Actor Taapsee Pannu is disappointed she will notbe able to watch Laxmmi Bomb in thetheatres

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BHUBANESWAR | SATURDAY, OCTOBER 10 | 2020

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

Oslo, Oct 9: The Nobel Peace Prizewas Friday awarded to the WorldFood Programme for feeding mil-lions of people from Yemen toNorth Korea, with the coronaviruspandemic seen pushing millionsmore into hunger.

The WFP was honoured for “itsefforts to combat hunger, for itscontribution to bettering condi-tions for peace in conflict-affectedareas and for acting as a driving

force in efforts to prevent the useof hunger as a weapon of war andconflict,” Nobel committee chair-woman Berit Reiss-Andersen saidon unveiling the winner in Oslo.

Whether delivering food by hel-icopter or on the back of an ele-phant or a camel, the WFP pridesitself on being “the leading hu-manitarian organisation” in aworld where, by its own estimates,some 690 million people – one in 11– go to bed on an empty stomach.

“With this year's award, the

Norwegian Nobel Committeewishes to turn the eyes of theworld towards the millions of peo-

ple who suffer from or face thethreat of hunger,” Reiss-Andersensaid.

Founded in 1961, the UN or-ganisation helped 97 million peo-ple last year, distributing 15 billionrations to people in 88 countries lastyear. The numbers are dizzyingbut only a fraction of the totalnumber in need.

Despite making progress over thepast three decades, the UN’s goalto eradicate hunger by 2030 ap-pears out of reach if current trends

continue, according to experts.Women and children are usuallythose most at risk.

War can be caused by hunger, buthunger is also a consequence ofwar, with people living in areasof conflict three times more likelyto be undernourished than thoseliving in countries at peace, theWFP says.

“There’s no two ways about it –we can’t end hunger unless we putan end to conflict,” WFP execu-tive director David Beasley said

September 21.This is the 12th time the Peace

Prize has gone to the UN, one of itsagencies or personalities – morethan any other laureate.

The virus will also affect theNobel Peace Prize ceremony onDecember 10 in Oslo, which hasbeen scaled back due to corona re-strictions.

The award consists of a goldmedal, a diploma and a cheque for10 million Swedish kronor (950,000euros, $1.1 million).

Nobel Peace Prize awarded to World Food ProgrammeTHE WORLD FOOD PROGRAMME WAS HONOURED FOR ITS EFFORTS TO COMBAT HUNGER AND IMPROVE CONDITIONS FOR PEACE IN CONFLICT AREAS

AGENCIES

Mumbai, Oct 9: (PTI) The ReserveBank of India (RBI) left key interestrates unchanged Friday but signalledmore easing ahead to support an econ-omy that it sees contracting 9.5 per centin the current fiscal.

The six-member Monetary PolicyCommittee, with three newly inductedexternal members, voted unanimouslyto retain the benchmark repurchase orrepo rate at 4 per cent while keeping itspolicy stance accommodative, imply-ing it could ease again.

The central bank had slashed therepo rate by 115 basis points since lateMarch before hitting a pause button inAugust. To bring down borrowing cost,RBI announced a number of uncon-ventional steps, including doubling ofthe size of open-market bond purchasesto `20,000 crore, offer to buy state debt,and easing a corporate cash crunchthrough a ̀ 1 lakh crore of targeted long-term funds available on tap.

Besides supporting economic activ-ity, the measures are aimed at ensuringthe government's record borrowing pro-gramme goes through smoothly.

RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das saidthe economic growth, which slumped toa negative 23.9 per cent in the April-June quarter, will turn positive only inthe final January-March quarter.

“By all indications, the deep con-tractions of Q1 2020-21 (April-June) arebehind us; silver linings are visible inthe flattening of the active caseload

curve across the country,” he said.Barring the risk of a second wave of

infections, the economy appeared poisedto begin a recovery, he said, noting foodgrain production was set for record highsand factories and cities were comingback to life. With macro indicators point-ing to a recovery, “GDP growth maybreak out of contraction and turn posi-tive by Q4 (January-March),” he said.

“For the year 2020-21 as a whole, there-fore, real GDP is expected to decline by9.5 per cent, with risks tilted to thedownside,” he said, adding that if the cur-rent momentum of upturn gains ground,a faster and stronger rebound is emi-nently feasible.

After the sharp contraction in Q1 ofFY21, the MPC expects growth to comein at (-)9.8 per cent in Q2, (-) 5.6 per centin Q3 and 0.5 per cent in Q4. “Against allodds, we shall strive and revive,” he

said. In a video live stream, he said RBIwill “continue with the accommoda-tive stance of monetary policy as longas necessary – at least during the cur-rent financial year and into the nextyear – to revive growth on a durablebasis and mitigate the impact of COVID-19, while ensuring that inflation re-mains within the target going forward”.

The governor noted that the recentpick-up in inflation is due to supplydisruption and higher markups dur-ing the lockdown. Going forward, assupply chains are restored, inflationcould ease to 4.5-5.4 per cent in the sec-ond half of FY21. RBI’s optimism on theinflation front is based on easing of sup-ply-side disruption, weak demand con-ditions and bumper Kharif harvest asit expects the retail inflation to declineto 4.3 per cent in the first quarter ofFY22. MORE P11

SHORT TAKES

State Covid tollnears 1,000-markBhubaneswar: Odisha’s Covid-19tally mounted to 2,46,839 Fridaywith 2,697 more people testingpositive for the infection, while17 fresh fatalities pushed the tollto 991. Of the 2,697 cases, 1,576were reported from variousquarantine centres, and theremaining detected duringcontact tracing. Khurda recordedthe maximum number of newcases at 482, followed by Cuttackat 234 and Nuapada at 153. Fourfresh fatalities were registered inKhurda, three in Balasore, twoeach in Mayurbhanj and Puri, andone each in Baragarh, Kalahandi,Malkangiri, Nayagarh,Kandhamal and Subarnapur.

Taipei: China, which has fourcoronavirus vaccine candidatesin stage 3 clinical trials, saidFriday that it is joining theCOVID-19 vaccine alliance knownas COVAX. The country signed anagreement with GAVI, the co-leader of the alliance, Thursday,China’s Foreign Ministry said in astatement. Initially, China did notagree to join the alliance,missing the global deadline tojoin in September. ForeignMinistry spokeswoman HuaChunying said in a statementthat “we are taking this concretestep to ensure equitabledistribution of vaccines,especially to developingcountries, and hope morecapable countries will also joinand support COVAX.” P10

China joins COVAXvaccine alliance

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, Oct 9: In a majormilestone, India on Friday suc-cessfully test fired a new genera-tion anti-radiation missile from aSu-30 MKI fighter aircraft of theIndian Air Force that can destroya wide variety of enemy radars,air defencesystemsand com-munica-tion net-worksfrom largestand-offranges, of-ficials said.

Themissile,Rudram-1,is India’s first indigenously de-veloped anti-radiation weaponsystem and it was test-fired by theDefence Research and DevelopmentOrganisation (DRDO), at an inte-grated test range in Balasore inOdisha at around 10:30 AM, offi-cials said. They said the missile,having a speed of Mach two ortwice the speed of sound, is ca-pable of bringing down a wide-range of enemy radar systems,communication networks and airdefence systems within a range ofup to 250 kilometers.

In a statement, the DefenceMinistry said Rudram hit the ra-diation target with “pin-point ac-curacy” and that the test estab-lished India's capability to developlong range air launched anti-ra-diation missiles.

The flight testing of the mis-sile comes in the midst of India'sbitter border row with China ineastern Ladakh.

RBI holds rates steady; sees fiscal recovery taking root

The monetary policy committee kept the repo rate at 4.0per cent, while the reverse repo rate stayed at 3.35 per cent

RBI GOVERNORSHAKTIKANTA DASSAID THEECONOMICGROWTH, WHICHSLUMPED TO ANEGATIVE 23.9 PERCENT IN THE APRIL-JUNE QUARTER,WILL TURNPOSITIVE ONLY INTHE FINAL JANUARY-MARCH QUARTER

BARRING THE RISKOF A SECOND

WAVE OFINFECTIONS, THE

ECONOMYAPPEARED POISED

TO BEGIN ARECOVERY: RBI

GOVERNORSHAKTIKANTA DAS

POST NEWS NETWORK

Puri, Oct 9: At least four servitorgroups (Niyog) of Srimandir Fridayadvised the Shree Jagannath TempleAdministration (SJTA) not to reopenthe 12th century shrine for devoteesamid the prevailing situation.

The members of Pratihari,Pujapanda, Suar-Mahasuar andKhuntia Niyogs of Srimandir putforth their suggestions against re-opening of the shrine at a virtualmeeting with the SJTA chief ad-ministrator Krishan Kumar Friday,sources said.

The SJTA chief also consulted fiveservitor members of ShreeJagannath Temple ManagingCommittee on the issue. The tem-ple administration has initiatedconsulting servitors for reopeningSrimandir after the state govern-ment began the process to allowpeople to visit religious places withstrict adherence to the Covid-19guidelines. The SJTA chief wouldconsult the remaining Niyogs ofSrimandir from October 12 to 16before taking a financial decisionon the issue, sources said.

According to sources, thePujapanda, Suar-Mahasuar,

Pratihari and Khuntia servitorssuggested that the 12th centuryshrine should not be reopen fordevotees till an effective vaccine isavailable for novel coronavirus.

The servitors argued that thecases of Covid-19 infection will risemanifold if the doors of Srimandirare reopened for the people amid theprevailing situation. “Rise in Covid-19 infection among theservitors would affectthe performance ofrituals atSrimandir,” theypleaded.

The servitorsalso urged thedevotees to co-operate thetemple au-thorities onthe issue.

Theyalsourgedthe

SJTA to take step for providing spe-cial care to their colleagues who havetested positive for the deadly virus.Moreover, the servitors also pleadedfor a hike in the financial assistanceprovided to them by the SJTA to com-pensate the temple shutdown.

Srimandir managing commit-tee member and senior servitorRam Chandra Dasmahapatra saidmore than 500 servitors have testedpositive for Covid-19, while 18 havedied due to the virus infection.

“The state government can re-open other temples for devotees.But, Srimandir should not be re-opened for devotees till the end ofHindu month of Kar tika,”Dasmahapatra added.

SJTA administrator (rituals)Jitendra Kumar Sahu said theywill seek the views of all Niyogs ofSrimandir on the issue. “The viewsof all servitor groups would beplaced before the Srimandir man-aging committee before takingany final decision on the templereopening,” he added.

Notably, a few servitors hadstaged a dharna in front of theshrine a couple of days agoseeking the reopening ofSrimandir for devotees.

Servitors advise againstreopening Srimandir now

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: TheElection Commission hasissued a formal notificationfor the by-elections to theBalasore Sadar and TirtolAssembly constituenciesFriday.

Speaking to reportersh e r e F r i d ay, C h i e fE l e c t o r a l O f f i c e r o fOdisha, Sushil KumarLohani said both seats willgo for by-poll November3, while results will be de-clared November 10.

The filing of nominationshas started Friday. October16 is last date for filing nom-inations and scrutiny will bedone on the following day(October 17), he said.

In view of the pandemic,the Election Commissionhas taken various measuresto ensure smooth and in-fection-free election. As perthe instructions of ECI, onlytwo persons can accompanythe candidate during filingof nomination papers andonly two vehicles are beused by the candidate inthis regards, the CEO said.

Only five persons, ex-

cluding security persons,should accompany the can-didate while undertakingdoor-to-door campaign. Theyall should wear mask andmaintain social distancing.The electorate who havetested Covid positive or aresuspected to be infected,will be allowed to cast votein the last hour of poling.

Public meeting by the po-litical parties will be held inlarge open places previouslyidentified by the DistrictElectoral Officer with a max-imum 100 people, as per theguideline issued by OdishaDisaster ManagementAuthority.

In view of the Covid pan-demic, voters per booth hasbeen reduced to 1,000 in-stead of 1,500, while thenumber of booths has beenincreased, he added.

Notification released forBalasore, Tirtol by-polls

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi/Berne, Oct 9: Indiahas got the second set of Swissbank account details of its na-tionals and entities under the au-tomatic exchange of informationpact with Switzerland, marking akey milestone in the government’sfight against black money allegedlystashed abroad.

India is among the 86 countrieswith which Switzerland’s FederalTax Administration (FTA) has ex-changed information on financialaccounts within the frameworkof global standards on AEOI thisyear.

India had received the first setof details from Switzerland inSeptember 2019 under AEOI(Automatic Exchange ofInformation), when it involved 75countries.

The information exchange thisyear involved nearly 3.1 million (31lakh) financial accounts, FTA saidin a statement Friday. The numberof such accounts was similar in2019. While the statement did notexplicitly name India among the86 countries, officials told thisnews agency that India is amongthe prominent countries withwhich Switzerland has shared de-tails about financial accounts ofclients of Swiss banks and variousother financial institutions.

The officials further said a “size-able number” relates to Indiancitizens and entities in the over-all exchange of information aboutover three million financial ac-counts by Switzerland this yearwith 86 countries.

Besides, Swiss authorities havealready shared information aboutmore than 100 Indian citizens andentities in the past one year onreceipt of requests for adminis-trative assistance in cases in-volving probes into financialwrongdoings including tax eva-sion, the officials added.

These cases mostly relate toolder accounts that might havebeen closed before 2018, for whichSwitzerland has shared details.

India gets 2ndset of Swissbank a/c details

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: The team ofCommissionerate police investi-gating into the petrol pump ex-plosion near the Raj Bhawan,Wednesday, reached the office ofIndian Oil Corporation Limited(IOCL) at Chandrasekharpur inthe city Friday to enquire into thereasons behind the mishap.

Speaking to Orissa POST,Commissioner of Police SudhanshuSarangi informed, “We have col-lected important documents fromthe IOCL office to ascertain thework in progress at the accident siteduring the explosion, number ofworkers and organisations engagedtherein and the detailed proceduregenerally adopted during such op-erations. An experts’ team of theState Forensic Science Laboratoryalso visited the spot. It will takesome more days to get the scientificexamination reports.”

The forensic team has been ex-amining the CCTV footage fromthe hard drive of computers at thepetrol pump to check the ongoingwork at the spot before the explo-sion. The team also recovered parts

of a human spinal cord along withsome other body parts from spot,Friday.

On the other hand, the familymembers of Simanchal Parida,the diploma engineer who is miss-ing since the explosion Friday wereat spot throughout the day withthe grim hope to getting the where-abouts of Parida. They have alsolodged a complaint with the Capitalpolice in this regard.

Meanwhile, the PESO authori-ties told Orissa POST that theyare in touch with the IOCL au-thorities and the CommissioneratePolice. “We are yet to interrogatethe officials of Suryashakti VesselsPrivate Limited, the Faridabad-based company in-charge of thework at the spot. Parida who wasan employee of the firm is stillmissing.

PETROL PUMP EXPLOSION

Human body partsunearthed at blast site

India test firesanti-radiationmissile Rudram-1

Mumbai: Taapsee PannuFriday tweeted to expressdisappointment that shewill not be able to watchthe Akshay Kumar-KiaraAdvani star rer LaxmmiB o m b i n t h e theatres.

Taapsee’s reaction cameshortly after Akshay Kumarposted the trailer of the up-coming horror comedy onhis verified Twitter account.

The film is set for a Diwali re-l e a s e o n a n O T T

platform.Reacting to the trailer,

Taapsee tweeted: “You have

KILLED IT n how !!!! I’m ac-tually disappointed I’m notgonna watch it in theatres!”

Meanwhile, even as the-atre owners gear up to re-open theatres on October15, a host of films wereannounced Friday forOTT release, includingVarun Dhawan and SaraAli Khan-starrer CoolieN o. 1 , R a j k u m m a rRao-starrerC h h a l a a n g a n dD u rg a v a t i f e a -t u r i n g B h u m iPednekar.

IANS

Manushi a fan ofBahubali maker

Rajamouli’s workMumbai:Former beauty queen Manushi Chhillar,who is all set to make her Bollywood debut,says she is a fan of the films of director SSRajamouli, and can watch his works on theloop.

“Rajamouli sir is one of the finest film-makers of our times and I’m a huge fan of hiswork. They are simply pathbreaking, and hehas given Indian cinema some of the mosticonic films to cherish. Bahubali and

Magadheera are my absolute favouriteRajamouli films and I can watch them on loop,”

Manushi said.She hopes her hard work is noticed by the vi-

sionary filmmaker one day, and she gets achance to work with him.

“Watching Bahubali was an experience thatmade me want to be a part of these big, grand, fan-tastical projects that entertain the nation. I can only

wish and hope that I work really hard consistently to beable to be a part of such projects in the future,” Manushi said.

Manushi is all set to make her Bollywood debut oppositeAkshay Kumar in the upcoming film, Prithviraj. Directed byChandraprakash Dwivedi, Prithviraj is based on the life of KingPrithviraj Chauhan. It stars Akshay as Prithviraj, whileManushi plays Sanyogita, the love of his life.

She will also be seen starring opposite Vicky Kaushal ina yet-untitled film. IANS

Mumbai: Amid wedding rumours,singer Neha Kakkar confirmed her re-lationship with Rohanpreet Singhthrough an Instagram post Friday.

Neha posted a photograph of singerRohanpreet and her, and captioned it:“You're Mine @rohanpreetsingh#NehuPreet.”

To this, Rohanpreet replied: “@ne-hakakkar Babuuuuuu I love youuusoooo much mera putt meri jaaaan YESI AM ONLY YOURS MERI ZINDAGI.”

Rohanpreet also shared a similar pic-ture on his Instagram feed and intro-duced Neha as his ‘zindagi’. He wrote:“Meet my zindagi, Neha Kakkar.#NehuPreet.”

Their confirmationcomes at a time whenthere are strong mar-riage rumours. Thewedding is expected totake place October 24. Infact, a few days ago, a photoof Neha and Rohanpreet went

viral and was rumoured to befrom their roka ceremony.

In the image, they areseen sitting together with

his parents. Neha,though dressed in ca-suals, was seen sittingwith a large gift bag inher lap.

Rohanpreet was a contestant onthe singing reality show RisingStar Season 2, and he alsopar ticipated inSare gama LilChamps. Earlier thisyear, Rohanpreetwas seen as one ofthe suitors ofShehnaaz Gill in ashow MujhseShaadi Karoge.

IANS

Dilip Kumar-Saira Banu won’tcelebrate wedding anniversary

P2 BENEDICT CUMBERBATCHJOINS SPIDER-MAN 3

leisure English actor Benedict Cumberbatchwill reprise his role of the sorcerersuperhero Doctor Strange in the thirdpart of the revived Spider-Manfranchise. Tom Holland returns asSpider-Man in the film.

Actress Mindy Kaling has given birth toher second child, a baby boy. Kalingmade the announcement during anepisode of The Late Show with StephenColbert, reports people.com.

SATURDAY | OCTOBER 10 | 2020 | BHUBANESWAR

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AQUARIUSTravelling is on the cardsfor you today. Ganeshaadvises you to travelalone, because if you takepeople with different tastes along withyou, their preferences may dampen yourmood and spoil the trips. But, once put insuch a situation, you will try to adjustyourself and find enjoyment in that, too.

PISCESYour planetary configura-tion not being favorable,you are advised not tostart any new projectstoday. The benefits accrued by any projectyou take up today might not justify the risksassociated with it. Businessmen need to beextra careful in all their dealings.

SAGITTARIUSTake it as a piece ofadvice: tough timesdon't last; tough peopledo. The day has a lot ofups and downs in store for you. However,you are the sailor of stormy seas andwould sail through all the troubles easily.Take the advice given by your near anddear ones, says Ganesha.

LIBRATrivialities should be theleast of your concernstoday. Do not let thesmall things faze youout. Remember that it is the overall pic-ture that matters, and not one smallstroke of the brush. Bear this is mind,since you may come under some pressurefrom subordinates at your workplace.

SCORPIOThank Ganesha that youhave the grace to handlepressure at work, becausetoday, you are going to bebogged down with a lot of work pressure.By the end of the day, try some stressbursting activities like yoga, meditation oflistening to soft music.

LEOYou will be able to influ-ence people with yourco-operative and acco-modating attitude today.You will have discussions on various top-ics with people who come into contactwith you. You will also come into contactwith people who share the same mentalwavelength as you do, says Ganesha.

VIRGOYou will remainengrossed in personalmatters at the cost ofprofessionalism. Solveyour problems today by taking themhead-on. Ganesha warns you not to letyour emotions suppress your enterpris-ing spirit, especially in the evening.

GEMINIYou know where you areheaded, and will redoubleyour efforts to reach yourgoals today. You are full of energy andenthusiasm, which helps you to achieve allyour targets. You will receive unexpectedgains owing to your hard work. Bountifulsuccess will be yours at the end of a hardday's labour, says Ganesha.

CANCERSentimentalism will behinder your path of suc-cess. So, says Ganesha,give up too much senti-mentalism. It can be quite a hazard inthe future. You will win over people withthe force of speech and polite approach.

ARIESToday will be a difficultday full of action. Youmay not agree with yourfriends about trifling matters, butyou will love it. You will complete allwork that has been pending, whichwill give you relief. Ganesha says it isan optimistic day.

FORTUNE FORECAST

TAURUSThis is one of those dayswhen not goes well,warns Ganesha. No mat-ter how hard you try you may not beable to keep problems and difficulties atbay. You may not be pleased or comfort-able doing what has been assigned, orrequired, and could simply sit sullenly,doing nothing.

CAPRICORNYour lover is in for manypleasant surprises today.You'll be in a completelyromantic mood, makingevery wish of your sweetheart your com-mand. Both of you will go shopping, andhave fun. Extravagant expenditures willkeep you charged up for the day.

BREVITY

CALVIN AND HOBBES

PEANUTS CROSSWORDSUDOKU

SOLUTIONS

CRO

SSW

ORD

SUD

OKU

CHECK FOR SOLUTIONS OF THE PUZZLES TOMORROW

post To solve the Sudoku puzzle, each row, column and box must contain the numbers 0 to 9 and the letters A to E.

