stefan Twig as eighthgeneral secretary of the CPA.

Informing about the meet-ing Agarwal said that the actionplan of the executive councilsmeeting held in 2019 wasendorsed by the CPA.

The annual report of theCPA and the review report of theworks were also tabled in themeeting. The reports of subcommittees were also presentedbefore the CPA. Agarwalinformed that the CPA has threeregional representatives fromIndia region. The Speaker of

Assam assembly Hitendra NathGoswami, Member ofParliament (MP) AnuragSharma and PremchandAgarwal are these three mem-bers.

Agarwal further informedthat the CPA has extended histenure till next year. In themeeting it was proposed todefer the 65th conference ofCPA till August 2021. This con-ference is scheduled to be heldbetween January 12 to 18 nextyear in Canada.

In the meeting the repre-sentatives of India, Africa, Asia,Australia, British islands,Caribbean, America andAtlantic regions took part.

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To remove the encroachmentfrom the government lands

in Dehradun district, the districtadministration has commencedthe procedure to reclaim thepossessions of all such lands. Inthe last few days, the adminis-tration has already removed theencroachment from the sixbigha land in Majri Grant atDoiwala and three hectares landin Amwala Uparla area on thedirections of district magistrateAshish Kumar Shrivastava.According to sources, there areseveral plots of governmentlands in the district which arenot under the active possessionof the authorities. Some of suchplots are being used by somepeople for commercial purpos-

es for several years, as per thesources. On the question ofhow many more governmentlands are there in Dehradunwhich have been encroached bysuch people, Shrivastava saidthat the officials are preparing alist of all the government landsand soon the procedure toremove the encroachment fromthese lands will begin.

It is pertinent to mentionhere that several lands of theadministration have been leftunmarked in various areas of theDehradun district but now, thedistrict administration has start-ed marking the area afterreclaiming the possession ofthe lands like by setting up atemporary boundary in the sixbigha land in Majri Grant onThursday.

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India’s Covid-19 tally crossedthe 29-lakh mark on Friday,

up by nine lakh cases in just twoweeks. Friday saw a single-dayspike of 68,898 infections, whilethe recoveries increased to21,58,946 taking its rate to over74 per cent.

The Union Health Ministrysaid in a statement that in a sin-gle day 62,282 patients recov-ered and went home in the past24 hours.

“With more patients recov-ering and being dischargedfrom the hospitals and homeisolation (in case of mild andmoderate cases), the total recov-eries have crossed the 21.5lakh-mark till Friday(21,58,946).

“The gap between recov-ered patients and active Covid-19 cases has increased andreached 1,466,918 so far. As ahigher number of patientrecover, their percentage ratecontinues to steeply rise alongwith the steady decline in per-centage active coronaviruscases,” said the Ministry in a

statement.With such high level of

recoveries, India’s RecoveryRate has soared past 74 per cent(74.28 per cent as on August 21)ensuring more and morepatients are recovering. This isbolstered by 33 states andUnion Territories reportingrecovery rate more than 50 percent, it said.

The current active cases(692,028) compose the actual

caseload of the country. “It is23.82 per cent of the total pos-itive cases today, registering afurther drop in the last 24hours. They are under activemedical supervision,” said thehealth ministry adding thatIndia’s Case Fatality Rate (CFR)is at 1.89 per cent much belowthe global average.

The health ministrystressed that more than 70 percent of the deaths occurred due

to comorbidities.“Our figures are being rec-

onciled with the Indian Councilof Medical Research (ICMR),”the ministry said, adding thatstate-wise distribution of figuresis subject to further verificationand reconciliation. Accordingto the ICMR, a cumulativetotal of 3,34,67,237 sampleshave been tested up to August20 with 8,05,985 samples beingtested on Thursday.

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Even as the Governmenthas made downloading of

Arogya Setu app mandatoryfor every citizen, a reviewpublished in the journalLancet Digital Health hassaid contact tracing apps areunlikely to contain the spreadof Covid-19 without properpublic health control mea-sures such as physical dis-tancing and closure of indoorspaces.

The systematic reviewshows that evidence aroundthe effectiveness of automat-ed contact tracing systems iscurrently very limited.

In fact, points out thereview that “automatedapproaches raise potentialprivacy and ethics concerns,and also rely on high smart-phone ownership, so theymay be of very limited valuein some countries. Too muchreliance on automated contacttracing apps may also

increase the risk of Covid-19for vulnerable and digitally-excluded groups such as olderpeople and people experi-encing homelessness.”

The research suggeststhat large-scale manual con-tact tracing alongside otherpublic health control mea-sures — such as physical dis-tancing and closure of indoorspaces such as pubs — is like-ly to be required in conjunc-t ion with automatedapproaches.

The researchers fromUniversity College London(UCL) in the UK found 15relevant studies by reviewingmore than 4,000 papers onautomated and partially-auto-mated contact tracing.

They analysed these tounderstand the potentialimpact these tools could havein controlling the Covid-19pandemic.

“Across a number ofmodelling studies, we founda consistent picture that

although automated contacttracing could support manu-al contact tracing, the systemswill require large-scale uptakeby the population and strictadherence to quarantineadvice by contacts notified tohave a significant impact onreducing transmission,” saidlead author Isobel Braithwaitefrom UCL.

Partially-automated sys-tems may have some auto-mated processes, for instancein determining the durationof follow-up of contactsrequired, but do not useproximity of smartphones asa proxy for contact with aninfected person.

“Although automatedcontact tracing shows somepromise in helping reduce

transmission of Covid-19within communities, ourresearch highlighted theurgent need for further eval-uation of these apps withinpublic health practice,” saidBraithwaite.

“None of the studies wefound provided real-worldevidence of their effective-ness, and to improve ourunderstanding of how theycould support manual con-tact t racing systems,”Braithwaite said.

The review shows that, atpresent, there is insufficientevidence to justify reliance onautomated contact tracingapproaches without additional extensive publichealth control measures.

India’s Arogya Setu Appis at the forefront of down-loads in terms of downloadcount. It has been mademandatory not only for thegovernment employees todownload the app but also atvarious public places.

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Union Minister for RoadTransport, Highways Nitin

Gadkari on Friday stressed uponutilising modern and greentechnologies in road construc-tion all over the country.Chairing a meeting to reviewNew Green Highways Policy(Plantation) and to discuss useof new technologies in road con-struction through video con-ference, Gadkari said that itshould be our mission to reducecost of construction by 25 per-cent and for this, new tech-

nologies are required.While discussing new tech-

nologies in road construction, hesaid that it should be our mis-sion to reduce cost of construc-tion by 25 percent and for thisnew technologies are required.He said that specific areas likehilly areas, border areas andcoastal areas need differentapproach and technologies. Heappreciated the use of suchtechnology in road constructionin Andaman and Nicobar andmotivated NHIDCL to followthe example in rest of the pro-jects.

The Minister also launched

‘Harit Path’, a mobile app tomonitor the plantations throughgeo-tagging and web-based GISenabled monitoring tools. Theapp has been developed byNHAI to monitor location,growth, species details, mainte-nance activities, targets andachievements of each of its fieldunits for each and every plantunder all plantation projects.While inaugurating the mobileapp, Gadkari emphasised onstrict monitoring of plantationand transplantation of trees.

The Minister suggested thatspecialised persons/agenciesshould be hired for plantation oftrees along the highways. Hesuggested involving NGOs, Selfhelp groups and Horticultureand Forest department in this.The officials assured that theywill be able to achieve the goalof 100% plantation on highwaysupto March 2022.

While discussing the issueof Transplantation of trees,Gadkari said that it should beour mission to save all the treesfrom being cut and specialisedagencies equipped with newtechnologies should be hired forthe purpose. The ministerstressed upon using local indige-nous material like jute, coir, etcfor strengthening purposes. ShriGadkari also said that rightchoice of species suiting localconditions is also very impor-tant.

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The Election Commission(EC) on Friday announced

that the bypoll to fill the RajyaSabha seat that fell vacant uponthe death of Samajwadi PartyMP Amar Singh will be held onSeptember 11.

According to the EC’sstatement, the notification forthe bypoll will be issued onAugust 25 and the electionwould be held on September 11.As per the established practice,the counting of votes will beheld on September 11 eveningafter the conclusion of voting.The EC said in a statement thatthe Uttar Pradesh ChiefSecretary had been directed toappoint a senior officer to makesure that instructions related toCOVID-19 are followed duringthe bypoll process. The bypollis likely to go uncontested andwill increase the numbers of theBJP in the Upper House.

Singh was a member ofRajya Sabha from UttarPradesh. Veteran politicianAmar Singh passed away onAugust 1 at the age of 64 whilehe was in Singapore due to kid-ney-related complications. Histerm as a Rajya Sabha memberfrom Uttar Pradesh was till July,2022. He was elected to theUpper House on a SamajwadiParty ticket, but had lateraligned with the BJP.

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Education Minister RameshPokhriyal Nishank has said

that the Government is work-ing to prevent talent and patentfrom leaving the country.“Now, we will stop both talentand patent from leaving thecountry,” Pokhriyal said at theAll India ManagementAssociation (AIMA) 25th con-vocation on Thursday.

He pointed out that 7.5-8lakh Indian students go over-seas looking for their futureand, in the process, Rs 1.5 lakhcrore flows out of the country.“India is contributing to theexcellence of other countries,”he remarked. He added thatthe proof of our education’sexcellence is that the CEOs ofGoogle and Microsoft studiedin India.

The Minister said thatIndia would lead the onlineeducation revolution andefforts would be made to offeronline courses from theworld’s top 100 universities. Heappreciated AIMA’s initiativein promoting online education

and testing, and asked theorganisation to promote theobjectives of the NEP.

Nishank also declared thatthe new curriculum of man-agement and engineeringinstitutes would be developedin partnership with the indus-try. He also stated that nowonwards 50% of the studentsof IIMs and IITs would workwith the industry during theirstudies.

AICTE Chairman, Dr AnilSahasrabudhe delivered thekeynote address of the convo-cation.

He appreciated AIMA forholding the country’s firstentirely online convocation.He pointed out that covid hadallowed higher education andregulation to go online thoughAICTE had faced stiff resis-tance for two years in digital-izing the approval process.

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The Supreme Court on Fridaydismissed the bail applica-

tion of Malkit Singh alias Shera,one of the accused in connec-tion with the blast which tookplace in Punjab’s Tarn Taran dis-trict in September last year.

A bench headed by JusticeNV Ramana dismissed the pleasaying it cannot grant bail to theaccused.

The accused Malkit Singhhad earlier applied for bail onhealth grounds in the Punjaband Haryana High Court andthe National InvestigationAgency (NIA) court in Mohali,both of which were dismissed bythe respective courts.

Before the NIA court, hehad sought bail contending thathe was falsely implicated andthat he was a patient of diabetes.

The prosecution had sub-mitted before the NIA courtthat during the course of inves-tigation incriminating role of

the accused had emerged andthat he was highly radicalisedtowards Khalistan movement and he was part ofa gang that had planned ter-rorist activities.

The NIA court observedthat evidence pointed to theaccused was an active memberof the pro-Khalistan terroristgang, adding that it was of theopinion that there was suffi-cient ground for believing thataccusation against the appli-cant/accused is prima facietrue.

The NIA had in March thisyear filed a chargesheet againstnine accused in connectionwith Tarn Taran blast casebefore a special NIA court.

Two persons were killedand one other was injured inthe blast, which took place inTarn Taran on September 4 lastyear, when the victims werereportedly digging a pit toretrieve a concealed explosiveconsignment.

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The Supreme Court hasextended the term of three

Administrative Members ofthe Armed Forces Tribunalfor a period of two months. Athree-judge bench headed by

Chief Justice of India S ABobde passed the order afternoting that connected matterswere posted for hearing in thenext month.

“ The term of threeadministrative members ofthe Armed Forces Tribunal

was extended for a period ofone month by an Order of thisCourt dated July 16, 2020.

“As all the connected mat-

ters are scheduled to be list-ed for hearing on September9, 2020, we deem it appropri-ate that the term of threeadministrative members ofthe Armed Forces Tribunal isextended for a period of twomore months,” the bench said.

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The Supreme Court onFriday refused to enter-

tain a plea seeking setting upof a three-judge panel toinquire into the conduct offormer Chief Justice of IndiaRanjan Gogoi as a judge of theapex court.

Gogoi is now a RajyaSabha MP.

A bench headed by JusticeArun Mishra termed as“infructuous” the public

interest litigation (PIL), andsaid the petitioner did notpress for a hearing in last twoyears and moreover, nowJustice (retd) Gogoi hasalready demitted office.

“Why did not you (peti-tioner) press it for hearing inthe last two years? This pleahas become infructuous as hehas demitted office,” thebench, also comprisingJustices B R Gavai andKrishna Murari, said.

“Sorry we can’t entertain,”the bench told petitionerArun Ramchandra Hublikar,who had sought inquiry intothe alleged “omission andcommission” by Justice (retd)Gogoi as a judge of the apexcourt. The petitioner claimedbefore the bench that he hadmet the secretary general ofthe top court for listing of hisplea but it was not listed.

Justice Gogoi, the firstperson from the northeast toreach the top of judiciaryand credited for bringing thecurtains down on the decadesold politically and religious-ly sensitive Ayodhya land dis-pute, had retired as the CJI onNovember 17 last year.

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The flood situation in Biharremained grim on Friday

with an additional 1.13 lakh peo-ple bearing the brunt in 16 dis-tricts in the past 24 hours, tak-ing the total number of affect-ed people to 82.92 lakh, DisasterManagement Department bul-letin said. Flood-related deathsremained unchanged at 27, thebulletin said.

