· 3/7/2021 · upcoming election to the tamil nadu legislative assembly. the dmk will contest on...

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Prime Minister NarendraModi explained the “pori-

borton” narrative during theSunday’s mega election rally atBrigade Parade Ground inKolkata even as he launched ablistering attack on ChiefMinister Mamata Banerjee for“letting down and insultingthe people of Bengal” who hadreposed faith in her by votingher to power in 2011.

“This will be the ashol

poriborton (real change) andnot the fake one unleashed bythe Trinamool Congress whenpeople brought Mamata didito power with great hopes, butshe betrayed them and choseto play the limited role of a bua(aunt) to her own bhatija(nephew) considering not foronce the plights of lakhs ofother nephews that looked upto her for respite,” said the PM,taking a dig at the ChiefMinister for allegedly unleash-ing a regime marked by “cor-

ruption and nepotism.”Cine star Mithun

Chakrabarty on Sunday joinedthe BJP in front of a massivesaffron crowd at the historicBrigade Parade Ground inKolkata. The megastar, whoreceived praises from Modi,said he had been inspired bythe PM’s ideas.

“”Yes I have been involvedin some kind of extreme pol-itics in my early years as Iwanted to do something forthe poor and downtrodden …

now I have joined the BJP asI have seen the PM doing theworks that correlate with mydreams… So I have joined thisparty and will campaign forit,” the former TMC RajyaSabha member who shared anexcellent chemistry with theerstwhile Left Governmenttoo said.

Reciting a dialogue fromone of his movies where hesaid, “I am a cobra … whoseone bite will transform you intoa photo frame.”

Attacking Mamata forallowing “syndicate raj, tolaba-ji (extortion) and corruption”to flourish during her rule,Modi said, “Your Governmenthas seen so many scams that a‘scam Olympics’ can easily beorganised here.

The PM reminded “nepo-tism” and “cut money” hadbeen the only considerations forgetting an appointment inGovernment jobs. “But after theBJP comes to power on May 2,things will change forever… wewill bring ashol poriborton andnot the fake one.

“Bengal will become sonarBangla (golden Bengal) andfrom city of joy Kolkata willgraduate into city of opportu-nities… new flyovers will beconstructed, new infrastruc-tures will be developed, indus-trial investment which hadbecome a story of the past willreturn to Bengal…

“The smaller cities andtowns will get adequate infra-

structure to sustain a self-supporting economy, foodprocessing and port landdevelopment which have greatprospects in Bengal will bedeveloped … there will be newopportunity for the farmers,workers and businessmen,slum dwellers will no-longerhave to live in shanties andthey will be given pucca hous-es,” the PM said.

Taking a jibe at Mamata foroften abusing him Modi saidthe Chief Minister often gets

angry at him and calls himRavan, daitya and danav(demon).

“I want to ask you Didithat why you are so angry atme for the rise of BJP inBengal” he said, adding thatLotus bloomed only inswamps.

“The mire (read misrule)that the TrinamoolGovernment has created inBengal has led to the bloom-ing of Lotus,” he said.

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After weeks of dilly-dallying,the DMK allocated 25 seats

to the Indian NationalCongress on Sunday for theupcoming election to the TamilNadu Legislative Assembly.The DMK will contest on 180seats in the House of 234.

The deal was signed byDMK chief MK Stalin andpresident of Tamil NaduCongress Committee KSAlagiri in the presence of AllIndia Congress Committeeleader Dinesh Gundu Rao.

“The DMK and theCongress have sealed the seat-sharing deal. The Congresswill contest on 25 Assemblyseats and the Kanyakumari

Lok Sabha seat. Both cadre willnow work together. We will winbig,” Rao said.

The gloom on the face ofAlagiri and Rao during thephoto session made it clear thatthe Congress had to eat hum-ble pie in the negotiations withthe DMK. The Congress hadasked for at least 40 seats, a seatlesser than what it was allocat-

ed by the DMK for the 2016Assembly election. But theparty that ruled singlehanded-ly till 1967 and had contributedall-time greats like K Kamaraj,N Sathyamoorthi, CRajagopalachari, RVenkitaraman and CSubramanian to the nation was at the mercy of the DMK

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India reported more than18,000 fresh Covid-19 cases

for the first time since Januaryin the last 24 hours with sixStates, including Maharashtra,Kerala, Punjab and Gujarat,continuing to form a majorchunk of infections, accountingfor 84.71 per cent of the 18,711new cases.

Though cases are on therise, Union Health MinisterHarsh Vardhan on Sunday said,“We are in the end game of theCovid-19 pandemic in India”and to succeed at this stage, pol-itics should be kept out of theCovid-19 vaccination drive.

“People should trust thescience behind vaccines andensure that their near and dearones get vaccinated on time,” hesaid while speaking at theDelhi Medical Association’s(DMA’s) 62nd Annual DelhiState Medical Conference(MEDICON 2021) in collabo-ration with DharamshilaNarayana Hospital on Sunday.

Vardhan said over 2 crore

Covid-19 vaccine shots havebeen administered so far andthe vaccination rate has beenincreased to 15 lakh per day.

Around 14,392 peoplewere discharged and 100 deathsreported in the last 24 hours, asper the Union Health Ministry.Maharashtra continues toreport the highest daily newcases at 10,187, followed byKerala with 2,791 while Punjabreported 1,159 new cases.

The active cases registered

an increase for the fifth con-secutive day. The Covid-19active caseload increased to1,84,523 which now comprises1.65 per cent of the total infec-tions while the recovery rate hasdropped further to 96.95 percent. On January 29, 18,855new infections were recorded ina span of 24 hours. The num-ber of people who have recu-perated from the disease surgedto 1,08,68,520 which translatesto a national Covid-19 recovery

rate of 96.95 per cent, while thecase fatality rate stands at 1.41per cent.