MINDY KALING WELCOMESHER SECOND CHILD

Mumbai: Veteran Bollywood cou-ple Dilip Kumar and Saira Banu willnot celebrate their wedding an-niversary October 11 this year, be-cause they are mourning the re-cent Covid deaths of his two youngerbrothers.

Saira Banu announced the de-cision on Dilip Kumar’s verified

Twitter account. The statement reads: “Message

from Saira Banu Khan: Oct. 11, isalways the most beautiful day in mylife. Dilip Saheb married me onthis day and made my cherisheddreams come true. Thisyear, we are notcelebrating.

You all know we lost two of ourbrothers, Ahsan Bhai and AslamBhai. The unprecedented turmoildue to the Covid-19 pandemic hastaken many lives and caused sor-row in many many families. In thecurrent circumstances, we requestall of you, our dear friends, to prayfor each other’s safety and well

being. May God be with us all.Stay Safe.”

Dilip Kumar, 97, and SairaBanu, 76, tied the knotOctober 11, 1966. This year

would mark 54 years oftheir wedding.

Dilip Kumar’s youngestbrother Aslam Khan, whowas battling Covid-19,passed away August 21 atthe age of 88. The actor’s

second brother Ahsan Khansuccumbed to

the virusSeptember

3. IANS

Neha makes relationship with Rohanpreet official

Taapsee upset for notgetting to watch

Laxmmi Bomb in theatre

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: The stategovernment Friday drew theCentre's attention to alleged viola-tion of Covid-19 guidelines by BJPnational spokesperson andBhubaneswar MP Aparajita Sarangiduring her birthday celebrationhere.

A purported video of the eventThursday showed Sarangi sur-rounded by a large number ofwomen not wearing face masks ormaintaining adequate social dis-tance, mandatory to contain thespread of the virus. They were alsoseen singing and dancing at the

programme.Minister of State for Home Dibya

Shankar Mishra in a letter to theUnion Minister of State, HomeAffairs, Nityananda Rai, said that

Sarangi had flouted Covid-19 pre-vention protocols while celebrat-ing the occasion.

He attached the video clip withthe mail.

“I am sure that your office willbring this to the notice of the PrimeMinister and the Union HomeMinister and advise the MP not toendanger the lives of the people of

Bhubaneswar,” he said.Rejecting the allegation, the bu-

reaucrat-turned-MP, told PTI, “Therehas been no violation of Covid-19norms.”

“I would not have brought this toyour notice, had this been the firstoccasion where the MP has bla-tantly violated Covid-19 guidelines,”Mishra mentioned in the letter.

Repeated advisories, warningsand booking of at least three casesagainst the MP for disobeying Covid-19 prevention protocols have failed

to bring any im-provement in her

behaviour, theminister said.

“These irre-sponsible actswill put her, peo-

ple near to her,and the public at

grave risk. Such ir-responsible behaviour

on the part of a people’s represen-tative will demotivate Covid war-riors and is an insult to all those whohave lost their lives," he said.

As the national spokesperson ofthe BJP, it is important that "her con-duct inspires people to follow Covid-19 guidelines at this very criticaljuncture,” Mishra said.

The letter also mentioned that asmany as 109 people have succumbedto the infection and five frontlineworkers have died in the fightagainst COVID-19 in Bhubaneswaralone.

“In this backdrop, the MP cele-brating her birthday in disregardof Covid-19 guidelines makes acomplete mockery of the strugglesand sufferings that ordinary peopleare going through,” the ministersaid.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: The stategovernment Friday approved fivenew proposals involving total in-vestment of ̀ 1851.96 crore at a state-level single window clearance com-mittee meeting. The projects willcreate employment opportunitiesto 1,624 persons.

The meeting was held on digi-tal mode under the chairmanshipof Chief Secretary Asit Tripathy atLokseva Bhawan where Industriesdepartment principal secretaryHemant Kumar Sharma was alsopresent.

The approved projects weremainly from metal and metal down-stream and cement sectors.

M/s Narbheram Power and SteelPrivate Limited will set up a 2MTPA pellet and grinding plantwith an investment of `350 crorein Keonjhar district. It will createemployment opportunities for over258 persons.

Also, Viraj Steel & Energy PrivateLtd will expand its existing 0.1

MTPA integrated steel plant to a 0.3MTPA capacity in Sambalpur dis-trict. The expansion will cost ̀ 261.71crore and generate 338 employmentopportunities.

Proposal of BR Sponge and Power

Limited for expansion of its unit atTumkela in Sundargarh was alsoreceived the green signal of thestate government. The companywill expand its unit to 0.21 MTPAsponge iron, 1 MTPA iron ore ben-

eficiation, 0.6 MTPA pellet, 0.112MTPA MS billets, 0.112 MTPA TMT,50 TPH coal washery.

Similarly, M/s. Nu Vista Limited(Erstwhile Emami Cement) will in-crease its cement grinding capac-ity from 1.5 MTPA to 2 MTPA atKalinga Nagar in Jajpur with an in-vestment of `598.62 crore. A ce-ment grinding unit of 2.5 MTPAcapacity initiated by M/s. OCLIndia Limited (OCL) will be set upin Cuttack district with investmentof `441.43 crore which will gener-ate over 141 job avenues.

While giving in principle nod tothe projects, Chief SecretaryTripathy directed IndustrialPromotion and InvestmentCorporation of Odisha Ltd (IPI-COL) and other departments con-cerned to facilitate early groundingof the projects.

“Since Odisha is a power sur-plus state, the newly coming up in-dustries will be motivated to sourcepower from the GRID instead ofsetting up captive power plants(CPPs),” Tripathy said.

P3

downtown

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SATURDAY | OCTOBER 10 | 2020 | BHUBANESWARNET PRACTICE

An elderly man repairs hisfishing net on thepavement of Purighat RingRoad in Cuttack, Friday

INFECTED RECOVERED DEAD

World 3,69,31,002 2,77,77,312 10,69,151

India 69,06,151 59,06,069 1,06,490

Odisha 2,46,839 2,20,388 991

COVID-19 TRACKER

Nod for `1851.96cr investments FILLIP TO INDUSTRY SECTOR

Narbheram Powerand Steel

Private Limitedwill set up a 2MTPA pellet andgrinding plantwith aninvestment of Rs350 crore inKeonjhar whichwill create 258jobs

Viraj Steel & Energy Private Ltdwill expand its 0.1 MTPA

integrated steel plant to a 0.3MTPA capacity in Sambalpur with

an investment of Rs 261.71 crore

Nu Vista Ltd will increase itscement grinding capacity from 1.5MTPA to 2 MTPA at Kalinga Nagarin Jajpur with an investment of Rs598.62 crore

PNN & AGENCIES

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: The stategovernment is going to conduct aCommon Entrance Test (CPET)through Students AcademicManagement System (SAMS) fromOctober 12 this year for admissionsto 68 state public universities andcolleges having PG courses.

Official sources said that themain objective of the initiative isto alleviate the hardship of stu-dents, particularly of those resid-ing in remote areas.

The CPET provides a single-win-dow system for applying and ap-pearing at one entrance test, therebysaving the students from the in-convenience of appearing in mul-tiple entrance tests conducted bymultiple institutes at multiple placesand on multiple dates. It also savesa lot of money of students as theydo not have to pay application feesto multiple institutes, nor do theyhave to incur expenses to travel tomultiple places.

It also eliminates the problem ofclash of dates which was, otherwise,forcing the students to appear in onetest and forego others in spite of pay-ing the fees. CPET will also lead toease, convenience and transparencyin PG admissions of these 68 uni-

versities and colleges of the state.A common subject-wise rank list

will be prepared and the applicantswill be admitted into the universi-ties/ colleges and PG subjects oftheir choice on the basis of theirrank and the reservation pol-icy/weightage policy of the con-cerned institution. Every year,CPET will be conducted by one uni-versity, to be selected on rotationbasis. This year it is being con-ducted by Utkal University.

The CPET-2020 will be held fromOctober 12 to 22 at 26 centres, lo-cated in state universities and au-tonomous colleges. About 62,189students will face the test for ad-missions into 83 PG subjects forabout 14,700 PG seats.

The examination will be for 90minutes consisting of 70 multiplechoice questions in OMR sheet. Afew model questions have been up-

loaded for information of students.Students have the option of apply-ing for admission in multiple sub-jects and also giving their preferenceregarding university/college wherethey would like to be admitted.

The state-wide merit list will beprepared by giving 70 per centweightage to the performance in en-trance test and 30 per cent weigh-tage to career from Class X on-wards. Merit list will be publishedin about two-three weeks time.

The examinations will be con-ducted in three sittings every day.The schedule and guidelines havebeen published in SAMS website.Admit cards can be downloadedby students who have filled up thecommon admission format.

SMSes are being sent to all stu-dents regarding common queries.There will be one-hour gap betweensittings. All Covid-19 guidelineswill be adhered to including sani-tisation, social distancing. HigherEducation Secretary Saswat Mishra,“Special arrangements will be madefor Covid-19 examinees to attend theentrance. They can appear in the ex-amination in isolation rooms.”

Care has been taken to see thatstudents who have applied in mul-tiple subjects have no overlap inexamination timings.

Common entrance test forPG courses from October 12

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: Thenewly-appointed Congress in-charge of Odisha AChellakumar, Friday, said thatthe party has failed to mar-ket its achievements whichled to the drubbing in the lastelection in the state.

Addressing a presser here,the Congress Parliamentariansaid, “Somewhere we werenot able to properly marketour achievements. On the mar-keting sector, we are very weak.We will rectify our mistakes.”

He also said, “We will talkto the people. Wrong impres-sions have been created aboutthe party.”

This was Chellakumar’smaiden visit and presser inOdisha after being appointedas Odisha in-charge. Whenthe leader was asked whether

he or the high command hasplanned any change of guardin Odisha Congress, he replywas negative.

“I have come here tostrengthen the party. By chang-ing a person alone cannotchange the whole system. Thisis a wrong notion. We will cor-rect our mistakes. We willbring a united face. I hopethereafter the picture willchange in the party,” he said.

He set a target of one monthto fill the vacancies of differ-

ent positions in the partyacross the state. The Lok SabhaMP also accused the BJD-ruled state of not doing wellon development, industrialprogress, irrigation growthand law and order fronts.

“During the Congressregime, we had establishedeight sugar industries in thestate to support the farmers.Now, only 2/3 sugar industriesare there. Odisha has now be-come one of the worst stateswith criminal records. Crimesare rising in the state but no-body is bothered,” he said.

He also added, “Dishonestbureaucrats have taken overthe governance in the state.In Odisha, there is mockery ofdemocracy. No public repre-sentatives in the state get ac-cess to Chief Minister. Thisis the saddest part of admin-istration in Odisha.”

Cong failed to marketitself: A Chellakumar

POST NEWS NETWORK

New Delhi/Bhubaneswar,Oct 9: Divisional forest officer(DFO) of Mahanadi WildlifeDivision in Satkosia TigerReserve of Odisha, AnshuPragyan Das, was Friday fe-licitated with Green WarriorAward by NatWest GroupIndia, which announced thenames of winners of 10th edi-tion of the NatWest GroupEarth Heroes Awards.

She won the award basedon the theme ‘Conservationof Biodiversity and SustainableDevelopment’. The award ac-claims the grit and determi-nation of individuals and in-stitutions stepping beyondtheir call of duty, to protect

India’s biodiversity and crit-ical natural ecosystems, and inturn have worked to mitigateclimate change. Eight winnersincluding Das were felicitatedthrough a virtual ceremony.She has extensively workedfor five years in the TigerReserve playing a crucial rolein revival of the southern partof Satkosia Tiger Reserve inthe face of hostile communi-ties and the presence of left-wing extremist activity.

DFO Anshu Pragyan feted with Green Award

Aparajita flouted nCoV norms: Minister

Bhubaneswar MP Aparajita Sarangi at the birthday celebration

Such irresponsible behaviouron the part of a people’srepresentative willdemotivate Covid warriorsand is an insult to all thosewho have lost their livesDS MISHRA | MOS FOR HOME

Therehas been noviolation of

Covid-19 normsAPARAJITA SARANGI |

BHUBANESWAR MP

POST NEWS NETWORK

Cuttack, Oct 9: 5T Secretary VKPandian along with senior stategovernment officials Friday in-spected the expansion work ofTaladanda canal road here.

The canal road connecting Ranihaatto Jobra area has been widened as partthe expansion and modernisationwork of SCB Medical College andHospital (SCBMCH) here.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaikis scheduled to inaugurate thenewly-expanded Taladanda roadvirtually Saturday, said the districtadministration sources.

“The road expansion work hasbeen completed recently. The 5Tsecretary has praised the work andcongratulated all for the successfulimplementation of the project,”said an official of the district ad-ministration. It is learnt that the 5TSecretary emphasised on devising

a strategy to solve the traffic is-sues in the Silver city. He also sug-gested the district administrationand the municipal body of the cityto launch a survey for widening ofall major roads in the city.

“The 5T Secretary asked the civicauthorities to take steps for properrehabilitation of the slum dwellerswho have been evicted for the roadexpansion work,” said the official.

The 5T Secretary also visited

Malgodown and Chhatrabazar whole-sale market areas, added the official.Among others, Works department sec-retary Krishan Kumar, RevenueDivisional Commissioner Anil KumarSamal, Cuttack Collector BhawaniShankar Chayani, Cuttack MunicipalCorporation Commissioner AnanyaDas and Cuttack DeputyCommissioner of Police PrateekSingh were present during the 5TSecretary’s visit to the city.

New-look Taladanda road to open for public today

5T Secretary VK Pandian (2nd from L) inspects the road expansion work, Friday

Two more special trains to New DelhiPOST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: Ministryof Railways has decided to runtwo more special trains towardsNew Delhi from Bhubaneswar.

The Bhubaneswar-AnandVihar Weekly Special via Angul-Sambalpur City-Jharsuguda-Rourkela will leaveBhubaneswar at 12:45pm onSaturdays beginning October17, 2020 and reach Anand Viharon the following days at 8:50pm.

In the return direction, theWeekly Special will leave AnandVihar at 7:5am on Mondays be-ginning October 19 and arriveat Bhubaneswar at 4:15pm on thenext day.

This train has one First AC,one AC-2 Tier, Five AC-3 Tier,eight sleeper class, two guard-cum-lugg age vans in its composition.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: A fresh lowpressure area (LOPAR) formedover Bay of Bengal Friday whichwill bring heavy rain in some partsof the state during October 11 and 12, said BhubaneswarMeteorological Centre.

The LOPAR now lies over northAndaman Sea and adjoining eastcentral Bay of Bengal with the as-sociated cyclonic circulation ex-tending upto mid-tropospheric lev-els, the Met Centre said in a bulletin.

It is likely to concentrate into adepression over central Bay ofBengal by Saturday and move west-northwestwards and cross northAndhra Pradesh coast as a depres-sion October 17 morning, it said.

Light to moderate rain or thun-dershower is likely to occur inmost places over south coastal,south interior and north coastalOdisha till Saturday, the Met of-fice said.

Heavy to very heavy rainfall wasforecast in some areas of Gajapati,Ganjam, Rayag ada, Puri ,Malkangiri, Koraput, Kandhamal,Jagatsinghpur, Khurda andNayagarh districts, Sunday.

Similarly, heavy to very heavyrainfall is also likely to lash someplaces in Malkangiri, Koraput,Rayagada, Gajapati, Ganjam, Puri,Nabarangpur, Kalahandi,Kandhamal, Jagatsinghpur,Kendrapara, Cuttack, Bhadrak andBalasore districts on the next day,the weatherman said.

Strong surface wind with speedreaching 45-55 kmph and gusting to65 kmph may prevail over centralBay of Bengal during October 10 to11 and along and off Odisha Coastadjoining northwest Bay of Bengalfrom October 11 to 13, it said, ad-vising fishermen not to ventureinto the sea during the period.

Special Relief Commissioner(SRC) PK Jena has asked district of-ficials to be in a state of readiness.Since sea conditions are likely to berough, the advice for fishermen mustbe strictly implemented, he said.

LOPAR to bring heavy rain on Oct 11 & 12

PNN & AGENCIES

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: State’s novelcoronavirus disease (Covid-19) tallymounted to 2,46,839 Friday with2,697 more people testing positive forthe infection, while 17 fresh fatali-ties pushed the toll to 991, an offi-cial of the Health and FamilyWelfare (H&FW) department said.

Of the 2,697 cases, 1,576 were re-ported from various quarantinecentres, and the remaining detectedduring contact tracing, the officialsaid.

Khurda district, of which statecapital Bhubaneswar is a part,recorded the maximum of 482 cases,followed by Cuttack 234 and Nuapada153.

Taking to Twitter, the H&FW de-partment said, “Regret to inform thedemise of seventeen #COVID 19positive patients while under treat-ment in hospitals.”

Four fresh fatalities were regis-tered in Khurda, three in Balasore,two each in Mayurbhanj and Puri,and one each in Bargarh, Kalahandi,Malkangiri, Nayagarh, Kandhamaland Subarnapur.

As many as 53 Covid-19 patients

died due to comorbidties, said thedepartment.

As many as 36.64 lakh sampleshave been conducted in the state sofar, including 45,169 Thursday.

Six major districts such asKhurda, Cuttack, Ganjam, Puri,Balasore and Sundargarh have sofar reported 627 deaths (63 per cent)while Covid tally in these six districts

accounted for 1,14,043 (46.20 percent).Meanwhile, 3,404 patients re-covered from the viral infection,taking Odisha’s total recoveries to2,20,388.

The recovery case in the statenow stands at 87 per cent and only0.4 per cent Covid fatality has beenreported till date.

City Covid-19 tally at 24,853

With 316 more persons testingpositive for Covid-19 in the last 24hours, the total number of infectedpersons in the Capital city climbedto 24,853, the BhubaneswarMunicipal Corporation (BMC) saidFriday.

While 232 were local contactcases, the remaining 84 were quar-antine ones linked with earlier pos-

itive cases, the civic body said.Meanwhile, as many as 326 pa-

tients in Bhubaneswar recoveredfrom the disease in the last 24hours, taking the total recoveriesin the City to 21,214,the BMC said,adding that the active cases in theCity now stands at 3,507, while111 patients have so far succumbedto the viral infection.

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Covid-19 fatalities near 1,000-markINFECTIONS & DEATHS

Khurda district, of which statecapital Bhubaneswar is a part,

recorded the maximum number ofnew cases at 482, followed byCuttack 234 and Nuapada 153

Four fresh fatalities wereregistered in Khurda, three in

Balasore, two each in Mayurbhanjand Puri, and one each in Bargarh,Kalahandi, Malkangiri, Nayagarh,Kandhamal and Subarnapur

Khurda, Cuttack, Ganjam, Puri,Balasore and Sundargarh have

so far reported 627 deaths (63 percent), while Covid tally in these sixdistricts accounted for 1,14,043(46.20 per cent)

PNN & AGENCIES

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9:Around 1,000cycling enthusiasts from the SmartCity Friday took par t in‘Cycles4Change’ challenge, a jointinitiative of the BhubaneswarMunicipal Corporation (BMC) andthe Bhubaneswar Smart CityLimited (BSCL).

The event was organised to payrespect to cyclists and promote cy-cling as a public transport meansin the City.

As a part of the initiative, cy-clists from different parts of theCapital city Friday took part in theevent—Cyclegiri-Cycles4Change—

and pedalled from Sishu BhawanSquare to Dhauli, a stretch ofaround 12km.

Bhubaneswar was one of the 95cities in India to have registered forthe India Cycles4Change Challenge,which is an initiative of SmartCities Mission of the Union Housingand Urban Affairs Ministry to pro-mote cycling.

BMC Commissioner PremChandra Chaudhary who was pres-ent in the event said that the ini-

tiative aimed at boosting cyclinghabits among the denizens.

“Bhubaneswar has good scope forcycling on city roads. We alreadyhave a vast cycling track and a ded-icated public bicycle sharing system.Because of Covid outbreak it wentinto a dormant phase. Now, wewant to revive it and take it to thenext level. We want to request thecitizens to dedicate every Friday tocycling voluntarily,” he said.

During the event, several citi-zens took the pledge to use cyclesat least on every Friday. To pay re-spect to cyclists a Cyclegiri anthemwas also launched. The BMC andBSCL have requested the citizensof the smart city to use the envi-ronment-friendly means of trans-port in the city for a sustainable de-velopment of the state capital.

The urban bodies have nowplanned to make this event as a so-cial movement and continue cre-ating awareness through specialcampaigns till December 14. Onlineand offline campaigns have alsobeen planned to mobilise the com-munities to encourage them to docycling.

‘Cycles4Change’ flagged offBHUBANESWAR WASONE OF THE 95 CITIES

IN INDIA TO HAVE REGISTERED FOR

THE INDIACYCLES4CHANGE

CHALLENGE

Five held in confectioner murder case POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9 :Commissionerate Police Friday ar-rested five persons in connectionwith the murder of a confectionerat Samantarapur here October 4.

The accused have been identi-fied as Dillip Kumar Behera,Balaram Behera, Sasmita Behera,Biswajit Barik and Rashmi RanjanBarik. The accused have been for-

warded to sub-divisional court hereBhubaneswar.

Prabhakar Sahoo, the owner of

a sweet stall at Samantarapur, washacked to death over business rivalryOctober 4. Sahoo, a resident ofBoudh district, had recently openeda sweetmeat shop at Samantarapurunder Lingaraj police limits here.

After Sahoo’s death his wife hadlodged an FIR with Lingaraj po-lice wherein she alleged that theowners of ‘Balaram Sweets’, a for-mer employer of Sahoo, were in-volved in the ghastly murder of

her husband. She told the media thatSahoo used to work at a sweetmeatshop in the same market. However,he was left jobless after ‘BalaramSweets’ closed down four-fivemonths back.

