Printedat . Chennai . Coimbatore . Bengaluru . Hyderabad ... · PDF filesaid: “The Proctor’s office ... Bahraich(U.P.) PrimeMinisterNarendra ModionThursdaysaidhe ... (DFO) Ashis

The Delhi University campusremained calm on Thursday,a day after protesters andAkhil Bharatiya VidyarthiParishad activists clashed,turning the university into abattleground.

Delhi University ViceChancellor Yogesh Tyagisaid: “The Proctor’s officewill conduct an investigationafter speaking to the DelhiPolice. Universities aretemples of learning andthere should always bepeace on the campus.”

Asked if the police was

soft on ABVP activists whoallegedly started the viol-ence, Prof Tyagi said “thereis no question about goinghard or soft on a particularsection of students. They areall our students and what isimportant is maintaining anenvironment of learning.”

Classes not heldClasses were not held as theuniversity administrationhad suspended teachingbetween 9 30 a.m. and 5p.m. to enable students toparticipate in the annualflower show.

The university said the

holiday had been plannedwell in advance and was notdeclared due the incidentson Wednesday.

The National Students’Union of India (NSUI) andthe ABVP took out marchesfrom the Arts Faculty.

Outside the Delhi Policeheadquarters in ITO, hun-dreds of students, teachersand activists from variousleft groups also protested,demanding action againstthe ABVP.

In contrast to the arrange-ments that were in place onTuesday and Wednesdayoutside Ramjas College to

deal with the protesting stu-dents, the area outside ArtsFaculty on Thursday wasbarricaded and hundreds ofpolicemen stood on duty.

Vocal protestThere was even a water can-non parked outside. Whilethe NSUI organised a silentmarch to the Maurice NagarPolice station, condemningthe violence, the ABVP car-ried out a more vocalprotest.

DU campus calm a day after violenceProctor’s oice to conduct investigation after talking to the Delhi PoliceJaideep Deo Bhanj

New Delhi

MORE REPORTS ON � DELHI

METRO PAGE 1

The Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) continued its politicaldominance in Maharashtrawith resounding electoralvictories in key municipalit-ies and zilla parishads acrossthe State. It won eight of the10 municipal elections thatwere held on February 21.The Shiv Sena, its erstwhileally, won in Mumbai andThane.

In the Brihanmumbai Mu-nicipal Corporation (BMC),it was a close call, with theSena winning 84 out of the227 seats and the BJP 82. InThane, the Sena won 67 ofthe 131 seats, while the BJPwon only 23, fewer than theSharad Pawar-led NationalistCongress Party (NCP), whichbagged 34 seats.

In eight other municipalzones, the BJP swept theelections, giving Chief Minis-ter Devendra Fadnavis a ma-jor image boost as well as anupper hand against theSena, a party that is a part ofthe government. For the mu-nicipal elections, the Senahad broken the alliance anddared the BJP to go it alone.

In Pune, the BJP won 98of the 162 seats, with theNCP coming a distantsecond with 40 seats andthe Sena bagging a mere 10.In Nagpur, Mr. Fadnavis’ ho-metown, the BJP won 108 ofthe 151 seats, leaving theCongress way behind with29 seats. In Nashik, whereRaj Thackeray’s Maha-

rashtra Navnirman Sena(MNS) had won in the 2012elections, the BJP won 67 ofthe 122 seats. The MNS wasdecimated, with five seats.

‘We’re more powerful’“This victory has made usmore powerful in Maha-rashtra,” Mr. Fadnavis said ata press conference. “Ourpolitics consists of trust andtransparency. This result is aclear indication that Mum-baikars and the people fromthe rest of the State have ac-cepted our way of function-ing. No other party in thelast 25 years has deliveredsuch results.”

He added: “The victoriesin the BMC and other muni-cipal corporations havemade the BJP more humble.Instead of merely talkingabout good governance, the

party will now work towardsdelivering the promises ithad made in the campaign.The people have acceptedPrime Minister NarendraModi’s demonetisationwholeheartedly. The trans-parency agenda has also re-ceived tremendous supportfrom the people.”

“I thank my Marathibrothers and sisters for theiroverwhelming trust in me,”Shiv Sena president UddhavThackeray said in a state-ment released at a pressconference.

He said the party had ex-pected a few more seats, butlost in a close contest. “Notonly will the next Mayor ofMumbai, but also the nextChief Minister, be from theShiv Sena.”

BJP sweeps Maharashtra,trails Sena in MumbaiBoost for Fadnavis as party wins 8 out of 10 municipalities

Alok Deshpande

Mumbai

CONTINUED ON � PAGE 10

CMYK

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Three soldiers were killedand five others, including aLieutenant Colonel and aMajor, were injured whenmilitants ambushed an Armyconvoy in Shopian early onThursday. One woman wasalso killed in the crossfire.

A Srinagar-based policespokesman told The Hindu

that a joint search team ofarmy and police was at-tacked by militants at MuluChitragam, Shopian, 60 kmsouth of Srinagar, at 2:25a.m.

The militants fired at theArmy patrol for an hour un-der cover of darkness.

Search operationThe personnel of the 44Rashtriya Rifles were return-ing from a search and cor-don operation at Kungnoovillage when the militantsopened fire.

The police said the wo-man, identified as Taja, “washit by a stray bullet insideher house during the cross-fire”.

The Hizbul Mujahideenhas claimed responsibilityfor the attack. “A Hizbulsquad carried out the attack.We congratulate it for thesuccessful attack,” saidHizbul deputy chief Peer Sai-fullah Khalid and MehmoodGhaznawi.

The deceased soldierswere identified as Lance

Naik Ghulam Mohi-ud-DinRather of Bijbehara, SapperSreejith M.J. of Palakkad inKerala and Sepoy VikasSingh Gurjar of Rajasthan.

Lieutenant ColonelMukesh Jha and Major Am-ardeep Singh, who sustainedgrievous injuries, are under-going treatment, along withthree other injured soldiers,the Army spokesman said.

Chief Minister MehboobaMufti condemned the attackand said, “Violence hasnever been and could neverbe a means to address is-

sues. The unending cycle ofviolence has brought untoldmiseries to the people andcollective efforts are neededto get the State out of themorass of death anddestruction.”

Another cordon andsearch operation in northKashmir came under stonepelting in Baramulla’s Pal-halan area. Locals said threeresidents were hit by pelletsduring the clashes.

Rising tollWith Thursday’s attack, the

number of security person-nel killed in Kashmir in just afortnight has gone up tonine. Nineteen militantshave also been killed in thesame period. While twojawans were killed on Febru-ary 5 during an operationwhich left four Hizbul Mu-jahideen militants dead, Feb-ruary 14 saw a Major killed inan encounter at Kupwara.The same day, three Armypersonnel were killed inheavy fire frommilitants hid-ing in a house in Parrey Mo-halla in Bandipora.

Hizb ambush in J&K leavesthree soldiers, civilian deadLt. Colonel, Major among 5 injured as militants attack Army convoy in Shopian

At loss:Villagers attend the funeral of a womanwhowas killed in the crossire at MuluChitragam, 60 km south of Srinagar, on Thursday. NISSAR AHMAD

Peerzada Ashiq

Srinagar

SC agrees to hear

Nambi Narayanan’s

petition in April

page 7

Over 61% polling in

phase 4 of Uttar

Pradesh elections

page 11

Bharti Airtel to buy

Telenor's India unit

in no-cash deal

page 13

Indian bowlers

keep Australia on

a tight leash

Page 15

FRIDAY REVIEW � 12 PAGES

(TABLOID)

DELHI METRO � 6 PAGES

In a dramatic end to a six-day cat and mouse gamewith the police, Sunil Ku-mar aka ‘Pulsar’ Suni andV.P. Vijesh, key suspects inthe abduction and molesta-tion of a film actor, werearrested at the DistrictCourt complex in Ernaku-lam on Thursday after-noon. The police later filedan FIR under Section 376of the IPC.

The police nabbed theduo even as they attemp-ted to surrender before amagistrate here.

The drama unfoldedaround 1.15 p.m. when theaccused entered the Dis-trict Court complex aftermoving a surrender applic-ation with the AdditionalChief Judicial Magistratecourt. The duo managed toreach the complex un-detected in a two-wheeler.

On the run,‘Pulsar’ Suniheld in courtHiran Unnikrishnan

KOCHI

CONTINUED ON � PAGE 10

Abhay Chautala arrestedfor violating ordersCHANDIGARH

Punjab police on Thursdayarrested Indian NationalLok Dal (INLD) leadersincluding Leader ofopposition in HaryanaAssembly Abhay Chautalafor violating prohibitoryorders.

NEARBY

NORTH � PAGE 2

Modi lights into Akhileshfor ‘donkey’ barbBahraich (U.P.)

Prime Minister NarendraModi on Thursday said hewas amused that UttarPradesh Chief MinisterAkhilesh Yadav was“afraid” of the donkeys ofGujarat.

NEWS � PAGE 11

Kashmir law studentgoes missingSrinagar

A Kashmir University lawstudent has gone missingdays after participating inan anti-government protestover civilian killings in theKulgam encounter onFebruary 15.

NATION � PAGE 6

‘Pulsar’ Suni being taken toAluva. SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

CAMPUS CHILL � EDIT PAGE

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NOIDA/DELHI THE HINDU

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NORTH

DELHI Timings

Friday, February 24

RISE 06:51 SET 18:18

RISE 05:04 SET 16:11

Saturday, February 25

RISE 06:50 SET 18:18

RISE 05:48 SET 17:09

Sunday, February 26

RISE 06:49 SET 18:19

RISE 06:31 SET 18:09

Opposition Congress andNational People's Partymembers disrupted Gov-ernor Kalyan Singh’s ad-dress on the opening dayof the Rajasthan As-sembly's budget sessionhere on Thursday. TheMLAs alleged that therewas all-round corruption,unemployment and insec-urity in the BharatiyaJanata Party rule.

As soon as Mr. Singhbegan his speech, CongressDeputy Whip Govind SinghDotasara rose to protestagainst the government'salleged failure to check cor-ruption, while chargingthat it was busy in “meet-ing, sitting and cheating”.

Supported by NPPMLAs, Mr. Dotasara saidthe government had failedto address the issue of un-employment among theyouths.

NPP MLAs KirorilalMeena, Golma Devi, GeetaVerma, Naveen Pilania andIndependent MLA Hanu-man Beniwal soon troopedto the well of the House,where they staged a sit-in.

Governor'sspeechdisruptedSpecial Correspondent

JAIPUR

The Punjab police arrestedIndian National Lok Dal(INLD) leaders, includingLeader of the Opposition inthe Haryana AssemblyAbhay Chautala, for violatingprohibitory orders whenthey attempted to step intoPunjab to dig the controver-sial Sutlej-Yamuna Link (SYL)canal at Shambhu barrier onNH-1 at the Punjab and Hary-ana border.

Fifteen party MLAs andtwo MPs were among thosewho courted arrest after theywere stopped by the Punjabpolice near the Shambhubarrier for breaching section144 of the Cr P C.

“SYL canal is the lifeline of

Haryana and we will fight toget water for the State,” saidMr. Chautala, addressing a“Jal Yudh Sammelan” rally atthe Ambala vegetable mar-ket. Thousands of INLDworkers then marched to-

wards the Shambhu barrierin an attempt to enter Punjaband start digging the SYLCanal in symbolic gesture. Atthe barrier, the Punjab policeissued them a warning andasked them to leave. They

were arrested when they re-fused.

Strong caseHaryana Health Minister AnilVij, meanwhile, said theINLD was inciting the peopleto dig the canal so that thedecision of the SupremeCourt cannot be implemen-ted. “The State had presen-ted a strong case for the con-struction of the SYL Canal inthe Supreme Court, whichruled in favour of the State.The step taken by the INLDwas not in the interest of thepeople and was more likelyto harm the State.”

He said the ShiromaniAkali Dal and the INLD werecolluding to hamper the con-struction of the canal. “Hary-

ana government will not al-low these parties to succeedin their evil designs and willensure that Haryana get itsrightful share of the waterwithin the ambit of the law,”he said.

Punjab Congress presid-ent Amarinder Singh warnedof a serious law and orderproblem in the old Naxaliteand Khalistani belt of south-ern Punjab if the SYL canalconstruction was completedwithout taking the groundrealities into account.

Pointing to the huge infra-structural cost involved inthe canal construction, hesaid all efforts would come tonaught if there was no waterto share with the neighbour-ing States.

INLD leaders court arrest over SYLThey were trying to enter Punjab to dig the controversial canal at Shambhu barrier on NH-1

Water war: INLDworkers in Ambala taking part in themarchtowards Punjab on Thursday. PHOTO: AKHILESH KUMAR

Vikas Vasudeva

CHANDIGARH

Over a week after polls wereconducted in Uttarakhand,Prime Minister NarendraModi’s rally in Haridwarcontinues to be an issue ofpolitical and legal debatebetween the Congress partyand the Bharatiya JanataParty (BJP) here.

While the Congress hasbeen alleging that the rallyin Haridwar was conductedwithout prior permissionand was in violation of theModel Code of Conduct(MCC), BJP leaders said thatthe party had the requiredpermission for holding Mr.Modi’s rally at Haridwar’sRishikul Maidan.

After First InformationReports (FIRs) were re-gistered against HaridwarBJP workers over Mr. Modi’srally, Uttarakhand BJP pres-ident Ajay Bhatt, while ad-dressing the media onThursday, alleged, “The FIRagainst our workers was re-gistered under pressurefrom the chief minister[Harish Rawat].”

On Wednesday, AssistantReturning Officer (ARO)cum Haridwar city magis-trate Jai Bharat Singh re-gistered FIRs against Bhar-atiya Janata Party workersunder Section 188 (disobedi-ence of order given by apublic servant) of the IndianPenal Code.

FIR registered underpressure, says BJP

Rally conducted sans permission: Cong

Staff Reporter

DEHRADUN

On the first day of thebudget session of the Biharlegislature, a BJP MLAcrawled from his house tothe Assembly to demandthe laying of a road in hisconstituency in WestChamparan district.

Vinay Bihari, who rep-resents Lauriya constitu-ency, crawled wearing onlya vest and pair of shorts. Bythe time he reached thegate of the Assembly build-ing, his knees were bruisedand bleeding.

“I have requested [chiefminister] Nitish Kumar,[deputy chief minister] Te-jaswi Yadav and even[Union transport minister]Nitin Gadkari, asking themto get a road constructed inmy constituency, but noth-ing has happened so far.This is my way to protestand to draw their atten-

Special Correspondent

Patna

Bihar MLAcrawls toAssembly


THE HINDU NOIDA/DELHI

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EAST

IN BRIEF

Chinese ship crew stuckat Haldia served foodKOLKATA

The Chinese Consulate hereand the Kolkata Port Trust(KoPT) Authority have cometogether to provide food andwater to the crew of aChinese cargo vessel stuck atthe Haldia port sinceDecember end.“The food and water reachedthe ship on Wednesday as perthe list of the ship’s captain,”said an official of the AlapCarrier, the cargo handlingagent.- Special Correspondent

Myanmar delegationvisits MizoramAIZAWL

A Myanmar delegation onThursday said that they hadvisited Mizoram to study thefederal system of the countryespecially how the areasinhabited by minoritycommunities wereadministered. The delegationled by a MP of ArakanNational Party, said that theyalso wanted to know howpeace was achieved inMizoram which was reelingunder insurgency. - PTI

Trinamool show ofstrength in AgartalaAGARTALA

With just a year left for theAssembly elections, theTrinamool Congress organiseda huge show of strength inAgartala on Thursday. Thoughit was only the party’s youthwing that had called for a“disobedience” agitation , allranks of the party from acrossthe state joined it.- Special Correspondent

A record-breaking mass nest-ing by 3.8 lakh endangeredolive ridley turtles(Lepidochelys olivacea) tookplace at the Rushikulya rook-ery coast in Ganjam districtof Odisha in February 2017.Interestingly, no mass nest-ing had taken place at thesite a year ago.

It was then suspected thatseveral environmentalfactors, including chemicalfactors like salinity of thebeach and the sea near thecoast, may have promptedthese marine reptiles to givethe coast a miss in 2016.

Mass nestingAccording to experts, mostmass nesting sites of oliveridley turtles in the worldare located near rivermouths, where salinity islow. However, a lot stillneeds to be explored with re-gard to the influence of thesalinity factor as not much isknown about the relationbetween mass nesting bythese endangered turtlesand coastline salinity.

This behaviour, however,has prompted experts tostudy turtle sensingsuperpowers.

Explaining what may haveprompted the mass nesting,Berhampur Divisional ForestOfficer (DFO) Ashis KumarBehera said a sandbaremerged at the mouth ofRushikulya river near Purun-abandha this year. This, headded, prevented fresh wa-ter from the river from enter-ing the sea directly.

“So the fresh water star-ted flowing northward. Thismust’ve decreased the salin-

ity of sea water near thecoast towards north of theriver mouth,” said Mr. Be-hera. Usually, the DFO ad-ded, mass nesting takesplace between Gokharkudaand new Podampeta, wherethe effect of fresh river waterdiverted by the sandbar maybe high.

Low salinity also meansmore small fish and insects,which are food for theturtles near the coast duringmating andmass nesting sea-sons. The corrosive effect ofsalinity on eggshells cannotbe ignored either.

“Olive ridley turtles burytheir eggs on the beach.These eggs incubate with thehelp of sand heat for 45 to 50days. High sand salinity maydamage eggshells, while lowsalinity will minimise thecorrosive effect,” said Mr.Behera.

It’s possible the olive rid-leys took the salinity factorinto account while nesting atRushikulya rookery coastthis year, but what remainsunanswered is how theysensed it.

Many questionsAccording to Bivash Pandav,a scientist with the WildlifeInstitute of India (WII), sev-eral mysteries related to thelife, migration and massnesting of olive ridleys areyet to be unravelled.

Dr. Pandav, who has beenstudying olive ridleys sincedecades, said a proper studyof sea salinity levels near thecoast in relation to the extentof mass nesting during pastyears will have to be takenup to understand the rela-tion between salinity andnesting behaviour.

Record olive ridley nestingbales wildlife expertsAuthorities studying how turtles detect salinity levels before laying eggs

Endangered:Olive ridley turtles at the Rushikulya rookery inGanjam district of Odisha. - PHOTO: LINGARAJ PANDA

Sib Kumar Das

Berhampur

As many incidents of vi-olence were reportedduring the panchayatpolls, legislators of theopposition Congress andthe BJP demanded a dis-cussion on the issue inthe State Assembly on

Thursday.As the opposition

MLAs shouted slogans assoon as the House as-sembled on the secondday of the budget sessionand demanded that theissue be discussed can-celling question hour,Speaker Niranjan Pujariadjourned the House

ing rural polls in thepast.

The veteran Congressleader alleged that polit-ical activists of the op-position parties were at-tacked and killed.

BJD Chief WhipAnanta Das said theywere in favour of a de-bate on the issue.

proceedings.

‘Unprecedented’When the House reas-sembled, Leader of theOpposition NarasinghaMishra demanded thatthe Speaker allow a de-bate as violence in suchlarge scale had never oc-curred in the State dur-

Cong, BJP seek discussion on poll violenceSpecial Correspondent

BHUBANESWAR

A major power failure onThursday morning disrup-ted Kolkata Metro serviceduring peak hours, leavingmany passengers strandedin darkness for almost 15minutes.

Kolkata Metro authorit-ies blamed the CalcuttaElectricity Supply Corpora-tion for disconnection ofpower without any priorinformation and said it wasfor the first time in historythat metro rail serviceswere affected because ofpower failure.

“Electricity supply wasdisconnected at 9.53 am.Normal metro services re-sumed at 10.08 am,” ChiefPublic Relations Officer,Metro Railways, IndraniBanerjee, said

The trains which were inthe tunnel were rolled andbrought to the platforms,she said.

Passengers claimed itwas pitch dark inside thetunnel and fans and air-conditioners stoppedworking leading tosuffocation.

Since the power disrup-tion occurred during peakoffice hours, the trainswere crowded.

For irst time,power cuthalts metroSpecial Correspondent

Kolkata




CMYK

ND-ND

WEST

As predicted by the exitpolls, the Bharatiya JanataParty (BJP), like a tidal waveswept the polls in westernMaharashtra, emerging asthe single-largest party in thefour municipal corporationsof Pune, Pimpri-Chinchwad,Nashik and Solapur.

Except the Solapur Muni-cipal Corporation, where itnarrowly missed total major-ity, the BJP scored landslidevictories in the remainingthree municipalcorporations.

The BJP also emerged vic-torious in all three civic bod-ies in the Vidarbha region,including the Nagpur Muni-cipal Corporation, and alsoemerged as the largest partyin zila parishad bodies inmany districts of the region.

The victory in Pune andPimpri-Chinchwad effort-lessly supplanted the SharadPawar-led Nationalist Con-gress Party (NCP), definit-ively breaking the Pawarclan’s power bases in the dis-trict and ending its decade-long reign in the cash-richPune Municipal Corporation(PMC) and the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Cor-poration (PCMC).

A last-minute pactbetween the Congress andthe NCP in the battle for PMCcame a cropper, as the BJPjuggernaut notched a record-best performance winning98 of the 162 seats.

In contrast, the NCP wasrouted with 40 seats. TheCongress and the Sena se-cured 11 and 10 seatsrespectively.

The Raj Thackeray-led Ma-harashtra Navnirman Sena(MNS), managed just twoseats.

Winning strategyIn the cash-rich PCMC,where the voting figuretouched a historic high of67%, the saffron party’sstrategy of awarding ticketsto heavyweight defectorsfrom opposing parties, espe-cially the NCP, paid-off as theBJP secured an emphatic ma-jority, winning 78 of the 128seats.

The NCP, after consecutivelandslides in the PCMC in2007 and 2012, was reducedto 35 seats from its previous

tally of 83. The Congressfailed to open its account,while the Shiv Sena and theMNS got nine and one.

Likewise, the BJP oustedthe beleaguered Congressfrom its traditional citadel inthe Solapur Municipal Cor-poration (SMC), but narrowlymissed absolute majorityhere. It secured 49 of the 102seats with Shiv Sena, emer-ging second with 21 seats.

Bitter infightingThe decimation of Congressin Nagpur and neighbouringMunicipal Corporations andZila Parishads could see theemergence of a new andyoung leadership in theparty. However, it will be upagainst a powerful BJP whichhad made Nagpur and theVidarbha area as its bastionsince 2014.

In Nagpur, the party won

Assembly segments of thecity and made sure that allsix MLAs from Nagpur, MLCsand even Rajya Sabha MPs,actively participated in thecampaign.

The party’s ideologicalmentor, the RashtriyaSwayamsevak Sangh’s (RSS)headquarter is also based inthe city. The BJP registered amajority despite denial oftickets to relatives of seniorRSS functionaries andBajrang Dal leaders.

In Amravati, the BJP won45 out of 87 seats in the civicbody. The ruling Congresswas restricted to 15 seats andthe Shiv Sena won only sevenseats. The BJP also managedto retain Akola MunicipalCorporation by winning 48out of 80 seats. The Congresswon 13 seats, the Shiv Senaeight seats, and the NCP wonfive seats in the civic body.

108 out of total 151 seats, andthe main Opposition, theCongress, was limited to 29seats. Vikas Thakre, Nagpurdistrict president of the Con-gress, was defeated by theBJP’s Dilip Dive from wardnumber 37 by 800 votes.

The Bahujan Samaj Partywon 10 seats, down from 12seats it had won last time.The Shiv Sena secured twoseats, and the NationalistCongress Party (NCP) waslimited to just one seat.

The BJP carried out an or-ganised campaign in Nagpur,with Union Minister NitinGadkari involved in the selec-tion of candidates andcampaigning.

The NMC election had be-come a prestigious electionfor Chief Minister DevendraFadnavis as he hails fromNagpur. Mr. Fadnavis ad-dressed a meetings in all six

BJP landslide in western Maharashtra, Pawar citadelEmerges single largest party in municipal corporations of Pune, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Nashik and Solapur

Grand victory: BJPworkers clebrating results of the PuneMunicipal Corporation elections.(Left) 84-year-old BJP candidate Devika Laxman Katkari celebrating with her supporters afterwinning panchayat samiti elections in Raigad. MANDAR TANNU & YOGESHMHATRE

Shoumojit Banerjee

Pavan Dahat

Pune/Nagpur

Weather WatchRainfall, temperature & air quality in select metros yesterday

Temperature Data: IMD, Pollution Data: CPCB, Map: Skymet

Forecast for Friday: No weather warningcity rain max min city rain max min

Agartala............35.5.....30.0.....21.2 Kozhikode............ — .....34.4.....25.6

Ahmedabad....... — .....33.2.....14.7 Kurnool ............... — .....39.7.....23.7

Aizawl............... — .....23.1 .....8.9 Lucknow.............. — .....27.4.....10.9

Allahabad.......... — .....28.7.....13.2 Madurai ............... — .....36.4.....21.0

Bengaluru ......... — .....35.0.....19.2 Mangaluru ........... — .....33.7.....23.6

Bhopal .............. — .....29.9.....13.2 Mumbai ............... — .....33.7.....17.4

Bhubaneswar..... — .....36.3.....24.9 Mysuru ................ — .....34.9.....16.8

Chandigarh ....... — .....24.0.....10.9 New Delhi............ — .....25.5.....11.0

Chennai ............ — .....32.6.....24.2 Patna................... — .....28.7.....12.6

Coimbatore ....... — .....36.8.....22.2 Port Blair............. — .....31.0.....23.8

Dehradun .......... — .....24.5 .....9.0 Puducherry .......... — .....31.8.....21.1

Gangtok............ — .....17.7 .....9.5 Pune.................... — .....36.7.....13.8

Goa................... — .....34.7.....21.6 Raipur ................. — .....33.7.....19.1

Guwahati .......... — .....30.2.....15.6 Ranchi ................. — .....28.6.....18.2

Hubballi ............ — .....35.0.....22.0 Shillong ............... — .....20.4 .....9.6

Hyderabad ........ — .....37.7.....19.3 Shimla ................. — .....14.3 .....5.0

Imphal .............. — .....23.7.....15.2 Srinagar............... — .....13.4 .....0.9

Jaipur ............... — .....27.8.....12.0 Trivandrum.......... — .....33.5.....24.7

Kochi ................ — .....33.4.....26.2 Tiruchi................. — .....35.9.....22.0

Kohima ............. — .....21.6 .....8.4 Vijayawada .......... — .....35.6.....22.8

Kolkata ............. — .....31.2.....24.8 Visakhapatnam..... — .....31.4.....24.2

Particulate matter in the air you are breathing Yesterday

CITIES SO2 NO2 CO PM2.5 PM10 CODE In observations made at 8.00

p.m. air quality index in

Siri Fort, Delhi, was

hazardous with a score of

420. Chandrapur in

Maharashtra followed

at 314. At Karve Road in

Pune and

Saneguravahalli, Bangalore

the AQI was

moderate with a score of 50.

Ahmedabad ........ .161 .121 .109 .. 422......—.....*

Bengaluru........... ...44 .195 ...94 ......— ..160.....*

Chennai .............. .....3 ...37 ...82 .... 59......—.....*

Delhi .................. ...49 .125 .101 .. 362 ..423.....*

Hyderabad .......... .142 ...99 .101 .. 341 ..212.....*

Kolkata............... ...20 ...87 ...54 ......— ..137.....*

Lucknow............. ...20 .102 .107 .. 302......—.....*

Mumbai .............. ...27 ...41 .103 .. 223 ..168.....*

Pune................... ...55 ...98 ...56 .. 295 ..135.....*

Vishakhapatnam . .211 ...76 ...84 .. 116 ..140.....*

Air Quality Code: * Poor * Moderate * Good

SO2: Sulphur Dioxide. Short-term exposure can harm the respiratory system, making

breathing difficult. It can affect visibility by reacting with other air particles to form

haze and stain culturally important objects such as statues and monuments.

NO2: Nitrogen Dioxide. Aggravates respiratory illness, causes haze to form by

reacting with other air particles, causes acid rain, pollutes coastal waters.

CO: Carbon monoxide. High concentration in air reduces oxygen supply to critical

organs like the heart and brain. At very high levels, it can cause dizziness, confusion,

unconsciousness and even death.

