16
A fter two years and involve- ment of four top organisa- tions, including the prestigious IITs for track augmentation between Mughalsarai and Allahabad Junction, the route remains a nightmare for trains. The situation has gone from bad to worse this year in par- ticular. After the onset of the fog, trains, including Rajdhanis, are taking nearly 14 hours to cover a distance of 140 km between the two stations. Allahabad junction also caters to trains bound to Mumbai and other central and southern Indian destinations besides New Delhi and beyond. During the last one week, New Delhi-bound trains from Bihar, West Bengal, Odisha and North Eastern regions have almost reached on time till Mughalsarai, but reaching Allahabad from there has proved to be a nightmare for them. In most cases, it has taken even superfast trains 12 hours to cover this journey. For instance, New Delhi- bound Bhubaneswar Rajdhani took 13 hours from Mughalsarai to Allahabad. Similarly, Bhagalpur-Anand Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad and Mughalsarai. Last year, the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) had sought explanation from Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu over the reason for late running of trains based on the complaints by passengers and had asked the Ministry to fix the problem on priority. The Ministry then had swung into action and a top Railway official was made to camp at Allahabad junction to examine the reasons for the delays in the NCR and ECR zone. The enquiry found that the maximum number of trains were delayed on New Delhi- Howrah route, particularly in the Patna-Mughalsarai- Allahabad section due to sev- eral asset failures like signalling, engines and track problems. In his Budget speech this year, Prabhu had pointed that punctuality performance of passenger trains was a matter of concern for several decades. He also admitted that the Ghaziabad to Mughalsarai sec- tion (through Allahabad and Kanpur which spreads across three Zonal Railways) badly impacted the overall punctu- ality of the entire network. “We initiated the audit of operations on this section to improve our performance. Some improvement is already visible and capacity augmen- tation in the medium term will further reduce the delays,” Prabhu had stated in the Budget speech. The Railway Ministry last year joined hands with its engi- neering consultancy company Rail India Technical and Economic Service (RITES) and IITs to find a way out to solve the problem of late running of trains in the country. The ini- tial report submitted to the Railway Minister indicated that the delay of one train on the “erratic” Allahabad- Mughalsarai section is having a cascading effect on punctuali- ty of all the trains on the route. The Zonal Railways administration conveyed to the Ministry of Railways that it is “impossible” for them to maintain the scheduled timings because of non-completion of track augmentation exercise. The delay is also related to the Railway Ministry’s new caution guidelines to the dri- vers of passenger and express- es train that they should run the train as per visibility restric- tions. In the past, trains were allowed to be pulled at an average speed of 60 kmph even in foggy conditions. . “This year, the situation is worse as the train operators have been directed to limit their speed as per their per- sonal visibility. The trains between Mughalsarai to Kanpur have been running at a speed of less than 10 kmph ever since the setting of fog,” said a senior railway official jus- tifying the inordinate delay. On Thursday and Friday foggy weather conditions in northern India disrupted over 100 trains. F or the workers and daily wagers of Okhla, Bawana and Patparganj industrial areas, life has come full circle due to demonetisation of 500 and 1,000 notes. Hundreds of daily wagers have left their workplaces and are returning to their villages as they are either being paid wages in old notes, or not getting payments on time, or losing the job. With the cash crunch looming large, workers have been reportedly told by their masters that they are not sure whether they will get their dues in the next month. Factory owners normally pay to their workers on the 10th of every month but they have been paying them early that too in the form of the scrapped currency notes, forc- ing the workers and daily wagers to stand for hours in the queue in the banks to deposit their money and then withdraw it in the form of new notes. While many have left their work, some are hoping against the hope and willing to plough through this difficult period. Labourer Ramadhir, while picking up a carton of crockery, told The Pioneer, “We have to do our work. This is our only source of income. We received our salary last month in old denomination notes. I get 8,000 as my salary. I even got 4,000, all in old 500 and 1000 notes, as advance in the current month and I hope to see some new 500 and 2,000 notes once the cash crisis ends. “How long will I survive with old notes? It is painful to get them changed and after exchanging them I need to send money home. My father is admitted to a Government hospital back home. I need to send some money. When I ask the factory owner, all he shows me are old notes,” said Kumar. Meanwhile, factory owners in Outer Delhi’s Bawana Industrial area persuaded labourers to accept half of their salaries in new currency notes and the balance later once the cash flow is normal. Workers said they have no other choice but to accept the conditions of their employers as they do not have any other source of income. Continued on Page 4 A s fog continues to blanket Delhi and other parts of India with low visibility impact- ing flight operations, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), United States, on Friday cate- gorised as “red” flight timings at Indian airports. Eight flights from the Indira Gandhi International Airport were cancelled, leaving passengers in the lurch. The Delhi International Airport Limited (DIAL) said more than 60 flights were delayed and diverted at the Indira Gandhi International Airport. “New Delhi experi- enced a thick blanket of fog. At 8.30 am, visibility at Palam area was less than 50 metres and at Safdarjung was 300 metres. This improved to 600 and 800 metres by 11 am,” said an offi- cial from the India Meteorological Department (IMD). According to FAA, the excessive delay rate was “five” while the visibility was one mile barely. In weather conditions, the airport was tagged under “smoky” status. Around 24 Asian airports come under the FAA regular observation on flight operations. Other prominent airports of India, like Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport, Mumbai, were also categorised under “excessive delay” by the FAA. Its visibility was only two miles. Comparatively, the neigh- bouring airport at the Beijing Capital International Airport has improved the flight timings. The FAA has rated the excessive delay at “two” while the Flight Delay Index (FDI) has been marked with “low delay” status. The visibility was recorded six miles. The Shanghai airport received a “significant delay” sta- tus with the delay rate at “3.25”. Meanwhile, Bangkok’s Survarnabhumi airport has come under “moderate” FDI status as the flight delay rate was 2.50. In Kuala Lumpur International Airport, the vis- ibility was six miles. The delay rate was 0.75. While speaking to The Pioneer, Group Captain of the India Meteorological Department (IMD) RK Vishan said, “The sky will remain clear, however, moderate or dense fog can be witnessed in wee hours of Saturday. The maximum temperature would be around 25 degrees Celsius and mini- mum temperature will remain at 11 degrees Celsius.” Dense fog engulfed the National Capital Region (NCR) limiting the visibility to less than 50 metres at some places, affecting the transport ser- vices. Over 70 trains were run- ning behind schedule and at least 12 were rescheduled. “The entire North India was affected by heavy fog on Friday. Magadh Express is run- ning 25 hours behind the schedule and Seemanchal Express is running late by 20 hours,” said an official from the Indian Northern Railways. U ttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Friday appeared not averse to an alliance with the Congress for UP Assembly polls, saying such a combine can win over 300 seats in the 403-member House, but firmly ruled out any tie-up with the BSP. Only last month, Samajwadi Party supremo and Akhilesh’s father Mulayam Singh Yadav had ruled out any pre-poll alliance and asserted that there can only be mergers. Replying to a volley of ques- tions on a possible tie-up with Congress against the backdrop of its poll strategist Prashant Kishor meeting Mulayam and and himself later, the Chief Minister said that a final deci- sion on the alliance will be taken by the SP supremo and he can only give suggestions. Akhilesh also suggested that the Congress will have to accept that it may have to fight on a fewer number of seats than it wants in an alliance because a tie-up will not work out if it keeps thinking about “profit and loss”. He also hit back at BSP chief Mayawati, who had recently mocked him for call- ing her ‘bua’, saying her prob- lem is that BSP is not in con- tention to capture power and added that he will no longer call her ‘bua’ (father’s sister). “When there is an alliance, somebody has to accept that he will get fewer number of seats (to contest). Continued on Page 4 A political slugfest erupted on Friday in the national Capital with its epicenter in Kolkatta when West Bengal Chief Minister cried foul over Army’s “routine exercise” in Bengal and Army dismissed the politics over it. The Army released four letters that it had sent to different authorities in West Bengal, informing them about its operations in the State and requesting their cooperation. The Central Government expressed shock over attempts to politicise the Army’s “routine exercise” in West Bengal and said it was “coordinated by State Police”. Trinamool Congress MPs raised the issue in the two Houses of Parliament seeing “sinister designs” behind the Army taking over toll plazas in the State. The main Opposition Congress and the BSP too joined hands with the TMC seeking clarification on the Army deployment at 19 toll plazas in West Bengal. Uttar Paradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav also backed Mamata. Continued on Page 4 I n a major crackdown on bank employees involved in irregularities post-demoneti- sation, the Government on Friday suspended as many as 27 senior officials of various public sector banks (PSBs) and transferred six others. The move of the Government comes at a time when reports of Income Tax authorities conducting search and seizure in many places. In one of such raids, Rs 5.7 crore cash in new currency notes was recovered from two business- men in Bengaluru. Some other cases have also come to notice of officials involved in carrying out irregular transactions in violation of the guidelines of Reserve Bank of India (RBI), according to the Finance Ministry statement. C BI Additional Director Rakesh Asthana has been given additional charge of CBI Director on the retirement of Anil Sinha on Friday. Asthana, a Gujarat cadre 1984 batch IPS officer, is expected to hold the additional charge till the high- level committee comprising Prime Minister, Chief Justice of India and Leader of the main Opposition in the Lok Sabha select a full-time CBI chief. It is the first time in last 10 years that no new CBI chief has been named in time to succeed an incumbent. Sinha completed his two-year tenure on Friday. “The competent authority has approved assignment of additional charge of the post of Director, Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), Continued on Page 4

Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

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Page 1: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

�������������������� ��������������������� ����������� ������������� ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� ������!�!"�������������#$��! �����%�����������������$$���&�����������������#���������%����������#�$$����$�%����������������������'�������!����������������������������������������� ������������������������(�����������������������������)����������� ������������'��������!������&������������������*++!+� ��,-��&������������������������������������#������ ����������������%(

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After two years and involve-ment of four top organisa-

tions, including the prestigiousIITs for track augmentationbetween Mughalsarai andAllahabad Junction, the routeremains a nightmare for trains.The situation has gone frombad to worse this year in par-ticular. After the onset of thefog, trains, including Rajdhanis,are taking nearly 14 hours tocover a distance of 140 kmbetween the two stations.Allahabad junction also catersto trains bound to Mumbai andother central and southernIndian destinations besidesNew Delhi and beyond.

During the last one week,New Delhi-bound trains fromBihar, West Bengal, Odishaand North Eastern regions

have almost reached on time tillMughalsarai, but reachingAllahabad from there hasproved to be a nightmare forthem. In most cases, it hastaken even superfast trains 12hours to cover this journey.

For instance, New Delhi-bound Bhubaneswar Rajdhanitook 13 hours from Mughalsaraito Allahabad. Similarly,Bhagalpur-Anand Vihar, whichreached Mughalsarai around9.30 pm on Thursday, reachedAllahabad on Friday morning at9.40 am. Around 75 trains havebeen running late by over 10hours between Allahabad andMughalsarai.

Last year, the PrimeMinister’s Office (PMO) hadsought explanation fromRailway Minister SureshPrabhu over the reason for laterunning of trains based on the

complaints by passengers andhad asked the Ministry to fixthe problem on priority.

The Ministry then hadswung into action and a topRailway official was made tocamp at Allahabad junction toexamine the reasons for thedelays in the NCR and ECRzone. The enquiry found thatthe maximum number of trainswere delayed on New Delhi-Howrah route, particularly inthe Patna-Mughalsarai-Allahabad section due to sev-eral asset failures like signalling,engines and track problems.

In his Budget speech thisyear, Prabhu had pointed thatpunctuality performance ofpassenger trains was a matterof concern for several decades.He also admitted that theGhaziabad to Mughalsarai sec-tion (through Allahabad and

Kanpur which spreads acrossthree Zonal Railways) badlyimpacted the overall punctu-ality of the entire network.

“We initiated the audit ofoperations on this section toimprove our performance.Some improvement is alreadyvisible and capacity augmen-tation in the medium term willfurther reduce the delays,”Prabhu had stated in theBudget speech.

The Railway Ministry lastyear joined hands with its engi-neering consultancy companyRail India Technical andEconomic Service (RITES) andIITs to find a way out to solvethe problem of late running oftrains in the country. The ini-tial report submitted to theRailway Minister indicated thatthe delay of one train on the“erratic” Allahabad-Mughalsarai section is having acascading effect on punctuali-ty of all the trains on the route.

The Zonal Railwaysadministration conveyed to

the Ministry of Railways that itis “impossible” for them tomaintain the scheduled timingsbecause of non-completion oftrack augmentation exercise.

The delay is also related tothe Railway Ministry’s newcaution guidelines to the dri-vers of passenger and express-es train that they should runthe train as per visibility restric-tions. In the past, trains wereallowed to be pulled at anaverage speed of 60 kmph evenin foggy conditions. .

“This year, the situation isworse as the train operatorshave been directed to limittheir speed as per their per-sonal visibility. The trainsbetween Mughalsarai toKanpur have been running ata speed of less than 10 kmphever since the setting of fog,”said a senior railway official jus-tifying the inordinate delay.

On Thursday and Fridayfoggy weather conditions innorthern India disrupted over100 trains.

���������������� �����������������������������������

���������������"������������� +4���4 �/

For the workers and dailywagers of Okhla, Bawana

and Patparganj industrial areas,life has come full circle due todemonetisation of �500 and�1,000 notes. Hundreds ofdaily wagers have left theirworkplaces and are returning totheir villages as they are eitherbeing paid wages in old notes,or not getting payments ontime, or losing the job. Withthe cash crunch looming large,workers have been reportedlytold by their masters that theyare not sure whether they willget their dues in the nextmonth.

Factory owners normallypay to their workers on the10th of every month but theyhave been paying them earlythat too in the form of thescrapped currency notes, forc-ing the workers and dailywagers to stand for hours in thequeue in the banks to deposittheir money and then withdraw it in the form of new notes.

While many have left theirwork, some are hoping againstthe hope and willing to ploughthrough this difficult period.Labourer Ramadhir, whilepicking up a carton of crockery,told The Pioneer, “We have to do our work. This is our onlysource of income. We received our salary last monthin old denomination notes. I get �8,000 as my salary. I even got �4,000, all in old �500 and �1000 notes, as advance in the current

month and I hope to see somenew �500 and �2,000 notesonce the cash crisis ends.

“How long will I survivewith old notes? It is painful toget them changed and afterexchanging them I need tosend money home. My fatheris admitted to a Governmenthospital back home. I need tosend some money. When I askthe factory owner, all he showsme are old notes,” said Kumar.

Meanwhile, factory ownersin Outer Delhi’s BawanaIndustrial area persuadedlabourers to accept half of theirsalaries in new currency notesand the balance later once thecash f low is normal. Workers said they have no other choice but to acceptthe conditions of their employers as they do not haveany other source of income.

Continued on Page 4

�������� ��� +4���4 �/�

As fog continues to blanketDelhi and other parts of

India with low visibility impact-ing flight operations, the FederalAviation Administration (FAA),United States, on Friday cate-gorised as “red” flight timings atIndian airports.

Eight flights from theIndira Gandhi InternationalAirport were cancelled, leavingpassengers in the lurch.

The Delhi InternationalAirport Limited (DIAL) saidmore than 60 flights weredelayed and diverted at theIndira Gandhi InternationalAirport. “New Delhi experi-enced a thick blanket of fog. At8.30 am, visibility at Palam areawas less than 50 metres and atSafdarjung was 300 metres.This improved to 600 and 800metres by 11 am,” said an offi-cial from the IndiaMeteorological Department(IMD).

According to FAA, theexcessive delay rate was “five”while the visibility was one milebarely. In weather conditions,the airport was tagged under“smoky” status. Around 24Asian airports come under theFAA regular observation onflight operations.

Other prominent airportsof India, like Chhatrapati ShivajiInternational Airport, Mumbai,were also categorised under“excessive delay” by the FAA. Itsvisibility was only two miles.

Comparatively, the neigh-bouring airport at the BeijingCapital International Airporthas improved the flight timings.The FAA has rated the excessivedelay at “two” while the FlightDelay Index (FDI) has beenmarked with “low delay” status.The visibility was recorded sixmiles. The Shanghai airportreceived a “significant delay” sta-tus with the delay rate at “3.25”.

Meanwhile, Bangkok’sSurvarnabhumi airport has

come under “moderate” FDIstatus as the flight delay ratewas 2.50. In Kuala LumpurInternational Airport, the vis-ibility was six miles. The delayrate was 0.75.

While speaking to ThePioneer, Group Captain of theIndia MeteorologicalDepartment (IMD) RK Vishansaid, “The sky will remain clear,however, moderate or dense fogcan be witnessed in wee hoursof Saturday. The maximumtemperature would be around25 degrees Celsius and mini-mum temperature will remain

at 11 degrees Celsius.”Dense fog engulfed the

National Capital Region (NCR)limiting the visibility to lessthan 50 metres at some places,affecting the transport ser-vices. Over 70 trains were run-ning behind schedule and atleast 12 were rescheduled.

“The entire North Indiawas affected by heavy fog onFriday. Magadh Express is run-ning 25 hours behind theschedule and SeemanchalExpress is running late by 20hours,” said an official from theIndian Northern Railways.

� �� ���� +4���4 �/

Uttar Pradesh ChiefMinister Akhilesh Yadav

on Friday appeared not averseto an alliance with the Congressfor UP Assembly polls, sayingsuch a combine can win over

300 seats in the 403-memberHouse, but firmly ruled out anytie-up with the BSP.

Only last month,Samajwadi Party supremo and

Akhilesh’s father MulayamSingh Yadav had ruled out anypre-poll alliance and assertedthat there can only be mergers.Replying to a volley of ques-tions on a possible tie-up withCongress against the backdropof its poll strategist PrashantKishor meeting Mulayam andand himself later, the ChiefMinister said that a final deci-sion on the alliance will betaken by the SP supremo andhe can only give suggestions.

Akhilesh also suggestedthat the Congress will have toaccept that it may have to fight

on a fewer number of seats thanit wants in an alliance becausea tie-up will not work out if itkeeps thinking about “profitand loss”. He also hit back atBSP chief Mayawati, who hadrecently mocked him for call-ing her ‘bua’, saying her prob-lem is that BSP is not in con-tention to capture power andadded that he will no longercall her ‘bua’ (father’s sister).

“When there is an alliance,somebody has to accept that hewill get fewer number of seats(to contest).

Continued on Page 4

���������������� +4���4 �/�

Apolitical slugfest eruptedon Friday in the national

Capital with its epicenter inKolkatta when West BengalChief Minister cried foul overArmy’s “routine exercise” inBengal and Army dismissedthe politics over it. The Armyreleased four letters that it hadsent to different authorities inWest Bengal, informing themabout its operations in theState and requesting theircooperation.

The Central Governmentexpressed shock over attempts

to politicise the Army’s “routineexercise” in West Bengal andsaid it was “coordinated byState Police”.

Trinamool Congress MPsraised the issue in the twoHouses of Parliament seeing“sinister designs” behind theArmy taking over toll plazas inthe State.

The main OppositionCongress and the BSP toojoined hands with the TMCseeking clarification on theArmy deployment at 19 tollplazas in West Bengal. UttarParadesh Chief MinisterAkhilesh Yadav also backed Mamata.

Continued on Page 4

����������� �������������������������������������� +4���4 �/

In a major crackdown onbank employees involved in

irregularities post-demoneti-sation, the Government onFriday suspended as many as27 senior officials of variouspublic sector banks (PSBs) andtransferred six others.

The move of theGovernment comes at a timewhen reports of Income Tax

authorities conducting searchand seizure in many places. Inone of such raids, Rs 5.7 crorecash in new currency notes wasrecovered from two business-men in Bengaluru. Some othercases have also come to noticeof officials involved in carryingout irregular transactions inviolation of the guidelines ofReserve Bank of India (RBI),according to the FinanceMinistry statement.

����������������������������������������������������������������������

��������������� ���� ���

����� +4���4 �/

CBI Additional DirectorRakesh Asthana has been

given additional charge of CBIDirector on the retirement ofAnil Sinha on Friday. Asthana,a Gujarat cadre 1984 batch IPSofficer, is expected to hold theadditional charge till the high-level committee comprisingPrime Minister, Chief Justice ofIndia and Leader of the mainOpposition in the Lok Sabhaselect a full-time CBI chief.

It is the first time in last 10years that no new CBI chief hasbeen named in time to succeedan incumbent. Sinha completedhis two-year tenure on Friday.

“The competent authorityhas approved assignment ofadditional charge of the post ofDirector, Central Bureau ofInvestigation (CBI),

Continued on Page 4

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Page 2: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

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The Delhi Government hasset a target of setting up

1,000 mohalla clinics by Marchnext year to provide “qualityhealth services” to all Delhiites,said Chief Minister ArvindKejriwal after inaugurating twofirst mohalla clinics at night shel-ter complexes at Dandi Park andSarai Kale Khan ISBT on Friday.He said the file relating to set-ting up of 1,000 mohalla clinicshas been sent to the Lt GovernorNajeeb Jung and hoped it will becleared within 10 days.

“The L-G has stopped fileof 1,000 mohalla clinics fol-lowing which the Governmentwon’t be able to set up all ofthem by the end of this year.

“I hope that 1,000 mohal-la clinics will be built by March31 next year. These mohallaclinics are aimed at providingquality health services to thepeople of Delhi,” he said.

Kejriwal said the twomohalla clinics inauguratedon Friday will give the right ofhealth services to the homeless.

The Government has alsoformed 18 rescue teams whichwill work from 10 pm to 4 amdaily. These teams will roamaround the city to find home-less people sleeping in theopen during winter monthsand shift them to night shelters.

“This is the first time thatpoor people are being givenrespected lives by the AAPGovernment. Earlier, whichev-er political party formedGovernment, it used to forgetafter winning election. But,our Government is taking careof the poor,” he said.

The Government has alsolaunched a mobile application

through which one can uploadimages of homeless personssleeping in the open and there-after, rescue team of DelhiUrban Shelter ImprovementBoard will shift them to thenearest night shelters.

He claimed officers work-ing in Delhi used to focus on“earning” money during previ-ous Governments, but they arenow enjoying serving the peo-ple as AAP has adopted zero tol-erance against corruption.

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In a recent development, Delhi Commissioner of Police AlokKumar Verma ordered the transfer of Delhi Police Public

Relation Officer Rajan Bhagat. Having served as the PRO for morethan a decade, Bhagat will now look after the work of DCP CrimeRecords Office (CRO) only. His office will be at the CRO locat-ed at Kamla Market.

According to an issue by the Deputy Commissioner of Police(Establishment) on the behalf of the Commissioner of Police, onJanuary 1, stated that Bhagat will now look after the work of CRO.Bhagat became PRO of the Delhi Police in 2006 and he servedunder several Commissioners, including YS Dadwal, BK Gupta,Neeraj Kumar and BS Bassi. After Alok Kumar took charge asCommissioner of Police, Special Commissioner (Crime) TajHasan was appointed as chief spokesperson of the Delhi Police.

