RNI NO.: WBENG/2015/65962

VOL. 7, ISSUE 232 | Wednesday, 25 August 2021 | Kolkata | Pages 12 | Rs 3.00PUBLISHED FROM DELHI | KOLKATA

MILLENNIUMPOST.IN

No Half Truths

City: Pg 3State appeals to UNESCO to give Durga Puja ‘World Heritage status’

CityMADHYAMIK SYLLABUS REDUCED 3

NationKERALA LOGS 24,000-PLUS CASES 6

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CONTINUING STRUGGLE 7

InternationalROLLING STONES DRUMMER DIES 8

BusinessSENSEX, NIFTY AT LIFETIME HIGHS 10

SportINDIA EYEING SERIES LEAD 11

In today’s paper

...

You need to keep ego in pocket while batting in England

Virat Kohli

Nation: Pg 6Top court asks AFT to decide pleas of Navy officers on PC

Film: Pg 12‘Such a loser. You aren’t Salman Khan’

WE HAVE WINGS

Athletes light the Paralympic cauldron during the Opening Ceremony of the 2020 Paralympics at the National Stadium in Tokyo, on Tuesday. India is being represented by its largest ever delegation of 54 athletes in competitions spread across 12 days. AP/PTI

1 cr throng Duare Sarkar camps in just 8 days

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday laid down the parameters to be considered by High Courts while consid-ering the bail plea of an accused, according to Bar and Bench.

A Bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and MR Shah prescribed the following to be taken into account by courts — Whether there are prima facie or reasonable grounds to believe that the accused has committed the offence; nature and gravity of the accu-sation; severity of the punishment in the event of conviction; danger of the accused absconding, if released on bail; charac-ter, behaviour and standing of accused including his/her antecedents; likelihood of the offence being repeated; reasonable

apprehension of the witnesses being influ-enced; danger of justice being affected for grant of bail.

These directions came in a judgment in which the Court cancelled the bail granted by the High Court to a person accused of murder under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

The Court held that if the accused is released on bail, he would pose a threat to the safety of the appellant and the prob-ability of a repeat offence was also high.

“Considering the overall facts and cir-cumstances, we have held that the High Court has committed grave error in releas-ing the accused on bail. Consequently, the High Court order is quashed and set aside. Respondent No. 1 is directed to surren-der and be taken back into custody,” the

Court ordered.The Court also relied on the fact that

in a different case, the High Court had cancelled the bail of the accused after he had committed heinous crimes when out on bail.

“We have considered allegation, ante-cedents and other FIRs filed against the accused. From the material on record it is clear that as and when he is granted bail, he came out of jail, committed another offence and again went to jail. Even the High Court cancelled the bail in another case specifically observing that when on bail during the pendency of the appeal, they were involved in other cases of hei-nous crimes,” the Supreme Court said while cancelling the bail granted to the accused. WITH AGENCY INPUTS

SC lays down parameters for bail pleas While cancelling bail granted to an accused due to a high possibility of repeat offences, the Bench

found it necessary to lay down guidelines to be taken into account by courts while deciding bail pleas

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: The Mamata Banerjee government on Tues-day achieved a rare feat with one crore people registering, including 74.26 lakh only for Lakshmir Bhandar scheme, in its biggest outreach drive Duare Sarkar camps in just eight days.

The second edition of Duare Sarkar clocked one crore registrations in only eight days while it took 18 days dur-ing the first edition of the out-reach drive at the end of 2020.

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee congratulated all officers, including the district authorities, for the feat that helped people get benefits of 18 different state-run schemes, including Lakshmir Bhandar, at their doorsteps.

At 11 am on Tuesday, the figure of registration touched one crore. Subsequently, the Chief Minister sent her best wishes to all District Magis-trates and concerned officers stating “congrats to our team”. Appreciating the efforts of all concerned, she stated: “Keep up the good work. Still a long way to go.”

The second edition of Duare Sarkar camps begun from August 16 and will con-tinue till September 15 to provide benefits of schemes, including Lakshmir Bhandar, Krishak Bandhu (New), Stu-dent’s Credit Card, Kanyas-hree, Aikyashree, Manobik, Jai Johar, Caste Certificate and bank account related issues at the doorsteps of beneficiaries.

There were more than 1.22 crore registrations at Duare

Sarkar camps till 6 pm on Tuesday since August 16 and 10,750 camps were held. More than 1.62 lakh registrations have taken place only on Tues-day. The state government is now scheduled to hold at least 37,203 camps in one month.

With an overwhelming response in regard to Lakshmir Bhandar scheme that ensures minimum monthly income to women aged between 25 and 60 years of Rs 500 to Rs 1,000 (for women from SC and ST communities), there has been massive turnout at the Duare Sarkar camps. In a bid to ensure better crowd con-trol, the state government has already increased the num-ber of camps and even held it at polling booth levels, espe-cially for the Lakshmir Bhan-dar scheme.

It needs a special mention that out of one crore, the max-imum number of footprints at Duare Sarkar camps was in South 24-Parganas where more than 14.05 lakh people visited the camps in the past nine days.

The second highest was in Murshidabad where 11.18 lakh people had turned out. Regis-trations of around 7.01 lakh people have taken place in East Midnapore. In Kolkata, around 2.09 lakh people attended the camps.

The data of the state gov-ernment shows that 74.26 lakh women have applied for the Lakshmir Bhandar scheme till August 24. About 19.57 lakh people have applied for the Swasthya Sathi scheme and 3.49 lakh went for Krishak Bandhu (New) scheme.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: India added 25,467 new COVID-19 cases, while the active cases declined to 3,19,551, comprising 0.98 per cent of the total infec-tions, the lowest since March 2020, according to the Union Health ministry data updated on Tuesday.

The total tally of COVID-19 cases has increased to 3,24,74,773. The death toll has climbed to 4,35,110 with 354 fresh fatalities, according to the data updated at 8 am. The active cases were the lowest in 156 days, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate has increased to 97.68 per cent, the highest since March 2020, the ministry said.

A reduction of 14373 cases has been recorded in the total number of active COVID-19 cases in a span of 24 hours. Also, 16,47,526 tests were con-ducted on Monday, taking the cumulative tests conducted so far for detection of COVID-19 in the country to 50,93,91,792.

Meanwhile, passengers headed from India to the UAE, and even those who’ve stayed in India over the last two weeks, will not be able to access the “visa-on-arrival” facility.

Replying to a query, the Etihad Airways, the UAE’s national carrier, said in a tweet: “The UAE authorities have decided to temporarily sus-pend the visa-on-arrival facility for passengers who are arriving from or been in India in the past 14 days. We’re working to update our website, please keep an eye on https://bit.ly/Travel-GuideEN for latest regulations.”

Not enough data has been generated locally to decide on the need for a booster dose of COVID-19 vaccine for those fully inoculated, say experts amid the possibility of a third wave of the viral disease hit-ting the country between Sep-tember and October.

An expert panel set up by an institute under the Minis-try of Home Affairs (MHA) has predicted that the third wave of COVID-19 can hit the country anytime between September and October and suggested sig-nificantly ramping up the vac-cination pace.

The World Health Organ-isation (WHO) has, however, sought a two-month halt on administering booster shots of COVID-19 vaccines in view of severely constrained vaccine availability around the globe.

Meanwhile, WhatsApp on Tuesday said the MyGov Corona Helpdesk on its plat-form will now allow users to locate their nearest vaccina-tion centre and book their slots.

India reports 25,467 new

Covid cases

Hope terrorists don’t use Af soil for fuelling unrest: India

Narayan Rane gets bail hours after arrest over

‘slap Thackeray’ remarkOUR CORRESPONDENT

MUMBAI/NEW DELHI: Union minister Narayan Rane, arrested on Tuesday over his remarks about slapping Maha-rashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray for what he called the latter’s “ignorance of the year India won Independence”, has been granted bail by a court in Maharashtra’s Mahad.

Rane was taken into cus-tody by police in coastal Rat-nagiri district, where he is travelling as part of the Jan Ashirwad Yatra, an official said.

Rane, who joined Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Cabinet in July as Minister for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, is the first Union Minister to be arrested in 20 years.

He had claimed that Thac-keray forgot the year of Inde-pendence during his August 15 address and had to check with his aides mid-speech.

Earlier, he was produced before a court at Mahad in Raigad district, some 160 km from Mumbai, in front of Mag-istrate Shaikhbabaso Patil by the Mahad police.

His lawyer Aniket Nikam had said the police had failed to follow due process of law before arresting Rane, a BJP leader. A notice has to be issued under Section 41A of the CrPC (Code of Criminal Proce-dure) before arresting some-one in cases where custodial interrogation is not required, he said.

Rane faces four FIRs across Maharashtra over his remark that he would have slapped Thackeray over the latter’s alleged ignorance of the year of India’s Independence.

He was arrested on Tues-

day afternoon by the Ratnagiri police and taken to Mahad in Raigad district.

A complaint was lodged by Nashik city Shiv Sena unit chief at the cyber police station there, after which an FIR was

registered against Rane under IPC Sections 500 (defamation), 505(2) (mischief), 153-B (1)(c) (remarks likely to cause dis-harmony, or feeling of enmity or hatred or ill-will), a police official said. Turn to P4

Trinamool mulls nationwide stir against Nat’l Monetisation Pipeline

TMC MP says this policy does not have the consent of the public as it was not listed in the BJP manifesto

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Stating that the National Monetisation Pipe-line (NMP) was not discussed in either Parliament or in any Parliamentary Committee or the Consultative Committee of the Finance ministry, Trin-amool Congress (TMC) Rajya Sabha MP Sukhendu Sekhar Roy on Tuesday said the party was planning a nationwide pro-test against the new economic reforms policy.

“It (NMP) was decided by the Niti Aayog, which is not a constitutional body and was set up following the recommen-dations of the Centre,” he said, adding that the BJP had never mentioned anything about this major economic overhaul in its election manifestos of 2014 and 2019. “Since they didn’t mention NMP in the election manifesto, we can now say that people don’t want MNP,” he added.

The leader claimed that

TMC would get in touch with the Opposition parties over the issue and then the protest will be launched.

The TMC MP stated that the Centre’s claim that the pri-vate players would be involved in the PPP model was “abso-lutely bogus” as the assets would be “perpetually leased” to the private companies and the lease would be renewed every 25 years.

“In a huge country like India, it is not acceptable that all public properties will be handed over to private players like this,” he added.

“It is alarming that perpet-ual lease has been granted to the private sector and this lease can be extended further. It will destroy the ecosystem. Work security will no longer exist and hire and fire policy will dic-tate. No strikes or protest will be allowed,” he said.

He maintained that the BJP had deliberately not mentioned NMP in the election manifesto

of 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha polls to avoid public wrath. He added that the NMP would be implemented over a span of four years.

“The BJP is going to face a general election in 2024 and no one knows about the man-date. Under such a situation, how can they take up a policy that will be implemented over a span of four years,” he asked.

He further stated that the assets coming under the pur-

view of NMP were 26,700 km national highways, 42,300 cir-cuit km of power transmission line, 8,000 km natural gas pipe-line, two hydrogen generation plants, 5,000 MW power gener-ation capacity and 4,000 km of the oil pipeline, among others.

In addition to these, 400 railway stations, 150 trains, 1,400 km railway tracks, 265 goods sheds, 160 mining proj-ects and 161 mineral blocks would be leased out. Turn to P4

CM CONGRATULATES TEAM

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: India on Tuesday hoped that the situation in Afghani-stan does not pose a challenge to its neighbours and the Afghan territory is not used by terrorist groups such as LeT and JeM to threaten other coun-tries, as it pitched for an inclusive and broad-based dispensation in Kabul representing all sections of Afghan society.

In his address at a special session of the UN Human Rights Council on the situation in Afghanistan, Indian ambassador to the UN in Geneva Indra Mani Pandey said a “grave” humanitarian crisis is unfolding in the country and everyone is con-cerned about the increasing violations of fundamental rights of the Afghan people.

He said India hopes that the situ-ation stabilises soon, and the parties concerned address the humanitarian and security issues.

“We also hope that there is an inclusive and broad-based dispen-

sation which represents all sections of Afghan society. Voices of Afghan women, aspirations of Afghan chil-dren and the rights of minorities must be respected,” he said.

“A broad-based representation would help the arrangement gain more acceptability and legitimacy,” he added.

Pandey, India’s Permanent Rep-resentative to the UN in Geneva, added: “We hope that the situation in Afghanistan does not pose a challenge to its neighbours and its territory is not used by terrorist groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), to threaten any other country.”

There has been increasing concern in the security establishment in India about the possible security impact of developments in Afghanistan in Jammu and Kashmir as LeT and JeM have close links with the Taliban.

The ambassador said as a neigh-bour of Afghanistan, the situation prevailing there is of “great concern” to India. Turn to P4

Sukhendu Sekhar Roy

Union minister Narayan Rane with BJP workers during the Konkan tour of ‘Jan Ashirwad Yatra’, at Sangameshwar in Ratnagiri district, on Tuesday PTI

CIA director held secret meeting: Report

State-run Schemes No. of applicants collected forms or enquired about schemes till August 24

Lakshmir Bhandar 74.26 lakhSwasthya Sathi 19.57 lakhCaste Certificate 6.69 lakhKhadya Sathi 6.37 lakhKrishak Bandhu (New) 3.49 lakhBina Mulya Samajik Surakshya Yojona

3.33 lakh

100 Days’ Work 1.42 lakh Students’ Credit Card 43,470 Mutation or land records’ minor correction

63,777

Aadhaar related issues 57,929Banking Related issues 48,141Aikyashree 26,735Taposhili Bandhu 17,618Manabik 24,950Jai Johar 13,485Kanyashree 7,720Rupashree 5,962Sikhashree 4,882 Total 1.22 crore

Union minister had claimed Maha CM forgot year of Independence during his Aug 15 address & had to check with his aides mid-speech

Highlights » Rane, who joined Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Cabinet in July as Minister for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, is the first Union Minister to be arrested in 20 years » His remarks drew sharp reactions from Shiv Sena, whose workers put several posters in Mumbai and other places, calling him a ‘kombdi chor’ (chicken stealer), a reference to the poultry shop he ran in Mumbai’s Chembur area five decades ago » Sena activists poured petrol, brought by them in bottles, on the posters installed outside the office and set them afire around noon. They also hurled stones at the office » Shiv Sena workers carrying placards and shouting slogans against Rane assembled in the Juhu area

FOR MEN IN UNIFORM

British Council and Kolkata Police launched ‘Communication with Confidence’ at an event held at British Council, L&T Chamber, Camac Street on Tuesday. It was launched by Police Commissioner Soumen Mitra in presence of Sophie Ross, the Acting Deputy High Commissioner, Kolkata PIC/MPOST

State to build organic fertiliser hub at Rajarhat worth Rs 15 cr

More than 3.71 cr doses cumulatively administered

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Four youths who worked with a catering com-pany and used to cook food for US forces managed to return to their native places in North 24-Parganas from Kabul on Monday night, bringing a sigh of relief to their family members.

Three youths returned to their houses at Gopal-nagar area of Bongaon while another was from Ashokenagar area. Though they were secured as they were under the protection of the US army, the sounds of firing and fighter jets triggered fear in them.

Bidyut Biswas and Palash Sarkar are from Sankarpur village while Prabir Sarkar is

from Raghunathpur under Gopalnagar. They said that at one point of time they thought that they would not be able to return home.

“Talibans had given an ultimatum that all foreign nationals would have to leave Afghanistan by August 31. We were not so hopeful that we would be back home. As we said we would leave, our com-pany told us that they would

hike our salary. We were told that around 5,000 $ would be given to us for 15 days. But we decided to return home. We have turned jobless. We would have been killed there,” said Biswas. All of them returned to India via Qatar. Ajay Majumdar, another youth and a resident of Ashokenagar in North 24-Par-ganas went to Afghanistan around five months ago. He

also worked in the army camp.“Last one week ten-sion mounted up as we always heard sounds of firing outside. We were safe as we were at army camp. As the situation was deterio-rating fast, we did not have the courage to stay back. Our parents were under fear as well. They were hopeful as attempts were made to bring the Indian nationals back home,” Majumdar said.He further added: “We had faced difficulties in the last few days before returning. Local Afghan youths do not like Talibans as they unleash terror and atroc-ities. People were safe as US forces were there for a long time but everything changed since August 15.”

4 Bengal natives who cooked for US forces return to state

‘Foreign nationals asked to leave Afghanistan by August 31’

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Bengal has administered around 4,34,581 doses on Tuesday. As many as 3,71,51,033 doses have been cumulatively administered in Bengal so far. Incidentally, state on Monday achieved more than 5 lakh daily vaccination mark.

Bengal had achieved another milestone of complet-ing the administration of 1 crore of second doses on Mon-day. State has crossed 4 lakh daily vaccination mark five times so far. On Monday, total 5.19 lakh doses were adminis-tered across the state.

Around 2,65,69,195 peo-ple received first dose of Covid vaccinne till Monday while around 1,01,22,140 people had received the second dose till Monday. In the special category vaccine group aged between 18-45, around 1,03,85,537 doses have been administered so far till Tuesday.

Despite the challenges posed by the inadequate supply of Covid vaccine by the Cen-

tre, the state health department has successfully achieved these milestones. Health department has the capacity to perform more than 7 lakh daily doses but inadequate supply of vac-cinne by the Centre. The health department has been able to utilize each vial without any wastage. Despite the slowdown in the second dose vaccination in August, the state managed to vaccinate the highest number

of people compared to many other states.

State has given enough stress on the vaccination drive keeping in mind an antici-patory third wave of Covid. Health department has been trying to complete as much vaccination as possible before October. Some health experts apprehend that third wave of Covid may reach it’s peak dur-ing October and November.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: In an unprece-dented move, two professors of Visva Bharati university have been suspended for allegedly vitiating the environment of the academic institution on Monday.

Three students, who were earlier suspended for six months, had been sacked by the university authorities.Pro-fessor Arani Chakraborty and Professor Piyush Kanti Ghosh of Physics depart-

ment were suspended for viti-ating the environment of the university. Profes-sor Chakraborty had lodged a complaint with the police alleging that the teachers had been confined illegally by the Vice-Chancellor Professor Bidyut Chakraborty. He also sought police pro-tection alleging threat to his life. He alleged that the Vice-Chancellor had taken the decision vindictively.A senior Reader of Calcutta University preferring ano-nymity said the Vice-Chan-cellor during his tenure had so far suspended about 20 teachers When contacted the Registrar of the university refused to comment.

ONE HELD FOR DUPING JOB SEEKER BY POSING AS COPKOLKATA: A person was arrested for duping a man by promising a job for his son and impersonating a policeman on Tuesday in Jadavpur. According to police, on August 19, the complainant identified as Kalyan Guha of Bijoygarh in Jadavpur lodged a com-plaint against Kalipada Bar who allegedly imperson-ated a Kolkata Police personnel. Bar allegedly asked Kalyan to pay Rs 5,000 and give him his motorcycle to provide a job to his son Krishnendu Guha in the Kolkata police. Kalyan had given the money and his motorcycle during the first week of August, but Bar started avoiding him.

PVT BUS OPERATORS URGE STATE TO GIVE FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE KOLKATA: Private bus operators on Tuesday urged the state government to financially support them in converting their vehicles into CNG. “We want to convert our buses into CNG. But we need financial support from the state government,” said Rahul Chat-terjee, general secretary of All Bengal Bus Minibus Samannay Samity.

2 professors of Visva Bharati

suspended

SOUMITRA NANDI

KOLKATA: The state Agri-cultural Marketing department is coming up with an organic fertiliser hub at Rajarhat, the first-of-its-kind in the state. The hub will not only act as a platform for buying and selling of organic fertiliser by farmers but also for sale of organic pro-duces directly to the customers, ruling out involvement of any middleman.

Organic products presently are available in a number of retail chain stores in the city but the price of the products is quite high, beyond the pur-chase capacity of common peo-ple. The organic products will be available at reasonable rate in the hub and will be afford-able to the common people.

“The developed countries in the world have shifted to organic farming amidst com-

plaints of use of pesticides in agriculture which is detri-mental to health. The people of the state too would surely love organic products if they are sanguine of the genuine-ness. Organic products includ-ing vegetables will be sold in the hub and will also be made available in the Sufal Bangla outlets across the state,” state Agriculture Marketing minis-ter Biplab Mitra said.

The seven storied building on 988.5 sq metre land will also

have an advanced laboratory with skilled professionals for testing of the organic products. Only certified organic prod-ucts from the laboratory will be sold in the hub. There will be facilities for conference and guest house in the building.The use of pesticides in crops not only poses health hazards for the consumers but at the same time its use affects the volume of crop production “Farmers will be encouraged to purchase organic fertiliser and cultiva-

tion will assure them of good crop yield,” a senior official of the department said.

The minister along with CEO of West Bengal State Agricultural Marketing Board

(WBSAMB) Jaideep Dut-tagupta visited the site at Rajar-hat on Monday. The minister said if everything goes as per plan the construction of the hub will be completed by Feb-ruary 2022. The total project cost is Rs 15 crore. “The main objective of setting up a dedi-cated hub of organic fertiliser is to ensure that the farmers get assured return by organic farm-ing and the people of the state get genuine organic products at a reasonable price,” Mitra said.

A good number of farmers across the state have already adopted organic farming after receiving training at the insti-tute of WBSAMB – Netaji Subhas Training Institute of Agricultural Marketing.“Once we develop the market link-age for them in the form of this hub, more farmers will be encouraged to adopt organic farming,” the minister said.

‘IF EVERYTHING GOES AS PER PLAN, HUB WILL BE BUILT BY FEBRUARY’

News at a Glance

Agriculture minister Biplab Mitra and CEO of WBSAMB visited the project site at Rajarhat PIC/MPOST

Highlights » The seven storied building on 988.5 sq metre land will also have an advanced laboratory with skilled professionals for testing of the organic products » The main objective of setting up a dedicated hub of organic fertiliser is to ensure that the farmers get assured return by organic farming and the people of the state get genuine organic products at a reasonable price

2 millenniumpostCitympWEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021 | KOLKATA

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State plans to set up five small food processing units

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: The state Food Processing Industries & Hor-ticulture (FPI& H) department is planning to set up five small food processing facilities with basic infrastructure to facili-tate setting up of small units at that particular place. These units can utilise the common infrastructure of these food processing facilities for their own functioning.

“We have abundant raw material in the form of fruits and vegetables. But transpor-tation to some other place for processing involves a lot of hassle and time. So, we have planned to set up five small food processing facilities with centralized cold rooms and allied facilities. Interested persons can set up their own units in these places and use the common facility of the cold room, laboratory etc of the government and run their

own unit,” Subrata Gupta, Additional Chief Secretary of FPI&H department said while speaking at a special session on “Developments and Oppor-tunities in Food Processing & Horticulture Sector of West Bengal” at Merchants’ Cham-ber of Commerce and Industry.

The negotiation with NAB-ARD in this matter is in its final stage and the department is hopeful of getting the approval by October so that the facilities can be put into place by Janu-ary- February next year. The basic idea is to do food pro-cessing near to the place of pro-

duce so that there is no hassle of transportation to some other place for processing.

Gupta said farmers are often denied of a better price as they do not get enough time to sell their produce. “Post har-vest there is a huge gap due to lack of cold storage and cold vehicles for transportation of things from the field to mar-ket. So we are encouraging the private sector to come forward and develop facilities for cold storage or pack houses,” he said.

