saying that mamata’s aspi-rations to become the pm would remain a pipedream as “no one can...

16
T he voting for the 72 Lok Sabha seats in Phase IV across nine States saw a turnout of 64 per cent and sporadic vio- lence in West Bengal. The prominent candidates whose fate is now locked in EVMs include Giriraj Singh, Babul Supriyo, Baijayant Panda (BJP), Urmila Matondkar, Salman Khurshid, Milind Deora (Congress), Dimple Yadav (SP) and Kanhaiya Kumar (CPI). The stakes are high for the ruling BJP and its allies as it as it had won 56 of these seats in 2014. West Bengal recorded a high turnout at 76.47 in the eight seats as against a turnout of 84 per cent last year. In Barabani, BJP candidate from Asansol and Union Minister Babul Supriyo’s vehicle was vandalised allegedly by TMC workers outside a polling sta- tion, while in Dubrajpur area Central security forces per- sonnel reportedly opened fire in the air to disperse irate peo- ple who attacked them when they were barred from entering the booths with mobile phones. An FIR was registered against Supriyo for allegedly threatening polling officials. The ruling Trinamool Congress and the BJP accused each other of intimidating voters in the State, which has seen violence in all previous three phases despite stepped up Central forces deployment. Clashes broke out between supporters of rival parties in Nanoor, Rampurhat, Nalhati and Suri areas of Birbhum seat, leaving several people injured. Anantnag recorded 10.5 per cent, the lowest polling in the phase four polling. Anantnag had recorded 36.34 per cent turnout in 2014. Polling was peaceful in Rajasthan, with tribal domi- nated seat of Banswara record- ing the highest voting per- centage at 72.34, followed by Barmer, which recorded 72.21 per cent voting. Nearly 58.23 per cent vot- ing was recorded in Maharashtra (17 seats), 68 per cent in Odisha (6 seats), 58.92 per cent in Bihar (five seats), 63.39 per cent in Jharkhand (3 seats), 57.58 per cent in UP, 65.5 per cent in Madhya Pradesh, and 64.5 per cent in Rajasthan. A total of about 12.79 crore voters were enlisted to exercise their franchise in the fourth phase polling. Voting took place in 17 seats in Maharashtra, 13 each in Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, eight in West Bengal, six each in Madhya Pradesh and Odisha, five in Bihar, three in Jharkhand and a part of Anantnag constituency in Jammu & Kashmir. The scorching summer heat with temperature as high over 43 degrees Celsius in some States did come in the way of high turnout in the afternoon with most people preferring to cast their votes in the morning or just before evening. Sun was most punishable in 13 Lok Sabha seats of Rajasthan including the border Lok Sabha seat of Barmer. The constituencies in Rajasthan which went to poll in this phase are Tonk- Sawaimadhopur, Ajmer, Pali, Jodhpur, Barmer, Jalore, Udaipur, Banswara, Chittorgarh, Rajsamand, Bhilwara, Kota and Jhalawar- Baran. The Congress, which has formed Government in the State, is upbeat this time as it had scored a duck in 2014 LS poll with the BJP winning all 25 seats in the State. The BJP would like to retain as many of its seats as possible to consol- idate its all India tally. Similarly in Madhya Pradesh with 29 seats, the BJP had pocketed 26 of the 29 seats with the Congress winning only three seats. Like Rajasthan, the Congress has formed Government in MP too and hopes to increase its LS count significantly. In Maharashtra too where on Monday 17 LS seats went to poll, BJP-Shiv Sena have high stakes as in 2014 general elec- tions the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) won 41 out of the 48 seats in the State. The BJP and the Shiv Sena bagged 23 and 18 seats, respectively. The phase four thus holds maximum importance for the NDA in its bid to repeat man- date at the Centre in 2019. Jodhpur in Rajathan is one of the most talked about seats where Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot’s son Vaibhav is pitted against Union Minister of State and MP Gajendra Singh Shekhwat. The fate of former Union Minister Jaswant Singh’s son and former MLA Manvendra Singh (Barmer LS), erstwhile Jaipur royal family member Diya Kumari, Union Minister PP Chaudhary will also be decided in the polling. In Madhya Pradesh bypoll to Chhindwara Assembly seat, where Chief Minister Kamal Nath is seeking election, was held simultaneously with Lok Sabha poll on Monday. Six Lok Sabha constituen- cies of Sidhi, Shahdol, Jabalpur, Mandla, Balaghat and Chhindwara went to polls in Madhya Pradesh. Continued on Page 4 P rime Minister Narendra Modi’s claim on Monday that at least 40 Trinamool Congress legislators are waiting in the wings to join the BJP drew prompt counter-attack from West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. Mamata wondered how a person as high as the Prime Minister could indulge in horse trading, ruling out any possi- bility of a split in her party as “the people of Bengal would never side with a person whose hands were stained with blood of Gujarat riots.” Modi, who was addressing an election rally in Serampore constituency, said, “Ground beneath Didi’s feat is moving fast as anytime after May 23 when the results of the gener- al elections will be declared, at least 40 TMC MLAs will join the BJP.” This is the first that such a claim has come from the Prime Minister himself. Hours later, the TMC lodged a complaint with the ECI while senior party leader Derek O’Brien accused the PM of “indulging in horse-trading.” Claiming that India had witnessed four streams of pol- itics — Naam Panthi, Waam Panthi, Daam and Daman Panthi — Modi said a time has come when the people would- finally chose the Vikas Panthis — or those who have come to emancipate Bengal from the Daam and Daman Panthis and develop it. In a slant attack on Mamata for “losing her nerves at the sight of saffron wave”, Modi said, “Didi is losing temper very frequently these days. She is attacking not only me or the BJP but everyone around her. Her own workers are so scared of her that they are evading her sight apparently to evade a slap or two.” Saying that Mamata’s aspi- rations to become the PM would remain a pipedream as “no one can become a PM with a handful of seats,” Modi said the “reason she is raising ‘Delhi chalo’ slogan is because she wants to establish her nephew (Abhishek Banerjee) firmly in Bengal.” On the NRC, the Prime Minister spoke out in Bengali saying if his party came to power in the State it would invoke NRC, an issue that had received sustained opposition from Mamata. The Chief Minister hit back hard saying the BJP was a party of thieves and a num- ber of its leaders were tainted. Continued on Page 4 C ongress president Rahul Gandhi on Monday filed his reply before the Supreme Court in connection with a contempt case against him for his “Chowkidar chor hai” remark on Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Rahul, in his fresh affidavit filed before a Bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi, reiterated his stand but did not apologise and expressed only regret for his comment. Rahul also sought dismissal of the contempt petition filed by BJP leader Meenakshi Lekhi, saying it was an abuse of the process of the court. In his sub- mission the Gandhi scion adopted his earlier reply and said the BJP was abusing the legal process to “gag” him from raising the Rafale issue. He has requested the SC to dismiss the contempt case with a fine. In her plea, Lekhi has alleged that Rahul has attrib- uted his personal remarks to the top court and tried to cre- ate prejudice. Though it had excused Rahul from a personal appear- ance, the SC had asked him to explain why he should not be held in contempt for claiming that it had “accepted” his “Chowkidar chor hai” slogan attacking the Prime Minister. Last Monday, Rahul had said in an affidavit that he had falsely quoted the SC as “rhetorical flourish in the heat of political campaigning”, with- out having seen, read or analysed the order. Continued on Page 4 I t is going to be former jawan versus chowkidar in Varanasi Lok Sabha constituency from where dismissed Border Security Force constable Tej Bahadur Yadav will be Samajwadi Party (SP) candi- date against Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The SP, in a tactical move, has changed its Varanasi can- didate Shalini Yadav and has fielded Tej Bahadur Yadav to take on the Prime Minister. After the Congress refused to field Priyanka Gandhi Vadra against Modi, the SP turned the battle into an ex-jawan versus chowkidar contest. After filing his nomination paper, Tej said, “The issues of Samajwadi Party are mine and now I am the candidate of the party as I have filed my nom- ination on the party’s symbol. We are fighting for farmers and soldiers of the country.” Tej was dismissed from BSF in 2017 after he released a video of the alleged poor food served to jawans in J&K. Continued on Page 4 M uslim women in Sri Lanka will not be allowed to wear any form of face veils in public from Monday under new regulations announced by President Maithripala Sirisena who used emergency powers in the wake of the Easter Sunday bombings. The new regulation ban- ning any form of face covering was announced by the President on Sunday, a week after the coordinated blasts hit three churches and three lux- ury hotels, killing over 250 peo- ple and injuring more than 500 others. The ban specifically men- tions “any face garment which hinders identification”. “The ban is to ensure national security... No one should obscure their faces to make identification difficult,” Sirisena’s office said in a state- ment. He took steps under the emergency regulation to pro- hibit the use of face coverings of all sorts which is an obsta- cle to ensure the identity of the people and a threat to nation- al and public security. Detailed report on P12 D onning saffron turban and wearing blue shirt, actor and BJP candidate Sunny Deol filed his nomination papers as SAD-BJP combine candidate from Gurdaspur Lok Sabha seat on Monday. The new entrant to politics has declared total assets, including that of his wife, as 87.18 crore. Evoking his Punjab-con- nection while amusing his audience with filmy dialogues, the Bollywood angry man delivered his brief and power- packed four-minute speech during his first election rally wherein his younger brother Bobby Deol, two Union Ministers and local party lead- ers, including Kavita Khanna, wife of late Vinod Khanna, and Swaran Salaria, were present. Reminding voters of his patriotic character in Gadar and referring to his dhai kilo ka haath from Damini, Sunny declared that he had not come to make promises “but to asso- ciate with you (the people)”. Amid loud cheering and bole so nihaal slogan, Sunny called himself a “patriot” who does not know much about politics. The Jat Sikh, who addressed the rally splashed with movie dialogues, started his address with “ Mere Gurdaspur walo, Sat Sri Akal”. Striking an emotional chord with the people, he said when he was given ticket for Gurdaspur, his father Dharmender said, “Sunny, you should accept the opportunity for the sake of your love for Punjab.” Yesteryears’ Bollywood superstar Dharmendra could not make it to Sunny’s nomi- nation event, but tweeted his support asking the people of Gurdaspur to back his son, say- ing his victory will be that of the people of “my Punjab”. Despite initial rebellion from within after the ticket to Sunny from Gurdaspur, the BJP managed to put up a united show on Monday. Kavita Khanna, who had earlier expressed disappoint- ment with the party for not fielding her from the seat once held by her late husband Vinod Khanna, was at the rally to express support for Sunny. Another ticket-aspirant Swaran Salaria too was present on the occasion. Thanking the people of Gurdaspur, Deol said, “I am here because you invited me. My father told me that you stay in the heart of each person in Punjab — son, go there and they will shower you with love. I want to tell you that I love you a lot.” “I do not know much about politics but I am a patri- ot,” he said, adding, “I have come here to connect with you because I want our Punjab and our country to scale new heights...All of you join me and we will fight together, and win this battle.” Saying he seeks people’s support so that Modi returns as PM, Sunny said, “If you make me victorious, then Modiji will win and you will win... Continued on Page 4

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The voting for the 72 LokSabha seats in Phase IV

across nine States saw a turnoutof 64 per cent and sporadic vio-lence in West Bengal.

The prominent candidateswhose fate is now locked inEVMs include Giriraj Singh,Babul Supriyo, Baijayant Panda(BJP), Urmila Matondkar,Salman Khurshid, MilindDeora (Congress), DimpleYadav (SP) and KanhaiyaKumar (CPI). The stakes arehigh for the ruling BJP and itsallies as it as it had won 56 ofthese seats in 2014.

West Bengal recorded ahigh turnout at 76.47 in theeight seats as against a turnoutof 84 per cent last year. InBarabani, BJP candidate fromAsansol and Union MinisterBabul Supriyo’s vehicle wasvandalised allegedly by TMCworkers outside a polling sta-tion, while in Dubrajpur areaCentral security forces per-sonnel reportedly opened firein the air to disperse irate peo-ple who attacked them whenthey were barred from enteringthe booths with mobile phones.

An FIR was registeredagainst Supriyo for allegedlythreatening polling officials.The ruling Trinamool Congressand the BJP accused each otherof intimidating voters in theState, which has seen violencein all previous three phasesdespite stepped up Centralforces deployment.

Clashes broke out between

supporters of rival parties inNanoor, Rampurhat, Nalhatiand Suri areas of Birbhumseat, leaving several peopleinjured.

Anantnag recorded 10.5per cent, the lowest polling inthe phase four polling.Anantnag had recorded 36.34

per cent turnout in 2014. Polling was peaceful in

Rajasthan, with tribal domi-nated seat of Banswara record-ing the highest voting per-centage at 72.34, followed byBarmer, which recorded 72.21per cent voting.

Nearly 58.23 per cent vot-

ing was recorded inMaharashtra (17 seats), 68 percent in Odisha (6 seats), 58.92per cent in Bihar (five seats),63.39 per cent in Jharkhand (3seats), 57.58 per cent in UP,65.5 per cent in MadhyaPradesh, and 64.5 per cent inRajasthan.

A total of about 12.79crore voters were enlisted toexercise their franchise in thefourth phase polling.

Voting took place in 17seats in Maharashtra, 13 eachin Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh,eight in West Bengal, six eachin Madhya Pradesh and

Odisha, five in Bihar, three inJharkhand and a part ofAnantnag constituency inJammu & Kashmir.

The scorching summerheat with temperature as highover 43 degrees Celsius insome States did come in theway of high turnout in theafternoon with most peoplepreferring to cast their votes inthe morning or just beforeevening.

Sun was most punishablein 13 Lok Sabha seats ofRajasthan including the borderLok Sabha seat of Barmer. Theconstituencies in Rajasthanwhich went to poll in thisphase are Tonk-Sawaimadhopur, Ajmer, Pali,Jodhpur, Barmer, Jalore,Udaipur, Banswara,Chittorgarh, Rajsamand,Bhilwara, Kota and Jhalawar-Baran.

The Congress, which hasformed Government in theState, is upbeat this time as ithad scored a duck in 2014 LSpoll with the BJP winning all 25seats in the State. The BJPwould like to retain as many ofits seats as possible to consol-idate its all India tally.

Similarly in MadhyaPradesh with 29 seats, the BJPhad pocketed 26 of the 29 seatswith the Congress winningonly three seats. Like Rajasthan,the Congress has formedGovernment in MP too andhopes to increase its LS countsignificantly.

In Maharashtra too whereon Monday 17 LS seats went to

poll, BJP-Shiv Sena have highstakes as in 2014 general elec-tions the National DemocraticAlliance (NDA) won 41 out ofthe 48 seats in the State. TheBJP and the Shiv Sena bagged23 and 18 seats, respectively.

The phase four thus holdsmaximum importance for theNDA in its bid to repeat man-date at the Centre in 2019.

Jodhpur in Rajathan is oneof the most talked about seatswhere Chief Minister AshokGehlot’s son Vaibhav is pittedagainst Union Minister of Stateand MP Gajendra SinghShekhwat.

The fate of former Union

Minister Jaswant Singh’s sonand former MLA ManvendraSingh (Barmer LS), erstwhileJaipur royal family memberDiya Kumari, Union MinisterPP Chaudhary will also bedecided in the polling.

In Madhya Pradesh bypollto Chhindwara Assembly seat,where Chief Minister KamalNath is seeking election, washeld simultaneously with LokSabha poll on Monday.

Six Lok Sabha constituen-cies of Sidhi, Shahdol, Jabalpur,Mandla, Balaghat andChhindwara went to polls inMadhya Pradesh.

Continued on Page 4

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Prime Minister NarendraModi’s claim on Monday

that at least 40 TrinamoolCongress legislators are waitingin the wings to join the BJPdrew prompt counter-attackfrom West Bengal ChiefMinister Mamata Banerjee.

Mamata wondered how aperson as high as the PrimeMinister could indulge in horsetrading, ruling out any possi-bility of a split in her party as“the people of Bengal wouldnever side with a person whosehands were stained with bloodof Gujarat riots.”

Modi, who was addressingan election rally in Seramporeconstituency, said, “Groundbeneath Didi’s feat is movingfast as anytime after May 23when the results of the gener-al elections will be declared, atleast 40 TMC MLAs will jointhe BJP.” This is the first thatsuch a claim has come from thePrime Minister himself.

Hours later, the TMClodged a complaint with theECI while senior party leader

Derek O’Brien accused the PMof “indulging in horse-trading.”

Claiming that India hadwitnessed four streams of pol-itics — Naam Panthi, WaamPanthi, Daam and Daman

Panthi — Modi said a time hascome when the people would-finally chose the Vikas Panthis— or those who have come toemancipate Bengal from theDaam and Daman Panthis and

develop it.In a slant attack on Mamata

for “losing her nerves at thesight of saffron wave”, Modisaid, “Didi is losing temper veryfrequently these days. She isattacking not only me or theBJP but everyone around her.Her own workers are so scaredof her that they are evading hersight apparently to evade a slapor two.”

Saying that Mamata’s aspi-rations to become the PMwould remain a pipedream as“no one can become a PM witha handful of seats,” Modi saidthe “reason she is raising ‘Delhichalo’ slogan is because shewants to establish her nephew(Abhishek Banerjee) firmly inBengal.”

On the NRC, the PrimeMinister spoke out in Bengalisaying if his party came topower in the State it wouldinvoke NRC, an issue that hadreceived sustained oppositionfrom Mamata.

The Chief Minister hitback hard saying the BJP wasa party of thieves and a num-ber of its leaders were tainted.

Continued on Page 4

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Congress president RahulGandhi on Monday filed

his reply before the SupremeCourt in connection with acontempt case against him forhis “Chowkidar chor hai”remark on Prime MinisterNarendra Modi.

Rahul, in his fresh affidavitfiled before a Bench headed byChief Justice Ranjan Gogoi,reiterated his stand but did notapologise and expressed onlyregret for his comment.

Rahul also sought dismissalof the contempt petition filedby BJP leader Meenakshi Lekhi,saying it was an abuse of theprocess of the court. In his sub-mission the Gandhi scionadopted his earlier reply andsaid the BJP was abusing thelegal process to “gag” him fromraising the Rafale issue.

He has requested the SC todismiss the contempt case witha fine. In her plea, Lekhi hasalleged that Rahul has attrib-uted his personal remarks to

the top court and tried to cre-ate prejudice.

Though it had excusedRahul from a personal appear-ance, the SC had asked him toexplain why he should not beheld in contempt for claimingthat it had “accepted” his“Chowkidar chor hai” sloganattacking the Prime Minister.

Last Monday, Rahul hadsaid in an affidavit that he hadfalsely quoted the SC as“rhetorical flourish in the heatof political campaigning”, with-out having seen, read oranalysed the order.

Continued on Page 4

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It is going to be former jawanversus chowkidar in Varanasi

Lok Sabha constituency fromwhere dismissed BorderSecurity Force constable TejBahadur Yadav will beSamajwadi Party (SP) candi-date against Prime MinisterNarendra Modi.

The SP, in a tactical move,has changed its Varanasi can-didate Shalini Yadav and hasfielded Tej Bahadur Yadav totake on the Prime Minister.

After the Congress refusedto field Priyanka Gandhi Vadraagainst Modi, the SP turned thebattle into an ex-jawan versuschowkidar contest.

After filing his nominationpaper, Tej said, “The issues ofSamajwadi Party are mine andnow I am the candidate of theparty as I have filed my nom-ination on the party’s symbol.We are fighting for farmers andsoldiers of the country.”

Tej was dismissed fromBSF in 2017 after he released avideo of the alleged poor foodserved to jawans in J&K.

Continued on Page 4

����� ".2.��.

Muslim women in SriLanka will not be allowed

to wear any form of face veilsin public from Monday undernew regulations announced byPresident Maithripala Sirisenawho used emergency powers inthe wake of the Easter Sundaybombings.

The new regulation ban-ning any form of face coveringwas announced by thePresident on Sunday, a weekafter the coordinated blasts hitthree churches and three lux-ury hotels, killing over 250 peo-ple and injuring more than 500others.

The ban specifically men-tions “any face garment whichhinders identification”.

“The ban is to ensure

national security... No oneshould obscure their faces tomake identification difficult,”Sirisena’s office said in a state-ment.

He took steps under theemergency regulation to pro-hibit the use of face coveringsof all sorts which is an obsta-cle to ensure the identity of thepeople and a threat to nation-al and public security.

Detailed report on P12

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Donning saffron turban andwearing blue shirt, actor

and BJP candidate Sunny Deolfiled his nomination papers asSAD-BJP combine candidatefrom Gurdaspur Lok Sabhaseat on Monday. The newentrant to politics has declaredtotal assets, including that of hiswife, as �87.18 crore.

Evoking his Punjab-con-nection while amusing hisaudience with filmy dialogues,the Bollywood angry mandelivered his brief and power-packed four-minute speechduring his first election rallywherein his younger brotherBobby Deol, two UnionMinisters and local party lead-ers, including Kavita Khanna,wife of late Vinod Khanna, andSwaran Salaria, were present.

Reminding voters of hispatriotic character in Gadarand referring to his dhai kilo kahaath from Damini, Sunny

declared that he had not cometo make promises “but to asso-ciate with you (the people)”.

Amid loud cheering andbole so nihaal slogan, Sunnycalled himself a “patriot” whodoes not know much aboutpolitics. The Jat Sikh, whoaddressed the rally splashedwith movie dialogues, startedhis address with “MereGurdaspur walo, Sat Sri Akal”.

Striking an emotionalchord with the people, he saidwhen he was given ticket forGurdaspur, his fatherDharmender said, “Sunny, youshould accept the opportunityfor the sake of your love forPunjab.”

Yesteryears’ Bollywoodsuperstar Dharmendra couldnot make it to Sunny’s nomi-nation event, but tweeted hissupport asking the people ofGurdaspur to back his son, say-ing his victory will be that ofthe people of “my Punjab”.

Despite initial rebellion

from within after the ticket toSunny from Gurdaspur, the BJPmanaged to put up a united

show on Monday.Kavita Khanna, who had

earlier expressed disappoint-

ment with the party for notfielding her from the seat onceheld by her late husband Vinod

Khanna, was at the rally toexpress support for Sunny.Another ticket-aspirant SwaranSalaria too was present on theoccasion.

Thanking the people ofGurdaspur, Deol said, “I amhere because you invited me.My father told me that you stayin the heart of each person inPunjab — son, go there andthey will shower you with love.I want to tell you that I love youa lot.”

“I do not know muchabout politics but I am a patri-ot,” he said, adding, “I havecome here to connect withyou because I want our Punjaband our country to scale newheights...All of you join me andwe will fight together, and winthis battle.”

Saying he seeks people’ssupport so that Modi returns asPM, Sunny said, “If you makeme victorious, then Modiji willwin and you will win...

Continued on Page 4

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The Government bodymeant to recruit teachers

for the various subjects inschools run by the DelhiGovernment and the threemunicipal corporations couldnot fill up the vacancies as can-didates who appeared in thewritten tests, failed to clear thesame.

Delhi State SubordinateSelection Board (DSSSB) madea submission before the DelhiCourt in this regard during thehearing of a petition onMonday.

A lawyers group called‘Social Jurist’ has filed a petitionin the Delhi High Court in theend of March against theDSSSB in the end of March fornot filling the vacant teachingpositions. “The board has failedto fill the position and has notissued advertisement and invit-ed application to fill the requi-sition of 105691 additionalteachers vacancies received bythe board from Directorate ofEducation (DOE) by seventh ofApril 2019,” said the AshokAggarwal, the counsel for theSocial jurist.

The court then asked the

DSSSB to respond on the peti-tion for which the board sub-mitted its response.

As per the affidavit, out ofthe total 10057 notified examinations, the board hasfilled a total number of 6029vacant post and about 652teaching posts have been keptpending. Thus, there are still3376 unfilled vacancies inschools of Delhi Government,Municipal Corporations andNDMC.

“Major vacancies (1879)of the following post codes (10number of various subjectteaching post) of educationdepartment could not be filledas sufficient number of candi-dates could not secure thepassing marks,” said the DSSBin the affidavit.

Further as per the data, theDOE requested the DSSSB tofill the 1329 vacant position ofspecial Educators, out of which985 vacancies have not beenfilled.

Further there total 324 vacancies for mathematicsteacher in Delhi Government Schools but theBoard has filled only 43 postand the remaining 280 teach-ing position for the subject is

left unfilled. Further DoE asked the

DSSSB to fill various teachingpost of about 2598, out ofwhich 1879 posts have notbeen filled by the board and arelying vacant.

“The recruitment processof these vacancies has beenreturned to the user depart-ment for taking further actionin this regard. Further theresults for Out of 67 post codesfor various teaching posts, theresults for 49 posts have beendeclared and the results for sixpost codes will be declared by30th April i.e, on Tuesday,”DSSB told the court.

The DSSB said that it hassent the 1600 dossiers of 43post codes against the 3230vacancies to DOE and 413dossiers against one post codeof special educator has beensent to MCD.

“3789 dossiers of assistantteachers post against 4366vacancies will be sent to MCDby Tuesday.

The DSSB further request-ed the High court to extend thetime for declaring results ofremaining 12 post codesinvolving 4709 vacancies up to31st April 2019.

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The Indira Gandhi NationalOpen University (IGNOU)

will launch an awareness pro-gramme on Goods and ServicesTax (GST) in collaboration withBombay Stock ExchangeInstitute Limited from its July2019 session, the varsity saidMonday.

The programme, which will

be launched by IGNOU’s Schoolof Management Studies aims toimpart basic knowledge andskills required to fulfill variousrequirements under the GSTAct. This programme would bebeneficial to people who areengaged in maintainingaccounts and filing of variousindirect tax returns, the varsitysaid.

Entrepreneurs engaged in

small-scale business venturescan also benefit from this pro-gramme as it gives an overviewof the procedures and formali-ties to comply under the GSTAct, it said.

The main objective of theprogramme is to impart skills tobook keeping professionals tofile various regular GST returnsalong with the various compli-ance requirements, it said.

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Amajor fire broke out in fourchemical factories in west

Delhi’s Naraina Industrial areaon Monday. Being a weekly offon Monday, the factories in thearea were closed so no casualtywas reported but two DelhiFire Services official were injuredafter there was a blast in con-tainers in which chemical isstored. According to a seniorDFS official a call regarding thefire was received at 11:37 AMfollowing which 35 fire tenderswere rushed to the spot.