According to the Ministry,India’s Covid-19 tally hadcrossed the 20-lakh mark onAugust 7, 30 lakh on August 23,40 lakh on September 5 and 50lakh on September 16. It went

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The rollout of the Covid-19vaccines by India in col-

laboration with leading globalinstitutions has “rescued theworld” from the deadly coron-avirus and the contributions bythe country must not be under-estimated, a top American sci-entist has said.

Dr Peter Hotez, Dean of theNational School of TropicalMedicine at Baylor College ofMedicine (BCM) in Houston,during a recent webinar said thetwo mRNA vaccines may notimpact the world’s low and mid-dle income countries, but India’svaccines, made in collaborationwith universities across the worldsuch as BCM and the OxfordUniversity, have “rescued theworld” and its contributionsmust not be underestimated.

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Living up to the expecta-tions, star Indian wrestler

Vinesh Phogat grabbed the 53kg gold medal alongwith world number one rank while Bajrang Punia booked his spot in thefinal of the men’s 65kg eventat the Matteo Pel l iconeRanking Series event, here onSunday.

The 26-year-old Worldbronze medallist and the onlyIndian woman wrestler tohave qualified for the TokyoGames, Vinesh blankedCanada’s Diana Mary HelenWeicker 4-0 in the 53kg titleclash.

Vinesh scored all herpoints in the first period andheld on to her lead in the sec-ond to ensure a top-of-the-podium finish. Vinesh hadwon a gold medal in Kiev lastweek.

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West Bengal Chief MinisterMamata Banerjee on

Sunday responded to PrimeMinister Narendra Modi’s vit-riolic attack launching ascathing counterattack calling“him and Home Minister AmitShah the biggest tolabaj (extor-tionist) and syndicate” opera-tors of the country.

Mamata, who led a massivemarch against rising fuel andcooking gas prices in North

Bengal city of Siliguri, said,“Here the PM is calling TMCa syndicate and our men tolabaj… but I must say there is nobigger tolabaj than him andShah and no bigger syndicaterun by him and the HM.”

She said the PM is “ped-dling lies to mislead the voters,”adding “the lesser people can-not extort more than �500 or�1,000, but what could be theamount when the people upthere do the same”.

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The CBI has summoned twosenior Indian Police

Service (IPS) officers for ques-tioning in connection withthe illegal cross-border cattlesmuggling case. The agencyhas asked IPS officer of DIGrank Kallol Ganai and SP rankofficer Anshuman Saha toappear for questioning at theCBI office in Kolkata onMonday, sources said.

Ganai was earlier posted asDIG of Murshidabad Range,while Saha was posted as

Additional SP of Murshidabaddistrict where the alleged king-pin of the cattle tradeMohammad Enamul Haqueoperated.

The CBI had registeredthe case on September 21 lastyear against four persons,including some Border SecurityForce and Customs officers,who were allegedly bribed bythe international cattle smug-glers to facilitate the passage ofbovines from their jurisdictionalong the international borderwith Bangladesh.

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Kathmandu: Nepal PrimeMinister KP Sharma Oli took the India-made Covishieldcoronavirus vaccine on Sunday,as the Himalayan nation gearsup to start the second phase ofits immunisation drive. The 69-year-old Nepalese leaderreceived the Covishield jab at the Tribhuvan UniversityTeaching Hospital here onSunday morning. His wifeRadhika Shakya was also vac-cinated. PTI

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past 60 lakh on September 28,over 70 lakh on October 11,crossed 80 lakh on October 29,90 lakh on November 20 and

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India plans to launch onMarch 28 an earth observa-

tion satellite that will provide itnear real-time images of itsborders and also enable quickmonitoring of natural disasters.

GISAT-1 is slated to be loft-ed into space by GSLV-F10rocket from Sriharikota space-port in Andhra Pradesh’sNellore district, about 100 kmsnorth of Chennai.

“We are looking to launchthis Geo imaging satellite onMarch 28, subject to weatherconditions”, an official of theBengaluru-headquarteredIndian Space ResearchOrganisation (ISRO) told PTI onSunday. The rocket will place thespacecraft in a geosynchronousorbit. It will be subsequentlypositioned in geostationaryorbit, about 36,000 kms aboveearth’s equator, using its onboardpropulsion system. The launchof GISAT-1 onboard GSLV-F10rocket was originally planned for

March 5 last year but postponeda day before the blast-off due totechnical reasons. Experts saidpositioning the state-of-the-artagile earth observation satellitein geostationary orbit has keyadvantages. “It’s going to be agame-changer in some sense forIndia”, a Department of Spaceofficial said.

“With onboard high reso-lution cameras, the satellite willallow the country to monitor theIndian land mass and theoceans, particularly its borderscontinuously”. Listing the objec-tives of the mission, ISRO hasearlier said the satellite wouldprovide near real-time imagingof the large area region of inter-est at frequent intervals.

It would help in quickmonitoring of natural disasters,episodic and any short-termevents. The third objective is toobtain spectral signatures ofagriculture, forestry, mineral-ogy, disaster warning, cloudproperties, snow and glacier

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NOTICE

I Pritu Spouse of Nk-Dharmendra Singh Resident ofVillage- Dhamna, Post -Dhamna, Teh-Madhougarh,Distt- Jaloun, State-Uttarpradesh, Pin - 285126,Have Changed My name FromPritu To Preetu Singh VideAffidavit dated 01-03-2021before Faizabad (UP)

Lucknow (PNS): With the aim tomake the youth self-reliant and providethem jobs, Uttar Pradesh Chief MinisterYogi Adityanath has issued directives toopen 16 new Industrial TrainingInstitutes (ITIs) on public-private part-nership (PPP) model across the state.