As many as 82,92,464 peo-ple have been affected by thedeluge in 1,322 panchayats of130 blocks since Thursday.

Additional five panchayatareas faced flood fury in the

past 24 hours while the num-ber of blocks and districtsremained the same at 130 and16 respectively. Till Thursday,81,79, 257 people were impact-ed by the calamity.

Darbhanga andMuzaffarpur remained the twomost affected districts wherethe number of people hit by thedeluge has increased.

The number of sufferershas also risen in Gopalganj dis-trict. Of the 27 deaths,Darbhanga district reported11, followed by six inMuzaffarpur, four in WestChamparan and two each inSaran, Siwan and Khagaria.

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Election Commission’sguidelines for conducting

elections in Bihar and otherplaces have received mixedresponse from the politicalparties of Bengal which goes topolls in May next year.

While the ruling TrinanoolCongress have received theEC directives for holding safeelections during the pandem-ic period, Opposition Left andBJP have doubted whetherthings would be implementedproperly in Bengal next year.

Supporting the EC movesenior TMC leader SaugatoRoy on Friday said “It soundsgood that the Commission hastaken into consideration basicissues like social distancing

and protocol based campaign-ing,” Roy sad adding “it isgood that the EC has not post-poned the elections on groundsof corona.”

The Commission has mademasks, gloves and social dis-tancing both during votingand campaigns mandatory.Besides it has fixed the numberof people who would beallowed to campaign and thosewho would accompany thecandidate while filing the nom-inations.

“This is the best possibleway to conduct the elections ifwe at all have to conduct it byensuring the safety of the peo-ple who come to vote as alsothose who conduct theelections,” Roy a senior MP

said.

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After a brief lull, Tamil Nadu is expe-riencing yet another bout of surge

in Covid-19 cases. On Friday, 5,995 newpersons were diagnosed with the pan-demic across the State, said a medicalbulletin issued by the department ofHealth. The State also saw 101 personssuccumbing to Covid-19 in the last 24hours.

There were 53, 413 active cases ofcovid-19 across the State as on Fridayevening. The day also saw 5,764 patientsgetting cured and discharged from hos-pitals.

The covid test centres numbering139 across the State tested 72,423 per-sons on Friday proving the commitment of the HealthDepartment in aggressive testing and

isolation of the patients afflicted withthe pandemic.

The Chennai Metropolis diag-nosed 1,282 new cases out of the 5,995persons who tested positive on Fridayand this has caused anguish among thepolicy makers and health workers. This is in stark contrast to theevents of last week when the numberof afflicted persons in the capital citycame down to 900s for a few dayswhich was music to the ears of the civicofficials.

Situation in Chengalpet (430) andKancheepuram (220) were no differentas the numbers were high in these twodistricts which are home to the State’smany industrial and educational com-plexes. Thiruvallur , another neigh-boring district tested 369 positive caseson Friday.

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During his maiden visit toJammu on Friday Lt-

Governor J&K Manoj Sinha inau-gurated Phase-I of the 58.25 Kmlong Jammu ring road betweenAkhnoor road, Kangrail andBhalwal.

The foundation stone of thering road was laid by PrimeMinister Narendra Modi in May2018.

The project, funded underPrime Ministers Developmentfund, is scheduled to be com-pleted at an estimated cost of2024 crores in December 2021.

The 8 km long road link,inaugurated today missed theearlier deadline of March 2020due to Covid-19 pandemic.

Once completed the ring

road will provide smooth con-nectivity to the commutersbetween Samba and Nagrota.The road link is going to connect60 villages along the route. 54 vil-lages fall in Jammu district and sixothers in Samba district.

Official sources claimed, theJammu Ring Road will help easechaos and traffic within the cityby connecting peripheries of thecity directly, reducing distance

and travel timebetween otherdistricts of theUT.

Speakingon the occa-sion, LtG o v e r n o rManoj Sinhatermed roadsas vital for any

society to progress. He urged theexecuting agencies for early com-pletion of the entire project andassured incentives to the execut-ing agencies and officers for com-pleting projects within stipulatedtime period.

The LG also commendeddistrict administration of Jammuand Samba for timely land acqui-sition and prompt removal of bot-tlenecks in the execution of the

project.MoS PMO, Dr Jitendra

Singh; Member of Parliament,Shamsher Singh Manhas;Member of Parliament, JugalKishore Sharma and ChiefSecretary, BVR Subrahmanyamalong with senior officers of thedistrict administration and policeattended the inauguration cere-mony. Later, Lt-Governor metseveral delegations at Raj Bhawanand interacted with former leg-islators, delegation of J&K HighCourt Bar Association,Jammu,ex- Auqaf Chairperson and adelegation of West PakistanRefugees.

A delegation of Federation ofIndustries from Jammu provinceled by Lalit Mahajan also calledon Lt-Governor here at RajBhavan.

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There has been no let up in thenumber of persons in Kerala

getting afflicted with Covid-19 as1,983 new patients were diag-nosed with the pandemic onFriday, said a release issued bythe office of the minister ofhealth KK Shylaja. Out of the1,983 new patients, 1,777 personscontracted Covid-19 throughlocal transmission,

The department of healthconfirmed that 12 persons suc-cumbed to covid-19 in the Stateduring the last 24 hours.Thiruvananthapuram topped thetable of Covid-19 patients with429 new persons joining theband on Friday. Out of 429 newpatients in Thiruvananthapuram,411 contracted the pandemicthrough local transmission, saidthe release.

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Hindu Makkal Katchi , a politicaloutfit in Tamil Nadu, has

alleged that the AIADMKGovernment led by EdappadiPalaniswami is discriminating theHindus in the State while encour-aging other religion.

Arjun Sampath, founder, HMK,said in a statement on Friday that theGovernment’s refusal of permissionto Hindus to observe VinayakaChathurthi scheduled for Saturdaywas proof of this ‘blatant discrimi-nation’.

He said that this year’s VinayakaChathurthi was of significant to theHindus because of their prayer to theGod for an early end to the Covid-19 pandemic haunting the world. “We had told the Government thatthere wouldn’t be any festivities andcelebrations but we should be allowedto take processions observing socialdistancing norms for immersion ofthe statues in the Bay of Bengal andrivers in the State,” said Sampath.

Meanwhile the BJP cadre all overthe State are of the view that it wastime for the party to end its alliancewith the AIADMK. “More than 70per cent of the AIADMK support-

ers are Hindus. They are offendedand felt let down by theGovernent’smove to ban VinayakaChathurthi celebration. TheGovernment has opened TASMACliquor outlets and allowed slaughterof animals for Id. But why we arebeing discriminated against?” askedSri Priya Iyer, a BJP activist.

Sampath said while Maharashtraand Karnataka have allowed GaneshChathurthi festivities, the Dravidiangovernments in Tamil Nadu alwaystreat the event as a law and orderissue despite the Hindus observe thecelebration with due diligence.

But the Madras High Court onWednesday had disposed off a peti-tion filed by a Hindu Front activistasking for directive to theGovernment allowing the festivitiesof Vinayak Chathurthi. The StateGovernment had declared pro-hibitory orders till August 31 mak-ing it difficult for the organisers toundertake processions.

Sampath pointed out that theGovernment had allowed theRamadan and Id festivities all overthe State despite the pandemic sit-uation. “It had also allowed the char-iot procession of the Cathedral inThoothukudi.

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The Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, AligarhMuslim University, a frontline hospital of western

Uttar Pradesh, on Friday achieved another milestone asits Department of Cardiology has been sanctioned twoseats of DM (Cardiology) by the Medical Council of India(MCI). An inspection by MCI was carried last month.It is the second super speciality course started by the JNMedical College. It already has an MCH course in PlasticSurgery.

The MCI team was highly impressed by the currentinfrastructure and progress of the Department ofCardiology This is a monumental achievement in thehistory of the Aligarh Muslim University as this superspeciality course will go a long way in providing a fil-lip to the efforts of the Department of Cardiology, AMU,Aligarh, to further amplify the state of the art servicesto a large number of heart patients and will breed moretrained Cardiologists to cater to the increasing demandfor Interventional Cardiologists all over the country.

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As the dengue sting is back with themonsoon season, Aligarh Muslim

University has issued an advisory forpreventing dengue in the Universityarea and the Aligarh city.

The Registrar of the university, MrAbdul Hamid (IPS) in an advisory forpreventing dengue in AMU has urgedpeople to ensure the emptying andcleaning of desert coolers regularly,covering overhead tanks tightly,removal of unused tanks, clearingjunk materials from rooftops andbackyards, cleaning flower pot traysand not allowing stagnation of waterand avoiding flow of water on rooftops.

The advisory also stated that therooftops should be cleaned for smoothflow of water for avoiding mosquitobreeding, artificial open water collec-tion points must be notified to theHealth Office and proper meshwork ondoors and windows of the buildingmust be done.

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Aligarh has gained an edge in the Cleanliness Survey2020. Due to better sanitation, toilets, garbage dis-

posal, public feedback and downloading of sanitation app,Aligarh has ranked 30th in the country among the citieswith population of 1 to 10 lakh whereas it has got thirdplace in the state. Aligarh's ranking was 145 in the coun-try in 2019 survey.

Among cities with a population of one to 10 lakh,Aligarh is 30th in the country and third in the state. Afterthe announcement of the results of the Cleanliness Survey2020, there has been a wave of joy in the MunicipalCorporation.

Municipal Commissioner Satya Prakash Patel at theoffice located at Seva Bhavan told that in the 2018 sur-vey, Aligarh was ranked 173rd in the country and 145thin the 2019 survey. This time it is in third place. Aligarh(Score 4309.19) has been included in the top 3 cities ofthe state. Noida and Jhansi are in first and second placerespectively. He said that the credit for reaching 30th rankfrom 145 goes to the citizens, officers, employees, coun-cilors and especially the cleaning staff.

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Avideo went viral during thelock down at Muzaffarpur

railway station in Bihar in whicha 2-year-old innocent was try-ing to wake up her mother andwas dragging the cloth from herdead body, his elder brotherArmaan(4) and other familymembers were also seen stand-ing nearby in the video.

To help these orphanedchildren, many including filmactor Shah Rukh Khan, TejashwiYadav extended their hands,now Salma Ansari, wife of for-mer Vice President HamidAnsari, has taken up the respon-sibility of raising these chil-dren.

Salma Ansari, president ofthe Alnoor Charitable Societyand founder of Chacha Nehrumadarsa(school), said that dur-ing the lockdown when Alvinawas coming from Ahmedabadto Muzaffarpur in Bihar, shedied of sickness or hunger in thetrain. The body was kept at thestation. The two and a half yearold child was trying to wake hismother again and again. Itsvideo also went viral on socialmedia. Film actor Shah RukhKhan asked to adopt the childbut later gave �2 lakh to thegrandparents.

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Ramesh Chennithala, Kerala’sLeader of Opposition,

unleashed a no-holds barredattack on Chief MinisterPinarayi Vijayan and his coun-cil of Ministers on Friday for‘massive corruption andfavoritism’ associated with theLIFE Mission of theGovernment.

LIFE Mission was one of theflag ships programmes launchedby the LDF Government whichcame to power in 2016.

It envisaged houses for allpoor people in the State who donot own even a cent of land andalso a job which could sustaintheir families withoutpoverty.

But the Mission finds itselfenmeshed in corruption andmisdeeds as the UnionGovernment on Thursday askedthe State Government to furnishthe reasons behind violation ofprocedures in its implementa-tion. It has been disclosed bythose arrested in the gold smug-gling scam that the Kerala gov-ernment had signed aMemorandum ofUnderstanding with the UAEbased Red Crescent to buildhouses as part of LIFE Mission.

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Maharashtrabre a c h e d

the Covid-19infections’ markof 14,000 for thesecond consecu-tive day on Friday, as it recorded sec-ond highest-ever 14,161 infectedcases, while it logged 339 pandemicdeaths in various parts of the state.

A day after highest-ever 14,492people had tested positive for the pan-demic in the State, 14,161 new infec-tions were reported on Friday, takingthe total number of infected cases inthe State to 6,57,450.

Pune with 1,44,450 fresh casescontinued to race ahead of Mumbaiwith 1,34,228 in terms of the totalinfections.

With fresh fatalities, the totalnumber of deaths in the state rose toa staggering 21,698.

Of the 339 deaths reported onFriday, Pune accounted for a high-est of 81 deaths, followed by 46deaths in Thane and 42 in Mumbai.

Similarly, in the middle range,there were 20 deaths in Kolhapur, 17in Nagpur, 16 each in Palghar andNashik, 13 in Satara, 12 in Sangli inthe middle range.

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Page 6: ˘ ˇ...2020/08/22  · H1N1 has an existing flu shot to prevent its spread. Incidentally, prevention strate-gies are same as that for the Covid-19. “If a person is sick, it’s

Felling a tree is murder. Felling anentire forest is genocide. Peoplehave argued that India has sufficientland under forests and there is noharm in felling some of them to

make way for development, particularlywhen forests can be regrown elsewhere. Theyare grievously wrong. First, plants are feel-ing, communicating, mutually caring andbenevolent living beings that need to be treat-ed with respect and not cut down to suithuman convenience. Second, planted forestscan never be the same as the ones existingover the ages.

As to the first, Sir Jagadish ChandraBose, who made path-breaking contributionsto remote wireless signalling and micro-waveoptics, also made pioneering and revolution-ary contributions to the understanding ofplant physiology and psyche. In a landmarkdevelopment, he demonstrated that plantshad feeling. He did it through an experimentat the Royal Society, London, in 1901, show-ing a plant quivering frantically under theimpact of poison before dying. Bose, wholaid the foundation of what has come to beknown as plant neurobiology, also showedthat plants had, like animals, a central ner-vous system with nerves radiating to differ-ent parts of the organism and capable of elec-trically coding stimuli and transmittingimpulses from a nerve centre to terminalmotor organs.