He also informed the cham-ber of the recent schemes of the union government for setting up such facilities where a sub-sidy up to the extent of 35 per cent can be availed.

Balurghat civic body to repair roads & drains before Puja at Rs 4 croreOUR CORRESPONDENT

BALURGHAT: Balurghat civic body will repair the damaged roads and drains on an urgent basis before Durga Puja.According to a civic official, fund worth Rs 4 crore has already been allocated for the work.

“We have taken up an ini-tiative to repair the damaged roads and drains inside the civic areas. The works of a few damaged roads and drains have started after completing the tender process. The rest of the work will be completed before the upcoming Durga Puja festi-val,” the civic official said.

The new chairperson of the board of administrators for the concerned civic body Sekhar Das Gupta said: “The former chairperson had taken up the decision to repair the damaged roads and drains. A fund of Rs 4 crore has been sanctioned for

it. The work will be completed before the Durga Puja.”

The former civic body chairperson Haripada Saha said: “A list of damaged roads and drains was prepared recently and the fund was sanc-tioned accordingly but before completing the work, I have handed over the charge to the new chairperson.”

Recently, a group of civic officials had visited all the 25 civic wards to identify the dam-aged roads and drains.“After inspection, 75 such roads were identified. Due to the digging operation for the connectiv-

ity of piped-domestic drinking water service, the roads were damaged and needed immedi-ate repairing measures. In addi-tion to this, the team of civic officials had also identified 25 drains for repairing. As many as 20 tenders were already com-pleted and the rest of the ten-ders will be invited soon,” said the civic official.

The civic roads covering the areas of Uttamasha pally, Namabangi, Saheb Kachhari, Khadimpur and Lalmati are partly or fully damaged and the residents are facing difficulties while using the roads.

Job boost: Special courses on self-employment for youths

SHAHERYAR HOSSAIN

KOLKATA: The West Ben-gal Minorities’ Development and Finance Corporation (WBMDFC) is all set to offer special courses on self employ-ment for youths.

“We have made arrange-ments for residential courses for the minority youths with placement opportunity in the industries/ for self- employment,” said an official.

He reiterated that training and hostel cost will be borne by

the state government. Aspiring candidates (Buddhist, Chris-tian, Jain, Muslim, Parsee and Sikh) should apply online at www.wbmdfc.org latest by September 15, 2021. The age of the applicant should be between 18 and 25. Certificate Course in Machine Operation

(12 months duration) will be offered for class VIII passed students. Certificate Course in CNC Milling (six months) and Certificate Course in CNC Turning will be offered for Class X passed students. Welding Course will be offered for ITI/ class X passed students. CISCO Certified Network Associate (four months duration), Cer-tificate Course in Room AC and Home Appliances, Certif-icate Course in Audio/ Video - AC, among other courses will be offered for class XII passed students.

Training and hostel cost will be borne by the state government

KOLKATA: Five female con-tractual teachers of primary schools allegedly consumed poison on Tuesday while demonstrating before the state Education department head-quarters, seeking immediate fulfillment of their job-related demands, a senior police offi-cer said.

Four of them "drank some liquid from bottles" as soon as they were arrested for forcefully entering the premises of Bikash Bhavan and shouting slogans in violation of the disaster man-agement act, the officer said.

The fifth woman, who tried

to follow suit, was stopped by a woman constable before she could gulp down much of the liquid, he said.

Kunal Ghosh, the ruling TMC's spokesperson, wished the teachers a speedy recovery.

“It has to be looked into if there was any provocation from any quarter. A proper investi-gation will reveal the details,” he added.

“All five were taken to a state-run hospital, where the condition of four was stated to be serious. The fifth woman is out of danger,” the officer stated. MPOST

Five teachers attempt suicide while staging stir

The department is hopeful of getting the approval by October

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: As many as 46 Inspectors of West Bengal Police have been promoted to the rank of Deputy Superin-tendent of Police (Dy.SP) and Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) rank on Thursday.

Somenath Banerjee, Inspec-tor in Charge (IC) of Shibpur police station under Howrah Police Commissionerate has been made the ACp of Bid-hannagar police Commission-erate while IC, Bidhannagar North police station has been made the ACP in Chandan-

nagar Police Commissionerate. This apart, IC Dum Dum,

Subir Roy has been made the ACP in the Barrackpore Police Commissionerate.

Binod Gazmere who was the IC of Mathabhanga police station has been made the Dy. SP, DIB in Cooch Behar. Deb-asish Chattaraj, who was the Circle Inspector (CI) of Bol-pur in Birbhum, has been transferred to the post of ACP in Asansol Durgapur Police commissionerate.

This apart several changes have been made in the district police units as well.

46 Inspectors of Bengal Police get promotion

We were not so hopeful that we would be back home. As we said we would leave, our company told us that they would hike our salary. We were told that around 5,000 $ would be given to us for 15 days.

A man being inoculated at a camp held on premises of Elite Cinema Hall on Tuesday PIC/MPOST

Professor Arani Chakraborty and Professor Piyush Kanti Ghosh of Physics department were suspended

‘We have taken up an initiative to repair the damaged roads and drains inside the civic areas. The works of a few damaged roads and drains have started after completing the tender process...’

Additional Chief Secretary of FPI&H department, Subrata Gupta, at an event PIC/MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: The West Ben-gal Board of Secondary Edu-cation (WBBSE) has reduced the syllabus for class X students who will be appearing for their Madhyamik examination in 2022 by 30-35 per cent.

A notification in this regard undersigned by President of West Bengal Board of Sec-ondary Education Kalyanmoy Ganguly has been sent to the heads of all institutions.

The curtailed syllabus will be effective for all the subjects taught in the Madhyamik-level that includes First Language, Second Language, History, Geography, Physical Science, Life Science and Mathematics.

The chapter/topic wise marks have also been attached

along with the notification. The notification has also been uploaded in the Board’s website.

Schools have been closed since March 2020 due to Covid pandemic situation and physi-cal examinations could not be held in the year 2021.

Syllabus was also curtailed by 30-35 per cent for the stu-dents of 2021 Madhyamik.

“It has not been decided when schools will open. There are chances of open-ing after the Durga Puja but that too will depend on the COVID situation. So we have decided to continue with the reduced syllabus this year too for the benefit of the stu-dents,” a senior official of West Bengal Board of Secondary Education said.

3millenniumpost

EXHIBITION

A tram moves with the exhibition ‘From Kolkata to Italy’ in Kolkata, on Tuesday PIC/PTI

City mpKOLKATA | WEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021

State logs 613 new Covid cases; recovery rate stands at 98.21%

State directs dists to expedite vaccination of school teachers

AMITAVA BANERJEE

DARJEELING: At the Tribes Advisory Council meet, Chief Minister Mamata Baner-jee addressed issues per-taining to tribes residing in Kalimpong.

Rupen Sada Lepcha, MLA, Kalimpong and member of the council had raised certain issues pertaining to the Kalim-pong district.

“Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who is the president of the Council, had asked me specifically if there are any issues pertaining to the tribes residing in the Hills

that need to be addressed. Accordingly, I informed her,”

stated Lepcha.Lepcha informed the

Chief Minister that the Ekalavya Model school for tribes is yet to see the light of day in the Hills, despite land being allotted in Charkhole in Kalimpong for this. “The CM directed that the project should be taken up immediately. She asked Bijan Mandal, secretary of the Tribal Welfare department to visit Charkhole on August 27 to take up the project. Till the school building is constructed, the model school will run in rented premises,” added Lepcha.

The Kalimpong MLA also

raised the issue of teaching the Lepcha language in pri-mary schools in areas with a large Lepcha population. The Lepchas have already been listed in the Primitive Tribe list.

“This has been our long standing demand and the Lepcha Develop-ment Board has been doing the needful also. The CM stated that she will take up the matter with the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration so that primary schools in specific areas can start teaching Lepcha language as education comes under the GTA,” added

the MLA.He also raised the issue of

constructing houses for tea garden workers in the Kalim-pong district.

“I had visited 7 tea gar-dens to campaign during the Assembly elections. I felt the need for construc-tion of houses for the tea gar-den workers. There are many from tribe communities,” said Lepcha.

“The Chief Minister has assured that she will look into the matter and will ensure that houses are constructed for the tea garden workers,” added Lepcha.

CM directs to fast-track Ekalavya Model school projectTill the building is constructed, the model school will run at rented premises

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: District authori-ties and civic bodies have been directed to ensure vaccina-tion coverage at the earliest for school teachers and people residing in urban areas.

This comes at the time when Chief Minister Mamata Baner-jee has announced that schools would reopen after Durga Puja vacation if the Covid situation does not turn worse.

Chief Secretary HK Dwivedi on Tuesday held a meeting with all district mag-istrates and other concerned authorities to ensure that nec-essary steps are taken to fur-ther curb the cases of Covid positive.

This comes when 613 new cases and 12 deaths were recorded due to Covid.

Sources said that District Magistrates were directed to impose containment norms at the areas with higher num-ber of Covid cases. Micro con-tainment zones can be created besides undertaking proper vaccination drives in the urban

areas. Stress also has to be given to complete vaccination for school teachers. A large section of school teachers have already received vaccines as they had to go for election duty during the Assembly polls. The remaining number of teachers also has to be brought under the vacci-nation coverage at the earliest. Directions have also been given not to keep stock of vaccines for more than three days. Number of vaccinations in urban areas also has to be increased.

It needs mention that the steps taken by the state gov-ernment has reduced the Covid positivity rate to 1 per cent which was 33 per cent during the eighth phase of the Assem-bly polls.

The District Magistrates have also been asked to ensure that at no cost Covid norms should be violated at Duare Sarkar camps. At the same time they have been asked to ensure proper monitoring so that not a single applicant gets left out.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Four policemen suffered minor injuries after a truck hit a patrolling van on National Highway 6 at Raja-pur of Howrah late on Mon-day night.

According to sources, around 1 am on Monday night the police van was parked on the roadside of Kolkata bound lane and the four policemen includ-ing the driver were roaming on the road. Suddenly a truck arrived at a high speed and hit the police van which sub-sequently fell into a roadside swamp. The policemen jumped out of the way of the truck and suffered minor injuries. Later the policemen were rushed to the Uluberia sub divisional hospital from where they were treated and discharged.

However, the truck driver managed to flee with the truck.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: About 200 work-ers from different political par-ties joined Trinamool Congress in Tripura, while 300 BJP and CPI(M) leaders and workers joined the state’s ruling party in Uluberia.`

Moloy Ghatak, state Law minister and Dr Shantanu Sen, Trinamool Congress Rajya Sabha MP, were present at the joining function which was held in the house of Subol Bhowmick in Tripura.

Ghatak said more and more people were joining TMC every day and in the 2023 Assembly election the BJP government would be ousted. Pulak Roy, state minister for Public Health

Engineering department and Debashis Bandyopadhyay, presi-dent, Trinamool Youth Congress of Howrah district were present at the function. They handed over the flags to those who had joined the party.

About 200 BJP workers from Chanipur gram panchayat area joined Trinamool Congress. Ear-

lier, many BJP supporters from Beradi and Baniban areas had joined TMC a week ago. About 100 CPI(M) supporters—led by Rupali Roy, member of Madhab-pur I gram panchayat— joined TMC.

After joining Trinamool, Roy said CPI(M) had neglected the people and did not think about their problems. She said she along with her party colleagues had joined TMC as they wanted to take part in various develop-ment schemes announced by Mamata Banerjee. Pulak Roy said many rank and file of BJP and CPI(M) had supported the work taken up by Howrah district administration. In future, more workers from BJP and CPI(M) would join TMC, he said.

Four cops hurt after

truck hits a patrolling van

About 500 workers from different parties join TMC in Tripura & Howrah

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Single-day Covid infection has gone up to 613 on Tuesday from what stood at 510 on Monday. Single day Covid fatality jumped to 12 on Tuesday from what stood at 7 on Monday.

Number of daily casel-oad still remains higher in the districts like North 24-Par-ganas, Kolkata, South 24-Par-ganas, Hooghly and Darjeeling. According to the health bulle-tin on Tuesday, around 89 fresh cases were detected in North 24-Parganas while in case of Kolkata the number was regis-tered at 95. Darjeeling has seen 40 new cases, South 24-Parga-nas 35 and Hooghly 35. Cooch-behar has reported 27 new cases, Howrah 38, Nadia 31.

The recovery rate reached 98.21 per cent on Tuesday and rate of transmission of the virus

has been checked and the fatal-ity rate being restricted within 1.19 for nearly 3 weeks. The infection rate in some pockets has been a cause of concern for the health department. The positivity rate remained at 1.49 per cent on Tuesday.

Around 18,383 people have so far died of Covid across the

state. The total tally of COVID-19 infected cases reached 15,44,109 out of which around 15,16,509 patients have already been released from the hos-pitals so far. As many as 720 people were discharged from different hospitals on Tuesday. The percentage of occupancy of Covid beds in the State remains at 2.99.

Bengal has so far carried out 1,67,30,555 Covid sam-ple tests out of which around

41,262 tests were done in the past 24 hours. Kolkata has seen no Covid deaths on Tuesday while North 24 Parganas has seen 1 death, South 24-Parga-nas, Hooghly 3, East Burdwan 2, West Midnapore 1, Nadia 3 and Jalpaiguri 1.

Health department has so far addressed 21,21,949 gen-eral queries so far out of which 2,450 queries were addressed in the past 24 hours. State has so far given telemedicine con-

sultations to 8,57,018 people so far out of which 1,277 were given consultation in the past 24 hours. Around 508 people have been given tele-psycho-logical counselling in the past 24 hours taking the total num-ber of counselling to 4,18,624 till Tuesday.

Around 203 dedicated Covid hospitals have been still functional in the state out of 196 are run by the government. There are around 23,947 ear-marked Covid beds in the state and 2,861 ICU/HDU beds.

The total number of mucor-mycosis infected cases reached 89 in the state and the total number of suspected cases reached 205.

The number of confirmed deaths due to mucormycosis in Bengal has remained at 21 while 49 others who have died are still among the suspected cases.

FATALITY RATE RESTRICTED AT 1.19% FOR NEARLY 3 WEEKS

Key Points » A notification in this regard undersigned by President of WBBSE Kalyanmoy Ganguly has been sent to the heads of all institutions » The chapter/topic wise marks have also been attached along with the notification. The notification has also been uploaded in the Board’s website » Syllabus was also curtailed by 30-35 per cent for the students of 2021 Madhyamik » The curtailed syllabus will be effective for all the subjects taught in the Madhyamik-level » Schools have been closed since March 2020 due to Covid pandemic

Takeaways » This comes at the time when Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has announced that schools would reopen after Durga Puja vacation if the Covid situation does not turn worse » Sources said that District Magistrates were directed to im-pose containment norms at the areas with higher number of Covid cases » Directions have also been given not to keep stock of vac-cines for more than three days » The District Magistrates have also been asked to ensure that at no cost Covid norms should be violated at Duare Sarkar camps

Covid-19 Stats » Number of deaths in past 24 hours 12 » Total death toll so far 18,383 » Tested COVID positive in the past 24 hours 613 » Total COVID positive cases so far 15,44,109 » Total patients recovered from COVID so far 15,16,509 » Discharged from hospitals in a day 720 » Total sample tested so far 1,67,30,555

Madhyamik syllabus of 2022 reduced by 30-35%

Chargesheet filed against 2 in Nimtita Rly station blast case

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: The National Investigation Agency (NIA) filed chargesheet against two accused per-sons in Nimtita blast case in which Minister of State (MoS) for state labour department, Jakir Hossain and 21 others suffered injury.

The arrested persons were held accused under Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) along with Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Explo-sive Substances (ES) Act.

The incident had taken place at the platform number 2 of Nimtita railway station on Febru-ary 17 night this year when Hossain was wait-ing to catch a train to Kolkata. After the case was handed over to the Criminal Investigation (CID), a Special Investigation Team (SIT) was formed initially. But later on March 2, the NIA took over the investigation as instructed by the Union Home ministry. NIA had taken custody of two accused persons Abu Samad and Sahidul Islam, who were arrested by the police earlier.

During the probe NIA officials found that the accused duo had hatched a criminal conspiracy to kill Hossain, and his supporters in order to spread terror and to disturb the Assembly Election.

Islam had procured materials for making IED from the local shops and had held various meetings with Samad for final selection of site for executing the conspiracy. Both the accused per-sons had also unsuccessfully tried to destroy the phones used by them for misleading the investi-gation agency. NIA has submitted a chargesheet, the central agency has appealed before the Special NIA court to carry on with further investigation.

Earlier, a team of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) had conducted searches at the resi-dences of two persons in Murshidabad district in connection with its probe into the Nimtita blast case. NIA sleuths searched the residences of the two persons, who are meat sellers, at Chadra locality. One of the persons arrested in the case named the two as suppliers of “certain items to help manufacture the bomb”, a source said.

Cops to freeze bank accounts of ex-Min Shyamaprasad MukherjeeKOLKATA: The police have started the procedure to freeze the bank accounts of former minister, who is now a BJP leader Shyamaprasad Mukher-jee and his family members.

Mukherjee was arrested on Sunday for alleged misappropri-ation of Rs 10 crore by floating several tenders.

According to sources, on Tuesday police officials went to the Bishnupur Municipal-ity and interrogated an official as Mukherjee was the Chair-man for 34 years. Police are also interrogating the security per-son who was with Mukherjee

during his tenure as minister. The investigating officer has

already sent a letter to the bank authority where Mukherjee has an account. Cops will also check the affidavits submitted by Mukherjee to the Election Commission of India for his candidature in 2011 and 2016 Assembly Elections.

It is alleged that Mukherjee during his tenure as the Chair-

man of the Bishnupur Munic-ipality had floated around 55 tenders for development-related works but no work was done. Instead Mukherjee and his asso-ciates siphoned off the money. It was found that the amount dis-bursed from the bank account of the municipality was cred-ited in multiple bank accounts.

Recently Sub Divisional Officer (SDO) of Bishnupur, Anup Kumar Dutta came to know about the misappro-priation and lodged a com-plaint against Mukherjee at Bishnupur police station on August 20. MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: The state Higher Education department has directed the state government and government-aided teach-ers’ training institutions in the state to follow 90:10 ratio for home university and other university students during admission.

Earlier the department in a notification on July 13 had stated that admission will fol-

low 80:20 ratio for home uni-versity students and other varsity students.

The admission in teach-ers’ training programme for the academic session 2021-2023 kicks off from September 1 through the opening of portal for accepting application in online mode. The direction in this regard has been sent to all concerned institutions .

However, the ratio for home university students and other university students will be 80: 20 in case of state aided affili-ated universities.

‘Follow 90:10 ratio for home & other univ students during admission’

Earlier the department in a notification on July 13 had stated that admission will follow 80:20 ratio

Representative Image

However, the truck driver managed to flee with the truck

OUR CORRESPONDENT

KOLKATA: Durga Puja has long surpassed the boundary from being just a festival, it is now become a cultural event attended by people from across the globe and if all goes well—with the state government writ-ing to UNESCO—the annual carnival of Bengal will soon get an international status.

“The Durga Puja is the best instance of the public perfor-mance of religion and art in the city. It witnesses a celebration of craftsmanship, cross-cultural transactions and cross-commu-nity revelry. So we feel it deserves such status,” said a senior official of the state Tourism department.

The appeal to UNESCO has been forwarded through the Union Human Resources Devel-opment department.

Festivals of six countries that

includes France, Belgium, Swit-zerland, Brazil, Bolivia etc have got international recognition by UNESCO.

In 2019, the state Tourism department had made a presen-tation to a team from UNESCO to have the festival listed in the latter’s ‘List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity’ and had written to UNESCO for giving the status.

Bengal’s Durga Puja has been showcased in a big way across the globe with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee ushering in a grand end to the Puja by organ-ising a stunning carnival at Red Road where many of the city's best-known Durga idols are taken out in a parade.

The extravaganza, touted to be second only to the renowned Rio Carnival could not be held in 2020 because of the Covid pandemic.

State appeals to UNESCO to give Durga Puja ‘World

Heritage status’

File photo of a Durga idol depicting the plight of migrant labourers who walked for miles to reach their native places during the pandemic

The Narrative » ‘Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who is the president of the Council, had asked me specifically if there are any issues pertaining to the tribes residing in the Hills that need to be addressed. Accordingly, I informed her...’ » The Kalimpong MLA also raised the issue of teaching the Lepcha language in primary schools in areas with a large Lepcha population » The CM stated that she will take up the matter with the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration so that primary schools in specific areas can start teaching Lepcha lan-guage

He was arrested on charges of money laundering

Maha reports 4,355 new Covid cases, 119 deaths

Now, you can book vaccine slots through WhatsApp

4,240 PATIENTS DISCHARGED

4 millenniumpostNationmpWEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021 | KOLKATA

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: In an attempt to strengthen its aim to vaccinate all adults by the end of this year, the Union Health Ministry on Tuesday announced booking of vaccine slots using the What-sApp messenger.

Taking to the Twitter, Union Health Minister Man-sukh Mandaviya said that peo-ple could now book Covid-19 vaccine slots easily on their phones within minutes. Elab-orating on the process, he said, “One needs to send ‘Book Slot’ to MyGovIndia Corona Help-desk on WhatsApp, verify and then follow the requisite steps.”

In an official statement, WhatsApp on Tuesday said that the MyGov Corona Help-desk on its platform will now

allow users to locate their near-est vaccination centre and book their vaccine appointments.

“The MyGov Corona Help-desk on WhatsApp, since its launch in March 2020, has emerged as one of most authen-tic sources of COVID-related information during the pan-demic and served as a critical instrument in fighting the pub-lic-health crisis for over 41 mil-lion users across India,” it said.

MyGov CEO Abhishek Singh said that the MyGov Corona Helpdesk has been a path-breaking technological solution that benefited millions of citizens across the nation.

“Since its launch, MyGov Corona Helpdesk, enabled with support from Haptik and Turn.io, has evolved into a go-to plat-form that is not only helping

citizens with authentic Corona-related information but is now also aiding them in the pro-cess of vaccine booking as also finding vaccination centers and slots and downloading vacci-nation certificates,” Singh said.

To contact MyGov Corona Helpdesk chatbot, citizens can save the WhatsApp num-ber +91 9013151515 on their phones; start a chat by typing Book Slot and send it to the number. This will generate a six-digit one-time password on the respective mobile phone number.

Users then choose a pre-ferred date and location, based on the pincode and vaccine type. All users can follow this sequence to get a confirmation of their centre and day of their vaccine appointment.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

MUMBAI: Maharashtra reported 4,355 new coronavi-rus cases and 119 fresh fatalities on Tuesday, taking the infec-tion tally to 64,32,649 and the toll to 1,36,355, a state health department official said.

Seven districts namely Wardha, Gondia, Akola, Yavat-mal, Hingoli, Jalna, and Dhule did not report any fresh infec-tion of COVID-19 (in their rural areas), and same was the case with Chandrapur, Amara-vati, Akola, Parbhani, Jalgaon, Dhule and Malegaon munici-pal corporations (urban cen-tres), he said.

The official said 4,240 patients were discharged from hospitals across the state in the last 24 hours, taking the cumulative number of recov-ered cases to 62,43,034.

Maharashtra now has 49,752 active cases, he said.

The state has 3,01,955 people in home isolation and another 2,330 in institutional quarantine, according to the official.

Maharashtra's COVID-19 recovery rate stands at 97.05 per cent, while the fatality rate is 2.11 per cent, he said.

The cumulative num-ber of tests conducted in the state climbed to 5,26,32,810,

of which 1,87,121 tests were done in the last 24 hours, the official said.