PM2.5 & PM10: Particulate matter pollution can cause irritation of the eyes, nose

and throat, coughing, chest tightness and shortness of breath, reduced lung function,

irregular heartbeat, asthma attacks, heart attacks and premature death in people

with heart or lung disease

Even before the results forthe Nagpur Municipal Cor-poration were fully declaredon Thursday, senior Con-gress leader from Nagpur,Nitin Raut issued a statementblaming “certain party lead-ers” for “discarding partyprinciples of democraticfunctioning” resulting inthird successive defeat forthe party in Nagpur Muni-cipal Corporation polls.

This debacle follows theCongress party’s big defeatsin Lok Sabha and Assemblyelections here two years ago.

“The debacle of the Con-gress in Nagpur's civic pollsis a direct result of certainleaders discarding party'sprinciples of democraticfunctioning. We witnesseddictatorial attitude of a spe-

cific group which was not in-terested in effecting a Con-gress win but wantingCongressmen to lose. In thelast three decadesthat I havededicated to Congress, this isthe lowest point for theparty in the city I have ex-perienced and all this is be-cause somebody put himselffirst and the party second,”said Mr. Raut, who was also acabinet minister in Congress-NCP government.

The division in NagpurCongress was clearly evidentin previous elections as well.However, this time round,the district leadership of theparty was openly pittedagainst its own partyleaders.

Senior leader SatishChaturvedi, Anees Ahmad,and Mr. Raut kept them-selves away from the cam-

paign citing “undue ticketdistributions” by districtCongress president VikasThakre who is consideredclose to former Nagpur MPVilas Muttemwar. Mr. Thakrecould not retain his own seatand lost the election by 800votes. Promising candidateslike Praffula Gudadhe Patil,who had contested the lastAssembly polls against CMDevendra Fadnavis fromNagpur (South-West) con-stituency, had to wait for aticket till the last moment.Mr. Patil won his seat by de-feating the BJP candidates byover 4000 votes onThursday.

On the other hand, theBJP was led by two heavy-weight politicians from Nag-pur — Union Minister for Sur-face Transport and ShippingNitin Gadkari and Maha-

rashtra Chief Minister De-vendra Fadnavis.

At the time of ticket distri-bution, the party conductedmany surveys and deniedtickets to around 40 sittingcorporators and relatives ofsenior RSS and Bajrang Dalfunctionaries in the city.

Mr. Gadkari had campedat his home for three days atthe time of selection of can-didates and was actively in-volved in every election pro-cess, from candidateselection to pacifying thosewho were denied tickets. Mr.Gadkari also gave tickets tomany OBC candidates fromopen seats.

However, the BJP will nowhave to deal with the high ex-pectations of the Nagpurpublic to develop the city onthe lines of a metropolitancity.

Divided Cong. decimated in NagpurThe district leadership party was openly pitted against its own party leaders

Pavan Dahat

Nagpur

Pragmatic politics and calcu-lated risk-taking ensuredstunning wins for the BJP inthe Pimpri-Chinchwad andthe Pune Municipal Corpora-tions, as it put an end to theNCP’s monopoly over thecash-rich civic bodies onThursday.

The BJP’s unprecedentedperformance in the PMCbested all previous tallies ofthe NCP.

A jubilant BJP leader said,“Our win put an end to AjitDada’s [NCP leader AjitPawar] ‘Dadagiri’”.

The results proved thatthe BJP’s wins in the 2014Parliamentary and Assemblypolls still cast long shadowson the NCP.

Girish Bapat, senior BJPleader and Pune GuardianMinister, said, “Our win is amassive team effort withcareful planning andstrategy. It signifies that thepeople in Pune were cravingfor change.”

NCP groundedThe BJP’s onslaught has putother parties in the shade.Very few NCP loyalists man-aged to hold their ground.

While Mayor PrashantJagtap managed to win fromWanowrie, other stalwartslike five-time corporatorSubhash Jagtap were com-prehensively beaten.

In the PCMC, the PimpriMayor, NCP’s ShakuntalaDarade, bit the dust, whileall the BJP candidates in her

panel (number 15) emergedvictorious.

The Congress, too, with itsunfocused strategy, sufferedheavily. It’s old warhorses,like Kamal Vyawahare, lostheavily to their BJPopponents.

Vandana Chavan, theNCP’s city unit president,said, “The party accepts de-feat and will work as a con-structive Opposition.” Ms.Chavan tendered her resig-nation after the results wereannounced.

Affected by defectionsBesides, defections from topparty leaders like ReshmaBhosale, Bhosari legislatorMahesh Landge, and seniorNCP leaders Azam Pansareand Yashwant Bhosale also

proved costly for the NCP inthe PCMC area, where theBJP secured 78 seats, a land-slide win for the first time.

Issues like the endangeredecology, the Pune Metro Railproject and the Develop-ment Plan of the old cityplayed to the BJP’sadvantage.

After Thursday’s results,the future looks bleak for theNCP, the Congress, and Ma-harashtra Navnirman Sena(which reduced to a ‘double-digit’ party in the Nashik andPune Municipal Corpora-tions).

While the NCP has beensupplanted by the BJP fromits power bases in Pune, theCongress is in danger of be-ing reduced to a non-entityin State politics.

BJP supplants NCP in Pune, PimpriThe future looks bleak for Congress, NCP, MNS in State politics

Shoumojit Banerjee

Pune

CMYK

ND-ND




SOUTH

Rohith’s family seekstime to reply to noticeGUNTUR

The family of Rohith Vemula,the deceased researchscholar of the University ofHyderabad, has sought moretime to reply to the show-cause notice given by theGuntur district administrationto prove that they belongedto the Scheduled Caste.

IN BRIEF

Body cameras for Keralapolice personnel soonTHIRUVANANTHAPURAM

Soon, police officers in Keralawill wear body cameras.Officials claim the devices willdeter police misconduct whenengaging with the public. TheState police had come underscathing criticism on Tuesdayafter two “overzealous”policewomen on patroladopted a “moralistic”approach towards a couple.

Obscene video lands A.P.civic leader in troubleKURNOOL

An obscene video, allegedlyposted by Nandyal municipalvice-chairman Vijaya Kumaron the “TDP Nandyal”WhatsApp group, led toregistration of a case againsthim. The clip of a nakedwoman doing a belly danceenraged women councillorswho filed a complaint.

Uber-Ola protest leavescommuters strandedBENGALURU

As a majority of app-basedtaxis remained off the roadfor the second consecutiveday on Thursday inBengaluru, the autorickshawswere among the most soughtafter mode of transport.Taking advantage,autorickshaw drivers startedfleecing commuters. For oneweek, cab drivers have beenopposing cab aggregators.

In a first for the entire coun-try, Kerala will soon have asex offenders’ register and acomprehensive relief fundfor sex crime survivors. An-nouncing this in the courseof his customary policy ad-dress to the Assembly onThursday, Governor P. Satha-sivam said the register, to bekept in the public domain,would contain all identifica-tion details of sex offenders.Interim relief would beprovided to the survivors ofsex crimes, children andadults, from the proposedrelief fund.

The government, he said,would soon come out with acomprehensive law coveringcitizens’ charter, transpar-ency, accountability and so-cial audit, the core of whichwould be public service de-livery. Massive reformswould be initiated to put theState on top in ‘ease of doingbusiness'. Kerala would stick

to the Five Year Plan mode.In another first for the State,the government proposed tocome up with an exportpolicy to boost the State’s ex-port potential.

A fast track system forclearing investment propos-als would be put in place.Projects with an estimated

outlay of ₹10,000 crorewould be cleared by thenewly formed Kerala Infra-structure Investment FundBoard by next month. In thetourism sector, the govern-ment would soon introduce‘Safety App’ for tourists.Each of the five cities in theState would get metropolitan

transport authority to en-sure transport operationsunder a single command.

Terming the demonetisa-tion of high-value currencynotes one of the most dev-astating catastrophes in In-dia’s financial history, Mr.Sathasivam told the As-sembly that heart-tendingstories were coming in fromvarious parts of the State onhow farmers had to dumptheir crops, and small andmarginal business andhouseholds had to give awayat throwaway prices invent-ories built up over time.

The Governor was greetedby Opposition banners al-leging ‘mafia rule’ in theState and the slogan ‘no rice,no money, no work, no wa-ter, no pension.’ The Opposi-tion leaders termed thepolicy address a ‘disappoint-ment,’ and a reiteration ofwhat had been stated in lastyear’s policy address and thelast budget of the LDF gov-ernment.

Sex ofenders’ list in Kerala soonThe govt. will keep a register with their names and details in public domain

Stating policy: Kerala Governor P. Sathasivam deliveringpolicy address to the Assembly on Thursday. S. MAHINSHA

C. Gouridasan Nair

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM

Nearly two-and-a-half yearsafter a retired senior officerof the Indian Air Force wasmurdered in his residenceoff Hosur Road, theBengaluru district police onThursday claimed to havesolved the case.

They arrested a gang of 12persons, comprising mostlytruck and cab drivers, inconnection with the case.

Some gang memberswere picked up while mov-ing around suspiciouslynear a gated community onthe outskirts of the city.

Police said the gang mem-bers were from the outskirtsof the city. They were arres-ted in connection with a da-coity case.

Smothered to deathWhen questioned, theyclaimed to have committedmore than 20 robberies

across the city, and fivewere involved in the murderof Air Commodore ParvezKhokar (retd.) during a rob-bery attempt, sources said.

They had smothered 71-year-old Air CommodoreKhokar after he resistedtheir robbery attempt in hisvilla in November 2014, thepolice said.

His wife Promila wasasleep in an adjacentbedroom.

Retired IAF oicer’smurder solvedIt was a robbery bid gone wrong: Police


Bengaluru

Parvez Khokar

Amid Sangh Parivar’s op-position to Kerala ChiefMinister Pinarayi Vijayan’sparticipation in the Kara-vali Souharda rally here onSaturday, miscreants brokeinto the CPI(M) office atThokkottu under the Ullalpolice station limits onThursday. They set ban-ners, posters and furnitureon fire.

The miscreants are sus-pected to have entered theoffice early on Thursday.While the CPI(M) hasblamed Sangh Parivar forthe incident, the policehave said they are investig-ating. Vasantha Achari, sec-retary, Dakshina Kannadaunit of the CPI(M), saidabout 10 flexes and ban-ners, chairs, files, and atelevision set were burnt.

Mr. Achari said theSangh Parivar was trying tocreate a “fear psychosis”among people to disruptSaturday’s rally.

CPI (M) oicein KarnatakaattackedSpecial Correspondent

Mangaluru

The grief-stricken familymembers of Syed FarookBasha, 26, who was shotdead at Abyei in South Su-dan last Friday, are eagerlyawaiting the arrival of hisbody at the Rajiv Gandhi In-ternational Airport at Hy-derabad.

A group of armed mensurrounded the car in whichBasha, Field Project Co-ordinator in Omaski Sai InfraCompany Ltd., was travel-ling after the Friday prayers,and allegedly shot him deadon February 17.

Sushma’s assistanceAfter his cousin Ejaz Hussaintweeted to Union Minister

for External Affairs SushmaSwaraj seeking her assist-ance to bring the body to In-dia, she instructed the In-dian High Commissioner inSouth Sudan to make ar-rangements. The body isnow in the Abyei UNISFA

camp in South Sudan.“We were shocked on re-

ceiving a call at 3 a.m. onFebruary 17 from Syed PeerBasha Khadri, Basha’sbrother-in-law, who works inthe same company,” Basha’selder sister Syeda Ayeshaand maternal aunt S. SyedaBanu told The Hindu.

Basha studied in the ZPhigh school and the MedhaJunior College, both atMydukur. He did his gradu-ation in Computer Science.

Mugged thrice earlierBasha, who went to Juba,capital of South Sudan,along with his brother-in-lawin 2013, visited India on twomonths’ vacation every year.

He came home four

months ago, but was reluct-ant to go back to South Su-dan, torn by civil strife, as hehad been a victim of mug-ging thrice, Ms. Banu said.

He went back after themanagement representativesof his company repeatedlycalled him by making himhigher offers.

They had agreed to posthim at a place of his choicein Sudan, as he was super-vising three to four projects,Ms Banu added.

Basha’s mother, SyedaNaseem Banu, who is in adazed condition, has hardlyspoken since a week, shesaid. She was planning toperform his marriage duringhis visit in October/Novem-ber this year.

Family awaits body of kin killed in Sudan

Basha was shot dead at Abyei, South Sudan, after Friday prayers on February 17

M.V. Subramanyam

KURNOOL

Syed Farook Basha

Unrelentingmood: The activists of Festival Coordination Committee take out a march in Thrissur on Thursday to protest againstthe curbs on ireworks display during Pooram festivities. K.K. NAJEEB

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In one voice

Early summer is the timewhen people of Adilabadand neighbouring districtsstart staying indoors forlonger durations owing tothe constantly climbingmercury.

The forest staff seem to beno different from commonpeople. They are keen onavoiding the seasonal heatwhich, in Adilabad andNirmal districts, has resultedin forest fires raging inhundreds of hectares fordays together, but goingunnoticed.

Likely to spreadThick billowing smoke fromthe distant hills can be seenfrom Medipalli village oneither side of NH 44 bypassroad in Nirmal district. Thefire has been destroying the

pristine forest environmentfor five days. The forests inthis area, which encompassvillages of Arepalli,Burugupalli and the

habitations deeper, arealready under considerablestress owing to timbersmugglers and the plethoraof firewood sellers who show

no compunction in fellingtrees. The fire can be seenon the route in the junglefrom where the illegallyfelled teak is loaded onvehicles.

A fire has reduced thefallen dry leaves and muchof the smaller varieties ofplants, and destroyedprecious bird nests andhabitats of minor animals inthe hilly forests near theBorigaon crossing on NH 44in the Neredigonda mandalof Adilabad district. This fireseems to have started onFebruary 19 and is likely toengulf wider areas unlesscontrolled in time.

Possible causesThere are different reasonsput forth as the cause of theforest fires. Two of the mostimportant reasons for thedisturbing phenomenon are

the setting of dry leaves inthe forest on fire by beedileaf contractors, and theother, the effort of farmersliving in the vicinity toexpand their fields.

Beedi leaf contractorsdeny that the fires are theirhandiwork and it may not betotally wrong as concededby forest officials.

“The contractors set onfire the dry leaves at least inareas where beedi leaf growsabundantly,” pointed outone official on conditions ofanonymity.

The effort of thegovernment in checkingsuch illegal activity by givingtwo-wheelers to Forest BeatOfficers has apparentlycome a cropper.

Its two-year-old plan tolay a road along theperimeter of forest beats hasremained a non-starter too.

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Fire destroys precious lora & fauna in AdilabadIt has been raging unnoticed for days, playing havoc with plants, bird nests and animal habitats

Mass destruction: The forest ires has been raging in hundredsof hectares for days together. S. HARPAL SINGH

S. Harpal Singh

ADILABAD

The Kerala High Court is allset to issue guidelines on thefunctions of the Vigilanceand Anti-Corruption Bureau(VACB) in the backdrop ofcases being registered by theagency under the provisionsof the Prevention of Corrup-tion Act in connection withthe appointments and pro-motions of public servants.

The court, while stayingthe proceedings for a monthin a case registered againstP.K. Sudheer, a relative offormer Industries MinisterE.P. Jayarajan, clarified thatthe VACB could step in forinvestigation, only if actionsor orders involved any ele-ment of corruption or mis-conduct as defined under

the Prevention of Corrup-tion Act. The court said it feltit was necessary to issuesome guidelines regardingthe functions of the VACB.

The court observed that itwould have to examinewhether the legality andpropriety of the appoint-ment were being probed bythe VACB.

Democracy & rule of law“Our democratic set-up” hadconstitutional and statutoryjudicial authorities to decideon the question of legality orpropriety of appointments,promotions, and disciplin-ary actions in public service.Non-judicial statutory au-thorities and other authorit-ies could not, in any circum-stance, take over that

function. If they, in any cir-cumstance, proceeded todischarge such functions un-authorisedly, the courtwould have to interfere forthe protection of democracyand rule of law. Even the ju-dicial authorities would pro-ceed to decide on the legal-ity and propriety of thegovernment orders or Minis-ter-level orders making ap-pointments or promotiononly in the circumstances ofillegality or violation of anyrule or procedure governingthe process.The court alsopointed out that a govern-ment order appointing Mr.Sudheer as the managingdirector of the Kerala StateIndustrial Enterprises Ltd.was cancelled within twoweeks of issuing it.

Kerala HC to issue normson VACB functions‘It can step in only if actions involve element of corruption’

K.C.Gopakumar

Kochi

The Andhra Pradesh govern-ment has set a target of 25%growth in the agriculturesector and 30% in its alliedsectors during next fiscal.The government has de-cided to encourage mixedcrop cultivation under theNava Dhanya scheme.

Chief Minister N.Chandrababu Naidu called ameeting on agriculture andits allied sectors as apart ofpre-budget exercise at theSecretariat, near here, onThursday.

On the occasion, Mr.

Naidu said that the ayacutfor the third crop under thePattiseema project neededto be finalised. Water levelsin Pulichintala, Nagarjunas-agar, and Srisailam would godown during November andDecember. It was necessaryto prepare advanced plan-ning to provide water for thesecond crop. The waterwould have to be stored andlevels maintained. It wasequally important to ensurethat there was no drinkingwater crisis during summer,he said.

The fisheries sectorwould have to take a lead

role in ensuring food secur-ity. There was no dearth offunds. The fisheries and hor-ticulture departments stillwould have to spend ₹200crore allocated in the cur-rent fiscal budget, he said.

Fodder cultivation inKrishna district also neededto be encouraged. The offi-cials would have to encour-age farmers to go in for or-ganic farming.

Chemicals and pesticidesusage should be discour-aged. Effective use of rainguns would help in savingthe standing crops, headded.

Calls a pre-budget meeting of agriculture & allied sectors

Staff Reporter

VIJAYAWADA

Naidu to oicials: Ensure thereis no drinking water crisis

Wildlife conservationistshave strongly criticised theNational Board for Wildlife(NBWL) for granting permis-sion to the widening of aroad that falls in the bufferzone of the Nagarjuna Sagar-Srisailam Tiger Reserve andalso the Ecologically Sensit-ive Zone of the GundlaBrahmeswaram WildlifeSanctuary.

The NBWL gave permis-sion for widening of theNandyala-Atmakur road inKurnool district from thesingle lane to double lane atits most recent meeting heldin New Delhi.

Former honorary wildlifewarden and conservationistK. Mruthumjaya Rao said theNBWL should have sugges-ted a detour around thesmall piece of forest insteadof widening it.

Doubling the lanes wouldalso double the traffic, andthe number of heavy

vehicles would also increase,he said.

Displacement threat“Roads create barriers tomovement, impacting an-imal population in manyways. “When a road runsthrough a forest, it createsan edge habitat along the

portion of the forest that ison the fringe of the road.Roads not only fragment thehabitat but also alter them,leading to displacement ofsome species.

“Animals with large homeranges, such as panthers,have a high chance of en-countering roads,” he said.

Some animals were prone toroad mortality, mainly dueto their natural defencemechanisms, which they re-quired to survive in the wild.

Turtles often perceivevehicles as a threat and drawthemselves into their shell,which puts them at risk ofgetting struck because theystay on the road longer.

Snakes might also becomeimmobilised when ap-proached by a car and re-main so for a minute after acar passes. Venomoussnakes might be less inclinedto flee from a perceivedthreat because they typicallyuse venom for defence.

Some bigger birds thatnormally fly away from pred-ators may be unable to initi-ate flight quickly enoughwhen approached by a fast-moving vehicle.

The way in which animalsnaturally respond to threatsmay increase their risk of be-ing struck by vehicles, wild-life experts say.

Nod for road widening in sanctuary opposed

‘Roads create barriers to movement, impacting animal population in many ways’

G. Venkataramana Rao

Vijayawada

A ile picture of the Srisailam Tiger Project. NAGARA GOPAL




NATION

Farooq, Omar greetpeople on ShivratriSRINAGAR

National Conferencepresident Farooq Abdullahand working president OmarAbdullah on Thursdaygreeted the people of Jammuand Kashmir on Shivratri andexpressed hope that thefestival will be celebrated ina spirit of harmony.They prayed for peace andtranquillity and hoped for anew era of goodwill amongall sections of society, aspokesman of the NationalConference said. PTI

IN BRIEF

Ajay Singh namedleader of OppositionBHOPAL

Ajay Singh, a close conidanteof senior Congress leaderDigvijaya Singh, was onThursday appointed as theleader of the Opposition intheMadhya PradeshAssembly for the secondtime. The appointmentcomes two days after party’scentral observer, Ajay Maken,chaired the CongressLegislature Party (CLP)meeting here. The post waslying vacant since last fourmonths, after the death ofSatyadev Katare. PTI

TwowomanMaoistssurrender in OdishaBERHAMPUR

TwowomanMaoists,including one fromMaharashtra, surrendered inMalkangiri district of Odishaon Thursday. The Odishagovernment had declared areward of ₹4 lakh each forthe capture of the duo,Sumitra Madvi (35) and JagiMadkami (33), whowereactive in Malkangiri district.Both of them reached theMalkangiri district policeheadquarter to surrenderbefore the districtSuperintendent of PoliceMitrabhanuMohapatra.STAFF REPORTER

Nearly two decades after theworld came to know about alarge population in Odisha’sNuapadadistrict sufferingfrom crippled backbones onaccount of consumption ofhigh fluoride-laced water,the government is yet toprovide a solution to theproblem.

Over 50,000 villagers inthe district have been af-fected by fluorosis.

Suffering in silenceAdults mostly suffer fromskeletal fluorosis that de-forms bones and causesacute pain. Most cannotstraighten their backs andget exhausted very easily.Children below 15 years ofage suffer from mottling ofteeth or dental fluorosis.Afew hundreds have even diedof the disease.

In 1997, Prafulla Behera,then a 36-year-old healthyman of Karlakot village un-der Boden block, started ex-periencing pain in his neckand backbone. Doctors inOdisha could not diagnosehis problem. Two years later,doctors in Visakhapatnampointed out consumption ofcontaminated water as thereason behind his ailment.Mr. Behera was the first per-son from Nuapada to be dia-gnosed with fluorosis.

Government records showNuapada has a total of 2,784habitations. Fluoride contentis found beyond the permiss-ible level of 1.5 part per mil-lion (PPM) in 905 habita-tions. In Nuapada, thefluoride content in water var-ies from 0.14 - 7.2 PPM. Apartfrom causing health hazards,fluorosis adversely affectsthe economic productivity ofthe area, leading to hungerand malnutrition. There is asocial impact, too. Peoplefrom the non-contaminated

zones do not wish to estab-lish any marital relationshipwith people in the contamin-ated pockets.

Projects hanging fireThe steps taken by the gov-ernment to mitigate theproblem have had little im-pact. First, a pipe water sup-ply (PWS) project was set upat Karlakot village. However,people in other villages con-tinued to consume ground-water. Between 2010 and2015, the government an-nounced 21 mega PWS pro-jects at a total cost of ₹273.87.The projects are yet to take

off. In 2015, the NationalBank of Agriculture Rural De-velopment (NABARD) sanc-tioned ₹543.63 crore to thegovernment towards settingup a project that would havesupplied drinking water to1.2 lakh families in the fluor-ide-affected blocks of Sinap-ali, Boden, Khariar, Komnaand Nuapada. This project,too, is hanging fire.

“The State government isduty-bound to provide unin-terrupted supply of uncon-taminated water to the villa-gers in Nuapada, one of thecountry’s poorest districts,”says Bhubaneswar-based

BikashPati, an expert on theissue.

The government, how-ever, claims that fluoridecontamination has been ad-dressed. “Of the 905 habit-ats, 350 have pipe water sup-ply. Further, 600 fluorideremoval plants have been setup in 543 villages and 34PWS projects are being ex-ecuted to cover 98 habitats,”said Bhagaban Sahu, engin-eer-in-chief, Rural WaterSupply and Sanitation De-partment. PWS projects,meanwhile, have failed to ad-dress the crisis due to electri-city failure.

Fluorosis haunts Nuapadaas govt looks the other wayOver 50,000 villagers in Odisha district consume luoride-laced groundwater

Satyasundar Barik

KHARIAR (ODISHA) The ruling Janata Dal(United) on Thursday sus-pended party MLA MewalalChoudhary after he wasbooked in a case of “gross ir-regularities” in the appoint-ment of assistant professorsand junior scientists at BiharAgricultural University (BAU)during his tenure as vice-chancellor in 2012.

Bihar Agricultural Univer-sity at Sabour in Bhagalpurdistrict is an autonomous in-stitute under the Bihar gov-ernment and was estab-lished under the IndianCouncil of Agricultural Re-search in 2010.

The MLA was suspendedfrom the party for alleged in-volvement in irregularities inthe appointment of 161 as-sistant professors and juniorscientists. “The party has de-cided to suspend him as

charges of irregularitiesagainst him in the appoint-ment of BAU staff werefound to be true,” said JD(U)chief spokesperson andparty MLC Sanjay Singh. Mr.Choudhary was the foundervice-chancellor of the uni-versity till 2015 when he con-tested the Assembly pollfrom Tarapur on a JD(U)ticket.

Case registeredRecently a case (no: 35 / 17)was lodged against Mr.Choudhary after a probecommittee headed by Justice

(retd) Syed Mohammed Mah-fooz Alam of the Patna HighCourt found him guilty of ir-regularities in appointmentsat the university. “A caseagainst Mr. Choudhary hasbeen lodged under sections409, 420, 467, 468, 471 and120B”, said Neeraj Tiwari, of-ficer-in-charge of the Sabourpolice station. “Many ap-pointments during his ten-ure were made by ignoringthe candidates’ performancein written tests and aca-demic records. Those selec-ted were given high marks ininterviews and power-pointpresentation by the screen-ing committee,” said a mem-ber of the probe committee.

However, speaking tojournalists, Mr. Choudharysaid he was not given achance to explain his side ofthe story. “I was suspendedwithout a show-cause notice.But I respect the decision ofthe party,” he said.

Irregularities alleged in illing of 161 positions at BAU

Amarnath Tewary

Patna

Mewalal Choudhary

JD(U) suspends MLAover appointment ‘fraud’

A Kashmir University lawstudent has gone missingdays after participating in ananti-government protestover civilian killings in theKulgam encounter on Febru-ary 15.

Aqib Mushtaq Malik, aresident of Pinjura Shopian,a student of the thirdsemester, has been missingsince February 21. Universitystudents, who disruptedclass work on Thursday, al-leged that Mr Malik wentmissing immediately afterparticipating in the anti-gov-ernment protest. He had left

the university campus at3.00 pm on February 21.

Parents banking on cops“We have no idea about hiswhereabouts. The policeshould trace our son,” saidMushtaq AhmadMir, the stu-dent’s father.

The university’s public re-lations officer FaheemAslam said, “We also havelodged a missing report. Thevice-chancellor has writtento the Director General ofPolice (DGP) to look into thecase and ensure the safety ofthe student.” The policehave denied that he waspicked by any security

agency. Preliminary investig-ations have revealed that hiscell phone was last locatedat Srinagar’s Batamalooarea, a police officer said.

“There is also a transac-tion made from his bank ac-count in an ATM in southKashmir,” the police officersaid.

Meanwhile, a Hurriyatspokesman described thestudents’ protest as “legitim-ate.” “Kashmiri studentshave often been at the re-ceiving end of atrocities. It’sthe duty of the governmentto trace the whereabouts ofthe student,” a Hurriyatspokesman said.

Kashmir law student missingafter participating in protestUniversity iles complaint, cops deny he has been picked up

Peerzada Ashiq

Srinagar




CMYK

NATION

Sheena Bora murder trialadjourned for two weeksMUMBAI

The Sheena Bora murder caseof 2012 hit a road block onthe first day of trial and wasadjourned for two weeks.On Thursday, InspectorGanesh Dalvi of Khar Policedeposed before the specialCBI court. He narrated howIndrani Mukerjea’s driverShyamvar Rai was held with apistol and taken into custodyin 2015.

IN BRIEF

Another arrest in childtraicking caseJALPAIGURI (WB)

The CID on Thursdaymadeanother arrest in theJalpaiguri child traickingcase, taking the total numberof arrests to three.PTI

Rangoon can be releasedafter ₹2 cr. is paid: HCMUMBAI

The Bombay High Court onThursday said the ilmRangoonmade by VishalBhardwaj can be released onFebruary 24, its scheduledday, but ₹ 2 crore has to bedeposited in court.

WhatsApp now has a newfeature called Status,launched on February 20,which will allow users to up-date their statuses with time-limited photos, videos,scribbles and GIFs. Soundsfamiliar?