Bose held that plants were fully cog-nisant of changes in their environment andresponded visibly to stimuli, includingslight fluctuations in light caused by pass-ing clouds. Also, the transmission of nervousimpulses determined functions like growth,respiration and motor activity. He alsoobserved spontaneous pulsatory move-ments in plants like heart beat in animals.Indeed, in his seminal paper titled, “JagdishChandra Bose & plant neurobiology” in theIndian Journal of Medical Research, PrakashNarain Tandon cites Bose’s speech inGuildhouse in London on June 30, 1929, inwhich he says, “In many other ways we areable to find that plant has a heart that beatscontinuously as long as life remains.”

Other researchers and scholars fol-lowed the trail Bose had blazed and plantneurobiology came to encompass the studyof forests in different parts of the world. AsPradeep Krishen points out in his introduc-tion to Peter Wohlleben’s The Hidden Life ofTrees, leaf tissues transmit electrical signalswhen nibbled — just as humans do whenhurt — to summon defensive compoundsfrom within themselves and release chem-ical signals in the form of scent moleculesto warn other plants of the impending dan-ger and enable them to take defensive mea-sures. Wohlleben himself cites the exampleof umbrella thorn acacias in the AfricanSavannah which did not like giraffes feed-ing on them. In “mere minutes,” they start-ed pumping toxic substances into their leavesto rid themselves of the herbivores, which

got the message and moved on,but to trees about 100 yardsaway. The reason? The acaciasemitted ethylene gas that sig-nalled to neighbouring trees ofthe same species that danger wasat hand.

Wohlleben further pointsout that trees “communicate bymeans of olfactory, visual andelectrical signals.” Trees aresocial beings. Those belongingto the same species communi-cate with one another throughan intricate network of fungalthreads connected to their rootsystems by means of whichthey exchange carbon and othernutrients among themselves.This, Wohlleben says, “leads tothe conclusion that forests aresuperorganisms with intercon-nections, much like antcolonies.”

Wohlleben then asks: “Whyare trees such social beings?Why do they share food withtheir own species and some-times even go as far as to nour-ish their own competitors?”Saying that the reasons are thesame as in the case of humancommunities, he writes, “Thereare advantages of workingtogether. A tree is not a forest.On its own, a tree cannot estab-lish a consistent local climate. It

is at the mercy of wind andweather. But together manytrees create an ecosystem thatmoderates the extremes of heatand cold, stores a great deal ofwater and generates a great dealof humidity. And in the protect-ed environment, trees can live tobe very old. To get to this point,the community must remainintact, no matter what. If everytree were looking out only foritself, quite a few of them wouldnever reach old age.”

Besides what forests do forindividual trees they comprise,they contribute in critical waysto human survival. They inducerainfall. They capture carbondioxide from the atmosphereand transform it into biomassthrough photosynthesis andaccumulate it in the form of bio-mass, deadwood and litter andin forest soils. Deforestationand harvesting fires, besidesrespiration and oxidation,release carbon from forests andincrease atmospheric pollution.Further, deforestation destroysthe habitats of wild animals,which not only enhances the rateof extinction of species — whichstands roughly at an alarming3,000 of them every year glob-ally — but increases human-ani-mal conflicts.

The argument that all thelosses listed above can be com-pensated for by the planting ofnew forests does not hold. Thelinks among trees that can leadto mutual nurturing can only beestablished in undisturbedforests. The roots of planted treesare irreparably damaged, which,Wohlleben points out, seems to“make them almost incapable ofnetworking with one another. Asa rule, trees in planted forestsbehave like loners and sufferfrom their isolation.” In hisintroduction, Pradeep Krishencites the example of sal trees,which are known as gregariousbecause they grow together inlarge numbers and die in isola-tion, unable to communicatewith others of their group.

In her chapter, titled“Ancient Forests and SacredGroves” in the anthology CriticalThemes in the EnvironmentalHistory of India edited by RanjanChakrabarti, Nanditha Krishnawrites that recognition of the“importance of trees and forests’go back “to India’s earliest civil-isation.” She further states thatthe Rig Veda’s Oshadhi Suktaaddresses plants and vegetablesas, “O Mother” and says“Hundreds are your birthplacesand thousands are your shoots.”

The Rig Veda, she points out,very specifically states thatforests should not be destroyed(8.1.13). The Yajur Veda speaksof the ill-effects of deforestation.

In the ChhandogyaUpanishad, the sage UddalokaAruni asks Svetaketu, who wantsto know about the self, to bringthe fruit of a Nyagrodha(Banyan) tree and then asks himto break it. That done, the fol-lowing dialogue ensues, “Whatdo you see?/Some seeds,extremely small, sir/Break one ofthem/ It is broken, sir?/What doyou see?/Nothing, sir.”

Uddaloka Aruni continued,“The subtle essence that you donot see in that is the wholeessence of the Nyagrodha tree.Believe me, my son, that whichis the subtle essence — in thatall things have their existence.That is the truth. That is the Self.And that, Svetaketu, THATART THOU.” (Translated bySwami Prabhavananda andFrederick Manchester). Sincethe subtle essence of all is thesame, all are manifestations ofBrahman, the supreme being,the universal consciousness, allthings and beings, includingtrees, shrubs and forests.

The relevance of all that hasbeen written above has to beseen in the context of the draftof the new Environment ImpactAssessment Notification, someof whose provisions have beencausing serious concern. One ofthese lays down that projects canreceive clearance post-facto, ie,a project operating in violationof the EPA can now apply forclearance. This is despite aSupreme Court order on April1, clearly stating that such clear-ances are contrary to law. Alsoworrying is the listing of anumber of projects as being out-side the purview of the EIA,including any the Governmentmay label as “strategic.” Not justthat, the draft says that no infor-mation on “such projects shall beplaced in the public domain.”The list of exempted projectsalso includes all concerninginland waterways and nationalhighways. The concern trig-gered by this is matched by theprovision that construction pro-jects of up to 150,000 squaremetres in area shall be outsidethe EIA’s bounds.

It is good that UnionMinister Prakash Javadekar saidon August 10 that the “thou-sands of suggestions” received inrespect of the EnvironmentImpact Assessment (EIA) noti-fication would be consideredbefore the final draft is made.One hopes that the processleads to the shedding of someprovisions which have sentalarm bells ringing.

(The writer is ConsultantEditor, The Pioneer, and author)

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Sir — The demise of the maestro,Pandit Jasraj, will be mourned byfollowers of Indian classical musiceverywhere. He belonged to theMewati gharana and was widelyregarded as one of India’s great-est vocalists. He infused life intothe most complex ragas and mes-merised the audience with hisunique style. Jasraj also made amark for himself as a mentor tomany noted vocalists. He receivedseveral honours over a careerspanning 80 years, including thePadma Vibhushan and theSangeet Natak Akademi Award.His loss will leave a deep void inthe cultural sphere.

Ramesh G JethwaniBengaluru

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Sir — This refers to the editori-al, “For Sushant’s sake” (August21). The Supreme Court hasdone justice to Sushant SinghRajput’s family by ordering aCentral Bureau of Investigation(CBI)-led probe into the myste-rious death of the actor. It isunfortunate though that what

should have been a routine mat-ter to be handled by the policeturned into a political slugfestbetween two State Governments,their police forces and politicalsupporters. Now, the CBI has itswork cut out. Precious time has

already been lost. It is also fearedthat crucial evidence has beendestroyed. Yet the CBI has theability to dig out the buried mat-ter. It only needs a free hand.

ReshmaVia email

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Sir — Be it a bridge collapse, abuilding fire, a major road/railaccident or a fatal bomb blast,people flock to accident spots in

droves, clicking pictures or self-ies to announce “I was there” andpost them on social media tocount the number of “likes.” This“modern fashion” ofdark/black/grief voyeurism is notonly vulgar, it poses a great hin-drance to relief efforts, too.

Residents of Malappuramdistrict of Kerala are, perhaps,still backward in this respect. Assoon as an Air India Express air-craft crashed amid heavy rainfall,they rushed to the wreckage sitein hundreds, ignoring allCOVID-19 consequences theymight have had to face or the riskof an explosion from leaking fuel.The next morning, the sameresidents queued up in varioushospitals to donate blood.

Yes the residents ofMalappuram reinforced our faithin humanity. We must learn fromthese bravehearts about love,compassion and empathy.Perhaps, the new dawn of civili-ty and kindness would, at last,enlighten this society plagued asit is by the poison of hatred andintolerance.

Kajal ChatterjeeKolkata

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Page 7: ˘ ˇ...2020/08/22  · H1N1 has an existing flu shot to prevent its spread. Incidentally, prevention strate-gies are same as that for the Covid-19. “If a person is sick, it’s

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The New Education Policy (NEP) 2020 marksa paradigm shift in terms of focussing onskilling. However, its success will lie in prop-

er implementation. The NEP emphasises the roleof higher education in promoting individual andsocietal well-being. The policy envisions the devel-opment of an enlightened, knowledgeable andskilled nation that can find and implement robustsolutions to its own problems. This will be donethrough changes in higher education and impor-tantly, by focussing on integrating skill with edu-cation. This is a most contemporary and relevantdeparture from earlier policies on education thatcould lead the country into the 21st century andthe fourth industrial revolution.

The current scenario: The present skill gap isa quagmire for both the individual and the indus-try. In the present scenario, India has a large pop-ulation of unemployable youth. On one hand, wehave highly-educated graduates with expensive,State-funded degrees who cannot be employedbecause they do not have the right skills. On theother hand, we have highly-skilled individuals whoare not eligible for jobs because they do not havethe knowledge of the three Rs (Reading, Writingand Arithmetic).

The industry complains of the paucity of prac-tical training by the universities during undergrad-uate and postgraduate programmes. The academiacomplain of non-cooperation by the industry forstudents’ internships and project works. And thecountry bears the brunt of it all.

The 12th Five-Year Plan (2012-17) estimatedthat less than five per cent of the Indian workforcein the age group of 19-24 years received formal voca-tional education. This is in contrast to developedcountries like the US, Germany and South Korea,where vocational education is much more common,at 52 per cent, 75 per cent and 96 per cent respec-tively.

The causes leading to this situation are multi-farious. Vocational training and skilling are notplaced at par with the regular streams of educationin our society. The general perception is that voca-tional education is inferior to mainstream educa-tion. Students aiming to do well academically pre-fer mainstream colleges and vocational training cen-tres are considered second-rate.

This spills over into academics as well, to theextent that even students joining professionalcourses do not possess market-oriented practicalskills. The mushrooming of engineering collegeswithout adequate quality checks over the last twodecades has only worsened the situation. In this sce-nario, many B.Tech students get a lower pay pack-age than those passing out of polytechnics and ITIs.It is a matter of serious concern and needs to be dealtwith by a complete re-imagination of how vocation-al education should be offered to students.

The NEP aims to overcome this flawed percep-tion by focussing on imparting skills. This is a stepin the right direction. However, the success will liein its proper implementation, when we integratevocational programmes into mainstream education.This can be done in all educational programmes ina phased manner.

The NIFT experience: The experience of ourleading national institutions provides valuableinsight on how we may achieve success in ourendeavours. The National Institute of FashionTechnology (NIFT) has already taken an initiativein this direction. India has a rich heritage of hand-loom and handicrafts and there are hundreds of clus-ters of weavers and artisans across the country. A

three-week attachment with a cluster wasintegrated into the regular NIFT curricu-lum in 2010-11, with weightage in the col-lege credit system. Students are requiredto visit one cluster for 21 days, stay withthe locals and learn their skill. After theattachment, they prepare a diagnosticreport along with a SWOT (Strengths,Weaknesses, Opportunities, Strengths)analysis of the trade.

This exercise has proved to be extra-ordinarily beneficial for the students.Students pick practical tips right from thefield and understand the nuances of eachart and craft. They learn soft skills likedealing with impediments and forgingprofessional relationships. They get achance to practise management andmarketing skills in real-life situations. Asubsequent scrutiny by the institute andpeer group hones their analytical skills,where gaps in supply chain and marketlinkages as well as technical inefficienciesare identified, deliberated and addressed.

Over the last one decade, NIFT stu-dents have looked at spinning wheel,loom, dye casting, weaving, melting,moulding and welding in clusters acrossthe country. They are now in touch withthe sources for procuring niche productslike Kani, Patola, Paithani, Phulkari, Ikat,Chikan, Brocade, Batik and Ajrakh tex-tiles and the best of products in wood,metal, bamboo and terracotta handicrafts.They know the difference between hand-loom and powerloom, handspun andmachine spun cloth and organic andchemical dyes. They are also aware of theground realities and hardships of thecraftsmen.

The process has led to a windfall forthe weavers and artisans as well. Now theylook at the colour palette and can use thevarious hues of green and blue differen-tially. They have improved their technol-ogy, design and product mix. The gaudy

Maheshwari saree has been converted intodesigner evening wear, thus widening theconsumer base. Maheshwar cloth is alsobeing used for fancy curtains, cushioncovers and home decor, bringing diver-sification in the trade.

A Jhabua doll, earlier being sold for�2 in the village market, now fetches 50times that as earrings, keychains andimaginative napkin holders. In additionto becoming conscious of environmen-tal issues and sustainability, the artisanshave also become familiar with the inter-net and e-marketing techniques. Ordersflow to Beawar-Khas and Benares fromDelhi, Mumbai and Ahmedabad.