“The fire was major and firedepartment had to call more fire

tenders on the spot. Four facto-ries are affected by the fire and thefire was doused in the evening,”said the senior DFS official.

“The chemical was adhesivein nature. It is suspected that itwas spirit. The fire was broughtunder control at 2.10 pm. Justwhen it was thought that the firehad been doused, there was ablast in containers in whichchemical was stored which ledto injuries to fireman NareshKumar and special officerAman,” said the senior DFS offi-cial. “The impact of the blastwas such that the duo slippedand sustained burn injuries.The fireman sustained burn

injuries on the back and evenwhen water was being poured toease the pain, he was feeling aburning sensation and was cry-ing constantly,” a witness said.

“The injured were rushed toBL Kapoor Super SpecialtyHospital and are out of danger.It seems the factories did nothave fire clearance but they arechecking the facts. One of thethree factories was completelygutted in the blaze, one was partially burnt and the third one was affected a little bit, asenior fire officer said, addingthe cause of the fire is yet to beascertained,” said the seniorDFS official.

�����������)3(3)(��

Out of the total 492 pollingstations, Gurugram dis-

trict has 229 sensitive and 263highly sensitive polling boothsfor the upcoming Lok Sabhaelections. In order to ensure freeand fair elections on May 12 forthe Gurugram Parliamentaryconstituency, the district admin-istration has made elaboratesecurity arrangements withextra emphasis o sensitive andhyper sensitive polling booths.

Gurugram District ElectionOfficer and DeputyCommissioner (DC) AmitKhatri said that “Out of the sen-sitive and highly sensitivepolling booths, 48 are inGurugram Assembly segment,192 in Sohna assembly con-stituency, 89 in Pataudi assem-bly constituency and 163 boothsin Badshahpur assembly area”.

The DC further said, “InSohna assembly constituency ,there are 78 sensitive and 114highly sensitive booths, Pataudiassembly constituencies has 44sensitive and 45 susceptibleones, 77 sensitive and 86 high-ly sensitive in the Badshahpurconstituency and 30 sensitiveand 18 highly sensitive boothsin Gurugram assembly area.There will be deployment ofadditional forces alongwiththe police force” .

Khatri said that the boothsin Pataudi assembly con-stituency have been declared assensitive, the booth no. 6 of vil-lage Musadpur, two booths ofvillage Mahchana- 21,22 vil-lages, 2 booths of Khawaspur -34,35, three booths of villageJamalpur - 41, 42,43, a booth ofvillage Javath-75, two booths ofvillage Sherpur -79, 80, threebooths of village Junnoula -101,102, 103, two booths of vil-lage Naharpur casan117, 118,

three of village NakharullaBooth-126,127, 128, sevenbooths in Manesar- 132 to 138,village Nainwal - 139, a boothof village Sahrawan - 140, twobooths of village Kukdaula -141, 142, a booth of villageGwalior (Panchgaon) - 143,four booths of village loci - 216,217, 218 and 219, three of vil-lage Bilaspur Booth225,226,227, a booth of villageBhorka-235 and four booths ofvillage Patharidi -237 to 240 areincluded.

Similarly, 45 booths ofPataudi assembly constituencyhave been declared very sensi-tive, in which three booths of 31,33, 33 villages of village Taledev,4 booths - 49, 50, 51, 52, twelvebooths of village Hailimandi -From 54 to 65, 11 booths of vil-lage Bhadakalan- 152 to 162,three booths of village Malehera-166, 167, 168, three booths ofvillage Nankulan- 199, 200,

201, four booths of villagekhod- 207, 208 , 209, 211, andfour booths - 228, 229, 230 and231 in village Siddarwali.

A total of 48 sensitive andhighly sensitive booths havebeen declared in the Gurugramassembly segment, out of which30 have sensitive and 18 high-ly sensitive booths. In the sen-sitive booths, 30 booths ofGurugram Town are sensitive,including Booth no. 47, 48, 49,50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 82, 83, 84,193, 194, 195, 216, 217, 218, 219,220, 221, 222, 223, 224, 225, 226,227, 242, 276 and 277.

The highly sensitive booths include Gurugrambooth number- 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 243, 244, 245, 262,263, 264, 265, 266, 267, 269, 270and 271.

New Delhi: A minor girl wasmolested by her neighbour inNorth West Delhi’s AdarshNagar area on Sunday. The vic-tim is a second standard studentand is living with her family inAdarsh Nagar area.

According to a senior policeofficial, the accused on Sundaysent the six-year-old victim tobuy some product from thegrocery shop in the area andwhen the victim returned theaccused shut the door and force-fully undressed the victim.

“The accused later startedtouching her inappropriatelyfollowing which the victim start-ed crying, the accused got fright-ened and let her go. The victimimmediately rushed out of thehouse and stated her ordeal toher mother who approached thepolice,” said the senior policeofficial. “The police on the state-ment of the victim have regis-tered a case under section 354 ofIndian Penal Code and Pro-tection of Children from SexualOffences (POCSO) Act. Theaccused has been arrested,” thepolice official added. SR

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Anju Kamalkant and SanjayGoyal of Bhartiya Janta

Party (BJP) were elected unop-posed as Mayor and DeputyMayor of East Delhi respec-tively. Ms Anju Kamalkant andSanjay Goyal represent WardNo. 17 (Vishvas Nagar) andWard No. 29 (Vivek Vihar)respectively.

Besides that Bipin BihariSingh (Ward No—12,Patparganj); Ajay Sharma(Ward No-39, NaveenShahdara); and Abdul Rahman(Ward No-41, Zafrabad) werealso elected unopposed as themembers of the StandingCommittee.

On this occasion, thenewly elected mayor, AnjuKamalkant said that she willwork with full devotion. Themayor said that it would be herpriority to make EDMC self-self-reliant and work for theimprovement in sector of edu-cation and health.

“Primary responsibility ofCorporation is to keep the area

clean. In this direction, sanita-tion work will be improved tokeep the East Delhi clean. Ms.Anju Kamalakant said that thecivic facilities provided by thecorporation will be made eas-ily available to all”, she added.

Deputy Mayor said that hewould assist the Mayor andwork as a team.

Meanwhile, Avtar Singhand Yogesh Verma of BJP wereelected unanimously for theposts of Mayor and DeputyMayor of North Delhi respec-tively in the North MCD elec-tions held today.

Avtar Singh was electedCouncillor from Ward No. 83N (Civil Lines), while Yogesh

Verma had wonfrom Ward No. 75N (Ashok Vihar).

After the elec-tion of Mayor andDeputy Mayor ofNorth Delhi, threemembers ofS t a n d i n gCommittee of thehouse AdeshGupta (BJP), JaiPrakash (BJP) andR a v i n d e rBhardwaj (AAP)were elected unan-imously afterPrerna Singh(Congress) with-drew her nomina-tion from the post.

Newly electedMayor, AvtarSingh laid downhis priorities andsaid that sanita-

tion, education and healthwould be the priority. He saidstress would be on making theCorporation self reliant for thepurpose ongoing projectswould be given boost. DeputyMayor Yogesh Verma on hiselection on the post said that hewould assist the Mayor andwork as a team.

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In a shocking incident, aneight and a half-year-old

boy killed a toddler in SouthDelhi’s Fatehpur Beri area ashe nursed a grudge against thevictim’s sister.

The younger brother of the juvenile hadfallen accidently on the floora few days ago and he held theelder sister of the victimresponsible for this.

According to Vijay Kumar,the Deputy Commissioner ofPolice (DCP), South district,on Saturday morning around7.15 am a police control room(PCR) call was receivedregarding missing of the childfollowing which a team wasdispatched for the spot.

“During primary investi-gation, it was revealed that onetoddler, who was one and ahalf year old, had gone miss-ing from his house. The victimwas sleeping with his motherand sister on the roof of hishouse at Mandi Village on the

intervening night of Fridayand Saturday. He had gone missing from there in thenight between 1 am and 4am,” said the DCP. “However,police also noticed that ananother boy of eight and a halfyears old, who was tenant inthe neighbouring house, wasalso missing.

Later, the body of themissing child was recovered from the drain near the house,”said the DCP, adding thatinjuries were conspicuous overright eye, abdomen, leg andblood was also seeping outfrom right ear.

“The body of the victimhas been preserved in the

mortuary at AIIMS. A case under section

363/302 of Indian Penal Code(IPC) was registered atFatehpur Beri Police Stationand investigation was initiat-ed,” said the DCP.

“The juvenile, who wasalso missing, was traced onSaturday morning and wasfound involved in the inci-dent,” said the DCP.

According to a seniorpolice official, a few days back,the elder sister of the deceasedboy pushed the youngerbrother of the accused due towhich, he got a minor swellingon his head after he fell downon the floor of the house.

“The juvenile harboured a grudge after that incident and killed the toddler alone totake the revenge. He will beproduced in Juvenile Justice Board from his house,”said the senior police official. “Both the familiesused to live in rented accom-modation and their father aredaily labourers,” the seniorpolice official added.

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Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP)East Delhi candidate Atishi

on Monday wrote to theElection Commission seekingregistration of FirstInformation Report (FIR)against her Bharatiya JantaParty (BJP) rival GautamGambhir over his alleged vio-lation of the poll code by dis-tributing pamphlets withoutdetails such as printer's name.

The AAP nominee had onSunday written to the EC seek-ing a 72-hour campaign banagainst the cricketer-turned-politician for carrying out aroad show without permission.

On Monday, Atishi againwrote to the poll panel, alleg-ing that Gambhir is distribut-ing pamphlets without carryingin them details such as theprinter's name which is a vio-lation of the model code ofconduct.

"This is the third time in arow that Gambhir has violatedthe Model Code of Conduct.Such blatant disregard for theElection Commission is con-trary to the spirit of democra-cy and endangers the free andfair process of elections. Onlyan exemplary punishment candeter such continued willfulviolation," she said in the letter

to the EC."In light of this violation, I

request you to take strongaction and register FIR againsthim. I hope you will give mycomplaint most urgent con-sideration," the AAP candidateadded.

She has already movedcourt against Gambhir allegingthat he had enrolled as a voterin Rajender Nagar and KarolBagh Assembly segments inviolation of the Representationof the People Act.

Atishi also challengedGambhir for an open debate. "Iwant to ask Gambhir five ques-tions -- what did the incum-bent BJP MP Mahesh Giri do

for the promised east Delhicampus (of the DelhiUniversity). What did he do forwomen safety. What did he dofor affordable housing. Whatdid he do to stop sealing. Whatdid he do for choosing analternative for the Ghazipurlandfill site," she posed.

The AAP candidate alsosaid for the first time it is beingseen that a candidate does notknow how to fight election.

Atishi, Gambhir andCongress' Arvinder SinghLovely have locked horns in athree-way contest in the EastDelhi constituency. Delhi goesto poll in sixth phase of the LokSabha elections on May 12.

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The Chief Electoral Officerof Delhi on Monday said

that the commission will takeaction against the BharatiyaJanata Party (BJP) candidatefiled nominations for the EastDelhi constituency for alleged-ly having two voter Identitycards (ID), only if it receivesany complaint on the matter.

The Aam Aadmi Party'sEast Delhi candidate AtishiMarlena has recently objectedand moved to High Courtagainst the cricketer-turned-politician alleging that he hasenrolled twice as a voter inRajender Nagar and KarolBagh Assembly segments inviolation of the Representationof the People Act.

" The issue came to ourknowledge only through themedia reports that Gambhir isallegedly register as a voterfrom two places. However, wedid not receive any complainton the matter from anyone yet.Thus, the action and inquiry inthe matter will be only takenafter receiving a complaintagainst the respected candi-date," said Ranbir Singh, CEODelhi.

The Election Commissioncarries out a routine exercise to

detect and delete duplicateentries in the electoral rollbefore elections. When asked ifthe authorities failed to detectduplicate entries in Gambhir'scase, an official said, "Theprocess of deleting duplicateentries is carried out througha software. The poll panel can-not be blamed if the softwarefails to detect such anomalies."

Gambhir, however, hasrejected the allegation, sayinghe possesses only one voteridentity card. "I have only onevoter ID card from RajenderNagar. I used to live with mymaternal grandparents as achild at Ramjas Road (in KarolBagh), but I never voted fromor applied for any voter iden-tity card from there," he hadsaid earlier.

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Delhi Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) President Manoj

Tiwari staged a road show inSeemapuri assembly con-stituency on Monday. HittingAam Aadmi Party (AAP) andCongress party, Tiwari saidboth the parties have pushedcountry into backwardness.

"Corruption , terrorismwere rampant while congresswas ruling," said Tiwari who iscontesting election against for-mer Delhi Chief MinisterShiela Dikshit from north eastparliamentary constituency.

Bhojpuri star turned politi-cian Tiwari managed to gath-er a good crowd during hisroad show that started fromMother Dairy Tonga Standand passed through NandNagari, Sunder Nagri, NewSeemapuri, Janta Flats, NewSeemapuri, Dilshad Garden,Jagatpuri Extension and con-cluded at Jagatpuri.

Lauding the efforts of BJPbooth workers, Tiwari said,"Congress and AAP, both par-ties have damaged the countryand Delhi like a disease where-as during the last five years."

BJP leader MeenakshiLekhi and sitting MP fromNew Delhi inaugurated anopen gym in Lodhi colony.

Recalling her visit to Europewhere she first noticed conceptof open gym, she said 400open air gym have been set upin New Delhi.

"New Delhi Area has seenoverall development whether itis about the Solar Basti in RKPuram or laying down of newroads, installations of pink toi-lets for women," said Lekhiwho is contesting Lok Sabhaelection against Congressleader Ajay Makan.

Stepping up his campaignfor the re-election, South Delhi

MP Ramesh Bidhuri heldmeetings with booth workersin Dakshinpuri area.Addressing workers, Bidhurisaid that 12 May will decide thefate of South Delhi.

Targeting Delhi ChiefMinister Arvind Kejriwal forblaming Central government,BJP leader said that rulingAAP and Congress are spread-ing false propaganda againstBJP. "I have created 17 ChhatGhats in my constituency," I amnot against Purvanchalis," saidBidhuri.

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Delhi Pradesh CongressCommittee president and

Congress candidate for theNorth East DelhiParliamentary constituency,Sheila Dikshit, on Monday saidCongress will sweep all theseven seats in Delhi in the LokSabha elections on the strengthof the Congress Government'sunmatched achievements dur-ing its 15-year rule in Delhi.

Addressing public meetingat Seemapuri, Dikshit said thatduring the 15-year Congressrule in Delhi, the nationalCapital witnessed massivedevelopments as new flyovers,schools, colleges and hospitalswere constructed to make thelife of the citizens easier with-out crying for full Statehood inDelhi.

"The metro project got offthe blocks in Delhi onlybecause of the planning andinitiative of the CongressGovernment when develop-ments became a constant fea-ture in Delhi," said Dikshit

Hitting out at Delhi ChiefMinister Arvind Kejriwal,Dikshit said that ArvindKejriwal was fooling the peo-ple on the issue of fullStatehood for Delhi. "Ever sinceKejriwal came to politics, hehas been mouthing lies andmaking hollow promises tofool the people, but the intelli-gent Delhi voters have seen

through his game plan, andthey would no longer be fooledby his lies and falsehood, as hispolitics have been without anyscruples," said Dikshit.

Dikshit said that hadKejriwal read about the IndianConstitution and understood itwell, he would not have beenrepeatedly telling lies to thepeople on the full Statehoodissue. She said that asking forfull Statehood for Delhi meantgoing against the grain of theIndian constitution, and

Kejriwal seems to be totallyignorant about the country'sConstitution.

Dikshit said that both theAAP and the BJP Governmentscould not deliver on theirpromises other than makingfalse claims and they wererepeating the same falsehoodthey had indulged in during the2014 Lok Sabha elections. S

She said that both the AAPand BJP were not talking abouttheir old promises as they haveno face to show to the people

due to their utterfailure to fulfill thosehollow promises.

Mounting avicious attack on theK e j r i w a lG o v e r n m e n t ,Dikshit said that theAAP Governmenthas totally failed inGovernance despitegetting a historicmajority in the DelhiAssembly.

She said thatpollution levels havereached such a crit-ical stage that peopleare now inhalingpoisonous air in theCapital, and all sortsof diseases havebeen dogging thepeople of Delhi asthe AAPGovernment haswoefully failed inthe health sector

and in controlling pollution. Dikshit said that even with-

out getting full Statehood,Delhi has so much power thatthe AAP Government couldhave achieved much in the lastfour and half years, drawing from the example ofthe previous CongressGovernment, but Kejirwal andhis team proved to be totallyincompetent in governance,and they were now looking fornew issues and excuses to foolthe people.

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The office of the ChiefElectoral officer has filed as

many as 208 First Information'sReports (FIRs) and daily diary(DD) entries, out of which 16FIRs have been filed against theBharatiya Janata Party, 13 againstthe Aam Aadmi Party, threeagainst the Congress and oneagainst the Bahujan Samaj Partyfor violating the model code ofconduct laid for the Lok SabhaElections 2019.

Beisdes this, total 3.4 lakhbanners, posters and hoardingshave been removed installedacross the national capital. Themodel code of conduct for theLok Sabha election came intoforce on March 10. The CEOfurther added that it the DelhiExcise Department has lodgeda total number of 1,155 FIRs and1,157 people arrested under theExcise Act. Under the Arms Act,424 FIRs have been filed and 496people arrested.

Authorities have seizedliquor worth Rs 3 crore and over1,400 kg of drugs. Police haveconfiscated 545 unlicensedarms. Forty-three cases havebeen registered for "misuse ofvehicles, loudspeakers, illegalmeetings and gratification ofelectors."

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With polling day drawingclose in the national

Capital, Congress candidatefrom New Delhi Lok Sabhaseat, Ajay Maken on Mondayheld various public meeting inhis constituency. Leaving nostone unturned to win election,Maken during his campaign hitout at Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) and said BJP is trying tohide its failures in creatingemployment and boosting eco-nomic activity by raking upnon issues.

Maken had visitedAyurVigyan Nagar, GurudwaraSingh Sabha, JungpuraExtension, Sat Nagar, TelMandi, PaharGanj and variousother places as part of his elec-tion campaign on Monday.

"The sealing of commer-cial establishments, an ill con-ceived complex Goods andService Tax (GST) and note-bandi (demonetization) hadbroken the back of the Indianeconomy. Now, correctingthese ill conceived policieswould be the top priority of theCongress government whenvoted to power," said Maken.

Maken accused the BJPcandidates of refusing and fail-ing to address the real issues ofunemployment and slowdownof the economy. He accusedthem of diverting the attention

of the people by raising nonissues. He further accusedModi government of destroy-ing lakhs of businesses throughtheir ill thought out policies.

Maken said that theCongress government wouldaddress the issue of unem-ployment at a war footing. Hepointed out that when UPA leftoffice the unemployment ratewas 2.3 percent while theunemployment rate under thePrime Minister Narendra Modigovernment increased to adismal 7 percent.

"Instead of creating 2 crorejobs annually promised by theBJP government, 4 crore 70lakhs jobs were lost due the illthought out demonetization

policy & followed by a complexGST," said Maken.

He said that Congress haspledged to fill 22 lakhs gov-ernment vacancies within oneyear of coming to power. "IfCongress forms government,the party's policies wouldencourage small and mediumtraders who are instrumental increating employment. Congresspolicies always favoured smalland medium businesses andtraders which is borne out bythe fact that 8-9 lakh businesseswere protected from sealing in2006 and that they would do itagain in 2019," said Maken.

He further pointed outthat MNREGA, though a pol-icy of employment for ruralpoor had benefited bothtraders and economic activityin general as the poor tend tospend what they earn.

"Schemes like MNREGAand NYAY would lead toincrease in demand for goodsand services. As a consequencethere would be increase inproduction lead to betteremployment opportunities,"said Maken

He reiterated that Modigovernment was anti busi-nessmen and anti govern-ment employees. He said thateconomic performance of thegovernment was dismal andhad led to massive unemploy-ment.

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Iam not against Purvanchalis,my identity is Jaat/Gurjar

leader though, the matter offact is Purvanchalis are moreloyal to me (BJP) and theirnumber in my constituency isalso larger as compared toJaats/Gurjars. I would say,South Delhi’s fight is not casteor community based fight aspeople will vote on Rashtavadnot on Jaativad," said SouthDelhi Member of Parliament(MP) Ramesh Bidhuri who isconfident of getting re-elected

from South Delhi parliamen-tary constituency againstCongress candidate VijenderSingh and Aam Aadmi Party(AAP)'s Raghav Chadha.

Speaking to the pioneer inan interview, Bidhuri said thatwater to every kitchen, initial-izing of Metro Phase -IV workwithin 100 days , regularizationof unauthorized colonies willbe on top of his priorities.

"Soon after the Lok Sabhaelections, I will tell people,how Delhi Chief MinisterArvind Kejriwal is misleadingthe masses on full statehood

status to Delhi. Why there is nogovernment schools and hos-pital in my constituency". Iwant to question him, whattrouble he is facing to opengovernment school/hospital inSouth Delhi. When MohallaClinics and schools are every-where in Delhi, why this 'stepmotherly' behavior with mypeople," asked Bidhuri.

Air/ noise pollution fromaircrafts operations, shrinkingridge cover, overnight choppingof tress for the constructions ofresidential cum commercialcomplex, water scarcity inSangam Vihar area, illegal con-struction in Ghitorni area,poor drainage system andnever ending traffic problem

area the grievances of SouthDelhi constituency area.

Interestingly, the con-stituency hosts - rural, semiurban and urban populationbecause the constituencytouches the border of twomajor states of Northern India- Haryana and Uttar Pradesh(UP).

When asked to whomthey want to see their leader?People smiled and replied,"The one who is educated andcan frame policies with pass-able assessment on Traffic,Environment , Road lengthswith respect to growing popu-lation in the area," said a SouthDelhi resident.

Bidhuri claimed that is

well connected with rural andurban class as well and ques-tioned his opponent VijenderSingh who belongs to Bhiwaniin Haryana. "He is an outsider;a boxer, Jaat but not a leader",Bidhuri said. When askedabout AAP candidate RaghavChadha, "He does not exist!",Bidhuri quipped.

Explaining about his con-nection with masses despitebeing an MP not Member ofLegislative Assembly (MLA),he said, "For every failure,Kejriwal blamescentral gov-ernment, why?"

"In Delhi, we haveLieutenant Governor and ChiefMinister. The tax payers under-stand Kejriwal's responsibilitiesas CM. For education, health,enforcement of environmentallaws, water supply to everyhousehold, drainage systemsare in the jurisdiction of CM

Kejriwal, but he failed to deliv-er, one can see the pathetic con-dition of water bodies," saidBidhuri.

"With Delhi DevelopmentAuthority (DDA), I worked forthe revival of water bodies inMahipalpur, Jaunpur and AayaNagar," claimed Bidhuri.

From solo rugby ground inDelhi to the regional passportoffice of 400/220KV to theestablishment of 17 Chhat Ghat, the BJP is becoming popularamong masses and challengedhis opponents for high octanepolitical battle in the con-stituency.

There are ten assemblyconstituencies in South Delhiparliamentary constituencynamely — Bijwasan , Deoli ,Kalkaji, Palam, AmbedkarNagar, Tughlukabad , Mehrauli, Sangam Vihar , Badarpurand Chhatarpur.

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Congress candidate for theNorth West Delhi

Parliamentary constituencyRajesh Lilothia while address-ing public meetings at Narelaarea on Monday accused boththe Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)of betraying the people ofDelhi as they could not deliv-er even one of the manypromises they made to thepeople.

Lilothia said that both theBJP and AAP were oppor-tunistic parties who have nointerest in the welfare of thepeople of Delhi.

He said that the BJPGovernment at the Centre has done nothing to fulfil its promises in the last fiveyears while the KejriwalGovernment has made onlyhollow promises.

Lilothia appealed to thepeople in these areas to vote forthe Congress to ensure his vic-tory and said that it was imper-ative for the Congress to win allthe seven Lok Sabha seats inDelhi as the Congress party issure to form a Government atthe Centre, under the leader-ship of Rahul Gandhi.

He said that during the last

five years of Prime MinisterNarendra Modi rule, therewere attacks on secular anddemocratic forces, and even thecommon people were notspared as they became victimsof the BJP Government's high-handedness.

He said that PrimeMinister Modi was working asthe agent of a few rich indus-trialists by totally ignoring thepoor and common people.

He said that being a localman, he knows the North WestDelhi Lok Sabha constituencyinside out, and if he is elected,he would spare no effort in thetotal development of the con-stituency.

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The Congress Governmentin Madhya Pradesh was

left red-faced on the voting dayon Monday when powertripped at a polling booth inChhindwara district, forcing itshigh-profile voter and ChiefMinister Kamal Nath to cast hisvote in flashlight of cameras ofmediapersons.

Nath was among the earlyones to cast his vote for the LokSabha polls in Chhindwaraseat, where his son Nakul Nathis in the fray from theCongress. The Chief Ministeralong with his wife, son anddaughter-in-law arrived at apolling booth in Shikapur areaaround 8 am.

Power supply tripped forsome time when the chief min-ister and his family memberswere inside the polling booth,election micro-observerNarendra Singh Sisodia toldPTI. An eye witness said Nathvoted in the flashlight of cam-eras of media persons.

When asked about the inci-dent and power outage, Nathtold reporters that he wouldlook into the matter.

Power supply was restoredat the booth after nearly 25-30minutes, an official said. Powertripping has become a majorpoll issue in Madhya Pradesh.Earlier in the day, polling for thefirst phase in the state began inthe six Lok Sabha seats of Sidhi,Shahdol, Jabalpur, Mandla,Balaghat and Chhindwara.

By-election to ChhindwaraAssembly constituency, where

the Chief Minister is in the fray,is also underway. A poll officialsaid Nath would not be able toexercise his democratic right inthe Assembly bypoll as he is aregistered voter from SaunsarAssembly seat.

Nath, who is sitting MPfrom Chhindwara, needs to getelected as an MLA to validate his stay in office asChief Minister.

Ranchi: A CRPF jawan savedthe life of an on-duty electionofficial in Jharkhand onMonday after he carried himon his shoulders for about 3 kmwhen the latter fell sick duringpolling, a senior official said.

He said the incident tookplace at booth number 179 inSarango in Gumla district atabout 4 pm when a staffer,Leonard Lakda, at the centresuddenly collapsed with ableeding nose.