Facebook, which acquiredWhatsApp two years ago fora whopping $19 billion, hasalways been known to sharea rivalry with Snapchat, an-other dynamic messagingplatform, regularly ringing inchanges in step with its com-petitor.

Its latest WhatsApp fea-ture update, though, is moreupfront than ever.

WhatsApp has made sev-eral useful modifications ofits own. From introducing‘Read Receipts’, user tag-ging, end-to-end encryption,WhatsApp Web, to the re-traction of the paltry $1 an-nual subscription fee, What-sApp has updated itself withkey functionalities in con-sonance with user beha-

viour, including customisingthe previously templatisedstatus messages.

What is Status?Status allows WhatsAppusers to share photos,videos, emojis, sketches andeven GIFs as status updates.These updates will disap-pear after 24 hours. Theywill also, like all text mes-sages, be encrypted end-to-end. You can schedule mul-tiple updates, which wouldrun like a reel and give yourfriends a glimpse of your en-tire day. Its content duration

can be up to 45 seconds, andthey cannot be saved onyour device.

It will be available to allusers, iOS and Android.

Where is it located?Once the feature becomesavailable, it will automatic-ally show up on your app.You will see an icon between‘Calls’ and ‘Chats’ on thenavigation bar of your What-sApp home-screen. The tra-ditional text status updatefunction will remainseparate.

How it works* Once you have captured aphoto or video you wish toshare, you are taken to an in-terface that is a virtual pho-toshop. Here, you can...

- Scribble on the capturedfile

- Superimpose and posi-tion emojis on the file

- Add a caption below ex-plaining the content

* Once your Status is cre-ated, you can control whosees it by specifying so in

your Privacy Settings. OniOS, tap the icon ‘Privacy’.On Android, look for ‘StatusPrivacy’. You can make yourStatuses a universal delight,or select individual friendswho will get to view yourStatus updates, or excludespecific contacts. If you wantto send the content to a spe-cific friend, you send them aprivate chat message asusual.

* You can discover whichof your contacts has viewedyour Status on a ‘ViewCounter’ at the bottom of thescreen.

Statuses, yours andmineClicking on the Status tab,you will see a horizontal listof all your contacts with up-dated Statuses. Swipe left orright to scroll through thelist, tap to pause, or press-swipe on a Status to reply toit.

What’s in it forWhatsAppWhatsApp currently hasover 1 billion monthly users,and hosts a daily thorough-

fare of about 60 billion mes-sages. This includes 3 billionphotos, 750 million videosand 80 million GIFs, accord-ing to Bloomberg. Now, bymilking its potential for mul-timedia usage, WhatsAppcan augment itself from afunctional messaging tool toa platform that users go tofor entertainment.

This can effectively spellreal trouble for Snapchat,which has already seen an82% drop-off in user growthsince the 2016 launch of Ins-tagram Stories, anothercopycat that surpassed theoriginal.

This, therefore, opens upfresh avenues for monetisa-tion, which can help offsetthe opportunity cost of thescrapping of its earlier $1nominal fee.

The expanded user baseand usage can be used to at-tract advertisers, who couldinsert their plugs andproduct-placements inbetween Statuses to catchthe user’s eye as he scrollsthrough them.

WhatsApp’s update could kill SnapchatNew feature could turn WhatsApp from a functional messaging tool to a platform for entertainment

Mihir Balantrapu

CHENNAI

The Supreme Court onThursday agreed to hear inApril a petition filed byformer ISRO scientist NambiNarayanan, discharged inthe 1994 espionage case,seeking an order to initiatecriminal action against threeformer top police officers forallegedly fabricating the caseagainst him.

Seeks more timeA three-judge Bench led byJustice Dipak Misra hasscheduled the case for hear-ing in the second week ofApril after one of the re-spondent parties soughtmore time to file a counterto Mr. Narayanan’s petition.The petition was filed in2015. The court had issuednotice to the respondentsshortly thereafter in July2015. The case has beenpending since then.

The petition has ar-raigned former Kerala ADGP

Siby Mathews, K.K. Joshwaand S. Vijayan. Mr. Naray-anan moved the court after aDivision Bench of the KeralaHigh Court refused his plea.

Narayanan’s contentionIn his petition, Mr. Naray-anan contended that theHigh Court had “failed to ap-preciate the real undercur-rent that passed through themind of the Supreme Court,the NHRC and the singlejudge of the High Court intheir verdict and, on unten-able reasons, quashed theorder of the single judge.”

SC to hear ex-ISROscientist’s plea in April

Case was fabricated, says Narayanan

Krishnadas Rajagopal

NEW DELHI

Nambi Narayanan

The Supreme Court onThursday asked TamilNadu and Kerala to placeon record their lists of wit-nesses in the Neyyar riverwater dispute case.

A Bench of Justices Ran-jan Gogoi and Navin Sinhaasked both the States to filethe lists within two weeksin the original lawsuit pre-ferred by Tamil Naduagainst its neighbour in2012.

The Supreme Court had,in November 2016, framedthe issues to be heard, in-cluding whether the rivercan be classified as aninter-State river.

The court had decidedto move ahead with thelong-pending suit betweenthe two States, and agreedto hear on several disputedissues, including whetherthe supply of water toTamil Nadu by Kerala since1965 was only a gesture ofgoodwill or a legal obliga-tion imposed by Section108 (2) of the State Re-or-ganisation Act, 1956.

Neyyar case:SC asks forwitness listLegal Correspondent

NEW DELHI

The Supreme Court onThursday said it would con-sider setting up a Constitu-tion Bench soon for hearingappeals filed by the Delhigovernment against the HighCourt judgment holdingLieutenant Governor as theadministrative head of Delhi.“We will see whether it willcome up before or after thesummer vacation,” ChiefJustice of India J.S. Khehartold senior advocate GopalSubramaniam, representingthe Delhi government.

Recently, a two-judgeBench had referred to a Con-stitution Bench a series of ap-peals filed by the Delhi gov-ernment for laying down thelaw on whether the Lieuten-ant Governor can unilaterallyadminister the National Cap-ital without being bound bythe “aid and advice” of theelected government.

A Bench of Justices A.K.Sikri and R.K. Agrawal had

said there were several ques-tions of law that need to beinterpreted and settled by aConstitution Bench.

Justice Sikri’s Bench hadheard the appeals, whichwere filed in August 2016, ona preliminary basis to decidewhether the matter deservesto be referred to a largerBench.

The two-judge Bench hadhowever refrained fromframing questions for theConstitution Bench to hearon.

The batch of seven specialleave petitions filed by theDelhi government has chal-lenged the Delhi High Court’sAugust 4 judgment which up-held the Lieutenant Gov-ernor’s power not only overthe police, land and publicorder but also in the “ser-vices.”

The judgment had effect-ively shrunk the KejriwalCabinet’s girth.

The Supreme Court hadhowever refused to stay theHigh Court judgment.

Decision on Benchsoon, SC tells DelhiAppeal against High Court verdict on L-G’s powers

There are several questions of law that need to be interpreted,said the Bench. FILE PHOTO

Legal Correspondent

NEW DELHI

Religious fervour::Ganga Arti in progress on the eve of Shivratri at the Dr Rajendra Prasad Ghat in Varanasi on Thursday.PHOTO: R. V. MOORTHY


Shivratri today

A 25-year-old Dalit manwho was allegedly beatenup and forced to drink ur-ine after he allegedlypeeped into a neighbour’shouse in an inebriated con-dition has left his village inBhojpur, near Modinagar.His family, meanwhile, hasdemanded security and afair probe from authorities.

Police complaintIt is alleged that on Febru-ary 10, the man was caughtpeeping into a housewhere a woman was sleep-ing. The family of the wo-man lodged a police com-plaint, but then decided toteach him a lesson by call-ing a panchayat. The pun-ishment was allegedlydoled out in front of thepanchayat on February 14.

Locals said that follow-ing the punishment, theman tried to commit sui-cide and then left his housewith his wife.

Beaten up“In the presence of a hun-dred people, the man wasbeaten up and forced todrink urine. Thoroughlyhumiliated, he tried tocommit suicide but wassaved by the locals. Sincethen, he and his wife havefled the village. They fearfor their lives as pressure ismounting on the family towithdraw the complaintthey have lodged againstthose who beat him up,”said Chaman Lal, uncle ofthe victim.

Bhojpur manleaves hisvillagePurusharth Aradhak

Bhojpur (Modinagar)

Vidya Subrahmaniam

By any reckoning, the NarendraModi-led Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) had been dealt the best set ofcards for Uttar Pradesh 2017. Its2014 Lok Sabha performance — 71of 80 seats won on a vote share of42% — provided it with both an airof invincibility and a margin towithstand a large negative voteswing.

Yet today U.P. presents a con-founding picture as the seven-phase election to the State As-sembly enters midpoint. There arekeenly fought triangular — and inplaces quadrangular — contestswhere only some months ago anemphatic lead for the BJP wastreated as a given.

The uncertainty must explainwhy the BJP campaign, which star-ted on a lofty note with a promiseto stay above caste and religion,has begun to tread the familiarground of Hindu consolidation.The references to kabristan (grave-yard) and shamshaan (cremationground) in a speech by Mr. Modi,and Amit Shah’s coinage of the ac-ronym ‘Kasab’ (name of thePakistani terrorist caught andhanged by India for 26/11) for hisopponents, leave no scope for mis-understanding which way the BJPcampaign is being led.

Divisive discourseMr.Modi andhis party chief shouldrest easy. If they leave thepulpit fora few days and travel in westernU.P., they might be stunned to dis-cover that the model citizen oftheir imagination, who is one partproud Hindu and one part aspira-tional, already exists. This citizenhas rote learnt andcan recite atwillall that has been communicated tohim ever since the BJP became amajor player in U.P. politics. Andthis ideological grooming is inde-

pendent of who he might vote forin an election.

Which iswhy aBJP victory or de-feat is really only for the record.The language and thought pro-cesses of U.P.’s people have alreadybeen transformedandconditionedby the corrosive discourse that hassplit the State on Hindu-Muslimlines. Analysts have welcomed theabsenceof communal violenceandfailed attempts at polarising votersalong Hindu-Muslim blocks in thiselection as a sign of a State and itspeople returning tonormality afterfour years of being held hostage tocommunal provocations. TheMuz-afarnagar riots of 2013 may havebeen physically located in westernU.P. but thepoison from it had trav-elled wide, thanks to hotheadssuch as Yogi Adityanathheadquartered in eastern U.P. Thelynching of Mohammad Akhlaq inDadri and the pernicious love jihadcampaign were nothing if not Muz-afarnagar by another name.

On a recent tour of western U.P.,I was astonished by how often awell-conducted, amicable conver-sation suddenly got diverted intohate talk andMuslim-bashing. Thishappened at almost every stop Imade and was a pattern that cutacross castes.

In one word, Muzafarnagar,and the communal divide it hascome to represent, hasn’t gone

anywhere. In the 2014 election,voters primarily connected withMr. Modi on the aspirational prom-ise. However, they knew exactlywhat cues to pick up when hespoke in the same breath ofPakistan, the soldier dying on theborder, and the “pink revolution”sweeping the country. The lastmentioned was a euphemism forthe rise in meat exports, with thefurther veiled suggestion that themeat in question was beef.

Tricolour politicsThe reason why voters in the 2014election readily absorbed the sub-text toMr.Modi’smessageswas be-cause they had already beenprimed for it byMuzafarnagar.Mr.Modi’s instantly attractive ‘politicsof transformation’ came wrappedin the tricolour: U.P. and its peoplecould shine only if the nation couldshine and the jawan was given hisrespect. That this could be under-stood as excluding Muslims wasperhaps intended.

Travelling in western U.P., Ifound a deceptive calm in the partswhere the 2013 riots had raged.Prima facie, it seemed that thewounds of the past had healed.There were examples of Jats votingfor Muslim candidates in placessuch as Purqazi, a Jat-dominatedreserved constituency in Muzaf-farnagar district, and ThanaBhawan in Shamli district. Jat villa-gers in Kaji Kheda in Purqazi saidtheywould vote forChoti BegumoftheAjit Singh-ledRashtriyaLokDal(RLD) in preference to the BJP’sPramod Utwal. Choti Begum is aDalit married into a Muslim house-hold and hence the Begum suix.Jats have a history of hostility withDalits while Jats andMuslims, oncethe backbone of Jat icon Chaud-hary Charan Singh’s peasantparties, have been turned into twoinimical blocks by the Muzaf-farnagar violence. On both counts,Jats would seem to have transcen-ded their prejudices.

In Thana Bhawan, the BJP’s can-didate, Suresh Kumar, was pitted,among others, against the RLD’sJaved Rao. Mr. Rana was an ac-

cused in the Muzafarnagar viol-ence, which automatically placedhim on the side of Jats, who sawthemselves as primary victims inthe Hindu-Muslim conlict. ButJats, or at least a section of them,seemed to have voted for JavedRao.

Had I walked away after merelyascertaining the voting prefer-ences of Jats in both places, Ishould have truly been happy andconvinced that Jats and Muslimshad inally reconciled to living inharmony. But longer conversa-tions revealed that hate and suspi-cion lingered deep in Jat hearts.Ms. Begum and Mr. Rao were thepreferredchoicesonlybecause Jatsfelt betrayed by the BJP which hadreneged on promises made tothem. There was anger over denialof a job quota to the community,but balingly, the litany of com-plaints included the Modi govern-ment’s failure to abrogate Article370 of the Constitutionwhich givesJammu and Kashmir its specialstatus. To add to this, Jats wereseized by guilt that in the 2014 elec-tion they had preferred the BJP toMr. Singh, a fellow Jat and heir tothemantle of Charan Singh.

But, as they argued, their votewas to the RLD, not its Muslim can-didates. “We swallowed a bitterpill,” they said. Further, in 2014,the BJP was their “only defenceagainst the aggression ofMuslims.”A few days after my interactionwith Jats in Kaji Kheda, I received acall from Deependra Malik, whowas among those I had spoken to.He said Jats had set out to vote theRLD’s Choti Begum, but on votingday a good number had switchedto the BJP after hearing reports of amassive Muslim consolidation infavour of the Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance: “An SP-Con-gress victory means return ofMuslim supremacy which we willnot allow.”

A ‘Hindu-Muslim’ electionIn Khanpur village, which falls inthe Siwalkhas Assembly constitu-ency of Meerut district, the elderJats unanimously placed their faith

inAjit Singh, reciting the bynow fa-miliar complaints against the BJP.However, the mood changed dra-matically when a boisterous groupof young Jatsmuscled into our con-versation. They noisily proclaimedthat Mr. Modi was and will remaintheir hero. A 16-year-old schoolboy, Anirudh Chhikara, waspresented to me as the region’s‘mini Sangeet Som’. The chiefclaim to fame of Mr. Som, the sit-ting MLA and current candidatefrom Sardhana, also in Meerut dis-trict, is that he is an accused in the2013 riots. On January 17, 2017, Mr.Som, nicknamed Sangharshveer(brave warrior) for frontally ight-ing Muslims, had a case bookedagainst him for showing video clipsof the 2013 riots. However, for‘mini Sangeet Som’ and otheryoung Jats, this was only proof thathe remained committed toprotect-ing ‘us from them’.

As in the case of Jats, there werereports of Muslims voting for theSP-Congress’s Hindu candidates inpreference to Muslims in the fray.Muslims I spoke to were moreguarded in their choice of words,avoiding direct attacks on Hindus.But the tension was palpable.Babloo Saii, a resident ofRaikabadColony inDhaulana con-stituency, said Muslims had madeup their minds to vote the SP’sDharmesh Singh Tomar. But YogiAdityanath’s sudden tour of the re-gion and his “calculatedly provoc-ative” speeches had convinced asection that they would be safervoting the Bahujan Samaj Party’sMuslim candidate, AslamAli.

Everywhere, the conversationinvariably revolved aroundPakistan, the Indian lag, and howMuslims were not part of the na-tionalist narrative.What began as acheerful interaction ended with,“This is a Hindu-Muslim election.”My impressions are from westernU.P. but my takeaway is that PrimeMinister Modi is popular and theBJP’s messaging has hit the target.

Vidya Subrahmaniam is Senior Fellow atthe Hindu Centre for Politics and PublicPolicy

Beneath the surface calmWestern Uttar Pradesh has been transformed by the corrosive post-Muzafarnagar discourse

AFP

Vandana Gopikumar

A National Mental Health Surveyconducted by the National Instituteof Mental Health and Neuros-ciences (NIMHANS), Bengaluru, es-timated that approximately 150mil-lion people in India experience oneor the other mental health condi-tion. Typically, care access pointsare limited to clinics, psychiatristsor therapists, all serving essentialand distinct purposes. However,concerted attacks on inequalitythrough innovative social interven-tions that build social capital anddecrease the experience of relativepoverty and discrimination couldinluence trajectories of well-beingand mental ill health, especiallyamong families living in poverty (In-dia is home to 30% of all poor chil-dren globally). These in conjunc-tion with efective health systems,

marked by early identiication andappropriate care paradigms, couldyield ideal results.

A challenging nexusThe gender-poverty-caste nexusopens up a Pandora’s box in an un-quiet ecosystem that underestim-ates the impact of structural barri-ers on mental ill health. Poverty isfeminised in an uninterrupted,ceaseless cycle; characterised bymalnourished women and girl chil-dren who drop out of school to carefor their male siblings or becausethey are unable to manage theirmenstruation in schools withouttoilets or water. The last to accesshealth care when unwell and theirst to play caregiver, girls are mar-ried of before the legal age eventoday, often subject to brutality per-petratedbyapatriarchal society, illsof dowry and intimate partner viol-ence. We fare poorly (130/150) onthe gender inequality index, meas-ured by indicators including work-force participation, access to sec-ondary education and control overreproductive rights.

In this context, it is no surprise

that depression and anxiety aretwice as prevalent among womenthan men, and inordinately highamong the poor. This cannot beviewed exclusively in medically he-gemonic frameworks of a depress-ive illness. Sociological and philo-sophical attributes relective ofone’s disempowered status and im-poverished internal locus of controlare just as relevant.

Poor budgetary allocationsYet, in the 2017 Union Budget,growth in health and disabilitybudgets remains marginal. Particu-larly disappointing is the negligiblefocus on mental health, especiallyconsidering India’s suicide ratesrank among the highest globally.Unimaginative allocations primar-ily assigned towards upgradation ofpremium institutes leave scarce re-sources to address challenges inmental hospitals, leave alone grap-pling with issues around long-termcare in inclusive community spacesor constructing a robust social carecomponentwithin theDistrictMen-tal Health Programme.

Taking into cognisance health

andnon-health pathways to achievemental health gains, what if we ap-plied unorthodox and creative op-tions, such as unconditional cashtransfers (UCTs), as a stress-redu-cing, equity-promoting interven-tion for those among the 150millionin need of inancial recourse? Evid-ence from a rigorous randomisedcontrol trial conducted in Kenya bysocial scientists JohannesHaushofer and JeremyShapiro fromPrinceton University indicates thatUCTs resulted in an increase inearnings and other assets, greaternutritional spend, decrease in do-mestic violence and increase inmental health gains, qualiied by anincrease in levels of happiness andlife satisfaction, and reduction instress anddepression.Therewasnoadverse impact on alcohol or to-bacco spend, crime or inlation.Economist Esther Dulo in anotherstudy observed that the gains werenot unitary — i.e. the personwho re-ceived the transfer also seemed toinluence outcomes, so if the wo-man received the transfer, betteroutcomes for girl children seemedpossible. Closer home, a survey of

the Banyan’s service users’ disabil-ity allowance of ₹3,600 per annumfor over 11 years again indicated en-hanced social mobility and sus-tained engagement with the mentalhealth system.

It is time to discern whether ouriscal climate would allow this. Pro-fessor Pranab Bardhan from theUniversity of California, Berkeleyseems to think it could, especiallysince direct bank transfers wouldeliminate middlemen, corruption,subsidy leakages and relatedadmin-istrative costs. However, UCTs can-not operate independent of, or as asubstitute for public goods, namelyhealth and education.

The bi-directional inluencebetween mental ill health andpoverty is clear as is the need tomake meaningful investments andpursue inclusive development. Ex-perience of autonomy, one’s agencyand choice — the allied, yet pivotalbeneits of UCTs — are imperative tosocial change.

Vandana Gopikumar is co-founder,Banyan and BALM, and Professor, Schoolof Social Work, TISS

Basic income andmental health gainsInnovative interventions such as unconditional cash transfers could work wonders for millions




CMYK

ND-ND

EDITORIAL

The quest to ind life outside the solar system got a

big boost with the discovery of seven Earth-size

extra-solar planets, or exoplanets, orbiting a

dwarf star about 40 light years away. Unlike earlier dis-

coveries of exoplanets, all seven planets could possibly

have liquidwater — a key to life aswe know it on Earth —

with threeplanets having the greatest chance. This is by

far the largest collectionofEarth-likeplanets in thehab-

itable ‘Goldilocks’ zone of a star — neither too close nor

too far from a star, which raises the possibility of liquid

water being present on the surface. Only Earth has li-

quidwater in the solar system.Less than a year after sci-

entists announced the discovery of three planets orbit-

ing the dwarf star, the team found four more through

intense searches using several ground-based tele-

scopes, including a 20-day continuous monitoring us-

ing the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Adminis-

tration’s Spitzer SpaceTelescope. Since thedwarf star is

much cooler than the Sun, the dimming of light each

time a planet passes or transits before the star could be

easily recorded fromEarthunlike in caseswhenplanets

transit a Sun-like bright star. Since the initial discovery

of three planets was made using the Chile-based Trans-

iting Planets and Planetesimals Small Telescope, the

exoplanet system is called TRAPPIST-1. Unlike in the

case of our solar system, the planets have apparently

formed far away from the star and gradually migrated

towards it; they share a similar formation history with

the Galilean moons, which migrated towards Jupiter

after formation. Another major diference in compar-

ison with the solar system is the tight packing of the

seven planets around the star. The closest planet in the

TRAPPIST-1 system takes just 1.5 days to complete anor-

bit and the farthest one takes 20days; theorbital period

of the planets is also similar to the Galileanmoons.

With a fair possibility of liquid water being present

on at least three planets, the focus is now on decipher-

ing the climate and chemical composition of their at-

mosphere. As a irst measure, scientists are keen to

know if the planets are Earth-like, by ruling out the

presenceof hydrogen gas enveloping them.Mass estim-

ates already suggest that the inner six planets might

have a rocky composition, while the one with a low

densitymayhaveavolatile compositiondue to thepres-

ence of an ice layer or atmosphere. The composition of

the atmosphere can be identiied by measuring the

wavelength characteristics of light. Since the TRAP-

PIST-1 system is close by and the star is cool enough, it

would be easier to decipher the various critical features

of the planets. If there is life on these planets, wewould

know this in about 10 years. The search for extrater-

restrial life has just becomemore focussed.

Life elsewhereThe discovery of seven exoplanets makes the

search for extraterrestrial life more exciting

Avery uneasy calm was restored to the Delhi Uni-

versity’s North campus by Thursday, with anxi-

ety still gripping colleges and hostels after two

days of violence. Trouble started on Tuesday when

members of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, the

student organisation linked to the BJP, stormed Ramjas

College to disrupt a seminar titled “Cultures of Protest”

organised by its English department and the literary so-

ciety. They focussed attention on the participation of

Umar Khalid, a student leader from Jawaharlal Nehru

University ( JNU) who had been controversially booked

for sedition last year in a particularly fraught ideolo-

gical stand-of between the establishment and the left-

leaning JNU. They forced the cancellation of not just his

session at Ramjas College but alsowhat remained of the

two-day event. Aday later, as a protest against the incid-

ent was organised on the DU campus, ABVP members

again arrived at the gates of Ramjas College to prevent

students from participating in the march. In no time,

clashes erupted,with students of the college alleging vi-

olence by the ABVPmembers and a hands-of response

from the Delhi Police. Student politics in DU has often

been edgy, but this week’s events mark a dark andwor-

rying turn. Fearing trouble, many students associated

with the anti-ABVPprotest who live around the campus

left to stay elsewhere. Students are mobilising to de-

mand that the irst information report make a distinc-

tion between those who disrupted the seminar and

those rallying in its defence. But the most grave con-

sequence is themessage that is being sent out about the

possibility of free debate.

Umar Khalid was to have spoken in a session on “Un-

veiling the state: Regions in conlict — thewar in Adivasi

areas”, reportedly based on his research on Bastar. It

was part of a programme cleared by the college author-

ities. If they are so quickly intimidated into cancelling

the seminar, if the police do not rally suiciently to pro-

tect debate on the campus, the signal goes out that stu-

dents and faculty are on their own in defending the

right to free debate. The Ramjas College incident also

comes a year after the events at JNUwhen the ABVP led

the Sangh’s charge against what they deemed to be

“anti-national”. Then too an impression was created

that the police were too easily led to heed the ABVP’s

agenda; the reverberations of that episode are still be-

ing felt. Universities are arenas for intellectual evolu-

tion, they aremeant to be spaces where discussion and

debate push boundaries, where students learn not only

the art of provocation but also the argumentative skills

to defend and oppose such provocation. Certainly,

there are necessary curbs such as a bar on speech that

incites violence and hate. But when a students’ organ-

isation uses violence to have a seminar cancelled, and

when the authorities succumb so easily, Indian aca-

demia stands diminished.

Campus chillThere must be action against those behind

the violence at Delhi’s Ramjas College

OnMasood AzharThat China continues to bereluctant to declare MasoodAzhar a terrorist even afterample evidence against himshows its true face (“Caseagainst Azhar solid”,Feb.23). It is strange thatChina wantsmore evidence,for the U.S., the U.K. andFrance have all thrown theirweight behind India to getAzhar designated as a globalterrorist. China’s attitudeproves that it does not wantto annoy Pakistan. SinceIndia cannot possiblyprovidemore evidenceagainst Azhar, it is time forChina to come around if itwants to improve trade andbilateral relations instead ofdodging the issue on onepretext or another.K.R. Srinivasan,

Secunderabad

No place for dissentThemanner in whichstudents were roughed upat Delhi University’s Northcampus bymembers of theAkhil Bharatiya VidyarthiParishad (ABVP) has onceagain brought to light theattack on democratic values

and the intolerance towardsdissent even in secularspaces such as universitiesand colleges (“DU on edgeafter attack on students”,Feb.23). It is dishearteningto know that the JNU PhDscholar, Umar Khalid, hadto cancel his visit to speak ata seminar at DU. The Delhipolice reportedly said theycan’t protect Mr. Khalid.Why can’t the police controlmob attacks? Thewholeepisodemust be probed andaction should be takenagainst the guilty.Manzar Imam,

NewDelhi

Whole newworldsThe discovery by NASA ofseven Earth-like planetsorbiting around a star,around 40 light years fromthe Sun, with conditionsfavourable for the existenceof life is a signiicantdevelopment in our searchfor other life forms in theuniverse (“7 Earth-likeplanets spotted”, Feb.23).The fabulous discovery haslent credence to the theorythat we are not alone in thisuniverse. This discovery

shows that despite ourimpressive advancements inscience and technology overthe centuries, ourunderstanding of theuniverse has not reached itsfull potential. Perhapsmoresuch discoveries will bemade over the years.M. Jeyaram,

Sholavandan, Tamil Nadu

Not really disillusionedIn “Tackling the IslamicState” (Feb.23), the writercalls the deserters of theIslamic State (IS)“disillusioned” while alsostating that they have notgiven up their ambition toestablish a Caliphate.Clearly, theirdisillusionment is with theimplementationmethodology of the IS andnot with its ideology. Aslong as the IS’s ideologysurvives, it means thatextremists are not losingground. Themilitaryvictories against them areshort-termwins. The rootcause of the problem needsto be addressed irst.Sriharsha S.,

Chennai

Caring for the elderlyLife for senior citizens hasbecomemore diicult overthe years (“Ageing withdignity”, Feb.23). Jointfamilies are disappearing,the younger generation’slifestyle has changeddrastically and their careerstake up all their time.Health care shields theelderly from physicalsufering. But what seniorcitizens need is more familysupport. Laws have beenenacted to ensure thatchildren should look aftertheir parents and seniorcitizens, but howmanysenior citizens are assuredof such care?Senior citizens who arepoor especially needattention. A good steptowards this would beimplementing the universalbasic income scheme.WithIndia having such a highpopulation of seniorcitizens, it is timewe cameupwith a comprehensiveplan for covering thephysical and emotionalissues of senior citizens.Y.G. Chouksey,

Pune

A bad political moveTheMadras High Court’srefusal to grant any interimrelief to the DMK, whichchallenged themanner inwhich the voting wasconducted, is correct (“HCasks DMK to produce videofootage of loor test”,Feb.23). The DMKattempted to cash in on thepublic’s anger towards V.K.Sasikala; hence the protestsin the Assembly. But theparty cannot act innocentas its MLAs’ violentbehaviour in the Assemblydeserves censure. The

Speaker is well within hisrights to decide the votingprocedure. Nomember canadopt violence in the Houseand force the Speaker tochange his decision. Theparty could have easilyearned a good image had itsmembers conductedthemselves appropriatelyand allowed the loor test,irrespective of the result.V.S. Ganeshan,

Bengaluru

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Letters emailed to [email protected] must carry the full postal address and the full name or the name with initials.

corrections & clarifications:

A sentence in the Editorial, “Ageing with dignity” ( Feb. 23, 2017),read: “It is projected that approximately 20%of Indianswill be elderlyby 2050, marking a dramatic jump from the current 6%. The currentpercentage of elderly population is 8.