Depender Pathak (South West range) was also made thespokesperson of the national Capital. The search for the new DCPPRO has started with senior officers looking for a suitable can-didate among the additional DCPs and DCPs not engaged in dis-charging duties in the districts, sources said.

New Delhi: Mutilated body ofan unidentified man was foundon a road in South-east Delhi’sSangam Vihar area on earlyFriday morning. According toa senior police official, thebody was found wrapped in ablanket and was tied with arope. However, the feetchopped off were found metresaway from the body. This is thethird instance in a week whenunidentified and mutilatedbodies have been found onroadside in South andSoutheastern parts of Delhi.

A senior police official said,they received a PCR call around6.25 am when a passerby spot-ted the body on the MangalBazaar road at Peepal chowk. Inthe preliminary investigation, itappears that the deceased is inhis late 30s.

Police said they have reg-istered a case of murder underSection 302 of the IPC againstunknown persons at theSangam Vihar police station.

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New Delhi: The Crime Brancharrested six people and busteda Dhol Baaz gang which usedto steal luggage of the travellersin and around NizamuddinRailway stations.

According to police, theaccused has been identified asDevender (34), Mashkoor,Babloo (34), Vicky Choudhary(32), Rajan Aggarwal (38) andKuldeep Soni (42)

According to senior policeofficials, the modus operandiused by the gang was to duperailway passengers who didnot report the matter to police.“The accused used to lure rail-way passengers into cheap autoride before escaping with theirluggage,” said police on Friday.

The gang was busted aftertheir mastermind, Pramod,was apprehended red handedoutside the NizamuddinRailway station.

A senior police official saidthey have received informationabout several gangs operatingin the Railway stations, wholured the passenger in one wayor another and escaped withtheir belongings.

“Information was receivedby one Head Constable thatone gang led by Pramod oper-ating in Nizamuddin RailwayStation, would be coming to thebus stop near NizamuddinRailway Station,” said a seniorpolice official.

Police said on November21, the gang had duped a ladyof �5 lakh jewellery. “Duringsustained interrogation, theaccused disclosed their modusoperandi. It was Devenderwho was driving the auto rick-shaw with Mashkoor and VickyChoudhary as passengersapproached the lady, who waslooking for an auto. They toldher that as they were alsogoing to the same destination,they would charge only onethird of the total fare. As soonas she sat in the auto, anothermember of the gang stoppedthe auto by waving his hand,entered the auto and fled withher money,” said police. SR

Greater Noida: Four peopledied while five people, includ-ing a woman and four children,were injured in two separateroad accidents on Noida-Greater Noida Expressway onThursday and Friday.

The first incident tookplace around 9 pm onThursday as three people trav-elling in an Ola cab were killedafter they were hit by a speed-ing truck in Sector 126 on theNoida-Greater Expressway.

Police said the deceasedhave been identified as KeshriPrasad Singh (65), Manoj Tyagi(35) and Gaurav (22). All werein their way to New DelhiRailway station using an Olacab service.

Meanwhile, two identifiedas Veena Singh (60), wife ofKeshari Prasad and Ola cabdriver are survived as theywere seating in the car.

The second incident tookplace around 8 am at Dankaur-Sikandrabad road on Fridaymorning.

One person died while onewoman and four children gotinjured after when a WagonRin which they were travellingcollided with a truck due to lowvisibility and dense fog, policesaid. SR

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BJP-ruled South DelhiMunicipal Corporation

(SDMC) on Friday proposedmaking payment of property taxonline from next financial year.

Besides, the Budget hasalso proposed a 1 per centincrease in property tax for res-idential properties under cat-egories C, D and E and 2 percent in residential propertiesunder categories A and B; and5 per cent increase for certaincommercial properties undercategories A to H, viz., guesthouses, inns, lodges, PG hous-es, restaurants without bars orAC, liquor shops and bars.

“After Prime Minister’sannouncement on demoneti-sation, stress has been laid onmaking payments online.Prime Minister in his ‘Mann kiBaat’ spoke about a ‘cashlesssociety’ and advised movingtowards ‘e-wallet’. So, followingthe line, it is proposed that allproperty tax-related forms andpayment would be accepted

online only from next financialyear and payment in cash willnot be accepted,” SDMCCommissioner Puneet KumarGoel said while presenting theSDMC’s revised Budget esti-mates for 2016-17 and Budgetestimates for 2017-18 at theCivic Centre.

The proposed revised

Budget estimates for 2016-17stands at �3,796.33 crore whilethe Budget estimates for 2017-18 has been proposed to be�4,104.13 crore for total rev-enues. For total expenditure,the proposed revised Budgetestimates for financial year2016-17 stands at �4,046.77crore while the budget esti-

mates for 2017-18 has beenproposed to be �4,515.92 crore.

“For paying the propertytax, apps and e-wallets shallprovide the service accord-ingly. All these apps would beconnected to the corporation’sThose tax payers, who do nothave the facility to submitPTR from online, shall be

facilitated through a specialwindow that would be openedin each of our zones. Specialcamps would also be organisedin all wards,” Goel added.

Among other major deci-sions, 2,000 more dustbins arebeing purchased and installedin sanitation area and at least100 toilets are to be construct-ed at important places havingsubstantial footfall during thenext financial year. A waste-to-energy plant at Badarpur anda construction and demolitionwaste processing plant atBadarpur and Tajpur Paharihave also been proposed. Otherproposals include 21 newupgraded health centres with allfacilities, setting up of spe-cialised unit at Purnima SethiMulti Specialty Hospital inKalkaji in collaboration withSafdarjung Hospital. Const-ruction of 100-bedded hospitalin Tilak Nagar, Fatah Pur Beri,Dwarka is underway. It has alsobeen proposed to open a spe-cial diabetes centre in each zonefor testing and treatment.

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Fond of high-end motor-bikes like Royal Enfield, a

29-year-old man, who oncetook part in a TV talent showas a dancer, was one among thethree auto-lifters held by theSouth district police, policesaid on Friday.

According to police, theaccused have been identified asRohit, alias Prakash, SandeepChauhan and Akil. Police saidthey have recovered eightmotorcycles and 21 cases ofmotor vehicle theft have beencracked. Rohit, a participant inIndia’s Got Talent, hasbeen booked in severalcases of auto-

lifting and is in jail. “Duringinterrogation, the accusedrevealed that initially, they tookto stealing high ends motorcy-cles to fulfill their desire.However, as time passed, theycontinued to commit thefts tofulfill their expenses,” said asenior investigator.

In view of the spurt incrimes of auto theft in theVasant Kunj area, vulnerablepoints were identified and staffwas asked to be vigilant. Apolice team under ACP KPKukrety was formed to identify

the culprits, committingcrime in the area andarrest them.

Police said onNovember 29, theyreceived informationregarding movement

of auto lifters on astolen bulletmotor cycle

at Aruna Asaf Ali Road. Duringvehicle checking, police teamstopped one bullet motor cycle,coming from Katwariya Saraiside and going towardsKishangarh and apprehendedaccused Rohit. On verifica-tion, the said motor was foundto be stolen

“During sustained interro-gation, accused Rohit revealedthat he, along with his associatesPardeep and Sandeep Chauhan,have committed several inci-dents of auto lifting and used totarget Royal Enfield Bikes only.At the instance of Rohit, fivemore stolen motor cycles wererecovered,” said police.

On November 30, his asso-ciate Chauhan was also arrest-ed from Bhawani Kunj, VasantKunj. Both the accused dis-closed that they have disposedoff the stolen bikes to one Akil,who also was arrested later on.

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There is no major differencein air quality levels of Delhi

compared to last year, theDelhi Government said onFriday. “Analysis of the data ofdifferent pollutants shows thatno major difference has beenobserved in the concentrationof particulate matter during thelast week when compared tocorresponding week in theyear 2015,” a Government state-ment said.

The statement came afterDelhi Environment MinisterImran Hussain reviewed theprevailing ambient air qualityof the city in a meeting with theofficers of EnvironmentDepartment and DelhiPollution Control Committee.

“The EnvironmentDepartment said in winter,particularly when fog/mistdevelops in the city, a generalperception prevails that theair quality worsens, whereas thefact is that fog and smog aretwo separate environmentalphenomena,” the statementsaid. It added the nationalCapital was facing foggy con-ditions at present.

The levels of PM 2.5 andPM 10, most dominant pollu-tants in Delhi’s air, have con-

sistently violated the prescribedstandards by about four timeseach over the last ten days, offi-cial data shows.

The average levels of PM2.5 and PM 10 over an eleven-day period from November 21to December 1 were 194 and438 micrograms per cubicmetre, as against the corre-sponding safe limits of 60 an d100 respectively.

Although, these readingsshow no major difference whencompared to the data collatedover the same period last year,the city Government said.

In fact, the average level ofthese ultrafine particulates overthe same period were higher at264 and 518 last year. This yearthe situation has marginallyimproved riding on the back ofstrong wind movement forabout a fortnight.

Meanwhile, the CentralPollution Control Board’s(CPCB) air quality index (24-hour average) was in the ‘verypoor’ category today, with areading of 378. Yeserday, it was‘severe’ at 403.

The 24-hour-average(rolling) of PM 2.5 and PM 10were 197 and 381 microgramsper cubic metre respectivelytoday, as per Central agencySAFAR.

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Page 3: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

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The Supreme Court onFriday gave its nod to an

action plan prepared by theCentral Pollution ControlBoard (CPCB) that categorisedfour levels to measure air qual-ity of Delhi-NCR and mea-sures to tackle the pollution.

According to the scheme,when particulate matter (PM)levels reach alarming levels of300 micro grams per cubicmetre (of PM 2.5) and 500micro grams per cubic metre(of PM10), it would bedeclared as Emergency situa-tion. The authortieis will thenbe required to take urgentmeasures such as rolling outodd-even scheme for privatevehicles, banning entry of

trucks except those carryingessential goods, and closure ofschools.

After Dipawali, when Delhi’sair witnessed thick layers ofsmog, the PM levels were in therange of 400-800 microgramsacross major parts of the city.

The other three levels of airquality determined by theBoard were `Severe” (whenPM 2.5 is 250-300 and PM 10is 430-500), “Very Poor” (whenPM 2.5 is 121-250 and PM10is 351-430) and “Moderate toPoor “ (when PM 2.5 is 91-120and PM 10 is 101-250).

The report of CPCB wasapproved by the Green Benchof the Supreme Court com-prising Chief Justice TSThakur, Justices AK Sikri andSA Bobde. The report wasearlier approved by environ-

mentalist Sunita Narain, whois also part of the EnvironmentProtection Control Authority(EPCA), which advises andassists the Court in environ-ment-related issues.

At the level of Severe, thepollution manning agencysought closure of brick kilns,hot mix plants, stone crushingunits, Badarpur coal-based

power plant, besides othermeasures of improving publictransport and ensuring watersprinkling of roads. Again,when the air quality worsens tothe Very Poor level, the civicagencies will be authorized toenhance parking fee by 3-4times in designated parkingplaces in the Capital. There willalso be a ban on use of diesel

generators, coal/firewoodbased eateries during this peri-od. At the last level (Moderateto Poor), which may be anideal situation for the city, theBoard proposed complete stopon garbage burning in landfillsand heavy fines for violators.

The CPCB furtherinformed the Court of addi-tional monitoring stations tobe set up in Delhi-NCR with-in six months. Twelve realtime air monitoring stationswill come up in Uttar Pradesh,nine in Haryana, two inRajasthan besides 20 new sta-tions in Delhi apart from 28existing ones, the Board said.The bench sought a statusreport from the Board in sixweeks and posted the matterfor hearing in third week ofJanuary.

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Congress vice-presidentRahul Gandhi on Friday

accused Prime MinisterNarendra Modi of practising‘TRP’ politics and said thecountry has suffered damagedue to his “vanity and incom-petence”.

While Rahul describedModi as “a prisoner of hisown image” and one who isinflicting “tremendous suf-fering” on the people of Indiato protect his own persona,”the BJP hit back at him, say-ing he was caught up in thehabit of photo-ops and hasbeen “surrounded by blackmoney” all his life.

Addressing partyParliamentarians in theCongress Parliamentary Party(CPP) meeting, where ailingparty chief Sonia Gandhi wasnot present, the Congressvice president said if Modi lis-tened to the views of democ-ratically elected members itcould potentially prevent himfrom making the “cata-strophic” policy mistakes heis currently making.

Accusing the Governmentof getting itself into a “com-plete mess” with regards toPakistan, the Congress leader

said, “ Their policy onPakistan is a complete failure”.

“We never gave India aPrime Minister who bypassedthe experience of those sittingin the institutions. The coun-try has suffered tremendousdamage as a result of thevanity and incompetence ofour PM. The Congress nevergave India a Prime Ministerwho was a prisoner of his ownimage. We never gave India aPrime Minister, who wasready to inflict such tremen-dous suffering on the people

of India to protect his ownpersona. We never gave Indiaa Prime Minister who basedhis entire policy making strat-egy on TRPs,” Rahul saidchairing CPP for the firsttime.

Excerpts of his speech inthe central hall of Parliamentwere later aired by televisionchannels though such meet-ings are generally out ofbounds for the media.

Accusing Modi of singlehandedly declaring war on theworld’s fastest growing econ-

omy due to the “catastrophicexperiment” of demonetisa-tion, which is “badly con-ceived and incompetentlyimplemented”, he said itsresults will soon be revealedto the entire world.

“Ever y economist ofrepute has already con-demned it and questioned itscapacity to realise the goals itis supposed to achieve. Modijihas created a massive newcorrupt black market that isworking overtime to convertthe black money to white,” hecharged.

Rahul Gandhi said thePM “confused” India’s entirecash economy with blackeconomy, demonetised 86 percent of Indian bank notes anddecided to experiment withthe financial future of 1.3billion people. “All cash is notblack money and all blackmoney is not cash,” he said,adding that instead of attack-ing black money, he attackedthe very foundations of thecountry’s economy.

Rahul also accused Modiof s itt ing si lent ly whenKashmir is burning and saidhe has “gifted massive politi-cal space” to anti-India forcesby forging an alliance withPDP. He also targeted thePrime Minister over his pol-icy towards Pakistan and saidhe is the same person whoused to ridicule UPA’s Pakpolicy that led to isolation ofPakistan and brought peace toKashmir.

“Today the same personwho used to ridicule us sitssilently while Kashmir burns.Narendra Modi will be judgedby history as the man whogifted massive political spaceto anti- India forces by creat-ing an opportunistic politicalalliance between the BJP andthe PDP. He has created thepolitical vacuum that givesthe terrorists space to oper-ate,” he said.

Union MinisterHarsimrat Kaur said it is notthe Prime Minister but theCongress vice-president whois caught up in the habit ofphoto-ops and accused theCongress of spreading cor-ruption like cancer in everypart of the country and saidthat it was unable to digest thefact that a “strong leader” hastaken decisive action againstthe menace.

“His party has been inGovernment for 60 years. Forthe last ten years, he himselfwas in power. But in all thesetime, beside spreading cor-ruption like cancer into everycorner of our society, besideslooting the nation, 2G toCWG to Bofors, this Congressparty and the Gandhi familyhas nothing to their credit.Now when a Government hascome which is trying to rootout black money and corrup-tion, obviously Rahul Gandhiis not able to understandbecause they never had thisdesire to understand,” Kaursaid outside the Parliament.

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No society can be calledcivilised unless it respects

its mothers, sisters and daugh-ters, President PranabMukherjee said on Friday.

Receiving the first copy ofa coffee table book “Betiyan”at Rashtrapati Bhavan,Mukherjee said when we lookat the pages of history andeven in the contemporaryperiod, we feel proud of thecontribution made by womenthroughout the years.

“One of the inspirations ofthe first war of Independencein 1857 was Rani Laxmi Bai.Besides there have been anumber of women leaders in

the country such as formerPrime Minister Indira Gandhiand a host of others who havemade tremendous contribu-tion to the progress of ourcountry,” said a statementfrom Deputy Press Secretaryto the President Shamima

Siddiqui, quoting thePresident.

Mukherjee congratulatedauthor Kiran Chopra, FounderChairperson, Varishth NagrikKesari Club for the effort,saying it speaks of the deepcommitment, firm belief andconviction of her for the causeof the girl child which she isespousing.

“He thanked KiranChopra for focusing atten-tion on the important socialcause of women and the girlchild. He said that this bookwill act as a constant reminderto its readers that they have asacred duty towards theirmothers, sisters and daugh-ters,” it said.

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From Page 1Ravi Chabra, owner of

Jhulson chemicals in Bawana,said as per the new circular ofthe Labour Ministry, theworkers should be paid incheque but since they don’thave any account in banks,they are refusing to acceptpayments in cheques.

“So I had a meeting withmy workers and it was decid-ed that the workers would gethalf their monthly salary innew notes and the other halfwould be paid in due courseof time. I cannot give away thefull salary in new notes as Ican’t afford to be in queue out-side banks for long hours,”said Chhabra.

There were scores ofworkers who wore a forlornlook as they are feeling thecash squeeze. Workers of

Vidya Overseas could be seensitting outside their unit andresigned to their fate.

“We are not getting anywork as factory owners saythat they do not have newdenomination currency to payus. We charge a minimum Rs500 for our services for aday,” said Babloo Mahto, anative of Bhopal in MadhyaPradesh and who stays nearRohini Jail.

Vice-president ofPatparganj Industrial arealabours’ association VivekBagga said the factories, whichhave more than 50 labourers,are facing difficulty to figureout how they are going to paylabourers their salary onDecember 10.

“We paid the labourers inold denomination notes lastmonth and this month we

have a dearth of both old andnew notes. The labourersrightfully are not accepting theold notes and we do not havenew ones. They are also notaccepting cheques and half ofthem don’t even know what aNEFT transfer is,” said Bagga.It will take quite some timebefore these workers under-stand what net banking andmoney transfer are,” addedBagga.

Labourer DilipChoudhury employed withNav Label Pvt Ltd, a printingpress, in Okhla Industrial arealooked a worried lot. “We arevery insecure as productionhas been limited or stopped insome factories and at thesame time my factory owneris asking me to take my salaryin old notes or else in cheque.I am thinking of going back to

my village in Hisar. After I gotmy salary last month in oldnotes, I had to take leave forthree days without pay inorder to exchange the oldnotes with the new ones. Thelong queues were irritatingand I don’t want to face thesame situation again,” lament-ed Choudhury.

Factory owner KundanMaheshwari, who runs a plas-tic bags business, said thatsome of his labourers have lefthome due to this problem.

“I am very concerned as Iam only dependent on myworkers. It’s not that I don’twant to pay them but due tocash crunch I am unable topay them. I myself have toexchange a lot of old denom-ination notes. All I have forthem are old notes,” saidMaheshwari.

From Page 1If you keep thinking about

profit and loss, then it will notwork out. We are anywaygoing to form Governmentagain with a majority and ifthey (Congress) also comealong, then we will cross 300,”he said.

Speaking at the HTLeadership Summit here,Akhilesh (43) attacked theModi Government overdemonetization and took pot-shots at his rivals, includingAmar Singh, within SP. “It isa big dream,” he quippedwhen asked if Amar Singhwas also a contender for theChief Minister’s post.

He, however, asserted thatthe murky infighting that puthis uncle Shivpal Yadavagainst him is behind him andhe, “like Arjun is focusing onone goal, which is to formGovernment in the state

again”. It is for Congress,which has projected SheilaDikshit as its chief minister-ial candidate, to take a finaldecision on an alliance, hesaid, adding that Kishor hadmet him after meetingMulayam.

Akhilesh said that he con-veyed this to Kishor too. “It(UP polls) is a big battle. If theally is good, then we can sortout other parties,” the ChiefMinister said, though he ruledout any alliance with BSPwhich, he noted, had formedGovernment with BJP threetimes earlier and Mayawati“used to tie” Rakhi to someBJP leaders.

Attacking the CentralGovernment, he said it hasmade everybody stand inqueue and wondered if thiswas the ‘achchhe din’ forwhich people had voted forNarendra Modi.

From Page 1On her part, Mamata

accused the Narendra ModiGovernment of making a“wrong and concocted” state-ment in Parliament regardingdeployment of Army at tollplazas in West Bengal sayingher voice could not be stifledby hatching conspiracy andshowing force.

“They told Parliament thatthe State Government’s per-mission was taken. It isabsolutely wrong and con-cocted,” she told reportersbefore leaving the State secre-tariat in Kolkatta after anovernight stay protestingagainst the presence of Armypersonnel.

Earlier in the day, theArmy strongly rebutted theChief Minister’s allegation thatits personnel were deployed atthe toll plazas without inform-ing the State Government andwere collecting money, sayingthe exercise was being carriedout in coordination withKolkata police.

“This is being done incoordination with local policeauthorities. The exercise wasearlier planned for November27 and 28. The dates werechanged to November 30 toDecember 2 on a specificrequest by Kolkata police dueto Bharat Bandh called onNovember 28,” said GOCBengal area (officiating) MajGen Sunil Yadav.

“We deny all charges withall contempt,” he added.

In the Lok Sabha, DefenceMinister Manmohar Parrikarexpressed “big shock” over theissue and termed the deploy-ment as a “routine exercise notunique to West Bengal” andsaying that similar operationsto collect information on heavyvehicle movement that can beused during national emer-gencies had last month beingconducted in Uttar Pradesh,Bihar and Jharkhand.

Similar exercise was car-ried out in Arunachal Pradesh,Manipur, Nagaland, Tripura,Meghalaya and Mizoram,

Parrikar said while respondingto TMC and Congress MPs.

He said last year the sameexercise took place onNovember 19 to 21, 2015.

The Minister said origi-nally the exercise was plannedfor November 28-30 but wasshifted to December 1 and 2 atthe request of Kolkata police asthose dates were clashing withthe protests against demoneti-sation.

“It is shocking that a ChiefMinister is saying this. TheArmy’s deployment was part ofroutine exercise which hasbeen going on for several years,which has been going on forlast 15-20 years. Even last yearit was held on November 19 to21,” said Parrikar.

He said people have thehighest faith for Army and thelatter would now think “whythey are being used for thispurpose.”

“It was political frustrationrather than projection of cor-rect situation,” he said.

TMC leaders in bothHouses of Parliament allegedthat neither the StateGovernment nor local admin-istration, including police, was

taken into confidence on theexercise.

As soon as the Lok Sabhaassembled for the day, TMCleader Sudip Bandyopadhyayraised the issue of Armydeployment at 19 places inWest Bengal, claiming that themove was a challenge to thefederal structure of the coun-try and completely politicallymotivated.

He said Army personnelwere deployed at these places,including near the State secre-tariat, “without informing any-one in the State secretariat”.The TMC leader said Mamatahas been staging a ‘dharna’ inthe Secretariat demandingwithdrawal of the Army.

The Congress and the BSPtoo wanted to know from theGovernment how such anunprecedented move to carryout an Army exercise withouttaking the State Governmentinto confidence was done.