According to officials, the admis-sion process in the 16 new ITIs willbegin from August 2021.

“With the aim to provide technicalmanpower to the fast emerging indus-trial sector, the new ITIs will help inincreasing the number of seats in elec-tronic technician, computer operatorand programming assistant, machinistengineer, electronic mechanic and

more courses,” the official said.At present, over 1.72 lakh students

are undergoing skill training in 305 ITIsin Uttar Pradesh. “The government haslaid special emphasis on setting up ITIsin remote regions of the state to caterto the needs of the underprivileged sec-tions of society,” he said.

According to the officials, once thestudent completes training from the ITI,he/she will be provided a certificate thatwill be recognised at the national level.

Apart from setting up IT labs, smartclasses, and solar energy plants in stateITIs, the work of providing training tostudents by connecting them withindustrial units is also being done.

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With the aim to ensure welfare offarmers, Chief Minister Yogi

Adityanath has directed officials to giveKisan Credit Card (KCC) to all the ben-eficiaries of Pradhan Mantri Kisan Yojanain the state till April 15.

He also issued a directive to give cred-it cards to the farmers with small hold-ings under the Pradhan Mantri KisanYojana.

“For the first time in the state, 27departments have been asked tocoordinate towards the common goal ofwelfare of farmers. In order to connectall the beneficiaries of PM Kisan Yojanawith the Kisan Credit Card, theAgriculture Department has given theapplication of farmers to the financialinstitutions but all KCCs could not bemade due to the coronavirus crisis,” hesaid. Taking cognisance of this a cam-paign has been launched in every villageto make and provide credit cards to thefarmers.

Additional Chief Secretary(Agriculture) Devesh Chaturvedi hasissued letters to all district magistrates,chief development officers and deputydirectors of agriculture, instructing themto ensure 100 per cent verification of the

beneficiaries of PM Kisan Yojana toprovide them KCCs as part of the cam-paign to be continued till April 15.

“The state government is also goingto start an integrated development schemeto make farmers self-reliant. For this, aprovision of Rs 100 crore has been madein the budget for the financial year2021-2022,” the official said.

The plan includes identification ofmore crops in every agro climatic zoneof the state, promotion of new technol-ogy and investment in agriculture, valueaddition of selected products, creatingmarket for agri-produce, preparation for

marketing and setting up of FarmersProduction Organisations (FPOs) atevery block level. In view of the problemof stubble, biomass plants are being set upin many districts of the state.

At present, these plants have been setup in three districts Bahraich, Baghpatand Faizabad and the pallets producedby them are also being supplied toNational Thermal Power Corporation(NTPC), Unchahar.

“This is solving the problem of stub-ble on the one hand, and on the other,augmenting the income of farmers,” theofficial said.

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Lucknow (PNS): To further strengthen thesafety mechanism for girls and women, UttarPradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath will inau-gurate the second phase of the ongoing Safe Cityproject on Monday on the occasion of InternationalWomen’s Day. The event will be held at the IndiraGandhi Foundation in Gomti Nagar.

For the Lucknow Safe City project, Rs 194 crorehas been approved with 60 per cent and 40 per centshares of the Centre and the state government,respectively. For the safety and dignity of women,Safe City project was launched in eight metros ofthe country, including Lucknow. Under the SafeCity project in Lucknow, 100 pink booths are to beconstructed for women safety in various areas ofthe city in the first phase. Out of this, 70 pink boothshave been completed.

At the same time, 100 two-wheeler pinkpetrol and 10 four-wheeler pink petrol vehicles havebeen given to women policemen for the safety ofwomen and girls. These pink patrols are constant-ly patrolling around the girls schools, colleges andmarkets. Besides, pink toilets with special facilitiesare being constructed at 74 places in the city forwomen. Out of these, 18 pink toilets are ready.

Under the Safe City project, lights are beinginstalled at the identified dark spots in the city. Sofar, 3,625 dark spots have been identified and outof these, lights have been installed at 660 placeswhile 2,965 other spots will be taken up by the endof March. This will curb crimes against women atnight.

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Uttar Pradesh PowerCorporation Limited

(UPPCL) is likely to surrendercostly power supplied by vari-ous public and private sectorenergy companies. The poweris presently purchased by theUPPCL under PPA (powerpurchase agreement). Themove, if implemented, wouldbe a big relief for the debt rid-den UPPCL and power con-sumers as it will bring down theaverage cost of power.

According to a study by UP

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Samajwadi Party President Akhilesh Yadav on Sunday saidthat the people’s will was supreme in a democratic poli-

ty. Hitting out at the government over the three agricultur-al laws being opposed by the farmers, Yadav said the farm-ers’ agitation on the borders of Delhi had completed over 100days and so far 250 farmers had died yet they were deter-mined and their agitation was continuing.

He said if the farmers had raised a demand, the BJP gov-ernment was duty bound to find a solution and address theirdemand. He said instead of taking farmers into confidence,the BJP government had imposed three new laws on the farm-ers and the Union government had failed to instill a senseof confidence among the farmers who had deep suspicionabout the future impact of the new laws.

Targeting the Uttar Pradesh government, Yadav said thatUP could never become an ‘Uttam Pradesh’ due to the poorlaw and order. He said Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath wasmore concerned about election campaign in other poll-boundstates rather than focusing his attention on managing theaffairs of the state he was ruling.

“The state will not be able to recover from the infamyand misery in the current regime. There is a jungle raj every-where. The administration has become completely dysfunc-tional due to political interference,” he said.