The second deck of “Top court backs income rule for foreignspouses” (World page, Feb. 23, 2017) read: “Ruling impacts U.K. cit-izens with parents from outside EU”. It should have been partners.

A report, “Environmentalists urge PM to cancel visit to Isha event”(Feb. 23, 2017, some editions), inadvertently said Minister NarendraModi instead of PrimeMinisterNarendraModi.

It is the policy of The Hindu to correct signiicant errors as soon as possible. Please

specify the edition (place of publication), date and page. The Readers’ Editor’s office

can be contacted by Telephone: +91-44-28418297/28576300 (11 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday

to Friday); Fax: +91-44-28552963; E-mail:[email protected]; Mail: Readers’

Editor, The Hindu, Kasturi Buildings, 859 & 860 Anna Salai, Chennai 600 002, India.

All communication must carry the full postal address and telephone number. No

personal visits. The Terms of Reference for the Readers’ Editor are on

www.thehindu.com

more letters online:

www.hindu.com/opinion/letters/

CMYK

ND-ND

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DATA POINT

A report from The Lancet, pub-lished on Sunday, estimated thattwo lives in India are lost everyminute due to ambient air pollu-tion. The irst response from theEnvironment Minister, AnilMadhav Dave, was that the gov-ernment would come out with its

own study to understand the efects of air pollution on humanhealth. “A proud country,” Mr. Dave said, “always trusts itsown data and takes action on that.”It is diicult to discern which is worse: the fact that the au-

thorities are not interested in taking any immediate measuresto tackle the problem of the killer air, as described in the re-port, or that theyhavenot even initiated a study tounderstandits impact. The Minister, as well as anyone who has visitedDelhi in the last couple of months, would be able to vouch forthe fact that the evidence of the impact of the smoggy air onthe health of the city’s population has, to use a terrible cliché,been literally blowing in the wind.

Valuing cars over lungsAcute respiratory infections (ARIs), which have a direct link topollution, have been rising signiicantly. The National HealthProile 2015 reported a 30% increase in ARIs since 2010. Ac-cording to private doctors and paediatricians, the rise in thenumberof respiratory ailments, skin andeye infections— all ofwhich can directly be linked to air pollution — in the last threemonths is well over 50%. The elderly and children are espe-cially vulnerable to this. Yet, much like the government,people too have decided to err on the side of denial.

In January 2016,when theDelhi government decided to runthe odd-even experiment and restrict the number of cars inthe city, it was met with much outrage by a citizenry thatseemed to value its automobiles more than its lungs. In Octo-ber and November 2016, even when a dense brown air wasblowing from the burning ields of Punjab, a vast majority ofthe city’s population had no qualms about bursting irecrack-ers and adding more toxins to the air. Ever since, though theaverage PM10 (particulate matter less than 10 micrometers indiameter) has stood consistently at over 300 (it peaked to1,680 in October), there are hardly any masks visible in thestreets of the city. Even in upscale apartment complexes inGurugram and Greater Noida, where presumably the edu-cated and the erudite population of the region reside, mostactivities carry on as normal. Senior citizens practise yoga inthe manicured lawns at 6 a.m. when the PM10 levels are usu-ally above 450; on weekends children are out early in themorning being coached in football or karate.

This baling lack of personal awareness about the real im-pact of air pollution is part of the reason why there is no pres-sure on the government to take action. Mr. Dave said bringingdown pollution levels is not “rocket science”. Yet, he wasn’twilling to lay downany concrete steps to enable it. TheCentre,he said, could onlywork like a “philosopher and guide”. If thiswas aWhatsAppmessage, here’s where you would be aixingan eye-roll emoji.

Choke on itAir quality continues to deteriorate, butthere is no pressure on the governmentto take action


SINGLE FILE

Veena Venugopal

SUSHILKUMARVERMA

There are four or fivejudgments where thetriple talaq provision hasbeen struck down as in-valid. But it has not led to

this un-Koranic practice beingrooted out from our society. Tripletalaq continues to be the most com-mon method of divorce. We haddone a sample study of 4,710 wo-men and found that out of 525 wo-men who were divorced, 349 werevictims of triple talaq. While thecourts have settled the matter, wehave to look at the unjustness of theentire process. How can we acceptthat a man can simply utter theword talaq thrice or communicate it

through phone with no witnessdeemed necessary and where theburden is on the wife to legally con-test it? There is no law binding theman, he can just act on his whim.This is absolutely unfair and mustbe stopped.

Seeking a level playing fieldLet me cite a case fromMadhya Pra-desh where a woman who did notwake up when her husband re-turned late from work receivedtalaq thrice when she was asleep!She was informed about her hus-band’s decision by her mother-in-law. It is a convoluted argument tosay that triple talaq is not an issue

only because a few judg-ments have declared itinvalid. Why should aman have unilateralpowers to divorce, andthe woman just comply?What is wrong in seekinga level playing fieldbetween husband andwife? Such argumentsonly further the patriarchal order.

As far as the Koran is concerned,triple talaq is just not valid. Thereare verses calling for reconciliationand mediation over a period of 90days involving both sides. The ob-jective is that the woman shouldnot be rendered a destitute. Also,when the final pronouncement oftalaq is made, the women shouldnot be menstruating. This is anevolved system of jurisprudence

calling for just and fairdivorce.

All we are seeking isthat the Supreme Courtshould lay down the pro-cedure for talaq based onthe talaq-e-ehsan method.There is a debate aboutpersonal laws being violat-ive of fundamental rights.

But the personal law being prac-tised by the Muslim community inIndia is not based on Koranic in-junctions. Rather triple talaq is a vi-olation of the tenets of justice andfairness.

Gender justice is a central tenetof the Koran and gender inequalityand triple talaq are in violation ofthe Koranic principles. In fact, inthe Koran, the very conception ofhumankind is based on an equal

footing between man and woman.But patriarchal misinterpretationsand distortions rule our lives. Anytalk of reform in personal law isbrushed aside as interference in re-ligious matters.

On a Uniform Civil CodeAs far as our position on the Uni-form Civil Code (UCC) is concerned,we are clear that a secular law al-ternative must be available to everycitizen. This alternative exists in theform of the Special Marriages Act.But abolition of triple talaq andUCC are two separate issues. TheUCC question applies to the entireIndian population, not justMuslims. Muslim personal lawneeds drastic reform just like theHindu code or the Christian laws.There has been a legal discrimina-

tion of Muslim women in our coun-try. Muslim women are still subjectto the Muslim Personal Law(Shariat) Application Act, 1937which is silent on triple talaq, nikahhalala and polygamy. We need to bebrought on a par with Hindu sistersand Christian sisters who have alegal recourse. The Hindu womenhave the Hindu Succession Act andthe Hindu Marriage Act. We are apatriarchal society and it is not asthough Hindu and Christian wo-men have attained equality. Butthey do not face legal discrimina-tion the way Muslim women do.

It is the constitutional obligationof the government to enableMuslim women to obtain justice. Itis not about the BJP or the govern-ment but about gender justice forMuslim women.

Should triple talaq be outlawed?It is the constitutional obligation of the government to

enable Muslim women to obtain a level playing ield

zakia soman

Co-founder of

Bharatiya Muslim

Mahila Andolan, an

autonomous

organisation, and a

co-petitioner in the

triple talaq case before

the Supreme Court

LEFT, RIGHT, CENTRE

LEFT

The pronouncementof triple talaq is ac-ceptable to all fourschools of thought inIslam and though not

desirable, it is very much a Koranicinjunction. Those who criticise it donot understand the Koran. Havingsaid that, I should also state thateventually it comes down to thenikahnama, which is a contractualobligation between the two parties.If the terms of the contract do nothave provisions against triple talaqand have not been contested before

being accepted, the pronounce-ment of talaq at one go or over theprescribed period of three monthsis allowed in the Koran. Don’t forgetthat Islam is the first religion in theworld to institutionalise marriage.Nikah imposes conditions, pre-scribes equality of women, main-tenance of children and so on.

Conditions for triple talaqBut please don’t assume that theKoran does not condone talaq. Ithas been described as one of theworst options to be exercised only

under extenuating circum-stances. It allows for anexit when the marriagebreaks down but only un-der certain conditions.The talaq-e-ehsan, oneform of divorce, is over aperiod of three monthsand it is only after thecompletion of the third month thatyou are no longer man and wife.The talaq-e-bidat or triple talaq atone go allows the man to exhaust allthe options at once. Again, if thenikahnama has proscribed it, thenthe man cannot take recourse tothis divorce. Divorce is one of theworst things in the institution ofmarriage and allowed only in ex-

treme situations. Evenwhen a person goes tobuy a pen, he is boundby contractual agree-ment. In the case of anikah/marriage, the con-tract is between twoparties in the presence ofat least two witnesses.

We are governed by the Muslim Per-sonal Law (Shariat) Application Act,1937, and if the Supreme Court saysthis must be revisited, we will op-pose it.

ManymisconceptionsI also wish to clear the misconcep-tion on the number of triple talaqspractised among Muslims. We

moved RTIs to find out the divorcerates among the religions in Indiaand I can share with certitude thatit is the least prevalent amongMuslims. It is rare among Muslims.And those who practise it are usu-ally the uneducated and the poorwho do not know their Koran orthose who are misled by others. It isalso incorrect to say that triple talaqhas been banned in 22 countries; ithas been regulated in most of saidcountries. You could have concernsabout why is it that a man can takerecourse to uttering talaq and notthe woman. Under Islam, the manshares the greater responsibility inmarriage as far as maintenance ofhis wife and children are con-

cerned. He has many duties to fulfiland many responsibilities too. Thatis why he has been given the re-sponsibility of ending the marriageonly when it breaks down. Womentoo have the option of khula. Shewill have to approach the qazi if herhusband is absconding, of bad char-acter and so on.

We will plead before the apexcourt to have a separate depart-ment with people who are well-versed in the Sharia laws if at all thecourt wishes to mediate on the mat-ter. So far, the courts have beenvery careful in interpreting per-sonal laws — which are part of thefundamental right to religion forevery citizen of the country.

Triple talaq is a Koranic injunction. But it depends on

the terms drawn up in the marriage contract

Kamal Faruqui

Former chairperson of

the Delhi Minorities

Commission and

founder-member of the

All India Muslim

Personal Law Board

RIGHT

Back in 2002, the Su-preme Court had givenits ruling on tripletalaq in the ShamimAra v. State of U.P. case

— when Justice R.C. Lahoti andJustice P. Venkatarama Reddi said amere pronouncement of talaq in re-sponse to a woman’s plea for main-tenance cannot be treated as pro-nouncement of talaq. In order to bevalid, talaq has to be pronouncedaccording to the Koranic injunc-tion. Triple talaq, in fact, wasbanned in 2002 by the apex courtand I don’t recall the All India

Muslim Personal Law Board andother affiliates protesting againstthe judgment. There was a similarjudgement from the AurangabadBench of the Bombay High Court inthe Dagdu Pathan v. Rahimbi case(2002) which struck down tripletalaq. So I am perplexed whyShayara Bano, who recently filed apublic interest litigation before theSupreme Court, was not advised byher lawyers that the issue had beenaddressed and settled in the past.

Cues in the KoranAn unnecessary controversy has

been created now whenall the contesting partiesthat are shouting hadearlier kept quiet. Thewhole triple talaq issue isrepugnant to Islam andthose who say it legitim-ises Islam are doing agreat disservice to Islam.

The whole point of talaq is tofind a dignified way of getting out ofa marriage that has irrevocablybroken down. But it is not thatsimple. It is actually very difficult toget out of marriage. The Koranstates the conditions which have tobe observed. Triple talaq must bepronounced over three months.One per month. During themonths, mediation is essential with

both parties being rep-resented during the ne-gotiation. This is a Kor-anic injunction and it isonly after following theseconditions that talaq isgranted and once gran-ted is irrevocable. Youcannot say that you

uttered the word in a drunkenstupor; neither can you pronounceit over the phone or send it onemail or fax it or send a text mes-sage. But I feel that the communityhas to look within and take the leadin reforming such reprehensiblepractices, or else the state will inter-fere with personal laws. And it hasalready been settled that personallaw is in sync with the constitu-

tional rights guaranteed to allcitizens.

Egalitarian treatmentOn the issue of polygamy, which isagain being contested in court, it isconditional on so many things asspelt out in the Koran, which makesit abundantly clear that it is againsthuman nature to give egalitariantreatment to everyone. So, theconcept of four wives is simply notpossible if you follow the letter andspirit of Koran. It specifies that incase there is more than one mar-riage, it is essential that identicaltreatment is given to each wife. Butsince this is not possible given hu-man nature, it is best to have onlyone wife. The Prophet married

Hazrat Khadija. She was 15 yearsolder than him, she was a widow,and he worked for her. It was shewho proposed marriage. This is theProphet’s Sunnah (practice). Whatexample does it provide for thebelievers?

Islam is going through a turbu-lent phase world over and this issuecan be used as an excuse to creatediscord between communities giv-ing rise to a communal situation. Ialso fear that the hardliners willraise the spectre of ‘Islam indanger’ through this issue. I amafraid this is not the right time todebate on matters that have beensettled by the courts.

All views as told to Anuradha Raman

Why rake up matters that have already been settled by

the SC and create discord between communities?

Syeda Hameed

Women’s rights

activist, educationist, a

former member of the

Planning Commission,

and the irst woman

Qazi from Lucknow

CENTRE

Mr. K. Kamaraj, Congress President, and Mr. M. Bhaktavat-salam, Chief Minister of Madras, have been defeated in theelections to the Madras Assembly. The Dravida MunnetraKazhagam has secured absolute majority in the 234-memberHouse. Mr. Bhaktavatsalam, five of whose Cabinet colleagueshave also been defeated, will meet the Governor to-morrow[Feb. 24] and submit the resignation of his Ministry. Countingof votes in the following constituencies was not over by 8 p.m.to-day and it will be resumed to-morrow: Vanur, Pennagaram,Srivilliputhur, Cheyyar, Melmalayanur, Tiruvallur, Kaniyam-badi, Kadaladi, Kunnathur and Ottapidaram.

FIFTY YEARS AGO FEBRUARY 24, 1967

DMK gets majority in Tamil Nadu


FROM ARCHIVES

A public meeting was held last evening under the auspices ofthe Home Rule League at Morarji Goculdas Hall to protestagainst the order passed by the Punjab Government underthe Defence of India Act, prohibiting Mr. B.G. Tilak and Mr.B.G. Pal from entering the Punjab. Mr. B.G. Horniman, editorof the “Bombay Chronicle”, presided. The hall was crowded.On the motion of the Hon’ble Mr. Manmohandas Ramji, thefollowing resolution was adopted: the citizens of Bombayview with strong disapproval and grave concern the actiontaken by several Provincial Governments against recognisedpolitical leaders and regard the measure as an unjustifiablerestriction of the liberty of subjects and groundless interfer-ence with legitimate and constitutional political propaganda.

A HUNDRED YEARS AGO FEBRUARY 24, 1917

Protest meeting against Punjab order

Public sphere/SociologyGerman sociologist andthe guru of mass commu-nication theory, JürgenHabermas, wrote abouthow mass media changedthe concept of publicsphere. From the free-flowing discussion of ideasin coffee houses in 18thcentury Europe, publicsphere became the medi-ated space of the mass me-dia, where journalists andopinion-makers helpedreaders make informeddecisions about the worldin which they live.Now the explosion of so-cial media (and fake news)has once again changedthe nature of the publicsphere.

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CONCEPT-UAL

The 1267 Committee,

China’s hold andMasood

Azhar: A short history

http://bit.ly/1267Committee

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MORE ON

THE WEBthehindu.com/opinion

The introduction of theSpecified Bank Notes (Ces-sation of Liabilities) Bill,2017 is a rather late moveto give legislative supportto the demonetisation of₹500 and ₹1,000 notes.

In 1978, when the Mor-arji Desai government de-cided to demonetise₹1,000, ₹5,000 and₹10,000 notes, it first pro-mulgated an ordinance.Then it got legislative back-ing through the passage ofthe High DenominationBank Notes (Demonetisa-tion) Act, 1978. However,the Narendra Modi govern-ment implemented thepolicy in November 2016without legislative sup-port. Mr. Modi’s televisedannouncement was fol-lowed by a notification un-der the Reserve Bank of In-dia Act, 1934.

The demonetisation ex-ercise was replete withmultiple, and often contra-dicting, notifications. The

government did not seeklegislative support duringthe winter session of Par-liament, from November16 to December 16, 2016.

It was only a fortnightafter the Parliament ses-sion ended on a deadlockover the issue that the gov-ernment initiated the pro-cess of procuring legislat-ive support bypromulgating on Decem-ber 30 the Specified BankNotes (Cessation of Liabil-ities) Ordinance, 2016.

But by this time, the Su-preme Court had alreadyreferred a batch of writ pe-titions challenging the de-monetisation policy to afive-judge ConstitutionBench. The reference con-tained nine questions of avery fundamental yetprobing nature, startingwith whether the Novem-ber 8 RBI notification was“unconstitutional” andwhether the manner inwhich the policy was im-plemented suffered from“substantive and proced-

ural unreasonableness”.The 2017 Bill seeks to

extinguish the liability ofthe government and theRBI on demonetised ₹500and ₹1,000 notes that havenot been returned. It ismeant to replace the 2016Ordinance. The declaredobjective is the same: toget rid of a “parallel sys-tem” of black money andend the spread of counter-feit currency. The Bill notonly extinguishes the liab-ility of the governmentand the RBI, but also crim-inalises citizens found“holding” more than 10demonetised banknotes.

But in March 2017, theConstitution Bench isscheduled to hear the peti-tions challenging the de-monetisation. Judicial pro-nouncements that themove was not implemen-ted with legislative backingor that the RBI notificationwas ultra vires of Section26 (2) of the RBI Act, 1934could be a blot on thegovernment.

Awaiting judgment on demonetisation

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ACT ONE

Legislative support has been given to the move but theSupreme Court is yet to hear petitions on it


CMYK




NEWS

FROM PAGE ONE

Both the Sena and the BJPhave staked claim to thepost of Mumbai Mayor, buthave avoided the vitrioliclanguage that peppered thecampaign. BJP city unitchief Ashish Shelar claimedthe support of four Inde-pendents and said the nextMayor will be from Mumbai.

Meanwhile, the Congresslost several of its seats inMumbai, winning only 31.The party’s Mumbai chiefSanjay Nirupam offered hisresignation, accepting re-sponsibility for the defeat,which he blamed on infight-ing. The MNS was thebiggest loser as it managedto win only seven seats asagainst 28 in 2012. None ofits candidates was able tocatch the imagination of thepeople.

For the fifth consecutivetime in Mumbai, though,the Sena has become thesingle largest party. It notonly increased its 2012 tallyof 75, but Mr. Thackeray’sgamble to go it alone bysnapping its alliance withthe BJP also proved to be amajor factor in consolidat-ing the party’s traditionalMarathi vote base.

Though the BJP narrowlylost to the Sena in Mumbai,it was the real overall gainer.The party had won 31 seatsin 2012, and that numberrose to 82 in 2017. It not onlyretained the strong Gujaratiand North Indian vote banksbut also made inroads inDadar, the Sena’s turf. Mr.Thackeray said he was con-cerned about the missingnames from the voter list.

BJP sweepsMaharashtra

They entered the ACJMcourt from the rear by scal-ing the compound wall, dur-ing the lunch time recess-.They were accompanied byaround 12 lawyers. Theyreached the court via a lift inthe complex

However, as the magis-trate was inside his chamberfor lunch, a team led byCircle Inspector, Ernaku-lam, Ananthalal grabbed theopportunity and caughtSuni and Vijesh, who haveevaded the law since the in-cident on Friday. The ac-cused put up a stiff resist-ance but were overpoweredby the police.

A few lawyers present in

the court objected to the po-lice action. In the melee,Suni fell down but wasdragged away by the police.The duo was taken away in apolice vehicle. Police alsoseized the bike used by Suniand Vijesh and traced its re-gistration to Chennai. Evenas the police shifted the duoto the Aluva Police club fordetailed interrogation,Suni’s counsel filed a peti-tion against the alleged po-lice overreach.

Considering the petition,ACJM Siju Sheikh orderedthe Ernakulam Central SHOto take steps to hand overthe accused to the Investiga-tion Officer..

On the run, ‘Pulsar’Suni held in court

Dingwamsai Pul onThursday withdrew her peti-tion in the Supreme Courtseeking the registration of anFIR and a CBI investigationinto allegations of corrup-tion her husband, former Ar-unachal Pradesh Chief Min-ister Kalikho Pul, hadlevelled in his suicide noteagainst politicians, “twoseniormost Supreme Courtjudges” and even thePresident.

Senior advocate DushyantDave, appearing for Ms. Pulwho was present in court,said they were now consid-ering approaching Vice-Pres-ident Hamid Ansari. In a no-holds-barred hearing onThursday, Mr. Dave firstasked a Bench of JusticesAdarsh Kumar Goel andUday Umesh Lalit to refrainfrom hearing the matter. Hesaid Justice Goel should re-

cuse himself from the case.“Your Lordships should

not hear this matter...,” Mr.Dave began as soon as theBench sat at 1.30 pm. “IfYour Lordships insist onhearing, we do not want toparticipate in this hearing.”

The lawyer said JusticeGoel and Chief Justice of In-dia J.S. Khehar were once“colleagues” at the Punjaband Haryana High Court.

The suicide note was an-nexed to the letter to the CJI.

Ms. Pul had in her Febru-ary 17, 2017 letter to the CJIsaid two of the judgesnamed in her husband’s Au-gust 8, 2016 suicide notewere part of the Constitu-tion Bench that quashed theGovernor’s decisions, lead-ing to the imposition ofPresident’s rule in Ar-unachal Pradesh and com-pelling Pul to step down asChief Minister. Pul commit-ted suicide on August 9,2016.

The Constitution Benchwas led by Justice Khehar.

“Your Lordship [ JusticeGoel] should recuse. Justicemust appear to be done.The institution must be pro-tected,” Mr. Dave submitted.

Ms. Pul’s two-page letterwas converted into a crim-inal writ petition and postedfor judicial hearing beforethis Bench.

Her advocate says she may approach the Vice-President


NEW DELHI

Kalikho Pul

Kalikho Pul’s wife withdrawspetition in Supreme Court

Bangladesh Prime MinisterSheikh Hasina will visit In-dia in the second week ofApril at the invitation ofPrime Minister NarendraModi.

The schedule of the visitwas disclosed after ForeignSecretary S. Jaishankarcalled on Ms. Hasina at herparliament office onThursday. A source saidthe visit would take place“most likely after April 8”.The news was confirmedby the Prime Minister’sdeputy press secretaryNazrul Islam.

The visit will focus onmutual interests and devel-opment initiatives alongwith issues of connectivity,Mr. Jaishankar was quotedas saying.

“We can solve any prob-lem through discussion ifwe have good intention,”Prime Minister Hasina toldthe diplomat. She also putemphasis on increasingconnectivity between thecountries as well asstrengthening cooperationfor the welfare of thepeople of the twocountries.

Ms. Hasina’s visit to In-dia was earlier scheduledfor December but waspostponed. Prime MinisterNarendra Modi visitedBangladesh in June 2015.

Earlier, Mr. Jaishankararrived in Dhaka onThursday afternoon fromBeijing and was receivedby his Bangladesh counter-part Shahidul Haque andIndian High CommissionerHarsh Vardhan Shringla.

Mr. Jaishankar met Mr.Haque in the evening andreviewed areas of bilateralcooperation.

Hasina tovisit Indiain AprilHaroon Habib

Dhaka

Ahead of the first visit of anIndian Prime Minister to Is-rael later this year, India hasapproved a deal to developjointly a medium range sur-face-to-air missile (MR-SAM)system for the Army in a₹17,000-crore deal.

This is the latest in a seriesof other variants of SAM sys-tems for the Navy and the AirForce being jointly de-veloped with Israeli help un-der deals estimated at bil-lions of dollars.

Joint developmentThe Cabinet Committee onSecurity (CCS), headed byPrime Minister NarendraModi, which met onWednes-day, gave the go-ahead forthe deal to be executed by

the Defence Research andDevelopment Organisation(DRDO) and Israel AircraftIndustries (IAI). A sourcesaid Mr. Modi is likely to visit

Israel in June, and prepara-tions were currently underway in both countries.

The deal is for five regi-ments of the missile, which

consists of 40 units and 200missiles. It has a range of 50-70 km.

“The system will be basedon the older Barak system ofIsrael, which is in use in In-dia. It is being changed asper requirements,” a de-fence source said onThursday.

The systems will be manu-factured in India and wouldhave an 80% indigenous con-tent.

The DRDO would play acrucial role in developingthe target homing system.Deliveries would begin in2023, a source said.

The two countries are alsoin an advanced stage of ne-gotiations for the purchaseof two more long-range Phal-con Airborne Warning AndControl System (AWACS).

The CCS had approved thedeal for additional AWACSlast year expected at a cost of₹7,500 crore.

Russian partnershipIndia currently operatesthree Phalcon AWACS Israeliradars mounted on RussianIL-76 transport aircraft, un-der a $1-billion tripartite dealwith Russia, signed in 2003.

Russian officials said atthe recent Aero India that In-dia had already ordered twoIL-76 aircraft to be convertedto AWACS. Officials said theywere hopeful of a deal dur-ing Mr. Modi’s visit, and ad-ded that discussions wereunder way for additionallong-range drones. India andIsrael have stepped up theirdefence relations since Mr.Modi came to power.

India, Israel to develop missile for Army₹17,000-crore deal approved by Cabinet panel ahead of Modi’s visit to Tel Aviv likely in June

Dinakar Peri

New Delhi

Waiting in the wings: Amodel of Phalcon AWACS at Rajpathduring Republic Day parade rehearsal this year. SANDEEP SAXENA

A diary seized by the In-come Tax Department lastyear from the residence ofKarnataka Congress MLC K.Govindaraj has led to allega-tions of huge pay-offs to sev-eral party leaders, says a re-port aired by a televisionnews channel.

The report comes justdays after BJP State presid-ent B.S. Yeddyurappa al-leged that huge sums ofmoney were routed to theCongress high commandfrom the Karnataka partyunit. The diary excerpts ap-pear to corroborate theseclaims that surfaced onThursday.

The State BJP has sincedemanded the resignationof Chief Minister Siddara-maiah over the “revela-tions.” Former minister andBJP spokesperson SureshKumar said the Congressowes an answer to the

people of Karnataka. Theparty would take the issueto a logical end and the di-ary proved the allegationsmade by Mr. Yeddyurappa,he added.

The Congress has deniedthe charges, alleging thatthey are part of a pre-planned conspiracy.

The Congress media in-charge Randeep Singh Sur-jewala said: “The Congressparty released the video ofUnion Cabinet MinisterAnanth Kumar andKarnataka BJP presidentB.S. Yeddyurappa, wherein

they were speaking aboutgiving money to stay inpower, as also about a con-spiracy hatched through adiary to accuse the Congressgovernment in Karnataka.Both of them are currentlybeing investigated.”

BJP lodges complaintMr. Surjewala said thisproved that the “fake andforged diary is being pushedby the Modi government bymisusing the agency of In-come Tax/ED/CBI to ... as areaction to the Congressraising the issue of Sahara-Birla papers, wherein PMModi has been named.”