The success model of NIFT can beadapted and replicated by professional col-leges. Universities need to signMemoranda of Understanding (MoU)with the industry, trade and commerceorganisations. Regional engineering col-leges need to enter into agreements withlocal Micro, Small and MediumEnterprises (MSMEs) that they will part-ner with professional colleges, give spe-cial inputs and also hire apprentices.Classroom study in college needs to beregularly supplemented by supervised,hands-on work experience. This will bea symbiotic relationship and a win-win sit-uation for all.

The millennials will be able to bringtheir diverse thinking into the mainstreamin a protected environment. Theirstrengths in terms of customised use oftechnology and innovation will add valueto industrial products. This will also givethem space to grow by applying theirknowledge to practical problems. It willsharpen their thought process and makethem more aware of their own inclina-tions, thus better preparing them for thefuture.

Moving forward: Uttar Pradesh(UP) is contemplating essential industry

attachment and internship programmesin every year of professional courses. TheState universities can take a cue from thecurricula being followed by manufactur-ing giants like Germany. Students can havean internship with the industry for oneto two months in the first two years of aprofessional course, three months in thethird year and six to nine months in thefinal year. This internship need not onlybe with big business houses but shouldalso, and preferably, be with small andmedium enterprises spread across theState in the organised and unorganisedsectors. This skill training needs to bebacked up by a robust credit system thathas due weightage for this vital hands-onexperience. This will not only help in pro-moting vocational skill but also increasethe social signalling for skilling.

UP has recently come up with a Start-up Policy. This encourages innovation andentrepreneurship in higher education. Itsuggests a leave period of one year dur-ing an undergraduate or postgraduatecourse if a student wishes to start an enter-prise in between. This will be brought insync with the exit and re-entry provisionin the NEP.

The policy also suggests permittingthe start-up as the final year project of thestudent. Universities in the State are tak-ing steps to formalise these suggestions.They are also working towards setting upincubation hubs, providing financialknowledge and promoting entrepreneur-ship among students.

If vocational skilling and educationare properly integrated, the country’sdemographic dividend can be harnessedinto a huge set of skilled professionals. Thejourney is tough but the fruits will besweet.

(The author is currently AdditionalChief Secretary, Higher Education, in theGovernment of UP.)

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There is no other kind of tradingin India but the insider variety,”remarked a former president of

the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) in1992, whereas Arthur Levitt,Chairman of the US SecuritiesExchange Commission (SEC), viewedit as one with no place in any law-abid-ing economy. Between these ends ofthe spectrum lies the debate on insid-er trading. Although India was not latein recognising the detrimental impactof insider trading on the rights ofshareholders, corporate governanceand financial markets, the legal regime,including the enforcement mechanismrelating to its prevention, remains ina nascent stage. The Securities andExchange Board of India (SEBI),

Prohibition of Insider TradingRegulations, 2015 (PIT Regulations)prohibit insider trading while in pos-session of Unpublished Price SensitiveInformation (UPSI) subject to certainexceptions. Rule four of the PITRegulations contains provisions apro-pos trading when in possession ofUPSI. Trades carried out by a personwho has UPSI would be presumed tohave been motivated by the knowledgeand awareness of such information andthey shall be held guilty of insider trad-ing. Simply put, any abuse of positionor power by insiders for personal ben-efits, monetary or otherwise, is afraud committed on public sharehold-ers, who expect unbiased managementof the company’s operations in theirinterest. The 2020 amendments to thePIT Regulations aim at bolstering thelevel of compliance and mitigating thedefects plaguing them. Prior to theamendment, there was considerableconfusion with respect to the handlingof UPSI by intermediaries.Notwithstanding the FAQs released bythe SEBI to address the same, specif-

ic details regarding the maintenance ofthe digital database by such entitiescontinued to remain shrouded inuncertainty. Further, the list of trans-actions under Schedule B of theRegulations, exempting them fromtrading window restrictions, was notamenable to additions. This prohibit-ed reasonable expansion of the sameto include transactions of a like nature.Lastly, there was also the issue of lackof adherence to the code of conductunder the PIT Regulations.

Recent amendments to insidertrading: Through a previous amend-ment that came into effect on April 1,2019, the SEBI had mandated everylisted entity, intermediary and fiducia-ry to maintain a structured digital data-base, which would have the name andPAN details of a person with whom theUPSI was shared. This was done toensure that there was a trail of infor-mation whenever the SEBI needed toinvestigate the sharing of UPSI. Now,through an amendment in July, theSEBI has mandated that the nature ofthe UPSI and the details of the person

sharing it must also be recorded in thedatabase. Moreover, maintaining sucha database has to be done internallyand cannot be outsourced. The data-base should store data for the previouseight years at any given time.

The second most notable amend-ment is that the trading windowrestrictions would no more apply to“offer for sale” (OFS) and “RightsEntitlement” (RE). Schedule B of thePIT Regulations mandates that thereshould be a closure of the trading win-dow for designated people and theirrelatives as it can be reasonably expect-ed that they possess UPSI. However,through another notification in July,the SEBI allowed selling of promoters’holding by way of OFS and exercisingRE during the period of closure of thetrading window.

The SEBI also specified that list-ed entities, intermediaries and fiducia-ries are now mandated to promptlyand voluntarily report any Code ofConduct violation under the PITRegulations in the prescribed formatto the bourses and any amount recov-

ered from the defaulter shall bedeposited in the Investor Protectionand Education Fund.

Analysis and impact: The prima-ry benefit of the amendment that man-dated a structured digital database isreduced information asymmetry whilethe SEBI investigates matters of insid-er trading. In cases relating to it, dis-tinguishing the insider who conveyedthe UPSI, in any case, turns out to beprogressively significant for narrowingdown expected guilty parties and tofollow the data trail. This was one ofthe pertinent issues in the ongoing“WhatsApp spill” case wherein afterextensive investigations, the SEBI hadpunished certain people for spillingdata identified to be price-sensitive.However, since WhatsApp messagesare typically ensured through end-to-end encryption, the SEBI could notefficiently recognise the entitiesinvolved in the trade, thus setting analarmingly low standard of proof insuch cases. It is hoped that the new,organised and structured digital data-base may help and forestall such

cases. The second amendment thatcuts a special exception to the tradingwindow is in the light of the ongoingendeavours by the SEBI to facilitateeasy routes of raising capital. This ismuch needed and will give morechances to listed entities to raise fastcapital. Lastly, the mandatoryannouncing of infringement of thecode of conduct would make a morestrong system of compliance.

Regulatory solutions: With eachof these amendments, while the SEBIhas chalked out additional responsi-bilities for intermediaries and fiducia-ries, as well as streamlined its regula-tory powers with bourses, the overallimpact on the market hygiene remainsto be seen. While there seem to be con-cerns regarding the degree and extentof control that may be exercised bystock exchanges over unlisted entities,the same will depend on the success-ful implementation of the PITAmendment and issuance of furtherclarifications and circulars by SEBI.

The requirement of maintainingan enhanced digital database is in line

with the SEBI’s probe and surveillanceprocedure. However, it may lead toparticular operational challenges andissues for the listed firm, intermediaryor fiduciary, because in addition tomaintaining more data for a moreextended period, the entity is nolonger permitted to outsource the taskof keeping the database.

Market conduct regulation ispoised at a critical threshold in India,where a combination of nuanced lawsand efficient enforcement can indeedbe transformative. When understoodin their true spirit, these amend-ments are capable of engendering abehavioural shift across corporates,their Board and other key stakehold-ers, in terms of how we balance com-mercial interests with accountability forinformation access. As the marketpractice evolves on this, one can onlyhope that we can achieve that fine yetfirm balance, amply aided by even-handed regulatory practices and judi-cial momentum.

(The writer is Managing PartnerKS Legal and Associates.)

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London: In a joint statement,France, Germany and the UKsaid that they will not supportthe US in seeking to reimposesanctions on Iran.

The US sent a letter to theUN Security Council onThursday requesting to initiatethe “snapback” mechanism,which allows a participant to theJoint Comprehensive Plan ofAction (JCPoA) to the reimpo-sition of the multilateral sanc-tions against Iran which werelifted in 2015 in accordance withResolution 2231, reports Xinhuanews agency.

In response, the countries inthe joint statement said onThursday: “The US ceased to bea participant to the JCPoA fol-lowing their withdrawal fromthe deal on May 8, 2018... Wecannot therefore support thisaction which is incompatiblewith our current efforts to sup-port the JCPoA.”

France, Germany and theUK said they “are committedto preserving the processesand institutions which consti-tute the foundation of multi-lateralism”.

“We remain guided by theobjective of upholding theauthority and integrity of theUN Security Council. We callon all UN Security Councilmembers to refrain from anyaction that would only deependivisions in the Security Councilor that would have seriousadverse consequences on itswork.”

The three countries furthersaid they “believe that we shouldaddress the current issue of sys-tematic Iranian non-compli-ance with its JCPoA obligationsthrough dialogue betweenJCPoA participants, includingthrough the Joint Commissionand use of the DisputeResolution Mechanism”. IANS

Ankara: Turkish PresidentRecep Tayyip Erdogan hasannounced the discovery of alarge natural gas reserves offthe Black Sea coast, days afterhe promised “good news” thatwould usher in a “new era” forthe energy dependent country.

Erdogan said on Fridaythat the amount of gas dis-

covered is 320 billion cubicmeters, adding that he hopesto start extracting and usingthe gas by 2023.

If confirmed as recover-able resources, the reservescould ease the country’sdependence on costly energyimports and could ease thefinancial market jitters thathave seen the country’s cur-rency plummet to record lowsthis summer.

The Turkish drilling ship,Fatih, had been carrying outexploration operations in theTuna-1 sector in the westernBlack Sea for the past month.The sector is near whereRomania has also found gasreserves.

The discovery comes astensions between NATO alliesTurkey and Greece are run-ning high over oil and gasexploration in disputed watersin the eastern Mediterranean.

Greek and Turkish war-ships have been shadowingeach other after Turkey sent aresearch ship to look forpotential undersea oil andgas deposits. The Turkish shipis scheduled to search forenergy reserves there untilAugust 23. AP

Washington: Calling onAmericans to combat racism,Democratic presidential candi-date Joe Biden has recalled oneof the most important conver-sations he had during the cam-paign with George Floyd’s 6-year-old daughter, whose words“Daddy changed the world”burrowed deep into his heart.

Biden, 77, officially accept-ed the presidential nominationof the Democratic Party on thefinal day of the four-day virtu-al convention of the party onThursday night.

During his address, Bidensaid that his campaign was —among other things — about“winning the heart, and yes, thesoul of America ... for thosecommunities who have knownthe injustice of the ‘knee on theneck.’

It was a reference to Floyd,a Black man killed by aMinneapolis police officer inlate May. Biden said “one of themost important conversations”he had during the campaign

was with Floyd’s young daugh-ter Gianna, the day before hisfuneral.

“She was incredibly brave,”Biden said.

“I’ll never forget. When Ileaned down to speak with her,she looked into my eyes andsaid, ‘Daddy changed the world.“Her words burrowed deep intomy heart,” he said.

Floyd was killed during thearrest after allegedly passing acounterfeit $20 bill inMinneapolis. A white policeofficer, Derek Chauvin, knelt onFloyd’s neck for nearly eightminutes, choking him to death.

After his death, protestsagainst police violence toward

Black people quickly spreadacross the United States andinternationally against racism.

“George Floyd’s death wasthe breaking point” for thecountry to wake up to racism inAmerica, Biden said.

“America is ready in John’swords to ‘lay down the heavyburden of hate’ and do the hardwork of rooting out systemicracism,” Biden said. Bidenpicked California SenatorKamala Harris as his runningmate this week. Harris, 55, hasbecome the first-ever Americanof Indian and African descent tobe picked by a major party forthe top post as vice president ofthe United States. AFP

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New York: Democratic Party’spresidential nominee Joe Bidenhas said that his running mate,Kamala Harris will make a“great Vice President” with apowerful voice for the nation.

In his speech on Thursdaynight while formally acceptinghis nomination at the last day ofthe Democratic NationalConvention, he spoke of her var-ious identities that mesh with theparty’s assertions of unity andempowerment of minorities.

Outlining his monumentaltasks ahead if he is elected,Biden said: “I won’t have to doit alone. Because I will have agreat Vice President at my side.

Senator Kamala Harris. She is apowerful voice for this nation.

“Her story is the Americanstory. She knows about all theobstacles thrown in the way ofso many in our country.Women, Black women, BlackAmericans, South AsianAmericans, immigrants, the left-out and left-behind.

“But she’s overcome everyobstacle she’s ever faced. No one’sbeen tougher on the big banksor the gun lobby. No one’s beentougher in calling out this cur-rent administration for itsextremism, its failure to followthe law, and its failure to simplytell the truth.” IANS

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Washington: Taking a dig atDonald Trump, DemocraticParty’s presidential nominee JoeBiden took out a moment tothank Barack Obama for beinga great president who the chil-dren could and did look up tobut said the same cannot be saidabout the current occupant ofthe White House.

In his nomination accep-tance speech, Biden said, “speak-

ing of president Obama, a manI was honoured to serve along-side for eight years as vice pres-ident, let me take this momentto say something we don’t saynearly enough. Thank you, Mr.President (Obama). You were agreat president, a president ourchildren could and did look upto. No one’s going to say thatabout the current occupant ofthe White House”. PTI

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Washington: Previewingthemes for next week’sRepublican Party convention,Vice President Mike Pencepromised a heavy focus onGOP support for law and orderas he drew a contrast withDemocrats for a “negative”tone at their gathering and fail-ure to acknowledge violenceplaguing some US cities.

“We’re going to make surethat the American people seethe choice here,” Pence said.