Parliamentary AffairsMinister Ananth Kumar askedthe TMC not to drag Armyinto politics saying Defencepersonnel have been protectingthe country as well as democ-racy. “Whatever the Army has

done was part of a routineexercise. It is completely wrongto drag Army into politics,” hesaid.

Raising the issue in theRajya Sabha, Leader ofOpposition Ghulam NabiAzad said the Army is India’spride as it has upheld its unityand integrity besides protect-ing the borders.

But in West Bengal, theChief Secretary, administrationand DG Police had no infor-mation of Army taking overtoll plazas at 19 locations in theState, he said.

“This is probably the firsttime that the Chief Minister ofWest Bengal has lodged thiskind of protest where shestayed put for the night in theState Secretariat and is stillthere,” he said.

“This is a strange thinghappening. Without askingthe State Government, thechief secretary or the DGP, tollplazas of State Government aretaken over,” he added.

Sukhendu Sekhar Roy(TMC) said what happened inWest Bengal has never been witnessed in theState’s history.

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New Delhi: A special anti-money laundering court herehas confirmed an attachmentof assets order worth �1,411crore issued by the ED againstUBHL and others in connec-tion with its money launderingprobe against liquor baronVijay Mallya and others.

The central probe agencyin June had issued the firstattachment of assets order inthis case under the provisionsof the Prevention of MoneyLaundering Act (PMLA) thatincluded bank balance of �34crore, a flat each in Bengaluruand Mumbai, an industrialplot in Tamil Nadu, a coffeeplantation land in Coorg andresidential and commercialconstructed areas in UB cityand Kingfisher Tower inBengaluru in the name ofUnited Breweries (Holdings)Limited and other firms.

“I, therefore, hereby con-

firm the attachment of theproperties madeunder...PMLA. I, therefore,order that the said attachmentshall continue during the pen-dency of the proceedings relat-ing to the offence under thePMLA, 2002 before a court...,”an order issued by Member(Law) of the AdjudicatingAuthority of PMLA, Tushar VShah, said.

The approval by the courtwill now allow ED to takepossession of the seized assets,a senior official said.

The agency, while issuing

the provisional order in June, hadsaid its probe in the case revealedthat some of the properties werebeing “disposed of ” by theaccused so that further actionundertaken by the agency underPMLA can be “frustrated”.

An attachment of assetsunder PMLA is aimed atdepriving the accused fromobtaining benefits of their ill-gotten wealth.

Mallya, whose defunctKingfisher Airlines owes morethan �9,000 crore to variousbanks, had left India on March2. The total attachment madeby the agency in this case hasnow shot up to �8,041 croreand this is one of the largestattachment of assets made byED in a PMLA case till now.

The agency had registereda money laundering caseagainst him and others basedon an FIR registered last yearby the CBI. PTI

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Two elderly persons, one of them a pensionholder, died after being taken ill while in

queues to withdraw money today, in two sep-arate incidents in West Bengal.

The police said that 80-year-old BiswadebNaskar was taken ill while in a queue to drawhis monthly pension in front of the branch ofthe UBI Bank at Raidighi in South 24-Parganasdistrict. A resident of Kankandighi in the

Raidighi police station area, Naskar was takento a local hospital where he was declared'brought dead'. His body was taken to DiamondHarbour for post mortem.

In the neighbouring South 24-Parganas dis-trict, 72-year-old Rabin Mukherjee similarlydied just after withdrawing money from an SBIbranch at Machlandapur town, SP BhaskarBanerjee said.

His body was taken to a hospital in Habrafor post mortem.

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Page 5: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

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Welcoming the inter-governmental agreement(Foreign Military Sale) between India and

the USA for the purchase of 145 M777 ultra light-weight Howitzer artillery guns, US Ambassadorto India Richard Verma termed it as a ‘landmarkdeal’. He added this agreement marks a major stepforward in the US-India Defence relationship andsupports jobs in both countries.

“As major Defence partners, the US and Indiaremain committed to enhancing military mod-ernisation efforts and building a security part-nership based on trust, transparency, and sharedinterests,” Verma added.

India and the US on Wednesday signed Letterof Agreement and Acceptance for the guns. Theagreement marks the long-stalled Army’s artillerymodernisation plans, which came to a halt in thewake of Boors guns controversy in the mid 1980s.

Verma added the Indian industry will part-ner with the US Defence subsidiary of BAESystems to locally assemble, integrate, and testthe Howitzers, supporting Prime MinisterNarendra Modi’s Make in India campaign. TheM777 is a state-of-the-art, lightweight Howitzerthat will provide the Indian Army with advanced

capabilities. First guns will start coming in 21months after the initial payment is made in thenext five weeks.

Welcoming the news, Dr Joe Senftle, vicepresident and general manager for WeaponSystems at BAE Systems said, “We look forwardto providing the Indian Army with the combat-proven M777. Our plan to establish a domes-tic assembly, integration and test facility furtherdemonstrates our commitment to Make in Indiaand remains a firm part of our strategy to workwith the Indian Defence sector across Air, Land,Sea and Security.”

According to BAE Systems India will join theUS, Canadian and Australian forces in gaining theM777’s unmatched strategic and tactical mobil-ity. The company anticipates signing a contractin the coming weeks with the US Department ofDefense to supply these guns to the Indian Army.

At half the weight of other 155mm towedHowitzers, the M777 provides a rapid reactioncapability and a proven pedigree that deliversdecisive firepower in sustained combat condi-tions. With more than 1,090 M777s in service,it is the only battle-proven 155mm Ultra-light-weight Howitzer in the world, the company saidin a statement.

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Contending that large vol-umes of liquid cash are a

big source of corruption andblack money, Prime MinisterNarendra Modi on Fridayappealed to the people to “leadthe change” towards cashlesstransactions to lay the strongfoundations of an India wherethere is no place for suchmalaise.

“In 21st century India,there is no place for corruption.Corruption slows down growthand takes a toll on the dreams

of the poor, neo-middle classand middle class,” he wrote inan article posted onLinkedin.Com.

“Large volumes of liquidcash are a big source of cor-ruption and black money,” hesaid while referring to his “his-toric” decision on November 8to scrap �500 and �1,000 noteswith an aim of ending corrup-tion and black money.

Asserting that in 21st cen-tury India, there is no place forcorruption, Modi said,“Corruption slows downgrowth and takes a toll on thedreams of the poor, neo-mid-dle class and middle class.” Inthis context, he referred to hispitch for cashless transactions.

“I urge all of you, particu-larly my young friends to leadthe change and inspire others

to turn towards cashless trans-actions. This will set the strongfoundations of an India wherethere is no place for corruptionand black money,” the PrimeMinister said.

“Today we live in an era ofmobile banking and mobilewallets. Ordering food, buyingand selling furniture, orderinga taxi...All of this and lot moreis possible through yourmobiles. Technology hasbrought speed and conveniencein our lives,” he added.

Along with the article, heposted pictorial references tocashless options like credit cards.

“I am sure most of you areusing cards and e-wallets reg-ularly but I thought I mustshare with you ways throughwhich increased cashless trans-actions are possible,” he said.

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The Supreme Court onFriday asked the Centre

why it had barred district coop-erative banks from depositingthe scrapped currency noteswith the treasury or allowingcustomers holding accountswith these banks to withdrawmoney.

Noting the serious incon-venience faced by the con-sumers affected due to thisdecision announced by theReserve Bank of India (RBI) onNovember 14, 2016, the Benchof Chief Justice TS Thakurand Justice DY Chandrachudtold the Centre to take imme-diate steps in this regard.

“You (Centre) must devisea solution to their problem.There is a serious problemthese banks are facing. Peopleare suffering and they shouldnot be inconvenienced due toyour decisions,” the bench toldAttorney General MukulRohatgi who appeared forCentre to argue transfer of allpetitions on demonetisationto a single High Court.

Two top senior lawyers

who appeared for Tamil Naduand Sholapur DistrictCooperative Banks, namely PChidambaram and CU Singhsubmitted to the Court that theproblem faced by cooperativebanks is distinct from the realcontroversy relating to theNovember 8 RBI notificationdevaluing �500 and �1,000currency notes.

“We are not challenging theNovember 8 notification. Ourchallenge is to the November14 notification as this preventsour customers from with-drawing cash,” said Singh. Hefurther pointed out that inSholapur, all aided schoolshave transacted the salaries oftheir staff to the bank but nonew currency is available withthe bank to dispense cash.Also, the RBI has instructed theTreasury Chest maintained byState Bank of India not toaccept the old currencyexchanged at the SholapurCooperative Bank. “Between

November 9 and 13, we col-lected a sum of �2,000 crore indemonetised notes. Now we aretold they wont be accepted bythe Treasury.”

Chidambaram sought astay of the notification as itseverely impeded the work ofthe cooperative banks.“Thousands of farmers cannottake out their money and peo-ple want to pull out their sav-ings with the bank as whatgood is a bank that cannot givecash,” he said. The bench toldthe lawyers appearing in thebunch of petitions on thedemonetisation to draw out alist segregating the various cat-egories of petitioners byMonday. “Before transferringthe petitions, we need tostreamline them, maybe coop-erative cases can go to onecourt. We want to know howmany such categories exist orshould all petitions be heardtogether,” said the bench, post-ing the case for Monday.

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Armed with a copy of foren-sic audit report on finan-

cial transactions of Tata Group,BJP leader SubramanianSwamy petitioned to CBI onFriday to conduct a probe onthe ‘hawala transactions’ inAir Asia related business oper-ations. The forensic auditreport by Deloitte said thatthere was financial bungling ofmore than �22 crore in con-nection with Air Asia opera-tions involving paymentslinked to many dubious per-sons and entities.

“Recently I have had theopportunity to get a synopsis ofthe Forensic Audit Report car-ried out by Deloitte and onmoney flow emanating on theauthority of Ratan Tata. I amenclosing a photocopy of therelevant two pages for yourperusal.

“According to this, the TataSons under the leadership ofRatan Tata had engaged incorrupt hawala routed actionwith a Dubai based residentHamid Reza Malakotipour,whom the US Governmenthas classified as ‘A SpeciallyDesignated Global Terrorist’ forhis suspected terrorist activi-ties,” said Swamy in a letter to

Rakesh Asthana, the actingCBI Director.

Recently, the Delhi HighCourt asked Tata group direc-tors in Air Asia to produce theForensic Audit report on TataGroup prepared by Deloitte asper the directions of CyrusMistry, the ousted chairman ofTata Sons. The audit report,which is believed to be morethan 400 pages, is reported tohave found several financialirregularities in the functioningAir Asia operations.

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In a bid to ease the problemof the people due to demon-

etisation of high value cur-rency notes, the Science andTechnology Ministry hasdecided to organise trainingprogrammes to promote“cashless society” conceptamong the visitors at the IndiaInternational Science Festival(IISF) to be held here nextweek. Reportedly cell will beformed for such activities.

The festival organised by

the Union Science andTechnology Ministry andRSS-linked Vijnan Bharati(VIBHA) aims to provide sci-

entific temper among chil-dren, particularly those fromrural areas.

“We are trying to makethis science festival bigger inever y scale. We aim toencourage and develop sci-entific temper and attitude,promote exchange of ideasamong young minds, show-casing country’s contributionin science,” said Minister ofScience and Technology andEarth Sciences, HarshVardhan.

The IISF will be inaugu-

rated by Home MinisterRajnath Singh. Israel’s Scienceand Technology Minister OfirAkunis will also visit the fes-tival.

The IISF will have eventslined up such as YoungScientists Conclave, MegaScience and TechnologyExposition, Scientif icWorkshops, including DST-INSPIRE national-level camp,international science film fes-tival, industry-academiainteractive meet and a newconcept of Science Village.

More than 10,000 people,including 5,000 young scien-tists (those aged below 45),3,000 children from ruralIndia and 600 foreign studentsare expected to take part inthe festival.

Vardhan said the Ministryhas taken initiative to spreadawareness of cashless trans-actions at its level.

“We are going to organisetraining and motivation pro-grammes to promote cashlesssociety among those visitingthe science festival.

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Page 6: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

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The Gujarat Government isplanning to come up with

a dedicated policy on aerospaceand defence manufacturing inorder to attract investment inthe emerging sector.

Gujarat Chief MinisterVijay Rupani in his speech at afunction revealed that the StateGovernment is aiming to estab-lish Gujarat as the country’sleading hub for indigenousaerospace and defence manu-facturing. Besides the StateGovernment wants to developglobally competitive talent inthe sector to promote researchand development investmentsto drive globally-recognisedinnovation in product design,said the Gujarat Chief Minister.

“We want to tap Gujaratindustries’ manufacturingcapability in defense sectortoo. Already the State is havingadvantage of the State-of-theart infrastructure to promotethe aerospace and defensemanufacturing. Moreover theState would be able to con-tribute in making the nation

self-reliant in defense sectorwhich is extremely important,”he said.

Once Gujarat would roll-out the policy it would be ableto attract huge investment inthe sector, he said, adding thatthe State Government is envis-aging creating 20,000 directand indirect jobs in Gujarat inthe coming five years.

It is worth mentioning thatthe Gujarat Government hasalready announced 18 differentpolicies in order to attractinvestments. Sources in theState industrial departmentsaid that, the aerospace anddefense manufacturing policywould be rolled out around theupcoming eight edition ofVibrant Gujarat Global Summitto be organised in the second

week of January next year.In sync with the industrial

policies, the State Governmentis aiming high to provide qual-ity manpower to industries byinitiating the State’s first SkillDevelopment University nearVadodara in Central Gujarat.The university would generatemore employable manpowernot only for Gujarat but forentire country, said a seniorofficial with the State industriesdepartment.

“We want to give State-of-the-art infrastructure in all theindustrial estates managed byGujarat IndustrialDevelopment Corporation(GIDC) in order to encourageSMEs, in different sectorincluding aerospace anddefence”, he said.

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In a move to help the State’scooperative banking sector to

overcome the setbacks alleged-ly caused by currency demon-etisation, the KeralaGovernment is seriously con-sidering shifting of theaccounts of several PSUs andboards from commercial banksto district cooperative bankseven as the note freeze pushedthe ailing public sector KSRTCinto further losses and pulleddown the revenues of the State-run Kerala State BeveragesCorporation (Bevco).

As per the proposal putforward by the Registrar ofCooperatives, shifting of theaccounts of State PSUs andboards like Bevco, Kerala StateElectricity Board, Kerala StateRoad Transport Corporation(KSRTC), Kerala WaterAuthority, Civil SuppliesCorporation, Department ofLotteries, etc, which arepresently with commercialbanks, to district cooperativebanks.

As a first step, theGovernment is planning toshift the accounts of Bevco andsome other institutions. It alsohopes that the accounts of theDevaswom Boards, bodies in

charge of administration ofHindu temples, can be shiftedfrom commercial banks to dis-trict cooperative banks once apolicy decision is taken.

“Corporations like theBeverages Corporation are cur-rently getting fair currencies(after demonetisation of �500and �1,000 notes). This moneyis being deposited in com-mercial banks. In my opinion,it would be beneficial (to theState) if that money is deposit-

ed in cooperative banks. Adecision will be taken in con-sultation with the ChiefMinister and others,” FinanceMinister TM Thomas Isaactold newsmen in Delhi onFriday.

As lakhs of small transac-tions are taking place in most ofthese corporations, shifting theiraccounts to cooperative bankswould help in reducing theproblem of shortage of small-denomination currency notes,

according to Governmentsources. They say that such amove would also strengthen themove for establishing the pro-posed Kerala Bank.

Meanwhile, the currencydemonetization has pushedthe already ailing public sectortransport company, KSRTC,into further loss leading touncertainty in the disbursal ofsalaries and pensions for themonth of November. Officialssaid the corporation might notbe able to make payments to itsstaff and pensioners before themiddle of next week.

“Banks are hesitating togrant loan to the KSRTC as itsrevenues have fallen steeply.Therefore, payment of salariesand pensions are bound to bedelayed this month,” saidTransport Minister AKSaseendran. The corporation’smanaging director hasinformed the departmentheads that the date on whichpayments could be made couldnot be predicted. The corpo-ration has started talks with theCanara Bank for availing loanto the tune of �100 crore.

The public transport cor-poration, which already owes�125 crore to the Indian OilCorporation in fuel bill arrears,has reportedly been suffering a

loss of close to �1 crore per daysince November 8, the day thetwo high-value currencies weredemonetized. Before the cur-rency freeze, the KSRTC’s aver-age daily revenue was around�6 crore.

At the same time, the cur-rency demonetization haspulled down drastically thesales turnover of the State-runmonopoly bootlegger Bevco.Bevco’s sales turnover was tothe tune of �1,037 crore inOctober. Of this, �855 crorehad been coming from thesales in its retail liquor outletsand business through its ware-houses, beer-wine parlours andretail liquor shops run by theCooperative consumers’Federation accounted for theremaining amount.

There had been a hugedrop in this since demonetisa-tion, said sources. This drop insales turnover occurred as itwas not authorized to receivethe demonetised currenciesfor sale of liquor. The fall inBevco’s revenues has also affect-ed the State Government,which used to get hugeamounts of money in taxesfrom it. However, sources saidthat there has been a slightimprovement in sales in thepast one week.

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Even after losing seven pre-cious lives of brave Army

men, including two youngMajors, in the audaciousNagrota terror strike nothingmuch has changed on groundzero in terms of enhancingstrict vigil along the crucialstretch of Jammu-SrinagarNational Highway and evenplugging the gaps in andaround the garrison town.

On November 29, 2016when a heavily armed group offidayeen (members of a suicidesquad) stormed tightly guarded166 Artillery unit located on theperiphery of Nagrotra based 16corps headquarters they man-aged to breach multi layeredsecurity grid along the routewithout facing any resistance.

Now three days have passedeven as investigators are work-ing on ground zero to piecetogether the unsolved puzzlenothing much has changed onground zero. NationalInvestigating Agency (NIA) islikely to carry out the probe inthe Nagrota terror attack. TheUnion govt is awaiting formalclearance from the StateGovernment and the Armyauthorities before the formalannouncement was made.

On Friday when this cor-respondent set out to do a real-ity check he travelled betweenJammu and Katra, base campof Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine toverify the claims of elaboratesecurity arrangements.Ironically, the correspondentenjoyed free run along the 45km stretch of the highway.

At the security check pointnear by-pass road, startingpoint of Nagrota, none of thevehicles were halted for routinescreening or frisking of pas-

sengers in the wake of highalert sounded after the terrorstrike.

Another security checkpoint near Sitlee filtration plantalso remained unattended assome policemen were occupiedwith the tough job of regulat-ing movement of heavy vehi-cles ferrying essential suppliesto Kashmir valley.

Between Sitlee Filtrationplant and Ban toll plaza therewas no presence of either Statetraffic police or flying squad.

Along the route severalsmall villages and nomadicpopulation is located whereover ground workers couldhave created a safe hideout forterrorists before they executedthe terror plot.

At the Ban toll plaza a QRTvan of CRPF was stationed andlarge number of vehicles werebeing screened randomly bythe handful of policemen. Agroup of CRPF and Statepolicemen were present at thetoll plaza and attending brief-

ing by the superior officer. Between Domel and Katra

town ship two security checkpoints exist where randomchecking is carried out whilepassenger vehicles are thor-oughly screened and pilgrimsare subjected to manual frisk-ing along with their luggage.

Interestingly, the investi-gating agencies were yet to con-clude how these heavily armedterrorists managed to sneakinside the well fortified area ofNagrota and from where they

have actually infiltrated.According to initial assessmentthe fidayeen group had scaledthe periphery wall of theartillery unit from the rear por-tion and waited there till earlyhours to strike.The involve-ment of local support has sur-faced as the police uniformsworn by the terrorists werestitched locally and some otheritems recovered from their pos-session were Made in India.

Opinion among the secu-rity establishment responsible

for guarding the highway is stilldivided. According to seniorofficials, “only two possibilitiesemerge after carefully scanningthe preliminary reports sub-mitted by the local police andother intelligence agencies”.

Since Nagrota based 16corps headquarters can bereached from two differentdirections on the Jammu-Srinagar National Highway therole of State police and theCentral Reserve Police Force(CRPF) jawans becomes para-

mount in preventing suchstrikes.

On both sides of the high-way the jawans of State policeand CRPF stand guard andscreen vehicles before allowingthem to proceed further. Alongthe highway jawans of CRPFhave been deployed along withQuick Response Teams to reactto any emergency situation.

Ironically, none of the secu-rity check points, mobile QRT’s(Quick Response teams) teamsand network of CCTV camerasfitted across various city junc-tions spotted the movement ofthese terrorists before theymounted the strike. All thesecurity check points alongthe Jammu-Pathankot high-way too had failed to detect themovement of terrorists if theyhad infiltrated via Internationalborder. The gateway of Jammuat Kunjwani and other numer-ous checkpoints were alsobreached successfully by theterrorists or they had managedto camouflaged their identitybefore reaching their safe hide-out where they would havebeen handed over explosives tolaunch the strike.

"The truth is mostly likelyto emerge once thorough probeis completed", a senior policeofficer told The Pioneer.

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Reacting to the BJP’s criti-cism of Omar Abdullah’s

statement condemningprovocative posturing leadingto hostility between India andPakistan, National Conference(NC) on Friday said its work-ing president’s remarks were an“accurate reflection” on howjingoism had brought the twocountries to the brink of an all-out war.

“Growing hostility on theLine of Control (LoC) and theInternational Border (IB) was

being furthered for politicaldividends and the costs werebeing borne by the people ofJammu & Kashmir,” NC’s statespokesperson Junaid AzimMattu said here.

He said it was imperativethat Union Ministers speakwith restraint and responsibil-ity and understand the costs ofaggression and war-mongering,especially for the people of theState.

“One-liners and chest-thumping defies the basic inter-ests of the people of the entireregion and while war-monger-

ing might serve political divi-dends for certain political par-ties in the short term, thelong-term implications areadverse and would affect thepursuit of peace and prosper-ity,” the NC spokesperson said.

Mattu lauded Omar’s asser-tions and said opposing war-mongering was the need of thehour and the party did notrequire any certificates fromBJP or its leaders who areinvested in using hostility and chaos as political tactics.

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Vice-Admiral Girish Luthra,Flag Officer

C o m m a n d i n g - i n - C h i e f ,Western Naval Command, saidon Friday that in view of a“challenging and complex”maritime environment in the

Indian Ocean Region, the Navywas in a “high degree of oper-ational and combat readiness”.

Interacting with mediapersons on board the aircraftcarrier INS Vikramaditya aspart of the Navy Day 2016 cel-ebrations, Vice Admiral Luthrareiterated the Indian Navy’s

resolve towards ensuring safe-ty and security of the countryfrom any challenge or threatoriginating from the sea.

“The maritime environ-ment in the Indian OceanRegion is challenging andcomplex and that, develop-ments in the region has neces-sitated high degree of opera-tional and combat readiness.This has led to a very hightempo of operations, includingdeployments, surveillance andpatrolling,” Vice AdmiralLuthra said.