The diary, contents ofwhich were released by thetelevision channel, has a listof acronyms purportedlyshowing payments runninginto crores of rupees to M.Vora, AICC, AP, RG Office,SG Office, DGVS, KJP, MBP,KJG, RLR, etc.

Many names igure in diary seized fromMLC’s house


NEW DELHI

B.S. Yeddyurappa

Cong., BJP trade chargesover ‘pay-ofs’ to leaders

Jinja in Uganda is a townwhere history often over-whelms the occasion.

Built around the source ofthe Nile, Jinja was discoveredin 1862 by the British ex-plorer John Speke. It has oneof the biggest Indian com-munities on the continent.Indians first entered Ugandato trade and then cultivatesugar cane on the banks ofthe Nile after the First WorldWar. In 1948, MahatmaGandhi’s ashes were con-signed to the swirling watersof the Nile here, and almost50 years later, in 1997, PrimeMinister I.K. Gujral estab-lished a bust of the Mahatmaby the riverside.

It was to address this en-during link between Indiaand the East African countrythat Vice-President HamidAnsari decided to visit Jinja.

Honouring Gandhi“We are at the source of theNile and here to honour Ma-hatma Gandhi,” he said.“The Indian community in

Jinja and in Uganda is a keypart of our relationship withthe country,” he said.

The town is said to be thehome of Indian millionairebusinessmen Mayur Mad-hvani and Jay Mehta, who, asUgandan President YoweriMuseveni said, returned tothe country after the expul-sions of 1972 under Idi Amin.The Bank of Baroda, whichset up a branch as far back as

1953, is the town’s primarybanker and is heavily inves-ted in the local economy.

The town reflects thecomplications of the India-Uganda relationship, with In-dians, who pay a lion’s shareof the taxes, are a tinyminority.

“As far as account holdersare concerned, we have a80:20 ratio of localUgandans to Indian

Ugandans banking with us,but the ratio is reversedwhen you see the value ofbusiness they bring in,”Chandan Jha, a senior man-ager at the bank, said.

Sanjeev Patel, a business-man from Kampala, says hedoes not see any economicdominance or even theevents of 1972 as hindrancesto expanding the footprint ofIndian businesses.

Ansari visits the town of Jinja to underscore enduring link between the nations

Nistula Hebbar

Jinja (Uganda)

Diverse channels:Hamid Ansari on the banks of the Nile in Jinja on Thursday. PTI

By the Nile, a nest of Indians

Central and State universit-ies will have to compete withinstitutions such as the In-dian Institutes of Techno-logy and Indian Institutes ofManagement in this year’sofficial rankings of highereducation institutions,which will be released earlyin April.

The National InstitutionalRanking Framework (NIRF)was put in place by the Min-istry of Human Resource De-velopment last year, but thefirst NIRF ranked engineer-ing colleges, businessschools and universities inseparate categories.

“This year, we will have acommon list of all institu-tions across disciplines andfields. The IITs, IIMs and ouruniversities will be ranked ina common list,” said an offi-cial who did not wish to benamed.

“However, we will addi-

tionally bring out the ranksin the larger sub-categories,like last year,” the officialadded.

The NIRF rankings aredone on the basis of fiveparameters against which in-stitutions are rated: teachingand learning resources; re-search and professionalpractice; graduation out-come; outreach and inclusiv-ity, and perception.

Pay packagesAsked whether a commonranking of institutions wouldnot be like comparing whatwere intrinsically differentkinds of institutions — as, forinstance, placements fromthe IIMs were likely to bebetter than universities of-fering humanities’ courses —the official said the compar-isons would be done in sucha way as to account for thedifferences.

“We are not just lookingat pay packages but also at

different kinds of job place-ments with different salarylevels. We are also account-ing for students continuingin higher education,” the of-ficial told The Hindu.

“But if students passingout from an institution endup doing nothing, there issome problem and that willreflect in the scores.”

As far as perception of aninstitution goes, 2.4-2.5 lakhpeople across India havebeen asked to rank institu-tions. Last year, the IndianInstitute of Technology,Madras, had topped the listof engineering colleges andthe Indian Institute of Man-agement, Bengaluru, hadedged out its Ahmedabadcounterpart to come topamong the business schools.Among universities, Jawa-harlal Nehru University andHyderabad University wereranked three and four, re-spectively, while Universityof Delhi was at sixth rank.

NIRF rankings are drawn up on the basis of ive parameters

Vikas Pathak

NEW DELHI

Universities to competewith IITs, IIMs in rankings

R.N. Ravi, who was the inter-locutor in the Naga peacetalks, said here on Thursdaythat the peace agreementwas yet to be finalised and itwould not compromise theterritorial integrity of anyState.

On August 3, 2015, at amuch-publicised ceremonyat Prime Minister NarendraModi’s residence, Mr. Ravisigned a “peace accord” withT. Muivah, general secretarythe National Socialist Coun-cil of Nagalim (Isak-Muivah),to find a lasting solution to

the Naga issue. However, fol-lowing the signing of theagreement, the then ChiefMinisters of Assam, Manipur,

and Arunachal Pradesh,which have a sizeable Nagapopulation, said they hadnot been consulted by theCentre. The government isyet to release the terms ofthe framework agreement.

Manipur situationManipur, which goes to thepolls on March 4 and 8, hasbeen under an economicblockade for more than fourmonths following a strikecalled by the United NagaCouncil (UNC), a conglomer-ate of Naga bodies, againstthe Manipur government’sdecision to carve out sevennew districts.

The council operates un-der the patronage of theNSCN (I-M).

Mr. Ravi told a newsagency on Thursday: “Theframework agreement isless-than-one-page docu-ment; it tells about broadparameters within which thefinal settlement will beworked out. So it’s the prin-ciples within which we willwork out the settlement. Itdoes not mention anythingabout Manipur or any State,it does not compromise theterritorial integrity ofManipur.”

“A framework agreementis not the final agreement

and you do not serve half-cooked meal. We believe it isnot in the larger interest torelease the details now. But Ihave explained it to all thestakeholders by and large bygoing and meeting withthem on what it contains. Anincomplete agreement cancreate issues,” he said

Minister of State for HomeKiren Rijiju said that withoutconsulting all stakeholders, afinal decision would not betaken. The Minister said: “Iwill expose the evil design ofCongress, which will busttheir strength. I will changethe wrong perception by ex-posing the truth.”

‘Naga accord is still in the works’Interlocutor R.N. Ravi says framework pact only mentions broad parameters of a inal settlement

R.N. Ravi


New Delhi

Three youths were killed,and four others seriously in-jured in a freak railway acci-dent near St. Thomas Mountstation on Thursday morn-ing. All seven were re-portedly travelling on thefootboard of a suburban fastservice from Chengalpet toChennai Beach when the ac-cident occurred.

A senior official of theGovernment Railway Policesaid two youths were killedon the spot while the thirddied on the way to the hos-

pital. Four persons havebeen admitted to the gov-ernment hospital. Accord-ing to Railway ProtectionForce officials, the accidentwas caused when the back-pack of one of the com-muters got entangled in aniron ladder fixed to a signalpost. As a result he wasthrown off the train. In themelee that followed, theothers on the footboard alsofell from the train. The threevictims have been identifiedas A. Praveenraj (19) and K.Manikandan (22) andJaysingh.

Three killed in freakaccident in ChennaiStaff Reporter

Chennai

President Pranab Mukher-jee has directed return ofthe Bihar Sugarcane (Regu-lation of supply and pur-chase Amendment) Bill,2007, to the State As-sembly forreconsideration.

The President’s messagein this regard was read outby Speaker Vijay KumarChaudhary in the House onThursday.

The Sugarcane Amend-ment Bill approved by theAssembly in 2007 seeks toset up State AdvisoryBoard to fix cane price onits own in place of thatfixed by the Centralgovernment.

“Having considered theBill reserved for my consid-eration , I do hereby directthe Governor in pursuanceof proviso the Article 201 ofthe Constitution that theBill be returned to Legislat-ive Assembly of Bihar witha message to reconsider it,”the President’s messagesaid.

PresidentreturnsBihar BillPress Trust of India

Patna

CMYK




NEWS

Police foil attempt tolock down Tata plantAHMEDABAD

The Gujarat Police onThursday put an end to a bidto lock down the Tata Nanoplant near here by detainingAlpesh Thakor, an OBCleader, and his supporters,who had been staging aprotest demanding jobs forthe local youth in industriesin the State. PTI

IN BRIEF

Baggage tag goes inseven airportsNEW DELHI

The Centre on Thursdayscrapped the use of handbaggage tags at the airportsin Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru,Hyderabad, Kochi, Kolkataand Ahmedabad. MinisterAshok Gajapathi Raju said thisin a series of tweets.

BSP supremo Mayawati andUttar Pradesh Chief MinisterAkhilesh Yadav lambastedBJP chief Amit Shah on sep-arate platforms on Thursdayfor his “Kasab” remark, withMs. Mayawati going to theextent of calling him a“terrorist”.

The BJP president onWednesday used the ac-ronym “Kasab”, saying ‘Ka’(in Hindi) stands for Con-gress, ‘Sa’ for SamajwadiParty and ’Ba’ for BSP. Hehad said that till “Kasab”was laid to rest, Uttar Pra-desh would not have devel-opment. Kasab was thePakistani terrorist who wasarrested during the 26/11Mumbai attack and hangedin 2012.

In a stinging retaliation,the BSP leader said there“cannot be a bigger Kasab”than Mr. Shah.

“Aaj apney desh meinAmit Shah se bada koi aurbhi Kasab nahin ho saktahai, arthaat aatanki nahi hosakta hai (There cannot be abigger Kasab, meaning a ter-rorist, than Amit Shah inour country now),” she said.At an election meeting inAmbedkarnagar, Ms. May-awati said such language re-flected the mindset of theBJP leader and was “shame-

ful”. Mr. Akhilesh said, “BJPpeople have lost the battleon the ground and so theirlanguage has changed ... Weused to study that it was KAse kabutar, but these (BJP)people are teaching some-thing else. This time, peoplewere going to set your kabu-tar (pigeons) free.”

Ms. Mayawati had earliertaken on Prime MinisterNarendra Modi when heused an acronym to de-scribe the three parties.“SCAM is Samajwadi, Con-gress, Akhilesh and May-awati,” he had said at hisfirst election meeting in U.P.Mr. Modi had this week de-scribed the BSP as BehenjiSampatti (property) Party.In her riposte, Ms. Mayawaticalled the BJP “BharatiyaJumla (rhetoric) Party” andused Mr. Modi’s initials tocall him “Mr. Negative DalitMan.”

Amit Shah faces furyfor ‘Kasab’ remark

Mayawati, Akhilesh slam BJP chief

Press Trust of India

Ambedkarnagar/Balrampur (UP)

Mayawati

The fourth phase of voting inthe Uttar Pradesh Assemblyelections for 53 seats con-cluded on Thursday. Pollingwas held for 19 seats in sevendistricts of the impoverishedBundelkhand region, in ad-dition to the five major dis-tricts of Allahabad, Pratap-garh, Kaushambi, Fatehpurand Rae Bareli, a Nehru-Gandhi bastion. Total votingrecorded in this phase till 5p.m. was 61%, which is ex-pected to rise by 2% giventhe many persons still wait-ing to vote.

In 2012, the SP won 24seats in these districts — thehighest number — while theBSP was second with 15,seven of which came inBundelkhand. The BJP,which is hoping to makegains here based on its out-reach to non-Yadav back-ward castes had won onlyfive, while the Congress hassix seats in its hand.

Heavy pollingWhile both seats in Lalitpurdistrict in Bundelkhand re-corded over 71% voting, thelowest turnout was in Alla-habad North (42%) and Bara(49%), also in the Sangamcity. Hamirpur district,which has two seats, recor-ded 60.39%, while Alla-habad district, which has 12seats, the highest in theState, had an averageturnout of 50.3%.

Bundelkhand, often in fo-cus for its drought, poverty,illegal mining and agrarian

problems, was locked in athree-way fight. In the 2012elections, the BSP won thehighest number of seats inBundelkhand, seven, whilethe SP got five, the Congressfour and the BJP three, out ofwhich one was later lost in abyelection.

The BSP is confident thatit can double its tally thistime — the region has tradi-tionally been strong for theparty and some of its topleaders, including Nasimud-din Siqqidui, hail from here.

In 2007, the BSP won a com-manding 12 seats. It is alsothe only party to fight on all53 seats in this phase. The SPand the Congress are fightingon 30 and 23 respectively.

“We are aiming at 17 out ofthe 19 seats. We will be theparty to beat on every seat,”says Gaya Charan Dinkar,BSP MLA from Naraini inBanda, and also the leader ofthe opposition. He faced atough challenge from the BJPthis time. While he says thatdemonetisation will hurt the

BJP’s chances, he accusesthe SP of taking anti-peopledecisions, patronising illegalmining and goondaism.

BSP plankA major plank of the BSP’scampaign was to talk aboutthe projects started here un-der Mayawati’s previous ten-ure — overbridges, technicalinstitutes, medical collegeand an agricultural univer-sity. But there is also castemobilisation. BSP workersacross the region claim that

the party, despite losing topOBC leaders from the region,including the Maurya andPatel communities, gainedthrough the support of theNishad-Kewat-Mallah, mostbackward castes.“We havethe support of the Nishadand Kewat communities. Alltop Nishad leaders in the re-gion, including Ache LalNishad, and the core team ofSP Rajya Sabha MP Visham-har Nishad are fully with us,”says BSP worker R.K. Nishadin Tindwari.

61% turnout in U.P. Phase 4 pollingImpoverished Bundelkhand region in focus, in addition to ive major districts of the State

Day of the franchise: Voters queue up at the Aliganj polling station in Banda district of Bundelkhand region during the fourthphase of Assembly elections on Thursday. RAJEEV BHATT

Omar Rashid

CHITRAKOOT

“Aap chillate ho, mujhe darrlagta hai. Shant ho jaiye(When you shout, I getscared. Please be quiet),” ir-ritated by the relentless slo-gans, Dimple Yadav politelyappealed to the audience tomaintain decorum. But theinterruptions did not stop.She then jokingly threatenedto walk off the stage, andwarned the animated partysupporters that she wouldcomplain to the Chief Minis-ter if they did not heed her.“I will tell bhaiya that youdid not let me speak. I willcomplain ... bhaiya is com-ing here tomorrow,” shesaid.

Strong composureThough she appeared dis-tracted by the crowd, Ms. Ya-dav rarely lost her compos-

ure, deploying humour andplayfulness to keep herlisteners engaged.

Barring minor distrac-tions from party workers,the Kannauj MP’s electionmeeting in Allahabad onTuesday stood out for reas-ons for which she was not

known before: a focussedand confident attack onpolitical opponents (in thiselection, that includes PrimeMinister Narendra Modi) andthe advertisement ofschemes and work by herparty’s government in UttarPradesh. On one occasion,

she even quoted a famoussong from an AmitabhBachchan film — Mere angnemein tumhara kya kaam hai—to reject Mr. Modi as anoutsider.

A stark contrastThis is in stark contrast fromthe nervous Dimple Yadav ofthe past — only a year ago,while delivering a speech inthe Lok Sabha on women’semancipation, she fumbledon several occasions, mis-pronouncing difficult Hindiwords. The video went viraland she was widelyridiculed.

Her address in Allahabadpointed to her emergence asa confident leader this elec-tion, raising critical politicalissues while coolly managingunruly party workers fromthe stage. If she comparedthe law and order situation

of U.P. with that in the Statesruled by the Bharatiya JanataParty (BJP), she also delvedinto farm debt, police re-cruitment, free gas cylin-ders, Samajwadi pension,Metro Rail and women’ssafety. She was assertivewhen she promised womenthat, if voted back to power,the Samajwadi Party wouldprovide 33% reservation tothem in government jobs,and remove the age barrierfor women in the govern-ment sector.

The aggressiveness andconfidence in her speecheshas impressed party workersand those close to her. “Sheused to read things out atpublic platforms. There wasalso this clumsiness. Butnow her speeches are inter-active. She looks more pre-pared than before,” an aideof Ms. Yadav said.

Dimple Yadav comes into her ownAkhilesh’s low-proile MP-wife charms her audiences and leaves her stamp on the party’s policies

Omar Rashid

LUCKNOW

Dimple Yadav is backing her husband, Akhikesh Yadav, withher conidence on public platforms. RAJEEV BHATT

Prime Minister NarendraModi on Thursday said hewas amused that Uttar Pra-desh Chief Minister AkhileshYadav was “afraid” of thedonkeys of Gujarat, but heon his part took inspirationfrom the “loyal” and “hard-working” animal.

Responding to the donkeyremarks made by Mr. Yadavat an election meeting in RaeBareli three days ago, Mr.Modi said the criticism ofdonkeys by the Chief Min-istry only reflected his“casteist mentality” and“the feeling of hatred doesnot suit him”.

“In elections, opponentscriticise each other ...Akhileshji, I can understandif you attack me and the BJP,but I am amused that youhave attacked donkeys ... areyou afraid of donkeys ...these are thousands of kilo-metres away,” Mr. Modi said.

‘People are mymaster’Addressing the BJP’s VijayShanknaad rally here, hesaid, “The people of thiscountry are my master, Itake inspiration from thedonkey because I work forpeople day and night ... don-keys are loyal to their mas-ter.” “I am amused that yourcasteist mentality is having a

reflection on animals too...you found donkeys so bad ...it is natural as your govern-ment is so efficient that theentire government goesabout looking for buffaloeswhen they go missing,” hesaid.

Mr. Modi’s reference wasto the buffaloes of MinisterAzam Khan which had gonemissing in Rampur and thepolice had to track themdown. “This is the pehchaan[identity] of your govern-ment but you are not awarethat donkeys too give us in-spiration if heart and mindare clear ... we can also takethat inspiration, it is loyal tothe master and is very eco-nomical,” he said.

“Akhileshji, these 125crore countrymen are mymasters ... I do all the workthey ask me to do as I takeinspiration from donkeysand take it with full pride,”

Mr. Modi said. Elaborating,he said, “Donkeys do notdiscriminate while carryinganything on their back ...whether it is a bag of sugaror of lime... [those who dis-criminate] are the ones whoare neck deep in corrup-tion.”

Gujarat’s greatness“Akhileshji, you might hatethe donkeys of Gujarat but itwas that very State whichgave birth to DayanandSaraswati, Mahatma Gandhi... and Lord Krishna chose tostay,” he said.

“This feeling of hatreddoes not suit you,” Mr. Moditold Akhilesh, adding thathis alliance partner Con-gress, which led theerstwhile UPA government,had even released a stampon Gujarat’s donkeys.

“Jinko aapne gale lagayahai... unko bhi samajhne kaprayas kartey jab unki sarkarthi... 2013 mein inhi gadho kapostal stamp nikala tha,” hesaid, adding it must havebeen clear to him by now asto how talented and import-ant donkeys are.

At a rally in Rae Bareli,Mr. Akhilesh had said:“There comes an advertise-ment featuring a donkey. Iwill ask the megastar of thiscentury to stop campaigningfor donkeys.”

Modi lights into Akhileshfor ‘donkey’ barbI take inspiration from ‘loyal’ and ‘hard working’ animal: PM

Press Trust of India

Bahraich (U.P.)

Narendra Modi

Having denied the Congressthe status of the ruling partyin 2014, the electorate isnow denying it the status ofthe principal Oppositionparty, Finance MinisterArun Jaitley said here onThursday after results of themunicipal polls in Maha-rashtra were announced.

He said the Congress’sopposition to demonetisa-tion and the use of newtechnology and its relianceon one family were the keyreasons for its present state.

Mr. Jaitley said the BJPwas now emerging as a pan-Indian party, spreading itsroots even in eastern andsouthern India.

‘Tailender party’“But what about the Con-gress? In Odisha, it gotsqueezed out of the contest.In Maharashtra, it gotpushed to third or fourthplace in most cities. It is noteven a major contestant inStates like Tamil Nadu, WestBengal and Uttar Pradesh,”Mr. Jaitley said in a state-ment. “It is struggling to sur-vive by becoming the tai-lender in an alliance in

these States. Many in theSamajwadi Party are won-dering if it was worth leav-ing 103 seats to the Congressin Uttar Pradesh.”

The Congress, he said,had acquired an image ofbeing a fringe, anti-reform-ist, anti-growth party. “TheCongress Party’s stand ondemonetisation of highvalue currency is costing itdearly. Tax evasion enablesa small percentage of thepopulation to unjustly en-rich itself at the cost of theexchequer. Public resourcesget reduced and hence theexpenditure on the vast sec-tion of population isreduced.”

“The poor have suppor-ted the demonetisation. TheCongress has lost its tradi-tional constituency of thepoor to the BJP,” he said.

‘Congress slippingin many States’Jaitley blames its objection to note ban


NEW DELHI

Arun Jaitley

ED attaches ₹1 crore ofSurat man in note caseNEW DELHI

The Enforcement Directoratehas provisionally attached₹1.02 crore in the moneylaundering case involvingSurat-based businessmanKishorebhai Bhajiawala foralleged illegal conversion ofbanned notes.

Samajwadi Party expelsAman Mani TripathiLUCKNOW

The Samajwadi Party onThursday expelled Aman ManiTripathi for contesting as anIndependent against theofficial candidate fromNautanwa in Maharajganjdistrict. PTI

CMYK

ND-ND




WORLD

Dhaka editor ‘stopped’from flying to LondonDHAKA

Prominent Bangladeshi editorShafik Rehman, on bail forcharges of plotting to killPrime Minister SheikhHasina’s son, said onThursday he had beenstopped from flying toLondon to visit his sick wife,despite having high courtclearance to travel. Mr.Rehman was released fromjail last September, fivemonths after he was arrestedon charges of plotting to killMs. Hasina’s son. AFP

ELSEWHERE

Ecuador to hold run-offpresidential voteQUITO

Ecuador will hold a run-offpresidential election in Aprilafter a hard fought andinconclusive first round, theelectoral commission said onWednesday. In voting onSunday, ruling party’s leftistcandidate Lenin Morenofinished first but fell short ofthe margin needed to avoid arun-off. He will face a run-offon April 2 against hisconservative rival GuillermoLasso. AFP

Le Pen favourite to winfirst round in FrancePARIS

Far-right leader Marine LePen remains favourite to winthe first round of France’spresidential election butwould lose the May 7 run-offagainst either the centre-right’s Francois Fillon orcentrist Emmanuel Macron,two polls showed onThursday. A BVA poll showedMr. Macron beating Ms. LePen comfortably, by 61% to39%, in run-off. REUTERS

Anti-Dakota pipelineprotesters leave campCHICAGO

After nearly a year ofoccupying North Dakotaprairie land to block the routeof an oil pipeline, many of thecamp’s holdouts marched outon Wednesday. Some 10activists who had remainedafter the 2:00 pm (2000GMT) deadline were arrested,according to the NorthDakota Joint InformationCenter. AFP

U.S.-backed Iraqi securityforces captured Mosul air-port on Thursday, state tele-vision said, in a major gain inoperations to drive IslamicState (IS) from the westernhalf of the city.

Elite Counter Terrorismforces advanced from thesouthwestern side andentered the Ghozlani armybase along with the south-western districts of Tal al-Rumman and al-Mamoun.

Flight of civiliansLosing Mosul could spell

the end of the Iraqi side ofmilitants’ self-styled ca-liphate in Iraq and Syria,which Islamic State leaderAbu Bakr al-Baghdadi de-clared from the city aftersweeping through vast areasof Iraq in 2014.

Iraqi forces hope to use

the airport as a launchpadfor their campaign to drivethe militants from Iraq’ssecond largest city.

A Reuters correspondentsaw more than 100 civiliansfleeing towards Iraqi securityforces from the district of al-Mamoun. Some of themwere wounded.

“Daesh fled when counterterrorism Humvees reachedal-Mamoun. We were afraidand we decided to escape to-wards the Humvees,” saidAhmed Atiya, one of the es-caped civilians said.

“We were afraid from theshelling, he added.

Federal police and an eliteInterior Ministry unit knownas Rapid Response hadbattled their way into the air-port as IS fighters foughtback using suicide carbombs, a Reuters corres-pondent in the area south ofMosul airport said.

Police officers said themilitants had also deployedbomb-carrying dronesagainst the Iraqi CounterTerrorism Forces advancing

from the southwestern sideof the city.

“We are attacking Daesh[Islamic State] from multiplefronts to distract them and

prevent them regrouping,”said federal police captainAmir Abdul Kareem, whoseunits are fighting nearGhozlani military base. “Itsthe best way to knock themdown quickly.” Western ad-visers supporting Iraqi forceswere seen some two kmaway from the front-line tothe southwest of Mosul, a Re-uters correspondent said.

Ghozlani base retakenIraqi forces last month ous-ted IS from eastern Mosuland embarked on a new of-fensive against the militantgroup in densely-populatedwestern Mosul this week.

Counter-terrorism service(CTS) troops fought theirway inside the nearbyGhozlani base, which in-cludes barracks and traininggrounds close to the Bagh-dad-Mosul highway, a CTSspokesman told Reuters.

Iraqi troops capture Mosul airportHope to use it as launchpad for future operations against the Islamic State in the city’s western part

Knocking IS out: Iraqi forces participating in an ofensive toretakeMosul airport on Thursday. AFP

Reuters

South of Mosul

The White House on Wed-nesday overturned protec-tions for transgender stu-dents that required publicschools to allow them to usebathrooms and lockerrooms matching the genderwith which they identify.

With the move, PresidentDonald Trump has sidedwith social conservatives ona key issue at the centre of abroader cultural battlebetween conservatives andliberals.

Gender identityBy lifting federal guidelinesissued by the Obama admin-istration — interpreting TitleIX, the federal law banningsex discrimination inschools, to include genderidentity — the Trump ad-

ministration is leaving it upto States and school districtsto decide whether studentsshould have access to bath-rooms that do not reflecttheir biological sex.

In a two-page guidanceletter to public schools, theWhite House said the exist-ing guidance did not “con-tain extensive legal analysisor explain how the positionis consistent with the ex-press language of Title IX,nor did they undergo anyformal public process”.

The decision comes aftera reported disagreementover the language betweenAttorney-General Jeff Ses-sions, a major opponent ofthe LGBT rights movement,and Education SecretaryBetsy DeVos, who is said tosupport LGBT rights andhad to sign off on the move.

U.S. scraps protectionfor transgender students

Trump sides with the conservatives

Agence France-Presse

Washington

Explosives in a building un-der construction ignited onThursday, ripping through amarket in an upscale neigh-bourhood in Lahore, killingeight people, officials said. Itwas not immediately clearwhether the explosives weremeant to be a bomb ormerely stored in the build-ing.

The news came as a shockto many in Pakistan, where astring of brazen attacksclaimed by Pakistani Talibanover the past two weeks havekilled more than 125 people.Islamabad claims thatPakistani Taliban use Afghansoil to stage terrorist attacksacross Pakistan, a charge Ka-bul denies.

Thursday’s blast was sopowerful that it shatteredwindows of nearby buildingsand damaged vehiclesparked outside a market inthe Defence Housing Author-ity, said Rana Sanaullah, pro-vincial Law Minister.

Nearly 30 people werewounded in the blast that the

provincial Counter-Terror-ism Department (CTD) saidwas caused when explosivesinside the building ignited.

Mohammad Iqbal, spokes-man for the CTD, told report-ers that investigators werestill trying to determine thepurpose of storing explosivematerial in the building, andwhether it was an impro-vised explosive device or re-

mote control device.Lahore police operations

chief Haider Ashraf said theexplosion took place inside abuilding that was under con-struction and where labour-ers were working at the time.

The explosion was sopowerful it littered the park-ing area outside the buildingwith broken glass and debris.Dust and smoke covered

dozens of cars parked out-side, their windscreens andrear windows shattered.

Pakistani Prime MinisterNawaz Sharif, speaking to re-porters during an officialvisit to Turkey on Thursday,asked Afghanistan to actagainst those militants whoare using Afghan soil for ter-rorist attacks in Pakistan.

Mr. Sharif ’s commentscame hours after the AfghanAmbassador to Pakistan,Omar Zakhilwal, demandedthe reopening of bordercrossings closed by Is-lamabad in the wake of theshrine bombing. Pakistansays any decision about re-opening the crossings “willbe taken in due course”.