He said Ahmednagar dis-trict reported the highest 667 new infections, followed by Pune at 533, while Satara dis-trict topped the list of fatali-ties with 24 deaths in the last 24 hours.

Among the eight regions of Maharashtra, the Pune region reported the highest new cases at 1,876 followed by 895 in Kolhapur.

Among the other regions, the Nashik region reported 748 new cases, Mumbai 631,

Latur 168, Nagpur 21, Aurang-abad nine and the Akola region seven, he said.

According to the official, among the 119 fatalities, the highest 65 were reported from the Pune region followed by 27 from the Kolhapur region.

Significantly, Akola and Nagpur regions did not report any fresh fatality, while the Nashik region registered 14 deaths, Mumbai six, Latur five and the Aurangabad region two, he said.

The official said Mumbai witnessed 271 new COVID-19 cases and only one death, while

Pune city reported 226 infec-tions and two fatalities.

Among the 49,752 active cases in the state, Pune district has the highest at 11,962, he said.

The official said among the 62,43,034 recovered patients across the state, the highest - 10,80,515 - were from Pune district.

Coronavirus figures for Maharashtra are as follows: Total cases 64,32,649; new cases- 4,355; total deaths 1,36,355; total recoveries 62,43,034; active cases 49,752; total tests 5,26,32,810.

Health workers inoculate beneficiaries against Covid-19, at a vaccination centre of Nair hospital in Mumbai

NEW DELHI: At least 10 evac-uees from Afghanistan tested COVID-19 positive after their arrival at the Indira Gandhi International airport here on Tuesday, according to people coordinating evacuation efforts with the Indian government.

An Indo-Tibetan Bor-der Police (ITBP) official said 81 people, who arrived from Afghanistan on Monday and Tuesday, have been sent to the ITBP's quarantine facility at Chhawla in south-west Delhi.

According to an office memorandum issued by the Union Health Ministry on Monday, people arriving from Afghanistan have to undergo a mandatory minimum 14-day institutional quarantine at the ITBP facility.

Any person testing posi-tive or detected as symptom-atic shall be shifted to dedicated Covid Care Centre or Covid hospital of NCT of Delhi, the memorandum read.

Kanv Bhalla, an entrepre-neur coordinating rehabilita-tion efforts on behalf of New York-based philanthropist Mandeep Singh Sobti, said, All 78 people, who arrived from Kabul via Dushanbe, under-went Covid-testing at the IGI airport. Of them, around 10 have tested positive.

Sobti and Paramjeet Singh Anand through their Sobti Foundation have been mak-ing efforts to rehabilitate these distressed Afghans in coordi-nation with the government of India, Bhalla said.

Some people have tested positive for the infection. However, there is no clarity on their count, said Puneet Singh Chandhok, president of the Indian World Forum, an organisation coordinating evacuation efforts with the Ministry of External Affairs

and the Indian Air Force (IAF).Sources at the LNJP Hospi-

tal said two Indian nationals, who were among the people brought to India from Afghan-istan, have been admitted to its Covid ward after testing positive.

"These two patients are male and their condition is stable. They were brought to the LNJP Hospital yesterday," an official source said.

Earlier in the day, 78 people, including 46 Afghan Sikhs and Hindus, flew into Delhi from Kabul via Dushanbe on an Air India flight along with three copies of Sikh scripture Guru Granth Sahib.

Union ministers Hardeep Singh Puri and V Muraleed-haran received the three cop-ies of the Sikh scripture and the batch of Afghan Sikhs at the Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport.

The three copies of Guru Granth Sahib will be taken to Guru Arjan Dev Ji Gurdwara in New Mahavir Nagar, according to Chandhok.

Nearly 200 more Afghan Sikhs and Hindus are still stranded in Afghanistan. These people have taken shelter at the Karte Parwan gurdwara in Kabul, which is close to the air-port, he said.

According to people shel-tered in the gurdwara, the 10-kilometre-long drive to the international airport through various checkpoints is one of the biggest challenges in the rescue efforts. Around 75 more Afghan Sikhs and Hindus are likely to be evacuated soon, Chandhok added.

Till Tuesday evening, India had brought over 800 people from Afghanistan as part of the evacuation mission that began on August 16, a day after Kabul fell to the Taliban. MPOST

At least 10 evacuees from Afghanistan test

Covid positive

THIRUVANANTHA-PURAM: Kerala reported 24,296 COVID-19 cases on Tuesday, the second time it has crossed the 24,000 mark after May 26 when the state had recorded 28,798 cases.

On May 27, the state had recorded 24,166 fresh COVID-19 cases. Since then the state twice came close to the 24,000 mark on May 29 –23,513 –and then on August 3 –23,676.

After May 29, the state crossed the 20,000 mark on July 27 when it reported 22,129 fresh cases and since then it has been logging more than or close to 20,000 cases on almost every day.

On Tuesday, with 24,296 fresh cases and and 173 deaths, the total infection count was pushed to 38,51,984 and fatali-ties to 19,757 till date. The Test Positivity Rate (TPR) jumped to 18.04 per cent from 15.63 per cent on Monday.

As many as 19,349 people have been cured of the infec-tion since Monday, taking the total recoveries to 36,72,357 and the number of active cases to 1,59,335, an official press release here said. In the last 24 hours, 1,34,706 samples were tested and the TPR was found to be 18.04 per cent. So far, 3,04,53,773 samples have been tested, it said. AGENCIES

Kerala logs 24,000-plus

cases for second time after May 26

KOCHI: The Kerala High Court on Tuesday asked the Centre whether the 84-day gap between two doses of Cov-ishield was based on availabil-ity of the vaccine or its efficacy.

The query to the central government came from Jus-tice P B Suresh Kumar while hearing a plea by Kitex Gar-ments Ltd seeking permis-sion to administer the second dose of Covishield vaccine to its workers.

The judge also said that if efficacy was the reason for the

gap, then he was “worried” as he was administered the sec-ond dose within 4-6 weeks of the first dose.

The court said if availability was the reason for the gap, then those who are able to afford to buy it, like Kitex has, they should be allowed to take the second dose without waiting for 84 days as per the prevail-ing protocol.

The court further said if efficacy was the reason then the scientific data in support of it be also provided.

With the direction, the matter was listed for hearing on August 26 after the lawyer for the Centre sought time till Thursday to seek instructions.

Earlier, on August 12, the high court had asked the Kerala government why it was permit-ting the second dose of vac-cine only after expiry of 84 days from the first dose.

The court had also asked the Centre what was the reason for increasing the gap between first and second dose of Cov-ishield from the earlier 4 weeks

to 12-16 weeks.On Tuesday, the state gov-

ernment said it was following the COVID vaccination guide-lines issued by the Centre.

Subsequently, the lawyer for the Centre sought more time to answer the court’s query.

Kitex in its plea has said that it has already vaccinated more than 5,000 of its work-ers with the first dose and has arranged for the second dose, but was unable to administer the same due to the prevailing restrictions. AGENCIES

OUR CORRESPONDENT

LUCKNOW: BrahMos Aero-space has proposed to set up a state-of-the-art production facility in Uttar Pradesh for its next generation missile proj-ect, the state government said on Tuesday.

The company produces one of the world's best supersonic cruise missile system BrahMos, it said, adding that the pro-posed facility in Lucknow will be part of the Uttar Pradesh Defence Industrial Corridor.

The facility comes under

the aerospace firm's expansion for the BrahMos Next Gener-ation (BrahMos-NG) Missile project, the state government said in a statement. The estab-lishment of BrahMos Aero-space will make Uttar Pradesh an aerospace and defence hub of India as it will bring in niche technologies. It will also put Lucknow prominently in the world map as a manufacturing hub for top-notch technologies, the statement said.

The BrahMos team, headed by Director General BrahMos Dr Sudhir K Mishra, met Chief

Minister Yogi Adityanath on Tuesday and briefed him about the BrahMos weapon system.

Adityanath was also apprised about the joint ven-ture entity's ambitious and highly promising plans about setting up the major facility for production and supply of vari-ous systems and sub-systems for next generation missile sys-tems, the statement said.

The chief minister has assured full support for setting up the new production plant in Lucknow, it said.

The estimated investment

of the project is around Rs 300 crore and the company has requested for 200 acres of land in the state's capital with civil construction to start within three months of getting pos-session of the land, the state-ment said.

This project is envisaged to generate more than 5,500 direct and indirect employ-ment opportunities for tech-nical workers as well as more than 10,000 direct and indirect employment opportunities for skilled, semi-skilled and non-skilled workers, it said.

UP govt: BrahMos Aerospace proposes facility at Lucknow for next gen missile project

84-day gap between Covishield doses based on vaccine availability or efficacy, Centre asked

BHUBANESWAR: Odi-sha's COVID-19 tally rose to 10,02,323 on Tuesday as 625 more people, includ-ing 80 children, tested posi-tive for the infection, while 67 fresh fatalities pushed the state's coronavirus death toll to 7,493, a health official said.

Odisha has been witness-ing a decline in fresh cases for six consecutive days. The state reported 761 infections on Monday, 853 on Sunday, 911 on Saturday, 986 on Fri-day and 1,041 on Thursday.

As many as 366 new cases were reported in quarantine centres, while the remaining 259 infections were detected during contact tracing, he said, adding that the single-day positivity rate stood at 1.16 per cent.

Khurda district, under which Bhubaneswar falls, reg-istered the highest number of new cases at 214, followed by Cuttack (56) and Balasore (50). Cuttack recorded the highest number of fresh fatali-ties at 20, followed by Jagast-

inghpur (14) and Dhenkanal (eight). Fifty-three coronavi-rus patients have died due to comorbidities so far.

Odisha now has 8,443 active cases. Khurda remains in the red zone with 3,268 active cases, while Cuttack is in the yellow zone with 1,084 infections. The remaining 28 districts fall under the green zone, the official said.

A total of 9.86 lakh people have recovered from the dis-ease so far, including 1,072 on Monday. AGENCIES

Odisha reports 67 fresh fatalities

Trinamool mulls nationwide stir gainst Nat’l Monetisation...

Twenty five airports, 31 ports and two sports stadiums would be leased out. “In the telecom sector, Bharat Fibre Network across the country which was built with pub-lic money, would be leased out to the private players. Open coal mines, which would be leased out, were likely to pose potential envi-ronmental and health hazards,” he added.

He alleged that the BJP had ruined the country economically because of its faulty policies that include demonetisation.

“It was Mamata Banerjee who had first pointed out that it would impact the Indian economy badly. When the country was facing a great economic crisis, ambitious projects like the Central Vista worth Rs 20,000 crore and construction of a house for the Vice-President worth Rs 190 crore had been taken up,” he stated.

Moreover, the leader said that it was most unfortunate that the policies of the Central government had been drafted by the business groups.

“The Centre has become a government of the Corporate, by the Corporate and for the Corporate. It has completely forgotten that India is a welfare state,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway (DHR) — declared as a World Heri-tage — featuring in the National Monetisa-tion Pipeline, witnessed a widespread appeal to the Union government for revocation of the decision.

“We appeal to the Government of India to reconsider their decision. The DHR has always been a part and parcel of the com-munity. We are accustomed to seeing it with the Indian Railways and we would like it to remain that way,” stated Samrat Sanyal, gen-eral secretary of the Himalayan Hospitality and Tourism Development Network.

“One just cannot hand over a world heri-tage to a private company. It is not just about running a train, this is what Railways is not understanding. The Union, state and local government along with the community has to come forward to preserve the DHR, priva-

tisation will not help in any way,” stated Raj Basu, Secretary General of DHR India Sup-port Group. The DHR was inscribed a world heritage in 1999.

#Twenty five airports, 31 ports and two sports stadiums would be leased out. “In the telecom sector, Bharat Fibre Network across the country which was built with pub-lic money, would be leased out to the private players. Open coal mines, which would be leased out, were likely to pose potential envi-ronmental and health hazards,” he added.

Hope terrorists don’t use Af soil for fuelling unrest...

“We are closely monitoring the rapidly evolving security situation in Afghanistan and we continue to call upon parties con-cerned to maintain law and order, ensure the safety and security of all Afghan nationals, UN personnel and diplomatic staff members, and observe human rights and international humanitarian law in all circumstances in Afghanistan,” he added.

The UN Human Rights Council has convened the special session to discuss the human rights concerns and situation in Afghanistan after Kabul fell to the Taliban.

Meanwhile, America’s top spy held a secret meeting with the Taliban’s de facto leader Abdul Ghani Baradar in Kabul on Monday in the highest-level face-to-face encounter between the two sides since the militant group seized the Afghan capital, a media report said on Tuesday.

The Taliban seized power in Afghanistan on August 15, two weeks before the US was set to complete its troop withdrawal after a costly two-decade war. This forced Afghan President Ashraf Ghani to flee the country to the UAE.

CIA Director William J Burns held a secret meeting in Kabul on Monday with Baradar in the highest-level face-to-face encounter between the Taliban and the Biden administration since the militants seized the Afghan capital, the Washington Post reported, citing unnamed US officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

President Joe Biden’s decision to dispatch his top spy, a veteran of the foreign service, comes amid a frantic effort to evacuate peo-ple from Kabul international airport in what the President has called “one of the largest, most difficult airlifts in history,” the paper said.

The CIA declined to comment on the Taliban meeting but the discussions likely involved the impending August 31 deadline for the US military to conclude its airlift of US citizens and Afghan allies, it added.

The Biden administration is under pres-sure from some allies to keep US forces in the country beyond August 31 deadline in order to assist the evacuation of tens of thousands of citizens of the US and Western countries as well as Afghan allies desperate to escape Taliban rule.

However, a Taliban spokesman on Mon-day warned that there will be “consequences” if the US and UK sought an extension to the August 31 deadline for the US-led troop withdrawal from the war-torn country. WITH AGENCY INPUTS

Narayan Rane gets bail hours after arrest over ‘slap Thackeray’ remark

There were reports that while the process to arrest him was on, Rane complained of high blood pressure and sugar levels and a doctor was called to examine him.

It is shameful that the Chief Minister does not know the year of Independence. He leaned back to enquire about the count of years of Independence during his speech. Had I been there, I would have given (him) a tight slap, Rane said in adjoining Raigad district on Monday.

The former Chief Minister claimed Thac-keray forgot the year of Independence during his August 15 address to the people of the state. Thackeray had to check the year of Indepen-dence with his aides midway during the speech that day, Rane said.

He defended his remarks against Thac-keray, saying he hasn’t committed any crime by making them.

On media reportage of his ‘imminent arrest’ in the case, Rane said — hours before his arrest — that he was not a ‘normal’ man and cau-tioned the media against such reportage.

“I haven’t committed any crime. You should verify and show it on TV or else I will file a case against you (media). Despite not committing any crime, the media is showing speculative news about my ‘imminent’ arrest. Do you think I am a normal (ordinary) man?” Rane said.

His remarks drew sharp reactions from Shiv Sena, whose workers put several post-ers in Mumbai and other places, calling him a

‘kombdi chor’ (chicken stealer), a reference to the poultry shop he ran in Mumbai’s Chembur area five decades ago, during the initial part of his over four-decade stint with the Bal Thac-keray-led party.

Activists of Shiv Sena and its youth wing staged protests in various cities across Maha-rashtra against Rane.

In Pune’s Deccan Gymkhana area, Sena workers slapped posters of Rane with foot-wear. Yuva Sena workers staged a demonstra-tion in Hadapsar.

A stone was hurled at a mall located on JM Road in Pune, a police official said.

In Amravati, Sena workers vandalised the BJP office located in the Rajapeth area and also set various posters installed in front of the office on fire in protest against Rane’s remarks.

No BJP office-bearer or party worker was present in the office at the time of the incident.

Sena activists poured petrol, brought by them in bottles, on the posters installed out-side the office and set them afire around noon. They also hurled stones at the office.

Heavy police security was deployed outside Rane’s residence in Mumbai in the wake of his remarks against Thackeray, an official said.

BJP workers gathered outside Rane’s resi-dence on Juhu Tara Road in Santacruz (West) in the morning in support of their party leader.

Shiv Sena workers carrying placards and shouting slogans against Rane assembled in the Juhu area.

Police personnel, including women cops, were deployed outside Rane’s residence to pre-vent any untoward incident, the official said.

Maharashtra BJP president Chandrakant Patil distanced himself from Rane’s remarks. “I am not defending Rane’s comments, but I will also not express regret,” Patil said.

Leader of Opposition Devendra Fadnavis said the BJP does not support Rane’s comments, but the “party stands behind him 100 per cent”.

Alleging that the state police force was being used as a tool for “vendetta politics”, the former CM said there should be law and order and “not Taliban-like governance”.

Union minister Ramdas Athawale said Rane didn’t intend to insult Thackeray and will clarify his statement.

Shiv Sena MP Vinayak Raut wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, demanding the sacking of Rane over his remarks against the Maharashtra Chief Minister.

Raut said it was beyond his comprehension what message Rane would give to society when he was using such language.

Talking to reporters later, Raut said Rane should resign from the Modi ministry.

Nashik Police Commissioner Deepak Pan-dey on Tuesday issued orders for the immedi-ate arrest of Rane and a team of city police left for the Konkan region.

From Page 1

5millenniumpost Nation mpKOLKATA | WEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021

TN CM ANNOUNCES `39 CRORE MEMORIAL FOR KARUNANIDHI CHENNAI: A Rs 39-crore memorial for late DMK president and former Chief Minister M Karunanidhi will be constructed at the Marina on Kamarajar Salai here in recognition of his efforts to create a “modern Tamil Nadu,” chief minister M K Stalin announced on Tuesday. The “Kalaignar Memorial” on the famous beach, where he has been laid to rest after his de-mise on August 7, 2018, will come up on 2.21 acres of land, Stalin informed the state Assembly. Karunani-dhi is fondly addressed as Kalaignar. Leaders cutting across party lines, including main opposition party and DMK’s rival, AIADMK, welcomed the government’s announcement. Recalling the contributions of the late DMK stalwart in various spheres such as social wel-fare, transport , literature, education, urbanisation and infrastructure development, Stalin hailed his father as the “sculptor of a modern Tamil Nadu.”

LIGHTNING KILLS THREE WOMEN SAHIBGANJ: Three women working in a paddy field in Jharkhand’s Sahibganj district were killed on Tuesday when lightning struck them, an official said. Four women working in the field near Sakhi Garden under Rajmahal block were hit by lightning and were brought to hospital for treatment by the villagers, where the doctors declared three women dead. Con-firming the incident, Sub-Divisional Officer, Rajmahal, Roshan Sah said that the injured woman has been referred to Sahibganj Hospital for better treatment.

2013 MUZAFFARNAGAR RIOTS

HATE SPEECH CASE Nation Briefs

‘Govt in process of selling crown jewels built with public money’

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Hitting out at the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the National Monetisation Pipeline (NMP) plan, former Congress president Rahul Gan-dhi on Tuesday alleged that the Modi dispensation is in the pro-cess of selling India’s “crown jewels” built by previous gov-ernments with public money over 70 years. Addressing a press conference with former Union finance minister P Chi-dambaram, the Gandhi scion said that the BJP has claimed that nothing happened in India for 70 years, but now all assets created in all these years are being sold.

Lashing out the govern-ment, he said that the National Monetisation Pipeline plan was aimed to help ‘2-3 private play-ers’ and also countered the BJP’s favoured allegation that there had been no development in India under the Congress. Only a few businesses will be left as a result of it and those employ-ment opportunities would decline, he said.

“I want to tell the youth

what the country is selling and which asset is going to whom,” the Congress leader said, add-ing, “This is being sold to 2 to 3 private players. When I had cautioned the government about the Covid-19 outbreak, everyone laughed at me. I am saying is that this will have a huge impact on the future of this country.”

However, Gandhi alleged that the Modi government’s privatisation plan was aimed at creating monopolies in key sectors which will kill jobs. The Congress leader further alleged that the government

was indulging in the creation of monopolies in the formal sector and the elimination of the informal sector.

Listing out the assets to be sold by the government, Gan-dhi said, “The government has planned to sell 26,700 kms of national highways worth Rs 1.6 lakh crore, Rs 1.5 lakh crore worth of railways assets which includes 400 stations, 150 trains, railway tracks and woodsheds and 42,300 circuit kms of transmission network worth of Rs 40,000 crore.”

“Similarly, the Centre is announced selling 8,000 kms

natural gas pipeline worth Rs 25,000 crore, 4,000 kms pet-rol pipeline of Indian Oil and HPCL worth Rs 22,000 crore, 2.86 lakh kms of BharatNet Fibres Optics worth Rs 35,000 crore in the telecom sector and 210 lakh MT warehouse for food storage worth Rs 29,000 crore,” he said.

The Congress leader fur-ther said that the Modi govern-ment has sold 160 coal mines worth of Rs 32,000 crore, 25 air-ports worth Rs 21,000 crore, 31 projects and 9 ports worth Rs 13,000 crore and two national stadiums worth Rs 11,000 crore.

On the occasion, Chidam-baram said that raising funds cannot be the sole aim for sell-ing assets built over 70 years. All stakeholders, including

employees, worker unions, farmers, must be consulted before embarking on such a large sale of assets, he said.

Finance Minister Nir-mala Sitharaman on Monday unveiled an ambitious Rs 6 lakh crore NMP that included unlocking value by involv-ing private companies across infrastructure sectors -- from passenger trains and railway stations to airports, roads and stadiums. As many as 25 Air-ports Authority of India (AAI) airports, including ones at Chennai, Bhopal, Varanasi and Vadodara, as well as 40 railway stations, 15 railway stadiums and an unidentified number of railway colonies have been identified for getting private investments.

NEW DELHI: The Uttar Pradesh government has with-drawn 77 cases related to the Muzaffarnagar riots of 2013 related to offences entailing punishment of life sentence without giving any reasons, the Supreme Court was told on Tuesday.

A bench of Chief Jus-tice N V Ramana and Jus-tices DY Chandrachud and Surya Kant is scheduled to hear a plea filed by advocate Ashwini Upadhyay seeking speedy disposal of cases against lawmakers.

Senior advocate Vijay Han-saria, who has been appointed amicus curiae in the matter, in his report filed through advo-cate Sneha Kalita said that the

state government has informed that total of 510 cases, relating to Muzaffarnagar riots of 2013 were registered in five districts of Meerut Zone against 6,869 accused.

Out of these 510 cases, in 175 cases the charge sheet was filed, in 165 cases final reports were submitted, 170 cases were expunged. Thereafter 77 cases were withdrawn by the state government under sec-tion 321 of CrPC. The Gov-ernment Orders do not give any reasons for withdrawal of the case under section 321 of CrPC. It merely states that the administration after full con-sideration has taken a decision to withdraw the particular case, Hansaria submitted. AGENCIES

NEW DELHI: Attorney Gen-eral K K Venugopal on Tues-day urged the Supreme Court to reverse the Bombay High Court verdict which held that no offence of sexual assault under the POCSO Act is said to be committed if there is no direct skin-to-skin' contact between the accused and the child victim, calling the contro-versial judgement "outrageous" that would set a dangerous precedent.

The country's top law offi-cer also said that going by the approach of the high court, anybody can get away with a sexual assault offence by wear-ing surgical gloves.

The apex court, which was hearing separate appeals of the Attorney General and

the National Commission for Women(NCW), had on Janu-ary 27 stayed the high court order which acquitted a man under the Protection of Chil-dren from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act saying groping a minor's breast without 'skin to skin contact' cannot be termed as sexual assault . The verdict had come under attack from legal experts and child rights activists.