President Donald Trumpand Pence have blamed out-breaks of violence on a radicalleft, which they have sought toassociate with Democraticpresidential nominee Joe Bidenand his running mate,California Sen.

Kamala Harris, asemblematic of the type ofagenda they would pursue ifelected. AP

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4�����/������=!��%���� =( Moscow: Russian doctors gave

a dissident who is in a comaafter a suspected poisoning per-mission to be transferred abroadfor medical treatment, a seniorphysician said on Friday.

The reversal came aftermore than 24 hours of wran-gling over Alexei Navalny’s con-dition and treatment.

Navalny, a 44-year-oldpolitician and corruption inves-tigator who is one of RussianPresident Vladimir Putin’sfiercest critics, was admitted toan intensive care unit in theSiberian city of Omsk onThursday. His supportersbelieve he was poisoned andthat the Kremlin is behind it.

His family and supporterswanted him brought to a topGerman medical clinic, but hisphysicians in Omsk said he wastoo unstable to move, evenafter a plane with German spe-cialists and advanced equipmentarrived. Navalny’s supportersdenounced that as a ploy by

authorities to stall until any poi-son would no longer be trace-able in his system. A senior doc-tor in Omsk said the team didnot believe he was poisoned.

The German doctors laterexamined Navalny and said hewas fit to be transported,according to a representative ofthe charity that has organisedthe plane to bring him to Berlin.

“I understand he’s stillunconscious, but they’re used tosuch special assignments andthey say very clearly he can flyand they want to fly him,” filmproducer Jaka Bizilj, of CinemaFor Peace, told The AssociatedPress after being in contactwith the German doctors.

The Russian medical teamthen relented and deputy chiefdoctor of the Omsk hospitalAnatoly Kalinichenko toldreporters on Friday that hewould be allowed to leave.

The flight was scheduled forSaturday morning, Russia’s RIANovosti news agency reported,

citing airport officials.Earlier, a Kremlin

spokesman Dmitry Peskovdenied the resistance to thetransfer was political. He said hewasn’t aware of any instructionsto stop the transfer and that itwas purely a medical decision.“It may pose a threat to hishealth,” Peskov said.

Navalny’s wife toldreporters that hospital staff andmen she suspected were lawenforcement agents didn’t let herspeak to the German specialists,who she said were brought intothe facility in secrecy, througha back door.

The most prominentmember of Russia’s opposition,Navalny campaigned to chal-lenge Putin in the 2018 pres-idential election but wasbarred from running. Sincethen, he has been promotingopposition candidates inregional elections, challengingmembers of the ruling party,United Russia. AP

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Jerusalem: Palestinian mili-tants fired 12 rockets at Israelfrom the Gaza Strip overnight,nine of which were intercept-ed, and Israel responded withthree airstrikes on targetslinked to the territory’s militantHamas rulers, the Israeli mili-tary said early Friday.

It was the most seriousexchange of fire along the Gazafrontier in months, but therewere no reports of casualties.Police said buildings and vehi-cles in Israel were damaged,and that bomb-disposal unitshad been dispatched to pick up

shrapnel and rocket parts.In recent weeks, groups

affiliated with Hamas havelaunched incendiary balloonsinto Israel, igniting farmland ina bid to pressure Israel to easethe blockade it imposed onGaza when the Islamic mili-tants seized power in 2007. Therocket fire marks a significantescalation. Israel and Hamashave fought three wars and sev-eral smaller battles over the last13 years. Neither side isbelieved to be seeking war, butany casualties could ignite awider conflict. AP

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Washington: PostmasterGeneral Louis DeJoy, pressed bysenators over campaign seasonmail disruptions, said Friday hewas unaware of some recentchanges by his agency until theysparked a public uproar.

But he also said he has noplans to restore mailboxes orhigh-speed sorting machinesthat have been removed.

His testimony raised freshquestions about how the PostalService will ensure timely deliv-ery of ballots for the Novemberelection.

DeJoy told senators thatelection mail would be priori-tized for delivery as in yearspast. But he said that bluecurbside collection boxes andsorting equipment that havebeen removed are “not needed.”

DeJoy distanced himselffrom President Donald Trump’scomplaints about mail-in bal-lots that are expected to surgein the coronavirus pandemic,but he told senators could notyet provide a detailed planabout how he will ensure on-time election mail delivery.

He declared that the PostalService “is fully capable andcommitted to delivering thenation’s election mail securelyand on-time.” He said that washis “No. 1 priority between nowand Election Day.” “I think theAmerican people should beable to vote by mail,” DeJoy tes-tified.

The new postmaster gen-

eral, a Trump donor and allywho took the job in June, hasfaced a public outcry overchanges and delivery delays.Democrats warn his cost-cut-ting initiatives are causing anupheaval that threatens theelection.

They peppered him duringa two-hour hearing withquestions about the Trumpadministration’s push tostarve the Postal Service offunds to process ballots forNovember. Trump had saidhe wants to block agencyfunds to make it harder forthe Postal Service to handlethe expected surge of mail-inballots during the COVID-19crisis. DeJoy said he has hadfew conversations with WhiteHouse officials.

He said he had “no idea”equipment was beingremoved until the public out-cry. Democrats asked DeJoyto explain the rationalebehind the changes andpressed him on how, exactly,he would ensure electionmail and ballots would arriveon time.

“Do you have a moredetailed plan?” demandedSenator Maggie Hassan, D-NH, asking for it by Sunday.

“I don’t think we’ll havea complete plan by Sundaynight,” DeJoy replied,acknowledging it was justbeing formed.

Grilled by Senator Jacky

Rosen, D-Nev, DeJoy acknowl-edged he did few studies of howthe changes he was makingwould impact seniors, veteransand working families.

“Is there any analysis?” shedemanded. He said his analy-sis showed delivery would beimproved. AP

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India on Friday imposed anti-dumping duty on phosphor-

ic acid from Korea for five years with a view to guarddomestic manufacturers fromcheap imports.

The duty was imposedafter the Commerce Ministry’sinvestigation arm DirectorateGeneral of Trade Remedies(DGTR) concluded in its probethat continued dumping of‘Phosphoric Acid of all gradesand concentrations (excludingAgriculture or Fertilizer grade)’from Korea was impactingdomestic industry.

“The anti-dumping duty(USD 137 per metric tonne)imposed under this notificationshall be effective for a period offive years (unless revoked,superseded or amended earli-er) from the date of publication

of this notification...And shallbe paid in Indian currency,” theDepartment of Revenue said ina notification.

In international trade par-lance, dumping happens whena country or a firm exports anitem at a price lower than theprice of that product in itsdomestic market.

Dumping impacts price ofthat product in the importingcountry, hitting margins andprofits of manufacturing firms.

According to global tradenorms, a country is allowed toimpose tariffs on such dumpedproducts to provide a level-playing field to domesticmanufacturers.

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Businesses registering underGST can opt for Aadhaar

authentication, in absence ofwhich registration would begranted only after physical ver-ification of the place of businessIn a notification, the CentralBoard of Indirect Taxes andCustoms (CBIC) said whenan applicant for GST registra-tion opts for authentication ofAadhaar number, he shall, witheffect from Friday (August 21),undertake the said authentica-tion while submitting an appli-cation.”Where a person... Failsto undergo authentication ofAadhaar number or does notopt for authentication ofAadhaar number, the registra-tion shall be granted only afterphysical verification of theplace of business in the pres-ence of the said person,” thenotification added. PwC IndiaPartner National Leader(Indirect Tax) Pratik Jain saida taxpayer registering underGST can opt for Aadhaarauthentication, in which case

registration is deemed to begranted within 3 days withoutphysical inspection of thepremises. He added that inother cases, the time periodcould be up to 21 days andauthorities can undertake phys-ical verification of place ofbusiness or detailed review ofdocuments as necessary. “Withlinkage of Aadhaar with GSTand PAN (permanent accountnumber), there would be acentralised data base availablewith the government whichwill facilitate data analyticsand help in checking tax eva-sion,” Jain said.

AMRG & AssociatesSenior Partner Rajat Mohansaid authentication of Aadhaarnumber would be a norm forGST registration in absence ofwhich registration would begranted only after physical ver-ification of the place of busi-ness. “Rigorous pre-registrationverifications procedures wouldhelp arrest the rampant tax eva-sion by way of limiting thenumber of new fake entities,”Mohan added

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Markets regulator Sebi onFriday revised its guide-

lines on reporting of state-ment of accounts for entitieslisting their debt securities inInternational Financial ServicesCentre (IFSC).

The decision, aimed atfurther streamlining opera-tions at IFSC, has been takenafter consultations with stake-holders, the Securities andExchange Board of India (Sebi)said in a circular.

Under the new frame-work, entities listing their debtsecurities in IFSC will preparetheir statement of accounts inaccordance with InternationalFinancial Reporting Standards(IFRS) or US GAAP (GenerallyAccepted AccountingPrinciples) or Indian account-ing standards or accountingstandards as applicable to themin their place of incorporation,Sebi said.

In case an entity does notprepare its statement ofaccounts in accordance with

IFRS or US GAAP or Indianaccounting standards, a quan-titative summary of signifi-cant differences betweennational accounting standardsand IFRS will be prepared andincorporated in the relevantdisclosure documents to befiled with the exchange, Sebisaid. It further said if the issueis targeted at institutionalinvestors, then a quantitativesummary of significant differ-ences will not be required anda statement of differencesbetween local accounting stan-dards or IFRS or Indianaccounting standards wouldsuffice.

Apart from statement ofdifferences, such issuers needto give a disclaimer that they“have not quantified the effectof applying IFRS/ US GAAP /IND AS to its financial infor-mation and investor may make

their own judgment in access-ing the financial information”.

Currently, an issuer of debtsecurities in IFSC needs to pre-pare its statement of accountsin accordance with CompaniesAct as applicable in IFSC.

In a separate circular, Sebisaid an entity based in India orin a foreign jurisdiction mayprovide financial services inIFSC, subject to compliancewith the applicable regulatoryframework.

At present, a recognisedentity desirous of operating inIFSC as an intermediary mayform a company to providesuch financial services relatingto securities market, as per-mitted by the regulator.

To give effect to these, Sebihas amended IFSC guidelines.

The country’s only IFSC isin GIFT City near Ahmedabadin Gujarat.

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Benchmark indices resumedtheir ascent on Friday after

a day’s breather as investorsflocked to banking and powerstocks amid a rebound in glob-al markets.

After rallying 359 pointsduring the day, the 30-shareBSE Sensex ended 214.33points or 0.56 per cent higherat 38,434.72. Similarly, the NSENifty rose 59.40 points or 0.53per cent to close at 11,371.60.

NTPC was the top per-former in the Sensex pack, ral-lying 4.75 per cent, followed byAsian Paints, PowerGrid,HDFC Bank, Nestle India, SunPharma, SBI and Axis Bank.

On the other hand,ONGC, Bharti Airtel, Tata Steeland Reliance Industries wereamong the laggards, sheddingup to 1.34 per cent.

During the week, theSensex advanced 557.38 pointsor 1.47 per cent, while the Niftyclimbed 193.20 points or 1.72per cent.

“Indices held firm today

with help from select pivotalseven asmarket participantsbooked profits in late afternoontrade.

“Small-caps and mid-capsdid well this week and we sawa smart bout of profit bookingtoday in this space which isheartening as it speaks aboutthe maturity of the retailinvestor at a time when we keephearing about this investingsegment being victimised moreoften than not,” said SRanganathan, Head ofResearch at LKP Securities.BSE power, utilities, realty,bankex, finance and consumerdurables indices rose as muchas 2.83 per cent, while telecom,energy, teck, metal, oil and gasand IT closed with losses.

Broader BSE mid-cap andsmall-cap indices rallied up to1.41 per cent.

Global equities stabilisedafter Thursday’s selloff, led bytechnology shares on WallStreet, even as US-China ten-sions and unabated rise inCOVID-19 cases capped thegains.

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India may see the share of nat-ural gas in its energy basket

rise to 10 per cent by 2025 asa result of massive investmentpush in the creation of infra-structure to take the environ-ment-friendly fuel to con-sumers, GAIL Director(Marketing) E S Ranganathansaid on Friday.

Currently, natural gas

makes up about 6.2 per cent ofthe entire energy consumptionin the country.PM NarendraModi has set a target of raisingthe share of natural gas in theenergy basket to 15 per cent by2030 to cut carbon emission inthe economy. “With gasdemand (growing at) CAGR(of) 8 per cent, gas is expectedto account for around 10 percent of India’s primary energysupply by 2025,” Ranganathan

said at a PHDCCI webinar.CAGR stands for compoundannual growth rate.

India is making invest-ments worth billions of dollarsto expand pipeline network aswell as build import capacitiesto meet growing gas demand inthe country. Also, city gas dis-tribution networks are beingexpanded to raise the share ofgas as a transportation fuel aswell as kitchen fuel.

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Authority (GDA) on Fridayconducted an auction to

sell the property. Throughwhich half assets worth eightcrores were sold.

Today, Subedar Singh ofthe Financial Controller in the

Hindi building of Lohia NagarUnder the chairmanship, theauction process started at 11am and continued till theevening.

In which many people par-ticipated.

In this auction,Indraprastha Yojana seven plotsof industrial , business and oneplot in Nandagram ResidentialScheme,The auction was held.According to GDA’s OSDSanjay Kumar of this propertythe GDA will have a revenue ofeight and a half crores from thesale. Chief engineer at auction

Several officials were pre-sent, including VN Singh.