In this context, ViceAdmiral Luthra alluded to theconduct of a major exercisenamed Exercise PaschimLeher, wherein large number ofships, submarines and aircraftparticipated. He said that theexercise was to test andimprove our operational readi-ness, including mobilisationand synchronisation.

Terming the current secu-

rity scenario as a “”dynamicone”, Vice Admiral Luthrasaid: “Ships, submarines andaircrafts of the command con-tinue to be deployed andtasked in widely dispersed anddiverse locations at sea tostrengthen maritime defenceand security”.

“The Navy is alert, watch-ful and fully ready to safeguardnation’s maritime interests,and address any threats orchallenges that may come up.He said that impetus is alsobeing given towards strength-ening physical security, as wellas Cyber Security,” he said.

The Indian Navy celebratesNavy Day on 04 Dec everyyear, the date on which duringthe 1971 Indo-Pak conflict,naval ships, armed to the teeth,stealthily maneuvered offKarachi, and unleashed a lethalmissile attack that left the portablaze and destroyed severalenemy warships.

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Having inducted success-fully Delhi-class and

Kolkata-class destroyer ships,the Indian Navy is now work-ing of “next generationdestroyers” which are expect-ed to give an edge to the three-dimensional blue-water force.

Confirming this, ViceAdmiral Girish Luthra, FlagOfficer Commanding-in-Chief of the Western NavalCommand (WNC), said onFriday: “We are now planningand conceptualising next gen-eration destroyers whichwould be new in design andmore potent”.

During his interactionswith media persons on boardthe aircraft carrier INSVikramaditya, Vice AdmiralLuthra said that the Navy topbrass would take up the pro-posal with the Government of

India in due course of time.“These (the next-genera-

tion destroyers) will have addi-tional features than the Project15, Project 15 A and Project 15B,” Vice Admiral Luthra said.

The Project 15 and Project15 A class of ships have beencommissioned. While theProject 15 involved Delhi-class destroyers INS Delhi,INS Mysore and INS Mumbai,the Project 15 A include theKolkata-class destroyers INSKolkata, INS Kochi and INSChennai.

Two Project 15 B class ofdestroyers – better known as theVisakhapatnam-class class ships— two are under productionnow. They are: Visakhapatnamand Mormugao. While the firstone is expected to be commis-sioned in 2018, the next in theseries is expected in 2020. Thetwo others planned in the seriesare Paradip and Porbunder.

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Page 7: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

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In a major embarrassment tothe ruling Congress

Government in Karnataka, twoofficials were suspended onFriday in connection with theraid conducted by the IncomeTax sleuths who seized unac-counted money and propertyworth over �152 crore.

The ongoing Winter Sessionof the House at Belagavi wit-nessed a ruckus as both BJP andJD(S) demanded the suspensionof two engineers who were raid-ed by the Income Tax sleuths.Bowing to the Oppositiondemand in the KarnatakaLegislative Council, HomeMinister G Parameshwaraannounced the that two engi-neers TN Chikkarayappa andSC Jayachandra who had comeon the radar of tax sleuths havebeen suspended.

Chikkarayappa isManaging Director of CauveryNeeravari Nigama (irrigationcorporation) and Jayachandra,Chief Project Officer of theState Highway DevelopmentProject. They are said to be veryclose with some of the power-ful Ministers in the State.

The Home Minister said onthe floor that the Governmentwould decide on the next stepafter a probe and getting infor-mation from the IT Department,adding, none would be protect-ed and the guilty would bepunished according to law.

He also said it was notproper to link one official asbeing close to Chief MinisterSiddaramaiah and the other toPublic Works Minister HCMahadevappa, pointing out

that they had worked for pre-vious Governments also.

Over 50 I-T sleuths andpolice personnel had conduct-ed the operations and searchedpremises in Bengaluru, Chennaiand Erode (Tamil Nadu) withthe Department saying theseizure of cash in new curren-cy was over �5 crore.

IT officials on Friday saidthe cash found, after searcheswere launched on Thursday inthe premises of two engineersand two contractors, has risento �5.7 crore and these notesare in the denomination of thenew currency of �2,000.

“Total admission of unac-counted income by the groupstands at �152 crore.Investigations are on,” theysaid in New Delhi.

Parameshwara said it waspuzzling as to “from where �4.7crore came (in cash in new cur-rency). It must have comefrom the bank only. How didthey get it ... from which bank?”

He said the IT departmentshould now find out as to how“so much money reached them”and take action after complet-ing the relevant process.

As the Council met in themorning, Opposition BJP andJD(S) members rushed to thewell of the House alleging thatGovernment was protectingcorrupt officers by not sus-pending them forthwith.

Opposition BJP leader KSEshwarappa raised the issue

and said the State Governmenthad not taken any actionagainst the two officials thoughthe matter had come to the foreand demanded their immedi-ate suspension pending inquiry.JDS’ Basavaraj Horatti alsoinsisted on their suspension.

Parameshwara later told theHouse that he had discussed thematter with the Chief Ministerand Chief Secretary andannounced the suspension.

“Income-tax Departmentof Karnataka & Goa conduct-ed a search in the cases of twoState Government Engineersand two contractors on 30-11-2016. In these searches, cash inexcess of �6 Crores, bullion of7 kg approximately and jew-ellery about 9 KG were foundfrom the residences (Gold andjewellery is valued at approxi-mately �5 Crores). Out of thecash found, �5.7 Crores is innew currency of �2000 notes.About �90 Lakhs has beenfound in the old demonetisedcurrency” said in a press releaseissued by the income taxdepartment.

According to the pressrelease in addition, severalproperty documents were alsofound, and seized.” It was alsonoticed that these persons arein possession of high end lux-ury cars. Total admission ofunaccounted income in thegroup stands at �152 Crores.Investigations are continuing”adds the press release.

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Seeking to send a message ofunity in the ruling

Samajwadi Party which hasbeen battling a bitter powerstruggle, four Ministers sackedin October are likely to be rein-ducted. The Ministers areShipal Yadav who is also theState president of the party andOm Prakash Singh, Narad Raiand Shadab Fatima. The fourare likely to be inducted in theCabinet after the grand rally ofthe party in Bareilly onDecember 7.

The four Ministers weresacked by Chief MinisterAkhilesh Yadav on October 23,the day he had called the meet-ing of the party Legislators athis official residence. Daysafter the unceremonious dis-missal of the four Ministers, SP

supremo Mulayam SinghYadav had said that “he has leftthe matter of the reinduction ofthe four Ministers in theCabinet to the discretion ofAkhilesh Yadav’’.

As per the patch formulaworked out in the first familyof the party Shivpal Yadav islikely to demit the office of theState president of the party.Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadavor one of his confidants is like-ly to take over as the State pres-

ident of the party. The post ofthe State president is crucialsince the State Assembly elec-tions are round the corner andState president has an impor-tant role in the selection of thecandidates.

Samajwadi Party sourceshowever indicated that it’s a ten-tative proposal yet to be ratifiedby the party supremo MulayamSingh Yadav. The matter wasproposed to be discussed in themeeting of the members of the

first family of the party here onThursday. The meeting couldnot take place due to the preoccupation of the SP supremoin the ongoing winter session ofthe Parliament.

An SP leader privy to thepatch up process said“Samajwadi Party is alreadymuch behind all other partiesin campaigning, the feud in theparty has to be settled withoutany further loss of time”. ChiefMinister Akhilesh Yadav whileinaugurating the metro rail onThursday has said that “theelection campaign of theSamajwadi Party would beganwithin one hour of the inau-guration of the metro rail inLucknow.

The SP leader also said thatthe Chief Minister AkhileshYadav will participate in therally at Bareilly. Akhilesh had

skipped the party’s rally atGhazipur addressed by the SPsupremo on November 23.

Rajendra ChowdharyCabinet Minister and vice-president of the JaneshwarMishra trust said that “ourtarget is to prevent BJP fromcoming to power in the State inthe crucial 2017 elections’’. Headded “the youth are enthusi-astic in the leadership of theAkhilesh Yadav which was pal-pable during the two rounds ofthe Rath yatra undertaken bythe Chief Minister. He said thatthe target of the party is to formGovernment again in 2017.“We want to ensure that BJPshould not form Governmentand SP gets absolute majorityonce again.” He added that “ allsecular people will cometogether to remove BJP fromthe country’’.

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Patna: The last day of theWinter Session of BiharLegislature on Friday saw bothHouses failing to transact anybusiness due to disruption bymembers of Opposition andTreasury Benches.

The tone for the day was setin the morning itself, whenmembers of the ruling RJD,JD(U) and Congress stageddharna on the Assembly premis-es against PM Narendra Modifor allegedly not fulfilling the pollpromise of providing ̀ 15 lakh toevery citizen out of the blackmoney stashed in foreign banks.

Rabri Devi, wife of RJDpresident Lalu Prasad, and oth-ers also protested against BJP,alleging its members had raised“derogatory” slogans againstCongress president SoniaGandhi, Lalu Prasad and DelhiChief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.

Rabri Devi told reportersthey would not allow normalfunctioning of LegislativeCouncil till BJP leader SushilKumar Modi and former BiharBJP chief Mangal Pandey apol-ogise for their remarks.

Lashing out at the rulingcoalition, Sushil Modi toldreporters "there is no question ofapologising in this life...Whatshall we express regretfor?...Rather I will move twosteps forward and call Lalu

Prasad a 'baiman' (corrupt) andsay that Congress is promotingcorruption."

“What is wrong in callinga corrupt a corrupt... How cana corrupt be called honest?" hesaid on Lalu Prasad andreferred to his conviction in thefodder scam.

Sushil Modi, who is leaderof opposition in LegislativeCouncil, attacked Chief MinisterNitish Kumar for failing to reinin members of treasury benchwho were disrupting proceed-ings in the two Houses.

As the Legislative Assemblymet for the day, Leader ofOpposition Prem Kumar soughtexpulsion of six RJD andCongress MLAs for unrulyscene in the House onNovember 29 in course ofwhich BJP member GayatriDevi was hurt and RJDLegislator Bhola Yadav, a closeconfidant of Lalu Prasad, threat-ened her of dire consequences.

Speaker Vijay KumarChaudhary said all parties havealready condemned the unrulybehaviour of members of all par-ties on November 29 and saidobjectionable comments andslogans against the PrimeMinister and others have beenexpunged. But, this did not sat-isfy BJP members who troopedinto the Well. ���

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AIADMK workers on Fridayheld special prayers for

the speedy recovery of theirparty chief J Jayalalithaa, whois undergoing treatment at ahospital here since September22, by lighting about one lakhlamps at temples in differentparts of the state.

Prayers were held on behalfof AIADMK’s ‘J JayalalithaaPeravai’ forum and was attend-ed by Ministers, MLAs andsenior leaders.

About one lakh lamps werelit by the party workers inMurugan and Amman templesin different parts of the state,including Chennai, Madurai,Sivaganga, Nilgiris, Pudukottai,and Krishnagiri.

Lamps were lit in designsresembling ‘Om’ and ‘Amma,’ as

Jayalalithaa is addressed bysupporters, praying for hercomplete recovery and returnhome.

Jayalalithaa, 68, was admit-ted to Apollo Hospitals here onSeptember 22 after she com-plained of fever and dehydration.

Hospital Chairman PratapC Reddy had last week said thechief minister, who is gettingwhole body physiotherapy, isundergoing a “normal recu-peration after being in bed forseveral weeks getting treated forillness” and it is she who woulddecide when to return home.

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Aman has been booked forallegedly depositing fake

currency notes in old denom-inations in bank accounts of asmany as 47 persons afterdemonetisation decision wasannounced last month.

The face value of the coun-terfeit notes is stated to be�35,600, police said, adding thata case was registered against anunknown person on the com-plaint lodged by a private bank.

Police are investigatinghow the man convinced somany persons to accept thenotes for deposit.

The fake notes detected bythe banks comprise 25 pieces of�1,000 and 21 pieces of �500.

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Lucknow: With Oppositionparties going all guns blazingagainst Centre over its demon-etisation move, Prime MinisterNarendra Modi is slated toaddress a Parivartan rally inMoradabad on Saturday wherehe is likely to justify hisGovernment’s decision to cullhigh value currency notes.

Security has been tight-ened around the rally ground.Security personnel have alreadybeen deployed with SPG sleuthstaking control of the ground.

This would be the fourthaddress of PM in Parivartanrally, first being on November14 in Ghazipur, second in Agraon November 20 and the thirdin Kushinagar on November 27.After Moradabad, Modi willaddress two more Parivartan ral-lies - at Bariach on December 11and in Kanpur on December 19.

BJP leaders are gearing upto make this rally a success andhas set a target to bring a crowdof more than two lakh people toprove to the world that commonman is supporting demonetisa-tion move of the centre. ���

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Questioning Bihar ChiefMinister Nitish Kumar's

silence over unruly conduct ofthe legislators of the ruling par-ties in both the Houses, BJPleader Sushil Kumar Modi saidhe might change his stand ondemonetisation under pres-sure from his allies who con-tinue to protest the move.

“Members of RJD andCongress are openly criticisingdemonetisation and also cre-ating unruly scenes inLegislative Assembly as wellLegislative Council over itwhile Chief Minister NitishKumar, who is leader in bothHouses stands mute,” he said.

“The way Congress andRJD are creating pressure on

Kumar by staging violentprotests in Assembly andCouncil and also outside, wewill not be surprised if Kumarchanges his stand on demon-etisation in the next three tofour days,” Modi said.

The senior BJP leader alsodubbed Kumar as “nirih” (meek),who is constantly under pressurefrom RJD and Congress forsupporting demonetisation.

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With food safety regulatorFSSAI setting new stan-

dards for camel milk, dairymajor GCMMF, which sellsproducts under the Amulbrand, on Friday said it willlaunch camel milk in the nextthree months.

Amul will first start sellingcamel milk in Ahmedabad andwill later launch in other cities.

“We operationised stan-dards for camel milk today. Wetook two years to come outwith standards. The standardswill help better marketing ofcamel milk in cities,” FoodSafety and Standards Authority(FSSAI) Chairman PawanAgarwal said at an exhibitionorganised by NGOs ‘Sahjeevan’and ‘Foundation for EcologicalSecurity’ here.

This will also help createawareness about the healthbenefits of camel milk, headded.

Aggarwal assured that itwould take possible measuresif any fine tuning is required inthe standards going forward.

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Page 8: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

It is only a matter of timebefore the Supreme Courtends up modifying its orderto play the National Anthembefore each screening of a

film in a movie theatre anywherein the country. Not only is theorder bizarre, it is un-imple-mentable and unenforceable.

The court has directed thateverybody present in the movietheatre should stand to attentionand doors should be locked to pre-vent people from going out orcoming in. Latecomers to themovie, never mind if they are legit-imate ticket buyers, need to waitoutside, with the doors locked, tillthe national anthem is over.

Other than the fact that lock-ing doors is a contravention ofsafety norms upheld by the courtsthemselves, how does the judicia-ry imagine this rule will be main-tained throughout the country?What if the odd person in a halldecides not to stand to attention?Is the manager or owner of themovie theatre then obliged to callthe police and file an FIR? Will thepolice come in, interrupt the film— which surely would have begunby then — and take away the per-son in row A, seat 17, who themanager has complained did notstand to attention while theanthem was being played?

What is so special about thecinema? A logical corollary to thisorder is a public interest petitioncalling for the National Anthem tobe played before the commence-ment of any form of entertainment— why just a film? As such, plays,rock concerts, mushairas, thumrirecitals, not to speak of footballmatches and Indian PremierLeague games, should also havethe National Anthem playingbefore they start, with it beingmandatory for everyone present inthe auditorium or stadium orother venue to stand to attention.What should be a deeply meaning-ful and moving moment for thecitizen — standing to attentionand singing the National Anthemon a special occasion — will bereduced to symbolism and farce.

The order on the NationalAnthem is a milestone in judicialoverreach, and for two reasons.First, to frame rules that mayrequire the National Anthem to beplayed before a screening of a filmis in the domain of the executive,specifically in the domain of a Stateor city Government. It is not thejudiciary’s job to in effect legislate.In the classical tradition, it shouldmerely decide whether a givenpolicy is legally and constitutional-ly correct or otherwise. Yet, the

Supreme Court has legislated timeand again, and the NationalAnthem issue is only the latest.

Second, the judiciary has takenupon itself the role of the custodi-an of national values: Of recognis-ing patriotic credentials and pro-moting the moral and moralisingaspects of the Indian state. Quiteapart from the sense that theseaspects of the Indian state are bythemselves often an encroach-ment on the rights and autonomyof individual citizens and civil soci-ety, the judiciary has now decidedthat only judges — not the execu-tive, not Parliament, not civil ser-vants, not elected politicians — canbe trusted with these.

This is unfortunate because inthe past 20 odd years, India,Indian-ness and the Indian senseof nationhood has been finally,slowly getting over its annexationby the state. “Popular sovereign-ty” literally means sovereigntyvests with the people. In India,since 1947, it was tweaked to meansovereignty vests with theGovernment. The Governmentbecame the custodian of India, ofthe well-being of India, of the ideaof India. This made, for instance,August 15 or January 26, a bureau-cratic chore, rather than a genuinecelebration of common people andordinary families.

Patriotism was rendered a sortof public sector status, run by theproverbial Joint Secretary in theMinistry of High Culture. The pro-tocols and procedures of theadministrative matrix became farmore important than the self-pro-pelled energies of normal, everydayIndians. This made the flag and theNational Anthem, and all the cher-ished emblems of our national per-sona, monopolies of the state: Tobe used and decided upon by theGovernment of the day.

It has taken a long time andmuch effort for Indians to reclaimtheir symbols and their flag fromthe Government. The freedom toproudly fly the national flag itselfwas constricted and contested bythe Government till the FlagCode was amended, ironically fol-lowing a citizen’s battle in thecourts in the 1990s.

In 1962, in the aftermath ofthe Chinese invasion and just 15years into a still precarious andtentative freedom, theGovernment instituted the prac-tice of playing the NationalAnthem at movie theatres. Itwas an instinctive response toconditions and emotions thatwere immediate and reflectedthe nervous anxieties of a still-young nation.

Today’s India is very different

and that much more confident. Itdoesn’t need to give itself such reas-surance on a daily basis. Certainlyit doesn’t need the state to drivehome the idea of loving the coun-try, and prescribing the specificmode of loving the country.

Should such a diktat havecome from a self-importantbureaucrat or a buffoonishMinister, the arguments against itwould have been familiar and easyto make: That the public official inquestion is clinging to an outmod-ed relationship betweenGovernment and citizen, and refus-ing to let go of powers that his orher predecessors may have enjoyedbut that are unacceptable today.

When the judiciary makes thisrole its own, however, the problemis compounded. It is not clingingto an authority that was once itspreserve and should no longer be.It is actually expanding its role anddeciding it is at once lawmaker,rule-enforcer, adjudicator, andnow moral guardian. Far fromseparation of powers, this isenlargement of powers — includ-ing into areas that should bebeyond not just the judiciary buteven the executive and legislature.

(The author is distinguished fel-low, Observer Research Foundation.He can be reached [email protected])/

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Sir — This refers to the report,‘SC: Jana Gana Mana mustbefore movies” (December 1).The Supreme Court’s order thatthe National Anthem must beplayed in cinema halls before thestart of the film, is welcome asit will instill patriotism amongour youth. Patriotism is a virtuewhich will help us be united,despite mutual differences.Cinema, which educates,engages, entertains and alsoimpacts successive generations,has a social responsibility.

TS Karthik Chennai

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Sir — This refers to the report,‘SC: Jana Gana Mana mustbefore movies” (December 1).The National Anthem must alsobe played in Parliament beforeour MPs begin the days busi-ness. Seeing the never-endingugly fights among our so-calledpeople’s representatives, it wouldmake sense to make them standfor the National Anthem andrespect the nation.

Akshat JaiswalVia email

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Sir — This refers to the article,“From one economist to anoth-er” (December 1) by ShreyaKedia. Is former Prime MinisterManmohan Singh, who ruledthis country for 10 long yearsunder the UPA Government, notresponsible and even accountablefor the numerous scams, includ-ing the 2G Spectrum scam, theCommonwealth Games scam,etc, in which thousands of croresof rupees were looted and plun-dered allegedly by Ministers?

Singh’s indulgence in the scamsand corruptions cannot be ruledout. He should at least feel ashamedof his misdeeds and extend willingcooperation to the ModiGovernment in the larger interestof the nation.

Nimai Charan SwainBhubaneswar

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Sir — It’s encouraging that afterdemonetisation, the UnionGovernment has imposed a limit ongold holdings. The limit seems tobe moderate. Next, there should besome restrictions on real estate too.The poor and the middle class isfinding it difficult to buy a piece of

land as the rich and black moneyholders dump their ill-gotten wealthby buying houses and commercialcomplexes which resulted in aspurt of real estate prices.

Sravana RamachandranChennai

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Sir — This refers to the editori-al, “Both loved and despised”(November 29). The demise ofCuban President Fidel Castro isa great loss not only for his coun-trymen, but also for those whopatronise self-respect and whorefuse to accept any superpow-er’s hegemony.

Castro’s long-standing abhor-rence to the US brought him clos-er to the then Soviet Union andfrom a democratic country, itbecame a communist one. Castrodefied US hegemony for nearly halfa century and bedeviled as many as11 US Presidents and briefly pushedthe world to the brink of nuclearwar. Although it was backed by theSoviet block, Cuba was a pioneer inthe establishment of the non-aligned movement.

Sagar Singh Delhi

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����� ����&�������� '�4��� �������The death of the “last” revolu-

tionary leader, Fidel AlejandroCastro Ruz, came a decade after heformally and finally relinquishedpower in 2008. For more than halfa century, he remained a bane for tenAmerican Presidents, starting withDwight D Eisenhower and endingwith George W Bush. Also, he hadseen President Barack Obama com-ing to his homeland, offering ahand of cooperation to put an endto one of the longest and bitterestrelations with that country. However,this time, it was not the ElComandante, as he was popularlyknown, but his revolutionary broth-er, Raul Castro, who had to deal withObama. Fidel Castro, for all his life,till the last breath, defied the US inits backyard and the superpower hadto simply seat helplessly as allattempts to contain Fidel failed,both physically and ideologically. Hehad the courage to make Washingtonfeel its worst-ever nightmare in the1962 Cuban Missile crisis, when theSoviet leadership came to installnuclear armed missiles in his coun-try, just 90 miles away from Florida.However, then US President John FKennedy agreed not to attack Cubain exchange for the withdrawal ofSoviet missiles from the island.Sources also reported during thosedays that Kennedy also quietlyagreed to withdraw his country’smissiles from Turkey. The mostironical thing is what started as anationalist revolution against Cuba’shated military dictator GeneralFulgencio Batista, finally turned outto be another despised dictatorshipin the guise of freeing the Cubansfrom one.