Seeking to set aside the verdict during his arguments before a bench of Justices U U Lalit and Ajay Rastogi, Venu-gopal contended that touch-ing of the breast of a minor even without removing the top amounted to commission of offence of sexual assault under the Act .

"Suppose, tomorrow a per-son, wearing surgical gloves, touches the entire body of minor, then he would not be punished for sexual assault as per this judgment. This is out-rageous. Saying that skin-to-skin contact is required would mean a person, wearing gloves, getting an acquittal. The High Court did not see the far reach-ing consequences", he said.

The judgement is outra-geous and would set a danger-ous precedent."

Venugopal also referred to the definition of sexual assault under section 7 of the POCSO Act, and said this provides for a jail term of three years and is akin to the offence of outraging the modesty of a woman under section 354A of the IPC. MPOST

CHANDIGARH: Farmers seeking a hike in sugarcane prices called off their agita-tion after Punjab Chief Min-ister Amarinder Singh assured them of Rs 360 per quintal for it on Tuesday.

The CM announced a hike of Rs 35 per quintal in the state assured price (SAP) of sug-arcane after a meeting with farmer leaders here.

Farmers had blocked a national highway and rail tracks in Jalandhar, saying the recent hike announced by the state government was inadequate as their production cost had spiralled considerably.

Their demand had also got the backing of state Congress chief Navjot Singh Sidhu, who demanded better prices for Punjab farmers.

The farmers’ stir had entered fifth day on Tuesday.

According to an official spokes-person, agreeing to the demand for a hike in cane pries, the CM said Punjab’s fiscal situa-tion had prevented adequate increase in the state advised price for the past three to four years.

The CM said farmers were not to blame for the problem, which was caused by Punjab’s poor finances, the spokesper-son added.

According to the official, the CM said he was always with farmers and wanted to do his best for their welfare but the state’s fiscal crisis had pre-vented him from increasing SAP earlier.

Balancing the needs of farmers with those of the cooperative and private sugar mill owners was tough, given the prevailing fis-cal situation, said the Chief Minister. AGENCIES

MUZAFFARNAGAR: The Uttar Pradesh Police has given a clean chit to AAP MP San-jay Singh and two other party workers in a hate speech case registered here last year, offi-cials said on Tuesday.

In its final report filed in the court of Chief Judicial Magis-trate Manoj Kumar, the Crime Branch said no evidence was found against Sanjay Singh and Aam Aadmi Party work-ers Samerjit Singh and Brij Kumaru, they said.

Sanjay Singh was booked under sections of the Indian Penal Code and the IT Act on August 13 last year for alleg-edly making remarks against a community and claiming that the Uttar Pradesh government was favouring a certain class of society. Multiple cases were registered against the Rajya Sabha MP, who is also the AAP's Uttar Pradesh incharge, in connection with his remarks.

The court will hear the complainant's reply on the final report on September 16, the officials said. MPOST

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Over 1,500 representatives of farm unions from across the country will come together to discuss future strategies for the ongoing farm-ers’ protest during the national convention on August 26 and 27, farmer leaders said.

The convention at the Sin-ghu border is being held to mark the completion of nine months of farmers’ agitation against the three contentious farm laws. “Unlike our other events, the national conven-tion is not going to be a mass gathering or a rally. Instead, 1,500 representatives of farmer unions from across the country will come together for two days at the Singhu border to discuss strategies to sharpen and inten-sify our protests,” farmer leader Abhimanyu Kohar told.

He added that the conven-tion was aimed at bringing together farmers from across

the country, so that everybody could be part of the decision-making on how the protest was to be taken forward.

“We have been protesting for nine months. It is not a short span of time. We want to include everybody, and representatives of farmer organisations from east, west, south and north... everybody will be here,” Kohar added.

According to a statement by the Samyukt Kisan Morcha, the convention will be aimed at “intensification and expansion

of an all India movement against the three black laws and legal guarantee of MSP of all crops”. “The convention shall discuss a resolution on all issues of the farmers movement --repeal of all three pro-corporate farm laws, legal guarantee for MSP of all crops, repeal of Electric-ity Bill, 2021, no prosecution of farmers under the ‘Commission of AQ Management in NCR and Adjoining Areas Bill 2021’,” the statement said.

The two-day event will see five sessions -- three on Thurs-

day and two on Friday -- that will attempt to address the chal-lenges faced by industrial work-ers, agriculture labour, rural poor and tribal people.

Sessions revolving around women, students, youth and other sections of working peo-ple will also be part of the con-vention, the statement said.

Delegates representative of organisations that work for the welfare of these sections will also be participating in the convention. One of the major topics that will be up for dis-cussion will be the farmers’ upcoming ‘mahapanchayat’ in Uttar Pradesh’s Muzaffarnagar, Kohar said.

“Our next strategy is the Muzaffarnagar ‘mahapanchayat’ on September 5 which will also be discussed at the convention. Preparations for the ‘maha-panchayat’ are in full swing. I know that at least 5,000 vehicles will be travelling to Muzaffar-nagar,” he said.

On August 26, the farmers’ protest against the three con-tentious laws will complete nine months since they first arrived at the Delhi borders.

The farmers have been demanding the repeal of the laws which they are afraid will do away with the MSP system, leaving them at the mercy of big corporations.

Over 10 rounds of talks with the government that has been projecting the laws as major agricultural reforms have failed to break the deadlock between the two parties.

While the Singhu border will be the central point of the national convention, gatherings will be organised in different parts of the country parallelly. In Chandigarh, farmer leader Paramjit Singh said about 2,000-2,5000 people are expected to come together to discuss the “issues that have been impact-ing farmers as well as the com-mon man”.

BALLIA (UP): RSS-affiliate Bharatiya Kisan Sangh (BKS) on Tuesday warned of a nation-wide agitation from September 8 if the Centre fails to act on its demands on farm laws and MSP by the end of this month.

MSP should be decided on the basis of cost, and a new law should be formulated, keeping in mind the concerns raised by farmers, to resolve the dispute arising out of the new farm laws, it said.

"For these demands, a nationwide symbolic dharna will be organised on September 8. The Modi government has been given time till August 31 to act on the demands. If it does not take a positive stand on our demands, then after the dharna on September 8, a decision will be taken on further steps," BKS treasurer Yugal Kishore Mishra said here. "Farmers do not get a remunerative price for their produce. MSP is not remuner-ative," he said, adding that his organisation was being com-pelled to agitate because of this.

"RSS does not run the Modi government, otherwise our organisation would not have to resort to agitation. No gov-ernment has been serious on issues that are in farmers' inter-est," the BKS leader said. MPOST

‘UP withdrew 77 cases without giving any reason’

Reverse Bombay HC's skin-to-skin' contact verdict: AG to SC

RSS-affiliate Bharatiya Kisan Sangh warns of agitation from September 8

Punjab farmers call off stir as CM assures hike

in sugarcane prices

UP Police gives clean

chit to AAP MP

1,500 farm union representatives from across India to come together at nat’l convention

‘We want to include everybody, and representatives of farmer organisations from east, west, south & north... everybody will be here’

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The BJP on Tuesday cited the previous Congress government's efforts to monetise different assets to wonder if the party was then trying to "sell" the country as it hit back at the principal opposi-tion over its attack on the Modi dispensation on the decision to raise over Rs 6 lakh crore by monetising infrastructure across several sectors.

Union minister Smriti Irani said Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who had targeted the government earlier at a press conference, is "upset" that India will make Rs 6 lakh crore and is trying to tarnish the Cen-tre's image for working to fill state coffers transparently while keeping them secure from the "robbers" of the opposition party.

Noting that the govern-ment has made it clear that it will remain in ownership of all the assets proposed to be mon-etised, Irani cited a quote to take a swipe at Gandhi.

"This man's politics begins with hypocrisy, is sustained through arrogance and ends with contempt," she said, add-ing the Congress leader today displayed all of it.

His political hypocrisy was also on show, she alleged.

The coalition govern-ment, of which the Congress is a member, in Maharashtra had monetised the Mumbai-Pune Expressway for Rs 8,000 crore, she said, asking if Gan-dhi's charge meant it had sold the asset.

The UPA government at the Centre had floated an RFP in 2008 regarding the New Delhi Railway Station and started air-port privatisation in 2006.

"Is this Rahul Gandhi's allegation that a government whose 'mukhia' was his mother had sold rail, road and airport," Irani asked.

As Congress president, his mother Sonia Gandhi was seen as the political face of the gov-ernment headed by Manmo-han Singh.

With Gandhi accusing the Modi government of promot-ing a few select corporates

and alleging that the country was heading towards "enslave-ment", Irani shot back, saying "enslaved" are those who, under a family rule, speak of break-ing the country, a reference to controversial comments on Kashmir and Pakistan by two advisors of Punjab Congress president Navjot Singh Sidhu.

Asked about Rahul Gan-dhi's claim that he had warned the government of the COV-ID-19's dangers too, the BJP leader and Amethi MP shot back saying there was not even a district hospital and CT scan-ner in the constituency he rep-resented for 15 years.

Right from making PPE kits, the Modi government pre-pared the health infrastructure to deal with the crisis, she said.

BJP leader and Union min-ister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said the opposition party is a "non-performing asset" that has no value.

Speaking to reporters here, Naqvi took a swipe at the Con-gress, calling it a "depressed defaulter dynasty" and a "champion of confusion and contradiction".

While the Modi gov-ernment and the BJP are engaged in the "construction of the country, the Congress is involved in the "destruction of the country", he alleged.

‘Rahul upset that India earning `6 lakh crore’

SIMONTINI BHATTACHARJEE

NEW DELHI: Almost half a year in advance, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is set to puff the saffron surge with Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to the poll-bound state Uttar Pradesh from September.

Sources said that PM Modi is scheduled to inaugurate, lay the foundation stones of several developmental projects and will also address the karyakartas of the local party unit. However, no official date and programme

has been finalised yet.In addition to setting the

poll bugle, PM and other Union Ministers will now frequently visit the poll-bound state every month, until the model code of conduct comes into force, a party source told the Millen-nium Post.

The party leadership is also conducting surveys in every Assembly constituencies and collecting feedback. Taking a lesson from the West Bengal poll verdict, the saffron party is aiming to strengthen the organ-

isation base first. Only after the groundwork is completed, the party will plan the round of vis-its of central leaders.

The party is witnessing infightings in many places, hence, the three co-incharges - Satya Kumar, Sanjiv Chaura-sia and Sunil Oza are organis-ing Assembly-wise meetings to collect feedback and check the preparation at the grass-roots. Experts feel that these meetings would be crucial in deciding tickets for the existing MLAs.

BJP has also planned to deploy one senior leader in each Assembly constituency of Uttar Pradesh to oversee the party's poll affairs, which include BJP MPs, party secretaries, gen-eral secretaries and the Union Ministers hailing from Uttar Pradesh.

The BJP top brass also believe that micro-level booth management is one of the main reasons for BJP’s electoral suc-cess. The party president JP Nadda will also launch 'Booth Vijay Abhiyan'. Earlier it was

scheduled to be launched on August 23, but it has been post-poned now due to the demise of the BJP veteran and former chief minister Kalyan Singh, reportedly.

Sources said that during the campaign, the process of final-ising the booth committee and panna committee- on each page of the voter list will be com-pleted, for which the work is already in progress.

The Assembly election in Uttar Pradesh is scheduled for early next year.

‘PM, other Union Mins to visit poll-bound UP every month’

‘I want to tell the youth what the country is selling and which asset is going to whom’

The government has planned to sell 26,700 kms of national highways worth Rs 1.6 lakh crore, Rs 1.5 lakh crore worth of railways assets which includes 400 stations, 150 trains, railway tracks and woodsheds and 42,300 circuit kms of transmission network worth of Rs 40,000 crore

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi addresses a press conference on National Monetization Pipeline plan at Congress party headquarter in New Delhi on Tuesday NAVEEN SHARMA/MILLENNIUM POST

Farmers block Jalandhar-Delhi highway during their indefinite protest demanding higher sugarcane SAP, in Jalandhar on Monday PIC/PTI

‘Unlike our other events, the national convention is not going to be a mass gathering or a rally. Instead, 1,500 representatives of farmer unions from across the country will come together for two days at the Singhu border to discuss strategies to sharpen and intensify our protests’

Smriti Irani

FESTIVE TIME

Artists perform ‘Pulikali’ during the end of ‘Onam’ festival, in Thrissur on Tuesday PIC/PTI

2 NAXALS HELD IN CHH’GARH WITH IEDS DANTEWADA: Two Naxals, each carrying a re-ward of Rs 2 lakh on his head, were arrested when they were allegedly planning to plant improvised explosive devices (IEDs) to target security forces in Dantewada district of Chhattisgarh, police said on Tuesday. Two tiffin bombs were recovered from the possession of the arrested ultras. A patrolling team of the District Reserve Guard (DRG) and local police nabbed Pandu alias Mangu Madvi (23) and Hurra alias Korma Sodi (22) on Monday near Hiroli village under Kirandul police station area, Dantewada Su-perintendent of Police Abhishek Pallava said.

SUSPECTED ARMS DEALER KILLED IN ASSAM POLICE ENCOUNTERKARIMGANJ (ASSAM): A suspected arms dealer, who was arrested along with an accomplice, died in a police encounter in Assam’s Karimganj district when he allegedly tried to flee custody, an officer said on Tuesday. With this incident, the toll due to purported police encounters in the state rose to 21 since the new BJP-led government under Chief Minister Himant-aBiswaSarma assumed charge in May, while at least 31 people were injured as they allegedly attempted to escape from police custody. According to the police officer, the suspect, Nurul Islam, was being taken to Niralagaon in Badarpur on Monday night in search of one more of his accomplices when he allegedly tried to escape. Police had to open fire on Islam, who died after sustaining bullet injuries, the officer added.

‘HAVE TO FOLLOW HIERARCHY OF LAW’

Nation Briefs

6 millenniumpostNationmpWEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021 | KOLKATA

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked prin-cipal bench of Armed Force Tribunal here to adjudicate the pleas of Navy officers, who have challenged rejec-tion of their claim for Per-manent Commission (PC) and grant of pensionary ben-efits saying we as a national institution have to follow hier-archy of law .

The top court said that the principle of law which has been laid by it for grant of perma-nent commission to women officers in Army and Navy, will equally apply to the male offi-cers as well and there will be no discrimination.

A bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and M R Shah, while hearing a batch of plea, said that the Armed Force Tri-bunal (AFT) will adjudicate all the applications made by both male and women officers by

October 31.The bench said, You all can

always come to the Supreme Court, if you are not satisfied with the redressal of grievance by the AFT. We cannot enter-tain individual cases under Article 32 of the Constitution, especially when the Supreme Court has laid the principle of law. We as a national institu-tion have to follow the hierar-chy of law .

The top court said it agrees with the submissions of senior counsels for the Navy officers that these are weighty issues but the question is whether the Supreme Court opens its door for entertaining these individ-ual cases under Article 32.

We will continue your interim protection granted by earlier orders and request the AFT to decide these appli-cations expeditiously. The Supreme Court should con-sider the fall out of its decisions. We should be consistent in our

findings and follow the disci-pline of law, the bench said.

It directed that applications related to permanent commis-sion already filed in various branches of AFT should be consolidated and transferred to the principal bench of AFT in Delhi here.

In a batch of petitions, which were taken up for hear-ing on Tuesday, the bench noted that 18 Navy officers have challenged the rejection of their claim for permanent commission and in the alter-nate they have sought grant of

pensionary benefits.The top court said that its

verdicts in Army and Navy matters related to permanent commission were appeals from the high court and they were not petitions filed under Arti-cle 32.

Senior advocate CU Singh, appearing for three officers, said that they have been dis-criminated against after the top court's verdict and these offi-cers, who are meritorious, were not considered for grant of per-manent commission.

He said that these offi-cers are left high and dry as they were not even allowed to join the civilian admin-istration on the ground that the petition is pending before the top court.

Similarly, senior advocate Huzefa Ahmadi, appearing for some officers said that there was discrimination in grant of pensionary benefits as the top court had invoked Arti-

cle 142 to grant such benefits to women Navy officers in its verdict.

He said that now the Navy is saying that the order for grant of pension was only for women officers and not men, who were from the same cadre.

On March 17, the top court had said that there can't be "101 excuses" to deny women in the military equal rights and cleared the decks for granting permanent commission to women officers in the Navy and asked the Cen-tre to work out the modalities in three months.

In a landmark verdict for gender equality, the top court had held that a level playing field ensures that women have the opportunity to overcome "histories of discrimination", as it cited the achievements of women Navy officers, includ-ing those serving on-board the INS Jyoti warship.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

SRINAGAR: The People’s Alli-ance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) on Tuesday said deep uncertainty and a “big” politi-cal void exist in Jammu and Kashmir following abroga-tion of its special status and it being made a Union Territory in 2019.

The alliance, comprising six mainstream political parties of Jammu and Kashmir, seeks res-toration of the special status of the erstwhile state.

In a meeting held at PAGD chairman and National Confer-ence president Farooq Abdul-lah’s residence at Gupkar here, the alliance’s constituents adopted a resolution, which among other issues, high-lighted that “nothing substan-tial” has emerged after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s meeting with leaders from Jammu and Kashmir in New Delhi two months back.

“Unconstitutional decisions of August 5, 2019, taken in the Parliament to nullify Articles 370 and 35A of the Constitu-tion of India and the damaging legislation which dismembered the historic state and created

two Union Territories Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh - has created a big political void and deep uncertainty in the erst-while state,” the resolution said.

“It is most unfortunate that the judicial challenges against this abrogation as a violation of the Constitution continue to remain pending before the Supreme Court even after two years,” it said.

Members of the PAGD at the meeting said the statehood of Jammu and Kashmir as it existed prior to August 5, 2019, must be restored.

“All political prisoners must be released immediately. Indis-criminate use of draconian laws must be put to an end,” the alli-ance, which also has the Meh-booba Mufti-led PDP as its member, said in the resolution.

The other members are CPI, CPI (M), Awami National Conference and People’s Move-ment. The resolution claimed that “nothing substantial” has emerged after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Dilli ki Doori and Dil ki Doori’ slogan during his meeting with J-K leaders in New Delhi two months back.

LAKHIMPUR (ASSAM): A local BJP leader allegedly com-mitted suicide at his home in Lakhimpur district of Assam owing to a financial crisis, police said on Tuesday.

The person has been iden-tified as Mithuranjan Das, Laluk Police Station Officer In-Charge (OC) SurajDoley said.

"After we got a call, our team reached the place and found the body hanging in a room of his house on Monday morning. We have sent it for post mortem and other neces-sary formalities," he said.

Das left a three-page, hand-written suicide note, which has details of his financial condi-tion along with names of vari-ous people from whom large monetary sums were due, Doley said.

The note in Bengali, a copy of which is available with the news agency, is addressed to his wife Tanu. It said lakhs of rupees were receivable from government agencies and individuals.

"In total, almost Rs 50 lakh was due, including Rs 17 lakh from the government for sup-plying food to a Covid Care Centre at Laluk College," she told.

Several large contracts, which were carried out by Das, offered by different gov-ernment departments like the Water Resources and the PWD, remained unpaid, his wife alleged. AGENCIES

OUR CORRESPONDENT

SRINAGAR: Three Lashkar-e-Taiba militants were killed in an encounter with secu-rity forces in Baramulla dis-trict of Jammu and Kashmir on Tuesday, taking the num-ber of ultras killed in the val-ley in the past 24 hours to five, police said.

Security forces launched a cordon and search operation at Pethseer in Sopore area late on Monday night, following information about the presence of militants there, a police offi-cial said.

He said the search opera-tion turned into an encounter early on Tuesday as the mili-tants opened fire at the security forces positions. Three ultras were killed in the exchange of firing with security forces, the official said. “The slain terror-ists were identified as Faisal Fayaz, Rameez Ahmad Ganaie (both residents of Shopian) and Ghulam Mustafa Sheikh, a resi-dent of Tekipura in Kupwara district,” he said.

The official said the trio was affiliated with The Resis-tance Force (TRF), a shadow outfit of LeT. The self-styled chief of TRF, Abbas Sheikh, and his deputy Saqib Manzoor were killed in a brief shoot-out in Aoochi Bagh area of the city on Monday. This takes the number of TRF ultras killed by security forces in the past 24 hours to five.

“As per police records,

the killed terrorists were part of groups involved in several terror crime cases, including attacks on security establishments and civilian atrocities,” a police spokesperson said

He said incriminating material, arms and ammu-nition, including one AK-47 rifle and two pistols, were recovered from the site of the encounter.

Meanwhile, Inspec-tor General of Police Kash-mir zone Vijay Kumar said the total number of ultras killed this year has crossed 100. “Today, by the collective efforts of @JmuKmrPolice, @ChinarcorpsIA, @crpfin-dia and people of #Kashmir have led to #neutralisation of more than 100 #terror-ists in the year of 2021 so far in Kashmir division,” Kumar said in a tweet.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: The Congress on Tuesday said the Indore incident involving the beating up of a bangle seller is a prelude to "inciting communal conflict and polarisation" ahead of next year's assembly elections.

The opposition party also asked whether there was any rule of law in force, and said the goons are insulting the great Hindu culture.

A 25-year-old man sell-ing bangles on the streets was beaten up by a mob in Mad-hya Pradesh's Indore city on Sunday.

"These incidents are a pre-lude to inciting communal conflict, violence and polar-isation in the run up to the

next round of state elections," said senior Congress leader P Chidambaram.

"Ghaziabad, Kanpur and now Indore. Who are these persons who are emboldened to decide what is right and what is wrong," he asked.

"If the State Home Minis-

ter will justify mob violence and vigilante justice, why is he remaining in the chair of Home Minister," the former union minister said.

Congress chief spokesper-son RandeepSurjewala said, the poor bangle seller will be beaten up and sent to jail too.

"These goons are insult-ing the great Hindu culture by spreading violence. Shame on you, is this the rule of law," he asked in a tweet in Hindi.

Three persons have been arrested on charges of assault-ing the bangle seller, but the episode took a new turn when he himself was later booked under the POCSO Act for allegedly touching a 13-year-old girl inappropriately and was detained, officials said.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

AGRA (UP): Four people have died in two villages of Uttar Pradesh’s Agra district allegedly after consuming suspected spu-rious liquor, claimed a village head and family members of the victims on Tuesday.

Police said the incident took place on Monday night in Kaulara Kalan and Barkula vil-lages in Agra where they have sealed four liquor shops.

The police, however, have not yet confirmed that deaths

occurred due to the consump-tion of spurious liquor.

“The actual cause of the death is not known yet and that will be known only after post-mortem,” Agra Superintendent of Police (Rural East) Ashok Venkat told PTI.

The SP identified the sus-pected hooch tragedy victims as Radhe (42), Anil (34) and Ramveer (40) of Kaulara Kala village and Gaya Prasad (50) of Barkula village.

Anil’s father Shri Niwas (65) alleged that his son and two

other people of his village died of consuming spurious liquor only that they had bought from the village shop.

My son was a habitual drinker and he sat to drink along with Radhe and Ram-veer on Sunday night despite my repeated pleas to them not to drink it, he said.

Anil was taken ill on Mon-day and I took him to a local doctor and then to a hospital in Agra where he died, said Shri Niwas.

He added that Anil worked

as a labourer and had taken to drinking liquor after abandon-ing his wife and four children.