Recently, Sahoo had opened hisown shop after arranging moneyfrom several sources. His wife al-leged that the father-son duo of‘Balaram Sweets’, was livid withhim over the success of his shop.

Naveen pays tributeto Utkalmani POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: ChiefMinister Naveen Patnaik Fridaypaid tributes to freedom fighter andsocial refor mer UtkalmaniGopabandhu Das on his 143rdbirth anniversary.

Remembering Gopabandhu’sselfless service for the people ofOdisha, Patnaik tweeted, “Tributeto Utkalmani Pandit GopbandhuDas, one of the most prominent free-dom fighters and Panchasakhas.He will always be remembered forhis selfless service, his unique cre-ation that enriched the Odia lan-guage and literature, and the valueof building an educated society.”

Gopabandhu Das popularlyknown as ‘Utkalmani’ (Gem ofOdisha) was born October 9, 1877in a noble Brahmin family inSuando village located on thebanks of Bhargabi River in Puridistrict. His father was ShreeDaitari Dash and motherSwarnamayee Devi.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: UnionBiotechnolo g y de par tmentSecretary Renu Swarup exudedconfidence that biotechnology ap-plications will play an important rolein mitigating challenges in mostof the sectors.

The innovation ecosystem, pro-moted by the department andBiotechnology Industry ResearchAssistance Council in the recenttimes has enabled promotion ofyoung entrepreneurs for develop-ment of several products andprocesses in agriculture, healthcare,environment management, de-vices and many other areas, shesaid.

She was speaking at the inau-guration of a webinar series on‘Insights into Entrepreneurship inBiotechnology’ organised by theInstitute of Life Sciences,Bhubaneswar, Friday.

She hoped that with the excellentscience base, ILS will play a major

role in developing an enablingecosystem for bio-incubation inthe region.

ILS director Ajay Parida men-tioned that ILS is in the process ofestablishing a bio-incubator fornurturing, mentoring and pro-moting entrepreneurs in biotech-nology.

“ILS bio-incubator is being es-tablished with support from UnionBiotechnology department and thestate Science and Technology dept,”he added.

The bio-incubator will have all ad-vanced equipment and infra-structure facilities for carrying out

cutting-edge biotechnology researchand will focus on cost effective andaffordable product development.

In his address, state Science andTechnology department secretarySantosh Sarangi spoke about the op-portunities in the state for pro-moting an innovation ecosystemfor startups and entrepreneurshipin the area of biotechnology.

He stated that OdishaBiotechnology Policy has several ac-tion plans to take such initiativesforward and complimented ILS intaking the lead in this importantarea.

Taslimarrif Syed, CEO, C-Camp,Bangalore and Dr. Vijayraghavan,CEO, Sadguru Consultancy,Hyderabad spoke on the innova-tion trends in biotechnology andchallenges and opportunity for ac-ademic spin-offs.

The speakers urged the young re-searchers and faculties to take ad-vantage of the enormous oppor-tunity for turning research ideas tobusiness opportunity.

Bio-incubator at ILS soonThe bio-incubator willhave advanced equipmentand infrastructure facilities for carrying out cutting-edge biotechnology research

FOR TRANSPARENCY

A public hearing in progress at Bhakta Niwas in Puri, Friday, for acquisition of land for the construction of security corridor around Srimandir OP PHOTO

BMC to take over Mo Cycle mgmtObserving a slump in cycling culture in the city owing to lack of dedicated cycle

tracks, the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC), Thursday said that it willtake over the management of Mo Cycle from CRUT (Capital Region Urban Transport).Promoting a cycling event ‘Cyclegiri’, BMC commissioner Prem Chandra Chaudharysaid that the civic body will be working on different aspects including developmentof cycle tracks and safe passages to passengers. “Truck, bus and car drivers will beasked to take a pledge on how to let a cyclist feel safe on the road while appearingfor the driving license test,” Chaudhary added. Introduced in 2018 ahead of theHockey World Cup, Mo Cycle service was rolled out in the city as one of the SmartCity initiatives. About 2,000 bicycles were procured by the Bhubaneswar Smart CityLimited in a phased manner from three private agencies and CRUT was allowed tomanage the service. However, owing to lack of dedicated cycle tracks and encroach-ment of the 11km tracks created for the purpose, the popularity of Mo Cycle was lost.While ridership figures initially were promising, the numbers soon dwindled asdenizens lost interest. Observing this, BMC is reported to have taken the decision.

REMEMBERING UTKALMANI

People from various walks of life pay tributes to freedom fighter and social reformer Utkalmani Gopabandhu Das onhis birth anniversary on the premises Gopabandhu park in Cuttack, Friday OP PHOTO

Govt misleadingpeople: BJPBhubaneswar: The BJP Friday said thestate government has been misleadingthe people about the issue of compen-sation to be paid to the family mem-bers of the deceased Covid warriors.The party admitted that 41 claims ofthe families of the Covid warriors arepending. But it questioned the stategovernment figures of 60 such applications made to the Centre forcompensation. BJP leader PrithvirajHarichandan said, “The governmenthas been misleading the people on theissue of compensation. As per ourinformation, till October 8 there arenames of only 47 persons given to the Centre who were said to be COVID warriors.”

POST NEWS NETWORK

Nabarangpur, Oct 9: Twenty peo-ple including a forest guard wereseriously injured Friday morningin a clash between two groups overuse of forest land in Ghadadhanuavillage under Kosagumuda blockin Nabarangpur district.

Sources said, forest officials hadcalled residents of different vil-lages under Kosagumuda block inthe district to Ghadadhanua vil-lage. They wanted to conduct ameeting in order to allocate forestland equally among the villagers.The discussions turned ugly whenan altercation started among the vil-lagers regarding the distribution.Then the arguments snowballedinto a violent clash.

It should be stated here that theforest department has launchedan afforestation programme in 27acres of reserve forest land nearGhadadhanua, Kadabhata,

Janiguda, Dang ariguda,Kakadaguda and Dhadadhanuavillages. It has asked the residentsof these villages to use forest pro-duces from the area marked for af-forestation. However, the villagershave been at loggerheads with eachother over the use of land.

To solve the problem, officialsof the forest department had calledfor a meeting. But they did not ex-pect what followed. The villagerspelted stones and used sticks asthey clashed. People were merci-lessly beaten up. The violent vil-lagers also attacked the forest guardspresent at the spot. While most of theforest department personnel fledthe spot, one guard could not do so.He sustained serious injuries. Healong with 19 other injured villagerswas admitted to the district head-quarters hospital for treatment.

The forest department later reg-istered two separate FIRs againstthe villagers at the police station.

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POST NEWS NETWORK

Nayagarh, Oct 9: ManibhadraPuturia dam project was proposedin Nayagarh with an aim to controlflood and facilitating irrigation in2009. But the fate of this dam proj-ect has been stuck in land hurdlesince 2011. People in riparian pock-ets of the Mahanadi and Brutangavillages have been suffering flooddevastation every year.

Locals are unsure of the fate ofthe project and alleged the projecthas been pushed into cold storagesince 2011 due to bottlenecks inland acquisition and shortage offunds. Chief Minister NaveenPatnaik had laid the foundation ofthe project January 2, 2009. Thedam project was planned for alength of 14 km from Manibhadrahill (under Gania block) to Puturiavillage in Kishoreprasad panchayat.

Locals said, ”Had the projectbeen executed, several panchayatslike Kishore prasad, Gania,Belapada, Rasang, Chhamudia andBadasilinga would have been pro-tected against devastating floodsevery year.” They lamented that aplaque set up during the foundationlaying ceremony always remindsthem of the project.

Owing to floods from theMahanadi and Brutanga rivers,people in scores of villages inRasanga, Chhudia and Badasilangapanchayats have to face unprece-dented miseries as they remain cutoff from the rest of the world for

days together. Crops are completelydamaged. People have long beendemanding a dam to control floodsin the area.

After repeated agitations by localpeople, construction work of thedam project started. Work over an8-km stretch of the dam has beencompleted while the remainingpart of the project has been aban-doned as the land acquisition facedmuch trouble. It could not be car-ried forward, they lamented.

As for the ill-fated project, exec-utive engineer of the Nayagarhwater resources division RajendraKumar Mishra and assistant ex-ecutive engineer of the Dasapallawater resources divisionRabindranath Sethi said the work

of the ambitious project was actu-ally started in 2008 and was to becompleted in 2013.

“Locals agreed to spare theirland for the project, but later somepeople did not cooperate in thisissue. The land acquisition could notbe carried forward. By this time, thetimeline of the project funded byNABARD had expired. The workcould not be completed,” they added.

They also pointed out, ”In thiscondition, we are often told aboutresumption of the project work,but the main problem is shortageof funds. If land is acquired, the proj-ect work will be resumed easily.The department has apprised thegovernment about the situationand further funds.”

Manibhadra Puturia damproject faces land hurdle

UNCERTAIN FUTURE

ManibhadraPuturia dam

project was proposedin Nayagarh with anaim to control floodand facilitatingirrigation

But the fate of thisdam project has

been stuck in land andfund hurdle since 2011

People in riparian pocketsof the Mahanadi and

Brutanga villages have beensuffering flood devastationevery year

Had the project been executed, severalpanchayats like Kishoreprasad, Gania,

Belapada, Rasang, Chhamudia and Badasilingawould have been protected againstdevastating floods every year, locals said

POST NEWS NETWORK

Sambalpur, Oct 9: Sambalpur districtwas declared open defecation free afterit achieved 100 per cent toilet coverageunder Swachh Bharat Mission, accordingto official data. The ground reality, how-ever, tells a different story. About 90 percent of the toilets have allegedly be-come unfit for use, defeating the purposeof the Swachh Bharat schme.

Talajharan village under Jujumurablock can be taken as a case in point. Thisvillage was declared open defecationfree (ODF) December 31, 2018. On thisoccasion, the administration had or-ganised a function attended by gov-ernment officers and members of NGOs.It was then a prestige issue to get the ODFtag. As things stand, it would be a com-plete misnomer to call this village as anODF village. A visit to this village willmake one believe why it can no longerbe an ODF village.

One or two families in the villageare presently using toilets. And the resthave no choice but to go either to farm-lands or pond banks to relieve them-selves.

The villagers alleged that the an-nouncement was nothing but a gim-mick of politicians. The masons en-gaged to construct the toilets were fromoutside the state. “Neither they nor theadministrative officials responded toour queries regarding the design of toi-

lets. They instead would scold us, say-ing our names would be struck off thelist. We were then given a sum of Rs12,000 each to get our toilets constructed.We were then told that we can investmore to get a toilet of their choice,” avillager said.

“Due to substandard constructionwork, all the toilets developed cracks andsubsequently caved in, making themunfit for use. Those who got their toiletsrepaired are using the ones and thereare hardly one or two such families.As we were not aware of the scheme, wewere duped,” they rued.

Rural water supply and sanitation(RWSS) executive engineer B Routraywas evasive. "Earlier, the RWSS de-

partment was entrusted with the scheme.At that time, almost all the toilets werecompleted. As of now, district rural de-velopment department (DRDA) is car-rying out the scheme,” he said.

Notably, the scheme was launchedin the district in financial year of 2013-14. In the first year, only two toiletswere constructed. Later, a target for5,371; 37,111; 51,361; 20,303 and 37,825toilets was fixed for 2014-15, 2015-16,2016-17, 2017-18 and 2018-19 financialyears respectively. And the departmentinformed that the set targets wereachieved.

If the department sources are to goby, then as of now, only 250 toilets areunder construction.

Sambalpur’s ODF tag a misnomer

Odia lady officer wins‘Earth Heroes Awards

Koraput youth feted for 94 push-ups/min

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bargarh, Oct 9: With the COVID-19 pandemic showing no signs of let-ting up in Bargarh district, the dis-trict seems to be steadily emergingas the new COVID-19 hotspot inOdisha.

The district Friday reported86 fresh COVID-19 cases. Sohelablock in the district reportedmaximum cases of 14 followedby Bheden block (12), Atabirablock (11), Padmapur block(nine),Bijepur block (seven), Ambabhonablock (six), Barpali NAC andBarpali block (five each), Bhatliand Paikamal blocks (four each),Bargarh municipality (three),Jharbandh block (two) andAtabira NAC, Gaisilet block.Ambabhona block and PadmapurNAC (one each).

Informing about the district’sCOVID-19 situation, district infor-mation and public relations offi-cer Kalyani Dash said the district’stally went up to 7,258. So far, 6,429patients have recovered from the dis-ease and 816 are undergoing treat-ment. The disease has so far claimed13 lives in the district, she said,adding that, the district adminis-tration is taking all measures tocontain the spread of the disease.

Notably, in this district, a manidentified as Prahlad Bisi fromRushuda area under Bheden po-lice limits had claimed that hehad developed COVID-19 vaccinein September. The district healthdepartment had then swung intoaction and seized some red andblue vials and syringes from hispossession.

Bargarh emerging asnew Covid hotspot!

Sonepur: Even as Covid-19 in-fection cases are increasing inSonepur district, the deadly virushas made its entry into the districtcircle jail. The jail authoritiesand inmates were panicked, a re-port said.

The report said, the jail hasrecorded 58 Covid positive caseswhile the district reported 3230cases. There are 132 inmates inthe circle jail while 58 of themare infected. This has become acause of concern for the jail au-thorities. A medical team has beenengaged to take care of the pa-tients.

“In this situation, infected in-mates and non-infected have beenkept in separation so as to ward offfur ther infection,” saidSatyanarayan Behera, the jail su-perintendent.

Covid has spread in six blocksof the district while 11 patients havedied of Covid in the district.

58 inmates Covid+ve in Sonepur jail

Group clash leaves20 people injured

POST NEWS NETWORK

Malkangiri, Oct 9: Residents ofthis district have demanded thatAmmakund be protected as a touristdestination. Ammakund is locatedunder Khairaput block inMalkangiri district. A large num-ber of people participated in a rallyThursday evening to voice theirdemands. They staged a protestafter coming to know that anAndhra Pradesh-based companyhas applied for lease to extractstone from the quarry situatednear Ammakund.

Residents of seven panchayatsparticipated in the protest rally.They have submitted a memoran-dum to the local tehsdildar to re-strain the company or any other en-tity from extracting stone fromsites near Ammakund. People ofthis tribal dominated district mostlydepend on forest produces for theirlivelihood. The mining area spreadsover 600 acres and if allowed, itwill affect the eco-tourism spot,some villagers alleged.

Ammakund is rich with natu-ral beauties and water bodies.Tourists from several parts ofOdisha and outside throng thisplace for picnic and sightseeing,round the year. If allowed, miningactivities will take place on a hillwhich is situated one kilometreaway from Majhiguda village whileAmmakund under Mudulipadapanchayat is situated about 3.5kmfrom the hill, locals said.

Save ‘Ammakund’ fromstone mafia, say locals

SWACHH BHARAT IN MESS

POST NEWS NETWORK

Malkangiri, Oct 9: In a possible sorcery-related killing,some persons murdered a man at the virtually inaccessi-ble Udayagiri village of Padia block on the border ofMalkangiri district Thursday night. In their bid to destroyproof, the miscreants burnt the body of the deceased at thevillage cremation ground.

The deceased has been identified as Baga Kabasi, a res-ident of Udayagiri village of Kaladapalli panchayat.According to sources, some villagers were of the opinionthat Kabasi was into sorcery and black magic. They witnessedKabasi performing some acts Thursday night. Those actsenhanced their belief that Kabasi was indeed a black magicpractitioner.

The villagers called Kabasi out of his house and took himto a remote place where they murdered him in cold blood.They then cremated the body.

Man killed, body burnt in Malkangiri

POST NEWS NETWORK

Angul, Oct 9: Anshu Pragyan Das, deputyconservator of forests of Mahanadi WildlifeDivision at Satkosia Tiger Reserve in Anguldistrict, was conferred Thursday with theprestigious 10th NatWest Group ‘EarthHeroes Awards 2020’. She was honouredfor her contribution towards mitigatingthe ill effects of climate change and tryingto protect the planet’s biological diversity.Das is among the eight awardees from Indiawho were felicitated with the ‘Earth HeroesAwards 2020’.

The jury members had shortlisted Das

for her outstanding work in protection ofthe Satkosia tiger habitat by harnessingthe support of local communities. She is alsoworking for the revival of the endangered‘Gharial’ species found in the Mahanadi river-ine at Satkosia.

The award ceremony is usually held inNew Delhi in presence of ministers andother stakeholders. However due to theCOVID-19 pandemic, the prize distributionceremony was organised online.

The eight award winners, including Das,were felicitated in the presence of AssistantSecretary General of United Nations andExecutive Secretary of the Convention onBiological Diversity, Elizabeth MarumaMrema, NITI Aayog member Ramesh Chandand renowned British economist and climatechange activist Nicholas Stern and other dig-nitaries. Chief Secretary Asit KumarTripathy has congratulated Das on herachievement. Principal Chief Conservatorof Forest (PCCF) and Head of Forest Force(HoFF) of Odisha Sandip Tripathi alsolauded the efforts of Das.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Koraput, Oct 9: In a rare achievement,Tukuna Turuk of Koraput entered AsiaBook of Records Friday for doing 94 push-ups in one minute.

The youth from Bandikar village inKoraput district is thrilled with the achieve-ment. The B.Tech educated youth said, “I

was keen to stand out of the crowd than tofollow it. As I was good at push-ups, I focusedon that with concerted effort and the resultis here”. Turuk is also a bronze-medallistin national-level Taekwondo. “The morewe keep ourselves engaged in sporting ac-tivities, we can keep ourselves physicallyfit and have control over our mind,” theyoung man said.

WORDSWORTH

power post P6

F requent transfer is a fait accompli in government. But Pimpri- Chinchwadpolice commissioner Sandeep Bishnoi, who was recently transferred,has approached the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) challeng-

ing his transfer order. He was moved out from his post in less than a year.He has been succeeded by Krishna Prakash, a 1998-batch IPS officer.

Bishnoi has stated that “such abrupt transfers without justification or validreason is contrary to law and ought to be set aside.” Bishnoi and Prakashare part of a major reshuffle carried out by the Maharashtra governmentin which around 50 officials were transferred. Prakash is the third police com-missioner of Pimpri-Chinchwad in two years after the state government es-tablished the commissionerate in the industrial town, as law and order be-came a challenge following a rise in the number of street crimes and casesof vandalism. Bishnoi’s predecessor, senior IPS officer RK Padmanabhan,too was transferred before completing two years in office.

RBI PICKS MPC MEMBERSThe Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had to postpone its much-awaited mon-

etary policy review in the last week of September due to the lack of quorum.The delayed nomination of three government external members to its six-member Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) had led to the unprecedentedpostponement. Now the RBI has appointed Ashima Goyal, Jayanth R Varmaand Shashanka Bhide as MPC members for a period of four years.

The MPC is a statutory committee responsible for fixing the benchmarkinterest rate.

According to the RBI Act, thecommittee meets at least four timesa year and publishes its decisionsafter each meeting. The meetingcan begin only if at least four outof the six members are present.The new appointments were ne-cessitated after the four-year tenure of the three government-nominated mem-bers Chetan Ghate, Pami Dua and Ravindra Dholakia ended in August.

ADHOCISM IN ACTIONAfter the heady announcement heralding long-awaited reforms, Indian

Railways is moving cautiously on the implementation. Some observers aresurprised at the slow pace. From the time when Covid struck and passen-ger rail traffic almost stopped, the Railways has had plenty of time on itshands to consider its internal rearrangement.

While all posts of Members of the Railway Board are ex-cadre now andshould be filled with suitable officers, based on seniority and residual serv-ice, the Railway Ministry is edging ahead with great caution. Sources saythat the post of Director General of HR (DGGHR) was filled with an IndianRailway Personnel Service (IRPS) officer, even though more senior officersfrom other cadres are eligible and available. It is also being reported that thepost of Member Traffic & Rolling Stock is likely to be given to an officer fromthe Indian Railways Service of Electrical Engineers (IRSEE). Similarly,there seems to be a proposal to appoint the Member (Finance) from theIndian Railways Accounts Service (IRAS).

So far so good. But there is some grumbling among the Indian RailwaysService of Engineers (IRSE) and Indian Railways Service of MechanicalEngineers (IRSME), which seem to have lost out on apex grade posts to theother services in the new plan. According to sources, the Railway Ministryis still not drafted the Recruitment Rules, which may explain the sense ofadhocism prevailing in the ministry’s actions.

Share a babu experience! Follow dilipthecherian@twitter.com.Let’s multiply the effect.

F oreign Ministers from fourQuad countries met in Tokyolast Tuesday to discuss pan-

demic-related issues. At the behestof Japan, a Supply Chain ResilienceInitiative (SCRI) in order to reducedependence on China was also dis-cussed. The new supply chain wouldenhance access to affordable vac-cines, medicines, and medical equip-ment in the pandemic in additionto other goods. Japan thought thatSCRI could substitute for ASEAN-led Regional ComprehensiveEconomic Partnership which wasboycotted by India.

Quad, however, drew interna-tional attention as it raised thehackles of Beijing for refocusing onthe security co-operation in orderto counter China. This was con-spicuous in the statement of USSecretary of State Mike Pompeo. Inhis scathing attack on China,Pompeo stated, “As partners in thisQuad, it is more critical now thanever that we collaborate to protectour people and partners from theCCP’s exploitation, corruption andcoercion we have seen in the South,in the East China Sea, the Mekong,the Himalayas, the Taiwan Straits.”

Pompeo hinted at institutional-ising Quad and expanding it. Other

countries sharing the spirit and theunderstanding with the Quad couldcome on board at a later time. Quadcan evolve into a security frame-work that can counter the challengethat the Chinese Communist Partyis posing to the world.