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Global shares turnedlower on Friday after

new economic data showeda slowdown in Europe’seconomy and amid worriesabout a resurgence in coro-navirus cases in many coun-tries. European stocks fellafter a survey of businessesfound that growth in eco-nomic activity eased inAugust after a jump in July,when businesses werereopening from coronaviruslockdowns. The so-calledPMI survey suggests that asteady rise in new coron-avirus cases is undermininggrowth, and that the outlookfor jobs remains dim.

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UK Chancellor Rishi Sunakon Friday warned of some

“difficult decisions” ahead asofficial statistics revealed thatBritain’s public debt had risenabove 2 trillion pounds for thefirst time, largely down to theextra burden on the economyas a result of the coronaviruslockdown.

Sunak, who has been lead-ing the country’s economicresponse to the crisis with aseries of measures such as jobretention and loan schemes,said the figures from the Officefor National Statistics (ONS)are a “stark reminder” thatpublic finances need to bereined in.

“Today’s figures are a starkreminder that we must returnour public finances to a sus-tainable footing over time,which will require taking dif-ficult decisions,” said theIndian-origin finance minister.

“It is also why we are tak-ing action now to support thegrowth and jobs which pay forour public services, by helpingbusinesses to reopen safelyand, through our plan for jobs– protecting, supporting andcreating jobs – to ensure thatnobody is left without hope,” hesaid.The government borrow-ing figure at the end of Julystood at 227.6 billion poundshigher than the same monthlast year, according to the ONSdata.

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Markets regulator Sebi hasimposed a penalty of �2

lakh on Orissa MineralsDevelopment Co Ltd andtwo individuals for lapses inmaking timely disclosuresabout certain price sensitiveinformation back in 2012.

The watchdog had con-ducted a probe into thealleged delayed disclosure ofprice sensitive information byOMDC to the stockexchanges for the July 2 toAugust 10, 2012 period. Thefine has been imposed onOMDC, Satish Chandra andSucharita Das. Chandra andDas were Managing Directorand Compliance Officer,respectively, at that time,according to an order. It wasfound that there were delaysin making disclosures in atleast three instances, includ-ing about environmentalclearance for Kolha Roida

Iron & Manganese OreMining Project.”...Environment clearance inrespect of Kolha Roida Iron& Manganese Ore MiningProject; Merger of Bisra StoneLime Co. Ltd with theCompany; Issue of bonusshares and Splitting of sharesof the company were ‘pricesensitive information’,” theorder, dated August 20, said.

As per the order, it is onrecord that the company hasfailed to make the disclosurewithin such reasonable peri-od of time on a prompt andimmediate basis in three outof the four cases mentionedabove, the only exceptionbeing the dissemination ofthe information of splitting ofthe shares of the company.“The said three, disclosureswere made by the company tostock exchanges belatedlyeach after a period of morethan 24 hours since the timeof their receipt by OMDC.

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New Delhi: Sounding a note ofcaution, RBI GovernorShaktikanta Das on Friday saidthere is a disconnect betweenthe stock market and the realeconomy and a correction willbe witnessed, though its timingis hard to predict.

The Governor said excessliquidity in the global systemappears to be fuelling stockmarket exuberance. “There isso much liquidity in the system,in the global economy, that’swhy the stock market is verybuoyant and it is definitely dis-connected with the real econ-omy. It will certainly witnesscorrection in the future. Butwhen the correction will takeplace, it is hard to predict,” Dassaid in an interview to newschannel CNBC Awaaz.

The RBI is regularly mon-itoring the market behaviourand its impact on financial sec-tor stability and will take nec-essary steps as and when need-ed, he added.

“We are regularly moni-toring all market behaviour.RBI is vigilant about the impactof correction on the financialsector and how to deal with it,”he said. Referring to the wind-ing down of six debt schemesof Franklin Templeton MutualFund, he said the RBI took aproactive step by opening a Rs50,000 crore liquidity windowfor the mutual fund industry.

Das also said the loanmoratorium announced by RBIat the onset of the pandemic wasa temporary solution forCOVID-19-related stress. PTI

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New Delhi: With an aim topromote fitness in the country,the first open web fitness chal-lenge named #Myfireworkouthas invited occupationally gen-erated content creator’s cate-gory focusing on professionalslike chefs, artists, small andmedium business owners, filmmakers, florists to put out 30second short videos to partic-ipate and claim cash prizesworth about Rs 1 crore. Afterthe videos are evaluated, 25winners will be selected.

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New Delhi: Amidst stiff com-petitive bidding, Bharat HeavyElectricals Limited has won itsfirst commercial order for state-of-the-art Battery EnergyStorage Systems from TheEnergy and Resource Institute.The company has signed acontract agreement with TERIfor setting up of a cumulative410 kWh Battery EnergyStorage Systems in Delhi.

The tender was issued byTERI on turnkey basis underUI-ASSIST (US-IndiaCollaborative for SmartDistribution System withStorage) initiative with BSESRajdhani Power Limited.

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� Could you tell us about your writingprocess?

I both write and illustrate my books,so each one takes about nine months. I dothe writing first but I draw some illustra-tions as I go in pencil to feel my way intoa character or part of the story. When myeditor has finished with the manuscript,I do the illustrations and then my design-er and I put them into the book. I writein a little shed at the bottom of my gardenin London. Starting a new series takes alot more time. My most recent series, TheWizards of Once, began in a notebook thattook five years to develop, on and off.

� Why did you decide to write for chil-dren and make them your target audi-ence? Isn’t it more challenging to capturethe attention of the younger ones?

I have spent twenty years writing forchildren and over those years I have lostcount of the times people have asked me,‘Have you ever thought of writing foradults?’ as if writing for children was somesort of second best activity, something youdo before moving on to the higher level ofwriting for adults.

There is no greater privilege than writ-ing for children. As adults we can get con-fused by trivialities. Children are focussedon the essentials.

I often get asked if I had ever wantedto move to LA and be a screenwriter forHow to Train Your Dragon. The answer isno. I wasn’t a film writer, I was a bookwriter. When I was a little girl, dreamingof what I might possibly be one day, it wasalways to be an author, not a screenwriter.However glamorous and wonderful filmsmight be, I shouldn’t get distracted frommy ‘quest’. Children always know what thequest is. They may seem not to be concen-trating but when it comes to fundamen-tals, they don’t get distracted.

I should pause here to say that I lovethe work DreamWorks have done onDragon. One of my philosophies is to part-ner with the best people and trust them to

do their jobs. The most incredible team hasworked on the films — the producer,Bonnie Arnold, the director Dean DeBlois,the brilliant animation team, the music byJohn Powell… They are dedicated, talent-ed beyond anything I could have imaginedand have created something that’s stunningand absolutely in the spirit of what I spent15 years writing. Every time I watch thefilms, I get emotional, not just because theend result is so spectacular but becausesomething so personal to me also becamespecial to them and that comes acrossbeautifully on screen. I am grateful tothem, beyond words.

But my personal quest is to createbooks and play small part in trying to getthe children read, write and draw with thesame excitement and wonder that I didwhen I was a kid.

It can be tricky to write for children,because you have to pitch the writingexactly right and you also have to appealto the adult reading with the child, but it’schallenge I enjoy.

� What were you most excited aboutwhile writing How to Train Your Dragonbooks? What aspect from the bookfranchise did you think would work bestfor kids?

It was exciting, because even thoughit sounds very unlikely, How to Train YourDragon is a lot about my own childhoodand also about my children when theywere young. I began writing Dragonwhen I had just had a baby. And there isa moment when you have just had a baby,(every parent will recognise this), thatwhen you look in the back of the car andthere’s tiny little alien creature sitting therebehind you and you think: ‘They’re goingto let me out of hospital with a baby? ButI know nothing about babies!’

So you start reading up everythingabout babies and how to deal with them.While you’re doing this, you are thinkingabout your own childhood and how youwere brought up and how your own par-

ents dealt with you. I grew up in London but I spent a lot

of time on an uninhabited island off thewest coast of Scotland where real Vikingswould have lived once upon a time… SoI wrote this story based on that little islandand the relationship between Hiccup andStoick the Vast was inspired by my rela-tionship with my father. There really wasan Isle of Berk (though it has a differentname). And Hiccup’s relationship with

Toothless is a lot like me talking to my tod-dlers at the time.

I wanted the books to be funny andexciting but also make the reader feelthings — make them laugh or cry and wantto read on. I know I’ve succeeded when aDad tells me they’ve cried reading it…

� Did you anticipate this level of successfor the franchise?

Absolutely not. And I’m glad of that

now, because if I had known, it would havefelt daunting to start. I’ve been so, so lucky.I feel grateful every day for the readerswho’ve taken and made my books part oftheir family life. I also feel incredibly grate-ful to the team for taking something sopersonal and important to me and creat-ing it magnificently on screen.

� The first How to Train Your Dragonbook came out in 2003. How has your

writing evolved over the years? I think I’ve gotten better over the years.

The more you write and illustrate, the bet-ter you get, of course, because you’re learn-ing a craft. My stories have gotten moreepic — you can tell that from the style ofthe illustration.

� Where do you find the motivation tocontinue writing when you hit a writer’sblock? How do you deal with it?

I have to say I’ve never had it. I’ve beenlucky. When my children were young I hadvery little time to write, so I had to get itdone, there was no choice. Sometimesthat’s the best way, even though at the timeit was of course very stressful.

� What would be your advice to aspir-ing children authors?

Read as much as you can, to get a feelfor what age group you want to write for.Have big ideas notebook where what youwrite doesn’t matter. And then just do it.You’ll get better and you have to startsomewhere. Try and make yourself laugh,cry and feel. If you can’t do that for your-self, you won’t be able to do it for otherpeople. You are your own first reader.

� Since there’s currently a lockdown inmany parts of the world, people havemore time to read. Apart from yourbooks, what else would you recommendto people?

I’ve been doing lots of readings frommy shed on YouTube,CressidaCowellOfficial. Try and use thetime to be creative, get that notebook foryour ideas. But also, don’t put too muchpressure on yourself. A lot of people aretrying to work and look after the kids,which is very hard. In the midst of a glob-al crisis is not the time to make yourselffeel guilty about anything.

(Watch How to Train your Dragon: TheHidden World on August 30 at 1 pm and9 pm on Sony PIX.)

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The wait for Amazon PrimeVideo’s popular show —

Mirzapur season 2 does notseem to settle. Its season onewas a massive success and wenton to become one of the mostloved shows on OTT platform.The anticipation around thesecond season is soaring up andhere’s a glimpse that the plat-form brings — ‘Ode to a FAN-DOM,’ to express their gratitude

towards each on of Mirzapurfans.

The OTT platform createdthis showreel that portrays thecraziness and love the fanshave shown towards the show.The video showcases variousways in which fans tried to con-nect and reach the makers —via DMs, comments, tweetsand even attended the on-ground events to express their

love. It further progresses witha visual narrative that showcas-es fans’ unique ways.

Taking to their socialmedia, Amazon shared thevideo and wrote, “#ms2w butjust this one last time?” As theysay it, the video concludes bysaying, “Jald milenge, bohot huaintezaar.” Well, are they hintingat Season 2 of Mirzapur? We arealready waiting for it.

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Beginning in the salt pans of Kutch, sportsdrama, Rashmi Rocket is about a young girl

from a village, blessed with a gift — speed.She’s an incredibly fast runner. The villagefondly knows her as “Rocket”. When she getsa chance to showcase her talent profession-ally, she excels but also realises that the raceto the finish line is peppered with many hur-dles. What seems like an athletic contest turnsinto her personal battle for respect, honourand even her very identity.

Taking to its social media, RSVP moviesposted, “Getting back on track, one lap at atime! #RashmiRocket to start shooting thisNovember. #FridaysWithRSVP

Written by Nanda Periyasamy, AniruddhaGuha and Kanika Dhillon, the film, starringTaapsee Pannu in the lead, will be helmed byKarwaan director, Akarsh Khurana.

“We were all set to shoot when the pan-demic struck. I’m glad that we’re resumingsoon. The team and I have been waiting eager-ly to set off on this journey. It’s a terrific storythat I’m excited to tell,” says Akarsh.

Taapsee says, “I have been involved in thisproject from its very inception so that makesit even more special. Just before the pandem-ic, I was already three months into my train-

ing period to transform into a physique clos-est to that of a sprinter. This has been a longbreak but with the kind of subject it is, I amexcited to restart the journey from scratch. Ihave now again starting with my training.”

The actor wil l a lso be joined byExtraction-fame Priyanshu Painyuli in thefilm.

“Rashmi Rocket is a story of the trials andtribulations that several female athletes faceon their journey and an unmatchable resolveshown by each one of them to eventuallyachieve their destiny. There could be no bet-ter actor than Taapsee to essay the role of onesuch athlete — Rashmi. Post lockdown, we areeager and keen to be resuming shoots at RSVPand get this one on air,” says producerRonnie Screwvala.

Music maestro Amit Trivedi, known forfilms like Dev D, Lootera, Queen andKedarnath, will be composing the music forRashmi Rocket.

“The indestructible spirit of Rashmi isreflected by the team behind it. Audiencedeserves to see inspiring stories and hence theshow must go on,” says Pranjal Khandhdiyaof Mango People Media Network.

(The film is set to release in 2021.)

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THE QUEST FOR

STORIES

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Writer and director GopiPuthran describes his jour-

ney in the film industry as“incredible.” Steeping in YRF asthe writer of Lafangey Parindey, hebecame the writer and assistantdirector of Rani Mukerji-starrerMardaani and then graduated tobecome the director of Mardaani2. On the sixth anniversary of thefilm, Gopi talks about how he isthe only filmmaker to have asuperhit female cop franchise tohis credit.