Kaulara Kalan resident Sudip too confirmed that Anil along with Radhe and Ramveer had consumed spurious liquor on Sunday and they were taken ill on Monday. Ramveer had also complained of losing his eyesight, he said.

Anil’s father Shri Niwas further alleged that his vil-lage and its surrounding areas have become a hub of the illicit liquor trade.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: Multiple cit-ies in Uttar Pradesh, Mad-hya Pradesh, Gujarat and the national capital region are host-ing synchronised commando drills as part of a national mock exercise being carried out by the counter-terrorist force NSG to check its response time and reaction to hostage and hijack-like situations.

The third edition of the week-long annual exercise called 'Gandiv' has already been launched at these loca-tions by the National Security Guard (NSG) from August 22 and it will continue till August 28, an official statement issued on Monday said.

Gandiv was the name of Arjuna's bow in Mahabharata.

"The exercise will be cov-ering potential targets in the NCR, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat depicting multiple cities, multiple targets scenario cumulatively cover-ing about 30-35 targets," it said.

The drills are aimed to "vali-date the planning parameters" of the commando force in the event of a terrorist attack, hijack of an aircraft or hostage situation.

In Gujarat, the mock drills of armed comman-dos slithering down from helicopters or undertaking stealth house intervention drills will be conducted in Ahmedabad and state capital Gandhinagar.

The NSG said these cities in the western Indian state have been selected based on "threat

assessment and recommenda-tions of the state government."

"A total of 26 important buildings which include edu-cational institutions, hotels, government offices and com-mercial areas were recced (reconnaissance) in detail by NSG officials and eight loca-tions have been selected for conducting the exercise," it said.

The NSG said these exer-cises, apart from "validating" its own drills, procedures and standard operating procedures (SOPs) will also "assist to hone"

the counter-terror skills of the state administration, police, anti-terrorist squads and also create awareness among the public.

These exercises will be wit-nessed by officials from the ministries of external affairs, home, central armed police forces (CAPFs), state agencies and foreign delegates, the state-ment added.

The NSG was raised as a federal counter-terrorist force in 1984 to undertake surgi-cal commando operations in order to neutralise terrorist and hijack threats.

It also has a special squad that provides armed security cover to at least 13 high-risk VVIPs at present.

The NSG has five hubs in the country, apart from its main garrison in Manesar near here, and in each of them a team of commandos is sta-tioned in readiness 24x7 to respond to any threat situation within a 30 minute mobilisa-tion time-frame.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

GUNA: Madhya Pradesh police have registered an FIR against Urdu poet Munawwar Rana for allegedly hurting reli-gious sentiments by comparing Maharshi Valmiki, who wrote the Ramayana, with the Tali-ban, an official said.

The case was registered against Rana in Guna on Mon-day following a complaint filed by Sunil Malviya, state secre-tary of the BJP's Scheduled Caste cell, and other members of the Valmiki community.

Talking to a channel, Rana had said, Valmiki became a God after he wrote the Rama-yana, before that he was a dacoit. A person's character can change. Similarly, the Tali-ban, for now, are terrorists, but people and characters change.

Malviya alleged that Rana disrespected Maharshi Valmiki with his comments and hurt the feelings of the Valmiki community and Hindus.

"He compared Maharshi Valmiki with the Taliban and hurt the religious feelings of

Hindus. So, we have filed a complaint against him, he told reporters.

Guna Superintendent of Police Rajiv Mishra on Mon-day said, "A case was registered against Rana at the Kotwali police station. The case will be forwarded to the district concerned (Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh)."

The case was registered against Rana under IPC Sec-tion 505 (2) (statements con-ducing to public mischief) and was being forwarded to Hazrat-ganj police station at Lucknow in UP, police said.

Top court asks AFT to decide pleas of Navy officers on PC

‘Unconstitutional decision on 370, 35A created deep uncertainty’

Local BJP leader ends life in Assam due to financial

stress

4 die after consuming suspected spurious liquor

J&K: 3 LeT militants killed in encounter

‘Attack on Indore bangle seller prelude to polarisation ahead of Assembly polls’

NSG commandos undertake mock counter-terrorist drills across country

The third edition of the week-long annual exercise called 'Gandiv' has already been launched at these locations by the National Security Guard

MP: FIR against poet Rana for comparing Valmiki to Taliban

Malviya alleged that Rana disrespected Maharshi Valmiki with his comments and hurt the feelings of the Valmiki community and Hindus

Congress leader P. Chidambaram during a press conference in New Delhi on Tuesday PIC/PTI

Supreme Court

PAGD Spokesman M Y Tarigami with National Conference President Farooq Abdullah (R), PDP President Mehbooba Mufti (L) addressing a press conference after a meeting, in Srinagar on Tuesday PIC/PTI

Security personnel during an encounter with militants at Sopore area of Baramulla district on Tuesday PIC/PTI

The self-styled chief of TRF, Abbas Sheikh, and his deputy Saqib Manzoor were killed in a brief shootout in Aoochi Bagh area of the city on Monday. This takes the number of TRF ultras killed by security forces in the past 24 hours to five

7millenniumpost Editorial mpKOLKATA | WEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021

Much-needed succour

Ending the loop

Though the amended DICGC Act extends deposit insurance cover and mandates time-bound facilitation, linking risk rating of banks to insurance premium remains due

Until a variant-proof vaccine is rolled out, high-degree caution is needed to break the disease cycle; write Ankur Mutreja & Vignesh Shetty

The Deposit Insurance and Credit Guaran-tee Corporation (DICGC) Amend-

ment Bill was passed in the Lok Sabha on August 9, 2021. The Bill, which was already passed in the Rajya Sabha, has now become an Act. DICGC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Reserve Bank of India, pro-vides insurance cover on bank deposits. According to the pro-visions of the amended Bill, people will be given an insur-ance guarantee on deposits up to Rs five lakh in case of bank sinking. The depositors will be allowed to withdraw their deposits up to the said limit from the bank within 90 days.

The amendment to the Deposit Insurance and Credit Guarantee Corpora-tion (DICGC) Act, 1961 aims to instil confidence among depositors regarding the safety of their money. It aims at facili-tating the depositors to access their savings through deposit insurance in a time-bound manner in the event of sus-pension of the banking busi-ness of the insured bank under various provisions of the Bank-ing Regulation Act, 1949. It is noteworthy that Finance Min-ister Nirmala Sitharaman had announced about amendments to the Deposit Insurance and Credit Guarantee Corporation Act, 1961 in the General Bud-get on February 1, 2021.

Finance Minister Sithara-man said that at present it takes eight to 10 years for the deposi-tors of stressed banks to get their assured money and other claims, but after the implemen-tation of this law, the deposi-tors of distressed banks will get their deposits back in 90 days. She also said that 23 coopera-tive banks, including Punjab

and Maharashtra Cooperative Bank (PMC), were in trouble during 2019, due to which depositors had to face many problems. Now the immediate benefit of this amendment will be given to the customers of these cooperative banks.

Significantly, after the sink-ing of PMC Bank, thousands of customers of this bank had to face financial pressure. Still, the Reserve Bank of India has not removed all the restrictions imposed on this bank. After the PMC crisis, there was a constant demand to increase the insurance cover of Rs one lakh given by the DICGC to the depositors of banks, due to which, finally the govern-ment had to amend the exist-ing Act to increase the amount of insurance cover from Rs one lakh to Rs five lakh.

According to Nirmala Sitharaman, after this amend-ment, 98.3 per cent of the total deposit accounts and 50.9 per cent of the total deposit value will come under the revised insurance cover. Sitharaman

said that the sole purpose of amending the deposit insur-ance guarantee is to provide relief to bank customers. As per the amendment made in the Act, after 45 days from the date of ban or suspension on transaction of any bank by the Reserve Bank of India, the claims of all the depositors will be collected and submitted to the DICGC. DICGC will settle all claims within 90 days.

As per data of scheduled commercial banks as of June 30, 2021, the average amount per account as the fixed deposit is Rs 2.54 lakh, while the over-all average amount, which includes savings accounts, current accounts, and fixed deposit accounts, is only Rs 58,316. 67 per cent of fixed deposit accounts have depos-its below Rs one lakh, while only 8.6 per cent of those above Rs one lakh. Similarly, the aver-age deposit amount in the cur-rent account is Rs 1.51 lakh and the savings account is Rs 0.19 lakh, whereas in our coun-try the deposit amount above

15 lakhs is just 1.3 per cent, which is 55 per cent of the fixed deposits available in the bank-ing system. In this way, small depositors cannot be affected in any way in the event of a bank going bankrupt, as they are covered almost 100 per cent in revised insurance cover.

A special platform has been developed to solve the problems of investors when banks go bankrupt in differ-ent countries of the world like the US and Europe. Till the lat-est amendment in the Deposit Insurance and Credit Guaran-tee Corporation Bill, there was no concrete provision avail-able to solve the problems of investors in case of bankrupt-cies of banks in India. From this point of view, this amend-ment is a welcome move of the government.

Though the Deposit Insur-ance and Credit Guarantee Corporation Bill 2021 has been passed, the bank failure cases in India are still non-existent. So far DICGC has had to settle

very few claims. Most of such claims are from cooperative banks, which is because coop-erative banks in India largely fund themselves through retail and bulk deposits, which are identified as a source of risk in other countries.

Banks in India have been providing insurance cover at a fixed instalment rate of Rs one lakh per depositor since May 1993, but there has been a long delay in linking the risk rating of the bank to the insur-ance premium as per interna-tional practices. To rationalize the rate of insurance premium, what is needed today is that banks should be classified into risk categories based on adequate availability of capi-tal, quality of credit and non-performing assets (NPA) and then, on the basis of these, the insurance premium should be fixed. By doing this, the bank with the high-risk category will have to pay more insur-ance premiums. Obviously, banks offering higher insur-ance premiums would like to reduce the rate of insurance premiums to cut down on their expenses and for this, they will continue to try to either reduce or eliminate their risk factors in a planned manner.

It can be said that “the pur-pose of the Deposit Insurance and Credit Guarantee Cor-poration (Amendment) Bill 2021 is to ensure the protec-tion of the interests of banks and their investors in the event of failure of banks. The failure of banks can affect the finan-cial stability of the country, as they hold deposits of people, provide loans to the public and businessmen as per the need, and invest in big projects to strengthen the economy.

Views expressed are personal

SATISH SINGH

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

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

DearEditor

The Northeast is tired of asking for a separate time zone. Many politicians from the northeast over the years have tabled the request for a separate time zone but to no avail. The Centre is of the opinion that giving a separate time zone to the northeast would brew separatist tendencies in the people. Russia has nine time zones, the US has six, but we don’t see any such tendencies brewing in the minds of Russians or Americans. On the other hand, China sticking to one time zone to enhance national unity has backfired many times. In the winters, when the sun sets by 4 pm in the northeast, offices and industries have to remain till 6 pm which means extra consumption of electricity. In the summers when the sun rises by 4:30 am almost 5 hours of daylight are lost by the time people go to their work. The tea gardens in Assam follow a time which is one hour ahead of the IST to put the daylight hours to better use. I urge the government to please try to understand that giving a separate time zone to the northeast is not going to brew any separatist tendencies in us. It is for the greater good of the region.

The first wave of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in India — in

the summer of 2020 — was efficiently flattened by a rapid country-wide lockdown. A consistent drop in case num-bers from September 2020 to February 2021 allowed a cau-tious but smooth return to what was an almost normal life.

But the ensuing second wave — starting in March 2021 — proved catastrophic, with over 4,00,000 cases reported each day during its peak. The virus spiralled out of control, mainly because of behavioural and political complacency. Large religious gatherings, election rallies and recre-ational socialising allowed the virus to take hold in a huge population pool.

This helped give rise to the now dominant and highly transmissible delta variant, with huge consequences for the world. Delta is more capa-ble of causing illness in peo-ple who have been vaccinated or previously infected, than most other forms of the virus. Emerging evidence (some still awaiting review) also suggest that the variant increases the risk of hospitalisation across all age groups.

The Indian healthcare sys-tem’s capacity to respond to the second wave was insufficient, as its preparedness — fearfully arranged during the first wave – had been rolled back. Levels of beds in intensive care and equipped with oxygen sup-plies were reduced after the first wave was suppressed. As a result, the country’s health system became overwhelmed.

With the worst of India’s second wave behind it, work is now underway to try and avoid the same things happen-ing again in the future.Assessing the aftermath

India is currently report-ing around 40,000 cases and 500 deaths a day. Of the total

dedicated COVID-19 hospital beds in New Delhi, only two per cent are currently occu-pied. Business activity has returned to pre-pandemic lev-els, even though the numbers of cases and deaths are still much higher than they were after the first wave.

Following the second wave, a very high number of Indian people had COVID-19 anti-bodies. In recent surveys con-ducted by health authorities, two-thirds of India’s popula-tion have been found to have those. Considering less than 30 per cent of Indians had received at least one vaccine dose when the surveys were conducted, this clearly high-lights how widely the virus spread during the second wave.

With the virus having over-whelmed the country’s already struggling healthcare system, India is now trying to identify and fill the gaps that became visible during the second wave.

Alongside tighter bor-der controls to prevent cases

being imported, the country has invested in promoting COVID-appropriate behav-iour among the public, has hired more health workers, and has set up medical oxy-gen plants to improve supply during future outbreaks. Medi-cal oxygen had run out during the second wave.

On top of this, additional critical care infrastructure has been reserved for children, as dedicated facilities for them were shifted to adult COVID-19 patient care in the last two surges. Medicines have been stockpiled for opportunistic infections that can accompany COVID-19, such as mucormy-cosis. India is also strengthen-ing its network for tracking potentially dangerous new variants of the virus, with experts noting that this needs to be improved.

With low vaccine cover-age having allowed the virus to spread, there have also been efforts to strengthen India’s COVID-19 vaccination pro-gramme. Exports of domes-

tically produced doses were halted in the spring to bolster India’s own vaccine supply, and the procurement of vac-cines has been handed over from state governments to the Union government.Vaccine coverage is still a problem

India is the world’s leading vaccine producer, and most low- and middle-income countries rely on it for supplies. Bringing in export controls has diminished supplies elsewhere, but has allowed India to speed up its own vaccine adminis-tration to more than five mil-lion doses a day. Despite this, a shortage of doses continues to be an impediment, as does vaccine hesitancy.

Incentives to get people to take a vaccine — such as subsi-dising property taxes, offering cheaper air fares, discounted restaurant meals, cheaper gro-ceries and better bank inter-est rates — have proven a hit. Nevertheless, so far, less than 10 per cent of the population is fully vaccinated. Looking back,

it’s therefore unlikely that vac-cination played a major role in bringing India’s second wave to an end.

Natural immunity gen-erated following infection is likely to have played a bigger role — but even though two-thirds of the population have some COVID-19 antibodies, this isn’t enough to contain the virus. In many Indian states, cases are rising again.

Things will probably get worse the quickest in areas where vaccine- or naturally acquired-immunity is the lowest. Kerala, for example, accounts for over half of the daily reported national cases, and is the state with the low-est proportion of people test-ing positive for COVID-19 antibodies.

India continues to report the highest number of COVID-19 cases in Asia. There remain 400 million people with zero immunity to COVID-19.

Localised smaller waves could be therefore anticipated in those Indian states such as Assam, Haryana, Maharash-tra and Kerala, where immu-nity levels are relatively low. In states with higher levels of immunity across the popula-tion, cases are likely to remain low, unless a new variant arises that can bypass the natural immunity developed through being exposed to delta.

Until a largely variant-proof vaccine is rolled out across India, the cyclical behaviour we’ve already wit-nessed can be expected to con-tinue. More disease will lead to more demand for self-protec-tion, in turn leading to less dis-ease. This reduction in disease will result in less self-protec-tion, in turn leading to more disease.

In a country of the size of India, only if the seriousness of high disease time is con-tinually exercised during low disease time will we be able to truly squash COVID-19. DTE

Views expressed are personal

DICGC Act aims to ensure the protection of interests of banks and their investors in case of bank failures

— NOOPUR BARUAH, TEZPUR via email

EDITORIALContinuing struggle

On Monday, the Indian Ministry of Defence stated in a release that the Indian Army had approved the promotion of five women offi-cers to the rank of colonel. The ministry noted

that this was the first time women officers serving with the Corps of Signals, Corps of Electronic and Mechani-cal Engineers and the Corps of Engineers have been pro-moted to the rank of colonel. Earlier, this rank was only applicable for female officers serving in the Army Medi-cal Corps, Judge Advocate General and Army Education Corps. The ministry stated- “Combined with the deci-sion to grant permanent commission to women officers from a majority of branches of the Indian Army, this step defines the Indian Army’s approach towards a gender-neu-tral Army.” Though the defence establishment has hailed this step towards ‘gender-neutrality’, not everyone seems to be convinced. Reports have emerged this week of a number of women officers who are now in the process of approaching the Armed Forces Tribunal against the release orders issued to them. After being compelled to consider a permanent commission for women officers in the military, the Indian Army kickstarted the process of increasing the gender inclusivity of the armed forces. This resulted in 147 more women being granted permanent commission this year, in addition to another 277 that had been selected ear-lier. However, 28 women officers were rejected permanent commission of which seven have decided to approach the Armed Forces Tribunal against the release order. Addi-tionally, it has been reported that though the release orders of the aforementioned 28 women officers were issued on July 15, the results for another 77 female officers have been withheld. Speaking anonymously with the Indian Express, one of the officers mentioned above stated that the Army has “yet again misinterpreted the judgment to suit its inferior motives and denied PC to 28 women offi-cers and shown them the doors unceremoniously citing that they have not scored the required grade of 60 per cent”. Besides asserting that the rejected officers have “an impeccable and clean record”, the anonymous officer also claimed that though officers are given 60 days to contest a presumed wrong assessment, these women officers were not given any such opportunity for redressal. This is but the latest development in the long and protracted effort to increase the representation of women in the armed forces of India. Though official efforts to fight for the equal rights of women short service commissioned officers have been ongoing for decades, the state of progress in this regard is less than ideal. In a nation where the armed forces number around 1.3 million active troops and another 960,000 or so reserve troops, a 2021 RTI filed by India today revealed that there were only 1,672 women officers. Quite notably, none of these women officers were given commissions in any combat corps, a situation that is reflective of the larger problem of women not being allowed any combat roles in the Indian Army. Though India did open up the role of combat airforce pilots to women in 2015, there has been very little movement to increase the inclusion of women in combat roles in India since. The overall argument used by the government and the defence establishment in denying women combat roles and command positions seems to be that women and society are not ready for such a develop-ment. There have been arguments that India is not ready to accept “body bags” of women or that male soldiers are not mentally prepared to accept women officers in com-mand positions or even the classic reference to the chal-lenges of ‘motherhood and childcare’. Sadly, even with ample evidence to the contrary regarding the performance of women in commanding and combat roles in militar-ies elsewhere, the situation in India seems slow to change with perceptions holding up progress. But it is important to emphasise that this is not just a problem of a few coun-tries. For instance, while Israel has often been shown as a model of equality for women in the armed forces, the country has its own set of problems in including women in its armed forces. The inclusion of women in combat roles still remains a difficult challenge in the country with stern religious opposition from Rabbis. Women are given shorter terms of service as compared to male soldiers and are given exemptions for ‘traditional’ roles of marriage and childbirth. At the same time, Israel also has a troubling history of aggressively sexualising its female soldiers as a way of improving the moral standards of their military. Pictures of scantily clad female soldiers holding rifles and wearing high heels are frequently used as recruitment bait by the military that seeks to use female soldiers to give a ‘soft’ and ‘feminine’ face to the military. At the same time, the atmosphere of the armed forces is not quite as inclu-sive as PR efforts would claim. A 2016 survey by Haaretz revealed that 60 per cent of female soldiers and officers in the Israeli military felt that their units were overrun with sexual tension that was imposed on them by their male counterparts. This demonstrates, in essence, that while inclusivity goals may be met in practical terms in any mili-tary, true gender inclusivity remains a distant prospect for armed forces across the world.

To rationalize the rate of insurance premium, banks should be classified into risk categories based on adequate availability of capital, quality of credit and NPAs

Incentives to get people to take a vaccine — such as subsidising property taxes, offering cheaper air fares, discounted restaurant meals, cheaper groceries and better bank interest rates — have proven a hit

millenniumpost.in

FOR GREATER GOOD

8 millenniumpostWorldmpWEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021 | KOLKATA

Israeli strikes hit Gaza; Palestinian teen killed in NablusTEL AVIV: Israeli warplanes struck targets in Gaza over-night, drawing machine-gun fire from Hamas in the heavi-est cross-border fighting since an 11-day war in May.

In the occupied West Bank, officials said a Palestinian teen was killed in a clash Tuesday with the Israeli military.

Palestinian authorities said the 15-year-old boy died after being shot in the head during clashes with soldiers in the city of Nablus.

The Israeli military said soldiers were carrying out an arrest raid in the Balata refugee camp when they came under attack from nearby rooftops.

The military said large stone blocks were thrown at the troops, and that soldiers opened fire at a person they said was about to drop a large object on them. It was unclear whether the teen, identified as Imad Hashash, was the same person.

The Israeli military said a series of airstrikes in the Gaza Strip overnight hit a Hamas weapons manufacturing site, a tunnel and an underground rocket launch site.

The army said it struck an additional militant tunnel after Hamas fired machine guns across the border.

The violence came as cease-fire talks brokered by Egypt continued to deteriorate.

It also threatened to over-shadow Prime Minister Naftali Bennett's first meeting as pre-mier with President Joe Biden in Washington.

Tensions have been rising in recent weeks between Israel and Hamas, with the Islamic militant group frustrated over the slow pace of cease-fire talks that it hopes will ease an Israeli blockade over the territory.

Over the weekend, a Pales-tinian militant shot an Israeli soldier in the head from point-blank range during a dem-onstration along the Israeli border. The soldier report-edly remains in critical condi-tion. On Monday, Palestinian activists launched a series of incendiary balloons into Israel, igniting at least three blazes, according to Israel's national fire service.

Israel and Egypt have main-tained a blockade over Gaza since Hamas took control of the territory in 2007, a year after winning Palestinian par-liamentary elections. AGENCIES

Kathy Hochul becomes NY's

first female Governor

ALBANY(New York): Kathy Hochul became the first female governor of New York at the stroke of midnight Tuesday, taking control of a state gov-ernment desperate to get back to business after months of dis-tractions over sexual harass-ment allegations against Andrew Cuomo. The Demo-crat from western New York was being sworn in as gover-nor in a brief, private ceremony overseen by the state's chief judge, Janet DiFiore.

Her ascent to the top job was a history-making moment in a capital where women have only recently begun chipping away at a male-dominated political culture. AGENCIES

UN rights chief warns of abusesGENEVA: The UN human rights chief warned Tuesday that she had received cred-ible reports of severe abuses in areas under Taliban con-trol in Afghanistan, including summary executions of civil-ians and security forces who had laid down their arms and restrictions on women.

Michelle Bachelet urged the Human Rights Council to

take bold and vigorous action to monitor the rights situation in Afghanistan, where the Tali-ban's stunning takeover raised fears that they will return the country to the brutal rule they imposed when they were last in power.

Taliban leaders have prom-ised to restore security and tried to project an image of moderation, but many Afghans

are skeptical and are racing to leave the country, leading to chaos at Kabul's interna-tional airport. Amid scattered reports, it has been difficult to determine how widespread abuses might be and whether they reflect that Taliban lead-ers are saying one thing and doing another, or if fighters on the ground are taking matters into their own hands. AGENCIES

AMID TALIBAN'S AFGHAN BLITZ ‘US in talks with Taliban on daily basis through

political, security channels’WASHINGTON DC: The United States is in talks with the Taliban on a daily basis through political and security channels, and is also consulting allies and partners on the ongoing evacu-ation progress from the Kabul airport, National Security Advi-sor Jake Sullivan said Monday.