The remarks by Indian ForeignMinister S Jaishankar were as-tounding. He surprisingly madeno reference to the five-month LACstandoff nor did he mention China.Jaishankar said, “The events of20-20 have demonstrated the im-perative for like-minded countriesto coordinate responses to the var-ious challenges that the pandemichas brought upon us. As vibrant andpluralistic democracies with sharedvalues, our nations have collec-tively affirmed the importance ofmaintaining a free, open and in-clusive Indo-Pacific.”

What are the prospects of Quad?China is already rattled by thisgroup. The Chinese leadership hasdubbed it as a mini NATO and anexclusive clique. A statement is-sued by their Foreign Ministry onTuesday sounded highly critical ofthe Quad exercise. Beijing tends tobully countries joining the Americancamp. It has certainly turned ag-gressive against New Delhi for not

reconciling to Chinese hegemony inthe region and its quest for worldpower status. Beijing has carried agrudge for India giving asylum tothe Dalai Lama and sheltering theTibetan leadership in exile.

The Chinese animosity againstIndia continues for the latter’s at-tempt to emerge as a power centrein Indo-Pacific. New Delhi mov-ing closer to the USA exacerbatesChinese anger. Strange and in-credible that New Delhi couldn’t de-tect the Chinese attitude towardsIndia despite several anti-India ac-tivities it is engaged in. It behavedlike the proverbial cat drinkingmilk with its eyes closed and think-ing that nobody is watching.

It is high time New Delhi re-alised that it could not befriendChina anymore and it has to un-friend it sooner than later. Chinaunderstands the language of powerand force, not persuasion, dialogueor consultation. New Delhi con-tinues to suffer from confusion,equivocation and dithering withregard to China. Even now it seemsto believe that China will roll backfrom the border through dialogue.

Quad provides an opportunity forIndia to make up its power dis-parity with China in alliance with

other three countries. New Delhishould take greater initiative informalising and militarising Quad,unless it makes a bilateral secu-rity agreement with the US. Itseems to be opposed to militarisa-tion of Quad, whereas the US wantsto turn it into a security alliance.India’s stance defies understandingas China is already occupying 5,000sq km of our territory. New Delhimay be calculating that if it movesinto military alliances, Beijingmight declare a war on India.Precisely for such an eventuality,a military alliance is necessary todefend our territory.

To sum up, Quad meeting inTokyo sounds promising. The de-termination shown by Australia,USA and even Japan is encourag-ing. But it is New Delhi’s ambiva-lent attitude that disappoints. NewDelhi continues to try to be neutraland friendly with both the blocksas it did in the past between USAand USSR with a tilt towards the lat-ter. It tries to do the same betweenthe US and China with a bias towards the former. Will it work?

The writer is Professor ofInternational Relations, JMI.

INFA

Blinking when opportunity beckons

BARKING UP WRONG TREE U

nion Minister for Communications,Electronics &Information Technology,

Ravi Shankar Prasad, has ex-pressed satisfaction that the num-ber of mobile phone manufac-turers in India has increased fromtwo to 60 in the last five years. Inparallel, Secretary Ajay PrakashShawney has said that 90 per centof the mobile phones being sold inthe country are being manufac-tured here.

Further, we have had a streamof media reports saying that elec-tronics majors have submittedproposals to invest large amountsin India. A similar announcementwas made in 2015 that these com-panies will invest 17 billion dollars.These are encouraging statements.However, the electronics majorswere already present in India in2016 when the Make in India pro-gramme was launched. Foxconnand Lenovo had given contracts tolocal companies to manufacturetheir products in Sri City, AndhraPradesh and Sriperumbudur inTamil Nadu; and Samsung hadits own manufacturing facility inNoida, Uttar Pradesh. Questionis this: Why have they not ex-panded in the last five years?

In particular, a production fa-cility of Motorola, a subsidiaryof Lenovo, has been lying closedin Chennai. Lenovo has not evenrestarted its existing plant, letalone making new investment.The announcement made in 2015that these companies will invest 17billion dollars has clearly fallen flat.

Assocham has said in a reportthat the mobile phones being ‘man-ufactured’ in India are actuallyonly last line assembly just as thehomemaker brings flour, pulseand vegetables and cooks a lastline meal in the kitchen. This as-sembly work is not ‘manufacture.’

The objective of Make in Indiaand Atma Nirbhar Bharat schemesis to create self-dependence. Thesemanufacturers continue to be de-pendent on the import of parts.This grim reality is seen in theelectronics imports of 55 billion dol-lars against exports of mere ninebillion dollars in 2018-19. We arenowhere near becoming AtmaNirbhar. The truth is that there hasbeen no progress since 2015.

I studied eight posts regardingthe reasons of slow progress ofelectronics manufacturing in Indiaon the internet. Six of eight postscomplained about the unavail-ability of skilled workers. Onepost explained that our collegeswere asking the students to ‘learn’the function of the 40 legs in anIntel chip—which they needed tomemorise. Then the commentersays: “Even if the student wereto become a repair technician, hewouldn’t be required to store thefunction of each of the parts of thedozens of varieties of chips in hismind. Instead, asking the studenthow he would use the integratedcircuit to create a device wouldhave been a hundredfold morestimulating, constructive, and pro-ductive.” Alas! The professors inour government colleges them-selves do not know how to use thechips; and have no interest inlearning it either because theirsalaries are secured as long asthey churn out certificate-hold-ing useless graduates.

Two of the eight posts com-plained about the cumbersomeregulatory framework. I was toldby a manufacturer from Bangalorethat the government has recentlyintroduced a requirement thatevery export consignment wouldrequire to be accompanied by a cer-tificate from a chartered ac-countant. The manufacturer hasto now do additional paper work

to get the certificate. This takes anadditional two days in delivery.

The government is creatingsuch new roadblocks at everystep—the beneficiary of which,one may surmise, is the greasemoney obtained by the officials.Other reasons mentioned in theposts were legal hurdles in im-plementation of contracts, cost ofcapital, high rates of tax and costof land and electricity. I am not con-vinced of these reasons.

The government has made alaudable effort and made a schemeto provide 50 to 75 per cent capitalsubsidy for investments in newelectronics manufacturing facilities.This is not going to work. It is likegiving oxygen to a person dyingfrom malnutrition. As said above,the main roadblocks are our edu-cation system and government reg-ulations. Investments will not comeunless we solve these problemsjust as they have not come afterthe launch of Make in India in2016. It must be remembered thatour bureaucrats get more oppor-tunities to get grease money in dis-bursing these subsidies.

Perhaps, the government isbeing driven by the bad advicegiven by the World Bank. TheBank and other multilateral agen-cies like the United Nations aredriven by the interests of indus-trialised nations. The governmentsof those countries, in turn, aredriven by multinational corpora-

tions. These corporations have nointerest in developing manufac-turing in India. Their objective, onthe contrary, is to kill Make inIndia so that they can supply elec-tronics goods from their plants inVietnam and Taiwan where thereis greater availability of skilledlabour and less extortion by the bu-reaucracy.

Thus, in its recent WorldDevelopment Report, the WorldBank has advised the Indian gov-ernment to reduce import duties.Interestingly, the World Bank hasitself said in the same report thatthe share of international trade inglobally manufactured goods hadincreased from 43 per cent in 2000to 53 per cent in 2008 when theglobal financial crisis took place.It declined to 45 per cent in 2015after the crisis. Now, it can only fur-ther contract after the pandemic.Therefore, the government shouldnot run after foreign investors asadvised by the World Bank. Thegovernment must instead thinkthrough why would foreign capi-tal come into India when our ownHigh Net Worth Individuals areleaving for better pastures?

The government should solve thebasic problems of the economyinstead of giving capital subsi-dies. The professors of govern-ment colleges do not themselveshave practical knowledge. Theirsalaries are secure. They do notwant to teach. Further, the pri-vate universities are unable tocharge adequate fees to employcompetent teachers since the costof education in the government col-leges is less. There is a need tofree the government colleges ofthe decrepit professors.

Secondly, the government mustreduce the extortion by the bu-reaucracy. Thirdly, the govern-ment will have to reduce the socialdivisions in the society and havea constructive dialogue with theOpposition; and improve the en-vironment—water and air in par-ticular. Investments--foreign ordomestic—will take place whenwe provide pleasant living condi-tions. The present hype about theproposals of foreign investmentswill certainly prove a pipedream.

The writer is formerProfessor of Economics at

IIM Bangalore.

FOCUS

SPECTRUM

The main roadblocks are our education system and government regulations.Investments will not come unless we solve these problems just as they have not come after the launch of Make in India in 2016

Transfer travails

BEING LATE TO WORK

Tom had this problem of getting uplate in the morning and was

always late for work. His boss wasmad at him and threatened to fire himif he didn’t do something about it. SoTom went to his doctor who gave hima pill and told him to take it before he

went to bed. Tomslept well and in

fact beat the alarm in the morning byalmost two hours. He had a leisurelybreakfast and drove cheerfully towork. “Boss,” he said, “The pillactually worked!”“That’s all fine,” said the boss, “Butwhere were you yesterday?”

SATURDAY | OCTOBER 10 | 2020 | BHUBANESWAR

The existence of poverty is theproof of an unjust and ill-organisedsociety, and our public charities arebut the first tardy awakening in theconscience of a robber.

SRI AUROBINDO

QUAD

THE GOVERNMENT

SHOULD NOTRUN AFTER

FOREIGNINVESTORS AS

ADVISED BY THEWORLD

BANK. IT MUSTINSTEAD THINKTHROUGH WHY

FOREIGN CAPITAL WOULD

COME INTOINDIA WHEN

OUR OWN HIGHNET WORTH

INDIVIDUALSARE LEAVINGFOR BETTER

PASTURES

Bharat Jhunjhunwala

WISDOM CORNERJudge a man by his questions rather than his answers. VOLTAIRE

Be a lotus flower. Be in the water, and do not let the water touchyou. OSHO

The gem cannot be polished without friction, nor man perfectedwithout trials. CONFUCIUS

FOREIGN INVESTMENT

Readers of Orissa POSTare most welcome to contribute letters(200 words), articles andcolumns (between 750-1250words). Contributors arerequested to send theircontact numbers and fullpostal address/email ID. They may alsosend in their valuable comments, opinionand suggestions, preferably by email, to: edit@orissapost.com

B-15, Rasulgarh Industrial Estate,Bhubaneswar-751010

LettersTO THE EDITOR

QUAD MEETINGIN TOKYO

SOUNDS PROMISING. THEDETERMINATION

SHOWN BYAUSTRALIA, USA

AND EVENJAPAN IS

ENCOURAGING.BUT IT IS NEW

DELHI’S AMBIVALENT

ATTITUDE THATDISAPPOINTS

Dr D.K. Giri

Waste of tribal funds

Sir, Three different government departments claimed to have spent aroundRs 60 lakh to develop a fish yard in Baripada market, taking money from thetribal development funds. Yet, so far, they have completed only a half-builtcomplex to sell ‘Chilika fresh’. This place is around 600km from Chilika lake.The local fish markets thrive here with yards and markets in traditional modeand are growing. But the way the tribal funds meant for their livelihood de-velopment are squandered by officials and other vested interests is a mat-ter of serious concern. The tribals earn their livelihood from neither catch-ing nor selling fish. But a set of people are now enriching themselves fromthe fish business by way of massive pisciculture with support from fisheryagencies. Hence such an ubiquitous project failed to strike the minds ofanyone. Still we have spent hefty sums in the name of tribal development andthen left it half-done! The tribal development department was kept in the darkwhile implementing this project. Tribals here eke out their livelihood fromcollection of sabai, sal leafs, bamboo as also from minor forest produce.Besides, several people have been inducted into various jobs in this project.The ZP chairperson, herself from this community, has resented about thiswaste of money, in a past ZP meeting. But, no one took a serious note.

Janaki Ballav Dash, MAYURBHANJ

Gas for homes

Sir, It’s commendable that the Gas Authority of Indiahas undertaken the task of supplying cooking gas to house-holds through pipes in select cities. The initiative wouldhelp consumers on two fronts. First, they need not visitthe distributors for getting a refill; and two, there willnot be any occasion to ask the delivery man to check theweight. The metered gas supply to individuals will bebilled automatically and the users shall not have any ten-sion of shortage or under-weighed cylinders. Thissounds good, but who can guarantee the safety of sup-ply? The recent explosion in a filling station inBhubaneswar has raised our worry on this count. Theauthorities wake up from slumber only when an acci-dent takes place. The Bhubaneswar incident is said tobe the rarest of the rare kind in the history of gas ex-plosion. It’s certainly time for the administration andthe petroleum companies to see that no chance is takento play with the lives of innocent customers.

Sanjib Das, CUTTACK

cmyk

cmyk

Dilip Cherian

BABUDOMBYTES

Turdiform

It’s one of a select class of English words, including crapulent andformicate, that are guaranteed to mislead readers and raise a giggle

among children of all ages. Turdiform is an adjective that refers to birds ofthe thrush family. It comes from Latin turdus for one of the Europeanthrushes, probably the song thrush or mistle thrush (the latter having beengiven that name because it was noted for eating berries, particularly thoseof the mistletoe). Turdiform is found exclusively in old-time ornithologicalworks. It has always been specialist and technical; its appearances liemainly in the period from 1870 to 1910 and it is obsolete. We may guess thata certain fastidiousness on the part of writers has led to their expelling itfrom their vocabulary. However, the genus Turdus for the thrushes survives.Members include Turdus migratorius, the American Robin (the Europeanrobin used to be thought a thrush but is now in a different genus) and Turdusmaximus, the Tibetan blackbird.

Turducken

Many of us have heard of this gastronomic marvel, which in the USA isassociated with Thanksgiving and to a lesser extent with July 4. A

chicken is stuffed inside a duck inside a turkey — the inner two deboned firstand themselves stuffed with such delights as sausage, cornbread, or oyster.A culinary chimera, the turducken might be thought to stand on the samelevel of gustatory invention as the notorious Glaswegian deep-fried Marsbar, though those who have tried it say it’s quite tasty. Some chefs drawaway in horror from it, citing the excessive amounts of skin and fat and thehigh risk of bacterial problems because it is so hard to ensure that all threebirds are properly cooked through. This method of cooking is actually quiteancient, with recipes from medieval times that were often much morecomplicated still. The technical term for the process is engastration, fromGreek words meaning “in the belly”. A well-known English example of thenineteenth century was Pandora’s Cushion, a boned goose stuffed with aboned chicken, which was stuffed with a boned pheasant, itself stuffed witha boned quail. If the turducken were not enough, a news article from 1997said that a store in Louisiana was experimenting with a pigturducken,though nothing has been heard of it since.

LOL

cmyk

cmyk

TELANGANA

SATURDAY | OCTOBER 10 | 2020 | BHUBANESWARP7

BIHAR

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Patna, Oct 9: The list of JD(U)candidates for the Bihar assemblyelections bears the unmistakablestamp of Chief Minister NitishKumar, who has made a sagaciousattempt to consolidate his extremelybackward castes (EBC) supportbase while trying to make a dent intoRJD's Muslim-Yadav combine.

The EBCs, numerically large butdisorganised, have found a prideof place in the list, with 19 candi-dates drawn from this social seg-ment, nurtured over the years byKumar as a bulwark against theRJD.

Kumar, as part of his social en-gineering, zealously courted themthrough welfare measures like sub-quotas for them in government jobsin an attempt to make inroads intoRJD supremo Lalu Prasad's oncesolid OBC support base. For yearsthe OBCs had almost voted for theRJD en bloc before Kumar partedways with the Yadav chieftain.

Even more conspicuous is thecandidature of 19 Yadavs, numer-ically the largest caste group inBihar who have, by and large, stoodrock solid behind the RJD.

Yadav candidates like sittingMLAs Bijendra Prasad Yadav and

Poonam Yadav are old JD(U) hands.However, new entrants like

Chandrika Roy and JaivardhanYadav alias 'Bachcha' give a cleareridea of the game plan of Kumar,against whom the RJD has beentrying to create, with little success,a wave of resentment over the be-trayal of mandate a reference to theJD(U) boss winning the 2015 pollsin alliance with the RJD but chang-ing course midway and returningto the NDA.

Roy, who has been fielded from hispocket borough Parsa, is the fatherof Aishwarya Roy, who got mar-ried to the RJD supremo’s elderson Tej Pratap Yadav in 2018 butwas abandoned by her husbandbarely six months after tying theknot.

Jaivardhan, who won Paliganjfor the RJD in 2015, walked intothe JD(U) camp a couple of monthsago. His exit seems to have madethings too hot to handle for the RJDwhich has handed over Paliganj tothe CPI(ML) as part of a hurriedlycobbled alliance.

Jaivardhan Yadav is the grand-son of Congress veteran late RamLakhan Singh Yadav, a former unionminister and the most formidableYadav leader in Bihar of the pre-Mandal era.

With 18 Yadav and 11 Muslimnominees, the JD(U) also seems tohave sought to make a dent intothe RJDs famed MY combination,the bedrock of the par ty 's support base.

The candidature of 12 Kurmis,who are numerically small, is hardlysurprising. The community takespride in the fact that the chief min-ister is from amongst them. Ofstrategic importance, though, isparty tickets to 15 Kushwahas, nu-merically the largest among OBCsafter the Yadavs.

Kurmis and Koeris, the castename by which Kushwahas aremore popularly known, have beenseen as political comrades in arms.Their camaraderie have earnedthem the sobriquet Luv-Kush inthe political parlance of Bihar.

Attempts have been made byRLSP chief and former union min-ister Upendra Kushwaha to weanaway his castemen from the JD(U)but with hardly any success.

Seventeen tickets have gone to theScheduled Castes, and the partyhopes to offset any Dalit backlashcaused by the rebellion of ChiragPaswans LJP with the help ofManjhi.

Nineteen candidates happen to befrom among the upper castes, towhom the party has sought to reachout with the message that their out-right rejection of the JD(U) after itsnapped ties with BJP in 2013notwithstanding, the party caresfor all.

In any case, with Kumar re-turning to the NDA fold, his partyhopes to secure the solid backing ofthe upper castes. Among the uppercaste candidates, seven are Rajputs,whom the party has sought to reachout to with the induction of for-mer Union minister RaghuvanshPrasad Singhs son Satya Prakash,who is expected to be accommo-dated in the legislative council later.

Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, afounding member of the RJD who

enjoyed respect across party lines,had resigned from the primarymembership a day before his deathfrom post-COVID complicationsand a couple of months after step-ping down as national vice-president.

The party has also fielded 10Bhumihars. These include turn-coats like Sudarshan Kumar, thesitting MLA from Barbigha, whoquit the Congress recently and is theJD(U) candidate from the same seat.Another Bhumihar candidate whohas aroused much curiosity is RajivLochan Singh from Mokama, a soft-spoken man with roots in the SanghParivar who moves around wearinga tilak and is known by the nick-name sadhu baba.

The docile debutant is pittedagainst multiple-term MLA AnantKumar Singh, a dreaded figure whowas booked under the stringentanti-terror law UAPA last year aftera huge cache of arms, ammunitionand explosives was recovered fromhis residence.

Anant Singh had started his po-litical journey in 2005 with the JD(U)and was known to enjoy the confi-dence of Nitish Kumar. Ahead ofthe 2015 assembly polls, he burntbridges with the chief ministerwhen he quit the party saying he wasopposed to the proposed tie-up withRJD. The RJD supremo, on his part,claimed during the campaign thathe had got Nitish Kumar to actagainst the Mokama MLA for com-mitting atrocities against a Yadav boy.

Politics is known to make strangebedfellows and Anant Singh hasended up entering the fray as an RJDcandidate.

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

New Delhi/Patna, Oct 9: Amidgrowing resentment among dif-ferent aspirants over the ticket dis-tribution for Bihar Assembly elec-tions, the Congress is chalking outa campaign plan in which RahulGandhi will be its star campaigner.

Party sources said that during thethree-phase polls, Rahul Gandhimay address six rallies -- two ineach phase -- and one joint rallyalong with the Mahagathbandhanpartners.

The party also plans to reachout to the electorate digitally sinceCovid-19 scare many prevent peo-ple from turning out in large num-bers at Congress rallies and otherpublic meetings.

The Congress is contesting 70seats, including 21 in the first phase.

Tickets for the first phase wereannounced Wednesday, leading toa lot of resentment among the un-successful aspirants. Muslim lead-ers felt upset in the first phase, noteven a single ticket has been givento minorities.

Congress workers are protest-

ing at the party headquarters inDelhi, alleging nepotism by sen-ior leaders. Some alleged that tick-ets were sold.

While the Congress leadershipwas dismissive of such protestsand allegations, it maintained thatthe party had a limited number ofseats in its quota and hence noteveryone could be given a ticket.Those who were left out will bedisenchanted, the leaders said.

The state will go to polls in threephases October 28, November 3and November 7. The counting ofvotes will take place November 10.

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

Hyderabad, Oct 9: With dozens ofbudget schools in Hyderabad ei-ther shutting down or on the vergeof closure under the impact of thepandemic, an uncertain futurehaunts hundreds of private schoolteachers.

Closure of small unaided schools,often referred to as budget schools,is the latest blow to the teachers, al-ready reeling under unprecedentedfinancial distress since March.

With no salaries or 40-50 per centpay for the last six months, privateschool teachers are among theworst affected by Covid inducedlockdown and its continuing impact.

Unable to pay rents for the build-ings and bear other expenses, dozensof budget schools have shut downover the last few weeks. When themanagements themselves are atcrossroads, the plight of teachersdrawing salaries ranging from Rs4,000 to Rs 15,000 can be well imag-ined.

While teachers of aided schoolsand the major ones with multiplebranches are somehow managingwith 40-50 per cent salaries, theircounterparts in budget schools arestruggling for even a square meal.

Some teachers, IANS spoke to,broke down while narrating theirwoes and pleading for some helpfrom the government. Most of themdid not want their identity or thatof their schools to be revealed forobvious reasons.

As the schools have not termi-

nated their services, they hope toget back to work once things re-turn to normal.

With her meagre salary of Rs15,000 at a private school, TehseenFatima (named changed on re-quest), a widow, was running thehouse, looking after her two chil-dren and aged parents. The pan-demic has shattered her life.