Constable Anil Sharma ofthe CRPF’s 226th battalion wasdeployed at the booth for secu-rity duty and seeing this, heimmediately picked up Lakdaon his shoulders and rushed toa nearby health centre, about 3km from the booth, he said.

As Gumla is a Naxal-affect-ed region, armed commandosof the CRPF accompanied theircolleague to the health centre,the official added. Doctors ofthe health centre praised thejawan for his intelligent andbold move as that saved the lifeof the election official whoprobably was hit by the severeheat wave prevailing in thearea, he said. PTI

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Cyclone ‘Fani’ intensifiedinto a ‘severe cyclonic

storm’ on Monday eveningand is headed towards theOdisha coast, the IndiaMeteorological Department(IMD) said.

It could take a shape of an‘extremely severe cyclone’ byWednesday, prompting thegovernment to put the NationalDisaster Response Force andthe Indian Coast Guard onhigh alert, officials said. In its9 pm bulletin, the CycloneWarning Division of the IMDsaid the storm currently laysabout 620 km east-northeast ofthe Trincomalee in Sri Lanka,770 km east-southeast ofChennai and 900 km south-southeast of Machilipatnam.

“The Cyclonic storm ‘Fani’(pronounced as Foni) overSoutheast Bay of Bengal andneighbourhood moved north-northwestwards with a speed ofabout 16 kilometres per hour inlast six hours, intensified intoa severe cyclonic storm.

“It is very likely to intensi-fy into a very severe cyclonicstorm during next 24 hours andinto an extremely severecyclonic storm during subse-quent 24 hours. It is very like-ly to move northwestwards tillMay 1 evening and thereafterrecurve north-northeastwardstowards the Odisha coast,” thebulletin said.

The National CrisisManagement Committee(NCMC), the country’s topbody to deal with emergencysituation, Monday took stock ofthe situation arising out ofcyclone ‘Fani’ and assured thestate governments concernedof all assistance from theCentral Government to face the storm.

The NDRF and the IndianCoast Guard have been put onhigh alert and the fishermenhave been asked not to ventureinto the sea as cyclone ‘Fani’ isexpected to intensify into a‘very severe storm’ by Tuesday,the Home Ministry said.

The wind speed of acyclonic storm is 80-90 kilo-metres per hour with windgusting up to 100 kmph. In caseof an ‘extremely severe cyclonicstorm’, the wind speed goes upto 170-180 kmph and couldgain the speed of 195 kmph.

Light to moderate rainfallat a few places is very likely overnorth coastal Andhra Pradeshand south coastal Odisha onThursday. The precipitation is

likely to increase intensity with‘heavy to very heavy rainfall’ atisolated places over coastalOdisha and adjoining districtsof north coastal AndhraPradesh from Thursday.

Light to moderate rainfallis expected at many places.Downpour at isolated places isalso very likely to start overcoastal districts of West Bengalfrom Friday, the IMD said.

The NCMC met hereunder the chairmanship ofCabinet Secretary PK Sinhaand took stock of the situation.Chief secretaries, principal sec-retaries of Tamil Nadu, AndhraPradesh, Odisha and WestBengal attended the meetingthrough video conference.

Senior officers from thecentral ministries and agenciesconcerned also attended themeeting. The NDRF and theIndian Coast Guard are coor-dinating with the StateGovernments. The HomeMinistry has assured the StateGovernments to release inadvance the first instalment ofthe State Disaster Response

Fund (SDRF), as per theirrequest, a Home Ministrystatement said.

During the meeting, offi-cers of all the StateGovernments concerned con-firmed their full preparednessto deal with any emerging sit-uation arising out of thecyclonic storm.

Further, the StateGovernment highlighted thatthere is a seasonal ban on fish-ing in sea up to June 14 due tobreeding season. The StateGovernments were advised toeffectively enforce this ban

According to the IMD, thecyclone’s landfall over TamilNadu and Andhra Pradesh isruled out. However, the possi-bility of landfall in Odisha isunder continuous watch.

Regular warnings havebeen issued since April 25 tofishermen not to venture intothe sea and asking those at seato return to the coast. The IMDhas been issuing three hourlybulletins with latest forecast toall the states concerned. TheHome Ministry is also in con-tinuous touch with the stategovernments and the centralagencies concerned, the state-ment said.

The NCMC meeting fol-lowed directions from PrimeMinister Narendra Modi, whois closely monitoring the situ-ation. The NCMC will meetagain on Tuesday to take stockof the situation.

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Jammu & Kashmir police onMonday claimed to have

busted the Hizbul Mujahideen(HM) module responsible forthe car bomb attack on CRPFconvoy near Tethar area ofBanihal on Jammu-SrinagarNational Highway.

On March 30, 2019 at 1015hrs, a car bomb attack was car-ried out by terrorists at NHWTethar Banihal. In this regarda case FIR No 39/19 U/S307/120/120A/121/121A RPC,4/5 Explosive Substances Act,15/16 /18/20 ULA (P) Act wasregistered at Police StationBanihal and investigation washanded over to SDPO Banihal.

A day later police teamshad managed to arrest suicidebomber namely Owais AminS/O Mohd Amin R/O VehilShopian. During his sustainedinterrogation, he revealed in

front of investigations that hewas from HM and was in a sui-cide mission.

Addressing a press confer-ence late evening here in policecontrol room, IG, Jammu rangeMK Sinha said, “leads given byOwais led to the arrest of otheraccomplices namely UmarShafi s/O Mohd Shafi , AqibShah S/O Mohd Shafi Shahboth R/O Vehil Shopian,Shahid Wani @ Watson S/OMohd Ayub Wani R/OKinhama Shopian and WasimAhmed Dar @ Doctor S/OAbdul Majeed Dar R/OChakora Pulwama.

Sinha said, “Owais Aminwas motivated by an active HMCommander Rayees AhmedKhan @ Imaad Khan R/oShopian and Omar Shafi toattack the security forces on thedirections of the HM ChiefCommander Riyaz Naikoo”.

He further disclosed that

the car which was used in theblast on 30th March 2019 wasfabricated by Waseem @Doctor and some other mili-tants and was handed over tohim to attack a convoy of secu-rity forces. On 30th March, onan appropriate moment, hechose the target of CRPF con-voy and detonated the car inwhich he was sitting but theexplosion packed in the caronly blasted partially and hesurvived with injuries. Next dayi.e on 31st March 2019, he wasapprehended by Naka party ofJKP and Army while he wastrying to flee back to Kashmir.

The module of HM mili-tants in this case has beenarrested by police. On the dis-closure of Wasim and acting ona specific information anothermember of the HM Moduleinvolved in this car blast attacknamely Hilal Mantoo S/OGulam Rasool Mantoo R/O

Chakora Pulwama (Kashmir)was arrested by a team of SOGJammu headed by Dy. SP PCIftkhar Chaudhary fromCentral University Punjabwhere he was pursuing his Ph.D degree.

Hilal Mantoo during inter-rogation revealed that he was aclose confidante of HM com-mander Dr. Saifullah who isoperating in South Kashmirand who has motivated many youth of the area to joinmilitancy.

Hilal Mantoo furtherrevealed that the vehicle IEDwas fabricated by a group ofterrorists including Waseem@ Doctor (now arrested), HilalMantoo himself, Munna Bihari(Pakistani terrorist of JeM),Shah Jahan R/O Pulwama alsoof JeM and Sahil Abdullah.Sahil has been missing from hishouse after the incident andpossibly has become active.

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A56-year-old man wasarrested from Jaipur on

Monday for killing a 52 year-old woman after allegedlysmothering her in Dwarka’sSector-7 area. The body of thedeceased was found last weekon Friday at her house inDwarka.

The accused has been iden-tified as Dinesh Dixit, a resi-dent of Jaipur in Rajasthan.

According to a seniorpolice official, police hadarrested Dixit from Jaipur onMonday evening.

“During interrogation, itwas revealed that the accusedperson was in contact with thedeceased from last couple ofmonths and had visited herhouse many a times in thepast,” said the senior police offi-cial. “The accused had came tomeet her on Thursday after-noon and remained there tillFriday morning. Dixit alsorevealed that he smotheredthe victim and fled the spotwith cash and jewellery, theysaid, adding further details areawaited,” said the senior policeofficial. Earlier, a former IAFwing commander’s wife wasfound dead at her house inDwarka’s Sector-7 area.

The deceased was identi-fied as Meenu Jain (52), a res-ident of Air Force NavalOfficers’ Enclave in DwarkaSector-7.

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From Page 1“Considering the assur-

ance, I wrote to the PMO,Home Ministry, DG BSF andHuman Rights Commissionseveral times to bring out thediscrepancies and corruption inBSF. Instead of taking anyaction, the authorities startedharassing me,” he said.

“I was eventually dismissedfrom the BSF. This makes itclear that the PM is hand ingloves with the corrupt. On onehand, he claims that he isfighting corruption and, onthe other, he is finishing thosewho are fighting against cor-ruption,” the agitated formerBSF constable said.

In 2017, the BSF had set upa court of inquiry against Yadavafter he claimed in a viralvideo that the dal served tothem was watery and the cha-patis were burnt.

An investigation was

ordered into the incident by theUnion Home Ministry and thePMO had sought a report.Yadav was shifted out of LoCand was later on dismissed oncharges of indiscipline.

When asked why he wascontesting against Modi and noother BJP minister, the ex-BSF constable said, “I lost myson in January, now I havenothing to lose. I have only oneoption and that is to reachParliament and raise the voiceof the security personnel. Thatis why I have decided to con-test election against PMNarendra Modi.”

Sharing his action plan forthe election, Yadav claimed tohave the support of at least10,000 retired security per-sonnel. “We don’t have moneyto fight elections, also now Idon’t have a job. Our only wayto reach people is throughdoor-to-door campaign andwe will do that. We will tell thepeople the reality of the claimsthat Modiji makes about doingwelfare of the jawans. We havethe backing of around 10,000retired security personnel whohave pledged their support tome along with some socialorganisations,” he said.

From Page 1A day later, senior

Congress leader AbhishekManu Singhvi, acting as Rahul’slawyer, requested that the casebe closed.

As former AttorneyGeneral Mukul Rohatgi, argu-ing on behalf of the BJP, object-ed. Singhvi pointed out that thecourt had “not issued notice” tohis client but only asked for anexplanation to which the ChiefJustice responded by saying“You (Singhvi) are pointingout we have forgotten to issuenotice. We will cure it by issu-ing notice”. The Supreme Court

on April 23 issued notice tohim on the criminal contemptpetition.

“It is also clear that nocourt would ever do that andhence the unfortunate refer-ences (for which I expressregret) to the court order andto the political slogan in jux-taposition the same breath inthe heat of political campaign-ing was ought not to be con-strued as suggesting that thecourt had given any finding orconclusion on that issue,” Rahulsaid in his latest affidavit.

In his affidavit, the Gandhiscion said he did not have the

slightest or remotest intention tobring the court into politicalarena, or bring it into disreputeby attributing something whichthe court had not said. “At theoutset, it is clarified that theanswering respondent (Rahul)did not have the slightest orremotest intention, desire oreven thought process to bringthe court into the politicalarena, or bring it into disreputeor attribute to it deliberately orwillfully that which the courthas not said or meant,” he said

Rahul said several limbs ofthe Government and of the rul-ing party have repeatedly stat-

ed that the December 14 lastyear’s order of the apex courtconstitute a clean chit to theGovernment. “The answeringrespondent (Rahul) would alsosubmit that his statement onApril 10, 2019, had also beenmade in that context, purelypolitically, to counter the afore-said misinformation campaignbeing led by senior func-tionaries of the BJP as well asthe Government that the judge-ment of this court datedDecember 14, 2018, was aclean chit to the Governmentregarding all the aspect of theRafale deal.

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���������666From Page 1

Chhindwara, the Lok Sabhaconstituency held consistently byKamal Nath since 1980 has hisson Nakul Nath now seekingmandate from the seat, a pock-et borough of the Nath family.

State BJP president RakeshSingh and former UnionMinister and BJP’s tribal faceFaggan Singh Kulaste are in thefield from Jabalpur and Mandla,respectively. Lok Sabha elec-tions in MP will be held in fourphases on April 29, and May 6,12 and May 19, the last phase.

In Uttar Pradesh, seniorCongress leader SalmanKhurshid is locked in a three-way electoral contest from histraditional constituency ofFarrukhabad where he is facingthe challenge of overcomingthe “Modi factor” and out-smarting the SP-BSP-RLD coali-tion in capturing the anti-BJPvote. The opponents ofKhurshid, a former UnionMinister who has held portfoliosof External Affairs, Law andMinorities, may not be politicalheavyweights, but BJP’s sittingMP Mukesh Rajput and BSP’sManoj Agarwal are tough oppo-nents on a seat which is notdominated by a single caste, reli-gion or social group.

In Bihar Begusarai is wit-nessing contest betweenKanaihya Kumar and Giriraj

Singh. A number of film artists,including Shabana Azmi andJaved Akhtar, have campaignedfor Kumar. The BJP haddescribed Kumar as the part of‘Tukde-Tukde gang’ as Kumarhas described Singh as an “out-sider” in Begusarai.

Several Bollywood stars,including Rekha, Madhuri Dixit,Aamir Khan, Priyanka Chopraand Kareena Kapoor Khan, casttheir vote as Mumbai went topolls in the fourth phase of LokSabha elections in Maharashtra.

Polling was completed for17 seats in the State, includingsix in Mumbai. Actor UrmilaMatondkar, Congress candidatefrom Mumbai-North, wasamong the early voters. PriyaDutt (Congress) ,PoonamMahajan (BJP) and ArvindSawant (Shiv Sena) are alsocontestants from Mumbai’s LokSabha constituencies.

Veteran singer Asha Bhosle,actors Hrithik Roshan, VidyaBalan, Emraan Hashmi,Kangana Ranaut, VarunDhawan, Sanjay Dutt and wifeManyata, writer-lyricist JavedAkhtar, Gulzar, filmmakerRakeysh Om Prakash Mehraand Prem Chopra also voted.

In West Bengal the seat thatwent to poll are: Baharampur,Krishnagar, Ranaghat (SC),Burdwan East (SC), Burdwan-Durgapur, Asansol, Bolpur (SC)and Birbhum. They all saw afour-cornered contest between

the Trinamool Congress, the BJP,the Congress and the Left Front.

Celebrity candidate SatabdiRoy was the TMC’s name fromthe Birbhum seat against BJP’sDudh Kumar Mondal. TheCongress has nominated ImamHossain and the CPI (M) namedRezaul Karim for the seat.

The TMC has fieldedApurba Sarkar (David) againstthe Congress MP, Adhir RanjanChowdhury in the Baharampurseat. The Left Front constituentRSP has nominated IdMohammad, while the BJP hasnamed Krishna Joyardar.

In Krishnagar, the TMChas fielded Mahua Moitraagainst BJP’s Kalyan Chaubey, afootballer. The Congress hasnominated Intaj Ali Shah andthe CPI(M) Shantanu Jha.

Ranaghat (SC) will seeTMC’s Rupali Biswas lockinghorns with BJP’s JagannathSarkar. Congress has nominatedMinati Biswas and the CPI (M)Rama Biswas. In the BurdwanEast (SC) seat, TMC’s SunilKumar Mondal will contestagainst Paresh Chandra Das ofthe BJP. The Congress has field-ed Siddhartha Majumdar andthe CPI (M) Iswar ChandraDas. Mamtaz Sanghamita is theTMC candidate from theBurdwan-Durgapur seat againstBJP’s SS Ahluwalia. TheCongress has nominated RanajitMukherjee and the CPI (M)named Abhas Ray Chaudhuri.

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

From Page 1Addressing a huge rally at

Bagda in North 24 Parganasshe said “Modi has allowed hisparty to loot India.”

Questioning the reasonbehind the Prime Minister’ssilence on his five year’s per-formance, Mamata said “this isan election not to elect theChief Minister but the PrimeMinister where he has toaccount for his performance for the past five years. Instead of doing so he is attack-ing me here.”

Claiming that the BJP wason its way out she said, “In UPwhich had last time given themthe maximum number of con-stituencies the BJP will not getmore than 13 seats which iswhy they are trying peepthrough the window here. Butwe will not even give them asingle seat.”

On NRC, Mamata said,“These people who call them-selves champions of the Hindushave driven out 22 lakh HinduBengalis from Assam and nowthey are trying to invadeBengal. But we will not allowthem to do so. We will teachthem a lesson if they touch theBengalis here.”

������������<<<

From Page 1“I am saying from my heart

that whatever you need, I willfulfil that. I belong to you andwill never go anywhere else.”

The ruling Congress inPunjab had earlier targetedSunny, alleging that he will“disappear” once the elections

are over.In his first ballot battle,

Sunny is is pitted against sittingCongress MP and party’s Stateunit chief Sunil Jakhar, AamAadmi Party’s Peter Masih andPeople’s Democratic Alliance’sLal Chand.

Jakhar won the seat in a2017 by-election, necessitatedby the death of Vinod Khannain April that year. The actor hadrepresented the seat four-times,in 1998, 1999, 2004 and 2014.

Before filing his papers inGurdaspur, Sunny Deol offeredprayers at the Golden Templeand the Durgiana Temple inAmritsar, and also visitedBalmiki Ram Tirath.

����� /+�%��/

Agroup of people set on firemore than 20 vehicles of a

private firm in Dhanbad aftera villager was injured in firingallegedly by the company staff on Monday, police sourcessaid here.

The mob also damagedthe vehicle of Sindri DeputySuperintendent of PolicePramod Kesri when he went toclear the road of the protesters.Two police constables werealso injured, they said.

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Reports of electronic votingmachines ( EVMs) glitch-

es were reported from severalconstituencies in Uttar Pradesh,Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Odishaand Maharashtra during thefourth phase of the ongoingLok Sabhe elections leading todelays in the voting process onMonday. The Congress made30 complaints to the EC aboutalleged glitches in EVMs acrossthe 17 Lok Sabha constituen-cies in Maharashtra wherepolling was underway.

In Uttar Pradesh’s Kannauj,polling couldn’t begin on timeat booth numbers 35 and 435of Chhibramau area due to asnag in the EVM. Also, thepolling process was delayed atbooth number 189 and 196 ofChhibramau after a glitch inEVM was detected. Due toEVM glitches, polling alsodelayed Tirwa, Bidhuna,Niboh, Gursahayganj,Mirgaion, Naipal, Nadasia andAtara villages.Voters in thequeue alleged that the not a sin-gle vote could be casted at thebooth since the morning.

Meanwhile, polling wasstalled in booths no 74 and 76in Shahjahanpur. In Kanpur,polling was delayed in GovindNagar and Arya Nagar due to

EVM faults. “It hasn’t beenworking since the polling start-ed at 7 am. Not even one votehas been cast here. Voting hasnot started because of a glitchin EVM,” one of the voterswaiting in queue claimed. Thiswas also the case in six placesin Jhansi. EVMs were found tobe faulty in Lalitpur, Akbarpur,Farukkhabad and Lakhimpur.

UP’s Chief ElectoralOfficer L. Venkateshwarlu saidthat the problems were sortedout at the earliest. “There werereports of EVM snags whichaddressed soon so that pollingcould resume”, he said.

Meanwhile, SamajwadiParty MLA Arvind KumarSingh also wrote a letter to

Chief Electoral Officer (CEO)highlighting EVM malfunc-tions at several booths in thestate.

The EVM glitch has beenreported from Maharashtra’sPatlipada. The machine wasreplaced after one hour.However, most of the voterswent home after waiting for anhour. Another EVM snag wasreported in Mumbai’s Panvelwhere an EVM stopped work-ing at Gujarati Shala poolbooth. It was replaced in anhour.

In Suri, the headquartersof the Birbhum district in WestBengal the polling process wasstalled due to a glitch in theEVM.

In Odisha, according toreports, glitches in EVMsdelayed polling at 60 booths.This is the fourth and finalphase of polling in Odisha. InOdisha, voting delayed at boothnumber 71, 183, 198, 220 inBhandaripokhari, Dhamnagar(booth no 222, 244, 245, 54,243), Soro (booth no 2, 46,208,50), Simulia (booth no119, 109, 110), Basudevpur(booth no 69,114,116),Chandbali (booth no 216, 14,239) in Bhadrak due to EVMglitches

Voting delayed due toEVM glitches in booth no 219,268 in Kakatpur, booth no 42,66 of Nimapara, booth no 214in Paradip, multiple places inKujanga. The reports of EVMglitches also reported booth no226 & 128 in Aul and booth no213 in Aienda of MahangaKendrapara, booth no 115 ofDharmasala, booth no 110 ofBari a booth no 96 of Jajpur.

EVM machines at MaulanaAzad School in Jodhpur and atthe Chaupasani Housing Boardin the same city were reportedto be faulty early on Monday,resulting in protests by voters.In Bihar, polling was delayed atthree booths in Munger, two inDarbhanga and three inBegusarai due to glitches inEVMs.

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The Defence Ministry onMonday inked a contract

worth over �6,311 crore withKolkata-based defence ship-yard Garden ReachShipbuilders and EngineersLimited (GRSE) for the con-struction of eight Anti-Submarine Warfare ShallowWater Crafts (ASWSWCs).

As per the contract, thefirst ship is to be deliveredwithin 42 months from con-tract signing date and subse-quent balance ships deliveryschedule will be two ships peryear. The project completiontime is 84 months from the dayof signing the deal, the ministrysaid here.

The Navy had issued theRequest For Proposal (RFP) fordesign, construction and sup-ply of the eight ASWSWCs toDefence Public SectorUndertaking (DPSU) shipyardsand private shipyards in April2014 and the GRSE emerged asthe successful bidder.

The ships weighing 750tons each can carry 57 per-sonnel and can reach speed of

25 knots. These ships are capa-ble of full-scale sub surface sur-veillance of coastal waters andcoordinated anti submarinewarfare operations with air-craft. The ships can also bedeployed for search and rescueby day and night in coastalareas. In their secondary role,these will be capable to prose-cute intruding aircraft, and laymines in the sea bed, officialssaid.

The vessels are equippedwith highly advanced state-of-the-art integrated platformmanagement systems includingPropulsion Machinery,Auxiliary Machinery, PowerGeneration and DistributionMachinery and DamageControl Machinery. These war-ships will be built as perClassification Society Rules andNaval Ship Regulations andwill conform to latest MarinePollution Standards of theInternational MaritimeOrganization (IMO) and Safetyof Life at Sea (SOLAS). Thedesign and construction of theseships at GRSE is another sig-nificant milestone in the ‘Makein India’ initiative, they added.

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The Election Commission(EC) on Monday “strongly

condemned” Union MinisterManeka Gandhi for her“ABCD” remark in Sultanpurwhere she warned voters thatGovernment work suffers inareas which do not vote for hereven as it issued a show causenotice to another UnionMinister and BJP leader GirirajSingh for his communalremarks. He has been given 24hours to respond to the notice.

In another order, the pollbody has directed not to release‘Laxmi’s NTR’ movie till furtherorder.

Condemning ManekaGandhi for her remarks inSultanpur, the EC said in itsorder that Maneka has notonly violated provisions of themodel code, but also theRepresentation of the PeopleAct dealing with “corrupt prac-tice”. The commission alsowarned her not to repeat “suchmisconduct in future”.

Addressing a poll meetingin Sarkoda village in Sultanpur,Uttar Pradesh on April 14,Maneka had said, “We win inPilibhit every time, so what is

the parameter that we workmore for one village and less forthe other?” “The parameter isthat we segregate all villages asA, B, C, and D. The villagewhere we get 80 per cent votesis A, the village in which we get60 per cent is B, the village inwhich we get 50 per cent is keptin C category and the villagewhere we get less than 50 percent is marked as D.” She saidthe development work firsthappens in all A category vil-lages. Then comes B and onlyafter work in B is done, we startwith C, the minister had said.

On April 15, the poll panelhad reprimanded her andbarred her from holding cam-paigning for 48 hours for hercommunal remarks.

Issuing a show cause noticeto Union Minister Giriraj Singh,the poll body said that primafacie, Singh has violated provi-sions of the model code anddirections of the SupremeCourt which had said that reli-gion cannot be used whilemaking statements during cam-paigning. Taking suo motucognizance, the Begusarai dis-trict administration in Biharhad on April 25 booked Singhfor violating the model code of

conduct and the Representationof the People Act by makingcontroversial remarks againstMuslims at a rally on April 24,where BJP president Amit Shahwas also present. In the 2014Lok Sabha election, he wasbarred from campaigning inBihar and Jharkhand for com-munal remarks.

In Birbhum constituency,the EC has show-caused BJPcandidate Dudh KumarMondal after he was seen talk-ing over a mobile phone insidea polling booth, just beforecasting his ballot. Notably, thepoll panel has put TMC’sBirbhum president AnubrataMondal under scanner afterpoll workers complained thatthey feel “threatened” by hispresence.

In another order, the ECdirected producers not torelease the movie on Laxmi’sNTR till further order. In itsorder directing the producersof ‘Laxmi’s NTR’, said the biopicof the late NT Rama Rao,which ‘purported’ to depictincumbent state Chief MinisterN Chandrababu Naidu in amanner ‘allegedly diminish-ing the electoral prospects ofhis party’.

New Delhi: The Supreme Courton Monday sought a responsefrom the Election Commissionon a plea seeking setting asidea rule which provides for pros-ecution of an elector if thecomplaint alleging malfunc-tioning of EVMs and VVPATseventually turns out to be false.

A bench headed by ChiefJustice Ranjan Gogoi took noteof the plea, which alleged thatRule 49MA of ‘The Conduct ofElections Rules’ was unconsti-tutional as it criminalizes report-ing of malfunctioning ofElectronic Voting Machines andVoter Verified Paper Audit Trails.

The plea alleged thatputting the onus on the electorin cases of arbitrary deviantbehaviour of machines used inelection process, infringes upona citizen’s right to freedom ofexpression under theConstitution.

The bench, which com-prised justices Deepak Guptaand Sanjiv Khanna, also issueda notice to the Centre on theplea filed by Sunil Ahya.

His plea has sought a direc-tion to the EC to register acomplaint of any deviant

behaviour of equipment usedin the election process.

The petition said thatpresently, the burden of proof,rests on the elector for report-ing any deviant behaviour ofEVMs and VVPATs, who willface criminal charges irrespec-tive of whether the complaintwas truthful and honest.

It said that when an electoris asked to cast test vote as pre-scribed under Rule 49MA, hemay not be able to reproduce thesame result which he was com-plaining about, one more timein a sequence, because of thepre-programmed deviant behav-iour of the electronic machines.