The SP chief said, “Not a single city of the state is in thetop ten of the Ease of Living Index 2020. Health and otherbasic civic amenities have not been found good in the citiesof UP.”

He said even the state capital, Lucknow, was ranked at26th place in the Ease of Living Index 2020.

“The law and order situation in the state is such that apoliceman shot himself in front of Vidhan Bhawan and thereis no let up in the number of people attempting to immo-late themselves in front of Lok Bhawan,” he charged.

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Rajya Vidyut UpbhoktaParishad, this could resultin savings of nearly Rs2,000 crore annually to thestate, thus providing anelbow room to the powerutility to keep power tariffslow or even cut tariffs dur-ing the crucial electionyear. While UP’s powertariffs are among the high-est in the country, the statewill witness assembly pollsin the early months of 2022.

Most of the ‘costly’PPAs for 1,600 megawattpertain to the memoran-dum of understanding(MoU) route signed duringthe previous SamajwadiParty and Bahujan SamajParty regimes with the statepower utility, UPPCL.

The companies whoseprojects would be hit if theproposal to surrender cost-ly power gets implementedinclude public sector ener-gy major NTPC, and pri-vate power producers viz.Bajaj Group, MB Power,KSK Mahanadi Power andRKM Powergen.

UP Rajya VidyutUpbhokta ParishadPresident Avadhesh Vermaon Saturday submitted areport to UP EnergyMinister Shrikant Sharmademanding surrender ofpower that cost more thanRs 5 per unit since cheap-er power was readily avail-able from other sources,including energyexchanges. He claimed thatthe cost of power beingpurchased from these com-panies ranged from Rs 5.35per unit to as high as Rs6.05 per unit.

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Covid-19 vaccine jabs willbe given to senior citizens

and others aged between 45-49 with co-morbidities at 96hospitals across the state cap-ital on Monday. A womenexclusive vaccination exercisewill be carried out at three cityhospitals on account ofInternational Women’s Day.

District immunisationofficer Dr MK Singh said thatfor women, vaccine shots willbe given at a Bakshi-Ka-Talabhospital apart from AvantiBai and Civil hospitals.Women aged above 60 and orthose above 45 years with co-morbidities can avail of thefacility. There will be spotregistrations for women.Vaccine jabs will be adminis-tered at 51 government hospi-tals and 45 private hospitals.

“Directions have also beengiven to serve tea and water tothe elderly as they will have towait for their turn,” he said.

He added that they alsoheld an online meeting with allthe private hospitals wherevaccine jabs will be given for

the first time from March 8.“The district hospitals and

medical institutes such asKGMU, RMLIMS and SGPGIwill have the vaccination drivefrom Monday to Saturday. Allthe community health centresand primary health centres inLucknow will carry out thedrive on Mondays, Thursdaysand Fridays. The private hos-pitals can do so for sevendays in a week,” he said. Thevaccination drive was con-ducted at 14 private hospitalson Sunday.

Dr Arun Tewari, the nodalofficer for vaccination at LokBandhu Hospital, said theystreamlined the movement ofpeople by introducing thetoken system for vaccination.

“Walk-in registrationswere for those who were cre-ating a ruckus. We will keepthe walk-in registration systemat the waiting rooms and callthe beneficiaries only throughthe staff to keep the drive asmooth affair,” he added.

Meanwhile, People’sHealth Organisation secretaryDr Ishwar Gilada said that the‘made in India’ Covid-19 vac-

cines have done the countryproud globally.

“Though the global com-munity was aware of India’scapabilities on mass produc-tion and affordable vaccines,no one could believe thatIndia could develop its ownCovid vaccine and that too insuch a record time. Covishieldis developed by the OxfordUniversity and AstraZenecabut it is being mass manufac-tured in India. Covaxin isresearched, developed andmanufactured in India,” henoted. “There are several fac-tors which have played a rolein making the vaccinations asuccess in India; primarilyroping in private set-ups forthe vaccination drive and

keeping it open for longerhours since not everyone islooking at free vaccination.Most people want to save theirprecious time visiting vaccina-tion centres. No one wants torisk getting infected with coro-navirus in an effort to get avaccine. Opening it for seniorcitizens and those with co-morbidities in 45-60 agebracket was important becauseover two-thirds Covid deathswere of people with co-mor-bidities and hence the listed 20co-morbidities comes handyfor those with co-morbidi-ties. Looking into the glitchesof Co-WIN app is also impor-tant so that tech-savvy peoplecan go online and register.However, others find the drop-in strategy better. Making itavailable at a modest cost of Rs250 was also a good move,” hesaid.

Gilada pointed out thatoverall success of both vac-cines have pushed up theimmunisation drive. “It seemswe will achieve the goal ofimmunisation of the vulnera-ble population in a recordtime of 4-5 months,” he added.

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Aday after the death oftwo labourers in

ammonia gas leak, whichwas caused by an explo-sion at a cold storage inItaunja, police registeredan FIR for culpable homi-cide against the ownerand manager.

Two labourers diedwhile two others griev-ously injured followingammonia gas leak whichwas caused by an explo-sion in a pipeline at thecold storage in Itaunjapolice station area lateSaturday night.

The twoinjured wereadmitted toKGMU Trauma Centre’sICU where their condi-tion was said to beimproving, albeit gradually.

Around half a kilo-meter area around thefactory was cordoned offas a precautionary mea-sure while the firefightersstopped the leakage.

As per sources, thecontrol valve of theammonia pipeline insidethe Vindeshwari coldstorage exploded all of asudden, triggering panicwhen the workers werestoring potatoes.