“I never sought help from any-body but for the first time I had nooption but to go and stand in aqueue for ration distributed by a phi-lanthropist,” she said in a voicechoked with emotions.

She, like other teachers at herschool, is getting a 40 per cent salarywhich is insufficient to meet the fam-ily's needs. She wants to offer herservices online for some other in-stitution but has no laptop. “Ifsomebody arranges a used laptop

it will be a big favour for us,” saidTehseen.

Still feeling reluctant to speakabout their problems, many aresuffering in silence. “There is no sup-port system from the governmentfor people like us. There is no onewhere we can speak about our is-sues,” lamented Narasing Nayak,a teacher at New St. Maria HighSchool, Falaknuma.

Shabana, a Telugu teacher at aprivate school in the old city ofHyderabad, has not received salarysince March. With 18 years of ex-perience in teaching, she used todraw a Rs 10,000 salary beforeCOVID broke out.

Living in a small rented house inYakutpura whose roof leaks everytime it rains, the family of six arefacing a really tough time. Her hus-band, an electrician at a function

hall, is also getting half salary forthe last six months.

"We have no money to pay themonthly rent and for electricity,water and other day to day expenses.We are struggling a lot and there isno help from any quarter," saidShabana, 38.

When she approached the schoolmanagement for salary, they ad-vised her to look for some otherjob.

"Most of the schools are budgetschools and teachers especially atprimary and middle school teach-ers are the worst sufferers. Theycome from lower middle class back-grounds. Whatever little aid theygot during lockdown has exhausted.We are now seeing the full impactof the distress," Asaid Dr MazherHussain, Executive Director ofConfederation of Voluntary

Associations (COVA), which ex-tended helping hand to teachersduring the lockdown.

Since the managements of budgetschools are facing a huge crisis,he said the government should in-tervene to provide some relief tothem by persuading owners of theschool buildings to slash the rents.

Stating that this is a problemwith multiple dimensions, Mazhercautioned that if it was not ad-dressed it could have disastrousconsequences for society. “The stu-dents at the budget schools are firstgeneration learners. Since theseschools charge a monthly fee rang-ing from Rs 300 to Rs 1,000 permonth, parents from lower mid-dle class had enrolled their chil-dren. If these children drop outand slip into child labour it willnot be possible to bring them backto schools,” he said.

With parents not paying the fee,the school managements are facinga tough time in paying rent, elec-tricity bill and meeting mainte-nance expenses not to speak aboutsalaries of the teachers.

Syed Aslam of MK High Schoolin Bandlaguda area told IANS thatthey are paying 60-70 per centsalaries to teachers taking onlineclasses for students of 6 to 10. “Only30 per cent of the students are at-tending online classes as manydon't have smart phones or Internetconnection at home. As our schoolis located in a slum area, we can'tforce parents to pay the fee,” he said.

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, Oct 9: The ElectionCommission Friday doubled thebroadcast time allotted to recog-nised political parties in Bihar onDoordarshan and All India Radioduring the upcoming state assem-bly polls in view of the COVID-19pandemic and the enhanced rele-vance of ‘non-contact based’ cam-paign.

Each recognised national andregional party will be given a basetime of 90 minutes. The facilitieswill be availablefrom the re-gional centre ofAll India RadioandDoordarshanand relayed byother stationswithin Bihar, itsaid.

The addi-tional time tobe allotted to aparty has beendecided on thebasis of its pollperformance inthe last Bihar Assembly election in2015.

“A base time of 90 minutes willbe given to each national party andrecognised state party of Biharuniformly on the regional kendrasof Doordarshan network and AllIndia Radio network in Bihar,” the

commission said.No party will be allocated more

than 30 minutes in a single broad-cast session.

The period of broadcast will bebetween the last date of filing nom-inations and two days before the dateof polling in Bihar.

“The Prasar Bharati Corporationin consultation with theCommission will decide the actualdate and time for broadcast andtelecast. This will be subject to thebroad technical constraints gov-erning the actual time of trans-

mission avail-able with theDoordarshanand All IndiaRadio,” thepoll panel said.

The partieswill be re-quired to sub-mit tran-scripts andrecordings inadvance.

“In additionto the broad-cast by parties,the Prasar

Bharati Corporation will organ-ise a maximum of four panel dis-cussions and/or debates on theKendra/Station of Doordarshan/AllIndia Radio. Each eligible partycan nominate one representative tosuch a programme,” the commis-sion said.

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

Hyderabad, Oct 9: The numberof Covid-19 positive cases continuedto decline in Telangana as the statereported less than 2,000 cases Friday.

The last 24 hours saw 1,891 newcases across the state. For a sec-ond consecutive day the daily countwas below 2,000 mark.

The fresh cases pushed the state'soverall tally to 2,08,535. Seven morepersons succumbed to the Covid-19,taking the cumulative death toll to1,208.

The fatality rate declined to 0.57per cent against the national aver-age of 1.5 per cent.

Officials said the percentage ofdeaths due to Covid-19 was 44.96while the remaining 55.04 had co-morbidities.

A total of 1,878 people recoveredduring the last 24 hours, ending 8p.m. Thursday.

With this the total number ofpeople recovered increased to1,80,953. The state's recovery ratejumped to 86.77 per cent while thenational average is 85.5 per cent.

The state now has 26,374 active

cases, including 21,801 who are inhome/institutional isolation.

Greater Hyderabad reported 285cases. The state capital continuedto register a daily count of lessthan 300.

Medchal Malkajgiri districtrecorded second highest numberof cases at 195 fol lowed byRangareddy (175), Nalgonda (128),Karimnagar (97), Warangal Urban

(76), Khammam (72) and Siddipet(64). During the last 24 hours, 53,086tests were conducted. With this thecumulative numbers have gone upto 34,49,925.

Seventeen government-run lab-oratories, 44 private laboratoriesand 1,076 Rapid Antigen test centresare conducting the tests.

According to a media bulletinfrom the office of the director of pub-

lic health and family welfare,out of 53,086 samples tested dur-ing the last 24 hours, 49,411 weretested in government-run labo-ratories and 3,675 in private. Ofthe total samples, 23,358 wereprimary and 6,370 were second-ary.

Samples tested per million pop-ulation ratio improved furtherto 92,690. The daily testing targetfor the state is 5,600 per day as perthe World Health Organisation(WHO) benchmark of 140 per mil-lion per day. Out of 2,08,535 totalpositive cases so far, 70 per cent(1,45,974) were asymptomaticwhile the remaining 30 per cent(62,561) were symptomatic.

The data also shows that 64.13per cent of those tested positiveare in the age group of 21-50 yearswhile 22.76 are above 51 years ofage. Those below 20 years are13.13 per cent.

The state has 62 government-run Covid hospitals, where 6,993out of total 8,848 beds are va-cant. A total 228 private hospitalstreating Covid patients have 9,220beds, of which 6,502 are vacant.

Will Nitish’s social engineering help NDA? Bihar CM makes a sagacious attempt to

consolidate his extremely backward castessupport base while trying to make a dent

into RJD’s Muslim-Yadav combine

Amid tickets rowin Bihar, Congress plans Rahul’s rallies

Congress workers are protesting at the party headquarters in Delhi, alleging nepotism by senior

leaders. Some alleged that tickets were sold

Telangana sees declining trend in fresh virus casesFace recognition tool reunitesboy with parents after 5 years

As budget schools shut, uncertain future haunts teachers

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

Hyderabad, Oct 9: TelanganaState police’s face recognition tool'Darpan' has helped reunite a miss-ing boy from Uttar Pradesh withhis parents after five years.

Som Soni, a resident of Handia

in Allahabad, missing since 2015,was traced at a child home inAssam. Swati Lakra, AdditionalDirector General of Police, womensafety, said the boy who was miss-ing since July 14, 2015 was foundat the Child Welfare Centre inAssam's Goalpara district. The

missing boy was found by Goalparapolice July 23, 2015 and was sent tothe Child Welfare Centre.

“Telangana state police, whileusing the face recognition toolDarpan to match missing chil-dren's photographs with those ofchildren found at various childhomes across the country detectedthe said boy by matching his pho-tos,” she said.

The Telangana police immedi-ately informed the concernedStation House Officer of Handia po-lice station, Allahabad, who inturn informed the parents of themissing child. They rushed to theChild Welfare Centre and identifiedtheir kid. The police official saidthe Telangana State police playeda big role in reuniting the missingchild with their parents after fiveyears.Efforts are on to trace asmany missing children acrossIndia through ‘Darpan’ so as torestore them to their family, sheadded.

WITH NO SALARIES OR 40-50 PER CENT PAY FOR THE LAST SIX MONTHS, PRIVATE SCHOOL TEACHERSARE AMONG THE WORST AFFECTED BY COVID INDUCED LOCKDOWN AND ITS CONTINUING IMPACT

LATEST BLOWClosure of small unaidedschools, often referred to asbudget schools, is the latestblow to the teachers, alreadyreeling under unprecedentedfinancial distress since March

In a society where teaching isconsidered a noble professionand teachers are treated withrespect, the pandemic hasforced many to seek help fromNGOs and philanthropists

Some have been forced to do petty works like sellingfruits and vegetables to meet both ends

What is DARPAN

EC doubles broadcast timeallotted to parties in Bihar

Each recognised national and regional partywill be given a base time of 90 minutes

DARPAN, the face recognition software,developed by Telangana police, maintains

a database of children and persons lodged at various rescue homes across

the country

Telangana police, using the face recognition tool to match photographsof missing children with those of children found at various child homesacross the country, detected the boy bymatching his photos

P8

nationalSATURDAY | OCTOBER 10 | 2020 | BHUBANESWAR

The Congressleaders whohave become

new Maharajas(royals) are makingallegations aboutland which is withmy family for 300 years. If it iswrong to be born into such a family,then I admit my mistake

JYOTIRADITYA SCINDIA | BJP MP

of theday uote

The AAPgovernment istaking the

lead in fight againstair pollution inDelhi-NCR, but theneighbouring statesare still not serious about the issuedespite it becoming moredangerous due to the COVID-19pandemic

GOPAL RAI | DELHI ENVIRONMENT MINISTER

Paid tributesto our seniorUnion Minister

Shri Ram VilasPaswan ji. Paswan jiwill always beremembered as aperson with gentle behaviour andfor his work related to publicwelfare. May the grace of God be onhim and may his family have thestrength to bear this loss

AMIT SHAH | UNION HOME MINISTER

The realdanger to

India isn't that our PMdoesn't understand.It's the fact thatnobody around himhas the guts to tell himRAHUL GANDHI | CONGRESS LEADER

The Uttar Pradesh tourism departmentis preparing to give a betterexperience to tourists in Varanasiduring the pandemic. All the venueswhere entry is allowed only afterpurchasing their tickets, will now beaccessed with just a single ticket

BOOSTING TOURISM

Couple held Pune: A married couple wasarrested for allegedlyabandoning their infant sonnear a church in Khadakiarea of Maharashtra's Punecity, police said Friday. Athree to four-month-old boywas found wrapped in ashawl by some morningwalkers on Tuesday,following which the policewere informed and a casewas registered, an officialfrom Khadaki police stationsaid.

Man arrestedPalghar: A man was arrestedfor allegedly raping a 12-yearold girl in Mokhada area ofPalghar district, police saidFriday. The 30-year-old man,identified as contractorDeoram Bhoye, onWednesday entered thelatter's house in Talyachiwadiwhen she was alone andraped her, said an official.

Two killedNew Delhi: The driver and hishelper were killed in Delhiearly Friday in a fatalaccident when their truckcarrying iron rods rammedinto a furniture factory. "Thedriver Arif Ali and the helperMumtaz Ali succumbed totheir injuries in the accident.Both were residents of Hapurin Uttar Pradesh," said R.P.Meena, DCP South East Delhi.According to police the truckwas coming from AnandmaiMarg after it left Okhlaindustrial area at around 4a.m. and was headed to awarehouse in Haryana'sPalwal.

Worker dies Panaji: One worker died andanother was taken ill whenammonia gas leaked at afood processing plant in anindustrial estate in South Goaon Friday, police said. Thegas leak, which has sincebeen stopped, was reportedat the Quality Foods plant inCuncolim Industrial Estate inthe early hours of Friday.

406 water bodiesrevived in UPJhansi (Uttar Pradesh): As apart of the 'One Village OnePond' initiative, Jhansi districtin Uttar Pradesh has revived406 ponds in the past fourmonths. The initiative hasalso provided employment toabout 11,000 migrant workerswho had returned to theirvillages during the pandemic.According to official sources,there are 496 villagePanchayats in Jhansi and thework on the remaining 90ponds is still going on.

SHORT TAKES

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INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

Lucknow, Oct 9: The beleagueredBahujan Samaj Party (BSP) has de-cided to reach out to the Brahmincommunity in Uttar Pradesh tomake up for the party's shrinkingelectoral base.

BSP president Mayawati hasasked senior party leaders to launcha "Brahmin Jodo" campaign from'Navratri' this month. The party isholding meetings at all district lev-els with five top party leaders inevery district working out the modal-ities of the campaign.

Brahmin leaders in the BSP have

been asked to lead the campaign, ir-respective of their seniority in theparty. The party general secretarySatish Chandra Mishra is manag-ing the campaign at the state level.He has already held meetings withdistrict leaders from all 75 districtsof the state. In eastern Uttar Pradesh,the BSP plans to project formerminister Ranganath Mishra andBhishm Shankar Tiwari as theBrahmin leaders while central UttarPradesh, the responsibility will begiven to BSP MP Ritesh Pandey,former ministers Antu Mishra andNakul Dubey.

The party is frantically looking

for a Brahmin face in western UttarPradesh since one of its senior mostleaders, Ramvir Upadhyay hasmoved towards the BJP. A senior BSP

leader said, "Behenji (Mayawati)wants to repeat the 2007 experimentwhen Dalits and Brahmins joinedhands to usher in the party's first ma-jority government.

"We are reaching out to Brahminswho are decidedly upset with theBJP after the Vikas Dubey en-counter. We plan to assuage thefeelings of the community andbring them into the BSP fold."Meanwhile, for the first time,Mayawati will be addressing virtualrallies to connect with Brahmins inevery district. She will also con-nect with the Muslim leaders in asimilar manner.

REACHING OUT

Mayawati wooing Brahmins in a big way

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Jaipur, Oct 9: A priest died afterbeing set on fire allegedly by five peo-ple who wanted to encroach on tem-ple land in Rajasthan's Karauli dis-trict, police said Friday.

Chief Minister Ashok Gehlotcondemned the incident and said thatthe main accused has been arrested,while the opposition BJP attackedthe government saying the law andorder has deteriorated and peopleare under fear in the state.

The incident occur red onWednesday in Bukna village wherefive accused caught the priest BabuLal Vaishnav near an agriculturefarm and set him on fire after pour-ing petrol on him. He was admit-ted in a crucial condition to SMS hos-pital in Jaipur where he died onThursday night.

"The main accused, KailashMeena, has been arrested, whileanother accused was rounded up,"Superintendent of Police, Karauli,Mridul Kachhawa, said. The SPsaid a case of attempt to murder wasregistered at Sapotra police stationand it was converted into a murdercase after the death of the priest.

The accused wanted to encroachupon the land of the temple, the po-lice said. Deputy Superintendent ofPolice Kaila Devi, Mahaveer Prasad,

said that the body was handed overto family members on Friday. Thechief minister termed the incidentextremely unfortunate and con-demnable, and said the guilty wouldnot be spared."The Rajasthan gov-ernment is with the grieving fam-ily. The main accused in the incidenthas been arrested and action is beingtaken. The guilty will not be spared,"Gehlot tweeted in Hindi.

Such acts have no place in acivilised society, he said. BJP lead-ers in New Delhi, including Unionminister Prakash Javadekar, citedthe ghastly murder to attack theCongress over the recent crimes, in-cluding rapes, in the western state.

Taking a swipe at Congress leader

Rahul Gandhi, Javadekar said,"Instead of going to different placeson political tourism, he should takecognizance of heinous crimesagainst women and apologise tothe people of Rajasthan that theirgovernment has failed." Actionshould be taken against the cul-prits, he said. "Law and order inRajasthan has gone for a toss," theminister alleged referring to theKarauli incident.

The BJP leaders in the statecharged that the law and order sit-uation has worsened in the stateunder Congress rule. "There is nofear of law among criminals whoare roaming freely under Congressrule. People are living in fear while

criminals have no fear. This is thesituation when the chief ministerhimself is holding the home port-folio," BJP state president SatishPoonia told reporters.

Poonia also formed a three-mem-ber committee which will visitSapotra. "The fact-finding commit-tee comprises Jaipur MP RamcharanBohra, party's national secretaryand former MLA Alka Gurjar andformer state president of BhartiyaJanta Yuva Morcha Jitendra Meena.The committee will visit Sapotraand submit a report to the statepresident," BJP spokesperson andMLA Ramlal Sharma said.

Condemning the incident, formerchief minister Vasundhara Rajesaid in a statement that the waythe crime graph is rising in thestate, it is clear that no woman,child, elderly person or Dalit is safein the state.

"The Congress government of thestate should now wake up from slum-ber and get the family justice bystrictly punishing the culprits," shesaid. Rajasthan Congress chiefGovind Singh Dotasra said the po-lice have already caught the main ac-cused. Vaishnav's family membershave demanded action against theSHO, investigation by a deputy SPrank official, compensation and gov-ernment job for a family member.

Priest burnt alive over land disputeRAJASTHAN CHIEF MINISTER ASHOK GEHLOT CONDEMNED THE INCIDENT AND SAID THAT THE

MAIN ACCUSED HAS BEEN ARRESTED, WHILE THE OPPOSITION BJP ATTACKED THE GOVERNMENTSAYING THE LAW AND ORDER HAS DETERIORATED AND PEOPLE ARE UNDER FEAR IN THE STATE

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Mumbai, Oct 9: The NationalInvestigation Agency (NIA) Fridayfiled a chargesheet against eight peo-ple, including activists GautamNavlakha and 82-year-old FatherStan Swamy, for their alleged in-volvement in inciting a mob to vi-olence in Bhima Koregaon nearPune on January 1, 2018, officialssaid. Swamy, who said he has neverbeen to Bhima Koregaon, was ar-rested from his home in Ranchion Thursday evening and broughtto Mumbai where he was producedbefore a court Friday and remandedto judicial custody till October 23.

He is possibly the oldest personto be charged under the UnlawfulActivities (Prevention) Act (UAPA),officials said. Barring one person– Milind Teltumde who is ab-sconding – all other named in thecharge-sheet for allegedly con-spiring against the governmentare in judicial custody. NIAspokesperson and Deputy InspectorGeneral of Police in the agencySonia Narang said the charge-sheetwas submitted before a designatedcourt here.

Besides Navlakha and Swamy,the others named in thechargesheet are Delhi Universityassociate professor Hany Babu,Goa Institute of Management pro-fessor Anand Teltumbde, and JyotiJagtap, Sagar Gorkhe and RameshGaichor, activists of the BhimaKoregaon Shaurya Din Prerna

Abhiyaan group. They were arrested during the

course of the investigation into theviolence on January 1, 2018 in whichone person was killed and several in-jured after clashes at the 200th an-niversary celebrations of the Battleof Koregaon near Pune. Navlakhaand Teltumbde had surrenderedbefore the NIA in April this year.

The NIA chargesheet againstthe eight does not mention humanrights activist Sudha Bharadwaj,who has been in jail since 2018.She was arrested by Pune Police inthe case along with Ver nonGonsalves and Arun Ferreira inAugust 2018. Swamy's lawyer SharifShaikh said his client was pro-duced physically before the court."The NIA did not seek his custody.He is aged. We will peruse the pa-pers and file for a bail," he said.

The NIA chargesheetagainst the eight doesnot mention humanrights activist SudhaBharadwaj, who hasbeen in jail since 2018

Bhima Koregaon case:NIA files chargesheet

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Ahmedabad, Oct 9: The pompand grandeur associated withNavratri in Gujarat will be largelymissing this year as the state gov-ernment Friday banned organi-sation of any 'garba' event duringthe upcoming festival due to thecoronavirus pandemic.

The government said it willnot allow any type of garba eventin the state during Navratri, start-ing from October 17, and also re-leased a set of guidelines for thefestive season, which usually seeslarge gatherings, a fertile groundfor COVID-19 spread.

For the upcoming festivals, theBJP government released stan-dard operating procedures (SOPs)which stress on COVID-19-ap-propriate behaviour by citizensto curb the infection. No big,medium or small scale garbaevent will be allowed in the stateduring the nine-day festival, thegovernment said.

Garba is a popular folk danceof Gujarat and is performed withpassion and fervour during theNavratri festival. The govern-ment, however, will allow col-lective prayers to Goddess Durgawhere number of people shouldnot be more than 200, it said ina release. The time limit ofprayers will be of one hour, butnobody can perform garba atsuch gatherings, it said. Priorpermission of government au-thorities has been made manda-

tory for organisation of com-munity prayer programmes dur-ing Navratri.

At prayer gatherings, COVID-19-related norms such as social dis-tancing, covering of face withmasks and use of sanitisers willbe mandatory, the release said. Thegovernment said citizens above65, children below 10 years, preg-nant women and people with co-morbidities should avoid partic-ipating in any public programmeduring the festivals.

Navratri is one of the mostpopular festivals of Gujarat andis called the longest dance festi-val of the world. Revellers danceto the tune of traditional musicand songs for nine nights. The gov-ernment said event such as burn-ing of effigies of Ravana, Ramlilayatras, rallies, melas (congrega-tions), exhibitions would not beallowed during the festive sea-son (from Navratri to Diwali).

It advised people to celebratefestivals like Dussehra, Durgapuja, Diwali, Gujarati New Year,Bhai dooj and Sharad Poornimaat their homes with their families.In the SOPs, the government saidup to 100 people can attend func-tions such as marriage and thesame number will be allowed atfunerals. During any event, theorganisers will have to do floormarking with minimum distanceof 6 feet, it said. Thermal scannersare compulsory at Navratri com-munity prayers and other events,the release said.