“In the course of reportingthe deviant behaviour of anelectronic machine used in theelection process, an elector hasto cast two votes; first one insecrecy and the second a testvote in the presence of the can-didates or polling agents. A testvote cast subsequently in thepresence of others cannotbecome a conclusive evidenceof the deviant behaviour orotherwise of the previous votecast in absolute secrecy,” theplea said. PTI

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New Delhi: The Supreme Courthas given the legal burial to acase which had sought judicialintervention to reclaim the 108-carat Kohinoor diamond fromthe United Kingdom.

A five-judge bench headedby Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoidismissed a curative petitionseeking to re-examine its 2017verdict in which it had said thatit cannot pass order forreclaiming Kohinoor diamondfrom the UK or to stop it frombeing auctioned.

Kohinoor, which meansMountain of Light, is a large,colourless diamond that wasfound in Southern India inearly 14th century.

The 108-carat Kohinoorgem, which fell into Britishhands during the colonial era,is the subject of a historicownership dispute and claimedby at least four countriesincluding India. PTI

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The Supreme Court onMonday directed the

Punjab and Haryana HighCourt Registry not to appointany civil judge in Haryanawithout its nod and sum-moned the Registrar Generalwith all the selection recordspertaining to the exams held tofill 107 posts in lower judicia-ry.

The top court was hearingthe plea filed by 92 aspirantsto the post of Civil Judge(Junior Division) in Haryana.They alleged that 1,282 exam-inees, who had qualified thepreliminary tests, appearedfor the mains and out themonly 9 were selected for theinterview against a total 107vacancies.

“Issue notice, returnableon May 3. The RegistrarGeneral of the High Court ofPunjab and Haryana will bepresent with the records of theselection, including the eval-uation of the answer scripts ofall the candidates appeared inthe Main WrittenExamination.

“No appointments will bemade without leave of thecourt,” said a bench headed byChief Justice Ranjan Gogoi.

The plea, filed throughPrashant Bhushan, AmiyShukla and Shakti Vardhan, haslisted out several discrepanciesand sought quashing of theresult of the Main (Written)Examination of Civil Judge(Junior Division) in theHaryana, which was declaredon April 11.

The bench, which alsocomprised Justices DeepakGupta and Sanjiv Khanna, washearing the petition challeng-ing the selection process andevaluation method adopted inthe examination on thegrounds of being “unreason-able, arbitrary and malafide”.

The plea alleged that if theexamination’s selection processwas not stayed, it would causeirreparable damage to the peti-tioners and other un-success-ful candidates.

The petitioners alleged thatvarious RTI applications werefiled immediately after theresult of the main examinationseeking disclosure of marks,copies of answer scripts, modelanswers and marking criteria,but to no avail and the inter-view tests were scheduled onthe basis of the already declaredresults.

The petitioners havealleged that there was a “seri-ous problem” with the evalua-tion method being conductedfor selecting judicial officers inHaryana.

A total 14,301 studentstook the preliminary exami-nation held on December 22,2018 for total 107 vacancies.

“1,282 students, out of14,301, who were declared suc-cessful in preliminary exami-nation, took the main exami-nation held on March 15 and17, 2019,” it said.

The main examination wascleared only by nine studentsout of 1,282, against the totalvacancies of 107 which meansthat a total of 99.298 percent ofthe students failed the test, theplea said.

It further said that it was“surprising” and “invited dis-belief ” that at least 20-30 can-didates, who had appearedfor the main exam but werenot selected for the intervieware those who have alreadycleared judicial examinationsof other states or are sittingjudges in their respectivestates.

“Some of the candidateswho have not been found fit forthe interview are the toppersand gold medalists in theirrespective reputed law col-leges, the plea said.

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The CBI has taken over theprobe into the Chennai

Pollachi sexual harassment.The case pertain to alleged sex-ual harassment of a woman atPollachi in Coimbatore districtby a gang of men, who shot avideo of the incident andblackmailed her for money.

The CBI has registeredtwo FIRs in the matter — onepertaining to sexual harass-ment of the woman and anoth-er related to assault on herbrother — against differentsets of the accused. Both thecases were registered by CBI onFriday.

The CBI had taken over theinvestigation into the case fromthe state police that had regis-tered the cases at Pollachipolice station in Coimbatore.The State’s CB-CID was earli-er probing the cases.

The gang of the sexualpredators is believed to havesexually harassed and black-mailed a large number ofwomen in Tamil Nadu, whichtriggered an outrage in the stateafter which the governmenttransferred the case to the CBIciting the need for specialisedattention, dedicated investiga-tion with technical expertise andthe extremely serious nature ofthe crime as reason for probe by

the Central agency. A four-member gang of the

sexual assaulters had onFebruary 12 allegedly tried tostrip the woman inside a carnear Pollachi, over 500 kmfrom Chennai, and shot a videoof the act and blackmailed herusing the visuals.

The victim, who managedto free herself, lodged a com-plaint with police on February24, according to her complaintwhich part of the FIR.

The case assumed politicalovertones as a local functionaryof the ruling AIADMK alleged-ly attacked the victim’s brother.

The attack by the politicalfunctionary, who was later

expelled from the party byAIADMK, led to a state-wideoutrage.

Following reports that gangassaulted several other womenin a similar way led theOpposition DMK to charge theAIADMK for allegedly shield-ing the accused persons.

The four accused in thecase — Sabarirajan, Sathish,Thirunavakkarasu andVasanthkumar — are under-going judicial custody.

The accused have beenbooked under various sectionsof the Indian Penal Code,Tamil Nadu Prohibition ofHarassment of Women Actand the Goondas Act.

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Antimicrobial resistance(AMR), which is already

posing a huge health problemin India and making it par-ticularly hard to treat diseaseslike Tuberculosis, childhoodsepsis and malaria, has thepotential to cause 10 milliondeaths a year worldwide by2050 and damage to the glob-al economy similar to the 2008-09 financial crisis, warned anew United Nations reportreleased on Monday.

The InteragencyCoordination Group onAntimicrobial Resistance(IACG), which has membersfrom the World HealthOrganization, the Food andAgriculture Organization andthe World Organisation forAnimal Health, handed over itsfirst groundbreaking report tothe United Nations secretary-general on Monday. The groupwas formed in September 2016

with a mandate to providepractical guidance to ensuresustained and effective globalaction to address AMR.

Painting a gloomy sce-nario, the report said that by2030, antimicrobial resistancecould force up to 24 millionpeople into extreme poverty ifimmediate, coordinated andambitious action to avert apotentially disastrous drug-resistance crisis is not taken.Already, at least 700,000 peo-ple die each year due to drug-resistant diseases.

Also, the AMR poses a“formidable threat” in theattainment of the SustainableDevelopment Goals (SDGs),particularly in developingcountries, noting that if “super-bugs” are not stopped, SDG tar-gets will likely not be met by2030, said the report.

Some of the major recom-mendations that could savethousands of lives every yearand a few things in the report

apply directly to India whichhas prepared a National actionplan against AMR that focuseson six strategic priority areas,namely awareness and under-standing through education,communication and training,strengthening knowledge andevidence through surveillance.

It also talks about infectionprevention and control, opti-mised antimicrobial use inhealth, animals and food,AMR-related research andinnovation and strengthenedleadership and commitmentat international, national andsub-national levels.

However, more needs to bedone as the burden of infec-tious disease in India is highand healthcare spending isabysmally low, just 1.2% of theGDP. The country has one ofthe highest bacterial diseaseburdens in the world.

The UN report hasdemanded phasing out of antibi-otics as animal growth promot-

ers, emphasis on replenishingthe pipeline of new antibioticsand the need for pharmaceuti-cal companies to prioritise pub-lic good over profit.

Currently there’s a lack ofmarket incentive to developnew antibiotics so there are rec-ommendations for delinkingthe cost of research and devel-opment from the final price ofthe drug as one way forward.

The report also called forsetting up anIntergovernmental Panel onClimate Change (IPCC) likebody to tackle AMR, focusingon a ‘One Health’ approachwith agencies responsible forhuman, animal and environ-ment health working togetherto tackle AMR.

It has sought an immediateban on the use of antibiotics onthe WHO’s list of criticallyimportant medicines as growthpromoters in animals. It thensays that the use of otherantibiotics as growth promot-

ers should be phased out with-in five years.

“We are at a critical pointin the fight to protect some ofour most essential medicines,”WHO Director-general TedrosAdhanom Ghebreyesus said.“This report makes concreterecommendations that couldsave thousands of lives everyyear,” Ghebreyesus, who is co-chairs IACG, added.

“This report reflects thedepth and scope of the responseneeded to curb its rise and pro-tect a century of progress inhealth,” said Amina Mohammed,UN deputy secretary-generaland co-chair of IACG.

The WHO defines AMR as“the ability of a microorganism(like bacteria, viruses, and someparasites) to stop an antimicro-bial (such as antibiotics, antivi-rals and antimalarials) fromworking against it. As a result,standard treatments becomeineffective, infections persistand may spread to others.”

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The Supreme Court onMonday agreed to hear on

Tuesady a Congress MP’s pleaseeking direction to theElection Commission to decidewithout any “demur” the com-plaints against Prime MinisterNarendra Modi and BJPPresident Amit Shah on theiralleged hate speeches and usingarmed forces for “political pro-paganda”.

A bench headed by ChiefJustice Ranjan Gogoi took noteof the submissions of senioradvocate AM Singhvi that theplea of Sushmita Dev, CongressLok Sabha MP from Silchar inAssam and President of ‘AllIndia Mahila Congress’, beaccorded an urgent hearing asEC has not taken any decisionon complaints of model code ofconduct (MCC) violationsagainst Modi and Shah.

Dev alleged that “inaction”by EC on complaints againsttop BJP leaders was “a sign ofinvidious discrimination” andwas “arbitrary, capricious andimpermissible” as it wasdestructive of the integrity ofelectoral process.

Singhvi, along with lawyerSunil Fernandes, alleged thatBJP leaders have been violatingMCC during last four weeksand the EC has not taken anydecisions on as many as 40complaints of Congress party.

To this, the bench said itwill hear the plea on Tuesday.

At the outset, the benchtook note of the submission ofSinghvi and asked him as towhy he was reluctant in nam-ing the BJP leaders.

“Why don’t you (Singhvi)mention clearly the names,”said the bench, also comprisingJustices Deepak Gupta andSanjiv Khanna.

“Since March 10, that is the

date on which GeneralElections, were notified, thePrime Minister, NarendraModi and BJP President AmitShah, specifically in sensitiveareas and states, have ex-facieviolated the provisions of theRepresentation of People’s Actand the Conduct of ElectionRules and the process, thereof.

“It is in public domainthat they have indulged in hatespeeches, repeatedly used thearmed forces for political pro-paganda, despite a clear prohi-bition on the same by the EC,”Dev alleged.

The Silchar MP said shehas been constrained to moveto the apex court to seek direc-tion to the EC “to expedi-tiously take action on multiplerepresentations/ complaintspending before the ECI”against Modi and Shah.

Alleging inaction on thepart of EC, the plea said it hasnot been taking actions “despitecogent evidence” and exhorta-tions to the EC demonstrated“abdication and indecision anda complete absence of justice,in ensuring a level playingfield in ensuing general elec-tions.”

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Not belying expectations, trib-als and villagers in far-flung

hamlets in the state ‘out-voted’cool Mumbaikars, business andglamour world personalities inthe fourth and final phase of vot-ing for 17 Lok Sabha con-stituencies on Monday.

While thousands of tribalspatiently standing in serpentinequeues, especially inNandurbar, Dhule, Palgharremained virtually cut-off fromthe electronic media, the lime-

light was on around 200 bignames from the business,sports and glamour world.

The rural folk exercisedtheir votes without any fanfaredespite the blistering heat, butMumbai’s big personalitieswere virtually mobbed - as theystepped out of their cool homesinto pre-chilled vehicles, casttheir votes mostly withoutqueuing up, walking outexhibiting the indelible markedfinger, smiling and “byting” outhomilies before daintily depart-ing in their deluxe cars.

Prominent people of thecity are concerned by the lowturnout trends in the country’seconomic powerhouse and evencertain other urban centres andattribute it to several factors.

For instance, by 3 pm,Maharashtra barely notched anaverage polling of around 40 percent. The handsome voting inthe tribal-rural belts was rude-ly pulled down by the patheticturnout of around 30 per centin Mumbai and urban centres.

“I think the urban votershave largely taken it for grant-

ed that their single vote may notmake any difference as gover-nance doesn’t improve, irre-spective of which party or can-didates may come to power,”said former Chief InformationCommissioner Shailesh Gandhi.

Gandhi said people andparties should focus on “improv-ing the governance for the nextfive years” like in advanceddemocracies rather than deploy-ing “all energies towards win-ning or losing an election thatcomes every five years”.

A leading Mumbai busi-

nessman Pratap S. Bohra attrib-utes the “irritatingly lowturnout” in Mumbai and urbancentres due to the “self-centricand selfish nature” of the wealthyfolk who refuse to think of thenation or democracy.

“These people believe thatmoney means everything inlife... They have not an iota ofunderstanding of the miseries ofthe people living in rural or trib-al and backward regions of thecountry. These poor millionsfaithfully come out and vote inevery election, local, state or

national and then they demandtheir rights from the governmentin power,” Bohra pointed out.

A dejected social cam-paigner Tushar A Gandhi, great-grandson of Mahatma Gandhirued that the electoral responseof Mumbaikars “is true to form”though another three-four hoursvoting time was left.

“We have always shown aless-than-keen response to elec-tions and for Mumbaikars, thelong extended weekend was farmore attractive than theirdemocratic duty,” he said.

Gandhi feels it is time nowto think of some form of a ‘PollTax’ for those in the tax-payingbracket but who don’t vote, akind of ‘compulsory voting’.

“This is the sad reality ofour times... The averageMumbaikars are only con-cerned about their comfortzones and ignore their nation-al duty of going to vote thoughit comes only once in fiveyears. Then, till the next elec-tions, they derile whoever is inpower,” rued a well-knowntrader, Pankaj Deshmukh.

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In a slightly lesser turnout ofvoters than the one witnessed

in the 2014 polls, an estimated51.12 per cent of total 96.40lakh voters exercised their fran-chise in six Lok Sabha con-stituencies in Mumbai and anaverage 51.28 per cent of 3.12crore cast their votes in 17 con-stituencies across Maharashtra,even as Bollywood personalitiesand celebrities turned out inlarge numbers to vote in themetropolis.

Known for voter apathyover the years, Mumbai wit-nessed a marginal 0.4 per centdrop in the average votingpercentage of 51.6 witnessed inthe 2014 polls. The polling shotup in the 2014 polls by 7.4 percent from 44.2 per cent in 2009Lok Sabha elections.

Interestingly, Mumbainorth constituency whereBollywood actress UrmilaMatondkar is taking on againstBJP’s sitting MP Gopal Shetty,registered the highest 54.72 percent voter turnout in Mumbai.

As has always been the

case, the Mumbai south, whereformer Union Minister andtwo-time Congress MP MilindDeora fighting Shiv Sena’s sittingMP Arvind Sawant, witnessedthe lowest turn-out of 48.23.

The polling percentagesregistered in other constituen-cies in Mumbai were: MumbaiNorth East-52.30, MumbaiSouth Central-51.53, MumbaiNorth West-50.44 and MumbaiNorth Central-49.49.

Elsewhere the State,Nandurbar (ST) constituencyrecorded a maximum 62.44 percent voter turnout, while Kalyanin Thane district registered thelowest of 41.64 per cent.

Apart from Nandurbar(ST), the other reserved con-stituencies of Dindori (ST),Palghar (ST) and Shirdi (SC)retgistered higher voting per-centages of 58.20, 57.60 and56.10 per cent, respectively, ascompared with the urban con-stituencies.

Bhiwandi recorded 48.90per cent,while in the neigh-bouring Thane 46.42 per centelectors turned out to vote.Maval, where NCPchief Sharad

Pawar’s grandnephew Parth istaking on Shiv Sena’s sitting MPShrirang C Barne, regis-tered52.74 per cent.

Nashik recorded 53.09 percent of voter turnout, WhileShirur, Shirdi and Dhule reg-istered 52.45 per cent, 56.19 percent and 50.97 per cent respec-tively.

Bollywood actors, televi-sion personalities, Marathi filmand television personalities,sporting icons joined the ordi-nary Mumbaibars in queues atthe various polling stationsacross the metropolis to exer-cise their franchise.

Bollywood star AmitabhBachchan, cricketing iconSachin Tendulkar, playbacksinger Asha Bhosale, TataSons chairman NChandrasekaran and Mahindra& Mahindra group chairmanAnand Mahindra, industrialistsAdi Godrej, Anil Ambani, RBIGovernor Shaktikanta Das andNCP chief Sharad Pawar werealso among the early voters.Naresh Goyal, who recentlyhad to exit from crisis-riddenJet Airways too voted.

Jaipur: A Jaipur-based cardiologist covered a distance of around80 km on a cycle to cast his vote in Tonk-Sawaimadhopur LokSabha seat in Rajasthan on Monday. GL Sharma is a resident ofSoda village in Tonk district and runs a hospital in Jaipur.

He travelled from Jaipur to a polling booth in his village ona cycle to cast his vote on Monday. “This was just to create aware-ness for polling and good health. It took me four hours to reachmy village,” Sharma said. The doctor also advised people to docycling for good health. “I do cycling every Sunday as it is goodfor heart,” he added. Polling in 13 constituencies of the State istaking place Monday from 7 am to 6 pm. PTI

Mumbai: Braving the Aprilheat, a 108- year-old womancame out to cast her vote in theneighbouring Thane district ofMaharashtra. VithabaiDamodar Patil, perhaps amongthe oldest voters in the state,exercised her franchise at apolling booth in Kopri village,which is part of the Thane LokSabha constituency.

PTI

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Alarge number of first-timevoters came out to cast

their ballots on Monday inMumbai, marking their formalparticipation in choosing thenext government in the world’slargest democracy.

According to the ElectionCommission (EC) data,Maharashtra has over 1.19crore voters who fall in the agegroup of 18-19 years and areeligible to exercise their fran-chise in the Lok Sabha polls forthe first time.

Enthusiasm was palpableamong first-time electors, whoopenly expressed their viewsabout candidates in the fray andwhom they voted for. NinadTendulkar (18), who cast hisvote in Dindoshi, which fallsunder the Mumbai North-Westparliamentary constituency,said he had voted keeping inmind issues like good gover-nance and development.

Samruddhi Purav (19),who cast her vote for the firsttime in suburban Borivaliunder the Mumbai North LokSabha seat, said NOTA (None of the Above) optionwas discussed much in herfriend circle.

“I read and watch all newsand discuss them with myfamily members and friends.But I make my own decision.I voted for a young leadership.

Divya Khadpe (18), whovoted in suburban Goregaonunder the Mumbai North-Westseat, said she was excited to casther vote for the first time.

Kimaya Nadkarni (21),who cast her vote in Chembur,which is part of the SouthCentral parliamentary con-stituency, said, said she cast herballot after taking into accountseveral factors.

Mumbai: Police personnelposted at polling booths acrossMumbai on Monday earnedkudos for lending a helpinghand to senior citizens and dif-ferently-abled people to casttheir votes in the six Lok Sabhaconstituencies in the city andsuburbs that went to polls.

A total of 17 constituenciesin Maharashtra have voted inthe fourth and final phase.

In Fort area in SouthMumbai, which falls underMumbai South Parliamentaryconstituency, personnel of

Mata Ramabai AmbedkarMarg police station were seenassisting senior citizens topolling booths.

Similar scenes were wit-nessed in areas that fall underthe rest five constituencies thatcover the island city as well asdistant suburbs. ManyMubaikars clicked photos ofthis goodwill gesture ofMumbai Police and sharedthem on social media.“Fighting all the odds for anable democracy! Our salute toall the specially abled voters for

not compromising on theirduty! Lets not make any excus-es.” Mumbai Police tweetedfrom their official tweeter han-dle @MumbaiPolice.

In another tweet Mumbaipolice said, “Raising the bar forthe youth, senior citizens acrossthe city are turning out at largenumbers at polling booths tovote. It is our pleasure to helpthem in every little way wecan.” Praising the police, DipakDas tweeted, “@MumbaiPoliceare doing excellent job for oldage votes...Jai Hind”. PTI

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Youths wearing T-shirts withthe BJP’s “main bhi chowki-

dar” slogan at a rally onMonday caught the attention ofCongress president RahulGandhi, who asked them aboutthe 2 crore jobs promised byPrime Minister Narendra Modi.

Addressing a public meet-ing in Sardarshahar town ofRajasthan’s Churu district,Gandhi acknowledged thepresence of some youths whowere wearing the T-shirts hav-ing the “main bhi chowkidar”slogan of the BJP.

“You are wearing T-shirt ofthe ‘chowkidar’ (watchman).You all are welcome here,”Rahul said. The Congress chieffirst said Modi had promisedRs 15 lakh in the bank accountsof all Indians and askedwhether anyone present in therally had received the amount.

“’Chowkidar’ ji had alsopromised 2 crore jobs. Anyoneamong you got the jobs?” Rahulasked, pointing to the youthswho were wearing the T-shirts.

Describing demonetisationand the goods and services tax

as an attack on the country’seconomy and employment, theCongress leader claimed lakhsof youths were left unemployedby the twin decisions.

Rahul described the party’sproposed minimum income

guarantee scheme as “diesel forthe engine” of the Indian econ-omy. Gandhi promised to giveGovernment jobs to 22 lakhyouths in one year, make 10lakh recruitment in panchayatsand said no farmer will be

jailed for not repaying loan, ifthe Congress is voted to power.

He accused Modi of givingpublic money to the top 15 richpeople, adding that theCongress wants to give moneyto the poor through its pro-

posed minimum income sup-port scheme, Nyay.

Under the scheme, Rs72,000 will be deposited annu-ally in the bank accounts of thepoorest 5 crore women of thecountry, Rahul explained.

“The money to run thescheme will not come from thebank accounts of the middleclass and shopkeepers or fromthe pockets of honest busi-nessmen.”

He also talked about theCongress’ manifesto promise ofmaking loan default by farm-ers a civil offence.

Rahul pointed out to thefarmers’ budget promised bythe Congress if it comes topower. “After the 2019 election,two budgets are going to be pre-sented in India. The first bud-get will be the special budget forthe farmers. Not after the gen-eral budget, it will be present-ed before the general budget.”

In the budget, Gandhi said,the farmers would be told howmuch money the Governmentwas going to give them in a year.Issues of minimum supportprice and compensation will beclear in the budget, he added.

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BJP president Amit Shah onMonday accused the

Opposition of giving tickets to“bahubalis” (strongmen) inUttar Pradesh, asserting thattheir presence will not have anyimpact as the Yogi Adityanathgovernment has been actingtough against them.

He also reiterated that theBJP Government, after comingto power, will scrap Article 370of the Constitution whichgrants special status to Jammu& Kashmir.

Addressing an electionmeeting in Pratapgarh, Shahsaid, “We want to removeArticle 370 from Kashmir, butRahul Gandhi does not wantthis... When Modiji’s govern-ment comes back in power, it(Article 370) will be abrogated.”

Attacking the Opposition onthe issue of Kashmir, he said,“Omar Abdullah says thereshould be another PM forKashmir... His friends are

Mayawati, Akhilesh and RahulGandhi... All these together wantto separate Kashmir from India.”

In Jaunpur, the BJP leadersaid his party will never indulgein vote bank politics nor com-promise with the security of thecountry, “but Rahul, Akhileshand Mayawati can do any-thing for votes”.

Shah alleged that “goons”of the Bahujan Samaj Party(BSP) and Samajwadi Party(SP) used to work as landmafias, but ever since the “anti-land mafia squads” were set upby Chief Minister YogiAdityanath, encroachment ofland has stopped.

“The people from the‘grand adulteration’ have giventickets to ‘bahubalis’ in UttarPradesh, but such strongmendo not have an impact here,” hesaid addressing rallies inChitrakoot and Pratapgarh dis-tricts. The BJP has been refer-ring to the Opposition allianceas “mahamilavati” (grand adul-teration).

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Even as a blazing sun beatdown at 43-plus degrees,

reflecting the dogfight goingdown below among the BJP andthe Trinamool workers, inter-mittent violence marred thefourth phase of electionsmost-ly in Birbhum and Behramporeand to some extent in Asansoland Burdwan districts.

Thankfully however, no onewas killed on account of poll-related violence till sun downsave the two persons who diedof heart attack due to scorchingheat. Notwithstanding heavydeployment of Central forcesBengal lived up to its (ill) repu-tation as the workers of both theoutfits armed with bombs andlathis clashed against each otherin various parts of Birbhum,Bahrampur, Burdwan East andBurdwan Asansol.

And amid the environmentof violence TMC leader andBirbhum strongman claimedhis party would willy-nilly clinchthe two seats of BirbhumandBolpur under his command bymore than 5 lakh and 7 lakhvotes. “If I fail to do so I willquit,” he bragged triggering anOpposition onslaught wonder-ing “what led him to give sucha massive prediction.”

The BJP promptlyapproached the EC demandinga re-poll in all the booths of thetwo seats. Amid “attacks andcounterattacks” that saw UnionMinister Babul Supriyo’s car get-ting smashed by alleged MCgoons at Baraboni in Asansol theState saw a brisk polling. TheState had witnessed about 77 percent polling with maximumnumber of voters coming out tovote in Bolpur — 79 per cent andBolpur and Ranaghat — withabout 78.33 per cent.

Reports of violence pouredin from Hasibpur village inNalhati Assembly segment inBirbhum where alleged TMCsupporters stopped the votersfrom going to polling boothleading to a violent backlash. ABJP supporter received headinjuries while another got afractured hand in the fight,sources said adding there was noCAPF to escort them for voting.

Throughout Sunday nightarmed Trinamool goonsknocked our doors and warnedus against going to vote. In themorning when we tried to pro-ceed to the booth they attacked

us and we retaliated,” said a HaruMondal one of the scores of BJPsupporters who had gatheredoutside a TMC workers housewhose wife and daughter beggedfor life from the first floor.

Before the police came inand restored peace severalrounds of skirmishes led at leasthalf-a-dozen activists from boththe parties injured, locals said.