He, however, reiterated the US does not trust the Taliban.

"We are in talks with the Tal-iban on a daily basis through both political and security channels. I'm not going to get into the details of those discus-sions here, to protect those dis-cussions, which are covering a wide range of issues," Sullivan told reporters at a White House news conference.

Asked if President Biden is also likely to speak with the Taliban leadership, Sullivan said "that is not in contemplation at this time".

The US, he said, is also con-sulting closely with its allies and partners on the issue of the evacuation and its prog-ress. "We are taking this day by day. We believe we are making enormous progress," he said.

Sullivan said the conversa-tion with the Taliban covers every aspect of what's happen-ing in Kabul right now and what's happening at the airport; on how they need to ensure that there is facilitated passage to the airport for American citi-zens, third-country nationals, and so forth.

"We'll continue those con-versations with them," he said.

Separately, State Depart-ment Spokesperson Ned Price told reporters at the State Department that Special US Representative for Afghan Rec-onciliation Zalmay Khalilzad and his team is in constant con-tact with the Taliban and its leadership, who have now flown

to Afghanistan."For our part, we have been

in touch with relevant and key stakeholders, individuals who are taking part in intra-Afghan discussions with the Taliban. We're not in a position to read those calls out. This has been primarily on the part of our team in Doha, our team on the ground in Afghanistan, to make sure that we have a regular line in to those Afghan stakehold-ers," Price said.

The United States, he said, is also in continued contact with representatives of the Islamic Republic and stakeholders who are part of this ongoing dialogue.

"What we're doing now is all we can to encourage a peace-ful and orderly transition to an inclusive government with broad support. This is what we have been focused on in terms of how we are working with the parties, what we are com-municating with the parties, what we're conveying to them," he said.

"But just as importantly, this has been the message that representatives of the Islamic Republic, that Taliban officials have heard from the interna-tional community, whether it was from NATO, whether it was from the G7, whether it was from the 113 countries that came together at our organiza-tion about a week ago today to press for this very outcome," Price said.

Responding to a question, Sullivan reiterated that the US does not trust the Taliban.

"The President has been very clear about his views of the Taliban. You've asked him repeatedly, Do you trust these guys?' And he's told you repeat-edly, No, I do not.' Of course, he does not." AGENCIES

Blast in northern Syria kills and wounds dozens of militants

BEIRUT: An explosion shook the base of an al-Qaida-linked group in northern Syria on Tuesday, killing and wound-ing dozens of fighters, opposi-tion activists said.

It wasn't immediately clear what caused the explosion at the base of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham in the northwestern province of Idlib, the last major rebel stronghold in the coun-

try. HTS is the most power-ful group in Syria's northwest.

The Britain-based Syr-ian Observatory for Human Rights said the explosion near the village of Ram Hamadan was either an accident during training or a drone strike. It said 20 fighters were killed or wounded in the explosion.

Step news agency, an activ-ist collective, said at least nine

fighters were killed and oth-ers wounded in the mysterious blast. Step said it could have been caused when a mortar shell exploded during training.

Syria's 10-year conflict has left about half a million peo-ple dead and half the coun-try's prewar population of 23 million displaced, more than 5 million of them as refugees outside the country. AGENCIES

Safe passage out of Afghanistan is priority, say G7 leaders

LONDON: The safe evacua-tion of foreigners and Afghan partners by ensuring a continu-ing safe passage out of Afghan-istan remains the immediate priority, the leaders of the G7 said in a joint statement after an emergency virtual meeting on Tuesday.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who chaired the meet-ing in the UK's role as current president of the Group of Seven, told reporters after the talks that the leaders had agreed a "road-map" for future engagement with the Taliban.

While the joint statement indicates that an agreement on an extension to the August 31 deadline of the US-led NATO troop withdrawal from Afghani-stan failed to materialise, John-son declared that the G7's "number one condition" was that the Taliban must guarantee "safe passage" for those that want to leave the country beyond that deadline.

He also insisted that the G7 made up of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United States and the UK had considerable leverage at its

disposal."The number one condition

we're setting as G7 is that they have got to guarantee, right the way through, through August 31 and beyond, safe passage for those who want to come out," Johnson said.

"Some will say that they don't accept that and some, I hope, will see the sense of that, because the G7 has very consid-erable leverage economic, dip-

lomatic and political," he said.Johnson, alongside France

and Germany, was expected to push US President Joe Biden to focus on an extension of the deadline with the Taliban.

"Our immediate priority is to ensure the safe evacuation of our citizens and those Afghans who have partnered with us and assisted our efforts over the past 20 years, and to ensure continuing safe passage out of

Afghanistan," reads the G7 joint statement issued at the end of the virtual summit.

"We will continue to coor-dinate closely on this, and we expect all parties to continue to facilitate this, and to ensure the safety of humanitarian and medical personnel, and other international service providers. We will cooperate together, and with neighbouring and other countries in the region host-

ing refugees, on a coordinated approach to safe and legal routes for resettlement, it reads.

The statement expresses "grave concern" about the sit-uation in Afghanistan and calls for calm and restraint to ensure the safety and security of vulner-able Afghan and international citizens, and the prevention of a humanitarian crisis. It also calls for all parties to work towards an "inclusive and representative government" which will work to ensure regional stability.

"The Afghan people deserve to live in dignity, peace and security, reflecting the last two decades of their political, eco-nomic and social achievements, in particular for women and girls. Afghanistan must never again become a safe haven for terrorism, nor a source of terror-ist attacks on others, the state-ment notes.

It concludes: “We will work together, and with our allies and regional countries, through the UN, G20 and more widely, to bring the international com-munity together to address the critical questions facing Afghanistan.” AGENCIES

Biden decides to stick with Aug 31 final pullout from Kabul

WASHINGTON DC: Presi-dent Joe Biden has decided to stick with his August 31 dead-line for completing the US-led evacuation from Afghanistan, an administration official said Tuesday. The decision reflects in part the U.S. military's con-cern about heightened secu-rity threats to the massive airlift that began ten days ago.

A Taliban spokesman, speaking prior to word of Biden's decision, reiterated that the militant group would oppose any extension of the deadline.

It has allowed the airlift to continue without major interference.

Pressure from US allies and both Democratic and Repub-lican lawmakers, veterans groups and refugee organisa-tions has grown for Biden to extend his deadline, which he set well before the Taliban com-pleted its lightning takeover of Afghanistan on August 15.

It remains unclear whether the airlift from Kabul's inter-national airport can get out all American citizens and other foreigners by then, as well as former military and transla-tors and other at-risk Afghans who fear for their lives under Taliban rule.

Some Republicans bristled Tuesday at the U.S. seeming to

comply with a Taliban edict."We need to have the top

priority to tell the Taliban that we're going to get all of our people out, regardless of what timeline was initially set," said Rep. Steve Scalise, a Louisiana Republican.

Biden asked his national security team to create contin-gency plans in case a situation arose for which the deadline needed to be extended slightly, the official said.

The US has repeatedly stressed the risk of continu-ing the airlift, due to threats of violence by the Islamic State group's Afghanistan affiliate. Germany's top military com-mander, Gen. Eberhard Zorn,

said Tuesday the United States and Germany were particularly concerned about ISIS suicide bombers possibly slipping into crowds in Kabul.

The U.S. ramped up its round-the-clock airlift of evacuees from Afghanistan to its highest level yet on Tues-day. About 21,600 people were flown out in the 24-hour period that ended early Tuesday, the White House said. That com-pares with about 16,000 the previous day.

Thirty-seven U.S. military flights 32 C-17s and 5 C-130s carried about 12,700 evacu-ees. An additional 8,900 peo-ple flew out aboard 57 flights by U.S. allies. AGENCIES

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson told reporters after talks that the leaders had agreed on a ‘roadmap’ for future engagement with Taliban

Afghan passengers board a US Air Force C-17 Globemaster III during the Afghanistan evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan PTI

President Joe Biden PTI

Afghan airlift records best day yet: 20,000-plus flown out

Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts dies at 80

LONDON: Charlie Watts, the self-effacing and unshakeable Rolling Stones drummer who helped anchor one of rock's greatest rhythms sections and used his "day job" to support his enduring love of jazz, has died, according to his publicist. He was 80.

Bernard Doherty said Tues-day that Watts "passed away peacefully in a London hospi-tal earlier today surrounded by his family."

"Charlie was a cherished husband, father and grandfa-ther and also as a member of The Rolling Stones one of the greatest drummers of his gen-eration," Doherty said. Watts had announced he would not tour with the Stones in 2021

because of an undefined health issue.

The quiet, elegantly dressed Watts was often ranked with Keith Moon, Ginger Baker and a handful of others as a pre-mier rock drummer, respected

worldwide for his muscular, swinging style as the band rose from its scruffy beginnings to international superstardom. He joined the Stones early in 1963 and remained over the next 60 years, ranked just

behind Mick Jagger and Keith Richards as the group's lon-gest lasting and most essential member.

The Stones began, Watts said, "as white blokes from England playing Black Ameri-can music" but quickly evolved their own distinctive sound.

Watts was a jazz drummer in his early years and never lost his affinity for the music he first loved, heading his own jazz band and taking on numerous other side projects.

A classic Stones song like "Brown Sugar" and "Start Me Up" often began with a hard guitar riff from Richards, with Watts following closely behind, and Wyman, as the bass-ist liked to say, "fattening the sound." Watts' speed, power and time keeping were never better showcased than dur-ing the concert documentary, "Shine a Light," when direc-tor Martin Scorsese filmed "Jumpin' Jack Flash" from where he drummed toward the back of the stage. AGENCIES

Doherty said that Watts "passed away peacefully in a London hospital surrounded by his family

Watts had announced he would not tour with the Stones in 2021 because of an undefined health issue

millenniumpost NO H ALF TR U THS

millenniumpost.in

CHANGE OF NAME

I, No 14816743K Rank Hav Yatendra Singh S/o Prahlad Singh Unit 5017 ASC BN C/o 99 APO, have changed my name from Yetendra Singh to Yatendra Singh vide Affidavit sworn before the Notary Public Alipore Judges Court on 18.8.2021.

9millenniumpost Business mpKOLKATA | WEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021

MONEY LAUNDERING CASE

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: India's crude oil production continued its declining trend, falling by over 3 per cent in July as state-owned ONGC produced less than the target.

The country's crude oil pro-duction declined by 3.2 per cent in July to 2.5 million tonnes when compared with the previ-ous year, and by 3.37 per cent in April-July to 9.9 million tonnes, according to data released by the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas on Tuesday.

Oil and Natural Gas Cor-poration (ONGC), the nation's largest oil and gas producer, produced 1.6 million tonnes of crude in July. This was 4.2 per cent lower than last year and 3.8 per cent less than the target of 1.7 million tonnes.

During April-July, ONGC's oil output fell 4.8 per cent to 6.4 million tonnes.

Natural gas production showed a contrasting trend. Helped by KG-D6 fields of Reli-ance-BP, gas production rose 18.36 per cent year-on-year to 2.9 billion cubic metres and by almost 20 per cent in April-July to 11 bcm.

While gas production from ONGC's fields fell over 10 per cent, output from eastern off-shore -- where the KG-D6 fields are located -- jumped 12-fold to 573.13 million cubic metres.

"Increase in gas produc-tion is through contributions

from D-34 field of block KG-DWN-98/3 (KG-D6), which commenced from December 18, 2020 (and) wells from sat-ellite cluster (commenced with effect from April 25, 2021)," the explanatory note to the data said.

As fuel demand rebounded, oil refineries processed more crude oil in July. At 19.4 mil-lion tonnes, crude processing in July was 9.6 per cent higher than the year-ago period.

The crude throughput in July was the highest in three months, as the easing of corona-

virus restrictions boosted eco-nomic activity and fed demand for fuel.

Public sector refineries pro-cessed 5.6 per cent more crude at 11 million tonnes while pri-vate refiner Reliance Indus-tries turned 14.4 per cent more crude into fuel.

Refineries produced 6.7 per cent more petroleum products in July at 20.7 million tonnes and 13 per cent more in April-July at 80.6 million tonnes.

Overall, the refineries oper-ated at 91.34 per cent of their installed capacity.

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court Tuesday directed DoT not to invoke the bank guar-antees (BGs) of Bharti Airtel for three weeks for recover-ing Rs 1,376 crore in AGR-related dues of Videocon Telecom Ltd (VTL) which had sold its spectrum to the Bharti group.

The top court, which refused to entertain Airtel's plea that VTL dues are not payable by it, permitted the telecom major to approach the Telecom Disputes Settle-ment and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) with the grievances.

The DoT shall not invoke the bank guarantee of Respon-dent...(Bharti Airtel) for the period of three weeks from today, a bench comprising justices L Nageswara Rao, S Abdul Nazeer and M R Shah said in its order.

At the outset, the bench made clear to senior advocate Shyam Divan, appearing for Airtel, that it will not interfere with the earlier judgement.

We are making it very clear that we will not interfere with the judgement and we will give you the liberty to withdraw to approach the appropriate forum, the bench said.

It also noted the submis-sions of Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Department of Telecom, that DoT will be permitted to raise all the grounds including the objection to the jurisdic-tion, if any, before the forum to be chosen Airtel.

Airtel said a DoT com-munication of August 17 has directed it to pay AGR related dues of VTL within a week, failing which the BGs.

Divan referred to vari-ous documents including the spectrum trading guidelines

and said that the dues -- aris-ing from the Adjusted Gross Revenue or AGR of VTL, the seller of the spectrum -- were known at the time of the sale and hence the seller and not the buyer can be fastened with the liability to pay.

VTL had sold its spectrum to Bharti Airtel in pursuance of agreements entered into them in 2016.

The Bharti group has already paid Rs 18,004 crore in AGR-related dues to DoT by March 31, 2021 which is much more than 10 per cent of its total AGR dues of over Rs 43,000 crore, he said.

In its September last year order, the apex court had said that telecom operators shall make the payment of 10 per cent of the total dues as demanded by the DoT by March 31, 2021 and the rest be paid in yearly instalments from April 1, 2021 to March

31, 2031.Divan argued that Air-

tel should not be proceeded against without being granted a reasonable opportunity to raise the grievances before an appropriate forum.

The bench then suggested the DoT saying: We will per-mit him to withdraw and go before the TDSAT and hold your hand for two-three weeks.

The top court on July 23 had dismissed the applica-tions filed by telecom majors, including Vodafone Idea and Bharti Airtel, seeking recti-fication of the alleged errors in calculation of AGR related dues payable by them.

All the miscellaneous applications are dismissed, the bench headed by Justice L Nageswara Rao said while pronouncing the order.

The telecom companies had submitted before the apex

court that arithmetical errors in the calculation be rectified and there are cases of duplica-tion of entries.

The top court in Septem-ber last year had given a time period of 10 years to tele-com service providers strug-gling to pay Rs 93,520 crore of AGR related dues to clear their outstanding amount to the government.

The top court, which had held that demand raised by the DoT in respect of AGR dues will be final, had said there shall be no dispute raised by the telcos and there shall not be any re-assessment.

The apex court had in October 2019 delivered its ver-dict on the AGR issue.

The DoT in March last year had moved a plea in the top court seeking permission for allowing staggered payment of the dues by telcos over a period of 20 years.

Trend: India’s crude oil production continues to fall, dips 3.2% in JulyProduction declines to 2.5 million tonnes

Crude OilProduction

'000 tonnes

Performance ofOil and NaturalGas Sector

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July July*June

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19,383.64

2,891.96

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2,4

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20212020

SC asks DoT not to invoke BGs of Airtel for 3 weeks to recover AGR dues of Videocon

NEW DELHI: The Centre has procured a record 873.68 lakh tonnes of paddy so far in the 2020-21 marketing year end-ing September for nearly Rs 1.65 lakh crore.

Paddy procurement has reached at an all-time high level, surpassing previous high of 773.45 lakh tonnes in KMS (Kharif Marketing Season) 2019-20, an official statement said.

"About 129.03 lakh farm-ers have already been benefited from the ongoing KMS pro-curement operations with MSP value of Rs 1,64,951.77 crore," it said.

Paddy procurement in the ongoing KMS 2020-21 is con-tinuing smoothly in the pro-curing states. Kharif marketing season runs from October to September.

The Centre has purchased 873.68 lakh tonnes of paddy (including Kharif crop 707.69 lakh tonnes and Rabi crop 165.99 lakh tonnes) till August 23 against 763.01 lakh tonnes in the corresponding period of the previous year.

The food ministry said that

the Rabi marketing season (RMS) 2021-22 has concluded in wheat procuring states.

Till August 18, a record quantity of 433.44 lakh tonnes of wheat has been procured as against 389.93 lakh tonnes in the year-ago period.

"About 49.20 lakh farmers have already been benefited from the ongoing RMS pro-curement operations with MSP value of Rs 85,603.57 crore," the statement said.

The Rabi Marketing Sea-son runs from April to March. However, the bulk of wheat procurement is done during April-June period. MPOST

MUMBAI: The government is considering to introduce insur-ance bonds as an alternative to bank guarantees, Finance Secre-tary T V Somanathan said here on Tuesday.

Somanathan made the announcement during a meet-ing between industry captains and Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who is on a two-day visit to the financial capital.

"Government is exploring on instituting insurance bonds as alternatives to bank guaran-tees," an official statement said.

Bank guarantees are usu-

ally asked for while extending a loan and typically require a collateral. An insurance bond is also a surety but it does not require any collateral.

As per reports last year, insurance regulator Irdai was also looking at the option of insurers offering surety bonds in the context of road projects.

Sitharaman, who met the industry captains in the evening, said the government is commit-ted to working towards ensuring policy certainty, adding that the regulators also have a key role in ensuring the same.

She said the government is working with the regulators on this "important issue", as per the statement. The finance minister emphasised the importance of 'India's own equity capital' while addressing the industry and assured government facilitation for sunrise sectors and startups.

Revenue Secretary Tarun Bajaj said his department was working on tax-related issues of startups and sought indus-try inputs on the same.

Sitharaman also assured the industry of addressing issues related to competitiveness,

including high power tariffs, and matters related to cumber-some regulatory compliances, the statement said.

The economy is moving gradually from a bank-led lending model to a more mar-ket-based finance model and the operationalisation of the Development Finance Institu-tion (DFI) will ensure long-term lending for projects, Sithara-man said. The DFI will increase competition for banks and also improve their efficiency, the statement quoted her as saying. PTI

MUMBAI: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tues-day submitted draft charges against former ICICI Bank CEO Chanda Kochhar, her busi-nessman-husband and other accused in a special PMLA court here in connection with a money laundering case.

The court, set up under the Prevention of Money Launder-ing Act, fixed September 6 for farming of charges in the ICICI Bank-Videocon money laun-dering case.

The other accused in the case include Chanda Koch-har's husband Deepak Kochhar and Videocon Group promoter Venugopal Dhoot.

Deepak Kochhar is currently in jail under judicial custody after being arrested by the cen-tral probe agency in September last year.

Chanda Kochhar and Dhoot had been granted bail by the special PMLA court in February and March, respectively, follow-ing their appearance before the

court and honouring the sum-mons issued against them. The two accused have never been arrested in the case.

The ED had arrested Deepak Kochhar in September 2020 after it filed a criminal case for money laundering based on an FIR registered by the CBI against the Kochhars, Dhoot and others. The ED had invoked the PMLA for "illegal sanction-ing of loans" amounting to Rs 300 crore to the Videocon Group of companies. PTI

ED submits draft charges against Chanda Kochhar, other accused

Centre buys record 874 lakh tonnes of

paddy so far at MSP

FinMin exploring insurance bonds as alternative to bank guarantees

NEW DELHI: The gov-ernment will launch the e-SHRAM portal to maintain a database of workers in the unorganised sector on August 26, Union Minister for Labour and Employment Bhupender Yadav said on Tuesday.

Yadav on Tuesday launched the logo of the e-SHRAM portal, through which the government aims to register 38 crore unorganised workers such as construction labourers, migrant workforce,

street vendors, and domestic workers, among others.

Following the launch of the portal, the workers from the unorganised sector can begin their registration from the same day, he said.

The minister said the por-tal will be launched on August 26 and on the same day, a national toll free number 14434 will also be launched to assist and address the queries of the workers seeking regis-tration on the portal. PTI

Database of unorganised workers: Govt to launch

e-SHRAM portal on Thur

ICA- T10447(3)/2021

ICA- T10454(3)/2021

ICA- T10455(4)/2021

ICA- T10460(3)/2021

ICA- T10468(3)/2021

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGALWEST BENGAL HOUSING INFRASTRUCTURE

N.I.T No.13 of G.M. (Elect) of 2021-22 Sealed Single Part tenders on Percentage basis are invited for the work of “ Supply, installation, testing, commissioning of sound craft at Rabindra Tirtha, Replacement of old damaged cable, Replacement of damaged street light, providing decorative lighting arrangement, special repairing of Bieeco Lawrie make HT breaker, providing street lighting arrangement, Providing architectural lightning arrangement, Providing power connec-tion for newly installed Wi-fi system, Dismantling of old damage bollard garden light foundation at Rabindra Tirtha etc.” from the agencies hav-ing ability in execution for similar nature of work. Last date of receiving application 01-09-2021 upto 3.00 P.M. Detailed may be seen in our websiteat www.wbhidcoltd.com.

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGALWEST BENGAL HOUSING INFRASTRUCTURE N. I. T No.- 20 of G.M (E)-II of 2021-2022

WB HIDCO invitesonline item rate open tender in two bid system for “Land Development work by filling with carried earth at Proposed ‘KHEL NAGARI, DUMURJALA, HOWRAH”for resourceful bonafide Govt. Contac-tors and eligible outsiders in the manner as described in the detailed ten-der notice available on http://wbtenders.gov.in on and from 25.08.2021 at 11.00 A. M.Corrigendum / Addendum, if any to this e-tender would appear only on above Website and not be published.

General Manager (Engg)-IIWB HIDCO

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGALWEST BENGAL HOUSING INFRASTRUCTURE

N. I. T No.- 16 (2nd Call)of G.M (E)-II of 2021-2022 WB HIDCO invitesonline item rate open tender in two bid system for “Cen-tre for Career Development and Excellence of Sustainability at Nazrul Tirtha in New Town, Kolkata”for resourceful bonafide Govt. Contactors and eligible outsiders in the manner as described in the detailed tender notice available on http://wbtenders.gov.in on and from 25.08.2021 at 11.00 A. M.Corrigendum / Addendum, if any to this e-tender would appear only on above Website and not be published.

General Manager (Engg)-IIWB HIDCO

ICA- T10475(2)/2021

ICA- T10477(2)/2021

ICA- T10479(2)/2021

ICA- T10481(3)/2021

ICA- T10485(4)/2021

ICA- T10487(2)/2021

ICA- T10490(2)/2021

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGAL Notice

E-Tender is being invited from the bonafied contractors vide N.I.T. No.:- 02/PS/Phd. /2021-22, Dated :- 24/08/2021 , Memo No:- 215/PS/Phd Date:-24/08/2021 Last date for Sub-mission of Bids — 10/09/2021 up to 06.00PM, Other details can be seen from the Notice Board of the undersigned in any working days.