Gopi says, “The reason why(that’s my speculation) Mardaanias a franchise resonated so muchwith the audience is because thereis so much dearth of stories ofwomen, which are sincerely toldwhile tapping onto the correctinsights of the problems and thejourney they go through. SoMardaani is one such film thattaps into the core of being awoman, especially in a patriarchalsociety. Both the parts — I and II— have been dealt with completesincerity. We have tried to touchthe struggles of a woman, main-taining one’s own identity in aworld where she is constantlyasked to compromise.”

He adds, “I think the integri-ty with which we made both thefilms has clicked with the audi-ence very well. I hope we contin-ue to do justice in the way weapproach such themes in the sub-sequent parts that we’ll be hope-fully doing.”

This year, Gopi completes adecade of his association with thebanner, a journey that he cherish-es dearly. He shares, “It’s trulysome karmic thing, some connec-tion that I have with YRF and,most importantly, with AdityaChopra. The ease with which weconnected creatively, I could freelyargue with him if I felt stronglyabout a point. Our relationshiphas always been special. Somehow,Aditya has never interfered orasked me to change my ways ofworking. This openness and nur-turing is what has made me whatI want to be here.”

Gopi shares an incrediblyendearing relationship with Rani.“She has actually given her soul tothe character of Shivani ShivajiRoy. It’s so satisfying to see, espe-cially for a writer, when an actorputs in so much effort and time.The way she added so much ofdepth and gravitas to this charac-ter, it’s commendable! She actual-

ly made Shivani Shivaji Roy comealive,” says he.

He feels that Rani is natural ataction sequences and pulls themoff with ease. “Right fromMardaani to Mardaani 2, she iscompletely natural when it comesto action sequences. It was like shewas meant to do it. She can bringvulnerability and toughness bothat the same time. Thus, Shivanibecame a unique character,” saysGopi.

He shares that it was hugelymagnanimous on dada’s (PradeepSarkar) part who asked him to bea part of the making of LafangeyParindey. Since then, their journeystarted from the film to Mardaani,part I. “That is how I ended upbeing an associate director forboth these films. I always wantedto direct. I was one of those writ-ers who knew that I will write anddirect at the same time. I was justwaiting for the correct project tocome along,” he says.

Talking about how he concep-tualised a part two, Gopi says,“While I was discussing some-thing with Aditya, we were speak-ing about a couple of projects thatI should be directing. He suggest-ed that why don’t you just directa sequel to Mardaani because youknow the world entirely! It will berelatively simpler for you tomount this in the correct way. Youhave an equation with Rani, so itshould be your debut film. I com-pletely and whole-heartedlyagreed to it and that’s how it all fellinto place.”

Based on the eponymous best-selling novel by Garth Stein, The

Art of Racing in the Rain, a come-dy drama, follows Denny Swift, anF1 driver and his dog, Enzo, whobelieves in the legend that a dog“who is prepared” will be reincar-nated as a human in its next life.

Actor Amanda Seyfried or Evetalks about her character and herrelationship with other charactersand dogs, and what the audiencecould take away from the film.

Excerpts:

�What made you go for the role?It didn’t take much to sell me on

it. Well, if a story is good, I don’teven care to read the script.Something similar happened here!I didn’t feel like reading the scriptat that point because it just seemedlike a perfect little package. Thescript ended up being so great. It justfelt like one of those gems that don’tcome along very often. This is spe-cial and I think book fans are goingto love the film, too. I know theywill!

�Why do you think dogs makegreat characters?

If it’s a dog, it’s its smell, wide-eyed innocence, playfulness, loyal-ty and curiosity. Dogs just want tolove you and live in the present and

we could all learn that that’s a biggiant challenge for us humans to livein the present. But dogs just do itnaturally and it’s a beautiful thing towatch. I really enjoyed working onthis film for this very reason too —

having a dog as a co-actor!

�Why do you think Denny andEve connect so well?

Denny carries his shiny unpre-dictability along with him. Hecomes as an adventure in Eve’s lifeshe’s unaware of. She wasn’t neces-sarily looking for that but I think it’svery appealing. Denny is kind of alone ranger. That is why I think theyare kind of perfect for each other.They bring out a lot in each otherand they also show and rather,reflect the kind of life they mightwant.

�What would you say about Eve’srelationship with Trish andMaxwell?

She has a really good relation-ship with them but only until a newperson enters Eve’s life. I think theirinstinct is to protect her. But it turnsout to be very harmful to thedynamic that they create withDenny, especially because not only

is he coming into their lives andmarrying their daughter but healso has a somewhat dangerouslyunpredictable job. Hence, they area little concerned but well, yes, theyare a little too much! (Laughs)

�Anything about working withParker, the dog who plays Enzo...

Parker is really fun to be aroundwith. He is sweet and smart. Hereads the room well and is veryrespectful. It’s like he is older thanhis two years of age. I found himquite similar to my dog who can justchill anywhere.�What do you think the audiencewill take away from this film?

I think in just two hours, thisfilm gives the audience an opportu-nity to grow tremendously andunderstand a lot of things about lifeand its pursuits. They maybe find itentertaining too. But yes, if some-one can really get something fromthis film, they could get a perspec-tive, especially during times likethese, on the feeling of belongingwith your family and being withthem. Also, you might feel like res-cuing a dog afterwards or thingslike, ‘I think I should have a dog,too.’

(Directed by Simon Curtis, thefilm premieres on August 23 at 12 pmand 9 pm on Star Movies.)

�Describe the character of StewKlein and Debbie Klein and what itwas about him/her that drew you tothe script?

Steven Weber: My character isthe patriarch of this family. He’s a veryrelaxed, well-meaning, sweet lovingguy who enjoys taking occasionalcannabis edibles. He’s in love with hiswife, children and grandchildren. He’sgot a curious nature but is not a com-plex guy. So that is how my charac-ter is. It’s not that I chose to play him,the producers chose me I guess. It wasa relief because it is such a likablecharacter to play and a good fit.

Fran Drescher: I liked thatDebbie is violaceous and very lively.Generally, in sitcoms, a woman’sportrayal happens to be of a grand-ma with adult children. I think thatis not a very fresh version of the typ-ical sitcom grandmother. I’d ratherportray a 60-year-old woman as hotand alive who’s madly in love with herhusband.

�How did you get into the skin ofthis character since parenting is nottoo easy to understand?

Steven: It was easy for me to bepleasant, loving, tactile, amused andcurious, especially in the environ-ment of the sitcom and this particu-lar show. Fran is beautiful, we’refriends and we come from the sameneighbourhood and have a lot ofshared experiences. We have a sim-ilar sense of humour. So it was easyto become a guy who is in love withhis wife and has fun with her. Oneaspect that we don’t really talk aboutis that we (Fran and I) weren’t exten-sively the stars of the show. I wouldsay that there were no stars per se butwe had a sort of supporting roles. Soit allowed me to not work too hard.In certain scenes, I gave myself thecrossword puzzle task. So I didn’thave to show up much and listen allthe time. Basically, Fran and the kidsdid a lot of the heavy lifting while Icould be seen sitting on a very com-

fortable couch with my legs crossed,doing a crossword puzzle.

Fran: I found it easy to play thischaracter because she was so joyful,light-hearted and fun. She is thatcharacter which is far less complicat-ed than I am in real life. I think thehardest part about it was that she wasalways into looking fantastic. So forme physically that meant wearingheels, bras, a Spanx, dresses, jewelryand makeup. However, in my person-al life, I am generally more comfort-able and casual.

�What have been your memorablemoments from the shoot?

Steven: There were quite a few.There were many long periods whereduring a scene, things would kind ofmeltdown, at least for me, because Ifound what other actors were doingto be incredibly funny. There wereseveral times where I just had to basi-cally wave the camera away from mebecause I was not giving them any ser-viceable footage to use. I was justlaughing at whatever Adam wasdoing, or Jesse or Abby or Fran. Sobasically, the whole experience hasbeen really a memory. I’m sorry, Icouldn’t be more specific.

But I have to say that the idea thatIndebted is going to be shown in Indiais fantastic. I’m so thrilled. And I hopeit will become a huge hit and staplein the country because I want to beflown out there and, well, also, I wantto be hailed as a great hero in India(laughs).

Fran: Oh, well, you know, for me,it was more behind the scenes becausewe all had our own dressing rooms,but they were all on the stage. Wewould run lines in my dressing room.We would often bring food in for eachother. And whether it was pizzas ormeatballs or shrimp, or chips or youname it, we shared everything. Thatis by the way actually quite Jewish! Butit definitely brought us all closer andmade us feel like a family. And quitehonestly, those are some of my fond-est memories.

�Most actors are of the opinion thatcomedy is the toughest genre to pulloff. What is your take?

Fran: I absolutely think thatcomedy cannot be taught. And evennow, fine-tuning your craft can be askill that can be honed, but you gotto have a comedic or a funny bone.And I think Steven and I both havethat ability to see what’s humorousand to be funny as well. And, recre-ating that repeatedly.

Steven: I agree with everythingFran said.

Well, you have proof that come-dy is extremely difficult because itdoes not always hit the mar. I mean,it’s not something that can be taughtand I agree. So, it does requirenascent ability, but you can’t fault peo-ple for trying.

�What’s next for both of you?Fran: I am currently writing the

nanny musical for Broadway. I amalso beginning to write a teen novel.

Steven: I am actually into a lotof cooking these days. I’m just try-ing to stay kind of activated day today. On the work note, I do havesome short creative projects that Iam involved in. In the nascentstages, are couple of writing things

but true to my nature as a workingactor. I am also kind of waiting for thephone to ring for new works. I am try-ing to stay healthy and fit and reallyusing the time to teach myselfendurance, how not to panic, tobecome a little more introspective andto see that there’s more to life thanmaking a quick buck. Lately, I’ve actu-ally experienced a little panic, polit-ical feelings aside, about what’s hap-pening across the world. It has beenkind of an interesting and positivetime that I know we will all get pastand hopefully, by then, we would allhave grown!

(The series streams on SonyLIV.)

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Zak Crawley was on the vergeof posting his first test cen-tury as England reached

tea on 184-4 on the opening dayof the third and final Test againstPakistan at the Rose Bowl onFriday.

Crawley was on a career-besttest score of 97 and sharing anunbeaten 57-run partnership withJos Buttler (24) after England lostcaptain Joe Root (29) and OlliePope (3) after lunch.

Root edged a beautiful deliv-ery from paceman Naseem Shahthat seamed away, with wicket-

keeper Mohammad Rizwan tak-ing a flying catch to his right.

Pope lasted 15 balls before hewas bowled by Yasir Shah tryingto play the legspinner off the backfoot, leaving England 127-4.

Playing his eighth Test match,Crawley’s previous best score was76 against the West Indies at the

same ground in Southamptonlast month. He has hit 11 fours ina 165-ball knock.

Buttler is also seeing the ballwell, striking four boundaries.

Yasir has 2-60 off 19 oversafter coming into the attack early.

England leads 1-0 and islooking to clinch a first series vic-

tory over Pakistan in 10 years, aswell as a second of the summerafter beating the West Indies 2-1.

Fast bowler Jofra Archer wasrecalled by England in place of

Sam Curran in the only changefrom the drawn second Test onthe same ground in Southampton.

Pakistan selected anunchanged team.

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SPEZIA PROMOTED TO SERIE A FOR 1ST TIMEMilan: ?��>��� ���������������?�����%��������������������������������.�0��������������������������������� ���� ?����� �� ����� ������ ����� �������� .�.� ������������� "� �=���� ?��>��� ��� ��������� ��� ����������4������������=������������������������������������������ ��������?��>��� �������� ������ ���� ����������������� ���� ������ ��������� ������ ���� ����=����� ����� ���?���������./�������������<�������

INDIAN CHALLENGE OVER AT PRAGUE OPENPrague: ����#�������������������������������������%�2� <���������� 2������ 7���� ���� ���� ������ �� ��������� ������� ���������� ��� ���� �������� �=����� ���������� !�=�6� ?������ ���� 8����� "����� ����� �����:����������� 1�(�� (�*P/Q� ��� $���� �����4�� ���� �����&��"���� �� ?������ ����6�� ���� ���� �������� 3�����<����6���� ������������������������������������������ �� +�(�� 1�(� ��� ?��=��� !��>� ���� ���>� 8����� %���?���������������#���#=���4�������-�(��+�(����2������"������"�����������%������8�����4�����

MCKENZIE STEPS DOWN AS BATTING COACHDhaka: ������� ?����� %������ �������� ����&�3��>��� ���� �������� �� �� ���� ���� ��������� ������������L�� �������� ������� ������� ����� ������������++���������� ��� ��������������������������L� ���������� �������� ����������� ��� $��� -0./�� ����� ������������L��������������������������������������

WHITE RETIRES, TO FOCUS ON COACHINGMelbourne: �������%���������������������<������ ����� ��� ������ ���������� ���� ����������� ��������������� ����4���� ��������� �� �� ��������� ��� �������� �������������������� � ���������������1*���������� ��������������������,.�7!#��H�+*��-0#����� ����� ���������� %��������� ��=��� ������ ��� ��������=��������4������������ ����������������������� �

PERRY FINDS PLACE IN AUSSIE SQUADMelbourne: ?���� ������������ ������ 2��������=������ ���� �� ���������� ��6���� ��� ��� ����������� ������./�������%���������� ������:���� ������ �-0#� ���� 7!#� ������� �������� �� � E������� ��?��������� ���� ���� �������������� ���� ��� ���6���� ������������ �E������� �������=������%�����������������7!#��������������-0�#��������������

BISTA LIKELY TO PLAY FOR UTTARAKHANDMumbai: 2����������������$�������������������=���� ��� 7�6������� <���������� P�7<Q� ���� ����&�����<���4���%������������������4�����=�����'�����4�����F �� ��=�� ������� ���� �����7<� ��� ������ ����������������������������������������������� ��4�������������7<������������� ����������������������� ������ ��������������� �����������6�������K����������&<%����������������������%��������������������������������� �������������������������'�����4������ ���������� �������� �� ��������� ���� ���� ����� $���� ����������������������������7<�

KOEMAN NAMES LARSSON AMONG ASSISTANTSBarcelona: �� ����������� ������8������3����������������������? ���������4���"����4�������������������������������������������������!����������%����� ?���������� ��������� +/�� ���� �� ����� ����������������������������������������������������� ��-00(�<���������������� ����� ����"����������������������������������������������? �����������-0.0����� ����� 6��� ������ ���� ������ ����� "������������?����������+*��6�������������������������4������������������5�����������"�����������$����

NARINE STARS AGAIN IN TKR VICTORYTarouba: ?����� ������L�� ���������� ������� ������������� �� ������� ��������� ����� ������� ������������������ 3������ 8������ ��� ���� ���� �� ����"���� <2������� ���� �� ����������� ��=��� ��4��� =������ �=��$������������ ������#���������������������������?�������E��4�����������������������������=��� ��4�����������!��4 ������� ����������

NABI APPOINTED MEMBER OF AFGHAN BOARDKabul: %����������������������&�������������������������������������������������������L������4������������������������������=��������������������4����������������������� ��������� �����=����������������������� �������� �� %���������� <���4��� �����L������������������� � ��� �

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Exactly 13 years after heimpressed with his incisive

swing bowling in the U-19World Cup and the inauguraledition of IPL, left-arm seamerPradeep Sangwan will now be adesignated “net bowler” forDelhi Capitals in the UAE alongwith five others.