Let’s explore how the ElComandante survived so long andwhat made him such staunch enemyof the US throughout his life.

To begin with, Fidel Castro’sjourney from a pure revolutionaryleader to the making of an archenemy of the US, the contribution ofthe latter is even no less. Precisely theEisenhower administration was sole-ly responsible for pushing him to thearms of the Soviet Union during theheydays of the Cold War. HenryKissinger was not really happy aboutCastro’s role in Angola. The bottomline was clear: No AmericanPresident wanted a Latin Americanleader to speak the way he came outin public against US policies andactions. Each time a US Presidentdesired to mend ties with Cuba, hewanted Castro to either get out ofAfrica or terminate his ties withSoviet Union. Unfortunately, Castrodid neither and remained firm in hisposition. Thus valiantly he declared,“Why should Cuba have to play byone set of rules, where you tell us

what to do and you get to do what-ever you want? We’re a sovereigncountry, and the revolution meansthat we can act independently, that’swhat the revolution was for.” The CIAplotted to overthrow his regimeeven when he undertook a visit to theUS in 1959. Therefore, one can seemassive efforts from both theEisenhower and Kennedy adminis-trations to push Castro from power,but he resisted all of them and didperfectly well. Now, with the deathof Castro, the permanent resistanceto the US leadership has simply gonefrom its neighbourhood.

When Castro resigned in 2008,the Cuban economy was all in tatters.The manufacturing sector in thecountry was totally collapsed andshockingly, the debt per capitaincome was twice that of the entireLatin American average. On theother hand, the way the flow ofrefugees has landed in America,today Florida has virtually becomeanother Cuba. This was all createdby Castro, though subsequently pro-pelled by the successive US admin-istrations. But for all practical pur-poses, it was Castro who made all ofthem flee their homeland for fulfill-ing his political agenda. Sadly, morethan 20 per cent of the Cubans today

live outside the country, either forfear of political retribution or out oftheir own choice.

When the world is fast becom-ing globalised in every nook and cor-ner of the world, the Cubans are stilldeprived of the same. Reports say thatonly 25 per cent of the Cubans haveaccess to the Internet. This showshow they are restricted to the hap-penings of the world. There are noindependent media houses, exceptthe ones run by the party. Thus, hemade it all possible that there couldnot be any opinion manufacturedagainst his tall leadership.

His bold proclamation that “I amthe revolution” reflected howobsessed he was with his personali-ty cult and propaganda. Also, Castro’spropaganda did not stop even whenthe revolution became the establish-ment. The face of the leader remainedcentral to all programmes across thecountry. All his speeches were everdominant with the word “I” on alloccasions. He was truly obsessed withmassive self-propaganda machinerywhere only he existed. In fact, this wasthe normal style of all the commu-nist revolutionaries, including theSoviet leaders.

The biggest drawback of Castrowas that all his life he lived in a

closet. He even refused to see theworld beyond Havana. His worldview was limited by a dogged com-mitment to socialism, at times brand-ed as Cuban revolutionary socialismand sometimes, as Soviet style social-ism. Whatever it is, he failed his coun-trymen to realise the taste of freedomthat he enjoyed uninterrupted in hislifetime, without even a single oppo-sition to his rule. He was totallyobsessed with countering an impend-ing US and Western ploy to eliminatehim and his revolutionary regime.Unfortunately that did not happen tilldate and he led his all weapons andmeans of repression against every sin-gle person about whom he had aniota of doubt. His merciless tactics tocontain enemies across the island lit-erally made it a fortress of a uniquetype.

When he left his office in 2008,then US President George W Bushrejoiced and declare, “The UnitedStates will help the people of Cubarealise the blessings of liberty.” Alas!That has not happened so far. Afterhis brother came to power, much ofthe policies designed and imple-mented by the great revolutionaryleader hardly changed. Cubans haveno right and freedom to choose theirleader and a Government of their

own. Political and media freedom areextremely limited. A Human RightsWatch report stated, “Many of theabusive tactics developed during(Fidel’s) time in power — includingsurveillance, beatings, arbitrarydetention, and public acts of repu-diation — are still used by theCuban Government.”

So then where is the change thatmany people expected to comedown to Cuba? The malaise of theCuban nation is prolonging. Hence,the international community mustnot allow the same to happen. It isbetter to bring the country to theinternational mainstream. Its pariahstatus should come to an end withthe demise of the revolutionary.Also the global leaders and institu-tions must initiate prompt actions towelcome Cuba to break the ice. RaulCastro’s time begins now. He has tooffer his countrymen a chance toopen up their abilities to realign withthe globalised world.

The best ever but sort of a revo-lutionary change that landed in Cubawas no other than the beginning ofthe rapprochement with Americabeginning in 2014. Obama nomi-nated an ambassador to the island forthe first time since the Eisenhowerestablishment. He also initiated

prompt actions to lessenWashington’s five decades old tradeembargo over Cuba. This was a his-torical gesture shown by Obama, butunfortunately all actions were put for-warded from the American side. Andhis visit to the island in 2015 madea history as it was never imaginedthat a US President will come thatcloser to the Cuban leadership. Thiswas made possible through the helpof the Pope, and it finally paid gooddividends. That means more assertiveactions are expected from the Cubanleaders to roll back the US-Cuba rela-tionship to the normal level.

It seems and probably will hauntthe island nation by his longstandinglife, image, authority and style of gov-ernance that he practiced till his death.Though he gave up his office in 2006,his larger than life persona, will cer-tainly have a large impact on thefuture of Cuba. It is time for RaulCastro to bring his nation out of theisolation as the country sufferedfrom various American sanctionsfor nearly half a century. The Cubansdeserve a free life. They all should beallowed to be connected to the rest ofthe world. It is a country in surviv-ing amid ruins for years now. Most ofthe young people do not want to livethere. With the news of Raul Castroleaving office in 2018, political pun-dits say that Cuba may see a new faceand a new future. What will follow, noone knows. It will again be a mystery,but hope the Cubans will unveil a newroad in their long march to freedom!

While saluting Castro’s capacityto stand to the US, many feel that hemust remain as “yo soy la revolucion”(I am the revolution). His all pow-erful message to the Cubans was“venceremos”, meaning “we willwin”. Although he failed to winmany things for his fellow Cubans,he could assure them a fine systemof health and education for sure. Atleast he was capable of making theirlife much more honourable thanwhat it was under Batista, the dicta-tor who was overthrown by him.People started paying their respect toCuba as a citadel of world revolution,and judged the country’s strength,not by its size. And it was made pos-sible by the El Comandante! As timehas passed and things have changed,ideology has taken a back seat, par-ticularly for the young people inCuba and around the world.Therefore, how the young Cubansassess the contribution of FidelCastro, who have hardly seen andrealised his revolutionary leadership,will matter a lot. But, his style of lead-ership and persona will certainly passon to the long list of world of legends.

(The writer is Senior Editor, The Pioneer)

The near euphoric days of global-isation has either gone or has

never come into reality. Probably,what Canadian media theoristMarshal McLuhan predicted as thecoming of the “Global Village” in hispioneering works “The GutenbergGalaxy: The Making of TypographicMan, 1962” and “UnderstandingMedia, 1964”, have taken all of us toa new era. An era in which we havedriven ourselves into an extremelyinterconnected web of events.Globalisation has moved the worldinto an ever greater, complex andadvanced network of informationand communication technology(ICT). The world is fast becomingflat, as Thomas Friedman wrote, andgradually entered into a period of“End of history” (Francis Fukuyama),hinting mostly at the triumph of lib-eral democracy over socialism. Whatmore you want? And then comes the“Rise of the Rest” thesis of FareedZakaria. To him, the rise of othernations like India, China and Brazilwill bring new changes to the exist-ing global order. Zakaria stated,“The fact that newly rising nationsare more strongly asserting theirideas and interests is inevitable in apost-American world. This raises aconundrum: how to get a world ofmany actors to work together.” Thus,the rise of the rest has obviously ledto a new scenario and from here, thecoming of a multi-polar world orderindicated the beginning of anotherpower calculus from the later part ofthe 20th century. Against the back-drop of such dynamics taking placein international politics, the arrivalof various forces of globalisation hasforced many of us to rethink whetherit is oversold or outdated by now? Itis obviously a very complex question,loaded with more complicatedanswers. But let us see how globali-sation has unfolded what the worldnever witnessed in the past.

First, how globalisation brought

an open trade and in what way ithelped the world? But a true reck-oning is trickier than it might appearas it involves multiple factors. FormerUS President Bill Clinton, in the veryfirst year in office, proudly claimedthat the North Atlantic Free TradeAgreement (NAFTA) will createnearly 2,00,000 jobs in his country.But with the entry of China in theWorld Trade Organization (WTO)subsequently and many other play-ers in the global trade, it changed theground realities around the world. Inthe last 16 years, the local Americanshave lost more jobs to the emergingeconomies like India, China, Brazil,etc. Even the recently concluded USpresidential poll saw a bitter waramong the prime candidates fromthe two major parties on the loss ofjobs. Now President-elect Donald JTrump wants to bring a steep tariffon the imports from China and

Mexico to America. Other candi-dates like Bernie Sander’s also strong-ly lashed out at various trade deals,saying these are “a disaster forAmerican workers”. This brings tes-timony to the rest of the world whenTrump announced his country’swithdrawal from one of the most his-toric trade deal that America hadsigned last year — the Trans-PacificPartnership (TPP) — with 11 otherAsia-Pacific nations. On record, thedemocratic presidential candidateand the former Secretary of the State,Hillary Clinton, who was trulyinstrumental in the finalisation of theTPP at various stages during hertenure, too promised to withdrawfrom the deal. What all this impliesis the fact that global trade deals arenot doing good to economic giantslike America. Then we could imag-ine how least developed countriesand developing nations are strug-

gling and getting sandwiched underthe pressures emanating from the bigbusiness enterprises. Frankly speak-ing, the world is losing more thangaining from globalisation.

Second, a massive wave ofmigration has brought many of thedeveloped nations to a stage of rest-lessness. Many of the advancednations in Europe simply wanted tostop the flow of people from most ofthe Asian and African nations. Todate, these migrants are mostly eco-nomic migrants rather than fleeingtheir restive homelands for fear ofpolitical persecution, war, conflict,etc. However, the migrants whocame to European countries since thebeginning of the civil war in Syria in2011 and as a result of the ArabSpring are leaving their homes bothfor safety and for a decent livelihood.But can a persistent civil war in var-ious countries of the West Asia and

Africa justify the coming of the mil-lions of migrants to the advancednations? Why these developednations will take the “burden of oth-ers” even if they have enoughresources? Globalisation does notmean sharing of burdens irrespectiveof race, religion, region, nationality,etc. Openness towards a borderlessworld is heralding a never ending cri-sis. As a result, ethnic, xenophobicand ultra-nationalist forces are rais-ing their ugly heads around theworld, mostly in Europe.

Third, there has been a growingdisquiet too about the unfetteredmovement of capital. Most of the bigcorporate houses are shifting toplaces where they can pay lessertaxes. That is why America is com-ing heavily on tax inversions. On theother hand, the EU grumbles that theUS conglomerates engage in toomany tricks to evade taxes acrossEurope. Besides, the absolutely freeflow of debt capital helps spreadingthe malaise to other countries rela-tively faster than ever before. Suchfickleness in capital flow indeedscared some of the EU membersfrom joining the union’s single cur-rency Euro in the past.

Fourth, flattening the worldthrough numerous modes of tech-nology has made our lives easier,faster and cheaper. But does it meanwe are fully equipped to handle thepitfalls brought by the advancedtechnologies. Nevertheless, the hor-ror spread by the Islamic State (ISIS)today is largely possible because ofthe availability of communicationtechnology. Though we are receivingendless benefits, yet the impact of thenegativities spread by the ISIS andmany other anti-social entities likeit are taking a toll on humanity today.

Globalisation was supposed tofacilitate the flow of huge foreigndirect investments to developingnations. Yes, it happened to a con-siderable extent, but then globalisa-

tion has made corporate plunderingmuch easier than before. Given thefact that many of these developingnations were resource rich, themulti-national corporations drovedown to various corners of theworld and simply took away theirfortunes. Today locals are crying foulover opening their borders. They areraising banners of protest for losingtheir indigenous rights andresources.

These are a few instances whichamply make it clear that globalisationhas really moved us farther, but pro-duced greater problems. Socio-cul-tural shifts and making of thepromise of global citizens, actuallydid very little for ameliorating thehardships of the marginalised sec-tions of the world. But the big ques-tion remains: Is globalisation goodto humanity as a whole or to themajority of the inhabitants of thisplanet? The way events have unfold-ed largely belies what globalisationhas so far promised. The mandategiven for Brexit by the Britons, theemergence of the xenophobic anti-migration movements in Europe, thepersistent and meteoric rise of theISIS, the sky-high levels of global pol-lution, the massive rural-urbandivide, the expansion of the Sino-Russian influence in and around theglobe, the arrival of the Trump phe-nomenon, the demise of the ageingrevolutionary Castro and his coun-try’s possible march onto the globalmainstream may add more restless-ness to the conflict-ridden world. Itis very unlikely that all these will con-tribute more towards a healthy rela-tionship among the nations.

Hope some good actors will beable to herald little relief to human-ity. And, possibly minimise the gar-gantuan effects of globalisation andits aftershocks.

(The writer teaches Sociology atOP Jindal Global University, Sonepat)

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In order to absorb extra liq-uidity from the system fol-

lowing scrapping �500 and1000 high value currencies,the Reserve Bank of India(RBI) on Friday sharplyrevised the MarketStabilisation Scheme (MSS)ceiling, raising to �6 lakhcrore from �30,000 crore ear-lier.

MSS bonds are issuedwith the objective of provid-ing the central bank with astock of securities with whichit can intervene in the marketfor managing liquidity. Thesesecurities are not issued to

meet the Government’sexpenditure. Meanwhile, RBIalso auctioned the 28-dayCash Management Bills (CBS)of Government of India worth�20,000 crore.

“After the withdrawal ofthe legal tender character ofthe �500 and 1,000 denomi-nation notes with effect fromNovember 9, 2016, there hasbeen a surge in the depositswith the banks. Consequently,there has been a significantincrease of liquidity in thebanking system which isexpected to continue for sometime,” the RBI said in a state-ment.

However, EconomicAffairs Secretary Shaktikanta

Das said that RBI would oper-ate within that limit as perrequirement, not as if theentire quantum of MSS wouldbe uti l ised overnight.“Whatever liabilities come inthis year we should be able toabsorb it in Budget provisionsfor interest payment, which isthere already in the Budget,”he told reporters here.

The announcementregarding the auction ofCMBs was made within min-utes of increase in MSS ceil-ing. “The CMBs will have thegeneric character of TreasuryBills,” it said, adding that con-sequently, there has been a sig-nificant increase of liquidity inthe banking system that is

expected to continue for sometime.

“In order to facilitate liq-uidity management opera-

tions by the RBI in the currentscenario, the Government has,on the recommendation of theRBI, decided to revise the

ceiling for issue of securitiesunder the MSS to �6,000 bil-lion,” it added.

As part of liquidity man-agement exercise, RBI lastweek asked lenders to tem-porarily maintain an incre-mental cash reserve ratio(CRR) of 100 per cent. TheCRR is the portion of thedeposits banks are required topark with the RBI. The actu-al current rate of CRR is 4 percent.

Das further said the inter-est burden of MSS will dependon the tenure of the bondswhether it is 14-days or 28-days or 364-day t-bill. “TheRBI has its own opinion aboutwhat is the kind of liquidity

that is there. The central bankhas said that CRR will bereviewed. Therefore, there isan overall liquidity on whichRBI will take a view,” he added.

“It could be CMBs, t-billsof various maturities. So,depending on the maturity, theinterest payment liabilities willarise in this year or spill overto next year. Whatever liabil-ities come in this year weshould be able to absorb it inBudget provisions for interestpayment, which is therealready in the Budget,” Dasadded.

RBI Governor Urjit Patelsaid recently that the centralbank has announced incre-mental Cash Reserve Ratio or

CRR of 100 per cent becauseof the large increase indeposits of banks on accountof the return of �1,000 and�500 notes, and the decisionwill be reviewed immediatelyonce the Government issuesadequate quantum of MSSbonds.

“While the RBI has a sig-nif icant stock of theGovernment securities avail-able, we felt that if the increasein deposits continues we mayfall short, hence the decision.Once the Government issuesadequate quantum of MSSbonds, which they havepromised to, we will immedi-ately review the incrementalCRR,” Patel had said.

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Chitra Ramkrishna, whoserved National Stock

Exchange (NSE) for over twodecades since its inception, hasquit as Managing Director andCEO of the National StockExchange with immediate effectpresumably over differences withsome board members

While the exchange in astatement cited “personal rea-sons” for her departure, sourcessaid the exchange veteran decid-ed to leave -- months ahead of itsproposed IPO -- following dif-ferences with some board mem-bers.

Senior executive JRavichandran has been given theinterim charge till the NSE board,headed by former FinanceSecretary Ashok Chawla, finds afull-time replacement forRamkrishna, who rose throughthe ranks to head the exchangeand was part of the team that setup NSE in 1992.

The exit of 52-year-oldRamkrishna, one of the fewwomen executives heading a lead-ing exchange globally, also comesat a time when NSE has been infocus over a new regulatoryframework for high frequencytrades and co-location facilities,which some believe give undueadvantage to some brokers andtraders.

Her tenure was scheduled toend in March 2018. She tookcharge as Managing Director andCEO in April 2013 when she suc-ceeded Ravi Narain, who was alsopart of the first leadership team of

the exchange. Currently,Narain is the Vice Chairman ofNSE.

Sources said Ramkrishnadecided to leave with immediateeffect despite requests by the NSEboard to stay on for some moretime for transition.

Sebi is keeping a close watchon the developments at the NSE,sources said. The bourse wouldrequire the regulator’s approval fortop level appointments.

NSE’s initial public offer isbeing keenly awaited in the mar-ket as one of the biggest IPOs inrecent times. Rival BSE is also inthe process of launching its initialshare sale.

For going public, NSE hasbeen pitching for self-listing oroversight by an independent enti-ty and not a rival exchange in caseof cross-listing. Besides, NSE also

proposed overseas listing of itsshares.

In a release, NSE said itsboard of directors has accepted theresignation of Ramkrishna.

She “tendered her resignationdue to personal reasons andexpressed her desire to step downwith immediate effect. The board,while accepting her request, appre-ciated her sterling contribution tothe growth of the organisationover the long years that she hadbeen associated with it,” the releasesaid.

NSE said the board has alsodecided to immediately startthe process for selection of a newManaging Director and CEOand has set up a selection com-mittee for this purpose.”Theboard of NSE has appointed JRavichandran, Group President,to hold charge of the office of

CEO with immediate effect.“Ravichandran has been

associated with NSE for longyears and brings with him awealth of experience and fullunderstanding of the function-ing of the organisation,” therelease said.

Only last month,Ramkrishna was namedChairperson of the board ofWorld Federation of Exchanges(WFE), a global body of morethan 200 market infrastructureproviders, including exchanges.

She is only the third personto head the bourse in its entirehistory of about two decadesand was also part of the teamthat drafted the legislativeframework for the securitiesmarket regulator Sebi in 1987.

Ramkrishna has handledvarious operational and strate-gic aspects of NSE for manyyears during her roles as Deputyand Joint Managing Director.

She has often been namedamong the top women businessleaders from the country in var-ious rankings.

There are not many womenleaders heading a large exchangeacross the world and the stockmarket trading business haslong been considered a male-dominated area.

As per data from WFE,N SE i s among t he topbourses in the world interms of equity trades andalso market capitalisation.

Ashok Chawla and RaviNarain are the Chairman andVice Chairman, respectivelyof NSE.

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Rolling out of Goods andServices Tax regime before

September 16 next year is a con-stitutional compulsion as theexisting indirect taxes will cometo an end by then and it wouldnot be possible to run the coun-try without revenue collection,said Finance Minister ArunJaitley

He made a pitch for widen-ing the tax base, saying efforts areon to make taxation process farsimpler and make rates morereasonable.

For instance, he said, theGST Council is deliberating onways to reduce the taxationprocess, including assessment bytax officials.

“Today, each person getsassessed thrice, in each of thethree taxations (including VATand central excise). Now, you willonly be assessed once and whatone authority assesses, others willhave to accept that assessment,”he said.

Terming GST as a gamechanger, Jaitley said: “TheConstitution does not permitdelay in GST implementation.The Government notified GSTon September 16 and the con-stitutional amendment itself saysthe current indirect tax systemcan continue for one year, afterwhich the GST has to come.”

So, if as on September 16,2017, there is no GST, then thereis no taxation in the country, hereasoned.

“So, you have a constitu-tional compulsion to have aGoods and Services Tax inplace before September 16(2017), otherwise the countrydoesn’t run, and the tax isabsolutely essential. Therefore,our intention is it gets imple-mented from April 1, 2017, thatwas the original intention,” he

said.Jaitley made the point that

states should not oppose everyreform for the sake of opposi-tion because that makesinvestors wary.

“The states must welcomethe decision and I can only tellyou, if some states are seen asopposing every reform, theninvestors in the country and theones coming from outside, mustdecide which are the states theywant to invest in,” he cautioned.

“So, if your state is seen onthe wrong side of the reform,then investors are going to bevery wary of those states.”

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���������Consensus eludedon the model GST law on Day1 of the meeting of the all-pow-erful GST Council, which willdeliberate again on Friday theissue and also try to resolve thecontentious point of dual con-trol of assessees under thenew indirect tax regime.

The fifth meeting of theGoods and Services Tax (GST)Council, headed by UnionFinance Minister Arun Jaitleyand comprising state financeministers, will also deliberateon impact of demonetisationon revenue.

Some state finance minis-ter exuded confidence that itwas still possible to implementGST from April 1, 2017,though the Centre is runningon a tight time schedule.

“On duel control there isno consensus so far. It will betaken up tomorrow,” Jammuand Kashmir finance ministerHaseeb Drabu told reportersafter the meeting. ��

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���������Tightening the noosefurther around black economy,the Government may abolish dis-cretionary powers of tax officersin deciding liabilities for evasion,said NITI Aayog Vice-ChairmanArvind Panagariya.

He also hinted that stampduty for real estate dealings maybe eased with a possible rise inon-the-book property deals inthe wake of the ongoing crack-down on unaccounted wealth.

“We have to also go back andbegin to think much more seri-ously about a whole set of taxreforms, which would both bringin simplification and precision inthe definition so that you reduce,and hopefully even eliminate, dis-cretion of tax officers on this mat-ter,” Panagariya told private TVchannel India Today in an inter-view.

Panagariya, a former chiefeconomist of the AsianDevelopment Bank, wasresponding to questions on pos-sible follow-up measures to theNovember 8 announcement ofban on 500 and 1,000-rupeebanknotes.