Earlier in the day, ShekibMustaghni, the Afghan For-eign Ministry spokesman,said Afghanistan was readyto seek United Nations sanc-tions against suspected ter-rorist networks and theirsupporters, a veiled refer-ence to Pakistan. Kabul ac-cuses Pakistan of aidingTaliban insurgents, particu-larly the Haqqani network.

8 killed in Lahore market blastExplosives in under-construction building ignite; unclear if they were bombs

Associated press

Lahore

Living in fear: The blast in Lahore damaged vehicles parkedoutside amarket in the Defence Housing Authority. AFP

Mexico’s mounting uneaseand resentment over U.S.President Donald Trump’simmigration crackdown waslooming over a gathering ofU.S. and Mexican leadersThursday that the U.S. hadhoped would project astrong future for relationsbetween neighbours.

U.S. Secretary of State RexTillerson and Homeland Se-curity Secretary John Kellywere meeting with theirMexican counterparts inMexico City before theywere supposed to sit downwith Mexican PresidentPena Nieto.

But a top Mexican officialsuggested the meeting withMr. Pena Nieto, announceddays in advance by the U.S.,might not take place afterall.

“It all depends on theagreements that they arriveat,” Mexico’s Economy Sec-retary Ildefonso Guajardo

said on a morning newsshow. Even Mr. Trump,whose White House has in-sisted relations with Mexicoare “phenomenal”, acknow-ledged he’d sent his top dip-lomat to Mexico on a “toughtrip”.

“I want to say clearly andmost emphatically that theMexican government andthe Mexican people have noreason to accept unilateral

decisions imposed by onegovernment on another,”said Mexico’s foreign rela-tions secretary, Luis Vide-garay. “We are not going toaccept that, because wedon’t have to.”

Mr. Videgaray added acryptic but pointed warningthat Mexico wouldn’t hesit-ate to challenge the U.S.move at the United Nationsor other global venues.

Tillerson visit: U.S., Mexicosquare of on immigrationMexico says it rejects unilateral decisions imposed by U.S.

Associated Press

Mexico City

Tough trip:U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson withAmbassador Roberta Jacobson in Mexico City. AP

North Korea's state mediabroke a 10-day silence onThursday on the murder ofKim Jong-un’s half brother,launching a ferocious as-sault on Malaysia for “im-moral” handling of thecase and for playing polit-ics with the corpse.

In its first comments onthe airport assassination ofKim Jong-nam, KCNA saidMalaysia bore responsibil-ity for the death, and ac-cused it of conspiring withSouth Korea.

“Malaysia is obliged tohand his body to the DPRK[North Korea] side as itmade an autopsy andforensic examination of itin an illegal and immoralmanner”, the North’sKorean Jurists Committeesaid, in comments carriedby the state-run newsagency. Malaysia has notreleased the corpse “underthe absurd pretext” that itneeds a DNA sample fromthe dead man's family, itsaid.

Throughout its lengthydispatch, KCNA avoidedany reference to the deadman's identity, calling himonly “a citizen of the DPRKbearing a diplomatic pass-port”. North Korea hasnever acknowledged himas the estranged brother ofits leader.

Also Malaysia’s policechief said on Thursday thatthe country has requestedInterpol to put an alert outto apprehend four NorthKorean suspects.

Speaking to reporters onThursday, Malaysian policechief Khalid Abu Bakar saida request had been madeto Interpol to put out analert to apprehend thefour, who are believed tohave made their way backto North Korea, having fledMalaysia on the day of thekilling.

N. Korealashes out atMalaysiaAgence France-Presse

Seoul

Syrian peace talks in Genevaresumed on Thursday afterbreaking down 10 monthsago as the battle for Aleppoescalated, with the UN medi-ator hoping to corral thewarring sides into a rareface-to-face meeting.

UN’s Syria envoy Staffande Mistura convened separ-ate meetings with represent-atives of the government andopposition delegations onThursday morning.

The aim is to end almostsix years of war by agreeingon the future governance ofSyria, where the position ofPresident Bashar Al-Assad isstronger now than a year agoafter government forcesgained control of Aleppowith Russian military back-

ing. After meeting Mr. As-sad’s top negotiator at thetalks, Russia's envoy to theUnited Nations said de-mands from rebels and theirWestern and Arab backersfor Mr. Assad to step downwere “absurd”.

Agenda uncertain“The delegation of the

[Syrian] government arrivedin Geneva with constructiveinstructions to reach pro-gress at these talks,” Ambas-sador Alexei Borodavkin toldreporters.

“The agenda of thesetalks is not yet ready, as faras I understand,” he said. Hewas hoping for progress oncreating a government of na-tional unity, drafting a Con-stitution and schedulingelections, as mandated by a

UN resolution, he said.The scope of the talks has

been cut back to core polit-ical questions since last year,after an initiative by Russia,Turkey and Iran took thornymilitary issues off theGeneva agenda and assignedthem to a separate processin the Kazakhstan’s Astana.

“Geneva is where thepolitics are. Astana is abso-lutely suitable as a place tostrengthen the ceasefire,”one Western diplomat said.

Also, air strikes hit rebel-held areas in Deraa andHama provinces and insur-gents fired rockets at govern-ment targets, the Britain-based Syrian Observatoryfor Human Rights said. Butthe overall level of violencein western Syria was lessthan in previous days.

Syria talks resume inGeneva after 10monthsEnvoy holds separate meetings with government, rebels

Reuters

Geneva

In a world filled with excessfood, 20 million people areon the brink of famine, in-cluding 1.4 million childrenat imminent risk of death. Inthe face of such grim num-bers, a stark question con-fronts the world’s mostpowerful: Why in 2017 can’tthey avert such acatastrophe?

UN Secretary-General An-tónio Guterres raised thealarm on Wednesday after-noon about the risk of fam-ine in northern Nigeria,Somalia and Yemen. Andthis week, the United Na-tions declared famine in apatch of South Sudan.

“In our world of plenty,there is no excuse for inac-

tion or indifference,” Mr. Gu-terres said at a news confer-ence, flanked by the heads ofhis aid agencies. Each coun-try facing famine is in war, or

in the case of Somalia, recov-ering from decades ofconflict.

Famine is a rare and spe-cific state. It is declared after

three criteria are met: whenone in five households in acertain area face extremefood shortages; more than30% of the population isacutely malnourished; andat least two people for every10,000 die each day.

Not enoughmoneyFamine was last declared inSomalia in July 2011, after anestimated 260,000 peoplehad died, mostly in a two-month period. Mr. Guterrescited two reasons for thecrisis. First, he said, there isnot enough money; the UNneeds $5.6 billion to addressthe needs. Barely 2% of thatmoney is in hand.

Second, all four countriesfacing the threat of famineare reeling from conflict, and

in many instances, the lead-ers of warring parties areblocking aid workers fromdelivering relief where it ismost needed.

The situation in Somaliatoday is different from whatit was in 2011. The govern-ment is functioning, al-though there are vast pock-ets where al-Shababthrives.But Somalia has already hadtwo consecutive years ofdrought. In South Sudan,100,000 people are affectedby famine in a part of thecountry that is mosttroubled by the civil war.

In northern Nigeria,where the military is battlingBoko Haram, there wasprobably a famine in twotowns, called Bama andBanki, according to an early

warning system funded bythe U.S. Agency for Interna-tional Development. Buttravelling through the area isso dangerous that aid work-ers have been unable toverify the levels of hungerthere, let alone deliver relief.At least 5 million people facethe risk of famine.

The biggest crisis is in Ye-men, where a coalition ledby Saudi Arabia and backedby the U.S. is battling Houthirebels.

More than seven millionpeople need urgent food aid,according to the UN . Amongthem, 462,000 children face“severe acute malnutrition,”which means that even ifthey survive, they will prob-ably have developmental dis-abilities. NYT

Why 20million people are on brink of famineNations facing famine — S. Sudan, Nigeria, Somalia and Yemen — are either in war or recovering from decades of conlict

Somini Sengupta

United Nations

Conlict, hunger, starvation: Children from South Sudan in arefugee camp in Arua, Uganda. GETTY IMAGES

China’s Defence Ministrysaid on Thursday it wasaware of the presence of aU.S. aircraft carrier strikegroup in the South ChinaSea and China respectedfreedom of navigation forall countries in the watersthere.

The U.S. Navy said thestrike group, including theNimitz-class aircraft carrierthe USS Carl Vinson, began“routine operations” in theSouth China Sea onSaturday.

Defence ministryspokesman Ren Guoqiangsaid China had a “grasp” ofthe situation regarding thecarrier group in the SouthChina Sea.

China ‘aware’of patrol inS. China SeaReuters

Beijing

Mass evacuation:Thousands of people in San Jose, California, were ordered to evacuate early onWednesday as loodwatersinundated neighbourhoods after an area reservoir overlowed. AFP


San Jose inundated

CMYK

BUSINESSEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE



NIFTY 50

PRICE CHANGE

ACC. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1438.10. . . . . . . . . -9.50

Adani Ports. . . . . . . . . . . . . 297.25. . . . . . . . . -3.05

Ambuja Cements . . . . 232.00. . . . . . . . . -1.15

Asian Paints . . . . . . . . . . . . 1009.00. . . . . . . -11.30

Aurobindo Pharma . 666.25. . . . . . . -11.95

Axis Bank. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 528.15. . . . . . . . . . .2.85

Bajaj Auto . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2814.10. . . . . . . . 14.35

Bank of Baroda . . . . . . . 168.15. . . . . . . . . . .0.45

Bharti Airtel . . . . . . . . . . . 366.25. . . . . . . . . . .5.25

BHEL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153.45. . . . . . . . . -0.85

Bosch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21990.90. . . . . . . -70.30

BPCL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 717.65. . . . . . . . . . .3.35

Cipla . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 592.40. . . . . . . . . . .3.15

Coal India . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327.70. . . . . . . . . -0.65

Dr Reddys Lab . . . . . . . . 2887.40. . . . . . . -15.80

Eicher Motors Ltd. . . 24877.70. . . . . -192.60

GAIL (India) . . . . . . . . . . . . 517.55. . . . . . . . . -1.35

Grasim Ind . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1024.90. . . . . . . -22.60

HCL Tech . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 842.85. . . . . . . . . . .8.65

HDFC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1385.70. . . . . . . . . -8.40

HDFC Bank . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1394.30. . . . . . . . . -4.85

Hero MotoCorp . . . . . . . 3176.75. . . . . . . . 10.55

Hindalco . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182.10. . . . . . . . . . .2.05

Hind Unilever . . . . . . . . . 858.25. . . . . . . . . -5.90

ICICI Bank . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284.50. . . . . . . . . -1.65

Idea Cellular . . . . . . . . . . . 119.60. . . . . . . . . . .7.00

IndusInd Bank . . . . . . . . 1340.75. . . . . . . . 14.20

Bharti Infratel Ltd. . 297.90. . . . . . . . . -2.85

Infosys. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1008.85. . . . . . . . 18.70

ITC. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265.65. . . . . . . . . . .2.20

Kotak Bank . . . . . . . . . . . . . 810.95. . . . . . . . 15.10

L&T. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1486.60. . . . . . . . . . .9.65

Lupin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1450.00. . . . . . . . . -2.80

M&M. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1304.85. . . . . . . . . -6.35

Maurti Suzuki . . . . . . . . . 6031.00. . . . . . . -48.65

NTPC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165.50. . . . . . . . . -1.20

ONGC. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196.00. . . . . . . . . . .0.40

PowerGrid Corp . . . . . . 199.15. . . . . . . . . -2.45

Reliance Ind . . . . . . . . . . . 1182.75. . . . . . . -24.75

State Bank . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270.45. . . . . . . . . -1.85

Sun Pharma . . . . . . . . . . . . 674.55. . . . . . . . . . .4.20

Tata Motors . . . . . . . . . . . . 462.35. . . . . . . . . . .2.30

Tata Motors Dvr. . . . . . 280.95. . . . . . . . . -2.10

Tata Power . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83.45. . . . . . . . . -0.70

Tata Steel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 485.75. . . . . . . . . . .1.70

TCS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2481.80. . . . . . . . 70.30

Tech Mahindra . . . . . . . . 503.65. . . . . . . . . -4.30

UltraTech Cement. . . 3786.10. . . . . . . . . . .8.30

Wipro . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 486.10. . . . . . . . 11.60

YES Bank . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1446.75. . . . . . . . . -0.20

Zee Entertainment . 518.55. . . . . . . . . . .2.40

EXCHANGE RATESIndicative direct rates in rupees a unit except yen at4 p.m. on February 23

CURRENCY TT BUY TT SELL

US Dollar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . 66.63. . . . . . . 66.95

Euro . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . 70.30. . . . . . . 70.65

British Pound . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . 83.06. . . . . . . 83.47

Japanese Yen (100) . . . . . .. . 58.89. . . . . . . 59.18

Chinese Yuan. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . 9.69. . . . . . . . . 9.74

Swiss Franc . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . 66.00. . . . . . . 66.33

Singapore Dollar . . . . . . . . . . .. . 47.14. . . . . . . 47.37

Canadian Dollar. . . . . . . . . . . . .. . 50.67. . . . . . . 50.91

Malaysian Ringitt . . . . . . . . . .. . 14.97. . . . . . . 15.05

Source:Indian Bank

BULLION RATES CHENNAI

February 23 rates in rupees with previous rates inparentheses

Bar Silver (1 kg) . . . . . .. . . . 43,055. . . . (43,420)

Retail (1 g) . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . 46.10. . . . . . (46.50)

24 ct gold (10 g) . . . . .. . . . 29,730. . . . (29,770)

22 ct gold (1 g) . . . . . . .. . . . . . 2,824. . . . . . (2,828)

Less than a month afterVodafone confirmed it was intalks with Idea for a possiblemerger in India that couldcreate the country’s largestmobile operator, Bharti Air-tel on Thursday said it wouldacquire the local unit of Nor-way’s Telenor.

The deal will help India’slargest telecom services pro-vider to widen its lead overMukesh Ambani-led RelianceJio, which has alreadynotched up 100 millionusers. Were Vodafone andIdea to successfully concludea merger, the combined en-tity would have almost 400million users.

“Bharti Airtel has enteredinto a definitive agreementwith Telenor South Asia In-vestments Pte. Ltd. to ac-quire Telenor India,” Bhartisaid in a statement. “It willalso enable Airtel to furtherbolster its strong spectrumfootprint in these sevencircles, with the addition of43.4 MHz spectrum in the1800 MHz band,” it said.

Though the companiesdidn’t disclose the deal size,a Deutsche Bank Market Re-search report pegged thevalue of the transaction atabout $300 million, or morethan ₹2,000 crore. BhartiAirtel shares gained 1.4% onthe BSE to close at ₹366.05on Thursday.

Sixth acquisitionThis is the six domestic ac-quisition by Bharti in the lastfive years. It had acquiredQualcomm AP’s India busi-ness in May 2012, Loop Mo-bile in June 2014 and AugereWireless Broadband India ayear later. Last year it had ac-quired Videocon Telecom-munications and Aircel Dish-net Wireless.

As part of the agreement,Bharti will acquire all of Tel-enor India’s assets and oper-ations in seven circles -Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Ma-harashtra, Gujarat, U.P.

(East), U.P. (West) and As-sam. “These circles repres-ent a high population con-centration and thereforeoffer a high potential forgrowth,” the company said.

“As the new owner, Airtelwill take over Telenor India’sspectrum, licenses and oper-ations, including its employ-ees and customer base of 44million (4.4 crore),” Telenorsaid in a statement.

Bharti has more than 269million (26.9 crore) sub-scribers and a revenue mar-ket share of more than 33%in the telecom market. Ac-cording to Fitch Ratings,Bharti’s revenue marketshare will rise by 2 percent-age points to 35%, post theacquisition.

“The decision to exit Indiahas not been taken lightly,”Sigve Brekke, Chief Execut-ive Officer of Telenor Groupsaid. “After a thorough con-sideration, it is our view thatthe significant investmentsneeded to secure Telenor In-dia’s future business on astandalone basis would nothave given an acceptablelevel of return.”

The transaction will nottrigger any impairment, the

statement said, adding thatthe exposure to claims re-lated to the period Telenorowned the business, will re-main with Telenor.

The deal is expected toclose within 12 months, sub-ject to requisite regulatoryapprovals from the Depart-ment of Telecommunica-tions and the CompetitionCommission of India.

Gopal Vittal, ManagingDirector and CEO (India andSouth Asia), Bharti Airtel,said: “On completion, theproposed acquisition will un-dergo seamless integration,both on the customer as wellas the network side, and fur-

ther strengthen our marketposition considerably in sev-eral key circles.”

‘Consolidate or perish’According to Fitch Ratingsthe agreement by Bharti Air-tel to buy Telenor’s Indiantelecom operations “is thelatest sign that the entry ofaggressive new operator Reli-ance Jio is spurring incum-bents to consolidate to bettermeet the intense competi-tion and weaker telcos to exitaltogether.”

It added that Bharti’scredit profile will remain un-affected by the planned ac-quisition as the benefits fromadditional spectrum assetswill offset the spectrum liab-ilities taken over.

Jio’s massive investment of$20-25 billion and unpreced-ented offering of free voiceand data for six months tonew subscribers have accel-erated industry consolida-tion, according to Fitch.

“The on-going consolida-tion is likely to leave four lar-ger operators – Bharti, Jio,the combination of VodafoneIndia and Idea Cellular, andthe combined Reliance Com-munications and Aircel Lim-

ited,” Fitch said.In Fitch’s view, the 43MHz

of 1800MHz spectrum Bhartiwill acquire as part of thetransaction is the primarybenefit to the company.

“Telenor’s Indian opera-tions will also come with 45million subscribers (com-pared with Bharti’s Indiansubscriber base of 266 mil-lion), who generate revenueof $600-700 million andEBITDA of $50-60 million(compared with $14.5 billionand $5-5.3 billion, respect-ively at Bharti),” Fitch said,adding this won’t enhancethe acquirer’s debt levels.

“During 2012 and 2014spectrum auctions, Telenoracquired spectrum worth₹48 billion,” Deutsche BankMarket Research said.

“Adjusting for the upfrontpayment, the license-fee set-off and the annual paymentsmade to date, we estimateTelenor’s outstanding spec-trum liability would bearound ₹16 billion ($230m).This would transfer to Bhartiin the event of the acquisi-tion.”

Telenor’s other assetswere likely to fetch minimalvalue, Deutsche Bank MarketResearch added.

Price warThe price war triggered bythe arrival of Reliance Jio hashurt revenues and profitsmargins of telecom players,including Bharti Airtel, Voda-fone and Idea.

Bharti Airtel last monthreported a 54% drop in con-solidated net profit for theDecember quarter.

Idea reported its first everquarterly loss for the Octo-ber-December period andVodafone last year wrotedown the value of its Indianbusiness by €5 billion.

Last year, Reliance Com-munications, which had ac-quired Sistema ShyamTeleservices and is con-trolled by Mukesh Ambani’sbrother Anil, said it wouldmerge with Aircel Ltd.

Bharti joins battle with Telenor buyThe deal helps Bharti gain spectrum as Vodafone and Idea mull a merger, and Jio adds customers

SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI

Big buy: Bharti will acquire all of Telenor India’s assets and operations in seven circles — AndhraPradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra, Gujarat, U.P. (East), U.P. (West) and Assam. REUTERS

India on Thursday said ithas submitted to the WorldTrade Organisation (WTO) alegally vetted proposal on aglobal services pact, thatamong other things, aims toease norms for movementof skilled workers acrossborders for short-termwork.

The proposal for a TradeFacilitation in Services (TFS)Agreement will be taken upby an expert committee atthe WTO headquarters inGeneva during March 14-17,following which it will beput up for discussion amongall the WTO members, com-merce minister NirmalaSitharaman said.

Ms. Sitharaman said: “Wehave submitted the legallyvetted paper (on TFS) inGeneva. Till March 17, onlythe Council for Trade in Ser-vices members will be privyto it. After that we will takeit up for discussion with allthe WTO member countriesto build awareness.”

According to officialsources, the proposed pactalso aims to ensure portabil-ity of social security contri-butions, a single windowmechanism for foreign in-vestment approvals andcross-border insurance cov-erage to boost medical tour-ism. In October 2016, Indiahad tabled a concept noteon the proposed TFS at theWTO and followed it upwith a paper on its possibleelements in November 2016,Ms. Sitharaman said. TheTFS proposal is on the linesof the Trade FacilitationAgreement (TFA) in Goods.According to India, the pro-posed TFS pact is also about‘facilitation’ – that is “mak-ing market access ‘effective’

and commercially meaning-ful and not about ‘new’ (orgreater) market access.”

Meanwhile, the TFA inGoods — adopted by theWTO Members in 2014 —entered into force onWednesday.

According to the WTODirector General RobertoAzevêdo, the TFA in Goodsaims to streamline, simplifyand standardise customsprocedures. By doing so, itwill help to cut trade costsaround the world, he said ina statement.

TFA in goods“By 2030 the (TFA in Goods)Agreement could add 2.7%points per year to worldtrade growth and more thanhalf a percentage point peryear to world GDP growth.This impact would begreater than the eliminationof all existing tariffs aroundthe world,” he said. Indiahas already ratified the TFAin Goods.

Ms. Sitharaman said: “Itwill lead to effective func-tioning of ports and reducetransaction costs. Logisticswill improve, goods willmove faster. Besides, sinceall the ports will be connec-ted electronically, we willhave export and import dataon a real time basis.”

‘Legally vetted’pact on servicestabled at WTOAims to ease passage for skilled staf


NEW DELHI

Nirmala Sitharaman

market watch

23-2-2017 % CHANGE

Sensex dddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd28,893 dddddd 0.10

US Dollar dddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd66.82 dddddd 0.21

Gold dddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd29,850 dddddd 0.34

Brent oil ddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd57.09 dddddd 2.44

Industries will have tomaintain only five registersfor compliance with nineCentral labour laws asagainst the 56 registers re-quired earlier, according toa notification issued by theLabour Ministry onTuesday.

The move will give reliefto about 4.54 crore estab-lishments as “it will save ef-forts, cost and lessen thecompliance burden”, theLabour Ministry said in anofficial statement onThursday.

“Such an exercise hasreduced number of datafields in 5 registers to only144 from the then existing933 fields in 56 registers.”

The Ministry will de-velop a software for thesecommon registers so thatthey can be maintained indigitised form, and write toStates asking them to fol-low a similar practice forState labour laws.

From 56,labour logscut to just 5


NEW DELHI

Tata Motors and the world’slargest automaker Volkswa-gen, are likely to give a con-crete shape to their ongoing‘open-ended’ talks for part-nership at the Geneva Mo-tors Show scheduled for nextmonth.

The two companies areunderstood to have beenholding discussions for awhile over the possibility ofjoining hands and findingsynergies, keeping in viewthe technological develop-ments such as autonomousdriving and shared mobilityalong with stricter emissionnorms challenging the auto-motive industry.

When contacted, a Volk-swagen group spokespersonsaid that it is committed tothe Indian market, as the

country is an integral part ofits growth strategy — espe-cially among the emergingmarkets.

“To enlarge the productportfolio with tailor-made

solutions, for example in In-dia, Volkswagen Group isdiscussing and definingthese proactively with poten-tial partners as well asbetween the brands of the

Group. It is therefore, pre-mature to make any furtherdisclosures at the moment.”

With its future pro-gramme ‘TOGETHER —strategy 2025’ VolkswagenGroup empowers its brandswith new responsibilities inthe respective regions, theVW spokesperson added.

Similarly, a Tata Motorsspokesperson said: “As pre-valent in the automotive in-dustry, we regularly havediscussions with differentcompanies to explore futurecollaborations but we do nothave any specific announce-ments at present.”

Industry sources said thatthe current discussionsbetween the two companiesare “wide ranging and openended” with possibilities oftechnical collaboration andjoint venture.

Negotiations to focus on synergies in autonomous driving, shared mobility

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

NEW DELHI

Single lane: Industry sources said there are possibilities oftechnical collaboration and joint venture from the talks. AFP

VW, Tata Motors to hasten talks in Geneva

Digital wallet provider Mo-biKwik on Thursday an-nounced that it will invest₹300 crore in the currentyear as it looks to triple itscustomer base to 150million.

“The company aims tobecome three times largerin the year, acquiring over100 million users,” UpasanaTaku, Co-Founder of Mo-biKwik said. “The increasein user base will also cata-pult MobiKwik’s annualGross Merchandise Value to$10 billion by end of theyear from the current $2 bil-lion.”

The investment of ₹300crore will go into loyalty ini-tiatives, expanding reach &network, and introductionof other financial servicessuch as loans & investmentson our platform, she added.

The company, whichcompetes with Alibaba-backed Paytm, said that itwill also roll out Supercash,

a loyalty initiative thatpromises benefits to userson every transaction.

“Supercash is the firstever loyalty initiativelaunched by a mobile walletin India…Users can earn re-ward points at all MobiKwikmerchants…These pointscan be used on every trans-action thus enabling theuser to save money everytime he transacts on Mo-bikwik,” a company state-ment said.

1.4 million merchantsMobiKwik currently hasover 1.4 million merchantson its network and aims togrow the base to over 5 mil-lion by year end.

Founded in 2009 byBipin Preet Singh and Upas-ana Taku, the company hasraised three rounds of fund-ing from Sequoia Capital,American Express,Tree LineAsia, MediaTek, GMO Pay-ment Gateway and Cisco In-vestments, according to aposting on its website.


NEW DELHI

MobiKwik to invest₹300 cr. to expand

Piramal Enterprises has an-nounced a strategic part-nership with Ivanhoé Cam-bridge, a real estatesubsidiary of Caisse dedépôt et placement duQuébec (CDPQ), to providelong-term equity capital toresidential developersacross five metro cities inIndia.

According to a jointstatement issued by thecompanies, Ivanhoé Cam-bridge is allocating an ini-tial $250 million whilePiramal Enterprises willcommit an additionalamount alongside and co-invest between 25% and50% of each transaction.

The capital will be madeavailable to a selective listof Grade A developers whohave already demonstrateda track record of executioncapability, corporate gov-ernance and strong returnpotential, said thestatement.

Piramal tofund realtywith Ivanhoé

Special correspONDENT

mumbai




BUSINESS

Infosys board nod fornew articlesCHENNAI

The board of Infosys hasrecommended the adoptionof new Articles ofAssociation. The decisionwas taken at a meeting onThursday. The objective isto ensure that the Articlesof Association is in syncwith the Companies Act of2013. The board has soughtshareholder approval viapostal ballot. Under thecurrent Articles ofAssociation there is noprovision for buy-back, aboard member said.

UPASI opposes cut inrubber import dutyBENGALURU

The United Planters’Association of SouthernIndia (UPASI) asked theCentre not to further cutimport duty on naturalrubber as it will impact over1.2 million growers. “Anysuch move will bedetrimental to the interestof 1.2 million growersdependent on this agroindustry and tantamount toixing the inal nail in thecoin,” said Vinod Sivappa,President, UPASI.

CBEC unveils mobileapp on GSTNEW DELHI

The Central Board of Exciseand Customs on Thursdayunveiled a mobileapplication for informationrelating to the Goods andServices Tax. The app willprovide guidelines for themigration to the GSTregime and include draftversions of the Central GST,State GST, Interstate GSTand GST Compensationlaws. It will have draft ruleson registration and returns,payment, refunds, andinvoices under the regime.

17th February, it will con-tinue to accept inflows fromexisting SIPs.

If one has a SIP in thescheme, their bank accountwill continue to get debitedon the SIP date for the sameamount.

What is your advise forthe investors?� We are explaining to ourinvestors that stopping flowsdoesn’t signal anything unto-ward in our portfolio mix.We continue to actively man-age the portfolio, our core in-vestment philosophy has notchanged and we continue tohold positive view on our in-vestee companies. Hencelong-term investors in our

Fund House DSP BlackRockInvestment Managers Pvt.Ltd. recently decided to tem-porarily stop fresh inflowsinto its DSP BlackRock MicroCap Fund, which is focusedon investing on small andmid-cap companies. In an e-mail interview, VinitSambre, Senior VP and FundManager, DSP BlackRock saysliquidity challenges and soar-ing valuations are the keyfactors which led to the de-cision. Edited excerpts:

Why did you decide tostop fresh inflows intoDSP BlackRock Micro CapFund?� Over the course of thelast few years, DSP Black-Rock Micro Cap Fund hasgrown to become one of thelargest funds in its category.While we continue to find in-teresting investment oppor-tunities for the fund to investin, its current size posed thebigger challenge of liquidity.Due to the fund size, it is in-creasingly difficult to incre-mentally build positions, i.e.to increase stock weightageof companies to a meaning-ful size in the portfolio.