Four labourers wereworking inside the coldstorage at that time. Twoof them died. They wereidentified as Mishrilal(28) and Dharmendra(27) of Sitapur. Otherswho were injured wereidentified as Paramandaand Vinod.

“A case was regis-tered against cold storageowner Santosh Pandeyand the manager, who isyet to be identified, undersections 304 (culpablehomicide not amount-ing to murder), 308

(attempt to commit cul-pable homicide) and 269(negligent act likely tospread infection of dis-ease dangerous to life) ofthe IPC. There was anexplosion in the oxygensupply and it causedammonia leak,” policesaid.

Interestingly, thepolice were yet to find outthe reason which causedthe explosion in thechamber and triggeredammonia leak inside thecold storage.

Sources said thatsafety issues at the storagehad come to the fore ear-

lier too,but weren e v e r

probed. Villagers saidthey had voiced theirconcern in the past, but itwas not addressed. Seniorofficials could not becontacted for their ver-sion.

Ammonia, which isused in agriculture as ahigh-nitrogen fertiliserand in cold storages, isstored for industrial usein liquid form under highpressure and low temper-ature. It adversely affectspeople who come in con-tact with it and even atmoderate concentration,it can cause irritation ineyes, skin, nose andthroat. Ammonia reactsimmediately upon con-tact with available mois-ture in the skin, eyes, oralcavity, respiratory tract toform the very causticammonium hydroxidewhich disrupts the cellmembrane lipids, ulti-mately leading to cellulardestruction. The gas istoxic and affects the lungswith a possibility of caus-ing chemical pneumoni-tis — inflammation of thelungs caused by aspirat-ing or inhaling irritants.

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� �)�� Lucknow (PNS); A massive fire engulfed a floor millon Bani road in Mohanlalganj police station area,triggering panic among workers but the goods weresaved after hectic efforts on Sunday morning.Seven fire tenders were sent to the scene to dousethe flames. Huge quantity of goods were gutted bythe time fire tenders reached the scene. It took fourhours to tame the fire. On Sunday morning, someof the sacks in the floor mill caught fire which laterspread. The workers tried to douse the fire and alsosought police help but in the meantime, the fireturned massive. The police were probing the causewhich resulted in the fire incident. The team was alsoexamining if the fire safety arrangements were inplace in the mill.

Meanwhile, an elderly man was killed in a roadmishap while his son who was driving the bike suf-fered injuries in Mohanlalganj on Sunday.

Reports said Veerpal of Natkur village, along withfather Kishori Lal, was going towards Sisnedi on abike. When they reached Dhanuwasand village in thearea, a speeding car knocked the bike from behindcausing injuries to the father-son duo. Both wererushed to Mohanlalganj CHC where Kishori Lal wasdeclared brought dead.

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Nine people were arrested on Sunday fol-lowing a raid at a hookah bar which

was being run illegally in Thakurganj.However, the owners managed to give thepolice the slip. Those arrested were iden-tified as Mohammed Naseer & Ali Khan ofSaadatganj, Mohammed Nadeem ofWazirganj, Vishwas Sagar of Chowk,Sudhanshu Asthana of Hardoi, TaufiqSiddiqui of Kakori; and Siddharth Singh,Shailesh Singh & Deepak Jaiswal (all ofThakurganj).

The hookah bar owners, identified asDanish and Salman, managed to escape.The police said the accused were runninga café in Danish Building where they werehaving illegal activities. The police also

booked the accused under the EpidemicDiseases Act. However, locals flayed thepolice for giving a long rope to the accused.“It was being run for a long time. There wereinstances when some youths kicked up ashindy and the police settled the issue,” theysaid. Meanwhile, a joint team of crimebranch and Kakori police nabbed sixaccused, said to be hardcore criminals, onSunday. Those arrested were identified asGaus Miyan & Mohammed Farukh (bothof Para), Quddus & Mukesh (both ofKrishna Nagar), Firoz of Kakori, and Asdulof Sarojininagar. Gaus Miyan, Quddus,Firoz and Asdul are natives of West Bengaland they had been staying in Lucknow forthe last few years.

The police recovered over Rs 1.6 lakhin cash, several mobile phones, 30 SIM

cards, a country-made pistol and live car-tridges.

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Mahanagar was deprive of her two goldrings, one of which was diamond-studded,on Saturday. The victim lodged a case onSunday and a police team started a probeinto the incident.

Dr Suramya Pandey, who is a residentdoctor at the hospital, said she had keptthe ornaments in her purse in the ‘ladiesroom’ inside the OT before she left for per-forming a surgery. “I put my bag therearound 9 am on Saturday and I came backaround 4 pm. When I checked my purse,I found both the rings missing,” she toldthe police.

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Lucknow (PNS): The ghost ofthe dreaded don Aquil Ansaricame back to haunt police onSunday after an audio clip of hiscall to a businessman, ShazilRehman, during the hearing ofa case in Lucknow went viral.

The Prison departmentissued a clarification that Aquil,who is doing time in Hardoi jail,was brought to Lucknow courtunder security of Hardoi policeand made a call while he was stillin police custody on March 5,and not from the jail.

Sources said he used thephone of a constable in the secu-rity ring to make the call to Shazil.

As the controversy blew up, SP,Hardoi, Anurag Vats, suspendedconstable Ravindra Kumar,whose phone was allegedly usedby don Aquil to make a call to theLucknow-based businessman.Vats also ordered a probe underAdditional Superintendent ofPolice, East, in the incident. Hehad asked for a probe. “Nobodyfound guilty will be spared. Weare finding the call detail records,”he added.