Apart from Sangwan, whoplayed for Delhi Daredevils,Mumbai Indians, Gujarat Lionsand KKR in these years, anoth-er left-arm seamer Pawan Suyal,who has played for MI, is also inthe list of net bowlers that eachteam is taking.

Delhi all-rounderPranshu Vijayaran,Railways left-arm spinnerHarsh Tyagi along with twounheralded youngsters— left-arm wristspinner Rajat Goeland pacer BobbyYadav — completethe list.

“Yes, Sangwanand Suyal are trav-elling as net

bowlers. Pranshu is the third guyand even Harsh who now playsfor Ranji Trophy is our boy as herepresented Delhi during hisIndia U-19 days. Rajat is a localclub cricketer while Bobby isfrom UP,” a senior DDCA offi-cial said.

For Sangwan, who was heroof India’s U-19 World Cup tri-umph under Virat Kohli back in2008, it’s like life coming to a fullcircle 13 years after he playedalongside Mohammed Asif andGlenn McGrath before being thefirst Indian cricketer to bebanned by BCCI for failingdope test in 2013.

“Sangi (as his nickname isin Delhi circle) has suffered alot due to injuries in past fewyears. So has Suyal, who hasnow cut down his run-up

consistently after stressfractures and back

injuries. Hope bowl-ing in IPL nets helpthem,” the official,who has trackedboth since theiryounger days,said.

*���� �� �!��"#

Veteran Sri Lankanpacer Lasith Malinga

is likely to be unavailablefor the first few games ofMumbai Indians in theupcoming IPL due topersonal reasons.

According to areport in ESPNcricinfo,the 36-year-old Malingawill not be travelling to

the UAE, as his father hasnot been keeping well forsome time and mayrequire surgery in thecoming weeks.

The seasoned fastbowler, who has pro-duced match-winningefforts for both Sri Lankaand his IPL franchise,wants to be around hisfather while training inColombo.

������� England & Australiaplayers, who will be busy in thelimited overs series that con-cludes three days before the IPLopener, could well be availablefrom the start of the T20league, KKR CEO and MDVenky Mysore said on Friday.

Mysore’s comments comeafter RCB chairman SanjeevChuriwala on Thursday saidthe England and Australiaplayers will not need to under-go the mandatory six-day quar-

antine in the UAE as theywould be already coming froma bio-secure environment inthe UK.

“Can’t say anything specif-

ic. IPL is doing everythingthey can to put a process inplace so that those players areavailable to play. KKR are veryhopeful,” Mysore said.

The players include KKR’sstar acquisition this season,Australian pacer Pat Cummins,who was bought for a record�15.5 crore. KKR also have2019 World Cup winning skip-per Eoin Morgan, Tom Banton,Chris Green and Harry Gurneyin their roster. PTI

*���� !'�%#�

Restricted to their roomsfor six days, players who

have landed in the UAE forthe IPL, spent their openingday talking to each otherthrough ‘balconies’ besidesfollowing a fitness planhanded out by the teams’trainers.

Rajasthan Royals andKings XI Punjab playersarrived in Dubai onThursday evening whileKolkata Knight Riders land-

ed in Abu Dhabi in thenight.

While Royals’ squadcompleted its day 1 testing asper BCCI’s StandardOperating Procedure (SOP)at the airport itself, KXIPwent for a repeat test onFriday.

As per the BCCI SOP,testing will be done on day1, 3 and 6 and after thatteams can start training forthe league, beginningSeptember 19.

Since no one is allowed

to step out of the room in thesix-day isolation period,players made full use oftheir dedicated balconies tospeak to each other but fol-lowing all social distancing

guidelines.The Royals have demar-

cated the outdoor area whicha player cannot use if his nextdoor teammate too is out-side. “The players can use the

outdoor area alternately. Forexample, I can’t be in the bal-cony when the player nextdoor too is outside but I canbe out with the player in thefollowing room,” a teamsource said.

Royals pacer JaydevUnadkat also posted a videoon social media, covering hisfirst morning in Dubai.Going by the video, he has anair cycle in his room to keephim in shape and he used theoutdoor area for his Yogasession.

*���� �� �!��"#

Prime Minister Narendra Modi dis-tinctly remembers Suresh Raina’s

elegant cover drives during the epic 2011World Cup quarter-final against Australiain Ahmedabad, something that, he feels,the all-rounder’s fans will miss after hefollowed Mahendra Singh Dhoni intointernational retirement.

The 33-year-old Raina, a member ofthe 2011 World Cup winning India team,announced his retirement on August 15,minutes after Dhoni decided to call itquits internationally.

“I do not want to use the word ‘retire-ment’ because you are too young andenergetic to ‘retire’,” PM Modi, who alsowrote a letter of appreciation to Dhoni,said in a two-page note to Raina, which

he posted on his Twitter page on Friday.“During your cricketing career, you

sometimes faced setbacks includinginjuries but every time you overcamethose challenges, thanks to your tenaci-ty,” he said.

Raina, on his part, thanked thePrime Minister.

“When we play, we give our blood &sweat for the nation. No better appreci-ation than being loved by the people ofthis country and even more by the coun-try’s PM. Thank you @narendramodi jifor your words of appreciation & bestwishes. I accept them with gratitude. JaiHind,” the cricketer tweeted.

In the letter, Modi recollected howmuch he enjoyed Raina’s most famousinnings of 34 not out in a tricky run-chaseagainst a formidable Australia in the 2011

World Cup quarter-final at Motera.“India can never forget your inspir-

ing role during the 2011 World Cup espe-cially during the later matches. I saw youLive in action at the Motera Stadium inAhmedabad, during the Quarter Finalagainst Australia. Your anchoring inningshad a big role to play in our team’s vic-tory. The PM also described Raina as theperfect team-man who enjoyed others’successes.

“...Suresh Raina will always be syn-onymous with team spirit. You played notfor personal glory but for the glory ofyour team and the glory of India.

“Your enthusiasm on the field wasinfectious and we could all witness thatyou would be among the first and mostanimated players to celebrate the fall ofopposing team’s wicket,” the PM wrote.

�* � %�"��?

Manchester United cap-tain Harry Maguire was

detained for questioning onthe Greek island of Mykonosafter allegedly being involvedin an incident in which policeofficers were assaulted after abrawl, Greek state TV ERTsaid on Friday.

Officers were called in tobreak up a brawl between twogroups of tourists. Two otherBritons were also detained.

“The football player wasverbally abusive to an officerand then hit him,” a police offi-cial said. “The three wereresisting when brought to theMykonos police station.”

Manchester United issueda statement saying they wereaware of the incident involv-ing Maguire.

“The club is aware of analleged incident involvingMaguire in Mykonos lastnight,” it said.

“Contact has been madewith Harry, and he is fully co-operating with the Greekauthorities. At this time wewill be making no furthercomment.”

Maguire and the two otherdetainees will be taken by

ship to the nearby island ofSyros, where they will facecharges by a public prosecutor,the police official said.

Mykonos is a popular hol-iday destination with a repu-tation as a party island thatnever sleeps.

*���� �� �!��"#�

Set to be conferred with theArjuna Award, Indian men’s

doubles player Chirag Shetty onFriday termed it a “silver lining”amid the Covid-19 pandemic,while his partner SatwiksairajRankireddy said the recogni-tion will fuel their Olympicdreams.

For the first time, six peo-ple will be conferred with thenational award in badminton.Besides Chirag and Satwik,coach Gaurav Khanna, who hasbeen the reason behind themeteoric rise of Indian para-badminton, has been chosen forthe Dronacharya Award (regu-lar category).

Also Pradeep Gandhe,Trupti Murgunde andSatyaprakash Tiwari will begiven the Dhyan Chand Award.

“I see it as a silver lining inthese tough times. It’ll definite-ly motivate us to win big andwork harder to bring backmore laurels for the country.Also I think it couldn’t have

come at a better time,” Chiragsaid.

The 23-year-old fromMumbai and Satwik had a suc-cessful 2019, when the duo wona maiden Super 500 title atThailand Open and thenreached the finals of the FrenchOpen Super 750 event. Theirconsistent show was rewardedwith a world No 10 spot.

The reticent Satwik said itwill motivate them to win an

Olympic medal next year.“The feeling is sinking in

now. It is a proud moment forme. It is extra special as it is myfirst award.

“We were losing motivationafter everything was shut due tothe pandemic, but this awardhas provided a big motivationto work towards our goal ofearning a medal at Olympics,”the 20-year-old said fromAmalapuram in Andhra.

� �� � ���� Indian women’shockey team captain Rani onFriday said winning the KhelRatna, the country’s highestsporting honour, will motivateher to bring home more laurels.

“It is a really proud momentfor me and especially for myfamily.

“The Rajiv Gandhi KhelRatna Award is one of the mostprestigious awards that asportsperson can receive, and Iowe this to my coaches, team-mates, friends and family fortheir constant support since thebeginning,” Rani said in a releaseissued by Hockey India.

“It is an amazing feelingwhen your hard work is reward-ed, and I believe this award willserve as a great motivation forme and players like me to keepstriving for bigger feats andmake the country proud.

“I also would like to con-gratulate all the other award win-

ners too,” said Rani, who is cur-rently based out of the SAICentre in Bengaluru.

The 25-year-old had helpedthe Indian team secure a berthat the Tokyo Olympics, besidesleading the side into the final ofthe 2018 Asian Games. PNS

*���� ?7'�"%&2�7��

Teenage tearaway pacerNaseem Shah was on Friday

included in Pakistan’s 17-membersquad announced for the threeT20Is against England beginningon August 28.

The 17-year-old, who hasplayed six Tests so far, is yet tomake his white-ball debut forPakistan.

Besides Naseem,Pakistan also included 19-year-old batsman HaiderAli, who performed wellin the U-19 side, firstclass cricket andPakistan SuperLeague.

Babar Azam,who lead the teamto a T20 series wina g a i n s tBangladesh earlierthis year, will continue tocaptain the side in theupcoming serieswhich will concludeon September 1.

Former captain

Sarfaraz Ahmed, a wicket-keep-er batsman, has also been namedin the squad.

Experienced pacersMohammad Amir, who had with-drawn from the tour due to thebirth of his second child, andWahab Riaz also return to theside, along with batsman FakharZaman.

All-rounder Shoaib Malik,who arrived in England onAugust 12, has also beennamed in the squad and will be

joining his colleagues afterclearing the Covid-19 tests.

Squad: Babar Azam(captain), FakharZaman, Haider Ali,Haris Rauf, IftikharAhmed, ImadWasim, KhushdilShah, MohammadHafeez, Mohammad

Hasnain, MohammadRizwan, MohammadAmir, Naseem Shah,Sarfaraz Ahmed, ShadabKhan, Shaheen ShahAfridi, Shoaib Malik andWahab Riaz.

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� �� � ���� Olympic Bronzemedallist Sakshi Malik onFriday came down heavily onthe Sports Ministry for leavingher name out of the final list ofArjuna awardees.

The Ministry decidedagainst bestowing the Arjunaon Sakshi and weightlifterMirabai Chanu as the two havealready been conferred with theRajiv Gandhi Khel RatnaAward.

Sakshi said she is disap-

pointed with the Governmentfor ignoring her achievements.

“I always wanted to becalled as Arjuna awardeeSakshi Malik. The athletes doeverything to win such acco-lades. He or she wants to winall the awards. That’s whatmotivates us. “I don’t knowwhat I should do to win theArjuna award. I am happy to beconferred with the Khel Ratnaaward in 2016. And I respect ittoo. But I always wanted

Arjuna. That was my dream,”a fuming Sakshi said.

The initial list of 29 namesrecommended by selectioncommittee included Sakshi and2017 weightlifting world cham-pion Mirabai, but the decisionof bestowing the Arjuna onthem was left to the discretionof Sports Minister Kiren Rijiju.

This was due to the factthat they had already won theKhel Ratna, the country’s high-est sporting honour. IANS

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