“A lot of evasion of taxes hap-pens when there’s too much dis-cretion on the part of officers. So,we need to simplify,” heremarked.

“Simplification”, heexplained, “would mean doingaway with (tax) exemptions. Inaddition, (we need to) also definesituations much more precisely sothat it leaves no room for dis-cretion for the tax officers todecide whether under such andsuch situations you are liable totax, you are not liable to tax.”

The Government,Panagariya said, is beefing upenforcement against tax cheats inthe real estate sector. At thesame time, concerns over thehigh rates of the stamp dutyshould also be taken care of, he

suggested.“On real estate, we need to

begin to enforce it better. But weneed to address the issue ofstamp duty. Is it too high?” heasked. “If the transactions aregoing to come in white, proba-bly the amount for which thetransaction is taking place wouldrise.”

Asked whether he foresaw adrop in stamp duty, Panagariyaanswered “that’s something weought to have on the table”.

The NITI Ayog chief stout-ly defended Prime MinisterNarendra Modi’s demonetisa-tion of the country’s biggestnotes, which has come underheavy attack from a host ofeconomists, including formerprime minister ManmohanSingh.

“Stamping out corruption ona large scale has not been tried ina developing economy in thepast,” Panagariya argued. “This isthe first time, where in a devel-oping economy, a Prime Ministersays that look we got to do aclean-up job here and systemat-ically proceeds to do that.”

He described Modi’s cur-rency ban as an “essential step”.“This is the first time an econo-my has tried to do the clean-upjob. What the step has been takenis an essential step. It is not thelast step.”

Panagariya rejected Singh’sfierce criticism of the abruptscrap-ping of high-denomination bills,saying the former prime ministerhad given no evidence to back uphis contention.

“I really wished that the formerprime minister Dr ManmohanSingh had also given his argumentsvery clearly why he thought thiswas loot, why he thought this wasplunder. I really don’t know whathis arguments were, so I really can’tquite address them in an informedsort of way,” Panagariya said. ��

�������State Bank of India hasestimated that money worth�2.5 lakh crore may not comeback into the banking systempost demonetisation of high-value notes.

On November 8, theGovernment banned banknotesof �500 and �1,000 worth over�14 lakh crore from the econ-omy.

In a report, the EconomicResearch Department of StateBank of India (SBI) said“around �2.5 lakh crore on aconservative basis will not becoming back into the system”.

As per the SBI analysis, themarket estimate of �14.18 lakhcrore currency -- excludingcash with banks -- is based onMarch 2016 data while in real-ity it should be based on dataavailable as on November 9, aday after demonetisation wasannounced.

SBI noted that going bydata as on November 9, theamount of high currencydenomination notes was �15.44lakh crore (excluding cash inthe banks), an increase of �1.26lakh crore compared to theMarch figure.

It stated that RBI has pub-lished twice the deposited andexchanged notes data withbanks in November with a gapof 9-days. SBI said: “If we close-ly look at the data, the dailyworking day average deposit-ed/exchanged at banks hasdeclined significantly from�605 billion (November 10-18)to �501 billion (November 19-27) -- a decline of 17 per cent.”

In total, between November10-27, �8.44 lakh crore weredeposited and exchanged inbanks, the report said.

“All these estimates puttogether show that total moneycoming into the system in theform of high denominationwill be around �13 lakh crore(as against �15.44 lakh crorehigh value notes as onNovember 9),” it added. ��

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Aplea has been moved inthe Delhi High Court

against the CentralInformation Commission’s(CIC) refusal to provide infor-mation regarding Tata Sonsapplication to RBI in connec-tion with purchase of Japanesetelecom major NTT Docomo’sstake in Tata Teleservices Ltd(TTSL).

The application in CICunder the Right toInformation (RTI) Act hadalso sought information aboutcommunications between theReserve Bank of India (RBI)and the Ministry of Finance(MoF) regarding the applica-tion by Tata.

The high court is likely tohear the matter next week.

The commission haddenied the plea for providingthe information sought, sayingit may “prejudicially affect” theeconomic interest of the coun-try and relations with a foreignnation.

The CIC’s June 14, 2016order had come after theCentre had said that the mat-ter involved was a policy issuewhich was under considera-tion and thus, was exempted

under the RTI Act from pro-viding information sought bythe applicant, Ashish Rana.

The transparency panelhad agreed with theGovernment’s contention andhad also said that “disclosureof information sought mayharm the competitive positionof third parties, includingIndian companies, foreigninvestors...”

Recently, during hearingof Docomo’s plea for enforce-ment of an arbitral award of$1.17 billion in its favour to bepaid by Tata, the Indian com-pany had told the high courtthat it had written to RBIseeking permission for pur-chase of the Japanese compa-ny’s stake in TTSL, a joint ven-ture of the two, at a mutuallyagreed upon price.

Tata had said that as perthe shareholding agreementbetween them, on Docomo’s

exit from TTSL, Tata had toeither f ind a buyer forDocomo’s stake at 50 per centof the acquisition price orbuy it itself at fair marketvalue.

However, when RBI’s per-mission was sought to buy theshares, the central bank ofIndia had forwarded theirrequest to MoF seekingapproval. But the ministryhad denied the request, Tatahad told the court.

When the matter betweenTata and NTT Docomo wentto arbitration, the arbitratorhad awarded damages of $1.17billion to the Japanese com-pany for alleged breach ofcontract by Tata for not find-ing a buyer for Docomo’sstake.

Tata had again sought per-mission of RBI for paying thedamages and the bank hadrefused to grant it after whichDocomo had moved high courtfor enforcement of the award.

Yesterday, RBI had movedhigh court saying the share-holding agreement between thetwo companies permittingtransfer of funds to the foreignentity was illegal as it violatedForeign Exchange ManagementAct (FEMA) Regulations. ��

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������������ �������������� ���� ����������������������The Reserve Bank will come out with monetary policy review, the first after demonetisationof old �500/1000 notes, on Wednesday amid expectations of interest rate cut."The Monetary PolicyCommittee (MPC) will meet on December 6 and 7, 2016 for the Fifth Bi-monthly Monetary PolicyStatement for 2016-17."The resolution of the MPC will be placed on the website at 2.30 pm on December7, 2016," the central bank said.Interestingly, the monetary policy reviews were usually announced onTuesdays. For long, the central bank has been unveiling the monetary policy at 11 am.

Page 11: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

NEW DELHI: Having mademulti-million dollar bets onIndian startups like Snapdealand Ola, SoftBank on Fridayexuded confidence in ‘sur-passing’ its stated $10 billioninvestment commitment inIndia as it looks for neweropportunities in the country.

SoftBank Chairman andCEO Masayoshi Son, whocalled on Prime MinisterNarendra Modi on Friday, said,‘India has the best opportuni-ty’ given the democratic formof governance, huge populationbase and rapid pace of adop-tion of new technologies. “Thisis the country with such a largepopulation, this is a countrywhich is a democracy, many of

you speak English, this is thecountry where I think newtechnology is going to happenand new excitement is coming.This is the country where I amvery much interested in invest-ing,” Son said at the HTLeadership Summit here.

He added that the Japaneseconglomerate has alreadyinvested $2 billion in India inthe last few years. The com-pany, in 2014, had committedto investing $10 billion in 10years in India. “I am a man tokeep my words. We havealready invested $2 billion inthe last couple of years. Eightmore years to go. I am goingto surpass my word on thecommitment,” he said. PTI

MUMBAI: Extending its loss-es for the second day, bench-mark Sensex tumbled 329points to end at 26,231 onFriday as investors hit the exitbutton amid mounting globalconcerns. Participants are in await-and-watch mode ahead ofUS jobs report as well as Italy’sconstitutional referendum onSunday, which could deter-mine whether or not the coun-try will remain in theEurozone.

Caution also prevailedahead of the Reserve Bank'spolicy review next week, lead-ing to fall in banking counters.The BSE Sensex resumed lowerat 26,437.37 and hovered in arange of 26,463.06 and26,182.93 before closing 329.26points, or 1.24 per cent, lowerat 26,230.66, its lowest closingsince November 28. The gaugehas dropped by 422.15 points

or 1.58 per cent in two days.The NSE 50-share Niftydropped by 106.10 points or1.30 per cent to close at8,086.80 after moving in arange of 8,159.30 and 8,070.05.

“Since morning, the marketwas following the rising globalanxiety over today’s US employ-ment data and the forthcomingItalian constitutional referen-

dum. While RBI’s market sta-bilisation scheme (MSS) to suckthe excess liquidity out of the sys-tem provided some short-livedrelief to banks, the ongoing GSTCouncil meet and issues relatedto dual control and implemen-tation disrupted the investors’mood,” said Vinod Nair, Head ofResearch, Geojit BNP ParibasFinancial Services. Sustainedforeign capital outflows alsoaffected the market sentiment.

Foreign funds sold sharesworth a net �402.62 crore yes-terday, as per provisional datareleased by the stock exchanges.For the week, the Sensex andNifty both recorded losses byfalling 85.68 points, or 0.32 percent, and 27.50 points, or 0.33 percent, respectively. All the sectoralindices, led by consumer durables,FMCG and auto, ended with loss-es up to 2.32 per cent as sellingpressure intensified. PTI

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There has been a ‘consistentimprovement’ in perfor-

mance of telecom serviceproviders in meeting the bench-mark for call drop parameters, asper regulator Trai’s quarterlyreports between September 2015and June 2016, teh Rajya Sabhawas informed on Friday.

“It has been noticed from thequarterly performance monitor-ing reports of September 2015,December 2015, March 2016and June 2016 available on Traiwebsite that there has been con-sistent improvement in the per-formance of service providers inmeeting the benchmark for calldrop parameters,” TelecomMinister Manoj Sinha said in awritten reply in the Rajya Sabha.

The telecom serviceproviders have reported installa-tion of 1.20 lakh additional BaseTransceiver Stations (BTS) acrossthe country between June 15,2016 and September 30, 2016,and further plan to install 1.56

lakh BTS up to March 2017, theMinister pointed out. Sinha fur-ther said that Trai monitors theperformance of service providersthrough quarterly performancemonitoring reports.

For addressing call dropissue, Trai also regularly under-takes drive tests of mobile net-

works in select cities, highwaysand railway routes to assess thequality of service and coveragearound various areas and routes,and the results are shared withservice providers for improvingservice quality and coverage inthese identified areas.

In order to resolve the calldrop issues, the Department ofTelecom has also been under-taking various steps includingmeeting the Chairman andManaging Directors and CEOs ofservice providers to evaluate theperformance against action planfor improving call drop scenario.

Other steps include makingavailable plenty of spectrumresources in different bands forwhich auction process has recent-ly concluded, wherein the tele-com service providers haveacquired 965 MHz of airwaves,he said. Moreover the depart-ment is also facilitating necessarypermissions in CentralGovernment Buildings andEstate on sharable basis to roll outnew sites in affected pockets.

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NEW DELHI: Amid ongoingcash crunch following thedemonetisation of old �500 and�1000 notes, Government onFriday said the Reserve Bankmonitors the currency require-ment on a regular basis andaccordingly places order forprinting. Replying to questionsin Lok Sabha, Minister of Statefor Finance Arjun Ram Meghwalsaid the new series of bank noteshave been introduced with effectfrom November 10 after thecancellation of legal tender char-acter of the old high denomina-tion notes. These new seriesbank notes are distinctly differ-ent from the old ones in terms oflook, design, size and colour, hesaid in a written reply.

“The RBI monitors therequirement of notes on a regu-lar basis and places the indent onthe printing presses accordingly,”the Minister said. In anotherwritten reply, Meghwal said it is a

prevalent practice to changedesign of notes from time to timeand/or introduce/withdrawdenominations of banknotes. Theprevious highest denomination of

�1000 was introduced in 2000.“Due to persistent moderate

to high inflation since then, thevalue of the same has been pro-gressively eroded in Purchasing

Power Parity (PPP) terms.Simultaneously, disposableincome levels and GDP also con-tinued to grow. “This factor alongwith rising requirement for ban-knotes was the reason for intro-duction of banknote of �2000denomination...,” he said.

As on November 8, the dayon which demonetisation wasannounced, there were 17,165million pieces of �500 notes and6,858 million pieces of �1000notes in circulation. TillNovember 27, worth of oldbanknotes returned to the bank-ing system was about Rs 8.45lakh crore and withdrawal by thepublic was about �2.16 lakhcrore. “Arrangements have beenmade keeping under consider-ation stock position, augment-ing production of new series ofbanknotes, expediting suppliesto all the currency chests, includ-ing air remittances fromthepress,” Meghwal said. PTI

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0�/� ���� ����� ������ ��� ���������������������� ������������������� ���� ��)���� �������� �� ����� ����������� ����������������������� ���$� �� >����� ���$�����$����(�#"����������� ������������ ������� ����� ����������)����� �� $���� )������� ����� �������� ���� ���������� � ���>�������������$����������������������� �����������%�0�/�����(�����

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MUMBAI: India Ratings onFriday lowered its GDP fore-cast for 2016-17 to 6.8 percent from 7.8 per cent earli-er, stating that the demoneti-sation drive will lead to anerosion of �1.5 trillion thisfiscal. “We have revised GDPgrowth forecast for 2016-17 to6.8 per cent, 100 basis pointslower than earlier projectionof 7.8 per cent.

The downward revision isa fallout of the disruptionscaused at various levels in theeconomy due to the de-legal-isation of banknotes fromNovember 9, which accordingto our analysis can cost econ-omy a �1.5 trillion,” it said.

It said the measure, whichthe Government claims rootout black money, is likely todestroy �4.004 trillion worthof cash held in black moneyand fake currencies. PTI

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NEW DELHI: Germany is con-ducting roadshows across thecountry to promote itself as atourist destination and expect-ing around 1.2 million Indianvisitors every year to visit theEuropean nation by 2021. “Weare expecting 1.2 millionovernight visitors from Indiaevery year by 2021. The num-ber of visitors is going up around

five per cent every year,” RomitTheophilus, Director of Sales &Marketing Office India, GermanNational Tourist Office, toldPTI. German National TouristOffice (GNTO) is holding roadshows to promote tourism. Toattract tourists to Germany, it isshowcasing cheap and afford-able hotels and sight-seeings thecountry offers, he said. PTI

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/�������������������������C�&�����?������NEW DELHI: Being a billion-aire and losing 99 per cent ofwealth might not make manyhappy but SoftBank chiefMasayoshi Son feels otherwisesaying such an event helped him‘feel the joy of workand value of money’again. Son, one ofthe world’s richestindividuals now, saw almost hisentire wealth being wiped off inthe wake of the ‘dot com’ burstin 2000 as Softbank’s marketcapitalisation plunged from$200 bn to just $2 bn. PTI

Page 12: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

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Pyongyang: North Korea says a sweeping new round of UN sanc-tions aimed at choking its nuclear program by cutting off as muchas a quarter of its foreign trade revenue is an “abuse of power”and will be met with tough countermeasures.Vice ForeignMinister Han Song Ryol called a gathering of foreign diplomatsin the capital on Friday to lay out his country’s opposition to thesanctions, which are the harshest to date. AFP

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In a setback to UK PrimeMinister Theresa May, a pro-

EU lawmaker on Friday regis-tered a massive victory in theby-election in a posh Londonsuburb, indicating a rebukeover the Government’s plans topull Britain out of the 28 nationEuropean Union.

Liberal Democrat candidateSarah Olney, who fought on ananti-Brexit platform, overturneda whopping 23,015 majority ofthe ruling Conservative party inSouth West London.

She defeated ZacGoldsmith, brother of JemimaGoldsmith Khan – ex-wife ofPakistani cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan, by

polling 20,510 votes, comparedto his 18,638.

Goldsmith had held theseat for May’s Conservativeparty since 2010.

In contrast to the rest of thecountry, London had votedfor Remain in the June 23 ref-erendum, with Richmond astrong pro-Remain con-stituency.

“The people of RichmondPark and North Kingston havesent a shockwave through thisConservative Brexit govern-ment, and our message is clear- we do not want a hard Brexit.We do not want to be pulledout of the single market, and wewill not let intolerance, divisionand fear win,” Olney said in hervictory speech.

Aleppo: Elite Syrian troops moved into east Aleppo on Fridayahead of a push into the most densely populated areas, as regimeally Russia called for corridors to bring in aid and evacuatewounded. Despite global criticism including the UN warningAleppo risked becoming a “giant graveyard”, government forceshave pressed an assault to retake control of the divided city.

The artillery-backed offensive has spurred an exodus of tensof thousands of residents from the rebel-held east.

It has left Aleppo’s streets strewn with the bodies of men,women and children, many lying next to the suitcases they hadpacked to escape. Artillery fire continued on Thursday but sub-sided as heavy rainfall hit the city. AFP

Baghdad: The scope of thetoll the six-week old battle forMosul has taken on Iraqi forcesemerged on Friday, with UNfigures showing that around2,000 had been killed in fight-ing last month alone.

While high casualty tollswere expected for what hasbeen Iraq’s toughest battleagainst the Islamic State groupto date, few figures had beenreleased.

The United Nations’ mis-sion in Iraq released monthlycasualty figures for November

that showed 1,959 members ofthe Iraqi forces were killedjust last month and 450 otherswounded.

The UN toll includesmembers of the army, policeengaged in combat, the Kurdishpeshmerga, interior ministryforces and pro-governmentparamilitaries.

The UN statement also saidat least 926 civilians were killed,bringing to 2,885 the number ofIraqis killed in acts of terrorism,violence and armed conflictlast month. AFP

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A political drama threateningBrazil’s President MichelTemer has deepened withjudges ordering his top ally tostand trial and corruption sus-pects lining up to make morepotentially explosive revelations.

After a roller-coaster yearfor Brazil, the latest allegationsrisk destabilizing Temer just sixmonths after he took office, ashe seeks to rescue LatinAmerica’s biggest economyfrom crisis.

Supreme Court judges yes-terday ruled that Brazil’s third-most powerful official, Senatepresident Renan Calheiros, 61,must face trial for allegedembezzlement.

He denies the accusationsthat he used public funds tomake maintenance paymentsto a woman with whom he hada child.

Moscow: Russia’s main domes-tic security agency says unspec-ified foreign special services areplotting a series of cyber attacksaimed at destabilising thenation’s financial system.

The Federal SecurityService, known under itsRussian acronym FSB, said thecomputer servers involved inthe planned attacks are locat-ed in the Netherlands andbelong to Ukrainian companyBlazingFast.

The FSB said today that theattacks would be accompaniedby a stream of text messagesand posts on social networkscontaining claims of an immi-nent collapse of Russia’s majorbanks and the financial system’sbreakdown. AP

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US President-elect Donald Trump on Friday pledged that hisadministration “will do everything” to keep the scourge of

terrorism out of America, and called for uniting the country byrejecting bigotry and prejudice. Kicking off his first post-elec-tion victory rally from the key battle ground State of Ohio, Trumpmentioned about the recent car-and-knife attack at Ohio StateUniversity saying it “fully illustrates” the security problems causedby “stupid politicians” and an immigration system that fails toscreen out dangerous, would-be terrorists.

Washington: Islamic State groupjihadists are making a “last stand” intheir former Libyan stronghold ofSirte, where they now control onlyaround two blocks, the Pentagon hassaid.The ISIS group had held all of theMediterranean port city as recently asearly this summer, establishing a sig-nificant foothold in Libya.

The US started a bombing cam-paign in August at the request the UN-supported Libyan Government ofNational Accord to help local forcesrecapture the city more than a year. PTI

Kathmandu: Nepal’s opposition parties today obstruct-ed the parliament for the second consecutive day, sayingthe Constitution amendment bill, aimed at carving out anew province to meet the demands of agitating Madhesisand other ethnic groups, is “against national interests”.

The continued protests by the opposition parties ledby CPN-UML forced House Speaker Onsari Gharti Magarto reschedule the meeting for Sunday. The ParliamentSecretariat had set the agenda of concluding general dis-cussions on the impeachment motion against theCommission for the Investigation of Abuse of AuthorityChief Lok Man Singh Karki for the meeting on Friday.

Indianapolis: US President-elect Donald Trump haswarned American firms want-ing to relocate abroad thatthey will face punishment, as heannounced a deal with air con-ditioning manufacturer Carrierto keep jobs in the country.

“Companies are not goingto leave the United States anymore without consequences.Not going to happen,” Trumptold workers at the Carrierplant in Indianapolis in his firstmajor public remarks yesterdaysince winning the WhiteHouse.

“They can leave from Stateto State, and negotiate dealswith different states, but leav-ing the country will be very,very difficult,” Trump added.

During the presidentialcampaign, the Republican bil-lionaire threatened to slap tar-iffs on firms that decamped forplaces like Mexico or Asiawhere labour costs are cheap-er. It became a repeated refrainof his victorious campaign.

Trump specifically singled

out Carrier, a brand of UnitedTechnologies Corporation, say-ing he had been encouragingthe company not to shift thou-sands of jobs to Mexico.

If they did, he said hisadministration would imposemajor tariffs on Carrier prod-ucts as they made their wayback into the United States.

“But I called Greg (Hayes,UTC’s chairman) and I said it’sreally important, we have to dosomething because you have alot of people leaving and youhave to understand we can’tallow this to happen anymorewith our country,” Trump saidas he recalled an earlyexchange with the firm’s topexecutive.

Under a deal hammeredout with the help of VicePresident-elect Mike Pence,who is Indiana’s outgoing gov-ernor, the State offered Carrier$7 million in incentives over 10years, “contingent upon factorsincluding employment, jobretention and capital invest-ment,” the company said in a

statement.Pence said the deal will

keep about 1,100 jobs in “theheart of the heartland.”

“This is a great day forIndiana and it’s a great day forworking people all across theUnited States of America,”Pence said.

The deal is seen as anextraordinary industry inter-vention by a president-elect.

His supporters havedescribed it as the first tangi-ble part of Trump’s jobs cre-ation plan.

But liberal Senator BernieSanders, who challengedHillary Clinton for the 2016Democratic presidential nom-ination, said the deal shouldworry Americans.

The Hague: The Islamic State group is likely to carry out newattacks in the European Union in the near future, probably tar-geting countries that are members of the US-led coalition fight-ing the extremist organisation in Syria and Iraq, EU police agencyEuropol said in a report published on Friday.

“Estimates from some intelligence services indicate severaldozen people directed by ISIS may be currently present in Europewith a capability to commit terrorist attacks,” according to thereport, which draws on counterterrorism intelligence from aroundEurope and also cites media reports and previously publicisedcalls by ISIS leaders for attacks. But ISIS also is adept at inspir-ing marginalized youths, some of whom may have mental healthproblems, and inciting them to carry out attacks. The report alsowarns that tactics the group uses in Iraq and Syria such as theuse of car bombs could also be deployed in Europe. It also saidthat past attacks such as those in France and Belgium over thelast two years show that extremists acting in the name of ISIScan effectively plan complex attacks. AFP

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President Barack Obamamarked his final time light-

ing the NationalChristmas Tree with awish that Americanswill care for the sick,the hungry and thedowntrodden this hol-iday season and treatone another as they wouldwant to be treated.