Building 2-3% position ofthis fund into any companyin the micro-cap category re-quires us to buy a decent sizeof the company capital andgiven the liquidity scenario itis not easy to do the same. Inthe process we end up own-ing less than desired holdingof the company capital,which we believe could po-tentially impact our futureperformance. Due to thesechallenges we decided tostop fresh flows into thisscheme in the interest ofinvestors.

What has been the reac-tion of the investors?

� We are reaching out toour investors across differentchannels regarding our de-

cision. Investors seem to becurious to know if we haveturned cautious on the mi-cro-cap category. I wouldlike to allay these fears andstick to our positive long-term view. Investors whohave long term horizon of3-5 years should not be wor-ried. In the near term volatil-ity is not ruled out given theglobal geo-political issuesand slower than expectedearnings momentum locally.

What happens to existinginvestors and those whoinvested in SIP?� While the scheme hastemporarily stopped accept-ing fresh applications (bothlumpsum and SIPs), after

fund need not be worried.We are not giving any negat-ive signal for our portfolio orthe scheme.

Small and mid-cap stockshave run into high valu-ations. Was this a factor inyour decision?

� That factor has played arole in our decision.

Rising market levels leadsto increase in valuation ofcompanies especially thesmall and mid-space wherethe rise has been muchmore.

In some way, this is re-stricting our ability to findmany opportunities at reas-onable valuations, given thesize of the fund.

Lot of money chasingfewer ideas makes it difficultto build adequate position ofa company.

Hence we took a call tostop fresh inflows into thescheme.

We tried to defer thismove as much as we could,but when we felt it is becom-ing quite challenging, wetook this decision.

What is your outlook inthe small and mid-capspace? Do you think therewill be a correction?

� We continue to like thesmall and mid-cap spacewith a long-term view of 3-5years horizon.

We still believe that smalland mid-cap space remainsthe best way of creatingwealth in the long-term byparticipating in the growthof these companies.

However, we do not ruleout volatility in the market inthe near-term given the phe-nomenal rise of the categoryin the last two years and is-sues like UP election, GSTimplementation, demonetiz-ation-led slowing earningsgrowth, among others.

It is possible that smalland mid-caps mayunder-perform.

Near-term volatility not ruled outInvestors who have long-term horizon of 3-5 years should not be worried

INTERVIEW|VINIT SAMBRE

<> Rising market levels leads to increase invaluation of companies especially thesmall and mid-space where the rise hasbeen much more.

SANJAY VIJAYAKUMAR

CHENNAI

New Delhi-based PetainerInnopac Packaging Pvt.Ltd., which makes 20 litrebulk water cooler jar ‘pe-tainerCooler,’ is planningto set up two productionunits in the South and theNorth. It is also installingan additional line at its fa-cility in Maharashtra. “Inthe next three years, wewill have our expansionprogramme in place,” saidAtit Bhatia, Managing Dir-ector. “While, we might se-lect Chennai or Bengaluruto service the southernmarket, we are yet to de-cide on the location for thenorthern market,” he said.

PetainerInnopac toset up unitsN.Anand

Chennai

The Centre on Thursday an-nounced that it would issueapplications for the fourthtranche of the SovereignGold Bond scheme fromFebruary 27 to March 3.

The bonds will be issuedon March 17.

The bonds will be soldthrough banks, Stock Hold-ing Corporation of India,designated post offices, andthe National Stock Exchangeand Bombay StockExchange.

The first three tranches ofthe scheme saw the sale of5,114.95 kg worth of bondsamounting to ₹1,373 crore.

The first tranche, inNovember 2015, saw bondsworth 915.95 kg andamounting to ₹246 croresold, while the secondtranche in January 2016 wit-nessed 3,071 kg of goldbonds worth ₹798 crore be-

ing sold, and the thirdtranche in April collected1,128 kg of gold worth ₹329crore.

Physical demandThe aim of the scheme, asstated by the government atthe time of its introductionin September 2015, was to

help in reducing the de-mand for physical gold byshifting a portion of the es-timated 300 tonnes of phys-ical bars and coins pur-chased every year to goldbonds.

The minimum amountthat can be bought are eight-year bonds worth 1 gram.

First three tranches saw sales of bonds worth 5,114.95 kgSPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI

Secure future: The bonds will be sold through banks, NSE, BSEand designated post oices. ISTOCK/GETTY IMAGES

Gold scheme’s fourthtranche starts on Feb. 27

PepsiCo India HoldingsPrivate Ltd. has embarkedon a ‘3P’ initiative to put inplace an India-centric busi-ness strategy that binds it toconsumers in a purposefulway.

Explaining the new ap-proach in an interactionhere on Wednesday, HarshK Rai, Vice-President & GM,Po1 (Power of One) IndiaSales, PepsiCo India, saidthe three Ps comprisedpeople, product and planet.The focus would be on deliv-ering ‘transformationproducts’ by working with

people within and by caringfor the larger good of theecosystem.

The core objective of the3P initiative was to be relev-ant to people in terms ofproducts in a dynamic envir-onment where the focushad shifted to healthy living,he said.

Pepsico to focus onpeople, product, planet

To deliver ‘transformation products’

K.T.Jagannathan

Chennai

IN BRIEF

Bumrah exudes conidence

After another impressiveperformance in the limitedovers format against Eng-land, Jasprit Bumrah is backwith the Gujarat side for theVijay Hazare domestic ODIstarting on Saturday. The In-dia fast-bowler speaks aboutdeath bowling, his Test am-bitions and more. Excerpts.

You have donewell in theshorter formats. Howkeenare you to play in Tests andhowprepared are you?

It is always a dream to playTest cricket but I don’t focuson selections. I try to do wellwherever I play.

I did well this year in theRanji Trophy also. I havebowled long spells for IndiaA and in the Ranji Trophy,so I am mentally preparedfor that.

You are good bowling at thedeath. Do you fear you couldbe typecast as a ODI or a

Twenty20 bowler?

It doesn’t matter to me whatpeople think. My prepara-tion is different for everyformat.

In Ranjis I focus on a con-sistent line and length, bowl-ing longer spells, using theshorter ball and trying toswing the ball.

In shorter formats, youhave to use the slower ballsand yorkers. People haveonly seen me bowling withthe white ball. I have theconfidence that if I get achance, I can show what Iam capable of.

You have interactedwithLasithMalinga previously.This timeMitchell Johnson

will also bewithMumbaiIndians.What are the thingsyouwould be asking them?

I played with Johnson in2013 when I graduated fromthe under-19. I have goodmemories with them. I usu-ally talk to Malinga on deathbowling issues.

I ask him for his sugges-tions. It is always good tohave a word with him, whathe thinks and what I shouldtry.

Howdo you plan on abatsman like Virat Kohli?

It’s difficult. He is a masterbatsman. You have to alwayshave a clear plan and try tostick to it even if it doesn’t goyour way. You try to thinklike a batsman and thinkwhere the batsman will hit.

The game is towards thebatsman with short bound-aries and flat wickets. So youhave little margin for error.You fix that this is the ballyou are going to bowl andbelieve on that ball.

‘Given a chance, I can show what I am capable of ’S. Dipak Ragav

CHENNAI

CMYK

SPORTEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE



Danica reckons dozenconcussions in careerDAYTONA

Danica Patrick estimates shesuffered at least a dozenconcussions during her racingcareer and told reportersduring Daytona 500 mediaday at Daytona InternationalSpeedway said she wouldretire from NASCAR if adoctor told her there wouldbe long-term risks fromanother head injury. REUTERS

Brazilian wins Hamiltonhelmet challengeLONDON

A Brazilian designer, RaiCaldato, won a competitionto design Lewis Hamilton’s2017 helmet, the F1 driverannounced on Wednesday.Caldato incorporated into thehead-piece a tribute toAyrton Senna, along withthree stars for the FormulaOne titles won by both thelate Brazilian and the Briton.REUTERS

CoA sets the ball rollingseeking tenure detailsMUMBAI

The chief of the Committeeof Administrators Vinod Raitook the first major step byseeking individual declarationfrom all the managingcommittee members of theState associations about theirtenure. A communicationseeking details of the yearsserved by each members ofall the BCCI affiliates isreportedly sent by the CoA tothe office-bearers of theState bodies. The deadlinefor submitting the details isMarch 1.

1st Test, Day 1, MCA Stadium, Pune

AUSTRALIA — 1ST INNINGS RUNS BALLS 4s 6s

Matt Renshaw c Vijay b Ashwindddddddddd ddd 68 ddddd 156 dddddd 10 dddddddd 1

David Warner b Umesh dddddddddddddddddd ddd 38 dddddd 77 dddddddd 6 ddddddddd

Steve Smith c Kohli b Ashwin dddddddddddd ddd 27 dddddd 95 dddddddd 2 ddddddddd

Shaun Marsh c Kohli b Jayant ddddddddddd ddd 16 dddddd 55 dddddddd 3 ddddddddd

Peter Handscomb lbw b Jadeja dddddddddd ddd 22 dddddd 45 dddddddd 3 dddddddddd

Mitchell Marsh lbw b Jadeja ddddddddddddd ddddd4 dddddd 18 dddddddddd dddddddddd

Matthew Wade lbw b Umesh dddddddddddd ddddd8 dddddd 20 dddddddd 1 dddddddddd

Mitchell Starc (batting)dddddddddddddddddd ddd 57 dddddd 58 dddddddd 5 dddddddd 3

Steve O’Keefe c Saha b Umesh dddddddddd ddddd0 dddddd 13 dddddddddd dddddddddd

Nathan Lyon lbw b Umesh ddddddddddddddd ddddd0 dddddddd 1 dddddddddd dddddddddd

Josh Hazlewood (batting) ddddddddddddddd ddddd1 dddddd 31 dddddddddd dddddddddd

Extras (lb-6, nb-9) ddddddddddddddddddddddd ddd 15

Total (for nine wkts. in 94 overs) ddddddddd dd 256

Fall of wickets: 1-82 (Warner, 27.2 overs), 2-119 (S. Marsh, 46.4), 3-149 (Handscomb,59.2), 4-149 (Smith, 60.1), 5-166 (M. Marsh, 67.4), 6-190 (Wade, 75.4), 7-196 (Ren-shaw, 78.3), 8-205 (O’Keefe, 81.4), 9-205 (Lyon, 81.5).

Note: Renshaw (36) retired ill at 82 for one (27.2 overs) and returned to the crease afterHandscomb’s departure (149/3, 59.2).

INDIA BOWLING: Ishant Sharma 11-0-27-0, R. Ashwin 34-10-59-2, Jayant Yadav 13-1-58-1, Ravindra Jadeja 24-4-74-2, Umesh Yadav 12-3-32-4.

Toss: Australia.

M.S. Dhoni’s ‘perfect smile’amidst an abundance of greystubble may signify his jour-ney as a mentor at the fagend of his illustrious career.

Not surprisingly mostmembers of the Jharkhandsquad, barring a youngMonu Singh, are in awe oftheir two-time World Cup-winning skipper.

Notwithstanding Dhoni’seffort to bridge the gap, evid-ent from the train journey to

Howrah along with team-mates, some players preferto maintain a distance.

“I respect him, so I main-tain a distance. However, if Ineed to know anything, I goup to him,” said top-orderbatsman Virat Singh onThursday, followingJharkhand’s nets session atthe Eden Gardens hereahead of the Vijay HazareTrophy one-day matches.

“He is a legend and I can-not say enough about him…His leadership qualities, the

way he handles things andstays calm and composedare things to learn.”

Of late, Dhoni’s self-as-sumed role of a guide hasseen him grow in stature.

As a non-playing member,he had mentored Jharkhandin its first Ranji Trophy semi-final appearance, against Gu-jarat at Nagpur in December.

The session at the Edenon Thursday was another in-stance of Dhoni sharing hisknowledge and experiencewith fellow cricketers.

Donning a pair of shorts, aJharkhand jersey and a navyblue hat, Dhoni keenly over-saw his team’s preparation.

Even while engaging insome football action, anhour of spin bowling andbatting in short phases, hekept assessing hiscolleagues.

There was a conscious ef-fort to let others train and beprepared for contests againstquality opposition likeKarnataka, Hyderabad andSaurashtra.

Dhoni in his new avatar — that of the mentorAs a non-playing member, he had guided the Jharkhand players in their irst-ever Ranji Trophy semiinal

Follow the leader:M.S. Dhoni leads a warm-up session of theJharkhand team. PTI

Y.B. Sarangi

KOLKATA

All through the long-drawn season, the Indiancontingent has stressedon the team succeedingin varying conditions andsporting pitches.

In the final stretch ofthe season, however, theIndian team managementseems to have demandeda tailor-made pitch,which resulted in a stripcontrary to the reputa-tion of the MaharashtraCricket Association sta-dium at Gahunje.

Sanjay Bangar, India’sbatting coach, preferredto dead-bat a query aboutthe pitch. “I think Punewickets have been knownfor being very batsman-friendly. You see thenumber of first-classgames played here, and

the nature of the wicketremains the same overthe length of the first-class matches that havebeen played here,”Bangar said.

“But this is the firstTest being played on thisground and you will findout after the match be-cause judging the natureof the pitch or passingcomments can’t happenon day one, we have towait for the Test over thenext four days how itpans out.

Umesh Yadav, the fast-est bowler in the Indianteam,wasn’t given thenew ball, with Kohli opt-ing to bowl with R. Ash-win’s off-spin. Accordingto Bangar, it was a tacticalmove considering Yadav’sability to make the oldball talk.

Bangar dead-batsquery about pitchSpecial Correspondent

PUNE Matt Renshaw was in no pos-ition to continue batting be-cause of the need to “rush tothe toilet” and he decided toleave the field when DavidWarner fell to Umesh Yadav.

The young left-hander wasquite unabashed as hefielded a number of ques-tions on the incident thattook place before lunch.

On being asked when hebegan feeling uncomfort-able, he said: “It came prettysuddenly, probably aboutfive or 10 minutes beforeDavey [David Warner] gotout. I asked Richard [Kettle-borough] how long therewas till lunch, and he saidhalf-an-hour. I was strugglinga bit then. It was tough.

“I wasn’t sure of the rule; Ididn’t know you could retireout or retire ill, so thoughtI’ll just get out there andmake sure I batted till lunch.

And then, coming back; itwas probably a bit strangefor me, waiting to bat, be-cause as an opener you justgo straight out there to bat,so that was the most challen-ging bit, waiting to bat.”

On the conversation hehad with Steve Smith on hisway to the dressing room,Renshaw said: “He wasn’ttoo thrilled about it, but heunderstands that when youneed to go, you’ve got to go.It wasn’t an ideal scenario,but it’s life, pretty much.”

The nature of the pitch:I’ve never seen a pitch likethat, so I went with a prettyopen mind and I tried to dojust what I normally do inAustralia, which is bat aslong as possible and weighthe bowlers down.Playing Jadeja: I think ithelps having the ball turninto you. It’s quite hard to at-tack Ashwin when he getssome to turn big past the batand some to go straight on.As a left-hander, you natur-ally want the ball coming

back to you. If there’s an op-portunity to try and hit a sixyou take it.Starc’s batting: We were allsitting in our whites andready to go, but we couldhear the crowd and we weretrying to guess if it will be afour or a play and miss. Itwas a really entertaining in-nings and it helped usmassively.Facing Ashwin and Jadeja:They’re two class bowlers.You can tell why they’re No.1 and 2 in the world. Ithought we played themquite well, we just worked onwhat we spoke about.Ashwin taking the newball: We discussed thechance of that happening.It’s the first time I’ve faced aspinner opening the bowl-ing, so I was just enjoying thechallenge. Facing the bestbowler in the world is a greatchallenge in itself, be it witha new ball or an old ball.

‘I wasn’t sure of the rules about going of’Smith wasn’t too thrilled about the ‘comfort break’, but he understood, says RenshawG. Viswanath

Pune

Gotta go: Australia’s Matt Renshaw seeks permission to leavethe ground as captain Steve Smith looks on. KMURALI KUMAR

<> When it’s time to

answer nature’s call,

no amount of will

power can control

that

—

Sanjay Bangar,

India’s batting coach

<> Hahahaha... I had no

idea what I was

watching!

—

Michael Clarke,

former Australia captain, on Twitter

<> I’m still gettingmy

head around this...

JL (Justin Langer)

would have lost a

limb and still batted

on

—

DamienMartyn,

former Australia batsman

One decent partnership.Two contrasting fifties.Three double blows sufferedby Australia. And four wick-ets by paceman Umesh Ya-dav on a wicket that turnedfrom the first ball. That wasthe tale of the first day’s playof India’s series-openeragainst Australia at the Maha-rashtra Cricket Association’sstadium here on Thursday.

The visiting batsmenseemed to cope with the con-ditions pretty well before In-dia’s spin triumvirate peggedthem back. Umesh Yadavthen displayed his skills withthe old ball before MitchellStarc’s late assault made thefirst day of Test cricket inPune an intriguing one.

Australia finished the dayat 256 for nine.

Considering how dry thesurface was, Steven Smithwould have been relievedwhen the coin landed in hisfavour. David Warner andMatt Renshaw displayed ex-cellent technique and pa-tience for most the first ses-sion after India opened withR. Ashwin from one end, sav-ing Umesh for the older ball.

In fact, Jayant Yadav wasintroduced into the attack bythe ninth over as the Aus-tralian openers, both left

handers, found themselvestackling off-spin from bothends.

Renshaw and Warner,though, resisted the tempta-tion of poking at the ballsthat were turning away fromthem. Just as the partnershipinched towards the three-fig-ure mark, the Australianswere hit with an unusualdouble-blow.

Brought on as late as inthe 28th over, Umesh tookjust two balls to drawWarnerinto a drive which resulted inthe batsman dragging theball back onto his stumps.Barely had Smith walked outinto the middle when Ren-shaw was rushing to thedressing room after ‘retiringill’ to address an upsettummy. That left Australia

with two new batsmen at thecrease.

Although Smith andShaun Marsh batted pa-tiently, their associationhelped the Indian spinnerssettle into a rhythm in the af-ternoon session. Even afterMarsh’s attempted sweep offJayant took a top-edge beforefalling into Virat Kohli’shands at leg-slip, Smith con-

tinued in the same vein withPeter Handscomb.

Towards the end of thesession, however, both theset batsmen were dismissedin successive overs. WhileJadeja set Handscomb upwith a floater followed by anarm-ball that trapped himright in front, Smith mis-timed a flick off Ashwinstraight to Kohli at mid-wicket in the next over.

Even though Renshaw, re-suming his innings at the fallof Handscomb, held his endup and went past his half-century, the lower middle-or-der crumbled against thespin.

Renshaw eventually fell toAshwin, nicking one thatturned to M. Vijay at slip.When Umesh came back andstruck off successive balls to

remove Stephen O’Keefe — abrilliant catch by a divingWriddhiman Saha — andNathan Lyon whose reviewconfirmed that he was in-deed lbw, it looked like theIndian openers would haveto bat out at least half anhour in the evening.

However, rather than run-ning in hard at the India bats-men, the Australian pace-bowling duo of Starc andJosh Hazlewood frustratedthe hosts with an unbroken,run-a-minute 51-run

partnership.While Hazlewood pre-

ferred to block most of thedeliveries he faced, Starcwent after the spinners enroute an entertaining fifty.Left-arm spinner RavindraJadeja bore the brunt of it asStarc hit him for two fours —the first coming off an insideedge — before clearing thefield.

All of that ensured that the7,504 spectators had enoughreason to call it a memorableday.

Honours even after an eventful opening dayAustralia begins well, then loses its way before late lourish sees it to 256 for nineAmol Karhadkar

PUNE

Breakthrough: After batting with restraint against spin, DavidWarner attempted to go afterUmesh Yadav as soon as the pacer was introduced into the attack, but ended up dragging oneonto his stumps. K. MURALI KUMAR

CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCC

� Umesh took Warner’s

wicket for the ifth time in

10 innings. Shaun Marsh is

the only other batsman

the Indian has dismissed

as many times

� Renshaw (20 years, 332

days) is the youngest

Aussie to make a ifty in

India. Rick Darling (22,

154; Kanpur, 1979-80)

held the previous record

CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCC

#T20 GDL will changeface of S. African cricketMUMBAI

South Africa batsman HashimAmla has said the #T20Global Destination League(GDL) will change the face ofdomestic cricket in theAfrican nation. “It’s massive.We have been longing for abig league of our own toshowcase the talent, facilitiesand beauty of South Africa,”Amla was quoted as saying ina media release. PTI

IN BRIEF

CMYK

ND-ND




SPORT

SUDOKU

G A M B L E F A V O U R

F W R R L I N P

O Z O N E H O L E S A D H U

R K A S A T E T

A G E N T I T B E A T S M E

S H O A I M

H A S B E E N G I N T R A P

O T I E E H

R E I G N E D G R A N D M A

T C E E R S

T A K E H E A R T L A S S I

I Y A D I Y K S

M I E N S S A N M A R I N O

E N T E T L R N

I D L E S T O F L A T E

Solution to puzzle 11938 Solution to yesterday’s Sudoku

DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

As Krishna explains the stages of yoga that a jivatma has tocross to attain yoga siddhi, Arjuna is diffident about the jiv-atma’s effort in this path.

First of all, it involves patient practice and rigorous train-ing of the mind, the biggest challenge ever for anyone from anovice to the trained yogi. There are plenty of opportunitiesto err and fall from the yoga that one has striven to practise.Amid all this constant effort, there looms the possibility ofeasy disruption to the yoga, just as a cloud gets draggedaway from a group and is lost when a strong gust of windblows.

Will this be the plight of a jivatma who falls from his yogicpractice halfway through? Will he not lose what he hasgained?

While admitting that the mind is difficult to control andthat repeated practice, abhyasa, and renunciation, vairagya,are essential to keep it under check, Krishna reassures onethat the jivatma would obtain suitable reward for whateveryoga he has practised, said Velukkudi Sri Krishnan in a dis-course.

If one desires for life in swarga loka, it will be granted. Butsoon he will realise the futility of this desire when his termof life in swarga loka expires. He then has to get back to hu-man existence.

Once again he starts his yoga and aspires for somethingmore permanent and gradually will seek the Lord’s feet byHis grace. What happens when one is unable to pursue theyoga that he begins, either because of his own failings or be-cause his life comes to an end before he can complete it?Will his efforts go waste, asks Arjuna.

The Lord reassures him that by His Sankalpa, that jivatmawill be born in a suitable family where conditions are favour-able for continuing the pursuit of the yoga from his past life.

FAITH

The Gita on Yoga Siddhi3 Complaint on stigma attached

to a South American woman

(10)

4 Beef or ish? (4)

5 Old sailor left a mark (6)

6 Polished up a bit, then a brush

was used (6)

8 Hit man kept outside the circle

(7)

9 Man of science rose and

declared himself the arbiter

(5)

13 Islam — it can work like a

charm (10)

15 In the beginning one may use

ice — yes, and it's essential

throughout (7)

16 Legend about Rome and the

big chief (8)

17 Money for transfer — one

raises quietly (1-4)

18 One hundred + one ifty

unkeyed (6)

20 Poor ailing animal (6)

22 Stand over a river (6)

24 Despicable fellow — only

intruding a bit (4)

12 Search over — hard hat cracks

hydrocarbon (7)

13 Article becomes more of an

accepted idea (7)

14 Hundreds are sick, it's a

complaint (11)

19 Players pick a new area for

game (7)

21 Beer is clearly visible — not a

trick (7)

23 Financially sound, shows

liquidity (7)

25 It's a bad bad sign if it bulges

(7)

26 Before Aishwarya got married,

it was on the menu (8)

27 Particularly strange, not

typical of the countryside (5)

■ DOWN

1 Place to accommodate the

President — one with loose

morals (8)

2 The thief was born with it (6)

1 2 3 4 5

6 7 8

9

10 11

12 13

14 15 16

17 18

19 20 21 22

23 24 25

26 27

(set by Arden)

■ ACROSS

6 Extremist getting some useful

training (5)

7 Drop of cordial for a round of

Gin? It doesn’t make sense (8)

10 A hard place in Colorado (7)

11 A cheap alternative to acquire

new style (7)

THE HINDU CROSSWORD 11939

Mallya optimistic,dreams bigSILVERSTONE

Vijay Mallya has promisedForce India will “dream big”as it looks to break into thetop three of Formula One thisseason. “I said to SergioPerez that as much as peoplemay say that there is a hugebarrier of breaking into thetop three, I see no reasonwhy we can’t,” Mallya said.AFP

IN BRIEF

Pacquiao negotiatingAmir fightMANILA

Philippine boxing hero MannyPacquiao on Thursday said hewas in negotiations to faceBritish fighter Amir Khan,after weeks of conflictingreports over his next bout.“My team and I are innegotiations with Amir Khanfor our next fight. Furtherannouncements comingsoon,” Pacquiao, 38, said onhis official Twitter feed. AFP

Watanabe seeksTokyo gold and moreTOKYO

Fresh from setting a newworld record in 200mbreaststroke, Japan’s latestswim sensation IppeiWatanabe is plotting Olympicglory in 2020 at home andwants his gold medal sealedwith a kiss. “I’ll be at my peakwhen the Olympics arrive. Myaim is to win with a worldrecord and then propose tosomeone with my goldmedal,” he coyly added. AFP

It isn’t often that Olympics-winning team members getsidelined at a function tohonour the best in the busi-ness. But at the first-ever FIHHockey Stars event here onThursday, Argentina wasconspicuous by its absenceamong the men even as Bel-gium swept the awards.

Among the women,though, the awards weremore equally distributed.

Belgium, which finishedrunner-up at Rio, saw its cap-tain John-John Dohmennamed Player-of-the-Yearwhile compatriot Arthur vanDoren, currently participat-ing in the HIL, was namedthe U-23 Player-of-the-Year.

This is the first time a Bel-gian has won the award ineither category.

Irishman David Harte,meanwhile, was namedGoalkeeper-of-the-Year forthe second year in a row.

It was, however, surpris-ing to see the Argentinemen’s team — that won itsmaiden Olympic gold in 2016

— go completely unrepresen-ted in the winners’ list.

The team had two nomin-ations for the Player-of-the-Year and one among thegoalkeepers but remainedempty-handed.

India had two nomina-tions — P.R. Sreejesh andHarmanpreet Singh — butcouldn’t win any either.

The changing dynamics inworld hockey can be gaugedfrom the fact that among themen, the powerhouses —Germany, the Netherlandsand Australia — had nowinners.

Australia, in fact, had justa single nomination acrossall categories —Kathryn Slat-tery in the young playercategory.

Among the women, Na-omi Van As, who announcedher retirement after Rio, be-came the third Dutch wo-man in as many years to be

named the Player-of-the-Yearand was joined by Rio gold-medallist ’keeper MaddieHinch of England and MariaGranatto of Argentina as theYoung Player of the Year.

Though the annualawards have existed for al-most two decades, this is thefirst time such an event hasbeen organised to recognisethe achievements of playersand coaches.

Till now, the awards werehanded over on the sidelinesof the season-ending Cham-pions Trophy.

The winners:

Player-of-the-Year: Men: John-John Dohmen (Bel); Women:Naomi van As (Ned).

Goalkeeper-of-the-Year: Men:David Harte (Ire); Women:Maddie Hinch (Eng).

U-23 Player-of-the-Year: Men:Arthur van Doren (Bel); Wo-men:Maria Granatto (Arg).

Coach-of-the-Year: Men:Danny Kerry (Eng); Women:Karen Brown (Eng).

Umpire-of-the-Year: Men:Christian Blasch (Ger); Women:Laurine Delforge (Bel).

Dohmen, van As win FIH awardsHarte again named Goalkeeper-of-the-Year


CHANDIGARH

CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCC

� India had two

nominations — P.R.

Sreejesh and Harmanpreet

Singh

CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCC

MUMBAI: St. Andrews, ridden bySuraj Narredu, claimed theMalabar Hills Club Cup, the mainevent of Thursday’s (Feb.23) even-ing races here. The winner isowned by Mr. & Mrs. Shapoor P.Mistry rep. Manjri Horse Breed-ers’ Farm Pvt Ltd & Mr. DilipThomas rep. Rajagiri Rubber &Produce Co Ltd. and trained byBezan Chenoy.