At Kanandighi village inDubrajpur block in Birbhumdistrict the central forces resort-ed to firing in the air after vil-lagers gathered outside thebooth and stoned it. “The guardfired in self-defence when mis-creants tried to enter the booth,”said an ECI official whileBirbhum TMC strongmanAnubrata Mondal said “the peo-ple revolted after the CAPFtried to influence them to votefor the BJP.”

Bengal Chief MinisterMamata Banerjee said, “theCAPF has fired inside the boothbut they are not empowered todo so. Lawn and order is State subject. I heard they areinfluencing the people to votefor the BJP.”

Cut to Beldanga inBehrampore constituency:Alleged miscreants hurledbombs, jammed booths andconfined more than 700 votersinside Mirzapur village even asfrantic calls to the sector officeyielded no result.

“We are crying for policehelp but no police is to be seenfrom the morning. They (readTMC) have confined us in thevillage. If we venture out towardsthe booth they will kill us. Theyhave already said that we will memurdered if we go there,” saidSheikh Bulbul with the pollingday death at neighbouringMurshidabad constituency stillfresh in his mind.

“I don’t want to die like adog. Don’t ask me to go to vote.Please go away,” said a woman.“Even the Press people are atrisk. Go back to your Kolkata.This is not the place for you.”

Another voter refusing to benamed said, “We have not beenvoting since several years. Thatis our fate. Others vote for us.They take our voting slip,Aadhaar, epic card and go away.If we claim them back we will getthe sticks. They will stop all theGovernment facilities likeKanyashree, free rice, and evenwill take back the cycle that ourdaughters have got from theGovernment.”

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Over 64 per cent voterturnout of Kashmiri

migrants was recorded in thesecond phase of the three-phased elections in Anantnagparliamentary constituency on Monday.

Unhappy over the “cum-bersome” voter registrationprocess adopted for them bythe Election Commission, thecommunity members demand-ed scrapping of M-forms.

They alleged that the formsdeny and discourage themfrom voting.

“Over 64 per cent votes (byKashmiri migrants) werepolled today. As many as 1,784such voters cast their votes inthe second phase, out of a totalof 2,779 registered voters, aftercompleting the required formalities,” AssistantReturning Officer (ARO) for Migrants, Pankaj Anandtold PTI.

Though the official admit-ted that there were problemswhile preparing the electoralroll, Anand said hectic effortswere made to ensure no voterwas left out.

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In the rough and tumble of the coun-try’s longest election season, politiciansoften make statements for mileage.Congress president Rahul Gandhi’sexaggerated claims of benefits accruing

to industrialist Anil Ambani from the Rafaledeal, his inability to stick to one figure for thecorporate loans allegedly written off by theNarendra Modi Government and his imma-ture attempt to attribute his opinions aboutthe Prime Minister to the Supreme Court(which was not amused) can be taken as parfor the course.

Gandhi is fighting for survival against avery astute politician. Sister Priyanka GandhiVadra was inducted into the Congress andgiven charge of half of the critical State ofUttar Pradesh to revitalise the moribundorganisation and bring voters back to thegrand old party. Projected by an adoringmedia as a charismatic trump card and seri-ous game-changer, she frittered away heradvantages with juvenile antics about chal-lenging the Prime Minister in Varanasi andthen disappeared like the proverbial hornsof a donkey.

Vadra’s sense of entitlement can begauged from the fact that till the time of writ-ing, she has felt no need to explain her con-duct, either to the media that she used to cre-ate a false buzz around herself or to the party,whose workers looked up to her with somuch expectation. Her contribution to theCongress’ tally will match this attitude.

Diehard Congress fans see her flight fromVaranasi as extremely damaging. Far fromenergising the party, she has inadvertentlyexposed deep fissures within. Thus, confi-dants of Rahul Gandhi explained the deci-sion on one ground; the faction aligned withher explained it on another. This is a gravepolitical error. During his long apprentice-ship under Sonia Gandhi, Rahul never oncepresumed to overtake or overshadow hismother and kept his nascent camp undertight control. Similarly, Sonia Gandhi hasbeen careful never to take the limelight awayfrom Rahul after he became party president.By unilaterally proposing herself for Varanasion multiple occasions, Priyanka breached thisred line. Her retreat could be imposition ofparty discipline.

Anyway, Priyanka could regard SmritiIrani with scorn in 2014, but in 2019, Iraniforced Rahul to seek a safety net in Kerala.So, did Priyanka really believe (even if shedared to contest and give details of her andhusband Robert Vadra’s assets in a sworn affi-davit, along with five years of income taxreturns) that she was strong enough to faceModi? Informed sources say she is also shyof revealing her educational qualifications.

One wonders why Priyanka did not focuson helping the party to win Amethi. If thefamously secretive family has privately con-ceded Amethi to Irani and the BharatiyaJanata Party (BJP), how did she imagine thattossing a half-baked dare at the PrimeMinister was going to yield electoral divi-

dends? Now the reverse hashappened, to the dismay of theloyal glitterati.

The crux of the matter is thatVaranasi is not merely a con-stituency. It is the beating heartof Hindu civilisation andNarendra Modi chose it con-sciously for this reason in 2014.His obeisance to Pt MadanMohan Malaviya, who built theuniversity to cater to everyaspect of knowledge from tradi-tional to modern, was part of asubtle quest to align the BJP withthe soul of India. By seekingrefuge in a constituency domi-nated by the Indian UnionMuslim League, Rahul Gandhiunintentionally made theCongress-BJP contest a civilisa-tional battle. The temple-hop-ping sacred thread-wearing(jeneu-dhari) Kashyap gotra(clan) Brahmin persona evapo-rated in an instant. This truth willnot escape the Indian voter.

Modi alluded to the civilisa-tional aspect when he said thatthe Congress president hadsought safety in a minority-dominated seat. This Nehruvianlegacy — of making the Muslimcommunity a core vote bank andwinning elections by addingsome caste votes — is nowunder serious challenge. This iswhat the BJP sought when itespoused the Ram Janmabhumimovement and spoke of “justicefor all, appeasement of none.”

Perhaps the vision neededmore time or a new leader withan aspirational message linkingthe past with the future. This alsosums up Modi’s developmentalwork in Varanasi — grand roads,new institutions, cleaning theGanga and the ghats and recov-ering hidden temples on the pathfrom Kashi Vishwanath templeto the river. Modi alone has hadthe courage to venture into thespiritual heartland without thebenefit of family, caste or region-al roots. Kashi welcomes suchwanderers. The Gandhi familylacks roots on this civilisationalfirmament. Priyanka blunderedto think she could meet Modi onthis terrain. When apprised ofthe reality, she should haveretreated gracefully. Instead, shefed the frenzy. Later, theCongress announced the candi-dature of Ajay Rai the very dayModi filed his nomination andleft the poor scapegoat to fieldthe questions.

The media and intellectuals,who lionised Priyanka andinvented the mystique of herpolitical acumen, must feel dis-enchanted. Some of the eulogiesaccompanying her entry into theCongress on January 23 aretelling. One headline gushed,“Priyanka Gandhi is already asocial media star despite not hav-ing Twitter or FB account”. Herentry was described as a “bomb-shell.” A prominent intellectual

tried to evoke a supernatural linkbetween Swami Vivekanandaand the lady, for sharing thesame birthday and posed thequestion: “Will Priyanka be theX-factor that tilts the scales infavour of the Congress this cru-cial election year?” Well, theanswer is blowing in the wind.

A highly respected colum-nist made a hugely embarrassingprognosis, “The message is loudand clear. East Uttar Pradeshmeans Varanasi and Varanasiequals Narendra Modi. GivingPriyanka charge of Eastern UttarPradesh is tantamount to takingon the opponent on his turf.…Given her charisma, ability tothink on her feet and come upwith instant ripostes, and herresemblance to Indira Gandhi,the battle could become a Modiversus Priyanka fight in 2019,without her being declared as theprime ministerial candidate ofthe Congress or of theOpposition.” It has taken justthree months to shatter that illu-sion. This brings us to the realmystery of 2019. Was SoniaGandhi trying to avert siblingrivalry from spilling into theopen when she decided to con-test from Rae Bareli? Can a post-election split in the Congress beavoided or is it inevitable?

(The writer is Senior Fellow,Nehru Memorial Museum andLibrary; the views expressed arepersonal)

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Sir — The vilest practice in ourdemocratic polity, which isdenounced unreservedly, is thatthe electorate is bribed for votes.It is an obvious manifestation ofevil design and corrupt practice.Poor and ignorant voters arebribed by political parties, whoseek votes guided by self-interests.

The electoral off icersappointed by the ElectionCommission of India are reallyincapable of unearthing blackmoney that is used to allure theilliterate and ignorant voters.Even recipients have confessedhow much money they receivedfrom candidates for voting intheir favour.

It is regretful that poor andlower middle class people are notable to contest the election inview of the huge money requiredas expenditure. Politics is onlythe rich man’s business. Now,considering the tainted, evil andcorrupt practice resorted to dur-ing the national election, elec-toral reforms are absolutelymandatory, which includes mak-ing right to vote compulsory.

Nimai Charan SwainBhubaneswar

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Sir — This refers to the editor-ial, “Reveal the cheats” (April29). The Supreme Court’s direc-tive to the Reserve Bank of

India to reveal the names of wil-ful loan defaulters by complyingto the requests made under theRight to Information (RTI) hascome as a whiff of fresh air to allbanks that are reeling undermounting Non-Performing

Assets (NPAs). In fact, this move will ensure

financial transparency andaccountability of the bankingsector. Further, it will help thecause of the banks to recoverloans from defaulters while pre-

venting errants from circum-venting laws and escaping to aforeign land.

All in all, while the apexcourt’s ruling comes as a hugerelief for banks, it also serves asa reminder to defaulters likeVijay Mallya and Nirav Modithat it will now be difficult forthem to remain in hiding for toolong from the long arm of law.

KR Srinivasan Secunderabad

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Sir — Days have passed sincemultiple bomb attacks ripped SriLanka but the situation, as itappears today, is that the islandnation remains unsettled. Whatis most disturbing is that there’sa lack of communicationbetween the Sri LankanPresident and the electedGovernment. The fact that someleaders over there talk about nothaving received intelligenceinformation in advance showsthe sorry state of affairs.

AnitaVia email

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The trans-Himalayan region of Ladakh withZanskar ranges in the south and Karakoramranges in the north, bordering both Pakistan

and China, is strategically important and vital forIndia’s national security. At the time of Partition,it formed a part of the princely State of Jammu &Kashmir, which acceded to India in October 1947after the State was attacked by Pakistan-support-ed tribal raiders. Large parts of the region, includ-ing the strategic Gilgit, which during the Maharaja’srule formed the Frontier district and Frontier ilaqas,remain under illegal occupation of Pakistan.Islamabad has divorced these areas from Pakistan-occupied Jammu & Kashmir and refers to them asGilgit-Baltistan (former Northern Areas), whichare administered directly by the federalGovernment over there. A portion of the area,including the Aksai Chin, has been illegally cededby Pakistan to China. The famous China-PakistanEconomic Corridor (CPEC), Beijing’s most impor-tant strategic initiative in this region, also runsthrough areas under illegal occupation of Pakistan.It is a land-locked area comprising the trans-Himalayan ranges, mainly the ranges of Zanskar,Ladakh, Pangong and Karakoram.

Siachen Glacier, the world’s highest battlefieldwith Saltoro Ridge as the vital ground, is a part ofthis region. This further enhances the strategicimportance of the area; the occupation of Siachenhas provided the Indian Army a strategic advan-tage. The Saltoro Ridge, an extension of theKarakoram Range, which dominates the glaciat-ed region, is in complete command of the Army.Despite many desperate attempts, the PakistanArmy has not been able to secure even a toe-holdon the Ridge. Its occupation enables the IndianArmy dominate the ambitious CPEC, whose strate-gic and military exploitation by China andPakistan is a cause of concern for the nation. It alsoprevents the possibility of a pincer move by com-bined forces of Pakistan and China to cut off theNubra Valley and subsequent capture of Ladakh.The strategic significance of Kargil area is well-known.

Ladakhis are a very proud race, who take pridein being nationalists. They consider themselves tobe the guardians of India’s northern frontiers. Theyhave been resisting Kashmiri hegemony from thetime the administration of the State was transferredfrom the Maharaja to Sheikh Abdullah in 1949.In the first reorganisation of the State, Ladakh wasmade a district of the Kashmir Division, ignoringits ethnic, linguistic and cultural differences.Ladakhis felt that they had been made anappendage of Kashmir, which gradually provedtrue. Sheikh Abdullah’s first Cabinet did not haveany representative from Ladakh. The Sheikhabhorred the Opposition and, hence, the NationalConference was the sole political party compris-ing mainly of Kashmiri Muslims. Ladakh had onlytwo seats in the State Assembly. Thus, “majorityrule” virtually became “Kashmiri Rule.” Landreforms initiated by the Sheikh did not exclude theGompas and drew strong opposition fromBuddhist monks, who enjoyed a considerable clout.It was at the intervention of Prime Minister Nehruthat the Gompas were exempted from the provi-sions of the Land Reforms Act.

The situation became grave when Urdu wasmade a compulsory language for the Ladakhis. The

grant-in-aid given by Dogra rulers to three prima-ry schools run by Shias, Buddhists and Sunnis wasunilaterally withdrawn. No allocation was made forLadakh in the annual Budget. In fact, separate allo-cation for the region began only in 1961. Biasedand discriminatory policies of Kashmiri leaderspushed the Ladakhis to the wall and they starteddemanding separation from Kashmir to ensuredevelopment of their backward areas and preservetheir religion and cultural identity.

One of the main reasons of the under devel-opment of the area was the flawed policy of theNehru Government, which continued to treat theborder regions as frontier areas. The Governmentof the day failed to recognise the difference betweenthe two. While frontier regions were supposed tobe dynamic, temporary and a buffer zone subjectto give and take; border regions, defined by aboundary line, are fixed, sacrosanct and static.While the latter looks inwards, the former lookedoutwards. Since India had no expansionist designs,it should have concentrated on developing its bor-der regions rather than keeping them under-devel-oped under the false pretext of denying readymaderoad axis to a potential aggressor. Thus, neitherthe Union Government nor the State Governmentpaid much heed to the development of infrastruc-ture in this remote trans-Himalayan region, lead-ing to anger and alienation among the people.

Growing alienation initially led to the demandof a Central administrator followed by the call forinternal autonomy, regional autonomy and directCentral administration, as was done for a year after1962 and finally veered around the demand for aseparate divisional status for the region. The onsetof secessionist activities in the Kashmir Valley onceagain rang alarm bells for the Ladakhis and ademand for a Union Territory gained popularitysince the late 1980s under the banner of the LadakhBuddhist Association (LBA). An agreement wasreached in October 1989 for the formation of anAutonomous Hill Council on the pattern of theDarjeeling Hill Council. The Kashmir-centric StateGovernment was not in favour of the same. Aftermuch dilly-dallying, the Ladakh Autonomous Hill

Development Council Act was enacted by theUnion Government in May 1995, granting anAutonomous Hill Council each for Leh and Kargil.

Despite the formation of the Hill Councils,empowerment remained a bone of contentionbetween the Ladakhis and subsequent Kashmir-centric State Governments. Suspicious of the intentof Kashmiri leaders, LBA once again raised thedemand of a separate Union Territory. Coupledwith this is the growing resentment in Zanskaragainst the step-motherly treatment to Kargil dis-trict administration and gerrymandering of theAssembly constituency of Zanskar.

It goes to the credit of the Modi Governmentthat the long-pending demand of empowering theautonomous hill councils was conceded when theGovernor’s administration approved the LadakhHill Development Council (Amendment) Bill,2018, making the councils much stronger admin-istratively as well as financially. It was followed bythe establishment of a cluster university to giveimpetus to better education. Finally, in Februarythis year, the Government also conceded thedemand for a separate division for Ladakh, mak-ing it a separate administrative region like theKashmir and Jammu regions.

As has been said earlier, the region is veryimportant for national security due to its strate-gic location. Therefore, it is essential that the peo-ple inhabiting the border areas are kept happy andsatisfied by the Government so that they play theirrole well as the guardians of the nation’s borders.Ladakhis have a few genuine demands which needattention and cannot be ignored as disgruntlementamong locals can endanger national security aswell. Population in the border areas forms animportant centre of gravity, which always remainsin an adversary’s radar, who would always preferdissension and trouble in these areas. Such dissen-sion can be exploited by the adversary to threat-en vulnerable lines of communication in case ofconflict. The people of Kargil contributed and sup-ported immensely in evicting the Pakistan Army,leading to the Kargil victory as acknowledged bythe Indian Army.

Apart from holistic development of the entireregion with particular preference to border areas,there’s a need to improve connectivity throughbuilding a direct rail link, road network, includ-ing the much-delayed Darcha-Padum-Neemo-Lehroad and an airfield at Kargil. A strategic road link-ing Jammu region with Leh via Kishtwar is alsoneeded. Widening and macadamisation of Kargil-Zanskar road and the opening of the Panikhar-Pahalgam road should also be completed on pri-ority. The Zozila tunnel is a strategic necessity.

The establishment of professional colleges andhigher education institutions, including a separatecluster university for Kargil, should be a priority.Inclusion of Bhoti language in the Eighth Scheduleis a long pending demand. Both Kargil and Lehshould be developed as centres of excellence forreligious research and education. The discrimina-tion in recruitment of Ladakhis in the civil secre-tariat and Government offices also needs to belooked into. The attempt to disturb the demograph-ic balance in Leh needs to be aborted. Instead,emphasis must be laid on developing communalharmony. The Kashmir-centric leadership in thepast has depended on the formula of divide andrule by pitting Kargil against Leh. The hardshipfaced by the people of the region, especially dur-ing harsh winter months, needs to be understoodand addressed. The tendency of successiveKashmir-centric Governments to treat the peopleas second class citizens needs to end.

Ladakh was opened to tourists in 1974.Initially, tourism was limited to mountaineeringand trekking. Gradually, with the Valley being dis-turbed, Ladakh has grown into a major touristattraction centre. While modernisation of tourismindustry, including the development of touristinfrastructure, is required for the improvement ofthe local economy, the aspect of environmentaldegradation also needs to be kept in mind. Theregion has tremendous hydro-electric potentialwhich needs to be exploited.

(The writer is a Jammu-based political commen-tator, columnist and strategic analyst. The viewsexpressed here are personal)

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The pursuit of growth over socialjustice, which has been thedefining credo of classical econ-

omists, has brought prosperity tomost developing societies. But it hasalso created huge inequalities. Theargument that economic growth is theroad to social justice had been relent-lessly advocated for a long time withseveral wrong consequences for poorsocieties. The question that has nowengaged development economists andproponents of social justice is: Doesaccelerated growth translate into inclu-sive growth? Nobel Laureate AmartyaSen believed that to think just in termsof income rather than achievementsof particular living conditions, likehealth conditions and expectation of

life, is to miss something important.The dichotomy between the eco-

nomic might of India vis-a-vis the real-ity of our crumbling development sec-tors, leading to India being rankedlowest in Human Development Index,is a pointer to what is wrong with ourdevelopment paradigm. What are theends of development — growth inGDP or enhancement of people’scapabilities and widening of theirchoices and freedom? For all-perva-sive prosperity, we need a tide that canlift all boats.

For too long, we have been over-obsessed with two concepts: Top-down bureaucracy and trickle-downeconomics. We have believed thataggressive growth can generate wealthat the top and this will trickle downto deeper ranks where the poor live.But this has not helped. Many haveargued that we need to find a newmeasure to assess the health of oureconomies and more importantly,the people. GDP simply totals upeverything made within an economyin a year, from widgets to whizzyfinancial products at their marketvalue. GDP is regarded as a poor indi-

cator of progress and there have beenpersuasive calls to change the way wemeasure economic and social devel-opment

Dubbed as one of the greatestinventions of the 20th century, GDPhas long been a closely-watched met-ric for politicians, administrators,policy doctors and journalists alike.But it is no longer lionised and thelove-affair with GDP may come to anend because as economic historianAdam Tooze calls, it is “a narrow andsomewhat arbitrary slice of reality.”

There are several social econo-mists, who believe inclusive growth hasto be grounded in inclusive gover-nance. In the absence of inclusive gov-ernance, people at the grassroot levelthat is, the intended beneficiaries ofsocial programmes, are left dependenton a bureaucratic delivery mechanismover which they have no effective con-trol. The alternative system would beparticipatory development, wherepeople themselves are enabled tobuild their own future through elect-ed representatives who are responsi-ble to address local community needs.

The last two decades have seen a

phenomenal rise in market-driventheosophy of growth over State-drivendevelopment models that dominatedthe developing countries in the yearsthat followed their birth. One sectionembodied the values and principles ofthe older non-profits and other collec-tives, including social movements,mass organisations and community-based groups. The other section waslocated in market and technologyspaces and got rapidly populated bynew-age non-profits, social enter-prises and online collectives.

There is a fundamental contradic-tion between these spheres. The oldnon-profits’ worldview is premised onintegrated social sciences and systemicapproach in which complexity, inter-dependence and inter-relatedness ofdiverse factors at work need to beaddressed. By contrast, the approachof new-age non-profits emphasises onfinding technology-based manageri-al solutions for complex social, eco-nomic and political issues. One isempathetic and human-driven, theother is rational and techno-centric.

Those who look through thetechno-managerial lens encourage

and enable development groups tozoom straight into the middle of theproblem, without the need to engagewith contextual complications. Thisdevalues deeper socio-culturalnuances. In this process, the real world,existing in all its complexity, is circum-scribed or left behind. It is like creat-ing a bubble in which technical linearsolutions are expected to solve com-plex problems.

The whole issue of developmentgets artificially locked into a bubble,which is then presented as fertileground for systems change and inno-vation. These developments in turnlead to more investment, which resultsin the bubble belonging to itself till itpunctures. The complexity of thesocio-economic and political systemsand human behaviour remain periph-eral to the issue until the bubble bursts.In the meantime, the process of for-mation of new bubbles sets in.

A large part of the developmentwork is ‘change’. It requires the abil-ity to collectively envision a differ-ent future — about ‘design thinking’,‘direction setting’ and ‘influence’ ie,leadership. The most profound

lessons in development are ground-ed in the philosophy of Gandhism.Gandhi’s leadership was anchored instrong ethical principles. He wasconvinced that real India lived in vil-lages where the pattern of life wasnot only timeless but also insulatedfrom the pernicious influence ofindustrial civilisation.

Taking cue from the hallowedGandhian traditions, developmentprofessionals have plumbed a moredemocratic planning model, partici-patory development. It involves atough balance between not beingsubservient to the beneficiaries and notcoming across as disrespectful tothem. Winning a point is not as impor-tant as achieving long-term change. If,for this, we have to compromise for thetime being, we must be prepared. Thecore of our relationship must be withthe people as also with theGovernment. We must deal withpeople who are more permanent in thesystem and are the key interface withtheir societies.

Successful development practi-tioners have always recognised therichness of this local wisdom. By

involving local communities in devel-opment we can ensure more equitableand just growth — something whichis not captured by GDP. This shouldbe the true metric of both inclusive andsustainable development. For exam-ple, rapid growth, which involvesfaster growth in agriculture, especial-ly in rain-fed areas where most of thepoor live, will be much more inclusivethan a GDP growth that is drivenentirely by mining or extraction ofminerals for exports.

Amartya Sen had consistently saidthat “growth rate is a very daft and adeeply alienated way of judging eco-nomic progress.” Sen and Jean Druzewarned as early as 1995 that reformsthat boost growth, though important,were not enough to improve the liv-ing conditions of the poorest, let alonedismantle caste and gender hierarchiesand generate employment.”

“They have to be supplemented bya radical shift in public policy in edu-cation and health,” they wrote.

(The writer is Member, NITIAayog’s National Committee onFinancial Literacy and Inclusion forWomen)

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Mindler, an Edutech start-up, is looking to scale up itspresence across India with focus on scientific career

guidance, particularly for the 8th through 12th grade stu-dents. Mindler is currently providing its services throughthree verticals — integrated college counseling, online careerguidance through its website and trained counselors inremote areas.

Speaking to The Pioneer on proper guidance to theschool children, founder of Mindler, Prateek Bhargava said,“In India, there is a massive lack of career counselors, around93% of schools do not have counselors. Last year, we intro-duced a three month certification module program to traincounselors who have gone build their own operations intier two and tier three cities. We also organize events in dif-ferent cities in which teachers, parents and students takepart. This year, we are targeting 8 cities and next year 25.That is what we are going to do to scale this up.”

Mindler’s technology-enabled eco-system blends arti-ficial intelligence and machine learning with strategic humaninterventions to help students and parents choose the best-suited career path.

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As uncertaintycontinues over

the fate of the shut-tered Jet Airways, anemployees’ consor-tium has proposed totake over the airlinewith at least �3,000crore expected fromoutside investors forthe bid, according totwo staff unions.

This is the firsttime that employeeshave come togetherwith a proposal torun the more than25-year-old JetAirways, which tem-porarily suspendedoperations on April 17.

Two associations repre-senting pilots and engineers —SWIP and JAMEVA — havewritten to State Bank of India(SBI) Chairman Rajnish Kumarproposing that they would takeover the airline and can bringin up to �7,000 crore.

The Society for Welfare ofIndian Pilots (SWIP) and the JetAircraft Maintenance EngineersWelfare Association (JAME-VA) have written a letter to theSBI chief asking the lead lenderto consider “employee consor-tium” as an intending bidder forthe carrier.

While SWIP has around800 members, there are about500 employees with JAMEVA.

“The contribution fromemployees would be realisedfrom their future earnings andincreased productivity... As per

our initial estimate, the con-tribution of employees groupover a hypothetical 5-yearEmployee Stock OwnershipProgramme (ESOP) is likely tobe upward of �4,000 crore.

“In addition, we are alsoconfident of securing an invest-ment commitment of up to�3,000 crore from outsideinvestors,” the letter, datedApril 29, said.

The letter has been signedby four people — SWIPGeneral Secretary AshwaniTyagi, JAMEVA PresidentAshish Kumar Mohanty, JetAirways Manager (HumanResources) BB Singh and JetLite Senior Vice President(Operations) and AccountableManager PP Singh.

The deadline for submit-ting initial bids have alreadyended and the list of shortlist-

ed entities is expected to befinalised on May 10.

SBI Capital Markets, onbehalf of the lenders’ consor-tium led by the SBI, is manag-ing the bidding process.