The president said thatmessage rounds out his fami-

ly’s Christian faith, and that ofAmericans of all backgrounds.

“It’s a message of unity, anda message of decency and a

message of hope that nevergoes out of style,” Obama said.

“And it’s one that we allneed very much today.”

Obama reflected onhis eight years in office and

said the United States is acountry that has come backfrom economic crisis, warsand national tragedies.

Bogota: After pushing arevised peace deal with theFARC rebels through Congress,Colombian President JuanManuel Santos got down to afar bigger challenge Thursday:implementing it.

The lower house’s unani-mous vote in favor of the dealset off a countdown to end aconflict that has burned forover half a century and killed

more than 260,000 people.“Today we can say the war

has officially ended,” Santossaid in a speech.

“We all have to continuemaking sacrifices, but I hopewe will do so together.”

Interior Minister JuanFernando Cristo told a newsconference that Colombia nowfaces “an enormous challenge”to implement the accord. AFP

Islamabad: Pakistan’s newly-appointed Army chief GeneralQamar Javed Bajwa on Fridayraked up the Kashmir issue forthe first time in his address tosoldiers and asked them torespond with “full force” toeach ceasefire violation byIndia. “Each violation of anykind must be responded towith full force in the most effec-tive manner,” he said during avisit to the 10 CorpsRawalpindi and troops at for-ward locations along the Lineof Control (LoC). PTI

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Washington: US President-elect Donald Trump on Fridayannounced that he will nomi-nate retired Marine generalJames Mattis, renowned for histough talk and battlefield expe-rience in Iraq and Afghanistan,to be his defence secretary.

“We are going to appoint‘Mad Dog’ Mattis as ourSecretary of Defence,” Trumptold a cheering crowd atCincinnati in Ohio in his firstof the series of ‘Thank You’ vic-tory tour.

“But we are not announc-ing this till Monday, so don’t tell

anybody,” Trump told his supporters in his characteristicway.

Trump described 66-year-old Mattis as “one of our great,great generals.”

“He’s our best. They say he’sthe closest thing to (World WarII-era) general George Pattonthat we have and it’s abouttime,” Trump said at the rally.The retired four-star general,known as “Mad Dog,” com-manded a Marine battalionduring the First Gulf War anda Marine division during the2003 invasion of Iraq. PTI

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Washington: President-electDonald Trump’s “ignorant”conversation with PakistanPrime Minister Nawaz Sharifmay send India an unwelcomemessage, a leading Americanmagazine has said.

The Forbes magazine saidthat Trump’s “flattering” con-versation sends a message thathe has no awareness of theissues between the US, Pakistanand India. “His bluster is morelikely to be taken as the initialsignal of his Administration’sposition. When he goes onand on about how wonderfulPakistan is, and how strong ishis friendship, it matters. It mat-ters that he uses words like: very

good reputation, amazingwork...Fantastic country, fan-tastic place, fantastic people,” itsaid. “One of the main messagesit sends, is that he shows noawareness of the issues betweenthe United States, Pakistan,and India,” it said.

Stating that Trump is notaware about the ground reali-ties in South Asia, it said, his“ignorant” conversation withSharif may send India an“unwelcome message”.

Meanwhile, a prominentHindu American group urgedTrump to carefully look at therecords of Pakistan in particu-lar its fight against terrorismand human rights. PTI

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Washington: US President-elect Donald Trump knowswho are America’s “true friend”and his administration willfoster constructive ties whichwill pay dividends on peaceand prosperity in South Asia,said a prominent Indian-American industralist.

“President-elect Trump hassaid that under Trump admin-istration, the US and India willbe ‘best friends’ and that he lovesthe Hindu and Indian people,and particularly admires PrimeMinister Narendra Modi,” saidShalabh Kumar, who has beenappointed to the TransitionFinance and Inauguration com-mitte. PTI

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Actress Vidya Balan hasdone a lot of challengingroles in her career for

which she has been applauded,appreciated, perhaps even under-rated. But there’s one thing abouther onscreen persona. She hasalways made people sit up andtake notice, no matter what thecommercial fate of her films.Each of her characters has beenstand-out, without drawing on orfeeding off each other. That saysa lot about Vidya’s originality andthe ability to slip under the skin.It tells a lot about her sense ofsimultaneous involvement anddetachment. Which is why she isa survivor, and a gritty one at that.From fashion criticism to herpost-marital status, from beingsought after to her recent com-mercial lows, Vidya has handledit all. But now that she is on a highagain there is no sense of vindi-cation, just contentment.

When we met Vidya, theactress was grace personified,accoutred in a lovely orangekurta-palazzo accessorised with aprinted sleeveless jacket and a boldneckpiece. The statement neck-piece added a bit of zing to heroutfit. “I love silver jewellery,” shesaid as she sat down.

Rather than being eye candyin commercial cinemas, theactress took a not-so-easy path forherself, known for choosing off-beat films like Dirty Picture,Ishqiya, No One Killed Jessica, Paaand finally Kahaani that gave heran independent brand value.Perhaps, the weekend audiencecontemplated watching a filmonly because “Vidya Balan is in it.”Talking about that, Vidya laughedand said, “It is gratifying no doubtbut that audience didn’t come tothe theatre for my last four films(Ghanchakkar, Bobby Jasoos,

Shaadi Ke Side Effects and HamariAdhuri Kahani did not work atthe box office). I think it’s reallythe content of the film that dictateschoices in the end and not an indi-vidual, unless of course, you areSalman Khan. I enjoyed all thesecharacters, unique in their ownway, yet their stories didn’t get boxoffice approval which is extreme-ly important. When a particularfilm doesn’t work, it’s heartbreak-ing but you’ve got to move on. Igrieve, I mourn, I cry and some-times even rant at home but Imake sure I get it out of my sys-tem because unless I do that, Ican’t move forward.”

Vidya is again geared up toconquer the screens. This time,with Kahaani 2, which also fea-tures Arjun Rampal, acontrast to the power-house NawazuddinSiddiqui in the lastedition. About the fel-lowship, she toldus,“We had met social-ly at award functionsand parties. I didn’tknow him. But on ourfirst day of shoot hecame to me and huggedme. And I felt a suddenfamiliarity. After that daywe have been laughingthroughout. I love his infectiouslaugh. The only regret I have is notromancing him but anyway he isrunning after me in the film, so it’sok.”

So how easily did she sign upfor a no-make-up look in the film?“Facing the camera without make-up isn’t difficult at all; you just haveto protect your skin from thelights and heat. In the end, make-up, hair and costumes are all toolsand embellishments to create acharacter. The essence of a person-ality has to come from your craft.

Besides, I love myself withoutmakeup. So if the director wantsa simple and ordinary woman likeDurga Rani Singh, then I amready to do whatever it takes tobecome that character. On a reg-ular basis, all I need are a kajalpencil, gloss, and, of course, somemoisturiser with sufficientamount of SPF. I think it’s aboutbeing happy. When you feel happy,you look good.”

Vidya also shared her birth-days plans with us: “I will be inMumbai with my family for mybirthday. Hopefully celebrating thesuccess of Kahaani 2.”

Portraying the role of a moth-er, it seems she is quite comfort-able with kids now though she

wonders why automat-ically people assume ifshe is ready to be amother herself. “First,I used to be scared ofkids because whenev-er I would comeacross one, he or shewould start cryinguncontrollably. Fiveyears ago, my sistergave birth to twinsand I think thatbonding with themtaught me a lot

about handling kids. And this girlin Kahaani 2 is a remarkable child.Unlike other kids who overact, shehasn’t done anything of that sortat all. It gets irritating when yousee kids delivering heavy dialogueson screen. So Sujoy has made herspeak like a child only and kepther real.” She fobbed off queriesabout her maternity with a smile,wondering why men were neverasked these questions.

Has then the changing role ofwomen on screen not impactedthe mass mindset? “I think it is theother way around. The role of

women in society has changed,women are no longer just definedin terms of men in their lives, theyare not just some man’s daughteror some man’s sister or some man’swife. We have our individual lives,our motivations, dreams and aspi-rations. We are trying to lead ourlives in our own terms which iswhat is inspiring stories on screen.Of course, it’s very heartening tosee so many women-centric filmsdoing well commercially. But theroot of all this is the change that’shappening around us becausecinema is the reflection of reali-ty.”

She continued, “I have seenthe change happening over thepast 11 years since I joined thefilm industry. When I starteddoing films like Ishqiya and NoOne Killed Jessica, they were stillan aberration. But now, it’s not justabout women-centric films, it’sjust that the content has gotten somuch better, bolder, wider and theterms have changed even with theaudience. I think the definition ofentertainment has opened up. It’snot just about song and dancenow. It’s about quality cinema andthe manner you are telling a storythat reaches the audience.”

Vidya cares two hoots aboutbody-shaming or ageism. “I am avery proud 37-year-old. And ifyou look all around, women’scareers are not stopping afterthey get married or after they havehad children. So that’s true evenin films. Why should it be differ-ent for any female actor? Andbecause obviously writers getinspired by real people, orinstances of real incidents, I seemany of them writing roles for usto be busy with.” As she said, shenever looks back but keeps goingahead.

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Much before an army of designershopped on to the handloom band-

wagon, a few have been quietly workingwith weavers for decades. Collectionsthat come from their studios aren’t lim-ited by fashion trends. The saris, ethnicand Indo-western ensembles spell classand stem from an understanding ofweaving techniques. And there are fewcurators like Rupa Sood and SharanApparao who hand-picked those aptdesigners and did a thorough marketresearch of their latest collections to cel-ebrate the best of Indian weaves.

“I bought this hand-painted dupat-ta. I think it is gorgeous but what mat-ters more is that, whenever I wear it, Iwill carry a part of the remote villagewhere loving hands wove it,” smiles RupaSood.

The exquisite creations that we socasually buy and throw on are works ofart made by people who live incrediblydifficult lives. However, none of that painor pathos shows in their beautiful cre-ations. We may have romantic notionsabout handlooms but those in the knowsuch as Rupa and Sharan say that blood,sweat and tears go into keeping thatromance alive. “I have spent 33 long yearsin this field. And when I see the weaversworking on their looms, my eyes are gluedto their hands moving dexterously with theshuttle, winding the yarn around the bob-bins, meticulously fixing an occasional bro-ken yarn. Then my gaze roams up to theirfaces single-mindedly focussed on the jobat hand. And I wonder what goes on in thehead while the hands mechanically gothrough the motions of weaving. I won-der if he is actually thinking about theunfolding design, or trying to figure outhow to manage the next meal for the fam-ily or pay his child’s tuition fee, or the nextinstalment on his loan. When the weaveris a woman, I am in awe of her multi-task-ing. Her day begins before the crack ofdawn. She finishes her household chores,weaves, spins, winds bobbins, sometimesdyes yarns, takes care of kids, goes to the

market and, before she knows it, it’salready time to cook dinner. She is astightly wound up in this cycle as heryarns are around the bobbin. To me,every piece of handloom is specialbecause of this human touch. Itspeaks volumes about a weaver’sdreams, desires and hopes,” saysSharan.

Recalling her childhood mem-ories, she adds, “Handloom, to meevokes warm memories — Mom andher many beautiful saris; grandpar-ents and their Khadi outfits; trousseaushopping and timeless classics. I wasalways excited about choosing sarisfor my mother and grandma. Storiesof our freedom struggle, of peopleand places, our rich culture and a glo-rious heritage of legacies passed onfrom mother to daughter. A fabric wovenby the efforts of hundreds of hands. Buteach product is unique, singular and indi-vidual. It is a fabric of our past and for ourfuture.” Sharan believes her love for craftsand culture has woven her journey so far.

Rupa feels there’s a lot of government

push which has resulted inmore and more people wear-ing handlooms. “But justwearing handlooms is notenough. We need a bottoms-up approach,” she says.Adding to this Sharanexplains, “Traditional weavershave left weaving to becomedomestic help, securityguards, etc. Weavers areperennially in debt and theycall themselves coolies. Theydon’t have the money tobecome entrepreneurs. Fewgovernment schemes reachthem. Many of the schemeshave been planned by peoplewho have no real under-standing of the weaving fra-

ternity and their problems or require-ments. Weavers with amazing skills havebeen abandoned. There are no follow-ups.And we must realise that the weaver is onlyone person in the cycle. There is also thefarmer, the spinner and the dyer who areequally important. Unless we address the

ecosystem, we cannot save the handloom.”Asked about the solution, Sharan

elaborates, “Ideally, a lot more peopleshould engage themselves in this revivalprocess, since one person’s input is notgoing to be ever enough. But here we musttake into account that these engagementshave to be by people who understandweaving and designers who have a han-dle on the process that they are going toput their design into. This can’t be doneby everyone, so we then talk about NIDgraduates, graduates of textile technologyand so on.”

The challenge today for them is tobring the youth on board. “I am not boredyet as the trends keep changing. The testlies in how you keep up with life. In art,one has to adapt. How do I bring theyounger lot to adapt; that’s what I am bat-tling now. I want to see the younger lotwearing the Indian designs and feel pridein it,” says Sharan. The exhibition paystribute to the ancient textiles of the coun-try and presents them in new, eclectic waysthrough the aesthetic sensibilities of 19 tal-ented designers.

Designer Ritu Beri has decided to weavethe nation’s textile history with its

future, namely children. Through her BabyBeri collection, which will be unfurledtomorrow, she will show how even tradition-al phulkari can feature in everyday wear ofyour little ones.

The show has become a much sought-after annual event which is attended by thewho’s who of the social, political and mediaworld. Its popularity now attracts thousandsof people with enormous nationwide mediacoverage.

The launch of the “Baby Beri” line wason February 1, 2009. It was launched by actorAkshay Kumar. The event was a great suc-cess and was followed by the equally grandand successful “Baby Beri 2010” with SanjayDutt as the chief guest of the show. The thirdevent “Baby Beri 2011” was held onSeptember 24, 2011, Kunal Kapoor was thechief guest. The fourth event “Baby Beri2013” was held on March 2, 2013 withAbhishek Bachchan as the chief guest. It wasagain a resounding success.

And now the fifth edition of the show inassociation with The Blessed HeartsFoundation has the Union Minister ofScience and Technology and Earth SciencesDr. Harsh Vardhan as the chief guest,Chairman of KVIC, VK. Saxena andMember of Parliament, Meenakshi Lekhi asthe guests of honour.

The show will be a fun collection of occa-sion wear for kids. “There are four differentthemes this time, Lively Goa, Love, The Rootsand Angavastra,” said the designer.

Talking about her collection, Beriexplained, “Lively Goa is an extremely fun,playful yet relaxed and carefree collection inpastel colours of khadi with interesting flo-ral application and embroidery. Love haspretty, romantic, beautiful and flirty printsand feminine flamboyant styles that reflectthe romance of khadi in a bright colour

palette of red, white and blue.”“The Roots is a collection of phulkari

patterns and embroidery that are used inter-estingly to create a collection inspired bythe folklore of Punjab. It’s a very unique andculture-conscious collection in khadi silk.The Angavastra consists of ghagras and sal-wars, details of embroidery and appliques,mix of our rich tradition with a contempo-rary look this is a collection for theevenings in very interesting traditional sil-houettes. Throughout the show the collec-tion has an element of Vichar Vastras forthe tiny tots.

The event will be organised to spreadawareness about autism.

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Nirvana, a transcendentstate in which there is nei-ther suffering, desire nor

sense of self, which is common-ly called moksha (salvation), iswhat people have within them butfail to tap into. Nirvana is alsoabout Yashodhara, the wife ofSiddhartha Gautama, who did asupreme sacrifice after realisingthat the man she married wasmeant for the society and not justfor her.

“People have illusions in theirlife. Many of them seek peace, notaware of the fact that it is therewithin themselves. ThroughNirvana, we are trying to conveya message to look into yourselfand find peace,” says dancerAniruddha Das who along withNibedita Mohapatra has choreo-graphed a piece on the subject.

“Normally, choreography inclassical dance forms is aboutRama and Krishna. We decided todo something different. Weattempted to answer the questionthat if Gautama, a prince, couldleave earthly pleasures for prop-agating peace, then why couldn’twe start searching for it in our-selves,” he adds.

Nirvana was presented onthe first day of the Natya BalletDance Festival on Thursday.About how effectively a messagerooted in Buddhist philosophy,which is not followed by a major-ity, could be communicated to theaudience, Aniruddha says that itis possible with visual art. “It islike watching a movie rather thanlistening to a lecture. We can cre-ate the world in visual art that willbe played on stage. It could leavea lasting impact on the audience,”he adds.

Nibedita says that throughtheir presentation, they’veattempted to add a bit of contem-porary element into classicaldance. “We focussed onYashodhara, for whom copingwith the reality that her husband’slife was for the society waspainful. Siddhartha left when hischild, Rahul, was very young.Yashodhara didn’t give up andlater became a bhikshuni, (aBuddhist nun). Discussion on

Yasodhara’s life didn’t happenquite often as it did aboutBuddha. It’s similar to Lakshmanand Urmila in Ramayana. Anunknown sacrifice is there behindevery great life. The balance in thesociety is maintained by a man-woman relationship, not solely bymen,” Nibedita observes. Sheadds, “We searched for a poem tonarrate Yashodhara’s life andfinally we found Yashodhara: SixSeasons Without You by SubhashJaireth.”

About the choreography,Nibedita says that they haveblended Mayurbhanj Chhau andOdissi as the two dance formshave similarities. “When youcombine other classical danceforms, it will not match with thestyle of Odissi. We can’t compro-mise its authenticity. Differentclassical dance forms have differ-ent influences whereas Odissihas only temple influence whichis similar to Mayurbhanj Chhau,”she explains.

Nirvana, first choreographedin 2010, was performed in SriLanka and Bangkok. The duo’sproductions also includeDraupadi that explored the posi-tion of women in a modernIndian context against the back-drop of the life of Draupadi, thewife of Pandavas.

“We have rarely spoken aboutDraupadi’s life. In spite of herbeauty, intelligence, physicalprowess and inimitable spirit,she was betrothed to the victor ofa competition. Draupadi’s is thesupreme sacrifice behind thegreat Mahabharata war. The ques-tion is why Draupadi?”

Anirudhha and Nibedita, whohave founded Natya Ballet Centre,have also choreographed Krishnaand Samanvay. In Samanvay,they have blended seven classicaldance forms together, keeping thebasic tala.

The three-day Natya Balletfestival is organised by NatyaBallet Centre in association withthe Sangeet Natak Akademi. Itaims to devise multiple ways ofexploring and experiencing var-ied dance forms of the Indian sub-continent.

Bharatnatyam exponent RamaVaidyanathan took upon a chal-lenge. She decided to choreograph

a piece, NaTyatra, with eight dancers whopractise jazz, ballet, Kathak and even mar-tial arts. She trained this motley group,hailing from various cities and dancecompanies, over 20 days. Through thisexperiment, she wanted to prove thatdance as an artform traverses spirituali-ty and has a deep-set philosophy.NaTyatra depicts the ancient stories andphilosophical metaphors ofBharatanatyam. The project was born outof curator Tanusree Shankar’s belief thatthe eloquent expression of dance is uni-versal. It envisages the grammar of Indiandance to go beyond both traditional andclassical. Says Rama, “Through NaTyatraI wanted to convey that Bharatanatyamis not all about the basic steps, adavus andalarippu, that open every performance.The attempt was to dispel the misconcep-tions that the classical dance form is notopen or adaptable to changes. WhenTanusree Shankar approached me withthe idea of doing something different, itwas indeed a challenge.”

She continues, “Contemporary issomething which is happening now. Thatway, every dance is contemporary.”NaTyatra is an ensemble of three pieces.The first piece is Matabhumi, whichspeaks of how the earth encompasses thewhole ocean. “In Matabhumi, the earthis presented like a goddess. Her cloth isthe ocean and her bosoms are the moun-tains. In the performance we beg her for-giveness for stepping our feet on her,”Rama elaborates.

The second part is Kashi. It’s about

Lord Shiva, the Vishwanatha temple inKashi and the saints meditating on thebank of river Ganga. In Kashi, visveswaradarshan, a famous composition by SwathiThirunal Rama Varma, has been used.The third and the final is Pandit RaviShankar’s Tarana where the exponentshowcases the rhythmic pattern ofBharatanatyam and it’s complicated math-ematics. “It’s my own way of telling thatBharatanatyam is not simply about dhadhi,” says the artiste.

On the experience of training thedancers, Rama says, “I have been teach-ing since so many years. But this is thefirst time I am getting dancers from jazz,ballet, Kathak, Odissi and Kalaripayattu.

That is a different experience for me aswell. I learnt a lot of contemporarydance,” she chuckles.

Incorporating strengths of eachdancer, the choreography seeks inspira-tion from ancient literature and traditionsof the dance form. Though it takes yearsto master it, Rama will depict throughancient stories and philosophicalmetaphors, the unparalleled beauty of thebharatanatyam. The extremely distinct,clear, precise and direct movements ofbharatanatyam will take on the fluid andcontemporary vocabulary of thesedancers. Having enabled them to unlockthe many rasas of bharatanatyam, Rama’sdirectives will persuade the dancers tocreate three surreal pieces.

She adds, “I rehearsed myself every-day before training the dancers. I can’t saythat we have trained them to becomeBharatanatyam dancers in 20 days. I couldgive them an insight into the dance form,the basic grammar of it, which is similarto teaching alphabets of a language. Allthe dancers have a very sensitive mind toaesthetic style. They have a lot of respectfor classical dance. I watched them danc-ing before training to realise the poten-tial in each of them. They are profession-al dancers and their body is trained todance. I used the potential of each dancerin the production. A ballet dancer willbe able to do the leaps and kicks very well.I have been emphasising on usage of head,eyes and neck that makes it possible forus to communicate as much with the faceas much as the body.”

NaTyatra will be presented at theSerendipity Arts Festival to be held in Goafrom December 16-23.

While Moliere’s L’avare has been adaptedin many forms and dialects over time,

it is apt to say that the French dramatist is rel-evant in any time or context. Recently, at the60th year celebration of Alliance Francaise deDelhi, a group of students and teachers of theAlliance Francaise performed a Hindi adap-tation. “When we decided to mount the play,we didn’t think of it as a challenge. It isbecause his plays are written so smooth.Though they were written in the 1600s, theyare easily relevant in the present and contex-tual,” said director Soma Sundaram. L’avarewas loosely based on the Latin comedyAulularia by Plautus, from which many inci-dents and scraps of dialogue are borrowed,as well as from contemporary Italian farces.

Soma has always appreciated the worksof Moliere and compares him to Shakespeare.“Shakespeare always chose aristocracy as thebackdrop of his writings. But Moliere talkedabout common people. Every theme of hisplay revolves around people like us. That isone of the reasons I regard him as ‘evergreen’,”he said.