In the 2-minute audio, Aquilfirst greets Shazil and then askshim to visit the court on 10th(month not mentioned). In reply,Shazil says that if time permits,

he would come for a meeting.Aquil then replies and says hehad no spare time and so he (vic-tim) should ensure the meetingas he had some urgent work. ButAquil did not explain the workdespite the victim asking aboutthe work repeatedly. As per jailofficials, around 8:50 am onMarch 5, Aquil Ansari was takenout of the prison for a hearing intwo cases pertaining toGangster’s Act and also in a caserelating to Ayurveda scam inLucknow.

The team of Hardoi police,that ferried Aquil in their custodyincluded head constable-Vinod

Kumar Tripathi, constablesRamdhari, Ravindra Kumar andRaj Kumar. Later, Aquil wastaken inside the premises at 6pm. However, the call made toShazil was around 5 pm.

Aquil had shot to infamy fol-lowing the murder of ShrawanSahu, whose son Akash was alsokilled allegedly by him inLucknow a few years back. In theincident, the then SSP, Lucknow,Manzil Saini had taken a sternaction and suspended severalcops at Para police station andalso three were declaredabsconded and a cash rewardwas issued in their names.

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Women have come a longway but still they have

miles to go. This is what promi-nent women from various fieldsfeel about the existing conditionof women in UP.

Chairperson, StateCommission for Women,Vimla Batham said womenhave become empowered but attimes one feels that they do notrecognise their inner power.“That is the main reason whythey lag behind. The need of thehour is that women shouldunderstand their own potential,so that they can become confi-dent and enhance their person-ality. It is true that women inurban areas are far better thantheir rural counterparts and weneed to work for them,” shesaid. She added that they haveput their focus on rural womenfor this reason and programmesare being carried out at blockand tehsil level.

“We carry out awarenessprogrammes which are verysuccessful. We talk about gov-ernment schemes to thesewomen and encourage them toensure their participation in thesociety. The urban women aremaking a mark in all the areasand rural women also need tobe encouraged in this direction,”she added.

However, she pointed outthat complaints which theyreceived are from both urbanand the rural areas, but urbanwomen, being more aware,could put forth their point ofview more effectively. “For allthe changes that have takenplace, the destination is still farand women have to worktowards it,” she added.

ADG Neera Rawat, whilecommenting on the situationprevalent today, said thatwomen are still a victim of thepatriarchal mindset.

“Things have changed a lotfrom the earlier generations butthere is still a long way to go.The seed has been sown and theevolution of women empower-ment has started, but there isstill a long way to go,” she said.Regarding what is holding thewomen back, she said thatsomewhere it is related to theparenting of child in homes.

“Even women try to holdback the next generation and asmothers, they also surrenderbefore the patriarchal mindsetand rear their daughters in thesame way, maybe because ofsocial pressure. Somewhere,we are also discriminating inour families between girls andboys. Problems emerge fromthe household because it is themicrocosm of the society. It’sup to the parents how they

teach their sons to respectwomen,” she said.

Chairperson of All-IndiaMuslim Women’s Personal LawBoard Shaista Amber said thatregarding muslim women, itcan be said that the problemsremain the same and struggleto get their dues continues, butthey have also developed thewill to fight. “They want to beindependent, stand on theirown feet, and not suffer the fateof a Nirbhaya or an Ayesha.However, they still have tofight the mindsets and peoplewho trouble them find ways toevade the law even after theywin cases in court,” she point-ed out.

Head of LucknowUniversity’s Physics depart-ment Prof Poonam Tandonsaid a lot has changed butmore work needs to be done toimprove the condition ofwomen. “Generally, we shouldtalk about gender equalityrather than women empower-ment. People should not look atthe gender but at the merit.People are slowly changing inthis direction and there is a vis-ible change in society,” she said.She added that mindsets remainthe same in rural set-ups. “Toallow a woman to work is a dif-ferent thing but accepting awoman as an equal is still notthere in rural areas,” she said.

Lucknow (PNS): The land-scape of Indian agriculture ischanging after the outbreak ofCovid pandemic. Self-reliancein agriculture and communi-ty-led agriculture has emergedas a major game-changers. Inorder to transfer new sustain-able technologies for fruit andvegetable growers of UttarPradesh, CISH is organising aone-day Kisan Mela on itsRehmankhera campus onMarch 10.

Director Dr ShailendraRajan said that the CentralInstitute for SubtropicalHorticulture has developed

and demonstrated severaltechnologies to farmers in thepast, leading to the establish-ment of several agripreneursand start-ups in horticulture.

“Scores of community-based organisations and self-help groups have come up inareas like fruit processing,integrated mango farming,honey bee production & pro-cessing, nursery and organicfarming, Rajan said. CISH hasdeveloped varieties of mango,guava and jamun which havereached far-flung areas in thecountry and they have a hugedemand.

“CISH is producing coreplanting material of these vari-eties for the establishment ofmother blocks for decades.There is a need to createawareness among the farmingcommunity about theseimproved varieties,” he said.These varieties will be avail-able at the fair.

Rajan said that more than500 farmers are expected toparticipate in this event whichwill be inaugurated byAgriculture Minister SuryaPratap Shahi and Minister forHorticulture and ProcessingShri Ram.

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In a first, Mayor SanyuktaBhatia called for an all-

woman LMC House onSunday. There were discus-sions on the provision of basicfacilities for women and alsowith various problems whichthe corporators face in wards.

The corporators expressedhappiness on being invited forthis historic occasion. RupaliGupta put in a proposal of a‘Mahila Bazar’, which will bededicated to women with theproducts being sold by womenvendors that would help in pro-viding employment to women.She suggested that the map ofany shopping complex shouldbe passed only if provision hasbeen made for a ‘she’ toilet.