“We confirm that a pro-posal for employee takeover ofJet Airways has been submittedby us... We are optimistic thatthe banks and Government ofIndia will give our plan a seri-ous consideration,” the twounions said in a joint statement.

Tyagi said the letter hasalso been signed by two offi-cials of the airline.

Cash-starved Jet Airwaysstopped operations on April 17after lenders decided not toextend emergency funds. Sincethen, employees have heldgatherings in various cities andhave also met various ministerswith pleas to save the airline.

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Total export of ShellacExport Promotion Council

(SHEFEXIL) products duringthe quarter Jan-Mar 2019 hasseen a growth of 15.77 percentvalued at $623.25 Million whencompared with the same quar-ter of last year.

SHEFEXIL was formedunder the aegis of Ministry ofCommerce and Industry tofacilitate India’s exports of shel-lac and lac based products.“Top export products of SHE-FEXIL during the quarter ofJan-Mar 2019 are Guar gumtreated and pulverized, essen-tial oil of mint, extracts,Psyllium husk (Isobgul husk),Menthol crystal, Guar gumrefined split, Guar meal,Essential oil of peppermintetc. The Top 10 export marketsof these products are USA,

Iran, China, Hong Kong,Germany, Netherland, Russia,Japan, Italy and Norway,” saidthe official.

According to a summaryfrom the organization, overallexports of SHEFEXIL productshave increased in the regionssuch as North East Asia, West& East Asia and Africa where-as, export has declined in theregions such as North America,EU, ASEAN, Latin Americaand South Asia.

“Exports have increasedin the panels viz. vegetablesaps and extracts and othervegetable materials. The rea-son for increase in theexports are increase in theexport of menthol crystaldue to huge demand in inter-national markets such as EU,USA, Russia etc; increase inthe export of Gymnemaextract to Japan due to

increasing demand, rupeedepreciation against USD andincrease in export of Mint oilto Hong Kong and Singaporedue to surge in demand,”explained an official of theCommerce Ministry.

In order to increase theexports, the organization havemade specific suggestions tothe Government like extendingMerchandise Exports fromIndia Scheme (MEIS) benefit toGuar gum treated and pulver-ized; refund of embedded taxesand conclude the Free TradeA g r e e m e n t s(FTAs)/Agreements as early aspossible.

Apart from above sugges-tions an increasing awarenesson Indian Herbs, arrangingevents for Brand creation andinvesting in ProductDevelopment and Brand cre-ation has also been favoured.

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ABoeing 737 aircraft operated bySpiceJet on Monday overshot the

touched-down point while landing atthe Shirdi airport and veered off therunway, bringing all operations to a halt,airport director Dhiren Bhosale said.

All the passengers and the crew,however, are safe, and efforts are onto tow away the aircraft from therunway and resume operations at theearliest, he said.

Both the pilots of the flight havebeen grounded, pending enquiry, theairline said, adding the incident tookplace around 4:30 pm.

“A SpiceJet aircraft shot off the run-way by about 50 meters and skiddedoff. There is no injury to any passen-ger and the crew, though. Our first pri-ority is to evacuate passengers withoutcompromising their safety,” Bhosale toldPTI over phone from Shirdi.

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Empzilla has conducted aDigital Job Fair at Jawaharlal

Nehru Stadium in which around120 companies participated. TechMahindra, Genpact, Flipkart,ICICI Bank, Bajaj Capital, Tikonaand many more other big cor-

porations took part in the event.A live discussion panel was alsoheld in Empzilla Digital Job Fairwherein the speakers from thevarious industries shared theirvalueable thoughts on theemployment, recruitment andchallenges faced by a recruiterand the job aspirant.

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With the grounding of JetAirways leaving tens of

hundreds of trained staff up forgrabs, there can be a short-termsalary correction in the indus-try, as there are not enough jobsin the market due to the sup-ply glut, say headhunters.

Teetering for months, thefull service airline Jet Airwayswas finally grounded on April17, leaving over 22,000employees in the lurch. Theonce premium airline used toemploy around 1,300 pilotsand over 2,000 cabin crew.

They are now out in thejob market, leading to a supplyglut as other airlines are not ina position to absorb not evena quarter of the them due totheir poor finances.

“Given the current situa-tion, there are plenty of pro-fessionals willing to take asalary cut of up to 50 percentto grab a job. However, this willonly be for the short-term aswe see demand improving asthe aviation sector is poised togrow further,” Michael PageIndia director Mohit Bhartitold PTI Monday.

“There are definitely notenough jobs in the marketnow to absorb the influx of Jetemployees in one go. But, it isvery encouraging to see otherairlines increase their hiring asthey recognise the availabilityof good talent and the poten-tial to secure them for theirbusinesses in the future,” headded.

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US sanctions on Iran, risingunrest in the West Asian

and North Africa (WANA)and oil price volatility are drag-ging regional economic growth,the International MonetaryFund said Monday.

The IMF warned in a bi-annual economic outlookreport that prospects for theregion are “clouded by elevat-ed levels of uncertainty”.

“Such uncertainty mayincrease investors’ perceptionof risk for the whole region,leading to capital outflows andexchange rate pressure,” theglobal lender said.

The IMF forecasts the econ-omy in Iran, the second largestin the region behind SaudiArabia, will shrink by 6.0 percent this year after contractingby 3.9 per cent in 2018.

The bad news for Tehrancomes after the United Statesreimposed sanctions last yearfollowing its withdrawal froma 2015 nuclear accord.

Jihad Azour, IMF MiddleEast and Central Asia director,said the dire projection wasmade before the US tightenedup measures targeting Iran’s oilindustry last week — meaningthe pain could get even worse.

Azour told AFP that sanc-tions have already pushed infla-tion in Iran to around 50 percent.

Iran’s woes have a knock-on effect on regional figures.

Overall regional econom-

ic growth was expected toremain subdued at 1.3 per centthis year from 1.4 per cent in2018.

For oil exporters growthwas down at 0.4 per cent for2019, while importing coun-tries were expected to increaseat 3.6 per cent this year, from4.2 per cent in 2018.

Gulf Cooperation Council(GCC) countries — Bahrain,Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, SaudiArabia and the United ArabEmirates — were forecast toslightly buck the trend, improv-ing to 2.1 per cent growth from2.0 in 2018.

The IMF said economicgrowth in the broader regionwas negatively impacted byrising conflict, corruption, slowreforms, high levels of debt andcontinued oil price fluctua-tions.

“Social tensions are rising inthe context of lower growth andreform fatigue, threateningmacroeconomic stability,” it said.

After the first wave of ArabSpring uprisings in 2011, theregion is now witnessing freshupheaval in Algeria and Sudanand fighting intensified inLibya and Yemen.

As a result, reforms in theregion have become moreurgent to decrease dependenceon oil and create millions ofjobs, especially for the youth.

“For oil exporters, they areimportant to be less dependenton the volatility of oil price andfor diversifying theireconomies,” Azour said.

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Industry body Ficci has calledfor expediting auctions of

mineral blocks with known orexplored reserves, highlightingthat the average of such saleshas nosedived to around 15mines per year after theamendment in the Mines andMinerals Development andRegulation Act.

The chamber in a presen-tation to Niti Aayog statedthat “around 300-400 mineralsconcessions per year used to beallotted prior to 2015 which hasreduced on an average toaround 15 per year post-amendment in the Act(MMDR Act in 2015)”.

It recommended that auc-tions should “be expedited forareas with known/exploredmineral reserves.”

According to sources, offi-cials from Rio Tinto, Tata Steel,Vedanta and apex mineralbody Federation of IndianMineral Industries (FIMI)among others who were part ofthe presentation.

However, for areas with noor minimal known/exploredmineral reserves, it said thefirst-cum first-served systemmust be adopted with the pro-vision of first right of refusal forgranting mining lease, Ficcisaid.

To ensure transparency inthe mineral sector, the Minesand Minerals Developmentand Regulation) AmendmentBill was passed by Parliamentin 2015.

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India and Peru will hold theirnext round of negotiations

for proposed free-trade agree-ment (FTA), aimed at boostingtwo-way commerce andinvestments, here in August, anofficial said.

“Chief negotiators fromboth the countries will hold thefifth round of negotiations forthe agreement in August,” theofficial said.

In an FTA, two tradingpartners significantly reduce oreliminate duties on most of thegoods traded between thembesides relaxing norms andrules to promote trade in ser-vices and increase bilateralinvestments.

In the fourth round oftalks, senior officials of both thesides deliberated upon issuessuch as customs procedures,trade facilitation, market accessfor goods and movement ofprofessionals.

The fourth round was heldbetween March 11 and 15 thisyear in Lima, Peru.

The main chapters of theagreement include trade inservices, movement of profes-sionals, investments, disputesettlement, technical barriersto trade, trade remedies, rulesof origin of goods, customsprocedures and trade facilitation.

With growing uncertaintiesin its traditional markets,including the US and Europe,India is looking to enhanceengagements with otherregions such as Africa, SouthAmerica and Central Asia.

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����/�8�"���,Asurvey conducted by Sightsavers across almost 3000 peo-

ple living in the rural West Bengal revealed that 27 per centof the respondents believed poor eye sight to be a normal signof ageing; 59 per cent did not believe that diabetes if untreat-ed, could result in blindness and 45 per cent thought that new-borns could not have any serious eye conditions that neededany immediate attention.

India is the second most populous country in the worldand is also home to nearly 23.5 per cent of the world’s blindpopulation. A majority of the problem is attributed to subop-timal service provision and cost of care especially in rural areas.There is still a significant component of local myths and mis-beliefs that prevent people to access care at the right time..

Myth 1: If you can see well then,there is no need to visita doctor.

Fact: A routine annual check-up is recommended for all,especially for children irrespective of whether they complainof eye symptoms or not. In most cases children are able to man-age with poor eyesight till quite late and the only manifesta-tions are lack of interest in studies or mild headache.Amongst adults, there are some diseases like Glaucoma andDiabetic Retinopathy that may sneak in without much symp-toms in early stages. Delay in presentation to the doctor is oneof the most common causes of poor treatment outcome formany eye diseases.

Myth 2: Using spectacles will increase your (or your child’s)specs number and eventually, it will lead us to being depen-dent on them.

Fact: A pair of glasses is the simplest and safest option formanaging refractive errors (inability to focus clearly) whichis by far a common eye complaint.Wearing the right kind of

glasses as prescribed has nonegative implication on theeyes or the specs number.Depending on one’s age andtype of refractive errors, the eyesight might either reduce orremain stable but one shouldalways wear the prescribedglasses as directed.

Myth 3: Alldisplay devicessuch as mobile phones, laptops,television are bad for the eyes.

Fact-Although all visualdisplay units (ones that have ascreen) can affect the eyes ifviewed for long durations, theycannot be labelled as all bad. Byadjusting the viewing distance,brightness, ambient light, lim-iting viewing time, taking fre-

quent breaks in between and using anti-glare (UV screen)devices we can use these in the right kind of way without dam-aging the eyes.

Myth 4: To keep the eyes clean, one should wash them withwater frequently.

Fact: Nature has its own way of cleansing the eyes by meansof blinking and tears so, one does not need to wash them toofrequently. If you feel the urge to splash them with water fre-quently, you may be suffering from dry eyes and you shouldconsult an eye doctor. One should also be wary of the quali-ty of water being used.

Myth 5: Eye medications can be used without the expert’sconsultation.

Fact: Some eye drops, if used without proper profession-al consultation can lead to flaring up of minor eye infectionsand even serious issues like glaucoma and cataract which canbe potentially blinding. Even herbal remedies can cause sig-nificant discomfort or long term damage to eyes and thusshould be avoided. One should only use medications as direct-ed by a professional.

Myth 6: Eye exercises can reduce or eliminate the need foreye glasses.

Fact: They have no impact in reducing or impacting yourneed for power glasses. They might help only in strengthen-ing the eye muscles.

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����� Barley, a member of the grass family, is a majorcereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. Barley

grass is rich in phytochemicals, carotenoids (the source ofvitamin A), vitamins C and K, calcium and iron. This makesit a wonderful detoxifier for the liver,working on people with majorcholesterol and weight issues dueto low metabolism, a fatty liverand other liver disorders.

It also purifies the bloodand enriches it with the rightkind of iron, and helps com-bat acidity that results inacne, skin problems, puffiness,and weight gain. Barley is usedfor treating rheumatoid arthri-tis due to its anti-inflammatoryeffect, and barley grass juicemixed with vegetable juice heals allkinds of ulcers.

It is also good for hepatitis, high blood pressure, asthma, weakdigestion and weight loss.

Barley water beverages are widely used in summers becauseit have a cooling effect on the body.

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Exposure to paint,varnish, and othersolvents can put

people at a 50% higherrisk of developing multiplesclerosis (MS), a study has indicated. Thosewho have been smokers with solvent expo-sure and the MS genes are 30 times morelikely to develop MS than those who havenever smoked or been exposed to solventsand who do not have the genetic risk fac-tors.

In recent years, the prevalence of MShas changed dramatically worldwide withIndia being no exception. Initially, MS wasbelieved to be more common in theCaucasians of Northern Europe andUnited States. However, it has been foundto be present in the Indian subcontinentas well. Globally, about 2.3 million peopleare affected by this condition, while thereare about 2 lakh patients in India.

Tips from heart Care Foundation ofIndia:

�Eat a healthy diet with plenty offruits and vegetables, lean protein, andomega-3 fatty acids

�Movement of the body is crucial inpatients with MS at every stage. Regularexercise promotes better flexibility, boostsbalance, and can also help with commonMS complications.

�Practice good sleep hygiene bysticking to a consistent sleep schedule.

�Get plenty of Vitamin D. As per arecent research, people with MS who arevitamin D deficient tend to suffer more sig-nificant progression of the disease.

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Iit is very important to avoidinserting any object insidethe ear to clean wax. The

safest approach to cleaning earsis to visit a doctor as they usespecialised instruments toremove any excessiveearwax or debrissafely. But this maynot always bepractical and pos-sible. There aresome home reme-dies that one canfollow.

Remember: It isnever a good idea toinsert an object into the ear.

To clean the outer shell ofthe ear — use a wet cloth orpaper towel with lukewarmwater. After wringing out theexcess, they can use the cloth toclean the outer areas of the ear.

One can use coconut orolive oil. Slightly warm 1-3 tea-

spoons of oil. Again make sureit’s not too hot. Lay on your sideor with the ear you want to clearfacing up. Put three-four dropsof the warmed oil into your ear

canal. Allow it to sit for10-20 minutes. Turn

your body aroundso the treated earis now facingdown with atowel under-neath it. Allowyour ear to drain

and clean yourouter ear.

Clean ears withbaking soda. Mix 1/4 tea-

spoon baking soda and two tea-spoons water. Pour a few dropsinto the affected ear with thedropper. Let it stay there for afew minutes. Tilt your head toremove the melted earwax.Clean thoroughly with a softcloth.

It is a custom to clean ears regu-larly with earbuds or q-tips. But it

may be risky and therefore, it isimportant to be careful.

ROSHANI DEVI shares homeremedies on how one can clean

the eardrums

The fungus, Candida auris is an emerg-ing “superbug” and is fast becoming

a global health threat. The CDC has addeddrug-resistant C auris to a list of germs,which are considered as “urgentthreats.”

C auris has been reportedfrom South Korea, India,Pakistan, Kuwait, Israel,Oman, South Africa,Colombia, Venezuela, theUnited States, Canada, andEurope, including the UnitedKingdom, Norway, Germany andSpain. A total of 617 cases have beenreported in the US till March 29, 2019.

C auris is a deadly infection; immuno-compromised persons are more vulnera-ble to develop this infection. People whorecently had surgery, live in nursinghomes, or who have breathing tubes, feed-ing tubes or central venous catheters areespecially at higher risk.

Patients can remain colonised with Cauris for a long time and the fungus cansurvive on hospital surface for long dura-tion. This facilitates spread of C. auris

between patients in healthcare facili-ties.

It can cause different types ofinfections, including blood-stream infection, wound infec-tion, and ear infection. Thesymptoms of the infection are

not easily identifiable as thepatients are already critically ill.

According to the CDC, infectionwith C auris is of concern because:

�It is often multidrug-resistant.�It is difficult to identify with stan-

dard laboratory methods, and it can bemisidentified in labs without specifictechnology, which can lead to inappropri-ate management.

�It has caused outbreaks in healthcaresettings.

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For many people it is a normal shoulder pain,not to be worried about. But when the pain

gets prolonged it evokes a sense of alarm. Whilemany doctors treat it as a mere frozen shoulderbut it is not the case everytime.

Dr Deepak Choudhary, Director,Arthroscopy and Sports Medicine, BLKHospitals who is handling such cases from a longtime and is credited with performing over 12,000complex knee and shoulder surgeries says thispain can be because of rotator cuff tear whichis often confused with frozen shoulder.

“Many people ignore the pain for a longtime, but when the pain persists they consult adoctor, who then treat it as a frozen shoulder.Patients undergo steroid shots in the shoulderand sessions of physiotherapy, without muchrelief. But, not everytime shoulder pain signi-fies frozen shoulder. Sometimes it can be rota-tor cuff tear. In this condition, the tendon getstorn which result in pain,” he tells you. Timelydetection in such cases is the key.

“A lot of patients come for the right treat-ment at a very late stage. Therefore, they mayrequire surgery, but if a timely detection is done,then it can also be cured through steroid injec-tion and physiotherapy too. A latest treatmentin curing the condition at an early stage isPlatelet-rich plasma (PRP) injection, in whicha patient’s own blood is withdrawn and and thegrowth factors are centrifuged and injected intothe affected area thereby resulting in healing,”he explains.

There are various reasons that can lead tothe condition. “Different reasons can lead to tearof the tendon. It may happen while working out,playing sports, doing household chores, due toaccidents, improper exercise and in the elderlyit can be due to the age-factor. With age, the bonestart getting weak, tendons get abrade and thepressure on them increases which results inswelling and pain in the shoulder,” he tells youand adds that gym and yoga should be doneunder proper supervision to avoid this condi-tion from happening.

“Recently we saw a case of rotator cuff tearin a young national level wrestler from Haryana.Hemant, suffered a shoulder injury last year dur-ing a wrestling competition and he took steroidsto relieve the pain. The pain continued and gotworsened and he was unable to move his hand.Then on a family member’s advice he came tous for the right treatment. He underwent min-imal invasive Arthroscopic surgery and isdoing perfectly fine since then. He has now start-ed doing wrestling again,” he says.

Proper awareness regarding the conditionis necessary so that patients can go for the righttreatment without delay. “Lack of awareness isthe reason why some patients are misguided andare not diagnosed with the condition at the righttime. They keep on taking the wrong treatmentwhich results in further degeneration of the ten-don. So, proper awareness along with timelydetection is the key to treat this condition,” hetells you.

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NATURE TO THE RESCUELiver (Yakrit) is a vital organ. It

converts rasa dhatu to rakta dhatu(blood). It also produces bile (ranjakpitta) and detoxifies the body elim-inating ama from the blood. Wrongdiet and lifestyle damages the livertissues and leads to diseases like jaun-dice, fatty liver and hepatitis.

Ayurveda can help. Include thesefive simple Ayurvedic herbs in yourlife to keep your liver healthy.

�Kutki: This bitter tasting herbis cooling in nature and has a cleans-ing effect on the liver and gallbladder. In Ayurveda, kutki is pre-scribed to improve appetite and to treat jaundice or bile disorders.The herb is beneficial in skin disorders and to improve metabo-lism. You can take one Jiva Kutki capsule each day for a healthyliver.

�Turmeric: The yellow herb supports liver functions andcleanses blood. It can also aid the process of transforming rasa intorakta. It also promotes elimination of toxins from the body. In mostcases you do not need to take any additional turmeric if you alreadyuse it in your meals.

�Guduchi: Guduchi is known for its detoxifying and bloodcleansing properties. Ayurvedic herbal medicines prepared for liverproblems contain guduchi. The herb also has known benefits intreating kamala (jaundice), hepatitis and fatty liver. Guduchi shouldbe taken under the guidance of an Ayurvedic doctor.

�Triphala: The mixture of amla, bibhitaki and haritaki helpsin regularising metabolism and bowel movements. It cools downthe body and balances all tridoshas in the body. Triphala churnacan be taken by anyone every night before bed.

�Aloe vera: Aloe vera juice flushes toxins out of the liver (hepa-toxicity) and promotes good bowel movements. In addition to sooth-ing the digestive system, Aloe vera also fights stress and strength-ens the immune system.

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Unhealthy lifestyles, stress andincreasing exposure to toxinsin food and water have in

recent years led to a dramatic rise inlifestyle diseases including liver dis-eases. According to WHO, around 10lakh Indians are diagnosed with liverCirrhosis every year. As we battle aliver disease surge, adopting natuar-al practices can go a long way in help-ing our population maintain a healthyand toxin free liver.

Liver ailments are among the 10leading causes of deaths in India, withfatty liver disease emerging as a ris-ing cause of liver damage. It is impor-tant to educate people about the needfor following liver-healthy lifestylesand natural liver detoxification prac-tices.

Jindal Naturecure Institute hasrestudied and revitalised a series ofnatural liver cleansing and detoxifi-cation therapies that have existed inIndia for thousands of years.Everyday kitchen staples such aslemons, apples, berries, amla, turmer-ic, beetroot and grapes among oth-ers can become potent tools to main-tain a healthy liver if used with theright knowledge and regimen.

“Liver is an important organwith many essential functions includ-ing cleansing our bodies of harmfultoxins. A number of factors haveincreased the toxin load on our liv-ers. Regular consumption ofprocessed food — especially whiteflour, refined sugar, saturated, rancidand hydrogenated fats, smoked meatand alcohol are toxic to the delicateoperation of the liver cells.Additionally, the presence of additivesand pesticides in food, pollution,

drugs and anger — all have negativeimpact on liver health. This is why itis important to adopt naturopathypractices in our daily lives as a holis-tic approach to our health,” says DrBabina NM, Joint CMO, JindalNaturecure Institute.

To follow these simple yet time-tested steps of Naturopathy not onlyhelp in reducing excess body weight,abdominal girth, blood pressure lev-els, but also improves liver and renalfunctions.

“Some very simple solutions canhelp us maintain good liver health.We have a seven-day apple therapy tocleanse the liver naturally and drug-lessly. This therapy involves consum-ing six to eight apples every day forsix days. On the sixth day, the patientmust have no dinner but drinkepsom salt water at 6 pm and 8 pmfollowed by drinking a mixture ofconcentrated lime juice (200 ml)plus olive oil (125 ml at 10 pm). Onthe seventh morning, the patientmust consume tender coconut water,followed by sweetlime juice, littlekhichidi and curd for lunch. This isjust one of the many wonderful nat-ural treatments available to improveliver health,” says Sushma PS, ChiefDietician (Naturopathy), JindalNaturecure Institute.

Nature cure treatments likeenema, colon hydrotherapy, mudbath, mud pack, abdominal pack, hipbath, partial oil therapy to abdomen,hot and cold fomentation and castoroil pack are beneficial for improvingliver functions. Maintaining a phys-ically active lifestyle and practicingyoga are other important ways toimprove one’s health.

�Hemochromatosis: It is adisorder in which excessive ironbuilds up in the body and ham-pers the normal functioning ofseveral organ systems. In simpleterms it refers to iron overload.

The early symptoms ofhereditary hemochromatosis areinclude joint pains, fatigue, lethar-gy, abdominal pain and loss ofsexual drive.

The diagnosis of hereditaryhemochromatosis is usually chal-lenging as high index of suspicionis needed by the treating physicianto entertain its diagnosis. Certainblood tests are done includingserum ferritin, transferrin satura-tion to demonstrate excessiveiron in the body.

�Wilson’s disease: It is a rareinherited disorder in which exces-

sive copper accumulates in thebody, particularly in the liver,brain, and eyes. In Wilson’s dis-ease, the excretion of copper isdefective which leads to its exces-sive accumulation in the body.The symptoms of liver diseaseinclude yellowing of the eyes(jaundice), lethargy, fatigue, lossof appetite, and abdominalswelling.

The diagnosis of the diseaseis based on blood and urinetests. Liver biopsy can also be per-formed to quantify the amount ofcopper in the liver tissue.

�Lemons help the liver produce glu-tathione which neutralises toxins

�Apple Cider Vinegar reduces fataccumulated in the liver andreduces inflammation

�Green Tea is enriched with cat-echins which prevents non-alcoholic fatty liver disease

�Cruciferous vegetables like Broccolisprout, up-liver’s natural detoxifica-tion enzymes

�Beetroot juice protects the liver from oxidative damage and inflammation�Pear reduces liver inflammation and may protect from alcohol damage�Grapes and grape seed extract protect the liver from

cellular damage�Berries are high in antioxidants;

they help protect the liver andimprove its immunity

�Turmeric improves the body’sability to digest fats and pre-vent its accumulation inliver.

�Papaya and its seeds helpburn dietary fats and pre-vent fatty liver disease

�Amla detoxifies liver andis an effective homeremedy for fatty liverdisease

�Olive oil decreases levels of fatin the liver and improves liverenzymes levels.

�Grape Fruit protects the liver by reducing inflammation and enhancing itsprotective mechanisms.

�Shun alcohol completely as it damages the liver’s functioning.

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Muslim women in SriLanka will not be allowed

to wear any form of face veilsin public from Monday undernew regulations announced byPresident Maithripala Sirisenawho used emergency powers inthe wake of the Easter Sundaybombings.

The new regulation ban-ning any form of face coveringwas announced by thePresident on Sunday, a weekafter the coordinated blasts hitthree churches and three lux-ury hotels, killing over 250 peo-ple and inuring more than 500others.

It specifically mentions“any face garment which hin-ders identification”.

“The ban is to ensurenational security... No oneshould obscure their faces tomake identification difficult,”Sirisena’s office said in a state-ment. He took steps under theemergency regulation to pro-hibit the use of face coveringsof all sorts which is an obsta-

cle to ensure the identity of thepeople and a threat to nation-al and public security.

The order clarifies that thekey criterion for establishingthe identity of a person is theneed to clearly expose the face.

The President has takenthis decision to establish apeaceful and cohesive societywhich does not inconvenienceany community people as wellas ensure national security.

The presidential commu-nique, however, makes nomention of niqab and burqa.

The government was con-templating the move to ban

both niqab and burka. Theysought cooperation from theMuslim clerics some of whomissued statements that bothmust be refrained from wear-ing in view of the currentvolatile security situation.