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

Ranchi, Oct 9:Former Bihar ChiefMinister Lalu Prasad was Fridaygranted bail in a fodder scam case,but the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD)President will remain in jail forhis involvement in other cases.

The Jharkhand High CourtFriday granted bail to Lalu Prasadin the Chaibasa treasury fraudcase. Justice Apresh Singh grantedhim bail on the ground of spend-ing half of his jail term in theChaibasa case. He was awarded fiveyears' jail term in the case.

Lalu Prasad has been convictedin four fodder scam cases. In 2013,he was convicted in the first case.He was convicted in three othercases of fodder scam in 2017 and2018. During the last hearing onSeptember 11, the CBI had op-posed the bail plea of Lalu Prasadon the ground that he didn't com-plete 30 months (half the sentence)in jail. The ex-Bihar CM had con-tended that he had completed 29months in jail, which was almosthalf of his jail term of five years.

Though the veteran leader has gotbail in two cases, he will remain injail for his involvement in the Dumkatreasury fraud case, in which hehas been awarded two consequentseven-year jail terms. At present,Lalu Prasad is staying at the KellyBunglow designated for the Directorof the Rajendra Institute of MedicalScience (RIMS) in Ranchi.

After his conviction in four fod-der scam cases, Lalu Prasad wasstaying at the paying ward of RIMS,instead of the Birsa Munda centraljail on health grounds. He wasshifted to the RIMS Director's bun-galow due to coronavirus fear. TheRJD chief has been in RIMS forover two years now. The BJP hadquestioned the move to shift himto the Kelly Bunglow. In a sepa-rate case, the high court has soughtexplanation from the jail admin-istration for shifting Lalu Prasadto the RIMS Director's residence.

LALU GETS BAIL, BUTWILL STAY IN JAIL

Newly-recruited Punjab police personnel jubilate after taking oath during Passing Out Parade in Jalandhar, Friday

ON CLOUD NINE

PTI PHOTO

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

New Delhi, Oct 9: The SupremeCourt Friday issued notice to theNational Commission of Protectionof Child Rights (NCPCR) on thecondition of children in protection,juvenile and kinship homes inthe country in the backdrop ofCovid-19.

A bench of Justices L NageswaraRao, Hemant Gupta and AjayRastogi sought response from theNCPCR, while taking suo motocognisance of the letter, issued bythe child rights body, which di-rected eight states, having 70 percent of children in care homes, tofacilitate restoration of childrento their families. The bench hasslated the matter for further hear-ing on October 24. During thehearing, the bench noted that a gen-eral direction would not be suffi-cient in the matter, in the backdropof multiple aspects.

Covid effect: Top court seeks NCPCR response

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Mumbai, Oct 9: Marathi writerShobha Deshpande staged nearlya 20-hour protest here after a city-based jeweller allegedly refused tospeak in Marathi and asked herto leave his shop where she hadgone to make a purchase.

The jeweller Friday apologisedto the veteran writer, who hadstaged the protest overnight on thefootpath outside his shop sinceThursday.

Deshpande was later taken to ahospital for a medical check-up bythe police.

The Raj Thackeray-ledMaharashtra Navnirman Sena(MNS) backed the protest byDeshpande and warned the jew-eller, Shankarlal Jain, that he willnot be able to open his shop till helearns Marathi. MNS workers alsoallegedly slapped Jain.

Deshpande said she had gone tothe jewellery shop in Colaba, southMumbai, to buy earrings.

During their conversation, the au-thor insisted that Jain speak toher in Marathi.

His shop is in the capital ofMaharashtra whose language isMarathi and he must know how tospeak Marathi.

“He said he cannot speakMarathi. I was speaking in Marathiand he did not. "Since I did notspeak in Hindi, he refused to sellme the earrings. He arrogantlyasked me to leave the place,Deshpande alleged.

The writer said she demandedthat the jeweller show the licencerequired to run the shop, but he re-fused.

“When I called the police, theytoo took the jeweller’s side. ThenI staged the protest,” Deshpandealleged. Jain on Friday morn-ing apologised to the writer, whostaged dharna for nearly 20 hoursbefore being taken to the hospi-tal.

Meanwhile, the MNS workers,who had arrived at the spot to ex-press solidarity with Deshpande,were seen slapping the jeweller ashe apologised to the writer.

“We were here to support thewriter. We taught the jeweller alesson for being arrogant. We havemade him apologise. He will not beable to open shop until he learnsMarathi, MNS leader SandeepDeshpande said.

Writer fumes asjeweller refuses tospeak in Marathi

No garba in Covid times

The jeweller Friday apologised to the veteran writer, who had staged the protestovernight on the footpath outside hisshop since Thursday.Deshpande was latertaken to a hospital for amedical check-up by the police

Officials mustdevelop

industrial areas atsub-division levels toexpand the scope ofinvestment in thestate. Thedevelopment of industrial areas at thesub-division level will encourage moreand more entrepreneurs to invest

ASHOK GEHLOT | RAJASTHAN CM

P9

nationalSATURDAY | OCTOBER 10 | 2020 | BHUBANESWAR

Starting nextweek the state

government will rope inAYUSH doctors inproviding treatment toCOVID-19 patients withmild to moderatesymptomsPRAMOD SAWANT | GOA CM

Minor earthquakes shook Manipurand Arunachal Pradesh Friday,causing panic among people thoughno loss of life or property has beenreported so far, officials said

MINOR QUAKES HIT MANIPUR, ARUNACHAL

yy

cmyk

cmyk

Pleased tomeet ChairmanHCNR

@DrabdullahCE. Agood discussion onour bilateralcooperation andregional issues. Welcomed hisinsights and perspectives on recentdevelopments. As a neighbour, Indiaremains committed to peace,prosperity and stability in Afghanistan

S JAISHANKAR | EXTERNAL AFFAIRS MINISTER

of theday uote

Tiger kills farmer Lakhimpur Kheri (UP): A 65-year-old farmer was attackedand killed by a tiger inManjhara Purab forests underthe north Nighasan forest areaof Dudhwa buffer zone,officials said Friday. Thepartially eaten-up body ofPyare Lal was recovered onFriday from inside the densejungles. This is the secondsuccessive attack by a big catin Manjhara Purab forests. OnSunday, farmer Gyan Singh, 65,was killed by a tiger in similarcircumstances when heventured into the forests tobring back his cattle.

Two cops injured Thane: Two policemen,including a junior officer, wereinjured in an attack Fridaymorning by a murder convictwho was hiding in a forestafter jumping parole here inMaharashtra, an official said.The injured personnel weremembers of the Crime BranchUnit-I of the Thane police andhad gone to nab the murderconvict, Navnath Gangurde(34), who attacked them with achopper (a sharp-edgedweapon), senior inspector NitinThackeray said.

Four arrested Jabalpur: Four persons, includingtwo women, were arrested herein Madhya Pradesh for allegedlykidnapping a four-month-oldtribal boy and trying to sell himin Mumbai, police said Friday.The accused included a coupleand an aunt of the infant, whohas been rescued, districtsuperintendent of police SBahuguna said. The accusedwere identified by the police asRampyari Bai Barkade (40), theaunt of the boy, Sanjay Pandey(44) his wife Sharda (42) andRanu Sharma (36), a residenton Madhya Pradesh’sNarsinghpur district.

SHORT TAKES

HERE I GO

A participant shows his skills during a water sports event organised by Jammu and Kashmir Police at Dal Lake in Srinagar, Friday PTI PHOTO

HAL employee held for leakingsecrets to ISI

The HAL staffer has been accused of supplyingconfidential and sensitive information about Indianfighter aircraft and the manufacturing facilities inNashik, said Additional DGP (ATS), Deven Bharti

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

Nashik/Mumbai, Oct 9: In amajor swoop, the MaharashtraAnti-Terrorism Squad(Nashikunit) has arrested an employeeof the high-security HindustanAeronautics Limited (HAL) onalleged charges of spying for aforeign agency, top officials saidhere Friday.

The HAL staffer -- whose iden-tity has not been revealed -- hasbeen accused of supplying confi-dential and sensitive informationabout Indian fighter aircraft andthe manufacturing facilities inNashik, said Additional DGP(ATS), Deven Bharti.

Following a tip-off on his sus-picious activities, the employee -- working with HAL's critical air-craft manufacturing division inNashik -- was under the radar ofmultiple agencies, including theNashik Police, ATS and MilitaryIntelligence for the past severaldays, and was finally nabbedaround three days ago, said offi-cials.

Sustained interrogation of theaccused revealed that he was inregular contact with some mem-bers of Pakistan's Inter-ServicesIntelligence (ISI) and was pass-ing on secret and sensitive detailsand information about the HALmanufacturing unit at Ozar, theIndian Air Force airbase in Nashik,and the prohibited areas within theunit.

Among other things, the sleuthslearnt that he was allegedly pass-ing on documents, photographs,maps with longitude-latitude mark-ings of defence-related facilitiesin Nashik, via WhatsApp andother modes of communication.

"An offence under Sections 3, 4and 5 of the Official Secrets Act,1923 has been registered againstthe accused. We have seized threemobile handsets with five SIMcards and two memory cards,which have been sent for forensicexamination," Bharti said.

The accused was produced be-fore a special ATS court in Nashik,which remanded him to 10 days'police custody, said ATS DIG JayantNaiknavre. Further investigationinto the entire racket to unearththe possibility of others' involve-ment is presently underway.

"As the investigation is on, wehave no comments to offer," saidHAL spokesperson Gopal Sutar.Located around 200 km north ofMumbai, the HAL AircraftManufacturing Division is en-gaged in the production of dif-ferent variants of the MiG andSukhoi fighter aircraft.

The facility is the mainstay forRussian-origin aircraft in termsof life extension, modification,site repair and investigation. Italso exports spares to Russia,Poland, Algeria, Malaysia,Vietnam, Syria and Egypt.

Security of Hathras victim’s kintightenedPRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Hathras (UP), Oct 9: Sixty secu-rity personnel have been deployedand eight closed circuit television(CCTV) cameras installed at thehouse of a Dalit woman, who wasallegedly gangraped and killed, inher village in Bulgarhi area here toensure the safety of her familymembers, police said Friday.

DIG Shalabh Mathur, who hasbeen sent to Hathras from Lucknowas a nodal officer, said that if neededa control room will also be estab-lished there. "Sixty personnel, in-cluding women, have been deployedon 12 hours shifts for the securityof the victim's family. A gazetted of-ficer will also be deployed to mon-itor these personnel. With the helpof CCTV cameras, the house of thevictim will be monitored round-

the-clock," he said. HathrasSuperintendent of Police (SP) VineetJaiswal said that a register of vis-itors is being maintained by po-licemen at the entry of the house.

Two security personnel havebeen provided to each family mem-ber and witness for their personalsecurity, he said, adding that a teamof fire department and two local in-telligence unit personnel are alsodeployed there. "At the main gateof the house, a metal detector has

been installed and quick responseteams are also in place. With the helpof eight CCTV cameras, security isbeing ensured," the SP said.

The 19-year-old Dalit woman wasallegedly gangraped on September14 following which she was admit-ted to the J N Medical CollegeHospital in Aligarh with serious in-juries. She was referred to Delhi'sSafdarjung Hospital on September28 after her condition showed nosigns of improvement.

Bengal couple sellsbaby for `4,000INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

Kolkata, Oct 9: Parents of aneight-months-old girl child soldher off for just `4,000 in WestBengal's Midnapore district dueto severe monetary crisis amidthe continuing pandemic thathit the nation eight months back,police said.

Police said preliminary in-vestigation suggested that thefamily was dealing with acutepoverty during the Covid-19 out-break that started livelihood op-portunity crisis with repeatedlockdowns since March.

During the interrogation theparents admitted that it becamereally difficult for them to makeboth ends meet owing to almostno-income. The incident was re-ported from Harijon Pally area inthe district. Police said later theuncle of the infant somehow man-aged ̀ 4,000 and got her back homeon Thursday from the person shewas sold to. He handed over thebaby to the officials of state childwelfare department. Active cases dip below

9L, recoveries cross 59LPRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, Oct 9: India's COVID-19 tally of cases went past 69 lakhwith 70,496 infections being re-ported in a day, while active casesof infection fell below 9 lakh aftera month, according to the UnionHealth Ministry data updated Friday.

The total coronavirus casesmounted to 69,06,151. The death tollclimbed to 1,06,490 with 964 peoplesuccumbing to the disease in a spanof 24 hours, the data updated at 8 amshowed. The total recoveries havesurged to 59,06,069 pushing the re-covery rate to 85.52 per cent, whilethere are 8,93,592 active cases ofcoronavirus infection in the coun-try which comprises 12.94 per centof the total caseload, the data stated.

The COVID-19 case fatality ratedue to the coronavirus infectionwas recorded at 1.54 per cent. India'sCOVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7, 30 lakh onAugust 23 and 40 lakh on September

5. It went past 50 lakh on September16 and crossed 60 lakh on September28. According to the ICMR, a cu-mulative total of 8,46,34,680 sampleshave been tested up to October 8with 11,68,705 samples being testedon Thursday. The 964 new fatalitiesinclude 358 from Maharashtra, 101from Karnataka, 68 Tamil Nadu, 63from West Bengal, 45 from UttarPradesh, 42 Andhra Pradesh and 37from Delhi.

A total of 1,06,490 deaths havebeen reported so far in the countryincludes 39,430 from Maharashtrafollowed by 10,052 from Tamil Nadu,9,675 from Karnataka, 6,245 fromUttar Pradesh, 6,128 from AndhraPradesh, 5,653 from Delhi, 5,439from West Bengal, 3,741 from Punjaband 3,538 from Gujarat. The healthministry stressed that more than70 per cent of the deaths occurreddue to comorbidities. "Our figuresare being reconciled with the IndianCouncil of Medical Research," theministry said on its website.

THE SHOW MUST GO ON

THEATRE ADAPTS TO STRANGE TIMESPRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, Oct 9: The longing forhis sick mother waiting at homein Guwahati tugged at Raju Roy'sheart but the call of the stage, whichwas also the only way he could payfor her medicines, held him back.

After seven long months awayfrom stage, Roy had managed tograb the lead role in “PehlaSatyagrahi”, the National School ofDrama's first theatrical productionsince the lockdown was announcedin March and the actor just could-n't give it up. “I was hungry for thestage. I was hungry to get a role inanything and then suddenly I got thisopportunity,” Roy said.

Being back on stage was the elixirhe had been waiting for. Yes, it was

a very different experience – forthe audience and the cast – but thenif this what the times called for hewas up for it. Temperature checksto enter the campus, segregatedseating for the strictly limited num-ber of people allowed and manda-tory face masks made for an un-conventional theatre experience.

“It was unusual, but theatre pre-pares us for the unusual,” Roy said.Earlier this month, the Central gov-ernment further eased restrictionsunder its unlock guidelines and al-lowed live performances at opentheatre facilities with strict dos anddon'ts. NSD made its ‘debut' in theCOVID era with ‘Pehla Satyagrahi”

being staged at the campus lawns forthree days beginning October 2 tocommemorate Mahatma Gandhi's151st birth anniversary. It was alsothe among the first plays to be stagedin the new normal.

Live theatre is considered a su-perior form of acting because thereaction of the audience is instantlydelivered to the actors on stage andthere are no repeats. Be it a collec-tive sigh or a few smiling faces, theactors can read the audience andmeasure their response.

“Yes, it felt a bit strange to notget that reaction from the audiencethat we are used to,” said Roy buthe soon adapted. “For theatre actorsthe number of people shouldn'tmatter. I have once acted in front oftwo people,” he added.

Megha Kumari, one of those whowatched “Pehla Satyagrahi”, found“something lacking” because shecouldn't sit next to her friends.“Even though you are not supposedto talk during a show, a quick glanceor a quiet nudge delivers the mes-sage to your friend. I think being ableto communicate with your friendjust adds to the entire experience ofa play, even if it's non-verbal,” saidthe college student who sat six feetaway from her friends.

The National School of Drama,India's premier theatre institute,has plans to stage plays every al-ternate weekend at its campus, di-rector-in-charge Suresh Sharma.Adjusting to the changing times isthe only way theatre can return tothe people.

Goyal gets additional chargeof Consumer Affairs MinistryINDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

New Delhi, Oct 9: A day after thedemise of Union Minister RamVilas Paswan, President Ram NathKovind has given the additionalcharge of Ministry of ConsumerAf fairs, Food and PublicDistribution to Railway MinisterPiyush Goyal.

"The President of India, as ad-vised by the Prime Minister, has di-rected that Piyush Goyal, CabinetMinister, be assigned the charge ofthe Ministry of Consumer Affairs,Food and Public Distribution, in ad-dition to his existing portfolios," saida communique from the President'soffice.

Earlier, the Union Cabinet metand condoled the demise of Paswan,and also observed silence for twominutes in memory of the late

leader. The Cabinet approved a statefuneral for Paswan and passed thefollowing resolution: "The Cabinetexpresses profound sorrow overthe sad demise of Ram Vilas Paswan,Union Minister for ConsumerAf fairs, Food and PublicDistribution. In his passing away,the nation has lost an eminentleader, a distinguished parliamen-tarian and an able administrator."

Virus can survive on skin for 9 hrs: StudyPRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, Oct 9: The SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19, may linger on human skin fornine hours, much longer than theflu viruses can, according to astudy.

The influenza A virus (IAV), incontrast, remained viable onhuman skin for nearly two hours,said the researchers includingthose from Kyoto PrefecturalUniversity of Medicine in Japan.

The study, published in the jour-nal Clinical Infectious Diseases,found that both the viruses wererapidly inactivated on skin witha hand sanitiser. The finding un-derscores the importance of handwashing or using a sanitiser toprevent the spread of COVID-19.

The researchers noted that thestability of SARS-CoV-2 on humanskin remains unknown, consideringthe hazards of viral exposure to hu-mans. "We generated a model that al-lows the safe reproduction of clin-

ical studies on the application ofpathogens to human skin and elu-cidated the stability of SARS-CoV-2 on the human skin," the researcherswrote in the journal.

They evaluated the stability ofSARS-CoV-2 and IAV, mixed withculture medium or upper respi-ratory mucus, on human skin sur-faces. The researchers also eval-uated the disinfection effectiveness

on skin of 80 per cent ethanolagainst SARS-CoV-2 and IAV.

The study found that SARS-CoV-2 and IAV were inactivatedmore rapidly on skin surfacesthan on other surfaces such asstainless steel, glass and plastic. Thesurvival time was significantlylonger -- 9 hours -- for SARS-CoV-2 than for IAV (1.82 hours), ac-cording to the researchers.

Instead ofgoing todifferent

places on politicaltourism, RahulGandhi should takecognizance ofheinous crimes against women andapologise to the people of Rajasthanthat their government has failed

PRAKASH JAVADEKAR | UNION MINISTER

KANPUR GIRLFOUND DEADINDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

New Delhi, Oct 9: In a mysteri-ous case that is giving headachesto the Delhi Police, a 25-year-old girlwent missing from Delhi 'sKashmere Gate on Sunday morn-ing after she accompanied hermother to the Capital on a tripfrom her hometown Kanpur.

Two days later, she was foundhanging from a tree in a forest inHimachal Pradesh's Solan dis-trict. According to the police,Mansi told her family she had toappear in a competitive exam inNew Delhi on Sunday and hencecame to Delhi along with her home-maker mother.

However, leaving her motheralone, the girl went to check herexamination centre at Mori Gatebut never returned. An FIR in thiscontext was lodged at the KashmereGate police station.

REP

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ENTA

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E IM

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P10SATURDAY | OCTOBER 10 | 2020 | BHUBANESWAR

internationalIf theinfections in

the Kathmandu valley continue to increase atthis rate, hospitals willnot beable to supportthe burden JAGESHWAR GAUTAM | NEPALHEALTH MINISTRY SPOKESMAN

Prince Harry and his wifeMeghan are joining activistMalala Yousafzai in a videochat about the challenges girlsface in accessing educationamid the coronavirus pandemic

PRINCE HARRY, MEGHAN TEAM UP WITH MALALA

cmyk

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The tests, andthe reasonwe're

increasing tests, iswe're testing twouniverses--thenormal statewidetesting, which is what we've beendoing, and then testing just in thehot spot ZIP codes

ANDREW CUOMO | NEW YORK GOVERNOR

of theday uote

We aremovingtowards a

truce soon even ifthe situation(Nagorno-Karabakhconflict) is still fragile

EMMANUEL MACRON | FRENCH PRESIDENT

Brexitnegotiationsthis week

have made progressin some areas butdifferences remainon important issues

DOMINIC RAAB | BRITISH POLITICIAN

‘Death sentencefor rape’Dhaka: The Bangladeshgovernment has planned tointroduce capital punishmentin rape cases as protestshave erupted across thecountry over the recentincidents of sexual violenceagainst women. Law MinisterAnisul Huq told bdnews24Thursday that a proposal forthe legal amendment will beplaced at a cabinet meetingOctober 12.

Honour killing in Pakistan Lahore: In a suspected caseof honour killing, a 17-year-old girl was shot deadallegedly by his brother aftershe eloped with a boy in avillage in Pakistan's Punjabprovince. The girl was in lovewith a boy from her village inSattukatla, a low-incomethickly populated area, andrecently she eloped with him.

Nirav’s remandextended London: Fugitive diamondmerchant Nirav Modi wasFriday further remanded incustody during a routine call-over hearing held via videolinkat Westminster Magistrates'Court in London. At the nexthearing, the court will bepresented with arguments todetermine the admissibilityof the evidence provided bythe Indian authorities.

N Korea plans for military parade Seoul: North Koreans wearingmedical masks havegathered in the capital ofPyongyang, state mediareported this week, ahead ofwhat is expected to be a bigmilitary parade Saturday,possibly featuring thecountry’s latest ballisticmissiles. The holiday marksthe 75th anniversary of thefounding of the rulingWorkers’ Party of Korea.