Sd /- Executive Officer, Phansidewa Panchayet Samity

GOVERNMENT OF WEST BENGALOFFICE OF THE BLOCK DEVELOPMENT OFFICER

BANSHIHARI, DAKSHIN DINAJPUR ABRIDGED E- Rate Quotation Notice.

1st Call Rate Tender for NIQ Memo No. 2050/MGNREGS Dated: 23.08.2021 of Block Development Officer, Banshihari Dakshin Dinajpur is invited by the undersigned. Last date of bid Submission is 5:00 P.M on 03.09.2021. The details of NIQ May be viewed and downloaded from the Website of Govt. Of West Bengal http://wbtenders.gov.in & District NIC Cell and their website, ddinajpur.nic.in.

Sd- Block Development Officer Banshihari, Dakshin Dinajpur

PFC INKS PACT WITH NHPC TO FINANCE HYDRO PROJECTS NEW DELHI: Power Finance Corporation Ltd on Tues-day said it has signed a pact with NHPC Ltd to lend funds for the development of hydro projects. NHPC is engaged in the development of hydropower in India and has also diversified into solar and wind power. It also provides consultancy services to hydropower and renewable energy projects, PFC said.

REITs AND INVITs TO BE INCLUDED IN NIFTY INDICES FROM SEPTEMBER 30NEW DELHI: Real Estate Investment Trusts and Infra-structure Investment Trusts will be included in the Nifty indices from September 30, according to new eligi-bility criteria announced by the NSE. Vinod Rohira, CEO, Mindspace Business Parks REIT called it a very encouraging step from NSE. "This would enable wider investor participation in REITs and consequently in-creased volumes, liquidity and better price discovery. REITs merit to be on the Nifty indices, and this move will assist in widening investor participation for REITs at par with other equity options in India," he added.

SPENDING ON BIG DATA, ANALYTICS BY INDIAN COS TO TOUCH $2 BN IN 2021: IDCNEW DELHI: Indian enterprises are investing in big data analytics to base decisions on real-time data, and spending on such solutions is poised to grow by 11.5 per cent in 2021 to touch USD 2 billion, accord-ing to research firm IDC. IDC estimates big data tech-nology and service-related spending to grow with a five-year CAGR of 14.6 per cent over the forecast period of 2020-25. From an industry standpoint, banking has the largest share of spending in 2021, with an expected CAGR of 13.7 per cent during the forecast period till 2025, IDC said. "The banking industry has gained in-depth cognizance in numerous facets of operations - from data being an asset for the unpredictable environment, customer satisfaction, enhancing productivity and performance. The bank-ing industry is now making decisions much faster than the traditional ways by leveraging analytics in the Indian market," it added.

Business Briefs

10 millenniumpostBusinessmpWEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021 | KOLKATA

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: Finance Min-ister Nirmala Sitharaman will meet heads of public sector banks (PSBs) on Wednesday to review the financial per-formance of the lenders and progress made by them in sup-porting the pandemic-hit econ-omy, sources said.

The meeting with MD and CEOs of PSBs assumes signif-icance given the importance of the banking sector in gen-erating demand and boosting consumption.

Recently, the finance min-ister had said the govern-ment is ready to do everything required to revive and sup-port economic growth hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. The meeting is expected to take stock of the banking sector and progress on the restruc-turing 2.0 scheme announced by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the sources said, adding that banks may be nudged to push loan growth in produc-tive sectors.

The revamped Rs 4.5 lakh crore Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme (ECLGS) would also be reviewed during the meeting likely to be held in Mumbai, the sources said.

Besides, the finance minis-ter is expected to take stock of the bad loans or non-perform-ing assets (NPAs) situation, and discuss various recovery mea-

sures by banks, they said.As a result of the govern-

ment's strategy of recognition, resolution, recapitalisation and reforms, NPAs have shown a declining trend, from Rs 7,39,541 crore on March 31, 2019 to Rs 6,78,317 crore on March 31, 2020 and further to Rs 6,16,616 crore as on March 31, 2021 (provisional data).

At the same time, compre-hensive steps were taken to control and to effect recovery in NPAs, which enabled PSBs to recover Rs 5,01,479 crore over the last six financial years, the government informed Parlia-ment recently. Besides, Sith-araman is expected to declare the results of Ease 3.0 Index for 2020-21, they said, adding that PSBs would be rated on various indexes for the year.

Launched in January 2018, Enhanced Access and Ser-vice Excellence (Ease) is the common reform agenda for all public sector banks aimed at institutionalising clean and smart banking.

NEW DELHI: Infosys Ltd on Tuesday became the fourth Indian company to touch a mar-ket valuation of USD 100 billion.

The IT services major has joined the league of TCS, Reli-ance Industries and HDFC Bank for crossing the USD 100 bil-lion-mark in terms of market capitalisation (m-cap).

The milestone was achieved during the morning trade when the scrip was trading at its 52-week high value of Rs 1,755.6 on the BSE, which took the m-cap to Rs 74.77 lakh crore or USD 100.78 billion.

However, during the close of the trading session, it pared the earlier gains and settled 1.06 per cent lower at Rs 1,720.75.

On the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the shares had opened at Rs 1,750 apiece and then jumped to its 52-week high value of Rs 1,757. It closed the counter at Rs 1,721.5, lower 0.99 per cent as compared with the previous close.

In terms of traded volume, 2.27 lakh shares were traded on the BSE while 76.02 lakh scrips changed hands on the NSE, dur-ing the trading session.

According to the latest m-cap data, Reliance Indus-tries is the most-valued firm at Rs 13.7 lakh crore, followed by Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) at Rs 13.44 lakh crore and HDFC Bank at Rs 8.42 lakh crore. HDFC Bank has divested more than 2 per cent stake in Central Depository Services (India) Ltd (CDSL) in tranches during June-August this year, garnering nearly Rs 223 crore from the sale, according to a reg-ulatory filing. HDFC Bank sold 23,11,000 equity shares of face value of Rs 10 each fully paid up held by the bank in CDSL through the secondary market route on the NSE, the private bank said in the regulatory fil-ing. AGENCIES

NEW DELHI: The sprawling 'The Ashok' 5-star hotel in the heart of the national capital is planned to be leased out to private operators as part of the government's ambitious target of monetising "under-utilised" public sector assets.

The Ashok and the adja-cent Hotel Samrat are among the eight ITDC properties that have been listed in the National Monetisation Pipeline (NMP) released by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.

India Tourism Develop-ment Corporation (ITDC), a PSU under the Tourism Min-istry, runs hotels, restaurants at various places for tourists, besides providing transport facilities.

The present network of ITDC consists of four Ashok

Group of Hotels, four Joint Venture Hotels, seven trans-port units part of the travel and tourism infrastructure, 14 Duty-Free Shops at Seaports, one sound and light show, and four catering outlets.

As per the monetisation plan, ITDC would divest Hotel Ranchi Ashok in Ranchi and Hotel Nilachal in Puri.

Strategically located New Delhi's Hotel Ashok would be monetised by way of a sub-lease, while Hotel Samrat would be given to private play-ers under O&M (Operation & Maintenance) agreement.

Hotel Pondicherry Ashok in Puducherry would be mon-etised through joint leasing, while for Hotel Kalinga Ashok in Bhubaneswar and Hotel Jammu Ashok in Jammu O&M contract model will be followed.

For ITDC's Anandpur Sahib Hotel would be privatised along with transfer of ownership.

"All 8 hotel assets of ITDC have been considered for mon-etisation during the financial year 2022 to 2025. Long-term leasing, divestment, long term OMT contract may be explored as potential models for mone-tisation to be ascertained on a

case to case basis as per detailed asset-level due diligence," said the National Monetisation Pipeline (NMP) document.

The Ashok group of hotels is the flagship hotel chain under ITDC which has a brand value developed over the last 40-50 years and has been the centre stage for all government events organised by various ministries and public sector entities, the document said, adding there is a potential to leverage the brand value of Ashok Group.

ITDC chain of hotels are placed at 125 acres of land parcels spanning across major cities across the country that have not been utilised to their maximum potential and hence monetising them would act as government push for underuti-lised assets. PTI

MPOST BUREAU

NEW DELHI: The government on Tuesday again urged inves-tors to check the antecedents of Nidhi companies before putting in their money, as at least 348 entities have failed to meet the criteria to be declared as Nidhi companies.

This is the second time in six months that the corporate affairs ministry has come out

with an advisory as there are a large number of companies, which, though functioning as Nidhi companies, have not applied for such a status under the relevant rules.

The ministry, in a release on Tuesday, said 348 companies failed to meet requisite criteria for declaration as Nidhi compa-nies under the Companies Act, 2013, and Nidhi Rules 2014.

Nidhi companies are non-

banking finance entities that are into lending and borrowing with their members.

Under Section 406 of the Companies Act, 2013, and amended Nidhi Rules, com-panies incorporated as Nidhi need to apply to the ministry in form 'NDH-4' for declara-tion as Nidhi entities.

"It has been observed that companies have been apply-ing to the central government

for declaration as Nidhi under the CA, 2013, but of the 348 number of forms scrutinised up to August 24, 2021, not a single company could satisfy the requisite criteria for it to be declared as a Nidhi company by the central government," the release said.

Stakeholders are advised to verify the antecedents of the company functioning as a Nidhi company and ensure that

it has been declared as a Nidhi company by the central gov-ernment before becoming its member and depositing/ invest-ing their hard-earned money in such companies, according to the release. On February 25 this year, the ministry had asked investors to check the anteced-ents of Nidhi companies before putting in their money amid instances of such entities not complying with the rules.

MPOST BUREAU

MUMBAI: Equity benchmarks darted up to fresh lifetime highs on Tuesday, propelled by heavy buying in banking, finance and metal stocks amid supportive global cues.

Rising for the second straight session, the 30-share BSE Sensex soared 403.19 points or 0.73 per cent to end at its life-time peak of 55,958.98.

On similar lines, the broader NSE Nifty surged 128.15 points or 0.78 per cent to its all-time closing high of 16,624.60.

The market capitalisation of BSE-listed companies jumped to Rs 2,40,47,079.99 crore com-pared to Rs 2,37,67,773.84 crore on Monday. In one day, the mar-ket valuation has soared by little over Rs 2.79 lakh crore and as

many as 139 companies listed on the bourse touched their 52-week high on Tuesday.

Bajaj Finserv was the star performer in the Sensex pack, climbing 7.91 per cent after the company received in-principle approval from Sebi for sponsor-ing a mutual fund.

Tech Mahindra, Tata Steel, Bajaj Finance, HDFC Bank, SBI and ICICI Bank were the other prominent winners, spurting up to 3.41 per cent.

On the other hand, Nestle India, HDFC, Infosys, HCL Tech, Asian Paints, Kotak Bank were among the laggards, shed-ding up to 1.34 per cent.

"Domestic equities recov-ered sharply today mainly led by strong rebound in financials and metals. Further, positive cues from global equities also

supported markets....Notably, short coverings ahead of F&O expiry also aided some high beta stocks to witness sharp recov-ery today.

"Further, midcap and small-

cap stocks witnessed sharp recovery today after seeing continued selling pressure in recent weeks. Sharp correc-tion in number of quality mid-cap stocks had started offering

healthy risk-reward proposi-tions," said Binod Modi, Head Strategy at Reliance Securities.

Experts said market senti-ment was also bolstered after Finance Minister Nirmala Sith-araman on Monday unveiled an ambitious Rs 6 lakh crore National Monetisation Pipeline (NMP) that included unlock-ing value by involving private companies across infrastructure sectors -- from passenger trains and railway stations to airports, roads and stadiums.

Sectorally, BSE metal, basic materials, oil and gas, industri-als and capital goods indices rose as much as 2.76 per cent, while IT, teck and FMCG ended in the red.

Broader BSE midcap and smallcap indices rallied up to 1.69 per cent.

Global markets extended their gains after the USFDA granted full approval to Pfizer-BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine, boosting hopes of faster vacci-nation and economic recovery.

Elsewhere in Asia, bourses in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Seoul ended with strong gains. Equities in Europe were trading on a mixed note in mid-session deals.

Meanwhile, international oil benchmark Brent crude rose 1.14 per cent to USD 69.15 per barrel. The rupee appreciated by 3 paise to close at 74.19 against the US dollar on Tuesday.

Foreign institutional inves-tors remained net sellers in the capital market on Monday as they offloaded shares worth Rs 1,363.36 crore, according to exchange data.

Sensex, Nifty end at lifetime highsSensex soars 403.19 points to end at 55,958.98 while Nifty surges 128.15 points to 16,624.60

KBK graphicsInfo

Intra-day on August 24, 2021

9am 10 11 12 1pm 2 3 4 9am 10 11 12 1pm 2 3 4

Previous

close:

55,555.79

Previous

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16,496.45

NSE NIFTYIntra-day on August 24, 2021

BSE SENSEX

High:

16,647.10High:

56,023.22

Low:

55,536.84

Low:

16,495.30

Open:

55,647.11

Open:

16,561.40

128.15

(0.78%)

Close:

16,624.60 Close:

55,958.98

403.19

(0.73%)

FM Sitharaman to meet CEOs of public sector banks today

Check Nidhi cos’ antecedents before investing money: Govt‘At least 348 entities have failed to meet the criteria to be declared as Nidhi companies’

NEW DELHI: India has over-taken the United States (US) to become the second-most sought-after manufacturing destination globally, driven mainly by cost competitiveness, according to real estate con-sultant Cushman & Wakefield.

China remains at number one position, the consultant said in its 2021 Global Manufactur-ing Risk Index, which assessed the most advantageous loca-tions for global manufacturing among 47 countries in Europe, the Americas and Asia-Pacific (APAC).

"India takes the second spot after China as the most sought-after manufacturing destination globally," Cushman and Wake-field said in a statement.

The US is at third position, followed by Canada, Czech Republic, Indonesia, Lithuania, Thailand, Malaysia and Poland.

In the last year's report, the US was at second position while India ranked third.

The consultant said that this indicates the growing interest

shown by manufacturers in India as a preferred manufac-turing hub over other countries, including the US and those in the APAC region.

"The growing focus on India can be attributed to India's oper-ating conditions and cost com-petitiveness. Also, the country's proven success in meeting out-sourcing requirements has led to the increase in the ranking year-on-year," the statement said.

The rankings in the report are determined based on

four key parameters, includ-ing the country's capability to restart manufacturing, busi-ness environment (availability of talent/labour, access to mar-kets), operating costs, and the risks (political, economic and environmental).

The baseline ranking for top manufacturing destinations is determined on the basis of a country's operating conditions and cost effectiveness.

"This year, India and the US switched places (second

and third) taking India one rank above from the rankings released last year, when India stood at the third place.

"This switch in ranking is attributed to the plant reloca-tions from China to other parts of Asia due to an already estab-lished base in pharma, chemi-cals and engineering sectors, that continue to be at the cen-tre of the US-China trade ten-sions," it said.

As far as the cost scenario ranking goes, India continued to retain the third spot like last year, while Vietnam is pushed to the fourth position from the third.

"Despite being among the top-three countries in the base-line and cost scenario rankings, there is a long road for India to traverse when it comes to areas like managing the geopolitical risks involved in running busi-ness and its ability to restart its manufacturing business after a devastating second wave of the COVID-19 virus," Cushman said. PTI

India pips US to rank 2nd in list of most attractive manufacturing hub globallyChina remains at number one position among 47 countries

Infosys fourth Indian company to

touch m-cap of $100-bn

‘The Ashok’ to be leased out to private cos, 7 other ITDC hotels to be monetised in 4 years

NEW DELHI: India's mobile phone exports jumped over three-folds to Rs 4,300 crore during the April-June 2021 quarter, showing signs of recov-ery and growth in the segment, the India Cellular and Electron-ics Association (ICEA) said ob Tuesday. Mobile phones' exports had stood at around Rs 1,300 crore in the corresponding period a year ago, when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the globe, according to the ICEA.

"The mobile handset manu-facturing industry is continu-ing its growth juggernaut and its historic journey to meet its objective of becoming the world's number one manufac-turing destination in sync with the Prime Minister's (Narendra Modi) vision," ICEA Chairman Pankaj Mohindroo said in a statement.

He added that despite the second COVID-19 wave, the industry has made significant progress in manufacturing and exports, backed by the govern-ment's prudent policy to con-

tinue manufacturing and the production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme.

Mohindroo said electronic goods' exports have also shown a tremendous rise of 100 per cent year-on-year during the first quarter of the current financial year, crossing the Rs 20,000-crore-mark.

"There is a sharp decline in the imports of mobile phones to a minuscule Rs 600 crore dur-ing the first quarter of 2021-22, which was Rs 3,100 crore for the similar period in 2020-21. This is at an all-time low since 2014-15," he said. Mohindroo also said the industry is show-ing impressive growth defying all the odds during these diffi-cult times, and is on a path of regaining the momentum as envisaged in the National Policy on Electronics 2019. According to the ICEA data, imports of laptops and tablets saw over 50 per cent jump to Rs 10,000 crore during the June 2021 quarter, compared with over Rs 6,000 crore in 2020-21. PTI

Mobile phone export jumps over 3-fold to Rs 4,300 crore in Q1

NEW DELHI: The govern-ment is mulling allowing for-eign direct investment (FDI) in the country's largest insurer LIC, a move which would help overseas investors take part in the company's proposed mega IPO, sources said.

The proposal is under dis-cussion between the Depart-ment of Financial Services and Department of Investment and Public Asset Management (DIPAM).

"Discussions have been going on for the proposal for the last few weeks. It would also go for inter-ministerial discussions and would also require Cabinet nod," a source said.

According to the current FDI policy, 74 per cent for-eign investment is permitted under the automatic route in the insurance sector. However, these rules do not apply to the

Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), which is adminis-tered through a separate LIC Act.

As per Sebi rules, both FPI and FDI are permitted under public offer. However, sources said since LIC Act has no pro-vision for foreign investments, there is a need to align the proposed LIC IPO with Sebi norms regarding foreign inves-tor participation.

The Cabinet had in July approved the initial public offer-ing (IPO) of LIC.

The DIPAM had in January appointed actuarial firm Mil-liman Advisors LLP India to assess the embedded value of LIC ahead of the IPO, which is touted to be the biggest pub-lic issue in Indian corporate history.

The government expects to come out with the LIC IPO

by the end of current fiscal. Up to 10 per cent of the issue size would be reserved for policyholders.

The government has already brought in the required legisla-tive amendments in the LIC Act for the proposed IPO.

Deloitte and SBI Caps have been appointed as pre-IPO transaction advisors.

As many as 16 merchant bankers are in the race to manage the mega initial pub-lic offering. These bankers will be making a presentation before DIPAM during the week.

Seven international bankers, including BNP Paribas, Citi-group Global Markets India and DSP Merrill Lynch Ltd (now known as BofA Securities), will make presentations. The listing of LIC will be crucial for the government to meet its disin-vestment target. PTI

Govt may allow FDI in LIC

MUMBAI: The country's gross domestic product (GDP) is expected to grow at around 18.5 per cent with an upward bias in the first quarter of the current financial year, according to SBI research report Ecowrap.

This estimate is lower than the Reserve Bank of India's GDP growth projection of 21.4 per cent for the April-June quarter.

Based on our 'Nowcasting'

model, the forecasted GDP growth for Q1 FY22 would be around 18.5 per cent (with upward bias), the report said.

Higher growth in the sec-ond quarter of 2022, or Q1 FY22 is mainly on account of a low base.

State Bank of India has developed the 'Nowcasting Model' with 41 high-frequency indicators associated with industrial activity, service activ-

ity, and the global economy.The report expects gross

value added (GVA) to be at 15 per cent in Q1FY22.

The corporate results announced so far indicate that there is a substantial recovery in corporate GVA EBIDTA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation) + employee cost) in Q1 FY22, it said. The report said the cor-porate GVA of 4,069 compa-

nies registered a growth of 28.4 per cent in Q1 FY22. However, this is lower than growth in Q4 FY21, thereby corroborating the lower GDP estimate than what was thought earlier, it said.

The report further said it is globally noted that lower mobility leads to lower GDP and higher mobility to higher GDP, but the response is asymmetric.

With the decline in mobility,

the economic activity declines and thus GDP growth, however, with an increase in mobility the GDP growth does not increase in the same proportion, it said.

The relationship between the two has become weaker as can be seen in Q1 FY22 when mobility has declined, however, GDP growth is high and posi-tive. But higher y-o-y growth is mainly on account of the base effect, the report said. PTI

GDP may grow at 18.5% in 1st quarter of FY22: SBI report

ITDC chain of hotels are placed at 125 acres of land parcels spanning across major cities across the country

11millenniumpost Sport mpKOLKATA | WEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021

Tokyo Paralympics begins with glittering, fitting Opening Ceremony

TOKYO: In manner most fit-ting, the Tokyo Paralympics began here on Tuesday with the central theme of 'We Have Wings' in a colourful opening ceremony, depicting the para athletes' endeavour to fly high in the face of unimaginable adversities.

At times tugging at the heartstrings, the otherwise joy-ous and colourful opening cer-emony -- the main character of which was a 'little one-winged plane' -- encapsulated the idea that every human being has its own wings, and by mustering courage and spreading them wide, it can go anywhere irre-spective of which way the wind blows.

Emperor Naruhito declared the Games open in front of a near-empty stadium before the Paralympic flag was carried into the National Stadium.

International Paralympic Committee President Andrew Parsons said the organisers of the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics can deliver a "safe" Games.

"I cannot believe we are finally here," said Parsons.

"Many doubted this day would happen, many thought it was impossible. Thanks to the efforts of many, the most trans-formative event is happening.

"Organisers never lost faith and have worked tirelessly along with the Japanese Government."

Prior to that, the ceremony

paid homage to the resilience of para athletes while giving the message of moving forward amid the unrelenting devas-tation being caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Paralympics have returned to Tokyo for the first time in 57 years, making the Japanese capital the first ever city to host the Games twice.

The ceremony was set in a 'Para Airport' -- a symbol of diversity and inclusion -- and began with a video that depicted

the strength of para athletes.In the video, a gentle breeze

turned into a huge gust of wind that reached the stadium and swept through the field of play.

Following this, a group of crew members, who work at the airport, began a countdown at the end of which fireworks lit up the night sky to celebrate the start of the Games.

IPC chief Parsons and Naruhito were welcomed to the stadium following which the Japanese flag was carried to the

stage by six individuals includ-ing Kaori Icho, four-times Olympic freestyle wrestling champion and Takumi Astani, a rescue worker.

Sombre music played in the background.

After introducing the 22 sports and events at Tokyo 2020, a colourful line of light appeared at the end of the first video, which then transformed into the runway of the Para Airport.

Giant propellers and bal-

loons surrounded the outer stage, forming the Agitos sym-bol of the Paralympics.

After the Parade of Nations came the 'little one-winged plane' - performed by young 13-year-old wheelchair-bound Yui Wago, who had never acted before.

The little one-winged plane does not believe she can fly. But inspired by the others around her -- a group of vehicles who are unlike anyone she has ever met before including a huge, dazzling truck and his com-panions -- she musters enough courage and confidence and returns to Para Airport, where she heads towards the runway in the darkness alone.

The crew join her, begin clapping to a beat and cheer her on.

Before long, she takes off into the night sky, her wing shining brightly.

Meanwhile, during the Parade of Nations, catching everyone's attention, a guide dog helped lead the Israeli team out.