Khushbu Rakhi saidguards should be deployed inparks to keep away unsocialelements and make them safefor women. A demand was also

made to give half-an-hourrelief to safai workers, 50 percent concession in parking,naming of roads after femalefreedom fighters, setting up offemale help desks at zonaloffices of LMC, concession offive per cent in house tax forthose applications where thehouses are in the names ofwomen, baby feeding centres atparks to facilitate women walk-ers and free education for girlsliving on streets. The women

corporators got the chance tosit in the first row and whileSunita Singhal led the BJP cor-porators, SP corporators wereled by Charanjit Gandhi andCongress corporators byMamta Chowdhary. Bhatia saidwomen corporators often tellher that they never got theopportunity to be heard inany Nagar Nigam Sadan andtaking inspiration from ChiefMinister Adityanath Yogi, shecalled for a ‘Mahila Sadan’.

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Padmaja Chunduru, man-aging director and chief exec-utive officer ofIndian Bank,will be visitingLucknow onMonday. It willbe her maidenvisit following the successfulamalgamation and integrationof erstwhile Allahabad Bankwith Indian Bank. She will bevisiting some senior state-levelbureaucrats for furtherstrengthening the bank;s par-ticipation in economy of thestate, inter alia, through financ-ing various govt projects /sponsored schemes.

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The Yogi Adityanath-ledgovernment is all set to cel-

ebrate this year's InternationalWomen's Day on Monday inthe most special way under itsambitious Mission Shakti cam-paign across the state.

Under its successful initia-tive, 'Chaupals' will be conduct-ed at various primary schoolsas well as Kasturba Gandhischools across the villages tospread awareness about thesafety, dignity and empower-ment of women.

Apart from this, the gov-ernment will also allow free-of-cost visits of women to ancientand historical places in thestate. The government has alsoissued directives to organise anoath-taking ceremony of theguardians for the safety of thedaughters for which Rs 1,000

has been released to eachschool.

"With the aim to make thenew generation the carrier ofculture that guarantees respectand protection to women,many campaigns and aware-ness programmes are beingrun by the Yogi-led govern-ment," an official said.

In this sequence, mass pub-lic meetings will be held toensure women's security andempowerment on the occasionof Women's Day in all schoolsof the state.

Apart from this, theschool's headmasters, wardensand facilitators will promotethese awareness activities intheir respective villages andgram panchayats, etc.

The various programmeswill educate daughters about'Good Touch and Bad Touch'.Information about the gov-

ernment's women helplineswill also be given to parents andchildren. All the winners of thevarious competitions organisedat schools will also be hon-oured. Poster exhibitions willalso be organised to make chil-dren aware of social issues likedomestic violence, child mar-riage, gender discriminationand child rights.

Besides, films Khushi,Swashakti, Paheli will bescreened.

As a gift from ChiefMinister Yogi Adityanath onInternational Women's Day,women can visit historicalbuildings, including BaraImambara, Bhool Bhulaiyaa,Picture Gallery, Darwaza, andGhantaghar for free.

On the district magistrate'sdirective, an order has beenissued in this regard by theHussainabad Trust.

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Muslim clerics haveopposed the new curricu-

lum of the National Institute ofOpen Schooling (NIOS), anautonomous institute underthe Education ministry. Theclerics argue that the NIOS hasno jurisdiction to take decisionson madrasa curriculum.

Maulana Khalid Rasheed,Imam of Eidgah Lucknow andchairman of Darul UloomFarangi Mahal, said the purposeof establishing madrasas was tostrictly impart Islamic educa-tion. Maulana Khalid Rasheedis also a member of All IndiaMuslim Personal Law Board.

The National Institute ofOpen Schooling is facing stiffopposition from autonomousmadrasas in Uttar Pradesh forits decision to make teaching ofHindu epics like Bhagavad Gitaand Ramayana mandatory in100 autonomous madrasas. TheNIOS has mandated the rule formadrasas as part of the newcurriculum on ancient Indianknowledge and heritage in theNew Education Policy (NEP)."There are two types ofmadrasas in India; those gov-erned by the Madrasa Boardand others run by the commu-

nity on its own. The madrasasgoverned by the Board arebound to implement its deci-sions but others are indepen-dent to take their own deci-sions," Maulana Rasheed said.

"The NIOS, which comesunder the Education ministry,has no right to issue any direc-tion to independent madrasas,"he asserted.

Another Muslim cleric,Maulana Yasoob Abbas, alsodenounced the NIOS for intro-ducing the epics in the curricu-lum of Islamic seminaries. Hesaid if NIOS wanted to teachGita and Ramayana inmadrasas, why was it not intro-ducing the Quran in the cur-riculum of RashtriyaSwayamsevak Sangh-fundedSaraswati Shishu Mandirs.

Maulana Yasoob Abbas,who is also an executive mem-ber of Madrasa Sultan AlMadaris, said if anyone tried toimpose something onmadrasas, the communitywould protest against it.

Prominent academicianNadeem Hasnain said althoughthere was no harm if madrasastudents learnt ancient epics, it would be problematicif the government made it compulsory.

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Blowing to the smithereensthe police claim on having

ensured safety to women bysetting up cells and deployinghuge number of cops, a womanwas attacked by a stalker whenshe confronted him over eve-teasing near a bank inGomtinagar on Sundayevening.

However, the woman didnot let nervousness get betterof her and she, with the help ofthe commuters, nabbed theaccused. He was later handedover to police. She sufferedbruises on her hand. Her brav-ery helped cops in arresting theaccused later.

He was identified as VikasKumar Verma of Badi Jugauliin Gomtinagar.

Giving details, an official ofthe media cell of Lucknowpolice commissioner said theincident took place around 7pm and claimed that the

woman provided the registra-tion number of the accused’sbike to them after which thecops nabbed the accused.