Delta to hitLouisianaWashington: Hurricane Delta,which has now strengthenedinto a Category 3 storm, wasgrowing more powerful andthreatening to hit the USstate of Louisiana Friday,prompting mass evacuations,according to officials. "It isvery clear that SouthwestLouisiana is going to getmore of a punch from thisthan we would like to see, forsure, because we're stilltrying to recover fromHurricane Laura," CBS Newsquoted Governor John BelEdwards as saying in astatement Thursday. Headded that President DonaldTrump has approved thestate's request for a federalemergency declaration.

SHORT TAKES

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

Geneva, Switzerland, Oct 9: Morethan 2.7 million migrants whowished to return home have beenstranded abroad because of re-strictions put in place to fight thecoronavirus pandemic, the UnitedNations said Friday.

The world needs to urgently stepup cooperation to allow people to return in a safe manner despite thecoronavirus constraints, said theUN's International Organisationfor Migration.

The IOM warned in a report thatborder closures and travel banshad left large numbers of migrantsstranded.

It defined stranded migrants aspeople outside their country of ha-bitual residence who wanted to re-

turn home but were being preventedby restrictions related to the pandemic. IOM chief AntonioVitorino urged countries to do morefor the roughly 2.75 million peoplestuck in limbo.

"The scope and subsequent en-forcement of tens of thousands ofmobility restrictions, includingborder closures and nationwidelockdowns related to Covid-19, re-quires states to reach out to theirneighbours and to migrants' coun-tries of origin to address their needsand vulnerabilities," he said in astatement.

IOM said it had calculated the2.75 million figure from officialsources on known cases up to July13 of migrants stranded abroad inneed of assistance, including food,water, shelter and repatriation.

They include seasonal workers,temporary residence holders, in-ternational students, migrants whotravelled for medical treatment andseafarers.

The Middle East and NorthAfrica had the most stranded mi-grants, with 1.26 million stuck, fol-lowed by Asia and the Pacificwith 977,000.

There were a further 203,000 inthe European Economic Area andSwitzerland, and 111,000 in Northand Central America and theCaribbean, it found.

"Large underestimation"Based on data from 382 locations

in more than 101 countries, it "is con-sidered a large underestimation ofthe number of migrants strandedor otherwise impacted by Covid-19", IOM said.

The IOM said it had received re-quests to assist nearly 115,000stranded migrants to return homesafely and voluntarily, and hadbeen able to do so for more than15,000 of the most vulnerable inrecent months.

"Once stranded, some migrantsare at a higher risk of abuse, ex-ploitation and neglect," it warned.

"The loss of livelihoods canincrease vulnerabilities and ex-pose them to exploitation byc r i m i n a l s y n d i c a t e s , human traffickers and otherswho take advantage of these sit-uations."

The organisation said that toooften, migrants were excluded fromnational coronavirus response andrecovery plans due to their irregular status.

Virus measures strand almost 3 mn migrants: UNTHE MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA HAD THE MOST STRANDED MIGRANTS, WITH 1.26MN STUCK, FOLLOWED BY ASIA AND THE PACIFIC WITH 977,000

AGENCIES

Detroit , Oct 9: Thirteen men,seven of them associated with ananti-government militia groupcalled the Wolverine Watchmen,have been arrested on charges ofconspiring to kidnap the Michigangovernor Gretchen Whitmer, at-tack the state legislature andthreaten law enforcement , prosecutors said Thursday.

Prosecutors said the conspirators discussed recruitinga force of 200 supporters to stormthe state capitol building in Lansingand take hostages, but later switchedto a plan to kidnap Whitmer at hervacation home.

At a news conference, Whitmeraccused Trump of fomenting po-litical extremism, citing his com-ments during last week’s US pres-

idential debate against Joe Bidenin which Trump declined to con-demn white supremacists and in-stead called for members of theProud Boys to “stand back andstand by.”“When our leaders meetwith, encourage and fraternisewith domestic terrorists they le-gitimize their actions, and they arecomplicit,” Whitmer said.

Trump lashed back at Whitmeron Twitter late Thursday, sayingthe governor “has done a terriblejob” and casting her as being un-grateful to his administration.

“My Justice Department andFederal Law Enforcement an-nounced ... today that they foiled adangerous plot against the Governorof Michigan. Rather than say thankyou, she calls me a WhiteSupremacist,” Trump wrote.

Biden weighed in with his own

statement, accusing Trump of “giv-ing oxygen to the bigotry and hatewe see on the march in our country.”

Internal U.S. security memos inrecent months have warned that vi-olent domestic extremists couldpose a threat to election-relatedtargets, a concern heightened by po-litical tensions, civil unrest andforeign disinformation campaigns.

FBI Director Christopher Wraysaid in September that his agencywas conducting investigations intodomestic extremists, includingwhite supremacists and anti-fas-cist groups.

The FBI became aware throughsocial media in early 2020 of groupsdiscussing the “violent overthrow”of multiple state governmentsand used confidential sources totrack their movements, accord-ing to court records. The six mennamed in the federal complaint -Adam Fox, Barry Croft, Ty Garbin,Kaleb Franks, Daniel Harris andBrandon Caserta - could face lifein prison if convicted on chargesof attempting to kidnap Whitmer.

Fox and Croft, in particular, dis-cussed detonating bombs as a di-versionary tactic, “and Fox eveninspected the underside of aMichigan highway bridge forplaces to seat an explosive,”Andrew Birge, U.S. attorney for thewestern district of Michigan, tolda briefing.

Plot to kidnap Michigan Guvbusted, she rebukes TrumpThirteen men, seven of them associated with an anti-government militia

group called the Wolverine Watchmen, have been arrested

AGENCIES

Beijing, Oct 9: China has offi-cially joined the World HealthOrganisation's (WHO) COVAX al-liance to equitably distributeCOVID-19 vaccines around theglobe, ending speculation that itplans to supply them on its own todeveloping countries to improveits image dented by the pandemicsince it emerged in Wuhan inDecember last year.

According to the WHO, coun-tries should join the COVID-19Vaccine Global Access Facility(COVAX Facility) by September18 but not later than October 9with upfront payments. “OnOctober 8, China and Gavi, theVaccine Alliance, signed an agree-ment, officially joining COVAX,”Chinese Foreign Ministryspokesperson Hua Chunying saidin a statement on Friday.

“This is an important stepChina has taken to uphold theconcept of a shared communityof health for all and to honour itscommitment to turn COVID-19vaccines into a global publicgood,” she said, apparently re-futing reports that China plansto distribute the vaccines to de-veloping countries on its ownahead of developed countries.Hua later told a media briefingthat China is finalising the modal-ities of its participation with of-ficials of Gavi and agreed to buy15 COVAX vaccines to adminis-

ter them to the Chinese popula-tion. China has been in com-munication with COVAX partiesand will purchase vaccine for 15million people in China, this isbased on the consensus reachedby both sides and this is a goodresult for both, she said.

“Purchase of this percentageonly accounts for one per cent ofthe national population but itdemonstrates our support to theprogramme," Hua said, addingthat any larger purchase by Chinato cover its 1.4 billion populationwould deprive the vaccine oppor-tunity to people from a numberof countries.

WHO announced in Augustthat “172 economies are now en-gaged in discussions to potentiallyparticipate in COVAX, a globalinitiative aimed at working withvaccine manufacturers to providecountries worldwide equitable ac-cess to safe and effective vaccines,once they are l icensed and approved”.

China joins COVAXalliance for globaldistribution of vaccines

MASSIVE BLAZE

A mixed-use high-rise residential building is engulfed by a fire in Ulsan, South Korea REUTERS

‘nCoV broke out in world’s various parts last year’

China Friday claimed that the coronavirus broke out in the variousparts of the world last year but it was the only one to havereported and acted first, refuting the widely-held view that the

deadly contagion originated in Wuhan before turning out to be apandemic. China, besides denying the US allegations that COVID-19 hasemerged from a bio-lab in Wuhan, also rejected that it emanated from awet market in the central Chinese city from bats or pangolins beforeinfecting humans. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunyingtold a media briefing that ‘the coronavirus is a new kind of virus as moreand more facts emerge as reports reveal, we all know that the epidemicbroke out in various places in the world at the end of last year, whileChina was the first to report the outbreak, identified the pathogen andshared the genome sequence with the world.” Hua's comments came inresponse to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's allegations of a cover-up by the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC).

AGENCIES

Washington, Oct 9: Days after returning to the White House afterbeing treated for COVID-19, USPresident Donald Trump has expressed his willingness to holdrallies for the presidential elections, with his doctor sayinghe is "safe" to return to public lifeSaturday.

Trump, 74, and First LadyMelania tested positive for COVID-19 last week. The president wastaken to a military hospital fortreatment, which the White Housesaid was taken as a "matter ofabundance caution". After spend-ing four days, he came back to theWhite House on Monday. His doc-tors say he has had no fever sincelast Friday. In a memorandum is-sued Thursday night, White Housephysician Dr Sean Conley said,"Today, the president completedhis course of therapy for COVID-19 as prescribed by his team ofphysicians." Since returninghome, his physical exam has re-mained stable and devoid of anyindications to suggest progressionof illness. Overall he's respondedextremely well to treatment, with-out evidence on examination ofadverse therapeutic effects, hewrote in the memo.

PELOSI MULLS TRUMP’SFITNESS TO SERVE: HouseSpeaker Nancy Pelosi is ques-tioning President Donald Trump'sfitness to serve, announcing leg-islation Thursday that would cre-ate a commission to allow Congressto intervene under the 25thAmendment to the Constitutionand remove the president fromexecutive duties.

Just weeks before theNovember 3 election, Pelosi saidTrump needs to disclose moreabout his health after his COVID-19 diagnosis. "The public needsto know the health condition ofthe President," Pelosi said, laterinvoking the 25th Amendment,which allows a president's cabi-net or Congress to intervene whena president is unable to conductthe duties of the office.

Trump responded swiftly viaTwitter. "Crazy Nancy is the onewho should be under observation.They don't call her Crazy for noth-ing!" the President said.

TRUMP ‘SAFE’ TORETURN TO PUBLICON SATURDAY: DOC

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Islamabad, Oct 9: Pakistan's telecom watchdog Friday bannedthe popular Chinese video-sharingapp TikTok after getting numerous complaints against its“immoral” content.

The PakistanTelecommunication Authority(PTA) said in a statement that a"number of complaints from dif-ferent segments of the society"were made "against immoral/in-decent content" on TikTok.

The regulator took the step aftera "final notice" was given to TikTokto comply with the instructions fordevelopment of an effective mech-anism for a proactive moderationof its unlawful online contents,it said. However, TikTok failed tocomply with the instructions whichforced the PTA to ban it in thecountry. The watchdog said that itwas open for engagement withthe mobile application's parentcompany and would review its de-cision if a mechanism was de-veloped to moderate the content asper the earlier instructions.

TikTok, owned by China'sByteDance, has been in crosshairsworldwide. The Indian and theUS governments have alreadybanned it over security concerns.

Pak bans TikTok Deforestation in Amazon fallsbut destruction still high

REUTERS

Brasilia, Oct 9: Deforestationin Brazil’s Amazon rainforest fellin September for the thirdstraight month compared to ayear ago, government datashowed Friday, but destructionremains far higher than beforePresident Jair Bolsonaro tookoffice in 2019.

Forest clearances in theworld’s largest rainforest aredown 10% in the first ninemonths of 2020, compared tothe same period a year ago, ac-cording to data released by gov-ernment space research agencyINPE. September was the 7thhighest month for deforestationon record, outstripping anymonth in the two years preced-ing Bolsonaro’s inauguration.

Environmental advocatesblame right-wing Bolsonaro,who has rolled back environ-mental enforcement and calledfor mining and farming pro-tected areas of the Amazon, foremboldening illegal loggers,ranchers and miners to destroy

the forest. Bolsonaro says heaims to lift the region out ofpoverty and that the amountof forest still standing showsBrazil is a model for conserva-tion. Last week, US Democraticpresidential candidate Joe Bidencalled for a world effort to offer$20 billion to end Amazon de-forestation and threatened Brazilwith unspecified “economicconsequences” if it did not “stoptearing down the forest.”

In response, Bolsonaro blastedBiden as making cowardlythreats to Brazil’s sovereignty.

Despite the consecutivemonths of falling deforestation,Brazil’s official deforestationmeasure for 2020 is expected toshow a rise. Deforestation ismeasured annually by howmuch forest has been cleared asof the end of July, as comparedto the previous August. Thosemonths have less cloud coverthat interferes with the satelliteimages. For that period, defor-estation rose 34.6% to 9.216square kilometers, the prelim-inary data show.

P11

businessSATURDAY | OCTOBER 10 | 2020 | BHUBANESWAR

RBI’s move to extendco-lending scheme to

NBFCs and HFCs may infuseadditional liquidity, but therealty sector might not getbenefit due to strict duediligence norms and eligibility criteriaSATISH MAGAR | NATIONAL PRESIDENT, CREDAI

Motorola has partnered with e-commercemarketplace Flipkart to launch its global-first range of smart home appliances forIndian consumers. Available from October15, during Flipkart’s Big Billion Days saleevent, the product range comprises smartrefrigerators and smart air-conditioners

MOTOROLA PARTNERS WITH FLIPKART

cmyk

cmyk

ThisSeptember,our power

demand was higherthan September2019. So the growthstarted again.Despite the fact that Covid problemlingers, the growth in our powerconsumption and demand hasstarted

RK SINGH | POWER AND NEW & RENEWABLE

ENERGY MINISTER

of theday uote

The number offolios andfunds

mobilised inSeptember washigher than August,and the redemptionamount too came down. Thisindicates that while there areinvestors who chose to book profitgiven the surge in the equitymarkets, there are set of investorswho have started to invest inmarkets

HIMANSHU SRIVASTAVA | ASSOCIATE

DIRECTOR, MANAGER RESEARCH,MORNINGSTAR INDIA

The priorityfor mostcompanies in

2020 is keeping thelights on, so datacentre growth isgenerally beingpushed back until the market entersthe recovery period. However,hyperscalers will continue withtheir global expansion plans due tocontinued investments in PublicCloud

NAVEEN MISHRA |SENIOR RESEARCH DIRECTOR, GARTNER

Jio waives postpaid security feeNew Delhi: Reliance Jio haswaived security fee depositfor postpaid customers whoswitch to its network fromrival mobile serviceproviders, a company officialsaid Friday. The companywill offer the same creditlimit to the customer what itoffers to its existingsubscribers, the Jio officialsaid. "Reliance Jio has nowannounced first-ever 'carryforward of the credit limitfor postpaid customers ofother operators joining JioPostpaidPlus plans, atabsolutely zero cost," thecompany official said.

Adani Gas cutsCNG, PNG pricesNew Delhi: Adani Gas Fridaycut CNG and piped cookinggas prices in variousgeographical areas in syncwith the recent reduction innatural gas rates. Rateshave been reduced in UttarPradesh, Haryana andGujarat, the company saidin a statement. CNG pricehas been reduced by `1.75per kg in Khurja in UttarPradesh to `52.60 and thatof piped cooking gas (PNG)to `25.72 per cubic meterfrom `26.83.

Grinding unitgoes on streamChennai: Ramco CementsLtd Friday said it hascommenced operations atits new cement grindingunit in Odisha, set up at acost of about `710 crore. Itwas decided to set up theunit in Odisha, consideringthe State's high industrialpotential, besides being akey market for thecompany. Odisha CMNaveen Patnaik, who tookpart in the ground breakingceremony in 2017 formallyinaugurated the plantThursday, the city basedcompany said.

UK prepares jobs supportLondon: The Britishgovernment Friday is set toannounce further support forfirms to retain staff in thecoming months if they areforced to close as a result ofthe imposition of furtherlockdown restrictions.

SHORT TAKES

REUTERS

Bangalore, Oct 9: Retail inflationin India likely rose further above thecentral bank’s medium-term tar-get last month as food prices climbeddue to lingering supply disruptions,a Reuters poll found, reducing thechances of another interest ratecut. Persistent high prices havehurt the recession-stricken econ-omy, which contracted a record23.9% in April-June despite theReserve Bank of India (RBI) cuttingits key repo rate by a cumulative 115basis points since the pandemicstarted.

Although the government haseased some lockdown restrictionsto help the economy, supply chain

disruptions have shown little signof abating as the virus continues tospread rapidly in India.

The October 6-8 Reuters poll of 47economists suggested consumerprices rose 6.88% last month froma year ago, its highest in five monthsand faster than August’s 6.69% rate.

If realised, inflation would beabove the top end of the RBI’smedium-term target range of 2%-6% for the sixth consecutive month.

“An acceleration in food infla-tion and ongoing virus-related sup-ply disruptions have kept headlineCPI inflation higher than we had an-ticipated, but price pressures shouldease soon,” said Shilan Shah, sen-ior India economist at CapitalEconomics.

Above-average rainfall this year,a key determinant of yields infarming, is predicted to help re-duce food-price pressures over the

coming months. But inflation run-ning above target is expected tokeep the RBI on the sidelines for therest of this year, despite expecta-

tions the Indian economy will markits first full-year contraction since1979 this year.

The Indian government appointed

three new external members to theMonetary Policy Committee Mondayafter delaying the latest policy-set-ting meeting, which is scheduled toconclude later Friday.

“We expect the RBI to remaincognizant of the price pressuresbut maintain their accommodativestance especially as it is food-led. Ratecuts will be delayed but not denied,”said Rini Sen, India economist atANZ.

The poll also forecast that in-dustrial output fell for the sixthmonth in a row in August, with a7.5% decline, its longest fallingstreak since June 2009, as infra-structure output, which accounts forabout 40% of total industrial pro-duction, contracted 8.5%.

‘India’s already-high inflation likely climbed further in Sept’Persistent high prices have hurt the recession-stricken economy, which contracted a record 23.9% in April-June despite the RBI cutting its key repo rate

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, Oct 9: Bankers and fi-nancial experts Friday hailed RBI’spolicy, saying the decision to keepthe key repo rate unchanged is anaccommodative approach to man-age inflation while keeping growthas target, amid the current eco-nomic conditions.

The Monetary Policy Committee(MPC) evaluated domestic andglobal macroeconomic and finan-cial conditions and voted unani-mously to leave the repo rate un-changed at 4%, RBI GovernorShaktikanta Das said in his policystatement for the bi-monthly mon-etary policy review.

It also decided to continue withthe accommodative stance of mon-etary policy as long as necessary –at least during the current financialyear and into the next year – to re-vive growth on a durable basis andmitigate the impact of COVID-19,while ensuring that inflation re-mains within the target going for-

ward. “Today's policy statement byRBI is a perfect exposition of doing'whatever it takes' to revive growth,”SBI chairman Dinesh Khara said.

Given the expectation of inflationto stay elevated and a GDP con-traction of 9.5% in 2020-21, RBI hasdone the right thing by announcing“discretion-based” policy responsesrather than being “rule based”, headded. Bank of India's chief exec-utive AK Das said the retail andsmall business segments will alsohave better prospects by measures,

suchas, ratio-nalisation of riskweight for housing loans, en-hancement of regulatory retail capand co-lending with NBFCs/HFCs.

Punjab National Bank's MD andCEO SS Mallikarjuna Rao wel-comed the `1 lakh crore targettedlong term repo operations and saidit will support the economic growth.

Friday's monetary policy was asaggressively accommodative as pos-sible without cutting the policyrate, said Abheek Barua, ChiefEconomist, HDFC Bank.

"Given the stance, there is asignificant probability of a

rate cut in February, if not inDecember itself as infla-tion, as we expect, moder-ates. Has the RBI gone over-board in its effort to supportgrowth? We think not.

"These are unprecedenttimes and the Indian econ-

omy's revival efforts are hob-bled by the lack of adequate

fiscal support. If mone-tary policy does have to do

the heavy lifting, it cannot do itwithin the confines of a conven-tional take-no-risks framework,"Barua said.

Bankers, experts hail centralbank’s growth-oriented policy

Today'spolicy statement by

RBI is a perfect expositionof doing 'whatever it takes' to

revive growth. Given theexpectation of inflation to stay

elevated and a GDP contraction of9.5% in 2020-21, RBI has done the

right thing by announcing“discretion-based” policy

responses rather than being“rule based”DINESH KUMAR KHARA I

CHAIRMAN, SBI

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

New Delhi, Oct 9: The CentreFriday decided to give partial re-lief to onion exporters by easingrestrictions on certain varieties ofthe staple for foreign shipments.

In a tweet, Minister for Railwaysand Commerce and IndustryPiyush Goyal said: "Empoweringfarmers and increasing their in-come, the government permitsexport of Bangalore Rose andKrishnapuram onions of up to10,000 MT each."

Accordingly, 'Bangalore Rose'and 'Krishnapuram' varieties upto 10,000 MT each can now be ex-ported, subject to certain condi-tions.

"T he expor t shipment o f'Bangalore Rose' onions shall be al-lowed only through the Chennaiport and export to be completed byMarch 31, 2021," the DirectorateGeneral of Foreign Trade (DGFT)said in a notification.

"An exporter shall have to geta certificate from the HorticultureCommissioner, government ofKarnataka, certifying the itemand the quantity of 'Bangalore

Rose' onions to be exported.On 'Krishnapuram' variety, the

DGFT mandated that exportersneed to get certificates from theAssistant Director, Horticulture,Kadapa, government of AndhraPradesh, certifying the quantityof onions for export purposes.