“We have permitted peopleto leave their homes with facesuncovered as means to coop-erate with the security forces,”Fazil Farook, a spokesman forJamiyyathul Ulema, or theMuslim theologists body, said.

There has been a publicdemand to ban the niqab andburka following the bombattacks. Hijab, niqab, burka

are different kinds of coveringsworn by Muslim women allover the world.

Hijab covers the head andneck but leaves the face clear.Niqab is a veil for the face thatleaves the area around the eyesclear and burka is one-pieceveil that covers the entire face,leaving just a net screen to seethrough.

Muslims account for 10 percent of the population and arethe second-largest minorityafter Hindus. Around seven percent of Sri Lankans are

Christians.Nine suicide bombers car-

ried out a series of devastatingblasts that tore through threechurches and three luxuryhotels on the Easter Sunday,killing 253 people.

It was reported that at leastthree women suicide bombershad been involved.

The Islamic State claimedthe attacks, but the governmenthas blamed local Islamistextremist group NationalThowheeth Jamaath (NTJ) forthe attacks.

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Colombo: Introducing a toughnew legislation to eliminatejehadism and extremism fromSri Lanka is the Government’stop priority, Prime MinisterRanil Wickremesinghe has saidin the aftermath of country’sworst terror attacks.

The deadly attacks couldhave been prevented if the

new Counter Terrorism Bill,which provides for territorialjurisdiction, was passed inParliament without delay, hesaid on Sunday after joining theSunday Mass in Colombo andthe mass at the Saint Anthony’schurch in Kochchikade, a weekafter the deadly suicide bomb-ing killed over 250 people.PTI

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President Donald Trump hassaid that there are so many

migrants crossing into the USterritory illegally that “it’s likeDisneyland now.” The Trumpadministration threatened toclose the US-Mexico border,but backed off on the threat atthe beginning of April after anoutcry from congressional andbusiness leaders.

Trump has often blamedMexico for the growing flow ofillegal migrants entering the USand said they were a major

source of drug trafficking andother crimes.

Trump on Sunday lament-ed his administration’s decisionto stop the practice of separat-ing families illegally crossingthe, calling it “the worst immi-gration laws ever, incompetent,they’re there for a long time.”

“When they used to sepa-rate children, which was doneduring the Obama adminis-tration, with Bush, with us,with everybody, far fewer peo-ple would come,” Trump saidduring Fox News’ ‘SundayMorning Futures,’.

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Islamabad: In what is seen asa major diplomatic setback,Pakistan could not convinceRussia for a bilateral meetingbetween President VladimirPutin and Prime MinisterImran Khan on the sidelines ofa high-profile meeting inBeijing, a media report said onMonday.

Other than his meetingswith the Chinese President XiJinping and Premier LiKeqiang, Imran could onlymanage meeting the PrimeMinister of Ethiopia AbiyAhmed Ali and the Presidentof Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon

despite the fact that at least 37heads of state and governmentattended the two-day Belt andRoad Forum (BRF) that con-cluded on Sunday, The ExpressTribune reported.

There was no immediateexplanation from the govern-ment as to why more bilateralmeetings could not be arrangedbetween Khan and other worldleaders, it said.

On the sidelines of theBRF, Khan had separate meet-ings with InternationalMonetary Fund chief ChristineLagarde and the CEO of WorldBank Kristalina Georgieva.PTI

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Police are asking rape andsexual assault victims for

access to their digital devicesunder new guidelines pub-lished on Monday that prompted criticism fromwomen’s rights campaignersin Britain.

Officers now present vic-tims with consent forms toview messages, photographs,emails and social mediaaccounts, with police warning

that prosecutions may not goahead without the permissions.

The change follows a dis-closure scandal in the legal sys-tem which saw a series of rapeand sexual assault cases col-lapse in recent years after cru-cial evidence emerged at thelast minute.

Assistant commissionerNick Ephgrave, of the NationalPolice Chiefs’ Council, saidthe new “informed consent”forms would be used “propor-tionately and consistently”.

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Sri Lankan PresidentMaithripala Sirisena on

Monday suspended defiantpolice chief Pujith Jayasundaraand named his successor as wellas a new defence secretary aspart of the revamping of thesecurity establishment followingthe country’s worst terror attack.

Sirisena on Friday said thatJayasundara had resigned buthe never sent the letter andremained in his official resi-dence, according to officials.

Senior Deputy InspectorGeneral CD Wickremaratnehas been appointed as the act-ing police chief while formerInspector General NKIllangakoon named as an advi-sor to the Defence Ministry,according to the President’soffice.

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The sister of the suspectedringleader of Sri Lanka's

Easter Sunday bombings hasclaimed that up to 18 membersof her family are missing andfeared dead since the massivesuicide attacks and subsequentpolice raids, according to amedia report.

More than 250 people werekilled and at least 500 injuredin a series of coordinated sui-cide bombings at churches andhotels by the little-knownNational Tawheed Jamath(NTJ) across the island April 21.

Mohamed HashimMathaniya is the sister ofMohamed Zahran Hashim, theman Sri Lankan authoritiesbelieve was one of the leaders ofthe attacks, the country’s worst.

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The elusive chief of theIslamic State group Abu

Bakr al-Baghdadi has pur-portedly appeared for the firsttime in five years in a propa-ganda video released onMonday by the jehadi organi-sation.

It is unclear when thefootage was filmed, but theman said to be Baghdadireferred in the past tense to themonths-long fight for Baghouz,IS's final bastion in eastern

Syria, which ended last month.“The battle for Baghouz is

over,” the man said, sittingcross-legged on a cushion andaddressing three men whosefaces have been blurred.

But he insisted that IS'soperations against the Westwere part of a “long battle,” and

that IS would “take revenge” onmembers who had been killed.

“There will be more tocome after this battle,” he said.

Baghdadi, 47, had a longgrey beard that appeared dyedwith henna and spoke slowly,often pausing for several sec-onds in the middle of his sen-tences.

He appeared for the firstand last time in public inMosul in 2014, where hedeclared an Islamic “caliphate”in the swathes of territory ISISthen held in Syria and Iraq.

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Beijing: China and Pakistanhave signed an agreement onspace exploration, marking anew phase in space sciencecooperation including mannedmissions between the all-weather allies.

The agreement was signedon April 27 during the visit ofPakistan Prime Minister ImranKhan to China for the 2nd Beltand Road Forum (BRF), theChina National SpaceAdministration (CNSA) said.

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What is the most trauma-tising time for parentsof infants? Certainly,when the child is cry-ing, in pain or unable to

express himself/herself as s/he cannotspeak. For children, being unable toclearly explain their symptoms is thereason that they find an outlet in cry-ing to express their discomfort. Thisproblem worsens when it comes tobabies with congenital eye disease. Thechildren don’t audibly express thatsomething is wrong, which makes diag-nosing eye disease in infants much moredifficult. It requires parents and pedi-atrics to act like detectives in order tofind clues and make deductions. Andthis is where a new form of testing usingArtificial Intelligence (AI) can help.

Unlike the traditional method ofhaving a doctor lead the child’s gazewith a finger or a device, a new technol-ogy called DIVE uses a computerscreen, removing the element of humaninterference and outputting more pre-cise visual stimulation. In addition, itcan measure eye movement, automati-cally tracking children’s eyes with greateraccuracy than a doctor’s visual obser-vation of their reactions.

After collecting children’s reactions,it has to be determined if they are nor-mal. Tornado Pan, country manager ofHuawei, a telecommunications equip-ment company, says, “This is where thehelp of AI comes in. It records the per-formance of children with ordinary

vision and those suffering from impair-ment at different ages. AI analyses thisdata to learn the difference betweenchildren with and without eye diseases.When a new child undergoes testing, themachine learning model can provide asupplementary judgment on the child’scondition. The device provides thevisual stimuli, captures and analyse thechild’s reaction, then employs AI tomake a judgment. In comparison withtraditional manual testing, this repre-sents a big step forward. However, likemost standard medical technologies, thecurrent DIVE in its early stages stillrequires that the user goes to an oph-thalmologist for testing, as it relies onthe interpretation of its results by anexpert. Employing AI to make judge-ments allows inexperienced examinersto have an easy interpretation of visu-al assessments and to be able to iden-tify children with visual problems.”

What makes it crucial is when youconsider World Health Organisation(WHO) statistics, it say that there arearound 19 million children in theworld suffering from visual impair-ment. With timely intervention, theproblems of 70-80 per cent of them canbe prevented or treated. In this context,the timing of diagnosis and treatmentbecomes the key to deciding the chil-dren’s future.

Most eye diseases occur in the firstfive years of life. Early diagnosis isextremely important. Unfortunately, alack of parental knowledge and aware-

ness means that many children miss theoptimum diagnosis period. The pro-portion of kids suffering from eye dis-ease who receive early treatment is justone third of the total. Most of them goundiagnosed for a long time, affectingtheir eyesight and educational oppor-tunities. In low-mid income countries,going blind is an ever-present threat forsome children.

A recent study described how AIcan be applied to patients with retinaldiseases as it demonstrated that acomputer could learn to accurately andreliably recognise such common eyediseases as macular degeneration anddiabetic retinopathy.

While it could take a specialistdecades of practical experience toreach the highest levels of expertise, thestudy revealed that the computer couldrecognise such things after a few days.

Looking at the existing methods oftesting, there are three problems withit — First, the doctor’s presence itselfis enough to attract the child’s atten-tion and is therefore a form of inter-ference. Second, the final judgementrelies completely on human interpre-tation, necessitating highly profes-sional and experienced doctors. Third,this method requires active coopera-tion between the doctor and the patientbut many infants cannot correctly fol-low the doctor’s instructions.

Whereas, the newer diagnostictechnology uses light waves to takehigh-resolution, cross-section images

of the eye to give doctors a way to mapand measure the retina in detail.

The scans are then used to spotcommon conditions like maculardegeneration, in which a part of theretina called the macula, deteriorates,and diabetic retinopathy, a complica-tion of diabetes that causes the bloodvessels in the retina to swell and leakfluid. Both are dangerous conditionsthat can cause blindness if they are notdiagnosed and treated at the right time.

Researchers predict that such tech-nology will have uses across the world.In resource-rich countries like theUnited States, it can reduce the criti-cal time between symptoms of a dis-ease, its diagnosis and treatment. It’s awin-win for both patients and the doc-tors.

Due to the rapid pace of innova-tion, the use of AI will continue tobecome more and more streamlinedwith our lives. As technology contin-ues to be adapted and tested, there ishope that life for the visually-impairedwill see fewer obstacles.

While this new technology can pro-vide assistance to disadvantagedgroups, for the majority of sufferers oftreatable illnesses, researchers say,early detection and prevention of theseillnesses is still the key to improvedquality of life. Meanwhile, the key toincreasing the success rate of treatmentis paying more attention to children’seyesight and discovering problems asearly as possible.

When Laibi Oinam got inthe front seat of a sec-ond-hand auto-rick-

shaw as a driver almost a decadeago, she received a lot of nega-tive attention from people in herhome state of Manipur innortheast India. But her lifetook a new turn in 2015when her struggle to get pas-sengers and earn money tosupport her ailing husbandand young sons caught a

filmmaker’s attention.Now in her 50s, Laibi has

bought herself a new auto-rick-shaw, her younger son is inch-ing closer to his football dream

and she enjoys respect in thesame society that once lookeddown upon her for driving anauto and breaking another glassceiling for women without real-ly knowing it.

Laibi says that she didn’t takeup the job of an autodriver in2011 to challenge stereotypes.Her husband’s deterioratinghealth and sons’ educationdemanded more money. What

she earned by working in abrick kiln was insufficient. So,she collected money throughchit fund and bought a second-hand auto.

“I rented it out to others butwe didn’t get much money out ofit. Meanwhile my husband gotunwell, so I decided to start dri-ving,” Laibi said.

Whether it is fighting for acause or selling vegetables orhandloom weaving, traditionalmale bastions, women inManipur have always been in theforefront of society. But thesame can’t be said about auto-

drivers.“When I started driving auto

in 2011, I used to wear phanek(traditional wear of Manipuriwomen). Later on, I changed topants as people often refused totake rides because of my genderand outfit,” said Laibi, who learnthow to drive on a Vespa.

Since the sight of womenautodrivers was not a commonone in Manipur, it caught theattention of film director MeenaLongjam.

“I met her in 2012. It was anaccidental encounter. There weremany male autodrivers in themarket and then there was thisone woman waiting to get pas-sengers in her auto. I had neverthought that a woman coulddrive an auto in Manipur,” saidthe Madras Christian Collegealumnus.

An article on Laibi piquedMeena’s interest. “Someone hadwritten an article on her. ThenI thought of talking to her. Also,I remember back in 2011, therewas an economic blockade in

Manipur for so many monthsthat it crippled all of us. Ithought of sending out a mes-sage to people through my film.

“I wanted to show howdespite all the problems in thestate, a woman is working hardto support her family,” said thefilmmaker.

The documentaryAutodriver is barely of 30 min-utes but Meena gave about threeyears of her life to it.

“It took me time to buildrapport with her. I wanted her tofeel comfortable so that shecould open up and tell me herstory,” she said.

“While talking to her, Inoticed that Laibi has big dreamsfor her children. Though one ofher sons had to drop out of aSainik school due to her finan-cial condition, she still dreamsbig. She wants her elder son tobecome an IAS officer andyounger son a footballer.

“Her journey is very emo-tional. She does all the householdchores and then heads out toearn money as an autodriver —a challenging job for a woman inManipur,” she added.

The emotional story con-nected with many. It even baggedthe best social issue film in thenon-feature category at the 63rdedition of National Film awards.

“Now I am a known face. Alot of people have started sup-porting me. Even traffic policeofficials don’t bother me much.My younger son is studying in afootball academy in Chandigarh.The elder one is almost donewith his graduation. I earnaround �1,000 per day,” saidLaibi, almost twice what sheearned when she started out onher challenging journey.

So once her sons start earn-ing, will she quit driving?

“I know how to make phee(traditional Manipuri handloomlong scarf) but I don’t enjoydoing it. I think I will drive myauto all my life. I like driving. Itsuits me,” said Laibi.

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Writer-director andBollywood actorA y u s h m a n n

Khurrana’s wife Tahira Kashyaphas documented her journeybattling cancer on social media.

From sharing a series ofphotographs of herself showinghow chemotherapy affected herto talking about the change inher attitude towards life due tothe disease, Tahira took to socialmedia to open up about herstruggles on being a cancerpatient.

Dedicating her post “towomen of all shapes and sizesand to all those posts I get whenthey fret losing their hair duringor after chemotherapy.” Shewrote, “I am hoping there is achange in the perception of thatone perfect flavour that we havealways had.

“The last couple of monthshave been an extreme case ofmetamorphosis for me. And Iam not categorising it whether itwas from a caterpillar to a but-terfly phase or vice-versa. Icould be the larva or the pupa orany other intermediate stage aseach phase is unique and spe-cial. But there is a deep senseof acceptance when it comes tothe life cycle of this creature.Taking a ‘leaf ’ from this cater-pillar’s life, I feel I have under-gone a tremendous change men-tally and physically too.

“From my obsession withlong hair, associating beautywith rapunzel tresses, and hid-ing most of the time behindmy hair (as I felt secure, lestmy crooked nose, or frecklesor pimples or simply not sochiseled face isn’t exposed) tolosing my hair, wearingextensions and a cap, goingbald to now a short crop, Iam enjoying every phasebecause somehow with hairI lost my insecurity, my stu-pid notion of beauty and mycomplexes.”

She doesn’t know whethershe will be keeping long hairor not, “in either case I am notgoing to hide my face.”

“I have changed my ownmindset and my biggest vic-

tory is changing the mindset andperception of my seven-year-old-son, the next generation. Fromrunning to get a cap and placingit on my head when I was losingmy hair and had a bald patch toproudly introducing me to hisfriends when I was bald or nowwith short hair, I feel I am a partof a change,” she added.

On September 22 last year,Tahira revealed that she wasdetected with DCIS (ductal car-cinoma in situ) in her rightbreast with high grade malignantcells. G$/'�

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The Universe has come out of Ananda(supernal delight),” says theUpanishad. This delight includes

and transcends all joys and sorrows withNandalal Bose’s Haripura posters that arefull of nationalist spirit and fervour.

“Nandalal and his associates producedaround 400 posters for the Congress con-vention at Haripura, held in February1938,” reflects Director General of NGMA,Adwaita Gadanayak. He is upbeat aboutIndia’s participation at the Venice Biennalewhere he is celebrating 150 years ofGandhi with an exposition of the Haripuraposters by Nandalal from NGMA’s collec-tion. Earlier, in August 2017, Gadanayakcelebrated 70 years of Independence,when he hosted an exhibition that soughtto awaken our political consciousnessand included the historic Haripura postersthat were a joy to behold because it awak-ened our political consciousness at large.

“At the Venice Biennale we will displaythem as independent works but historysays they were done to decorate a tempo-rary township built for the annual sessionof the Indian National Congress in theremote village of Haripura in early1938,”adds Gadanayak.

According to historical notes by arthistorian R Sivakumar the township wasbuilt of local materials and in harmonywith the rural surroundings. The decora-tions were conceived, both in style andidiom, following the same aesthetics andwere designed to complement the tempo-rary structures. Sivakumar wrote in anessay that they have to be imagined in theiroriginal context as part of a total design tobe fully appreciated. Viewed in this man-

ner their nuanced sophistication, which ischaracteristic of Nandalal, comes to thefore.

���� ����!��"�#$%& '%“These posters were all produced on

handmade paper with pigments groundfrom local earth and stones, and mount-ed on straw boards; none were printed ormass-produced,” he adds.

These posters reflect the painter’sacute sensitivity to the landscape and vil-lage folk around him. Each poster is a val-idation of vitality and liveliness more than70 years after they were executed.

They depict genre scenes within archedniches and these appear like windows intovignettes of Indian village life.

When one imagines that they were exe-cuted in 1937 after being commissioned byGandhi for the Indian National CongressParty meeting in Haripura in 1938 – thesecan certainly be considered a benchmarkin Indian history. With subjects like anesraj player, a veena player, women doingtheir chores, Nandalal brings an authen-ticity and sincerity through his choice ofmaterials and techniques by ensuringtheir quality which is non-derivative fromWestern models. The fluidity of contoursand the weaving in of colour tones in theimages that personify the rural idyll are alesson in the roots of modernism.

�'���#�()�$%In the Bull Fighter, the vigour and

tenacity of the man and the bull are shownthrough strong, gestural lines and swathesof bright, bold colours. The Bull Fighterwas prominently displayed at the confer-

ence grounds at Haripura. It also resonateswith older styles that add myriad mean-ings.

Deceptively simple in appearance andinvoking folk paintings the HaripuraPosters are an amalgam of the decorativeand the calligraphic.

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Haripura was the crowning glory ofNandalal’s association with the Mahatmaand his experimentation with Gandhianethics in creativity, which had begun at theLucknow session of the Congress in 1936and taken a definitive shape at Faizpur in1937. In this context Gandhi’s assessmentof Nandalal’s achievements while inaugu-rating the exhibition at Faizpur is worthquoting.

He said, “Credit for the arrangementshere belongs to the architect, Mhatre andthe artist, Nandalal Bose. When Nandababu responded to my invitation a coupleof months back, I explained to him whatI wanted, and left it to him to give concreteshape to the conception. For he is a cre-ative artist and I am none. God has givenme the sense of art but not the organs togive it concrete shape. He has blessedNandalal Bose with both. I am thankfulthat he agreed to take upon himself thewhole burden of organising the artistic sidethe exhibition. He came and settled heresome weeks back to see to everything him-self. The result is that the entire Tilaknagaris an exhibition in itself, and so it beginsnot where I am going to open it, but at themain gateway which is a fine piece of vil-lage art. Of course our thanks are due also

to Mhatre who has spared no pains inbringing the entire plan to completion.Please remember that Nanda babu hasdepended entirely on local material andlabour to bring all the structures here intobeing.” (Quoted from, Collected Works ofMahatma Gandhi, digital edition, Vol. 70.Page 212.)

(��*)�,!��$��$%�� �)���$%The Indian Pavilion will also have Jitish

Kallat’s immersive and historic CoveringLetter: Projection of Gandhi’s Letter toHitler. Projected onto a traversable curtainof cascading fog, this work presents a his-torical letter by Mahatma Gandhi to AdolfHit ler, written just weeks before the start of World War II. Inthe spirit of his doctrine of universalfriendship, Gandhi begins the letter with the greeting “Dear friend.” Mist diffuses Gandhi’s projected text, echoingthe fate of his message, which wentunheeded.

Kallat says, “This describes Gandhi’scorrespondence as a plea, it is from a greatadvocate of peace to one of the most vio-lent individuals who ever lived. I also imag-ined it as an open invitation for self-reflec-tion, as its scrolling words speak to theextreme violence in the world today.”Kallat’s interest in remediating historythrough the actions and words of histor-ical figures places this piece among themost avant garde works of practicing con-temporary artists in India. In unveilingCovering Letter, in Venice on May 11, theartist focusses on the possibility of peaceand tolerance in a world plagued by con-trol and surveillance.

Different media, including foundobjects, appropriated industrial

machines, carved stone and wood, castbronze, and works embedded in con-crete and coated in oil, were usedtogether for a range of more than 25sculptures created during the past 13years by conceptual artist, Tallur L N.The Grounds For Sculpture (GFS) is setto present his first survey exhibition inthe United States.

FringeThe exhibition includes the premiereof an important new work and theexhibition’s partial namesake, Fringe(2019), a towering 18’-tall site-specif-ic installation coated in bone meal,bone char and crushed bone, whichwas inspired by historic Indian templefragments. This is from the collectionof the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Onview is also the debut of a video work,Interference (2019), inauguratingTallur’s use of film as an artistic medi-um. This mesmerising slow-motionvideo captures smoke-like plumes ofdust being beaten out of a historic rugfrom the collection of the JunagadhMuseum in Gujarat and obscuring itsintricate pattern.

ApocalypseIn one of the galleries, works are sitedon industrial scaffolding, an interven-tion which upends typical museum dis-plays. While visitors are invited to walkthrough and ascend the structure, itintentionally obstructs views and pro-vides partial access, thereby forcingviewers to accept multiple perspectiveson the sculptures and their meaning.

In another installation, titledApocalypse (2010), viewers squeeze inthrough cage bars and are invited todeposit coins in an industrial polish-ing machine. Following Tallur’s care-ful instructions, the coins become“civilised” and are polished to the pointof denuding their value.

Collective historyThe artist’s practice explores the waysin which humans navigate the absur-dities of a world rife with competinganxieties, desires, and fears. At amoment in our collective history whenthe society is often at odds with itselfand the lines between reality andtruth sometimes feel arbitrary, Tallur’swork amplifies and distorts what wehold as true or sacred and illuminatesparadoxes and contradictions.

Building on the rich sculptural tra-

ditions of India, he references ancienticonography, Hindu symbols, andmythology. Tallur purposefullyobscures, transforms and subverts thetraditional reading of these historic ref-erences as he creates conceptualmetaphors through the manipulationand integration/dis-integration ofmaterials. His work acknowledges thecomplexity of the global world we livein and creates dynamic tensionbetween the past and present whileprovoking questions about the future.

Milled HistoryIn Milled History (2014), Tallur

employed termites to feed on a wood-en copy of a temple figurine, then dig-itally scanned the remains and milledthem into sandstone that mimics thewood grain of its original state. Theartist relates everyday acts of consump-tion and digestion to the gradualeffacement and loss of culture, high-lighting how objects can be displacedand imitated to suit preferred versionsof history and politics.

Eraser ProThe exhibition title alludes to thenotion that we simultaneously carryforward and censor memories of thepast and that this subjective retellingbecomes history. Tallur likens thisprocess of collective memory andamnesia to two strong waves. Inphysics, ‘interference’ is a phenomenonwhere two waves come together. If theirfrequency and wavelength are in sync,they can amplify, diminish, or com-pletely negate each other.

His finest work is Eraser Pro 2012,a sculpture of Mahatma Gandhi thathas been created as a dulcet fragmen-tation incomplete in its insignia anddynamic in design dictates. Tallurloves to keep his viewers guessing. Heuses sculpture, wall pieces, interactivework and site-specific installations toexpose the absurdities of everyday lifeand the anxieties that characterise con-temporary society. His work incorpo-rates hand-made craftsmanship, foundobjects, organic and industrial mater-ial; symbols of developing India, oftentimes creating a correlation betweentraditional and contemporary cus-toms. The New York Times eloquentlydescribed the artist’s work, “Each of hispieces is like a miniature curiosity cab-inet, hand-assembled down to thesmallest detail and packed withcharmed and puzzling surprises.”

(The show begins from May 1.)

Many centuries after his death,the Bard and his works contin-

ue to be relevant — for a reason.Transport any of his plays to con-temporary times and it coulddescribe the society of that era.

Hamlet (1609), which someyears back was seen on the silverscreen as Haider, has often beendescribed as the world’s most filmedstory after Cinderella, for this workof William Shakespeare stays rele-vant to the present times and is oneof the most influential works ofworld literature. The play’s conceptreturns to the Indian stage as TheCurse of Hamlet by directorRajneesh Gautam as he directs andnarrates the story through Indiancharacters based in Delhi of 1993.

The director says that the actorsin the play are so invested in theircharacters that the boundarieswhich separate them from their realselves have become blurred.

The play, he says, is wovenaround “the basic idea ofShakespearean Hamlet.” It struckhim during some rehearsal sessionsin January that he could look for agroup which has been working onHamlet for the last 25-30 years. “Ifound one — the Abhigyan Theatre— and now the actors have becomeone with the characters.”

The theatre has been presentinga successful production of Hamletfor the last 25 years with SarveshwarSharma, the founder of the theatregroup, playing the eponymous lead.

In The Curse of Hamlet, taint-ed with the madness of the play, hisrelations with his wife Bhavna andhis 23-year-old son Siddharth, havealso soured. Siddharth’s girlfriendCharu wants him to leave the the-atre group, but Siddharth wants toplay Hamlet once, just to make apoint to his father.

Chetan Saxena, manager,Abhigyan Theatre, too is obsessedwith playing Hamlet and has a deepgrudge about never getting a chanceto do so. Chetan, Bhavna andSarveshwar were friends from col-lege days and their lives are intricate-ly and perhaps inextricably boundtogether. Their lives could have con-tinued in the same way, if not for afateful incident.