Tek Chand, who will com-pete in shot put, led the Indian contingent out during the open-ing ceremony after replacing high-jumper Mariyappan Than-gavelu as the flag bearer at the last minute after the latter came in close contact of a COVID positive person during his flight to Tokyo. AGENCIES

High-flying India eyeing unassailable series lead

THIRD TEST: INDIA VS ENGLAND

LEEDS: A supremely confi-dent India will look to tighten the noose around a struggling England and captain Virat Kohli will be expected to over-come his prolonged lean patch when the third Test of the five-match series begins here on Wednesday.

Kohli's last international hundred came in November 2019 and though he has scored a couple of 40s in the series so far, the expectations have always been sky high from the modern great.

He looked a tad vulner-able around the off-stump in the first two Tests and one can expect him to present a tighter technique when the ball is pitched on the fourth stump at Headingley.

The form of Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajinkya Rahane had also been a cause of concern for India but that has been put to rest after the experienced duo batted for almost 50 overs on day four of the Lord's Test and were responsible for taking the game to the final day before the Indian pacers scripted a famous win.

The performance of open-ers Rohit Sharma and K L Rahul has been the biggest plus for India in the batting department. Both have showed remarkable temperament and technique in testing conditions to give the team a solid start.

Rahul, who was drafted into the team in place of injured Mayank Agarwal, has grown in confidence with each innings and seem to be sure

about which balls to play and which ones to leave, which is critical for success in English conditions.

Rohit too has looked in sub-lime touch and only needs to figure when to play his trade-mark pull shot, having fallen to that stroke twice in the series so far. Rishabh Pant will play the way he plays and Ravindra Jadeja has also done a decent job at number seven. It can be said that he is playing in the team more as a batsman than as a left-arm spinner.

With conditions expected to be cold and favourable for the pacers at Headingley, India are expected to retain the four-prong pace attack, leaving no space for R Ashwin once again.

Shardul Thakur is fully fit but it is unlikely that Kohli will make any changes in the pace attack which won India the game on day five at Lord's.

Ishant Sharma, who had not played the opening Test, was really impressive at Lord's and the hugely experienced pacer is likely to be preferred over Thakur, who is the lesser bowler compared to Ishant but the better batsman.

The potency of the world-class attack has been increased by Mohammad Siraj, who was sensational on day five and has impressed many with his relentless accuracy.

India last played here in 2002 when they registered a famous win by an innings and 46 runs. None of the current players have the experience of playing on this ground and it will be interesting to see how they adapt to the challenge.

England, on the other hand, will be hoping their bat-ting woes will subside with the inclusion of white-ball special-ist Dawid Malan. AGENCIES

ATKMB qualify for knockouts of AFC Cup after 1-1 draw with Bashundhara Kings

MALE (Maldives): ATK Mohun Bagan qualified for the knockout stages of the AFC Cup following a 1-1 stalemate with Bangladesh champions Bas-hundhara Kings in a Group D match here on Tuesday.

The Indian club made the inter-zonal semi-final of the second tier continental tour-nament as South Asian Zone champions.

Brazilian midfielder Jona-than Fernandes (28') put the Bangladeshi side ahead in the first half before team-mate Sushanto Tripura (45+2') was sent off at the stroke of half-time.

Assisted by a Liston Colaco cross, Australian forward David Williams (62') scored the equal-

iser to make Bagan group top-pers with seven points as the Kings finished second with five points. The Kings were reduced to 10 men in the stoppage time of the first half when their right-

winger Tripura was shown a red card. This was the first time since 2018 that an Indian team has made the zonal semi-finals. Bagan will play the winners of Uzbekistan's Nasaf and Turk-

menistan's Ahal on September 22. ATKMB needed a win or a draw against Bashundhara to go through while the Bangladeshi outfit required a win.

Bagan struggled at the start against the pressing game of a determined Kings and the lat-ter gained control of the match when Fernandes struck one from the edge of the box giving the rival goalkeeper Amrinder Singh no chance.

Both teams had a few chances in the first quarter.

Searching an equaliser in their quest to avoid elimina-tion, Bagan found one after the change of ends when the Kings appeared to be on the defensive with a man down. AGENCIES

Meghna, Renuka earn maiden India call-ups as BCCI names women's squads for Australia tour NEW DELHI: Seam bowlers Meghna Singh and Renuka Singh Thakur were handed maiden India call-ups, while left-arm spinner Rajeshwari Gayakwad returned as the BCCI on Tuesday announced the women's teams for the upcoming one-off Test and limited over series against Australia.

The Indian team will leave for Australia on August 29 to play three ODIs, a day-night Test and three T20Is, beginning next month.

The selectors decided to reward 27-year-old Meghna and 25-year-old Renuka for their exploits in the senior one-

day trophy in April.While right-arm medium

pacer Meghna took five wick-ets for Railways, Renuka

grabbed nine wickets for Himachal Pradesh during the tournament.

Left-handed batter Yastika

Bhatia also found a place in all the three squads but Priya Punia and Indrani Roy were left out.

Experienced spinner Rajeshwari, who was part of the South Africa series, was not considered for England tour as she was recovering from a knee injury and had also suffered a bout of COVID-19.

The selectors announced an 18-member team, led by skip-per Mithali Raj, for the one-off Test and ODI series, and a 17-strong squad, captained by Harmanpreet Kaur for the T20 series.

"The All-India Senior Women's Selection Committee

on Tuesday picked the squads for India Women's upcoming tour in Australia. The series will comprise 3 ODIs, one Test match and 3 T20Is," the BCCI said in a release.

The tour will begin with the ODIs series, starting with the first game at the North Syd-ney Oval on September 19, followed by the second and third matches at the Junction Oval on September 22 and 24 respectively.

Perth will then host the pink-ball one-off Test sched-uled from September 30, fol-lowed by the T20Is at the North Sydney Oval on October 7, 9 and 11. AGENCIES

Indian team will leave for Australia on August 29 to play 3 ODIs, a day-night Test & 3 T20Is

Women football players leave Afghanistan on

evacuation flight

KABUL (Afghanistan): Play-ers from Afghanistan women's national soccer team had an important victory on Tuesday when they were among a group of more than 75 people evacu-ated on a flight from Kabul.

Global soccer players' union FIFPRO thanked the Austra-lian government for making the evacuation of players, team officials and family members possible, with work continuing to help more leave Afghanistan.

"These young women, both as athletes and activists, have been in a position of danger and on behalf of their peers around the world we thank the international community for coming to their aid," the union said in a statement.

The Afghan team was cre-ated in 2007 in a country where women playing sport was seen as a political act of defiance against the Taliban.

Players had been advised this month to delete social media posts and photographs

of them with the team to help avoid reprisals since the United States-backed Afghanistan gov-ernment fell.

"The last few days have been extremely stressful but today we have achieved an important victory, former team captain Khalida Popal said.

Popal is among a team of FIFPRO lawyers and advisors who have worked with authori-ties in six countries, including Australia, the U.S. and United Kingdom, to get athletes and their families on to evacuation lists and flights to safety.

"The women footballers have been brave and strong in a moment of crisis and we hope they will have a better life out-side Afghanistan, Popal said.

FIFPRO general secre-tary Jonas Baer-Hoffmann said evacuations had been an incredibly complex process.

"Our hearts go out to all the others who remain stranded in the country against their will," he said. AGENCIES

Four Indians enter semi-finals of Asian Youth boxing

NEW DELHI: Four Indian boxers entered the semifinals of the Asian Youth boxing cham-pionships being held in Dubai after a day of mixed results for the country.

The continental showpiece is being conducted simultane-ously for the youth and junior boxers (both men and women) for the first time.

Seven Indians took the ring in the quarterfinals on Mon-day evening and four of them emerged victorious.

Jaydeep Rawat (71kg) defeated UAE's Mohammed

Eissa in the most dominat-ing show by an Indian, out-classing his rival in the second round.

Vanshaj (63.5kg) won 5-0 against Tajikistan's Makh-kamov Dovud, while Daksh Singh (67kg) defeated Kyrgyz-stan's Eldar Turdubaev 4-1.

Suresh Vishvanath (48kg) was up against against Kyrgyz-stan's Amantur Zholbborosv and prevailed 5-0.

However, Victor Saikhom Singh (54kg) lost to Kyrgyz-stan's Derbek Tilvaldiev 2-3, while Vijay Singh(57kg) was

beaten 0-3 by Tajikistan's Morodov Abubakr.

Rabindra Singh lost 2-3 to Tajikistan's Yoqubov Abdurrahim.

India's assured medal tally stood at over 20 on the day of draws itself as many coun-tries either skipped or fielded smaller squads due to the COVID-19 travel restrictions.

The gold medallists in the youth category will receive prize money of USD 6,000 while silver and bronze med-allists will claim USD 3,000 and USD 1,500 respectively. AGENCIES

Record-breaker Antonio leads West Ham to

second straight winLONDON: Michail Antonio's record goal for West Ham was sealed with a kiss.

The fun-loving striker became the London club's all-time leading scorer in the Pre-mier League era, moving onto 49 goals by netting twice in a 4-1 win over 10-man Leicester at the Olympic Stadium on Monday.

Antonio's first a close-range shot on the turn to make it 3-1 in the 80th moved him past Paolo Di Canio's previous record mark of 47 and he celebrated by run-ning to the sideline and rais-ing aloft a cardboard cut-out of himself. Spinning around to cheers from a packed crowd, Antonio whose goal celebra-tions often provide amusement finished his routine by planting a kiss on himself before tossing the cut-out to the ground.

He said the celebration was based on 2001 movie "Save The Last Dance" and was pre-planned, having placed the cut-out behind West Ham's dugout before kickoff.

"I've not been celebrating of late because of VAR," Antonio said. "I was like, If I'm making history, I've got to do something special.' I started it off doing cel-ebrations so I've got to finish it doing celebrations."

Antonio a converted striker, having played as a winger and even a full back since joining West Ham in 2015 still had time to add a second goal, stretching to prod home a finish in the 84th after controlling a right-

wing cross. It wrapped up West Ham's second straight victory to open the season.

David Moyes' team is one of five to be on a maximum six points after two rounds, and is in first place on goals scored.

"I've challenged the players to find that extra two points that could have been enough to get us in the Champions League," Moyes said, referring to his team finishing in sixth place last sea-son two points behind fourth-place Chelsea. "I could be asking far too much but what else am I going to do stand here and say we want to avoid relegation?"

West Ham hasn't started a top-flight season with two straight wins since 1997. It has eight goals so far, having beaten Newcastle 4-2 last weekend.

Algeria winger Said Ben-rahma, who has also started the season strongly like Anto-nio, set up Pablo Fornals for West Ham's 26th-minute opener before scoring himself to put West Ham 2-0 ahead. Antonio played a key role in Benrahma's goal, intercepting a back pass by Leicester defender Caglar Soyuncu before playing the ball across the area for his teammate to convert. AGENCIES

Fully-vaccinated NZ batsman Finn

Allen tests Covid positiveDHAKA: New Zealand bats-man Finn Allen has tested positive for COVID-19 on arrival in Bangladesh, his country's cricket board said on Tuesday.

Allen, who represented the Birmingham Phoenix in Eng-land's new Hundred competi-tion, is fully-vaccinated and passed all his pre-departure tests in England before test-ing positive 48 hours after his arrival in Dhaka.

"He has been quaran-tined at the team's hotel and immediate advice is that he is experiencing moderate symp-toms," New Zealand Cricket said in a statement.

"Allen is receiving treat-ment from the Bangladesh Cricket Board's chief medi-cal officer, has been in con-tact with NZC's chief medical officer, and will be monitored during his stay in quaran-tine by BLACKCAPS doctor Pat McHugh," the statement added. New Zealand are scheduled to play five T20s against Bangladesh, begin-ning from September 1.

After he has undergone treatment and the statutory period of isolation, and has tests negative for COVID-19 on consecutive days, he will be cleared to re-join his team-mates. New Zealand team manager Mike Sandle said he was in constant contact with Allen. AGENCIES

The Paralympics have returned to Tokyo for the first time in 57 years, making the Japanese capital the first ever city to host the Games twice

Athletes from India enter the stadium during the opening ceremony for the 2020 Paralympics at the National Stadium in Tokyo, Tuesday PTI

India's Ravichandran Ashwin prepares to bowl during a nets session at Headingley cricket ground in Leeds, England, Tuesday, ahead of the 3rd Test cricket match between England and India PTI

It wrapped up West Ham's second straight victory to open the season

MANOJ ON HIS THREE-DECADE-LONG CAREER

ANGELINA ON US TROOPS WITHDRAWAL FROM AFGHANISTAN

SUYYASH RAI LASHES OUT AT BIGG BOSS OTT HOST KARAN JOHAR

12 millenniumpostLeisure

Entertainmentmp

WEDNESDAY, 25 AUGUST, 2021 | KOLKATA

Hollywood actor-filmmaker Ange-lina Jolie expressed

anger over the decision to withdraw American troops from Afghanistan, which

led to the fall of the Afghan govern-ment towards the Taliban.

“Whatever your views

on the war in Afghanistan,

we probably agree on one thing: it should not have ended this way,” Jolie wrote in an op-ed for ‘Time’ magazine.

She added, “Giving up the idea of a peace agree-ment between the Afghan government and the Tali-ban, appearing to cut and run and abandoning our allies and support-ers in the most chaotic way imaginable, after so many years of effort and sacrifice, is a betrayal and fail-

ure impossible to fully understand.”

Jolie, who has com-pleted humanitarian work as a Special Envoy for the ‘United Nations High Commissioner for Refu-gees’ (UNHCR), said that she is ‘ashamed’ of her country’s manner of departure and feels the US has been ‘diminished’ by the events in Afghani-stan, reported ‘femalefirst.co.uk’.

“After all the bloodshed and effort and sacrifice and time, America seems to have lacked the will to plan this transition in a managed way. It was never going to be easy or perfect but could have been better, more decent and safer,” lamented the actor.

Jolie further added, “As an American, I’m ashamed by the manner of our leav-ing. It diminishes us.”

The 46-year-old actor is also concerned about the

women in Afghanistan as the Taliban are notorious for mistreating females.

Angelina explained, “We have lost leverage to influ-ence what now happens in Afghanistan.”

“We lack a strategy to monitor and support women and civil society in Afghanistan, who the Tali-ban have a history of tar-geting - banning girls from school, confining women to the home and inflicting bru-tal physical punishments, including public lashing on any woman perceived to have stepped out of line,” she mentioned.

Jolie also added that the withdrawal from Afghan-istan has created ‘a new refugee crisis, on top of record global displace-ment, with nearly a quarter of a million Afghans dis-placed within the country since May with 80 percent of them being women and girls’. AGENCIES

The latest ‘Sunday Ka Vaar’ epi-sode of ‘Bigg Boss OTT’ left actor Suyyash Rai fuming. The former

‘Bigg Boss’ contestant took to his ‘Insta-gram’ page where he lashed out at host and Bollywood producer Karan Johar. From pointing out how he is not ‘Salman Khan’ to calling him a ‘loser’, Suyyash shared a series of ‘Instagram Stories’ criticising Johar’s behaviour during that episode, especially towards his friend Divya Agarwal.

Sharing a photo of himself watch-ing the show hosted by Karan, Suyyash first posted, “He has lost the plot”.

The actor-singer fur-ther wrote on his social media page, “Dear Karan Johar, come let me burst your bubble! You are not Salman Khan. Try talking sense!”

He followed it up with another story which read, “Never knew Karan Johar is such a loser!”

Rai further called out Karan for sup-porting Shamita Shetty over Divya Agarwal as he shared, “Dear Karan Johar, you check your tone next time, then expect others to speak

to u nicely! And you better not point that finger of yours at Divya! Do all this with your Shamita!”

On the first ‘Sunday Ka Vaar’ epi-sode, Johar had pulled up Divya for her high-handedness. He said that given her experience on other reality shows, she considers herself a queen and is often seen trying to school others.

Karan also fuelled a fight between Divya and Shamita after he told the lat-ter that Divya has been gossiping about her. All that led to Divya feeling isolated in the house and in the episode, when Karan picked on her again, the two got involved in a heated argument. A lot of fans felt that the host had been target-ing Divya and playing favourites with Shamita.

Suyyash too pointed the same and also backed Divya’s connection with Zee-shan Khan. In a note, the actor wrote, “I have felt so bad for Zeeshan in that epi-sode. He did not do anything wrong lit-

erally anything!” AGENCIES

DaBaby recently spoke about his homophobic rant which had caused quite a stir earlier this

month.While making an appearance

at Hot97’s ‘Summer Jam’ con-cert this weekend, the rapper addressed his remarks against the LGBTQ+ community and maintained he never meant to offend anyone.

The ‘Summer Jam’ marks his first perfor-mance since the rant. The six-time ‘Grammy Award’ nominee was disinvited to perform at an array of music festivals.

DaBaby thanked ‘Hot97’ and said, “Thank you ‘Hot97’ for allowing me to share

my gift and share my bless-ing with you all out here live on this stage among all the chaos and all

the backlash. So hats off

to you all for that.”“They accepted my sincerity and all

my apologies when I said I never, ever meant to offend the LGBTQ+ community or say anything to make anybody feel any type of way live on that stage a few weeks ago,” he added.

The rapper further said, “ ‘Hot97’ was also willing to stick its neck out on the line, willing to go against all odds with everything going on out here in the world. They still allowed me to come right here on this stage and utilise their platform. They helped the world move forward and become a better place by not dismissing people based on mis-takes made like we ain’t human.” AGENCIES

Rhea Chakraborty, who will be seen in the upcoming film

‘Chehre’, has got support from her co-star Krystle D’Souza.

D’Souza said that Chakraborty is ‘still staying strong’ and added that ‘this whole situation that was cre-ated could have ended a fam-ily’. Krystle also said that she hoped to ‘stand up for her a little more, but it did not happen’.

After the death of Rhea’s boyfriend and late actor Sushant Singh Rajput, she was accused of abetment to sui-cide by his family. Rhea was also arrested on drug-related charges in the case. She spent nearly a month in jail before she was let out on bail.

“My heart goes out to Rhea Chakraborty. Anybody in her place, I do not know how they would go through what she has gone through. She is still staying strong. I do not know

if anyone who could have even lasted this whole situation that was created could have ended a family. It is not easy what she and her family were put up with. Hats off to her and to all the women out there that fight for themselves and stand up for themselves,” said Krystle.

She added, “I hope I could stand up for her a little more, but it did not happen because you know everything hap-pened so suddenly. More than anything, this pandemic hit all of us personally. As we all were going through so much in our own lives, standing up for another per-son was becoming difficult at that point. I do not know how that girl did it, but hats off to her.”

Directed by Rumi Jafry, ‘Chehre’ features Amitabh Bachchan, Emraan Hashmi, Siddhanth Kapoor, Krystle D’Souza, Rhea Chakraborty, Annu Kapoor and Raghubir Yadav. The film was scheduled to release in April but was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It is set to release in theatres on August 27.

With ‘Chehre’, Rhea will make her comeback after three years. She was last seen in ‘Jalebi’ in 2018. AGENCIES

Emraan Hashmi said filmmakers should let go of their obses-

sion with box office num-bers as having a theatrical release amid the COVID-19 pandemic in itself is a step towards the revival of the industry.

Film shoots across India came to a standstill due to the pandemic, first during the last year’s nationwide lockdown and then earlier this year, when the second wave hit the country.

The increasingly worry-ing situation also prompted theatres to remain shut for months, to finally open up for operations in Delhi and other states recently. Maharashtra, a key centre for Hindi films, has still not allowed cinema halls to open.

Hashmi, whose lat-est film ‘Chehre’ is gear-ing for a theatrical release on August 27, said he is thrilled that the industry is finally gaining momentum. This is his second release in cinema halls after ‘Mum-bai Saga’, which opened in March.

“I’m happy that the-atres are opening up after a long gap. I’m the only actor

who has had two releases in this pandemic. Some might see it as a bold move oth-ers might see it as a stupid move,” he said.

The actor added, “But the obsession with the box office of our industry should not be the case any-more, at least not right now. The rules have changed, the game has changed.”

Hashmi said that while makers were never in ‘con-

trol’ of how their films would perform at the box office, the ongoing health crisis has only made it tougher.

The 42-year-old actor lauded superstar Akshay Kumar and the produc-ers of ‘Bell Bottom’ for releasing their film theatrically.

“With box office, you never felt in control even before the pandemic, but it

has become a bigger ques-tion mark with the situa-tion today. A film might look entertaining but when you weigh your and your family’s health, you might give it a pass because of the fear. So now no one knows how it will pan out. Reg-ulations are still there, Maharash-tra has still not

opened,” shared Hashmi.

He stated, “We should stop wor-rying and sweating about opening num-bers or box office col-lections. Someone has to make a start and it has to be done in that spirit. Kudos to Akshay and to the producers of ‘Bell Bot-tom’ for taking that initia-tive. PTI

As somebody who has seen several ups and downs in his close to

a three-decade-long career in the entertainment industry, Manoj Bajpayee said that he has learned to not let his pro-fessional achievements or fail-ures define him as an artiste.

The 52-year-old actor, who has received praise for the second season of his web series ‘The Family Man’, said he tries to make career choices that offer him as well as his audience a ‘unique’ experience.

“It has been 26 years in the industry and I have been through so many emo-tions,

excitement, success and fail-ures. All this has just become a part of my life. They do not define my craft or me as an actor or person. I’m a realist and do not get swayed by suc-cess or depressed by failures,”

admitted Bajpayee.An ‘Amazon

Prime Video’ show, ‘The Family Man’ first premiered in 2019

and marked the critically-acclaimed actor’s suc-cessful foray

into dig-ital

space.The show is an addition to

Bajpayee’s ever-growing list of memorable performances, which includes films like ‘Satya’, ‘Shool’, ‘Gangs of Was-seypur’ franchise, ‘Special 26’, ‘Aligarh’ and ‘Bhonsle’.

His portrayal of a mid-dle-aged investigation agent Srikant Tiwari in the action-drama series, created by filmmaker duo Raj Nidi-moru and Krishna DK, has raised the bar of the audience’s expectations from him, but the actor said he does not feel pressured by that.

“Audience expectations are welcome. They should expect good work from me as I also do the same for myself. I believe in having strict dis-cipline and doing a good job every time I step out to work. But I do not feel compelled by the expectations,” said the actor.

He added, “When I choose a project, I always look for what new things I can offer as a performer and how I can make this whole expe-rience unique for myself. If I’m excited about something I’m doing, that excitement gets transferred to the audi-ence.” AGENCIES

‘As an American, I’m ashamed’

Jolie further added, ‘I’m ashamed by the manner of our leaving. It diminishes us’

The 46-year-old actor is also concerned about the women in Afghanistan as the Taliban are notorious for mistreating females

‘Such a loser. You aren’t Salman Khan’

He shared ‘Instagram stories’ criticising Johar’s behaviour towards contestant Divya Agarwal

Never meant to offend LGBTQ+ community: DaBaby

The actor-singer further wrote on his social media page, ‘Dear Karan Johar, come let me burst your bubble! You are not Salman Khan. Try talking sense!’

The six-time ‘Grammy Award’ nominee was disinvited to perform at an array of music festivals, including ‘Lollapalooza’ in Chicago

The actor added, ‘The obsession with the box office of our industry should not be the case anymore, at least not right now. The rules have changed, the game has changed’

The ‘Jannat’ actor’s latest film ‘Chehre’ is gearing for a theatrical release on August 27

Krystal and Rhea will be sharing the screen in ‘Chehre’

Stop worrying about opening numbers: Emraan

‘My heart goes out to Rhea Chakraborty’

‘I’m a realist and do not get swayed by success’