Though planned three months ago, theplay subtly hinted on the current demoneti-sation scenario in the country. “We didn’t planit that way. Neither did we make any changesin the script. Still it oddly seemed congruent,”chuckled the director.

The play revolves around Mirza SekhawatBeg, the incorrigible miser, who is besottedwith Mariam, the love of his wastrel son,Farookh.

“The actors in the play are not very expe-rienced. While some of them are teachers atAlliance, others are students learning French.Despite not having much experience, Ibelieve they made for a good show,” saidSoma. However, the Hindi adaptation did

have a scene performed in French. “Since theyall are acquainted with the language, it wasnot much of a problem,” he added.

Sitting in the crowd and laughingthroughout the play was Jean FrancoisRamon, director, Alliance Francaise.“Honestly, apart from the French bits, I wasunable to understand anything.

Yet, the expressions of the actors mademe laugh. And that’s preciously the point oftheatre I believe. A person should be able toconnect with it no matter which language itis performed in,” he said.

Ramon also emphasised the need for sim-ilar interactive experiments. “The mainobjective of ours is to become a bridgebetween the two very rich cultures of theworld, India and France. Both the countrieshave a lot in their culture and history. Andwhat can be a better way to explore it than through the media of art and music,” he concluded.

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Page 15: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

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Barcelona are the more desperate side as Real Madridvisit Catalonia for the first El Clasico of the sea-son boasting a six-point lead at the top of La Liga.

Madrid have won 15 more points in all in La Ligaunder the guidance of Zinedine Zidane since the sideslast met in April and are riding a 31-game unbeaten runin all competitions.

"On Saturday we have more to play for than Madrid,they can lose, we can't," said Barcelona defender GerardPique.

Barca are off to their worst league start in nine sea-sons.

However, coach Luis Enrique believesmuch of the media criticism of his side has

been overblown, citing the institutionalcrisis that Barca overcame in the January

his debut season in 2015 to win the tre-ble.

"We remain favourites for all thetitles, but it is evident we have to

improve," said Enrique."We lack consistency, but

don't exaggerate. In my firstseason you (the media) exag-

gerated and we ended upwinning the treble."

The biggest match inclub football is expect-ed to capture an audi-ence of 650 millionpeople worldwide,according to figuresreleased by La Liga.

"I am not goingto say it is justanother game, it isa very importantmatch, it has aspecial mean-

ing....A specialtaste," Real presi-

dent Florentino Perez said."No one hides that is has a worldwide

impact, it is seen by millions of peopleacross the world, like the World cupfinal."

Yet, the composed Zidane refused toaccept that a first Liga title in five yearswould be Madrid's to lose should they bagvictory at the Camp Nou.

"I am not thinking about the con-sequences," he said after giving a

goalscoring debut to his son Enzo in Madrid's 6-1 Copa del Rey thrashing of Cultural Leonesa onWednesday. "We are thinking about preparing wellfor the game, and, whatever happens, it will notbe decisive."

�������� �Both sides are blighted by injury concerns.Madrid will be without Gareth Bale with the

Welshman now set to miss up to four months afteran ankle operation, whilst Toni Kroos is also side-lined by a broken foot.

Tough tackling midfielder Casemiro made hisfirst appearance in two months in midweek andcould come into contention to partner theCroatian duo of Luka Modric and Mateo Kovacic.

Cristiano Ronaldo has shot to the top of LaLiga's goalscoring charts once more with five inhis last two league outings and looks set to be part-nered by Karim Benzema and Lucas Vazquez inBale's absence. Barca are sweating on the fitnessof Jordi Alba and Pique, who both struggledthrough the 90 minutes in a 1-1 draw at RealSociedad described as a "miracle" by Enrique giventhe state of Barca's display.

However, the champions will be hugely boost-ed by the return of captain Andres Iniesta, whilstthe front three of Lionel Messi, Luis Suarez andNeymar are all fit to start.

The clash between the top two offers Sevillaand Atletico Madrid the chance to make up groundin the title race.

Sevilla sit behind Barca only on goal differencein third and can close on Real when they visit win-less Granada on Saturday lunchtime.

Atletico have bounced back from their Madridderby humbling at the hands of Real two weeksago with three wins and 11 goals without concedingsince. However, they will need to end a seven-gameunbeaten streak in the league by Espanyol to keepthat run going at the Vicente Calderon.

�������H������ �������-������Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger says Mathieu

Debuchy has been ruled out for six weeks with a"severe" hamstring injury, leaving the team shortof cover at right back.

The France international limped off after 16minutes of the English Premier League matchagainst Bournemouth on Sunday. It was his firststart for Arsenal in more than a year.

With Hector Bellerin also out injured, CarlJenkinson is the only fit right back in Arsenal'ssquad.

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There couldn't be a better time forLionel Messi to end his scoring

drought than in the clasico against RealMadrid.

With Barcelona struggling and des-perately needing a victory to stay closeto its rival in the Spanish league, Messicould help turn things around onSaturday if he can find the net again afterfive scoreless games against Madrid.

Barcelona enters the home game atCamp Nou six points behind Madrid,and another setback could leave it in adifficult position to fight for a thirdstraight league title.

Messi hasn't played badly in recentclasicos, but his last goal against Madridcame almost three years ago when he hada hat trick in a 4-3 win at SantiagoBernabeu Stadium.

He hasn't scored in the four gamessince, not even in the stunning 4-0 winat the Bernabeu last season, when Messicame off the bench in the second halfafter a long injury layoff. Barcelona haswon two of the last five games againstMadrid, but it's been 400 minutes sinceMessi last scored.

Since that hat trick in March 2014,Cristiano Ronaldo has attracted most ofthe headlines in the clasico, havingscored three times, including the lategame-winner at Camp Nou last seasonthat ended Barcelona's record 39-gameunbeaten streak.

Messi remains the all-time leadingscorer in the clasico with 21 in 32 match-es, but at Camp Nou it's been Ronaldowho has thrived the most.

He has 10 goals in 12 games inBarcelona, including five in the last fivematches and eight in the last nine. Hefailed to find the net only in four of those12 games. Messi netted only five timesin those same 12 encounters in Catalonia.

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Former champions Atletico de Kolkatawasted about half-a-dozen opportu-

nities to settle for a goalless draw againstFC Pune City in their Indian SuperLeague match here on Friday.

Their 35-year-old Spanish strikerJuan Belencoso struggled woefully withhis reflexes as ATK signed off their cam-paign in the league with eight draws from14 matches.

ATK, who have secured a berth in thesemis for a record third season in a row,finished with 20 points from 14 match-es as they will have to wait for the respec-tive results of Delhi Dynamos FC andKerala Blasters FC for their last-fouropponent.

Having adopted the Rabindra SarovarStadium after Vivekananda Yuva BharatiKrirangan was unavailable because of U-17 World Cup preparation, this wasATK's worst performance at home as theycapped a solitary win here, while draw-ing five and losing one.

FC Pune City finished with 16 pointsas coach Antonio Habas, ATK's former

coach seen in the opponent's dugout inKolkata for first time, struggled with histeam combination in a match dominat-ed by ATK. The home side received theirbest chance in the 78th minute with noone other than Belencoso missing the sit-ter of the season.

First it was substitute Stephen Pearsonwho got the ball from Javi Lara at the edge

of the box on the left before firing itstraight at the goalkeeper. ArindamBhattacharya punched it out and it fellstraight at Belencoso's feet with an entireview of goal in front of him.

But to everyone's dismay, theSpaniard put it wide of the post, some-thing that summed up ATK's poor per-formances at home this season. JoseMolina brought in their ace striker IainHume with seven minutes left in the reg-ulation time but the result was no differ-ent as they failed to strike even once.

The first-half was no different as itwas also a tale of missed chances. ATKstraight away went into attacking modeearning a fourth minute freekick from theleft flank with Ruidas on the prowlbefore he was fouled by Rahul Bheke.

Lara shot a curling freekick butArindam averted any danger tipping theball over in what was the beginning ofmany of ATK's raids but none resulted ina goal for halftime stalemate.

Ruidas and Lara continued to teasethe Pune defence at ease with Belencosoin the role of the sole forward, making itlook like a one-sided affair.

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Formula One champion NicoRosberg stunningly retired

from racing on Friday, five daysafter earning his first worldchampionship.

"I have decided to end myFormula One career. I had a very,very clear dream, that was tobecome Formula One worldchampion. I have achieved thischildhood dream now and I amnot willing to do that sort of com-mitment again," Rosberg said inVienna. "So I have decided to fol-low my heart, and my heart hastold me just to stop there, to callit a day."

Rosberg said he made thedecision on Monday, a day afterfinishing second at the season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix toclinch the F1 title. "I am on thepeak, so this feels right," he said.

He wrote on Facebook of thedifficulties he faced over a seasonthat took a toll on people close tohim: "It was a whole family effortof sacrifice, putting everythingbehind our target."

Rosberg had a strained rela-tionship with Mercedes teammateLewis Hamilton. They came upthrough the karting circuits tobecame fierce rivals in F1, con-

stantly needling each other in themedia. They dueled for the F1championship for the last threeyears. Rosberg was runner-up toHamilton in 2014 and 2015, buthung on this year to relieveHamilton of the title in the finalrace.

Rosberg's father, Keke, the1982 F1 champion, said afterwatching his son in Abu Dhabithat the strain of fighting Hamiltonwas sapping him. "I don't knowhow much it's taken out of him,"Keke Rosberg said on Sunday."Maybe he retires tomorrow."

All observers thought thatwas a quip. Mercedes said on itswebsite that 31-year-old NicoRosberg "will stop racing inFormula One with immediateeffect."

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Page 16: Vihar, which reached Mughalsarai around 9.30 pm on Thursday, reached Allahabad on Friday morning at 9.40 am. Around 75 trains have been running late by over 10 hours between Allahabad

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Former India opener Virender Sehwagis confident that the current Test teamunder Virat Kohli has the quality in

its pace attack to win outside the sub-con-tinent just like Sourav Ganguly's team didduring 2000-2004.

The Test team under Kohli has beeninvincible at home, having thrashed SouthAfrica and New Zealand by identicalmargins of 3-0 and is also on a roll againstEngland leading 2-0 in a five-match series.

"I believe this team under Virat has thequality and capability of winning Testmatches outside the sub-continent. Theycan definitely emulate the performances ofthe team that played under Sourav Gangulyand won Test matches in England andAustralia," Sehwag said.

For the dashing opener, what setsKohli's team apart is the quality in paceattack that has forced someone like IshantSharma to wait in the wings.

"The potential of the batting unit withVirat as the leader, we have all seen. Youneed a good bowling attack to take wick-ets. We have a brilliant bowler likeMohammed Shami. We have UmeshYadav and someone like Ishant Sharma,who can also win India matches.

"There is no reason why they can'treplicate their performances at home inoverseas conditions," said Sehwag, who isalso the brand ambassador of world'sbiggest ever tennis ball cricket tournament10PL carrying a total prize money of250,000 Dirham.

Asked about his prediction about thefinal result in the ongoing series, Sehwagsaid: "My prediction is 3-0 or 2-1. I thinkwe will win 3-0 as I expect England to showsome resistance and that's why won't pre-dict 4-0."

Sehwag also spoke about young sen-sation Rishabh Pant, who already hasscored 900-plus runs in Ranji Trophy andlooks upto the 'Nawab of Najafgarh' forinspiration.

"Rishabh's future is very bright. He willcertainly play for India. In my career, I havenot seen cases where people have per-

formed consistently and yet did not get achance at the highest level," said the man,who has scored 8586 Test and 8273 ODIruns with 38 international hundreds.

"There is a process in place for every-thing. Rishabh has to maintain this con-sistency and before one plays for India,there is India A. He will certainly get hischance to play for India A. He has to utilisethat and I believe no one can then stop himfrom playing for India," Sehwag said.

In the UAE to promote 10 Premier

League or 10PL, Sehwag spoke about histeenage days in Najafgarh when he playeda lot of tennis ball tournaments. The tour-nament is being promoted by Petromann,a UAE based oil and gas company.

"There wasn't use to be individual pay-ments at that point of time in mid and late90's in Delhi's tennis ball tournaments. Thetournaments I played had the winningteam getting a purse of �2100, �3100 whichwould be divided among 11 players.

"I, in fact, played a tennis ball tourna-ment after playing for India. Post 2000, ten-nis ball cricket also became a career for alot of players with prize money shootingup to �51,000. But 250,000 Dirham fortennis ball event is unheard of," saidSehwag.

So will he be interested in playing ina such tennis ball tournament where onecan find him hitting sixes and fours.

"Why not? I would love to play sucha tournament. People throng to thegrounds to see a Dhoni, Tendulkar or aSehwag hit sixes and fours. Tennis ball isa different pressure. People won't behappy for anything less than sixes andfours," Sehwag signed off.

�������������������DD�������� ����� India bowled out minnowsNepal for the lowest ever total of 21 runsto notch up a resounding 99-run win in aWomen's Asia Cup T20 tournament matchhere on Friday.

Put into bat, the Indian women scored120 for 5 in their allotted 20 overs withShikha Pandey top-scoring with a 32-ball39 not out which was laced with fiveboundaries.

Pandey and captain HarmanpreetKaur (14 not out) shared 51 runs for theunbroken sixth wicket to reach that totalat the Asian Institute of TechnologyGround here. India, who have already qual-ified for the final before Friday's match,rested some top players, including MithaliRaj and Jhulan Goswami, Friday.

Chasing 121 for a win, Nepal werebowled out for just 21 in 16.3 overs, thelowest total in women's T20 Internationals,to suffer a crushing defeat.

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Some of his best centuries havecome against the mighty

Australian attack which comprised abattery of fearsome pacers, but bat-ting legend Rahul Dravid admittedthat the greatest fast bowler he hadfaced was Aussie Glenn McGrath.

"They (Australia) were the bestcricket team in my generation.Amongst them all, the greatestbowler that I played against, not onlythe greatest Australian bowler, butthe greatest fast bowler (that) Iplayed against has to be GleanMcGrath," said Dravid, who wasknown for his impeccable defense, atan event here.

The right-handed batsman wasin conversation with Link Group MDJohn McMurtie at the Link LectureSeries, which was launched hereThursday night.

"He (McGrath) was absolutely(brilliant), no one challenged myknowledge of the off-stump as muchas McGrath did. He was relentlessand gave you nothing. A lot oftimes, whether he is bowling in firsthour of the morning or late in theafternoon of in the evening, he(McGrath) was going to give younothing, he was relentless (and the)accuracy," said Dravid, who scored

a whopping 13288 runs in 164 Testmatches.

Heaping praise on the legendaryAustralian fast bowler, Dravid said,"He was not mean as he looked, buthe could be very very mean with thecricket ball because he gave younothing. He was one of those guysyou, while batting, think how to scorea run and where is the extra-rungoing to come from. He just had thatlevel of accuracy and control.

"He had good pace, bounce buta good game sense as well. McGrathwas probably the greatest fast bowlerI played against," said the formerIndia captain, who has scored heav-ily against the Australians.

McGrath, regarded as one of thegreatest bowlers in the history of thegame, had taken 563 wickets in 124Tests and 381 wickets in 250 ODIs.

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The BCCI on Friday main-tained its opposition to some

of the reforms recommended bythe Lodha committee and willwait with bated breath for theSupreme Court's verdict on thematter come December 5.

At a Special General Meetinghere, the Board did not take anydecision on the recommenda-tions but it has been learnt fromsources that state associationshave been told to keep a Plan Bready in case the verdict is notfavourable from the apex court.

Lodha Committee has soughtdirections on appointment offormer union Home Secretary GKPillai as observer and removal ofall BCCI office-bearers.

"Senior office-bearers said wehave to wait till December 5. Anydecision taken can be Contemptof Court. He also advised thatstate units will have to keep aPlan B ready. If court gives a ver-

dict we have to abide by it andchange constitution accordingly,"a state unit official said.

Friday's Special GeneralMeeting witnessed Status Quobeing maintained by members.Two associations Tripura andVidarbha, who have decided toimplement Lodha reforms intoto were absent. "There was afeeling members are having dif-ferent opinion. Vidharbha andTripura did not come due to fog.We explained the situation andclarified with them again. Theyreiterated their stand that wastaken in the first SGM onOctober 1. Almost all recom-mendations agreed upon excepta few. We will wait for December5 Supreme Court hearing," BCCISecretary Ajay Shirke said.

The basic objections ofBCCI remain the same. Theage cap of 70, cooling off peri-od of three years between termsand one state one vote policy arebeing opposed by the Board.

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Madhya Pradesh needed justtwo deliveries to dismiss the

last Baroda batsman and wrap upan easy 232-run victory on thefourth and final day of their GroupA Ranji Trophy cricket match hereon Friday.

Sagar Mangalorkar was bowledby pacer Chandrakant Sakure, whocompleted his five-wicket haul, inthe second ball he faced withoutadding any run to his overnightindividual score of eight as well asto the team total of 114.

The other overnight batsmanBabashafi Pathan remained notout on 10 as he did not face any balltoday as Baroda were all out for 114in 35.2 overs while chasing animprobable 347 for a win at theHPCA Stadium.

Madhya Pradesh, who hadearned a 53-run first innings lead,collected all the six points from thewin while Baroda got none.

On Thursday, Baroda suffereda batting collapse in their secondinnings as, barring an openingstand of 32 and a third-wicketpartnership of 24, they failed to putup any resistance and were reducedto 95 for nine in 30 overs.

Thanks to an unbroken last-wicket stand between Mangalorkar

and Pathan, Baroda reached 114 for9 at the close of play on Thursday.

Opener Kedar Devdhar top-scored for Baroda in their runchase with 18.

!������������������������ ������ Jharkhand dishedout a disciplined all-round perfor-mance to notch up a five-wicket winover Assam on the fourth and finalday of their Group B Ranji Trophymatch here on Friday.

Jharkhand thus grabbed sixpoints from their fourth win out of

seven games to jump to the top ofthe group B table with a total of 32points, while Assam languished atthe bottom after their fifth loss.

Rahul Shukla (3/74) and AshishKumar (2/49) produced sensation-al spell of seam bowling to pick upthe remaining five wickets as Assamended their second innings at 299after resuming at an overnightscore of 269-5 in 98.2 overs.

With Assam adding just 30 runsto their overnight score, Jharkhandwere left with a victory target of 110runs at Dr PVG Raju ACA Sports

Complex.Opener Anand Singh (30) and

I R Jaggi (34) then emerged as thetop-scorers as Jharkhand piled upthe runs in 20.2 overs, losing halfof their side.

������� �����0������ �������Former champions Delhisecured three points by virtue offirst innings lead against Vidarbhaafter rains forced early closure to thefour and final day's play of theGroup B Ranji Trophy cricketmatch, here on Friday.

After complete wash out of thethird day's play yesterday, the matchresumed their morning followinghalf hour loss due to wet groundconditions.

But the skies opened up onceagain just before the lunch break,forcing the umpires to finally call offthe match at 2.45pm.

A total of 19 overs play was pos-sible today during which Vidharbascored runs 37 for the loss of threewickets in their second innings.

Delhi had ealier declared theirfirst innings at 250 for 8 in 81 overson Thursday in reply to Vidharbafirst innings total of 183 all out in52.3 overs.

While Delhi got three points,Vidharba took away one pointfrom the drawn encounter.

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Top seed Saina Nehwal and B SaiPraneeth crashed out in their

respective quarterfinal matches todraw curtains on India's challenge atthe the Macau Open Grand Prix Goldtournament, here on Friday.

Both Saina and Sai Praneeth suf-fered straight-game losses againstChinese opponents in the women'sand men's singles quarterfinalsrespectively.

Former World No.1 Saina, who isslowly trying to come back to her bestafter recovering from a major kneeinjury which affected her Olympiccampaign, found the going tough onFriday, going down 17-21, 17-21lower-ranked Zhang Yiman of Chinain the women's singles quarterfinal ina 35-minute clash.

Later in the day Sai Praneethtoiled hard for half an hour before los-ing 19-21, 9-21 to Jun Peng Zhao.

Saina, who improved a place onThursday in the world rankings to beat number 10, seemed to have beenaffected by the gruelling three-gamematches that she played in the last tworounds here.

19-year-old Zhang, who is rankedat World No. 226, took the early 4-2lead and then held a slender 9-8 atone stage. The young Chinese soonreeled off five straight points to jumpto a 14-8 lead and kept marchingahead as Saina lost the openinggame.

Saina, who had bounced backafter losing the opening game in thelast two matches, seemed to havechanged gears as she zoomed to a 6-

0 healthy lead in the second game. ButZhang came back to level the score 7-7 and surpassed her fancied rival,reaching 11-9 at the break.

Saina erased the deficit after theinterval with two points but theChinese managed to grab a 14-12advantage and then jumped to 19-12lead. The Indian picked up fourpoints to narrow the gap but Zhangsoon surged to seal the game and thematch in her favour.

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Young Thai Jazz Janewattananondleads on seven-under-par through 14

holes in the second round of thePanasonic Open India, which has beenreduced to 54 holes following fog dis-ruptions on Friday.

Inclement weather has caused sevenhours of play to be lost in two days at theDelhi Golf Club. With fog delays expect-ed in the next two days, the tournamentcommittee has decided to reduce the tour-nament to three rounds.

Asian Tour Tournament DirectorFritz Katzengruber said: "The tournamenthas been affected by lengthy delays dueto persistent fog throughout the week."

"As a result of the disruptions, we havedecided to reduce the tournament to 54holes. The decision was made in the bestinterest of the tournament and our AsianTour members."

A total of 112 players will return at9am local time on Saturday morning tocomplete their rounds. The third and finalround of the $400,000 Asian Tour eventwill be played on Sunday.

Jazz, who returned to sign for anopening 69 on Friday, tamed the weath-

er elements to put himself in prime posi-tion for a breakthrough win on theregion's premier Tour. He is currentlyfour-under for the round with four holesto play.

"It was really confusing out there. Wewere trying to finish as much as we can.I just tried to play my best on every hole.I wasn't thinking much. I am happy withwhere I stand now. I am just going to getsome good rest as I have been waking upvery early these few days," said the 21-year-old Thai.

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The fairytale ended at the eighth hole as Tiger Woods,with two double bogies over the final three holes,

returned to competitive golf with a mixed bag to beplaced 17th in an 18-man field after the firstround of Hero WorldChallenge here.

The American for-mer world number onehit a one-over-par 73 onhis return from a 15-month layoff afterrecovering from twoback surgeries.

The 40-year-oldWoods showedglimpses of his old self as he had a run of birdies tobegin with, and was even briefly tied for the lead. The14-time Major winner and 79 PGA Tour titles had fourbirdies in eight holes.

However, a bogey on the ninth after a wayward drivecut short the run.

At the end of the first day of this unofficial PGAevent at the Albany Golf Club, Woods was nine shotsoff the pace set by fellow American J B Holmes.

Woods was tied with Holmes, Louis Oosthuizen andMatt Kuchar after making his third successive birdie.

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