Impacted by many Westernstyles, he says that the play is sub-tle and realistic in nature since itdeals with not only the characters’obsession to play Hamlet, but alsowith the director’s urge to find sometheatre group which is working onit. The play, he says, presents someanswers to the questions like —What if the separation between the

characters and the actors ceases?What if the characters step off thestage and enter your life and person-al space? — “The conflict, struggleand dilemmas between real andunreal, life and art, actor and char-acter, the self and the very meaningof existence. This is the complex,intriguing, spell-binding story of TheCurse of Hamlet,” he says.

Talking about his personalexperiences, he talks about how thecharacters you play create an impact

on the personal self. He says, “Whenyou play a character on stage for along time, it impacts you deeply. Itchanges you for better or worse. Youstart thinking and behaving like thecharacter more than yourself. Thisblurring of lines between actor andcharacter changes things. So some-where the play is a journey of allthose actors who fell the same witha much darker tone.”

Since the play is set in April1993 in Delhi, Gautam explains why

he chose Indian names and charac-ters to bring out the story. “The playis of Indian origin so that it couldbe more relatable to the audience.Now when they see these characterson stage, they feel more connectedto them and their lives,” he says. Hefeels that the idea of Hamlet mightbe old, but “our progression is new.It is Hamlet, but at the same time it’snot.”

Gautam believes that the nameof the play should convey the“whole” idea of the play. “This playis based around the obsession forplaying Hamlet on stage and itsrepercussions. Hence, the title.”

For Gautam, writing a scriptand then executing it on stage aretwo different tasks. “The lines andscript are provided to the actors,which always need some processingand improvising. Their dialoguesshould feel like they are comingfrom them. We worked on theirnuances. And not just dialogues,there are many more things whichgoes into the transformation of awritten play into a stage perfor-mance.”

The director, who “adores playswritten by Manav Kaul,” believesthat there will always be people whowill continue to accept theatre as itwas during the time when exposureto cinema was comparatively less.He says, “There are still people whoappreciate theatre, rather they put itbefore cinema as they feel that it pro-vides a livelier experience.”

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Liverpool centre-back Virgil vanDijk was named as England'sPFA Player of the Year for 2019

on Sunday.Van Dijk succeeded Liverpool

team-mate Mohamed Salah in win-ning the award, voted for by his fel-low players and saw off competitionfrom ManchesterCity strikerRaheem Sterling.

But Sterling,24, was named theP r o f e s s i o n a lF o o t b a l l e r s 'A s s o c i a t i o nYoung Player of the Year, followingon from City colleague Leroy Sane.

Van Dijk joined Liverpool fromSouthampton for £75 million ($97million, 87 million euros) in January2018.

The 27-year-oldDutchman has been an ever-present for Liverpool in their bidto dethrone City as PremierLeague champions this season,with Sterling's side one pointclear of the Reds at the top ofthe table with just two gamesleft to play.

Van Dijk has starredin a hugely improvedLiverpool defence thathas kept 20 cleansheets and conceded amere 20 goals in thecurrent campaign.

E���������$"It's pretty difficult to put into

words," said Van Dijk, the firstdefender to win the award sinceChelsea's John Terry 14 years ago.

"I think it's the highest honouryou can get as a player to get votedplayer of the year by the playersyou play against every week. It'sspecial. I'm very proud and hon-oured to receive it."

Van Dijk, who also has aChampions League semi-finalagainst Barcelona to look for-ward to this week, added: "If yousee the standard of strikers or

playmakers we have in the league, it'sunbelievable."

England international Sterlinghas been praised both for his on-fieldperformances and a willingness tospeak out about football's continu-ing problems with racism.

Arsenal Women for wardVivianne Miedema won theWomen's Player of the Year awardafter scoring 22 times to lead theGunners to their first title since 2012,with her and Van Dijk completing aDutch double.

The north London side werecrowned champions with a 4-0 winaway to Brighton on Sunday.

Miedema was also nominated forthe Young Player of the Year awardwon by Manchester City forwardGeorgia Stanway.

Miedema said: "I'm obviouslyreally proud to represent my teamhere. I think we've had an amazingyear, especially with winning theleague today."

Meanwhile, the PFA's specialachievement award went toManchester City and England cap-tain Steph Houghton.

The 31-year-old defender is setto skipper the Lionesses at thisyear's World Cup in France.

But Houghton has said she couldmiss the tournament in order to carefor her husband, former Liverpoolmidfielder Stephen Darby, who wasdiagnosed with motor neurone dis-ease last year.

Darby, however, is determinedHoughton takes her place in manag-er Phil Neville's squad.

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Virgil van Dijk wascrowned the Premier

League's Player of the Year byhis peers on Sunday, but theLiverpool defender insists heis not thinking of battlingLionel Messi to win the Ballond'Or.

Van Dijk will come upagainst the five-time Ballond'Or winner when Liverpooltravel to Barcelona for the firstleg of their Champions Leaguesemi-final on Tuesday.

Messi has scored 46 goalsthis season as Barca havewrapped up another La Ligatitle with three games to spareand remain on course for a tre-ble of league, Copa del Rey andChampions League.

"That's not somethingthat's on my mind at all," saidVan Dijk at the prospect ofrivalling Messi.

"There are currently play-

ers walking around in thisfootball world that are out ofthis world basically and they'vebeen doing it for many years.

"I'm very happy how Iperform at the moment, howconsistent I'm performing,that I'm fit as well. I think I justneed to not look too farahead."

Liverpool head to theCamp Nou on a run of 10consecutive wins in all com-petitions, but have still notbeen able to usurp ManchesterCity at the top of the PremierLeague.

Jurgen Klopp's men trailthe champions by one pointwith two games to play andface a tricky trip to Newcastlesandwiched between both legsof their semi-final withBarcelona.

"Right now we're in atight title race, in theChampions League semi-finals against a fantastic team,where probably the best play-ers are playing so we just takeit game by game," added VanDijk.

"For us, now it's time tofocus on Barcelona midweekand then we have a big gameat Newcastle away as well.

"I won't look too far aheadand the only goals I will set arepersonal goals withLiverpool."

����� 2.%/.%

Ajax goalkeeper Andre Onanasays that the flamboyant

European dreamers aren't afraidof anyone as they prepare to con-tinue their wild ride in theChampions League with the firstleg of their semi-final atTottenham Hotspur on Tuesday.

Four times European cham-pions Ajax are hunting their firstmajor continental triumph sincePatrick Kluivert downed ACMilan in the 1995 final and havewarmed hearts with a thrillingrun to the last four that hasrecalled the glory days of JohanCruyff and Total Football.

Next up are Spurs, who Ajaxmeet after dispatching reigningEuropean champions RealMadrid and Juventus — tipped bymany to win the whole thing aftersigning Cristiano Ronaldo —with thrilling displays thatenchanted football fans across thecontinent.

"After beating Juventus andReal Madrid you're not afraid ofanyone," Onana said.

"They (Spurs) are a verygood team. They have very goodplayers, especially on the counterwhere they can create problemsfor us. But it's up to us to handlethese situations."

Cameroon internationalOnana has been a fixture betweenthe sticks as the Dutch giants hunta historic treble that Ajax have notcompleted since Cruyff 's 1972heyday, when they won the sec-ond of three consecutiveEuropean Cups and combinedthat with the Dutch Cup andleague title.

They are also top of theEredivisie, although level onpoints with PSV Eindhoven, andtake on Willem II in next month'sdomestic cup final.

Ajax have extra motivationgoing into their clash at the newTottenham Hotspur Stadium, asthey know that this is the lastchance for this group of players

to shock everyone and snatch thebiggest prize in football.

Star midfielder Frenkie DeJong will leave for Barcelona inthe summer for an initial 75 mil-lion euros ($89 million), whilecentre-back Matthijs de Ligt,who sent Juventus packing witha bullet header in the quarterfinals, could follow his teammateto Catalonia.

After knocking out Real,coach Franck De Boer admittedthat forwards Hakim Ziyech andDavid Neres and Onana wouldalso all be targeted by Europe'sbiggest clubs come the end of theseason, and the stopper wants tosign off this era with the perfectparting gift after missing out onthe Europa League to ManchesterUnited in 2017.

"It's clear that this is ourobjective. Not just for the goal inand of itself, but for us, becauseafter this season, there will be alot of players who will leave," saysOnana.

"It is important for us to dosomething big. If that meanswinning the treble, well that willbe simply beautiful."

����� ��43

Lewis Hamilton has warned Ferrarito shape up and mount a serious

title challenge after his Mercedesteam swept the first four races of theseason.

The defending five-time worldchampion, who finished secondbehind his Mercedes team-mateValtteri Bottas in Sunday's AzerbaijanGrand Prix, said the Italian team needto fight back hard to stay in con-tention to avert a similar Mercedesprocession in next month's SpanishGrand Prix.

"Until they start to perform at thelevel we are now, then this is how it'sgoing to be," said Hamilton, whoslipped a point behind championshipleader Bottas on Sunday whenMercedes collected a record season-opening fourth straight one-two.

"We definitely didn't expect tohave this level of performance, but Iam glad we do ... I think the team isout-performing itself. They're goingto have to pick it up if they want tofight us."

Ferrari's four-time championSebastian Vettel finished third and his

team-mate Charles Leclerc fifth."He is right," said Vettel, who has

not tasted victory since last year'sBelgian Grand Prix. "We need to pickit up. We need stronger pace. It is assimple as that.

"It's like a Rubik's cube where youhave to have everything in the rightorder. We have a good car, but we'renot using it to get the results weshould be getting."

Ferrari's optimism after dominat-ing pre-season testing in Spain seemsa distant memory after Sunday'srace and they badly need to rediscov-er their elan in Catalonia.

����� "+!%%���

Gomathi Marimuthu mighthave become an overnight

star with her Gold-winningeffort at the recently-conclud-ed Asian AthleticsChampionship in Doha butshe is completely focussednow on qualifying for the2020 Tokyo Olympics.

The athlete from a villagenear Tiruchirapalli, TamilNadu finished on top in 800metres in Doha and has nowset her eyes on doing well atthe World Athletics champi-onships.

"My next aim is to per-form well in the WorldAthletics Championship laterthis year," Gomathi said.

"I also want to run in theOlympics and am preparingfor it. Now more and morepeople and the government issupporting me. I want to doeverything possible to qualifyfor the Games in Tokyo. The

aim is to qualify for theOlympics," the athlete, whocomes from a humble back-ground, said.

Gomathi clocked a per-

sonal best time of 2:02:70s atthe Asian championship, bet-tering her previous best of2:03:21 that she had achievedat the Federation Cup in

Patiala earlier this year.Daughter of a farm

labourer (late Marimuthu),Gomati said she would haverecorded a better timing if itweren't for those years that shelost due to injury and lack ofsupport.

"No one knew me before,now that everyone knows meI am getting support from var-ious quarters including theTamil Nadu government. Icould have recorded a bettertime if I had not lost thoseyears due to injury and lack ofsupport," she said.

Her immediate goal is todo well in the inter-state ath-letic championship, to be heldin Kolkata in July, and thenconcentrate on the WorldChampionship in Doha inSeptember.

"Now I am feeling moreconfident after the win inDoha and next is the inter-state meet and then the bigone (World championship)."

����� ��/(�/

Zinedine Zidane apologisedand said he wished Real

Madrid's miserable season wouldend now after they were beatenby 19th-placed Rayo Vallecanoon Sunday.

Madrid's response toBarcelona winning the title onSaturday night was to slip to a 1-0 defeat at Vallecas and fall 18points behind La Liga's newly-crowned champions.

Zidane took over knowingMadrid's title challenge was all-but extinguished but the differ-ence on Barca then was 12 pointswhile catching Atletico Madrid,now nine ahead, seemed achiev-able.

Adri Embarba's penalty,given after consultation withVAR, was enough for Rayo, whomove to within six points of sur-vival, with three games left toplay.

"Today we did nothing,"Zidane said. "From minute oneuntil the end, at all levels.Sometimes you cannot score buttoday we did not even createchances, did not play at all.

"We must be very angry. I am

angry, because the image wegave off today was bad. I amresponsible for this as well, notjust the players. But we have toapologise for our performancetoday, all of us."

The gap widens betweenthem and Barcelona, whose play-ers had been dancing on the pitchat Camp Nou the night beforeand posing for photos with theirchildren after wrapping up afourth La Liga title in five years.

Asked if he would like theseason to end now, Zidane said:

"Yes, but we have to play thesethree games and do somethingdifferent. We cannot end like this.

"It is about me as well, todaywhat I did in the shape of theteam, it didn't work at all. Wemust respect football and whatthis club represents."

Rayo's last victory over Realat Vallecas was in 1997, by thesame scoreline, and this time theywere without their top scorer too,Raul de Tomas, who is on loanfrom Madrid and ineligible toface his parent club.

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Raheem Sterling was named the 2019 foot-baller of the year by the Football Writers'

Association on Monday hours after missingout on the players' player of the year award.

The Manchester City and England for-ward topped the poll of the 400-strong FWAmembership as a clear winner, with 62 per-cent of the votes, more than 100 ahead ofLiverpool defender Virgil Van Dijk.

Sterling's team-mate Sergio Aguero

was in third place. Sterling has been a key man in Pep

Guardiola's side and has scored 29 goals forclub and country, including a hat-trick forEngland in the opening Euro 2020 qualifi-er against the Czech Republic at Wembley,while also helping Gareth Southgate's youngsquad reach this summer's Nations LeagueFinals.

Manchester City's England forwardNikita Parris won the women's footballer ofthe year award.

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David Warner signed off his IPL2019 campaign in style, notch-ing up his eight fifty of the sea-

son to help Sunrisers Hyderabadtake a step closer towards qualifyingfor the play-offs with a comfortable45-run win over Kings XI Punjab hereat Rajiv Gandhi international stadi-um on Monday.

Playing his last match of seasonbefore heading home for World Cuppreparations, Warner struck a bel-ligerent 81 off 56 balls with sevenfours and two sixes to complete hisIPL 2019 campaign with 692 runs, thehighest so far in the tournament.

Chasing the imposing total, K LRahul (79 off 56, 4x4s, 5x6s) made avaliant effort with the bat but lackedsupport from the other end as KingsXI were restricted to 167 for eight.

By virtue of this win, Sunrisershave consolidated their fourth posi-tion in the table with 12 points from12 games, while Kings XI is at 10points from as many matches.

Both the teams have two morematches to go with Kings XI still inthe hunt.

Kings XI needed a brisk start butthey didn't get one, losing explosiveChris Gayle early.

Gayle departed in the first ball ofthe third over, brilliantly caught byManish Pandey off Khaleel Ahmed(3/40) with Kings XI scoreboardreading 11.

Thereafter, Rahul and MayankAgarwal (27 off 18) added 60 off 39balls to take Kings XI forward.

But just when the partnership waslooking threatening, Agarwal washoled by Vijay Shankar off RashidKhan (3/21) in the ninth over.

New man in Nicholas Pooran (21off 10) played a short breezy knockbefore Bhuvneshwar Kumar took abeautiful catch at long-leg boundaryoff Ahmed to sent packing the bats-man.

Rashid then came to the partyand picked up two wickets — DavidMiller (11 off 11) and skipperRavichandran Ashwin — in consec-utive balls in the 13th over to standin chance of registering a hat-trickwhich didn't materialise.

From there on, the asking was tallfor Rahul and debutant PrabhsimranSingh (16) and the former finally per-ished in the 19th over after a beauti-ful knock to shut the doors for KingsXI.

Earlier, Warner and WriddhimanSaha (28 off 13) got Sunrisers off toa brisk start after being sent into bat.The duo took the Kings XI bowlersto the cleaners to pile up 77 runs ofthe first six overs of powerplay.

Warner made his intentions clearfrom the onset, hitting young

Arshdeep Singh for two boundariesin the opening over and then followedit up with a six over long-off inMujeeb Ur Rahman's next over.

Mujeeb was in for some treatmentas Warner hit two more boundariesin the spinner's next over and thenSaha also found the fence to bring upSunrisers' fifty in the fourth over.

Saha then went after MohammedShami (2/36) and hit the pacer for aboundary and six off consecutiveballs.

Saha's innings came to an endwhen he under-edged a MuruganAshwin deliver y to debutantPrabhsimran Singh behind thestumps. Saha shared 78 runs off 6.2overs with Warner for the openingstand.

Warner continued in the samevein and notched up his eight fifty ofthe season with a boundary off Shamiin the 12th over.

Then came in in-form ManishPandey (36 off 25) and he too playeda quick knock in Warner's company.

Pandey, who struck three foursand a six, added 82 off 55 balls alongwith Warner before Kings XI skipperRavichandran Ashwin (2/20) strucktwin blows in the 16th over to removeboth the set batsmen.

First Ashwin accounted forPandey and then two balls later dis-missed Warner, caught by Mujeeb atpoint of what was a tired-lookingshot.

Then skipper Kane Williamson(14 off 7) and Mohammad Nabi (20off 10) also played short cameostowards the end.

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Legendary paceman Wasim Akramcautioned against discounting

Mohammad Amir ahead of nextmonth's World Cup, saying Pakistan'space spearhead would return to formfollowing a disappointing string ofperformances at the crease.

The 27-year-old Amir was left offPakistan's preliminary World Cupsquad but has a chance to force hisway back into the final 15 if he doeswell in the five-match one-day inter-national series against England start-ing from May 8.

All teams have until May 23 tochange their World Cup squads.

Missing the upcoming WorldCup would likely serve as anothercrippling setback for the youngbowler's career after he missed thetournament in both 2011 and 2015due to an embarrassing five-yearban over match fixing.

Since returning to competition,Amir has fallen into a rut after guid-ing Pakistan in a dramatic win overIndia in the Champions tro-phy final in June 2017 — withjust four wickets in 14 matches.

However, Wasim said he stillbelieved Amir could stage acomeback.

"We can't discount Amir from theWorld Cup," Wasim said.

"Amir would have been my firstchoice for the World Cup consider-

ing English conditions where he per-forms well." Wasim went on to saythat Amir had both youth and the

experience of competing at thehighest levels of the sport on his

side, including internationalTests and English countycricket.

"I am confident thathe will do well once hisrhythm is back," said Wasim,a veteran of five World Cups.

Pakistan's preliminary WorldCup squad is largely comprised ofyoung players, with only a handful ofveterans — Sarfraz and Haris Sohail,

who played in 2015, as well as ShoaibMalik, who played in 2007, andMohammad Hafeez, who took part inthe 2007 and 2011 tournaments.

Wasim added that big events arewon with a mixture of youth andexperience.

"I am all for youth but experiencehas no substitute, so we should mixyouth with experience," said Wasimwho guided Amir during the PakistanSuper League earlier this year.

"He is a good learner so I hopethings will come good for him soon-er than later because Pakistan teamneeds him."

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Bangladesh skipper Mashrafe Mortaza on Monday called onthe country's fans to douse their expectations for the World

Cup and avoid putting unwanted pressure on the team.After Bangladesh's appearance at the Champions Trophy

semi-finals two years ago and the Asia Cup final last year, nation-al hopes of a winning streak at the World Cup have skyrocket-ed.

But the 35-year-old captain called for calm ahead of theteam's departure for a warm-up tournament in Ireland, beforethe World Cup starts on May 30 in England and Wales.

"You are saying this is our best ever team, but that's notimportant," said Mashrafe.

"We went to the Asia Cup with the same team but could notwin it. We played in the Champions Trophy semi-final, we hadthe same team. So there is no need to create hype," he pleaded.

"The best team does not always win," added Mashrafe, whosaid the players do not need the "extra pressure on us" and thathe preferred to believe in "luck".

Mashrafe said there should be no public pressure to win oreven reach the semi-finals.

"If you ask the ex-players and analysts they will tell you weare not among the favourites. If we can do something, people'sattitude towards us will change."

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England batsman Alex Hales willnot feature at the World Cup after

being withdrawn from all internation-al squads following an off-field inci-dent not related to cricket, theEngland and Wales Cricket Board saidon Monday.

Hales was included in the 15-manpreliminary World Cup squad for thetournament in England and Wales butit emerged last week that he had beensanctioned under the ECB's discipli-nary policy for a second time.

A spokesman for Hales on Fridayconfirmed the Nottinghamshire bats-man had been suspended "followingan off-field incident last year".

An ECB statement on Mondaysaid: "Alex Hales has been withdrawnfrom all England squads ahead ofthe international season."

Hales's latest misdemeanourcomes just a few months after hewas suspended and fined by theECB for his part in a street brawlin Bristol also involving BenStokes in September 2017.

The 30-year-old has beenstood down from this Friday'sone-off one-day internationalagainst Ireland in Malahide, theupcoming limited-overs matchesagainst Pakistan and the World Cup.

Ashley Giles, ECB managing

director of England Men's Cricket,said: "We have thought long and hardabout this decision.

"We have worked hard to cre-ate the right environmentaround the England team andneed to consider what is in thebest interests of the team, toensure they are free from anydistractions and able to focuson being successful on thepitch.

"I want to make it clear thisis not the end of Alex's careeras an England player." Hales has

played 11 Tests, 70 ODIS and 60Twenty20 internationals but is nowregarded as a white-ball specialist.

�%������KL Rahul is a phenomenal tal-ent who has the ability to emulate ViratKohli's heady achievements if he remainsin his "zone", feels none other than 'UniverseBoss' Chris Gayle.

Rahul, 27, has overcome probably thetoughest phase in his life and career whichsaw him endure a dismal run in the Testtour of Australia and an interim BCCI sus-pension for making sexist comments.

Having put that phase behind, Rahul lethis bat do the talking and alongside hisKings XI Punjab teammate Gayle, forgedone of the most destructive opening com-binations in the ongoing IPL.

"KL is definitely one of the players thatcome to my mind (when you talk about thecurrent India players), I hope he producesthe goods like Virat. After Virat, it shouldbe him," Gayle said.

However, Gayle's advise for Rahulwould be not to take undue pressure.

"But it is not necessary for him to puthimself under that kind of pressure, heneeds to be himself, stay in his zone and trynot to compete with anyone.

"You have a lot of talent (in India), Icould go on and on and most of them don'teven get the opportunity (to play for the

national team)," said the 39-year-old WestIndian, who is in top form ahead of his fifthWorld Cup.

The Jamaican is also highly impressedby the work ethic of captain RavichandranAshwin, who has not played limited overscricket for India in the past two years withwrist spinners taking centre stage.

"I don't know what happened there(why he is not in India's limited overs setup).He has been a phenomenal bowler for India.He is a very passionate bowler, equally pas-sionate as captain and someone whostrongly believes in his ability as well histeams'. It is very good to see that in a cap-

tain," added Gayle. PTI

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Royal Challengers Bangalore will look to givetheir forgettable campaign a semblance of

respectability and dash Rajasthan Royals' faintplayoffs hopes here on Tuesday.

Rajasthan, with 10 points from 12 games, stillhave a theoretical chance to make it to the play-offs, provided they do not lose any of their remain-ing two matches.

Also, they would require table-toppersChennai SuperKings, MumbaiIndians andDelhi Capitals todefeat theirrespective oppo-nents.

Under thecircumstances,Jofra Archer and Ben Stokes' absence will add toRajasthan's pressure, more so when Archer's 12-ball 27 for a winning cause against Kolkata KnightRiders is taken into account.

Jos Buttler, who had 311 runs and three fiftiesin eight innings, had also returned to England forWorld Cup preparations.

The change in captaincy - replacing AjnkyaRahane with Steve Smith - helped RR to an extentas this helped Rahane roar back to form with anelegant century, albeit in a losing cause, againstDelhi Capitals.

It also saw Rajasthan bring their campaignback on track by beating Mumbai Indians andKolkata Knight Riders.

RR's last win at the Eden Gardens could gal-vanise their players to believe in themselves, afterRyan Parag led a dramatic late comeback.

They, however, still need to iron out a fewflaws which have plagued them of late. The fail-ure to grab moments, which cost them the gamesagainst Kings XI Punjab, Sunrisers Hyderabad andChennai Super Kings, is one of them.

The biggest positive for Rajasthan has beenSherays Gopal, who, with his googlies, deceivedthe likes of Virat Kohli, A B de Villiers andShimron Hetmyer in the previous match.

Sanju Samson, who had hit the first ton of thisIPL, has been good.

Hosts RCB will be playing for pride after theirslender hopes of entering the playoffs went up insmoke with their defeat to Delhi Capitals onSunday.

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Mumbai Indians' Australiapacer Jason Behrendorff

left for Australia to join thenational camp for ICC WorldCup in England next month.

Twenty nine-year-oldBehrendorff, who had joinedMumbai Indians after featur-ing in the ODI series againstPakistan, which the Aussiesswept 5-0, took to Twitter toannounce that he has left thefranchise for now.

"#VIVOIPL was thismuch fun with @mipaltan.Great 1st #IPL experiencewith an excellent franchise!Keep playing well boys, look-ing forward to watching us in the final in a couple of weeks!Until next time," tweeted Behrendorff along with three pic-tures.

Behrendorff played in five IPL matches and took fivewickets conceding 165 runs.

Mumbai Indians also through their official Twitter han-dle wished the pacer well for the upcoming World Cup whichbegin May 30 in England.

"Until next time, @JDorff5. All the best for #CWC19and see you in Mumbai soon. #OneFamily," the MumbaiIndians said in a tweet quoting Behrendorff 's tweet.

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Kolkata Knight Riders CEO Venky Mysore admit-ted that the team didn't perform to its potential in

the ongoing Indian Premier League, where they are indanger of losing out on a play-off spot.

KKR are currently placed fifth after winningagainst Mumbai Indians and will be aiming to sneakin as the third or fourth team in the play-offs.

"In all fairness, we have probably not played to ourpotential. If some of the results had gone our way, wewould not be talking about the conditions, pitch andall that," Mysore said when asked if the flat batting trackat the Eden Gardens had been an issue.

KKR had lost six straight games before winning theMI encounter and keeping play-off hopes alive.

The two-time IPL champions main strength overthe years had been their spin bowling but the pitch,which was re-laid two years ago, it has turned into a bats-man's paradise.

Mysore however didn't deny that they have beenlet down by the Eden track.

"You build a team based on your home conditionsprimarily because you're playing seven games there. Soit's been slightly unusual in that sense. That's (homeadvantage) a good thing and that's how rivalries are builtup," Mysore told reporters.

Mysore said the IPL franchise will hold discussionswith the CAB brass on getting back the home advan-tage but there's no question of moving away from thecity.

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