Centre allows export ofcertain varieties of onion

Empowering farmersand increasing theirincome, the governmentpermits export ofBangalore Rose andKrishnapuram onions ofup to 10,000 MT each,tweeted Piyush Goyal

THE OCTOBER 6-8 POLL OF47 ECONOMISTS

SUGGESTED CONSUMERPRICES ROSE 6.88% LAST

MONTH FROM A YEARAGO

THE INDIAN GOVERNMENTAPPOINTED THREE NEWEXTERNAL MEMBERS TOTHE MONETARY POLICYCOMMITTEE MONDAYAFTER DELAYING THE

LATEST POLICY-SETTINGMEETING

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, Oct 9: Automobiledealers' body the Federation ofAutomobile Dealers Associations(FADA) said that the passenger ve-hicle (PV) retail sales in Septemberwitnessed year-on-year (y-o-y) in-crease of 14.43% to 4,584 units,amid the ongoing COVID-19 pan-demic.

FADA said that automobile sec-tor sold around 4,584 units inSeptember as against 4,006 unitsale from same period of previousfiscal. On other hand, 2-wheelersegment showed de-growth by20.83% on a y-o-y basis, 3-wheelerby 55.13% and commercial vehicle(CV) sale was down by 26.65% dur-ing the same month. However, trac-tor registrations saw positive growthby 25.76%.

Two-wheeler registrations inOdisha totalled 39,193 in September

as compared to 49,502 in samemonth of 2019. The three-wheelersegment saw 984 registrations com-pared to 2,193 in the year-ago period.

Similarly, CVs witnessed a down-swing in September. About 1,731CVs were sold in September asagainst 2,360 sales in 2019, showedFADA’s data.

In all, the vehicle categories in thestate registered de-growth inSeptember as the Indian economycontinues to battle with Covid-19

pandemic. According to FADA’s re-port, the overall vehicles’ sale inOdisha saw only 48,119 in all cate-gories in same month while lastyear sales were 59,088.

On the other hand, vehicle reg-istrations in September continuedto grow by 11.45% on M-o-M basisbut fell by -10.24% on y-o-y basisacross India. On yearly comparison,2-wheeler sales were down by -12.62%, 3-wheeler by -58.86% andCVs by -33.65% in the country.

PV for the first time grew by9.81% since unlocking began.Tractor registrations continuedits upward journey with a mag-nificent 80.39% growth. Its sales inrural India continue in a positivemanner as Kharif sowing wit-nessed record progress of areacovered till date. Dealer Inventoryfor both 2W and PV are at highestlevels in anticipation of a goodfestive season.

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, Oct 9: India’s top oiland gas producer ONGC Fridaysaid it is losing `6,000-7,000 croreon natural gas business after thegovernment-mandated rates forthe fuel dropped to a decade low.

The government-mandated ratesare way below the cost of pro-duction of $3.5-3.7 per millionBritish thermal unit, Oil andNatural Gas Corp (ONGC) Director(Finance) Subhash Kumar said.

Every dollar reduction in gasprice leads to a revenue loss ofabout `5,200 crore and a `3,500crore on profit. "Our losses will bein the order of `6,000-7,000 crorein current fiscal," he said.

ONGC has been incurring losseson the 65 million standard cubicmeters per day of gas it producesfrom domestic fields after the gov-ernment in November 2014 in-troduced a new gas pricing for-mula that had "inherentlimitations" as it was based onpricing hubs of gas surplus coun-tries such as the US, Canada, andRussia.

The price, according to this for-mula, is revised twice a year andthe rate for the period beginningOctober 1 has been cut by 25% to$1.79 per mmBtu.

He, however, hoped the gov-ernment will act on the firm's re-quest and a floor price would be setto check losses.

ONGC Chairman and MDShashi Shanker said the cur-rent gas price does not covercost and the company has maderepresentations to the Ministryof Petroleum and Natural Gasfor suitable amendments tothe formula.

PVs retail sales in state rise14% y-o-y in Sept: FADA

ONGC sees`6,000-7,000 crloss on gas biz

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, Oct 9: Total market val-uation of all listed companies on theBSE rose to a new high of `160.68lakh crore on Friday following a bull-ish sentiment in the equity market.

Extending its gains for the sev-enth straight session -- the longestwinning streak in almost a year --the 30-share BSE Sensex rose by326.82 points or 0.81% to close at40,509.49. During the week, theSensex advanced 1,812.44 points or4.68%. Tracking gains in the broadermarket, the market capitalisationof the BSE-listed companies zoomedto `1,60,68,725.10 crore at close oftrade Friday.

Stock market benchmarks ral-lied on Friday as financial stocksadvanced following the ReserveBank of India's (RBI) accom-modative policy stance and steps to

boost liquidity to the banking sec-tor. The benchmark repurchase(repo) rate has been left unchangedat 4%, RBI Governor ShaktikantaDas said while announcing the de-cisions taken by the MonetaryPolicy Committee (MPC).

"Markets are trading currentlyat their peak, aided by fast recov-ery of economic activities and in-creased rural demand.

"Over the week, benchmark in-dices have ascended to new high sup-ported by restoration of industrialactivity near pre-COVID-19 level,

good start to Q2 result, in antici-pation of stimulus in India andpositive monetary measures byMPC," Vinod Nair, head (research)at Geojit Financial Services.

He added that global markets re-mained positive throughout theweek, as corporate deals and trans-actions revived in spite of an in-crease in COVID-19 cases.

ICICI Bank was the top gainer inthe Sensex pack, rising 3.64 percent. Axis Bank, State Bank ofIndia, HDFC Bank, Larsen andToubro, ONGC and Infosys wereamong the other major gainers.

RIL is the country's most-valuedfirm with a market valuation of`15,10,436.34 crore, followed byTata Consultance Services (Rs10,56,277.53 crore), HDFC Bank(Rs 6,78,991.98 crore), HUL (Rs5,02,534.84 crore) and Infosys (Rs4,71,751.13 crore).

M-cap of BSE-listed cos zoomsREUTERS

Washington, Oct 9: The UnitedStates is imposing new tariffs on$1.96 billion worth of aluminumsheet products from 18 countriesafter determining that the goodswere being dumped, US CommerceSecretary Wilbur Ross said Friday.

The tariffs were being immedi-ately imposed on countries in-cluding Germany and Bahrain,even though the department’s de-termination that there was dump-ing was preliminary, he told FoxBusiness Network.

Brazil, Croatia, Egypt, Greece,India, Indonesia, Italy, Oman,Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, SouthAfrica, South Korea, Spain,Taiwan and Turkey were also af-fected, he said.

Ross said the US InternationalTrade Commission would makethe f inal deter mination inFebruary 2021.

He said China was not on thelist, adding U.S. tariffs had alreadybeen imposed on Beijing’s alu-minum products, which led toChinese excess capacity that dis-placed production in other countriesand resulted in dumping in theUnited States.

The tariff rate would be largestagainst Germany with 52% to 132%followed by Bahrain with rates insingle digits, Ross said.

He said a rise in US consumptionof certain products amid the pan-demic, such as recreational vehi-cles and boats, increased the im-portance of aluminum sheetpricing.

US imposes tariffs on aluminum sheet from India

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Abu Dhabi, Oct 9: Kings XIPunjab (KXIP) will have to playout of their skins to get their stut-tering campaign back on trackwhen they face fancied KolkataKnight Riders (KKR) in the IPLhere Saturday.

Smarting from a 69-run drub-bing at the hands of SunrisersHyderabad, it will not be an easytask for a struggling KXIP side tostand up to the challenge thrownby an all-round KKR team, which

is a fine blend of youth and ex-perience.

Following five losses and a soli-tary win, KXIP are currentlyplaced at the bottom of the tablewith two points, whereas theKnight Riders are fourth withsix points from three wins.

Notwithstanding a couple ofreverses, KKR are graduallyemerging as a strong contenderfor a third IPL title, with many oftheir players striking form as thetournament approaches the half-way stage.

And thenthere is AndreRussell, whohas not set thetournamentablaze in the manner in which heis expected to. The biggest causeof concern for KKR is the formof their captain Dinesh Karthik,who is yet to contribute anythingsubstantial with the bat.

In pace bowling, they have theyoung duo of Kamlesh Nagarkotiand Shivam Mavi, besides theseasoned World No.1 PatCummins. While in spin, Narinehas Varun Chakravarthy for com-pany. KXIP will again rely ontheir trusted opening pair of cap-tain KL Rahul and MayankAgarwal. If Chris Gayle recov-ers from his food poisoning, he willmake his first appearance in theongoing IPL and that will be ahuge boost for KXIP.

The mis-firing Glenn Maxwellis likely to make way for Gayle.Nicholas Pooran’s exploits withthe bat is a positive for KXIP.

Death bowling is a major con-cern for KXIP and they wouldneed to get it right against a strongKKR batting line-up.

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Dubai , Oct 9 :Chennai Super Kings(CSK) will take on

Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB)in an intriguing mid-table IPL clashhere Saturday with both teams bat-tling inconsistency.

CSK batsman Kedar Jadhav’s se-lection will be under the scannerafter his failure in the defeat toKolkata Knight Riders. The CSKsank to a 10-run loss Wednesday,choking inexplicably with Jadhav’sapproach to batting attracting crit-icism from all quarters.

It remains to be seen if the CSKopt to jettison the 35-year-old giventhe team’s propensity to give playersa long rope.

Despite Shane Watson finding hisrange in a 10-wicket win over KingsXI Punjab and Faf du Plessis’ con-sistency at the top, the middle ordercontinues to remain a concern forCSK with skipper MS Dhoni himselfnot being at his best.

If they do decide to bench Jadhavafter his prolonged struggle, theyhave the option of recalling RuturajGaikwad or picking N Jagadeesan,who has been warming the bench

since the 2018 season.While worries remain on the bat-

ting front, the CSK bowling has gotbetter and they did well to restrictKKR in the previous game with in-fluential all-rounder Dwayne Bravoreturning to his wicket-taking ways.

Karn Sharma, who came in forPiyush Chawla did well to pick up acouple of wickets while not going fortoo many runs and the skipper willexpect him to do the same against aformidable RCB batting unit.

Yet, Dhoni would prefer the pac-ers – Deepak Chahar, Sam Curran andShardul Thakur – to provide early

breakthroughs and stem the runflow. However, the CSK bowling willbe up against a strong RCB battingline-up led by captain Virat Kohli, andthey will look for an improved per-formance.

Kohli aside, young DevduttPadikkal has looked in good touch,while AB de Villiers has been a keyplayer for RCB over the years. If thebig-hitting Aaron Finch can providea rapid start at the top, it would serveRCB better.

It is the bowling which wouldworry Kohli. Leg-spinner YuzvendraChahal has, as always, been the lead-

ing bowler while Washington Sundarhas been frugal upfront.

However, the pacers have not livedup to their reputation, with the likesof Umesh Yadav, Mohammed Sirajand Navdeep Saini leaking runs.Experienced Sri Lankan Isuru Udana’sinclusion has given a semblance ofcontrol towards the end of the innings.

KXIP TAKE ON KKR

Printed and published by Tathagata Satpathy on behalf of Navajat Printers and Media Pvt. Ltd. and printed at Navajat Printers, B-15 Industrial Estate, Rasulgarh, Bhubaneswar -751010, Odisha;Phone:7894447142(Marketing). Editor: Tathagata Satpathy, RNI No. ORIENG/2011/37159

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sportsSATURDAY | OCTOBER 10 | 2020 | BHUBANESWAR

TODAY’S

MATCHES

KXIP KKRAT 3:30 PM

CSK RCBAT 7:30 PM

TELECAST: STAR SPORTS

CSK LOCK HORNS WITH RCB VIRU SLAMS CSKNew Delhi: Former India openerVirender Sehwag has taken a dig atChennai Super Kings’ faltering IPLcampaign, saying that some of theirbatsmen think of the franchise as a‘government job’ in which remunera-tion is assured irrespective of perform-ance. Chasing 168, veteran openerShane Watson struck his second suc-cessive fifty to give CSK a perfect startWednesday, but the team choked atthe back end of the innings and wasrestricted to 157 for five to suffer itsfourth defeat in five matches. “Itshould have been chased down. Butthe dot balls played by Kedar Jadhavand Ravindra Jadeja didn’t help,”Sehwag told ‘Cricbuzz’. “And, in myview, some of the batsmen think ofCSK as a government job, whether youperform or not, they know they’ll gettheir salary anyway,” he added.

Delhi outwit Royals

REUTERS

Buenos Aires, Oct 9: Argentinagot their World Cup qualifyingcampaign off to the perfect startThursday when Lionel Messi’searly penalty gave them a 1-0 winover Ecuador in a lacklustre matchhere.

The Argentine FA piped fannoise around the empty Bombonerastadium and the chants of ‘Messi!Messi!’ were vindicated as earlyas the 12th minute when he putArgentina ahead from the spotafter Lucas Ocampos was fouled in-side the penalty area.

Argentina had lost just one oftheir last eight World Cup qualifiersagainst Ecuador and although theycould not add to the scoreline theynever looked in danger of losing ina scrappy game against limited op-ponents.

With the South American qual-ifiers twice pushed back from thescheduled start in March, it was al-most a year since either team hadplayed a full international andMessi said that inaction contributedto the poor spectacle.

The three points, however, weremore than welcome for a side thathasn’t won a major title since lift-ing the Copa America in 1993.

The win, which extendedArgentina’s unbeaten run to eight

games under coach Lionel Scaloni,was also positive given that sevenof the starting line-up had neverplayed a World Cup qualifier pre-viously.

Argentina’s next game is Tuesdayagainst Bolivia in La Paz, whileEcuador return home to faceUruguay, who beat Chile 2-1 in theiropener earlier Thursday, the sameday.

The top four teams in SouthAmerica’s 10-team group qualify au-tomatically for Qatar 2022 and thefifth-placed side goes into an inter-regional playoff.

KENIN EYES 2ND SLAM OF 2020, SWIATEK 1ST OF CAREER

Young guns blazing on clayPRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Paris, Oct 9: A little more thanfour years ago in Paris, Iga Swiatekbeat Sofia Kenin 6-4, 7-5 in thethird round of the FrenchOpen junior event.

“I remember I lost. Idon’t remember how Iplayed,” Kenin said whenasked about the only encounterbetween the two. “But definitely Ican say I was not as comfortable onclay as I am now, as I started to feellast year. ... Of course, we’re bothdifferent players now.”

Certainly are. And the stakes intheir second matchup at RolandGarros are considerably differentfrom that 2016 meeting, too: Kenin,a 21-year-old from Florida, andSwiatek, a 19-year-old fromPoland, will face each otherSaturday in the French Openwomen’s final.

Swiatek (pronounced Shvee-ON’-tek) is No.54, making her the low-est-ranked woman to get this far atthe tournament since the WTAcomputer rankings began in 1975.She seeks her first Grand Slam

title; in six previous appearances,her best showing was the fourthround.

Kenin, who is seeded No.4, isbidding for her second big trophyof the season, after triumphing atthe Australian Open in February,part of a 16-1 mark at the majors in2020.

Kenin needed to get throughthree sets to win four of her half-dozen matches in Paris, an indi-cation of some occasional lapsesin form, perhaps, but also of her

boundless resilience andgrit.

Swiatek’s progressthrough the surprise-filled

draw over the past two weekshas been as impressive as can be. If the chill and rain of the au-

tumnal setting — the French Openwas postponed from May-June to

September-October because of thecoronavirus pandemic — or thelack of loud crowds — only 1,000 fansare allowed on the grounds each day,also on account of COVID-19 con-

cerns — or the dearth of matchplay — the women’s tour re-turned from a five-monthhiatus in August — bothered

others, those factors were ir-relevant to Swiatek.Not only hasn’t she dropped a

set so far — no woman has wonthe title here without conceding atleast one since Justine Henin backin 2007 — but Swiatek allowed hersix opponents to combine for just23 games in 12 sets.

The lopsided results included 6-1, 6-2 victories over both 2018 cham-pion Simona Halep and 2019 runner-up Marketa Vondrousova, and a6-3, 6-2 win over 2014 Wimbledon fi-nalist Eugenie Bouchard.

She is young enough, remem-ber, that she recently finished highschool. Swiatek says she needs tofigure out whether to continue topursue her education or stick toprofessional tennis.

Messi penalty helpsArgentina beat rivals

Lionel Messi scores from the spotagainst Ecuador

Rafa juggernaut continuesREUTERS

Paris, Oct 9: Rafa Nadal movedwithin one win of a record-equalling20th Grand Slam title by reachingthe French Open final with a com-fortable 6-3, 6-3, 7-6(7-0) victory overDiego Schwartzman Friday.

Nadal was beaten by the 12th seeda little over two weeks ago on the claycourts in Rome but the 12-time FrenchOpen champion showed he was stillthe undisputed king of Roland Garrosas he notched up a 10th win in 11 meet-ings over the Argentine.

“Two and a half weeks ago, I lostin Rome,” Nadal said in an on-courtinterview. “I’m happy the way Iplayed, how I’ve improved, todaywas a very positive win for me.”

A victory Sunday for the 34-year-old left-hander, against either WorldNo.1 Novak Djokovic or fifth-seededGreek Stefanos Tsitsipas, will tie himwith Roger Federer’s men’s singlesrecord of 20 major titles.

The Spaniard reached his 13thFrench Open final without droppinga set in this year’s edition.

Schwartzman, playing his firstGrand Slam semifinal, had twobreakpoints in the opening game butNadal saved both to win the gameafter battling for 14 minutes.

The Spaniard went on to breakthe Argentine twice in each of thefirst two sets. The duo traded dou-ble service breaks in the third setbefore Nadal aced the tiebreak with-out losing a point. Schwartzman

found the net with a return to handNadal victory in three hours andnine minutes.

“It’s a very difficult year, thankyou everyone for coming,” saidNadal, who hit 38 winners duringthe contest. “With these conditionsit’s very difficult, and it’s still in-

credible to be in the final again.Thanks to my team, my family. It’sa beautiful moment for me.”

Schwartzman had his chances butcould convert only three of his 12breakpoint chances against theSpaniard, who raised his level underpressure.

Rafa Nadal reacts after beating Diego Schwartzman in Paris, Friday

Padmini in eves’ teamfor Asian Online Chess

AGENCIES

Chennai, Oct 9: Odisha chess starPadmini Rout is among the womenplayers for the Asian Online Nations(Regions) Cup Team Championship,beginning Saturday. The tourna-ment will conclude with the finalsOctober 25.

The Indian men and womenteams will start as favourites inthe tournament. The top-seededwomen’s team includes BhaktiKulkar ni , WGM Mary AnnGomes, Padmini, R Vaishali andPV Nandhidhaa, and is the high-est rated among 31 nations tak-ing part.

Grandmaster Surya SekharGanguly will lead the men’s teamwhich also include B Adhiban,Nihal Sarin, SP Sethuraman andK Sasikiran. However GM

Viswanthan Anand is not takingpart in this event.

The Indian squad is the highestranked among the 39 teams and isthe top seed followed by Kazakhstanand Iran. Apart from India, Iranalong with Kazakhstan andIndonesia are likely to be among thecontenders for the top prize.

The Indians had last month wonthe gold medal in the FIDE OnlineOlympiad. Three members of thetriumphant squad-Sarin, Bhaktiand Vaishali will be seen in actionin the Asian team event.

The tournament will be played onnine-round Swiss System prelimi-naries in both men’s and women’sdivision with a time control of 15minutes + 5 seconds increment.

The top eight teams will qualifyto the knockout stage of quarter-finals, semifinals and finals.

AGENCIES

Sharjah, Oct 9: Delhi Capitals(DC) moved to the top of the leaguestandings after scripting a com-prehensive 46-run win in their IPLencounter against Rajasthan Royals(RR) here, Friday. DC have now 10points from six matches, two aheadof second-placed Mumbai Indians,while RR are stranded at seventh po-sition with four points.

Put into bat, DC posted 184/8 intheir 20 overs, thanks to ShimronHetmyer (45, 24b, 1x4, 5x6) and MarcusStoinis (39, 30b, 4x6). In reply, RRwere bowled out for a paltry 138with two balls to spare. Kagiso

Rabada (3/35) was the pick of thebowlers and he was ably supportedby Stoinis (2/17), R Ashwin (2/22),Axar Patel (1/8), Anrich Nortje (1/25)and Harshal Patel (1/29).

Royals failed to set momentumfrom the very beginning of theirchase, losing wickets at regular in-tervals. Rahul Tewatia (38, 29b, 3x4,2x6) was the top scorer for them, withonly three other players – YashasviJaiswal (34, 36b, 1x4, 2x6), skipperSteve Smith (24) and Jos Buttler(13) – reaching double figures. Thehighest partnership – 41 runs – wasforged between Jaiswal and Smithfor the second wicket.

Earlier, an aggressive bowling

display coupled with some goodfielding saw Royals restrict DC towhat looked like a below-par 184/8.This was the lowest first innings totalat the ground this season.

Desperate to snap their three-match losing streak, RR opted to fieldand the bowling unit delivered withJofra Archer (3/24) taking threewickets and spinner Rahul Tewatia(1/20) and Kartik Tyagi (1/35) cap-turing one each.

The two run outs of the danger-ous Shreyas Iyer (22) and RishabhPant (5) also proved crucial. Hetmyerplayed a wonderful innings to be thetop scorer. Stoinis too chipped in.

Archer was the pick of the bowlers

as he dismissed opener ShikharDhawan (5) in the second over forhis first wicket in the Powerplaythis year. DC slipped to 42/2 in 4.2overs after losing Prithvi Shaw.

Jaiswal then run out Shreyas Iyerwith a brilliant direct throw withDelhi slumping to 51/3 at the end ofpowerplay. However, some good in-nings in the second half of the inningshelped DC go past 180-run mark.

BRIEF SCORES: Delhi Capitals184/8 (Shimron Hetmyer 45, MarcusStoinis 39; Jofra Archer 3/24) beatRajasthan Royals 138 (Rahul Tewatia38, Yashasvi Jaiswal 34; KagisoRabada 3/35, Marcus Stoinis 2/17,R Ashwin 2/22) by 46 runs.

Marcus Stoinis (C) is congratulated by his teammates after dismissing a Royals batsman; Shimron Hetmyer looks on after playing a shot in Sharjah, FridayIg

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