THE RESULTS:

1 ACRES CLUB TROPHY (1,600m),Cl. IV, rated 20 to 46: ELSA

(Bhawani) 1, Flashing Honour(Dashrath) 2, Sumaaq (C.S.Jodha)3 and Nelsons Blood (Trevor) 4.Nk, 3/4, Lnk. 1m 39.03s. Rs. 445(w), 58, 15 and 16 (p). SHP: Rs. 35,Q: Rs. 459. Favourite: NelsonsBlood. Owners: Mr. Niraj Tyagiand Mr. Vikas Sachdeva rep. Blaz-ing Saddles. Trainer: SubhagSingh.

2 MALABAR HILLS CLUB CUP

(1,400m), Cl. II, rated 60 to 86:ST. ANDREWS (Suraj Narredu) 1,Khayyam ( J.Chinoy) 2, She Is Spe-cial (Dashrath) 3 and Jeannine(C.S.Jodha) 4. 1-1/2, 2, 3. 1m24.30s. Rs. 14 (w), 13 and 13 (p).SHP: Rs. 19, FP: Rs. 20, Q: Rs. 12,

Tanala: Rs. 42 and Rs. 17. Favour-ite: St. Andrews. Owners: Mr. &Mrs. Shapoor P.Mistry rep. ManjriHorse Breeders’ Farm Pvt Ltd &Mr. Dilip Thomas rep. Ragiri Rub-ber & Produce Co Ltd. Trainer:Bezan Chenoy.

3 BOMBAY PRESIDENCY RADIO

CLUB TROPHY (1,400m),Maiden, 3-y-o only: CAPRISCA

(Trevor) 1, Themis (Parmar) 2,Selfie Star (Sandesh) 3 andMassimo ( J.Chinoy) 4. 3/4, Nk, 4-1/2. 1m 24.75s. Rs. 28 (w), 13 and27 (p). SHP: Rs. 56, FP: Rs. 220, Q:Rs. 102, Tanala: Rs. 172 and Rs. 49.Favourite: Selfie Star. Owner: Mr.K.H. Vaccha. Trainer: Imtiaz Sait.

4 BOMBAY GYMKHANA TROPHY

(1,000m), Maiden, 3-y-o only:POKERFACE ( J. Chinoy) 1, Ascen-sion (Neeraj) 2, Wild Fire(Dashrath) 3 and Polynecies (Tre-vor) 4. 1-1/4, 1, 2-3/4. 58.94s. Rs. 99(w), 28, 13 and 15 (p). SHP: Rs. 34,FP: Rs. 130, Q: Rs. 38, Tanala: Rs.392 and Rs. 202. Favourite: Ascen-sion. Owners: Mr. Jaydev M. Modyrep. J.M. Livestock Pvt. Ltd.Trainer: Nosher Cama.

5 OTTERS’ CLUB TROPHY

(1,200m), Cl. IV, rated 20 to

46: POWER SHADOW (Trevor) 1,Zoom Zoom (A. Gaikwad) 2,Grande Vitesse (Nazil) 3 and Back-street Bay (Shubham) 4. Nk, 1/2,1/2. 1m 12.53s. Rs. 18 (w), 10, 23and 27 (p). SHP: Rs. 65, FP: Rs. 77,Q: Rs. 93, Tanala: Rs. 265 and Rs.106. Favourite: Power Shadow.Owners: Mr. Haresh N. Mehta andMr. Manav H. Mehta rep. RohanBloodstock Pvt Ltd. Trainer:Mansoor Shah.

6 NATIONAL SPORTS CLUB OF IN-

DIA TROPHY (1,200m), Cl. III,rated 40 to 66: ARTISTIC (A.Gaikwad) 1, Flashy Wings (Neeraj)2, An Jolie (Parmar) 3 and LordArazan ( J. Chinoy) 4. Not run: Re-member The Time. 1-1/4, 1, 1-1/2.1m 11.97s. Rs. 27 (w), 16 and 20(p). SHP: Rs. 35, FP: Rs. 165, Q: Rs.19, Tanala: Rs. 244 and Rs. 172. Fa-vourite: Beach Game. Owners:Mr. Kishore M. Dingra & M/s.Gautam Thapar & Sultan Singhrep. Sohna Stud Farm Pvt Ltd.Trainer: C.D. Katrak.

7 WILLINGDON SPORTS CLUB

CUP (1,200m), Cl. V, rated 1 to26: SUPER BOLT (S. Amit) 1, Dec-can King (Nadeem) 2, Ricardus(Ajinkya) 3 and Vitesse (Vishal) 4.

1-1/4, 3-3/4, Lnk. 1m 13.85s. Rs. 40(w), 10, 18 and 25 (p). SHP: Rs. 32,FP: Rs. 117, Q: Rs. 139, Tanala: Rs.493 and Rs. 201. Favourite: LuckyStrike. Owner & Trainer: MansoorShah.

8 CRICKET CLUB OF INDIA

TROPHY, DIV.I (1,200m), Cl. V,rated 1 to 26: KNIGHT’S QUEST

(Parmar) 1, Samurai ( Joseph) 2,Isinit (Merchant) 3 and BakerStreet (Zeeshan) 4. 1-1/4, Nose, 3.1m 12.84s. Rs. 45 (w), 16, 23 and 22(p). SHP: Rs. 45, FP: Rs. 105, Q: Rs.121, Tanala: Rs. 1,463 and Rs. 530.Favourite: Knight’s Quest. Own-ers: Mr. Vijay V. Shah rep. Vs ZaiaThoroughbred Racing & BreedingPvt Ltd, M/s. Syed MehmoodAhmed, G. Shewakramani & Mo-han Chattaram. Trainer: NarendraLagad.

Jackpot: 70 per cent: Rs. 10,824(29 tkts.) and 30 per cent: Rs. 954(141 tkts.).

Treble (i): Rs. 158 (54 tkts.); (ii):Rs. 564 (34 tkts.).

Super Jackpot: 70 per cent: Rs.18,922 (3 tkts.) and 30 per cent:Rs. 1,871 (13 tkts).

St. Andrews wins Malabar Hills Club Cup

BENGALURU: Life Awaits andGoldberg may fight out the finishof the Saptharishi Cup (1,200m),the main event of the races to beheld here on Friday (Feb. 24).

False rails (width about 7.5m from1,600m to the winning post) willbe in position.

1 MUDABIDRI PLATE (1,400m),rated 00 to 20, 5-y-o & over, 2-

15 pm: 1. Chicago (6) M. Naveen60, 2. Moher (3) P. Surya 60, 3.Galeno (8) Nazerul Alam 59.5, 4.Resemblance (5) Rayan Ahmed58.5, 5. Campfire (7) S. Shareef 57,6. Dontworrymonday (1) PraveenShinde 56.5, 7. Fioroloco (2) Dar-shah 56 and 8. Crazy Pineapple(4) Sunil Samson 55.5.

1. MOHER,

2. CHICAGO,

3. DONTWORRYMONDAY

2 MANDYA PLATE (1,600m),rated 30 to 50, 2-45: 1. Cadillac

Sky (2) S. John 60, 2. Tanoura (4)Jagadeesh 58.5, 3. Super Smart (5)Suraj Narredu 56, 4. Intrepid War-rior (3) Rayan Ahmed 54.5, 5.Fiorenzo (6) P. Trevor 54 and 6.Tinderella (1) David Allan 54.

1. TANOURA,

2. SUPER SMART

3 BUGS BUNNY TROPHY

(1,200m), 3-y-o only, (Terms),3-15: 1. Aafrikaan (6) Irvan Singh57, 2. Depth Charge (7) P.P. Dhebe57, 3. Lofty Thoughts (5) Srinath57, 4. Starry Wind (8) I. Chisty 57,5. Ultimate Power (2) Jagadeesh57, 6. Bos Indicus (4) VinodShinde 55.5, 7. Indian Rocket (-) (-)55.5, 8. Malana (1) David Allan55.5 and 9. Setaglow (3) P. Trevor55.5.1. SETAGLOW,

2. LOFTY THOUGHTS,

3. MALANA

4 DEVARAYANADURGA PLATE

(Div. I), (1,400m), rated 45 to65, 3-45: 1. Alexandrite (8) SurajNarredu 60, 2. Summerhill (7) P.Trevor 58.5, 3. Thomas More (6)N.S. Parwar 58.5, 4. Topaz (1) Dar-shah 58.5, 5. Honour (9) P.P.Dhebe 58, 6. Splendid Splasher(5) P. Surya 58, 7. Virat (4) RajeshKumar 57.5, 8. Native Elements (2)R. Manish 56.5, 9. El Fenix (10)Jagadeesh 56 and 10. King Of TheCourt (3) Indrajeet Singh 56.1. ALEXANDRITE, 2. SUMMERHILL,

3. THOMAS MORE

5 SAPTHARISHI CUP (1,200m),rated 60 & above, 4-15: 1. Gold-

berg (11) S. John 64.5, 2. LifeAwaits (5) Srinath 60.5, 3. Topspot

(9) Arshad Alam 59.5, 4. Ace Bad-raan (1) Anjar Alam 58.5, 5. SuperSuccess (12) Suraj Narredu 58.5, 6.Royal Defence (2) Rayan Ahmed55.5, 7. Taqdeer Ka Badshah (6)Rajesh Kumar 55.5, 8. Areca Won-der (10) P. Trevor 55, 9. EmperorCruise (4) M. Kumar 53, 10. Fab-ulous Touch (8) P.S. Chouhan 53,11. Saladin (3) David Allan 53 and12. Fourth Dimension (7)Jagadeesh 50.1. LIFE AWAITS,

2. GOLDBERG,

3. ACE BADRAAN

6 STAR OF WINDSOR PLATE

(1,400m), rated 15 to 35, 4-45:1. Erdemir (5) Srinath 60, 2. CalicoKing (3) K. Mukesh 59, 3. Anemos(6) Jagadeesh 56, 4. Mission Blue(2) I. Chisty 56, 5. Candice (7)Janardhan P 54, 6. Queenofgood-times (9) Md. Akram 54, 7. Prin-cess Holly (8) Rajesh Kumar 53, 8.Nagarjuna (1) Adarsh 52.5 and 9.Perfect Prince (4) A. Ramu 51.1. ERDEMIR,

2. MISSION BLUE,

3. PRINCESS HOLLY

7 ALCHEMY PLATE (1,200m),rated 15 to 35, 6-y-o & over, 5-

15: 1. Breaking Away (9) A. Ramu60, 2. Game Guy (10) Raja Rao 60,3. Cannes (8) Jaykumar 58, 4.

Flame’s Fury (6) Rajesh Kumar58, 5. Real Generous (12) Srinath57, 6. Anmol Hira (3) Syed Imran56, 7. Feet On Fire (1) NazerulAlam 56, 8. Carducci (7) Janard-han P 55.5, 9. Flying Bullet (2) B.Nayak 55.5, 10. Goat (11) R. Pra-deep 54.5, 11. Air Dancer (4)Jagadeesh 53.5 and 12. Scorching(5) Rayan Ahmed 53.5.1. REAL GENEROUS,

2. BREAKING AWAY,

3. AIR DANCER

8 DEVARAYANADURGA PLATE

(Div. II), (1,400m), rated 45 to65, 5-45: 1. I’ve Got Clout (4) S.John 60, 2. Possimpossible (8)Rayan Ahmed 57, 3. War Envoy(10) Srinath 57, 4. Colour Of Gold(2) Ramesh Kumar 57, 5. Hector(5) Jagadeesh 55.5, 6. Hidden Sol-dier (1) Rajesh Kumar 55.5, 7.Mariko (9) Vinod Shinde 55.5, 8.Royal Rein (11) Syed Imran 55.5, 9.Wise Guy (6) K. Mukesh 55.5, 10.Zafran (3) P. Trevor 55.5 and 11.Racing Fire (7) Suraj Narredu 55.1. WAR ENVOY,

2. HECTOR,

3. RACING FIRE

Day’s best: REAL GENEROUS

Double: ERDEMIR – WAR ENVOY

Jkt: 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8; Tr (i): 3, 4 and5; (ii): 6, 7 and 8.

It’s Life Awaits vs. Goldberg

RACING

Hamilton’s calls forrevival of Formula One

LONDON

Lewis Hamilton said thatFormula One was “outdated”as he urged Grand Prixracing’s new owners to lead arevival of the sport’sfortunes. “I don’t feelFormula One is winning, andit hasn’t been for a longtime,” Hamilton said. AFP

Sabeena begins infine fashion

Sabeena Athica began thedefence of her title in finefashion at the 27th Nationaltenpin bowling championship,opening up a 72-pin lead atthe top of the standings.The Tamil Nadu bowler sitsahead of Karnataka’s JudyAlban (1029) and Telangana’sSumathi Nallabantu (993) inthe women’s classification.Over on the men’s side,Shabbir Dhankot posted ascore of 1201 from the firstblock of six games in thesecond round to keep thelead.

Union Sports Minister VijayGoel had very encouragingwords for the Indian shoot-ers as he inaugurated thefirst World Cup of the seasonat the Dr. Karni Singh Range,Tughlakabad, on Thursday.

Though he named GaganNarang, Heena Sidhu, JituRai and Chain Singh, theSports Minister exhorted allthe Indian shooters, whatwith the host fielding thelargest contingent of 63shooters, to follow in thefootprints of the country’sonly individual Olympic goldmedallist Abhinav Bindraand bring glory to thenation.

“I call upon everyone tofollow Abhinav Bindra andmake a lot of records,” theMinister said, after declaringthe World Cup open, in thepresence of ISSF presidentOlegario Vazquez Rana andsecretary-general FranzSchreiber.

“I have great expectationsfrom our shooters and lookforward to their perform-ances over the next week,”Goel said.

The Sports Minister re-called that the shootingrange, built for the 1982Asian Games had been con-siderably developed over theyears to world class stand-ards and expressed happi-ness that it would host theWorld Cup Finals in October,and also another World Cupin 2019, which would offerOlympic quota places in rifleand pistol for the TokyoOlympics.

He also pointed out that

the formation of the sportsministry had helped in tak-ing such elite sports likeshooting to the commonman.

“I am happy to be here inthis beautiful city again, saidVazquez Rana. Commendingthe organisers for the “excel-lent arrangements, hospital-ity and friendship”, he said

Delhi would be the centreof attention for the shootingworld for the next 10 days.

With the ISSF having con-ducted its general assemblyand executive committeemeetings here over the lasttwo days, top officials as wellas shooters from 50 coun-tries, enjoyed a crisp open-ing ceremony, after NationalRifle Association of Indiapresident Raninder Singhwelcomed the gathering.

Gagan Narang and HeenaSidhu took the oath on be-

half of the athletes, whileDhiren Bhatia and anotherdelegate from abroad tookthe oath on behalf of theofficials.

An energetic dance showby the Zenith troupe, to amix of Western and Indiannumbers, along with a bril-liant ‘hand shadowgraphy’by Amar Sen, kept everyoneentertained on a pleasantevening, on the eve ofcompetition.

The opening day’s pro-gramme on Friday will havemen’s and women’s air rifleapart from women’s trapfinals.

There will also be the firststage of competition inmen’s rapid fire pistol as wellas trap.

NRAI secretary-generalD.V. Seetharama Rao pro-posed a vote of thanks.

Go for it, Vijay Goeltells IndiansShooting World Cup inaugurated in Delhi

We swear!Gagan Narang and Heena Sidhu take the oath onbehalf of the shooters.

Kamesh Srinivasan

NEW DELHI

The International ShootingSport Federation (ISSF) hasofficially announced thatNew Delhi would host therifle and pistol World Cup in2019, which would offerOlympic quota places forTokyo 2020, following itsAdministrative and Execut-ive Committee meetings inthe Capital over the last twodays.

The other three WorldCups in 2019 would be heldin Munich, Beijing and Riode Janeiro. The shotgunWorld Cups will be held inChangwon, Lahti, Al Ain andAcapulco.

While deciding that theWorld Cup Final in shotgunwould be held in Al Ain,UAE, in 2018, the committeehas kept pending the de-cision to allot the rifle andpistol World Cup Final for2018.

The ISSF also approvedthe recommendations of itsad hoc committee for the in-troduction of three mixeddoubles events in air rifle,air pistol and trap, toachieve gender neutrality assuggested by the Interna-tional Olympic Committee.

A fundemantal step

“We believe this is a funda-mental step forward for ourbeloved sport,” the ISSFpresident, Olegario VazquezRana, was quoted as sayingby the ISSF.

“We want to retain 15Olympic events, preserveequality in our three discip-lines, rifle, pistol and shot-gun, and offer all female andmale athletes the same op-portunities.

Shooting is one of the old-est and most universalsports of the world, inclu-sion is part of our DNA,” saidRana.

India gets 2019 rileand pistol WC


NEW DELHI

Other World Cups to be in Munich,Beijing and Rio de Janeiro

Samir sizzlesNEW DELHI: Five goals bySamir Suhag powered SonaPolo to a 6-1 victory overCavalier/Drakon in a leaguematch of the Maharaja JiwajiRao Scindia Gold Cup 10-goalpolo tournament here onThursday.The results (league): SonaPolo 6 (Samir Suhag 5,Abhimanyu Pthak) bt Cavalier/Drakon 1 (Basheer Ali).

Kabir overcomesAnuragKOLKATA: Kabir Hansovercame a strong challengefrom Anurag Agarwal 6-4,4-6, 7-5 to book a berth in theunder-16 boys’ singlessemifinals of the SunfeastAITA Super Series juniortennis tournament at theCalcutta South Club here onThursday.The results (quarterfinals):

Boys: U-16: Rhythm Malhotrabt Asish Sinha 6-3, 6-3; UditGogoi bt Aryan Pandit 6-2, 5-7,6-1; Aman Dahiya bt AbhishekMohapatra 6-2, 6-4; Kabir Hansbt Anurag Agarwal 6-4, 4-6,7-5.

U-14: Udit Gogoi bt AbhishekMohapatra 6-4, 6-1; GirishChougule bt Kartik Saxena 6-2,6-1; Aman Dahiya bt KritantaSarma 6-4, 6-1; Rudra Kapoor bt

Sanjith Devineni 6-2, 6-1.

Girls: U-16: RituparnaChoudhury bt Ria Washimkar6-0, 6-1; Ishita Singh btMekhala Manna 6-1, 6-4;Sunskriti Damera bt AditiNarayan 6-1, 6-0.

U-14: Sunskriti Damera btDeepshika Sriram 6-2, 6-2;Mekhala Manna bt RiaWashimkar 6-1, 6-2; JoshikaPremkumar bt Aditi Narayan6-1, 7-6(6); Sanya Masand btHrudaya Shah 6-1, 7-6(5).

DSPORT TO beam

Daytona 500 live

KOLKATA: Discovery’s DSPORTchannel will telecast theDaytona 500 race, alsoknown as the GreatAmerican Race or theSuperbowl of Stock CarRacing, for the Indianviewers on February 26.

NASCAR Daytona 500 will bebeamed live from 1.30 a.m.on Sunday.

Among the celebrateddrivers participating in theevent will be Joey Logano(Ford), Jimmie Johnson(Cheverolet), Kyle Burch(Toyota), Kevin Harvick(Ford) and (the only womandriver) Danica Patrick (Ford).

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\ REGIONAL ROUNDUP \

SPORTEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE



Juventus edged closer to theChampions Leaguequarterfinals after second-half goals from Marko Pjacaand Dani Alves earned it a2-0 away win at 10-manPorto in a last-16 first-leg tieon Wednesday.

Porto’s downfall waspartly self-inflicted after leftback Alex Telles received ared card in the 27th minutefollowing two senselessbookings in the space of 90seconds.

Despite holding Juventusat bay for 72 minutes, Porto’sresolve was broken whenMiguel Layun deflectedPaulo Dybala’s pass into thepath of Pjaca who slammedit past Iker Casillas.

Dani Alves made sure ofvictory two minutes laterwhen he controlled Alex

Sandro’s cross with his chestbefore finishing calmly.

“We can be happy as it’s areally good result, but to behonest after the first-half redcard, we had to win thisgame,” said Juventus mid-fielder Sami Khedira.

“It’s absolutely not over,”he added. “We’re happy withtonight but in three weekswe’ll need to be careful asPorto are angry and havenothing to lose.”

Meanwhile in Seville,Jamie Vardy gave LeicesterCity some hope of staying inEurope’s elite competitiondespite a 2-1 loss to Sevilla.

Pablo Sarabia headed thehost into the lead in the 25thminute after KasperSchmeichel had saved Joa-quin Correa's penalty.

Correa made amends bynetting in the 62nd.

Sevilla had 80% of posses-sion in the first half, and ittook a number of brilliantsaves from Schmeichel tokeep it in the game.

Vardy made the most of arare attacking opportunityfor the struggling Englishchampion by blasting in across from Danny Drinkwa-ter from close range in the73rd minute and ClaudioRanieri's side was fortunatenot to concede late on whenAdil Rami’s header smashedagainst the crossbar.

The results: At Porto: FC Porto0 lost to Juventus 2 (Pjaca 72,Dani Alves 74).

At Seville: Sevilla 2 (Sarabia 25,Correa 62) bt Leicester City 1(Vardy 73).

Late strikes give Juventus edge over PortoJamie Vardy scores a late away goal to keep Leicester’s hopes alive against SevillaReuters

Porto

Marksman:Marko Pjaca (left) latched on to a ball fromMiguel Layun and slammed it home toopen Juventus’ account against Porto onWednesday. AFP

UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE

Two goals in the openingnine minutes from SimoneZaza and Fabian Orellanablew the La Liga title racewide open as Valencia beatleader Real Madrid 2-1.

The defeat leaves Madridjust a single point clear ofBarcelona and three pointsahead of Sevilla and now en-joys just a game in hand

over their title rivals.

“We lost this match in theopening ten minutes, tenbad minutes where we lettwo goals in,” Real coach Zi-nedine Zidane said.

“I’m not worried, I’mangry more than anything,because we only haveourselves to blame.”

The result: Valencia 2 (Zaza 4,Orellana 9) bt Real Madrid 1(Cristiano Ronaldo 44).

Valencia stuns Real

Zaza, Orellana strike for the winner

On cloud nine: Fabian Orellana celebrates his goal. AP

Agence France-Presse

MADRID

Ind v Aus: 1st Test, STAR1, 3 & HD1, 3, 9.30 a.m.

La Liga: Sony Six & SixHD, 1.10 a.m. (Saturday).

NBA: Sony Six & Six HD,6.30 a.m. (Saturday).

TV PICKS

Second seed Vishnu Vard-han battled past MohitMayur 6-3, 7-6(7) in thequarterfinals of the$15,000 ITF Futures tennistournament on Thursday.The results: Quarterfinals:Sriram Balaji bt Mateusz Ter-czynski (Pol) 6-0, 7-5; VijaySundar Prashanth bt ShaneVinsant (USA) 6-2, 6-4; SasiKumar Mukund bt HaadinBava 6-1, 6-4; Vishnu Vardhanbt Mohit Mayur 6-3, 7-6(7).Doubles quarterfinals: SriramBalaji & Vishnu Vardhan btTimur Khabibulin (Kaz) & VMRanjeet 6-1, 6-2; PriminHaenle (Ger) & Shane Vinsant(USA) bt Jui-Chen Hung (Tpe)& Karunuday Singh 6-1, 4-6,10-8; Rishab Agarwal & NikiPoonacha bt Vijayant Malik &Sidharth Rawat 7-5, 6-3; Mo-hit Mayur & Vijay SundarPrashanth bt Mateusz Ter-czynski (Pol) & Jose Fco. VidalAzorin (Esp) 6-2, 6-4. Firstround: Jui-Chen Hung (Tpe) &Karunuday Singh bt AryanGoveas & Dhruv Sunish 6-3,6-3; Mohit Mayur & VijaySundar Prashanth bt AnirudhChandrasekar & P.C. Vignesh6-2, 6-4.

Vishnu insemiinalsSports Bureau

JORHAT

Vani Kapoor’s final roundeven-par on Thursday sawher win the fourth leg ofthe Hero women’s Profes-sional Golf Tour.The scores:

Vani Kapoor (70, 73, 70)213; Amandeep Drall (71, 72,74) 217; Saaniya Sharma (69,76, 73) and Sharmila Nicollet(75, 67, 76) 218; Afsan Fatima(74, 74, 73) 221; Smriti Mehra(72, 76, 74) 222; Neha Tripathi(78, 73, 72) 223.

Vani winsSpecial Correspondent

KOLKATA

Saurabh sizzles, givesIndia u-19 the leadNAGPUR

Saurabh Singh’s 109 gaveIndia under-19 a slenderfirst-innings lead againstEngland on day three of thesecond ‘Test’ on Thursday.Daryl Ferrario (55), SiddharthAkre (54) and AbhishekGoswami (58) were theothers who chipped in as thehosts declared at 388 for ninein reply to England’s 375.The scores:England 375 & 34 for two innine overs vs India 388 fornine decl. (Abhishek Goswami58, Saurabh Singh 109, DarylFerrario 55, Siddharth Akre54). PTI

Mixed day forKyra ShroffNEW DELHI

Kyra Shroff lost in the secondround of singles but made thedoubles semifinals of the$15,000 ITF women’s tennistournament in Sharm ElSheikh on Thursday.The results:$15,000 ITFwomen, SharmEl Sheikh: Second round:Yuliya Hatouka (Blr) bt KyraShroff 6-1, 6-1.Doublesquarterfinals: EmilyWebleySmith (GBr) & Kyra Shroff btElena Bogdan &Miriam BiancaBulgaru (Rou) 6-4, 6-2.

A big off-seasonchallenge: Eating!SILVERSTONE

New F1 regulations will seefaster cars, and greaterG-forces on the drivers.That will mean the leanerdrivers — like Force India’sEsteban Ocon — will have tobulk up. The 20-year-old hashad to incorporate eating intohis off-season preparations!“It’s been a very hard trainingregime and not only thetraining, but the eating,” hesaid at the launch of theteam’s new VJM10 car atSilverstone on Wednesday.“I had to eat so much food!”AGENCIES

IN BRIEF

Chinese underdog TanZhongyi upstaged a sur-prisingly passive D. Harikain the opening game oftheir semifinal clash in thewomen’s World chesschampionship here onThursday. Playing black,Harika chose to be too de-fensive for her own com-fort and Zhongyi seized thechance to launch a severeoffensive on the castledking. Harika’s fortress wascrushed and she gave upon the 44th move.

On Friday, fourth seedHarika faces a must-winsituation with white to stayalive in the competition.

In the other semifinal,second seed AnnaMuzychuk, playing black,defeated third-seededformer champion Alexan-dra Kosteniuk in 64 moves.

Harika losesirst gameSports Bureau

Tehran

Six venues across the coun-try are close to being called‘ready’ to host the FIFA Un-der-17 World Cup, feels thetournament director JavierCeppi.

After having guided Chilesuccessfully through thesame event in 2015, Ceppisays India presents its ownsets of challenges. But thepreparations have been “90per cent” up to the mark.

The fixtures for the 52match tournament, sched-uled to be held in Octoberthis year, would be an-nounced after the final set ofinspections by a FIFA teamin March.

“Preparing the Salt LakeStadium, which could ac-commodate 1,20,000 peopleat one time, was a humong-

ous task. The progress hasbeen very satisfactory and Iam sure by the time the FIFAteam comes visiting, 90 to95 per cent work on the coreinfrastructure would becompleted,” said Ceppi.

Keeping in mind the in-terests of football aficion-ados in the country, ticketprices would be kept below ₹100 for a match. “We will belaunching tickets by mid-May. I cannot reveal the pri-cing, but it would be eco-nomical and definitely lessthan going to a movie. Theidea is you can watch aWorld Cup match for lessthan ₹ 100,” Ceppi said.

Asked about the prepara-tions at other venues, Ceppisounded satisfied sayingeach one of them offeredsomething remarkable.

“Being a private stadium,

the DY Patil stadium sets adifferent benchmark. Guwa-hati (Indira Gandhi Stadium)has done well to get things inplace and the training ven-ues in Delhi are quite good.Goa had got everythingready before AFC U-16 tour-nament last year.”

Talking about Delhi’schances, Ceppi said the Na-tional capital will hostmatches but there is a con-cern about the air quality inthe city post Diwali.

“We know that there is airquality concern post-Diwali.It has nothing to do withDelhi hosting matches. Letme be very clear that Delhiwill host matches. What isbeing analysed now are themeasures that could betaken to lessen the impacton the tournament post Di-wali,” Ceppi said.


KOLKATA

Under-17WC tickets tobe priced below ₹100

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