He said the accused wasarrested and the woman wasgiving the complaint to thepolice. He said the sections ofthe IPC will be invoked onlyafter a case is registered.

The incident exposedchinks in police preparednessin ensuring safety of women onInternational Women Day, tobe celebrated on March 8. Thegovernment is tough on itsstand to prevent crime againstwomen and has provided ade-quate force and gadgets besidesother facilities, asking thepolice to ensure safety ofwomen. Accordingly, the policeset up pink booths across thecity and women help desk atpolice stations. “There were nopolicemen when the accusedstarted talking lewd to thewoman and assaulted her,”locals said.

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In an apparent bid to appeal to theBengali sentiments, Modi who filledhis speeches with snatches of Bengalipromised introduction of vernacularmedium in technical education even ashe said, “The poor students who edu-cate in Bengali language will no longerhave to suffer as Bengali will be intro-duced as a medium of instruction inmedical, engineering and other cours-es.”

Saying that “today’s roar from thecrowd leaves no doubt that post-May2 Bengal will witness the real poribor-ton,” the PM said.

He added, “Democracy that hadbeen a casualty in Bengal during Didi’srule will be restored in every walk oflife … so that the people’s faith inadministration and police restored.”

Taking potshots on Mamata forriding a scooty to State SecretariatNabanna as a mark of protest againstrising fuel prices, Modi said, “I wasworried that you might not get a fall… or else you would start attacking theState of origin of the scooty (where itwas manufactured).”

He also mocked at the ChiefMinister for leaving her home con-stituency Bhawanipore and moving toNandigram. “ One wonders why youdiverted your scooty to Nandigram …okay if you want your scooty to fall atNandigram then what can anyone do,”he said.

Returning Mamata’s “outsider”salvo Modi said the BJP has beenrepeatedly attacked for bringing in“outsiders” “but I must say that human-ists like Tagore and Netaji SubhasChandra Bose would never have likedthis narrative … consider for once whofounded the Congress (AO Hume)from which the TMC was born andwho were the founders of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist philosophy … If theyare not outsiders then how can the BJPbe a party of outsiders when its DNAis inspired by Bengali stalwarts likeSyama Prasad Mukherjee … I must saythe BJP is the party of Bengal andBengalis.”

The TMC supremo has oftenattacked the national BJP leaders forcamping in Bengal as “outsiders who

have no sense of Bengali culture andheritage.”

Referring to remarks that he wasalways backing his “friends” the PrimeMinister said, “I am brought up inpoverty and so poor people are myfriends and so all my schemes aredirected towards them … I will con-tinue to support my friends come whatmay.”

Attacking the Chief Minister forraising Khela Hobey (a game is in theoffing) slogan (that many a critic calla message threatening electoral vio-lence) the Prime Minister said, “Ihave known Didi for ages. She is notthe same person who raised her voiceagainst the Left. She speaks someoneelse’s language now and is beingremote-controlled.” The PM added“There will be no khela ahead, thekhela (game) for the TMC is over …TMC’s Khel Khatom.”

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Saying that the Prime Minister wasthe biggest extortionist she said, “they arealways accusing us of taking cut money… but how much did they get in the dealsout of selling Rail, BSNL, Coal India, AirIndia and defence sector … who willanswer that.”

Attacking the Prime Minister forunleashing “Jumla politics” she said, “Heis making tall promises but first of all askhim to deposit Rs 15 lakh in every bankaccount that he had promised before the2014 Lok Sabha elections … ask him toturn UP, Bihar and MP into golden Statesbefore promising Sonar Bangla (goldenBengal).”

Attacking the Prime Minister foralleging that women were not safe inBengal, the Chief Minister said that “heshould first look into what is happeningin UP’s Hathras where girls are raped andmurdered every day… Bengal is the safestState and Kolkata has been rated as thesafest city even during the night time.”

Slamming the Prime Minister forsqueezing the people of India she said,“When the price of crude is low in theinternational market the Government isincreasing petro price in India … they aregiving free gas connection but selling thecooking gas for Rs 900 … I provide riceto people for Rs 2 and the same rice is

cooked for Rs 900 … is it not a joke.”The Chief Minister is scheduled to

return to Kolkata on Monday and takeout a march on Tuesday. She is likely tofile her nomination for Nandigram seaton May 10, sources said.

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The CBI had carried out searches at34 locations across the country andarrested then BSF Commandant SatishKumar and cattle smuggler MohammadEnamul Haque last year. Haque is cur-rently undergoing judicial custody.

The cattle were taken from India toBangladesh after paying illegal gratifica-tion to BSF personnel manning thefrontier there.

The accused BSF Commandant wasposted in West Bengal betweenDecember 2015 and April 2017 andallegedly seized over 20,000 cows beforethey could be transported to Bangladesh,but the vehicles involved were notimpounded, according to the FIR.

The CBI filed a chargesheet in thecase in February this year against sevenpersons.

The agency has also issued a lookoutnotice against Bijay Mishra, brother ofTrinamool Congress (TMC) leader BinayMishra, who is a close confidant of partyMP Abhishek Banerjee.

The agency may approach Interpolto get a Red Corner Notice (RCN)issued against Binay Mishra, who has notjoined the probe till now, officials said.

Binay Mishra has also evaded sum-mons so far in the case.

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leaders who cited the low strikingrate of the Congress as the reason for thereduction in the number of seats.

The only consolation for the Congressis that it has been allocated theKanyakumari Lok Sabha seat where abypoll is being held on April 6.

The bypoll will elect a successor toH Vasanth Kumar, the sitting CongressMP who succumbed to Covid-19. It isexpected that the Congress may field one

of the sons of late Vasanth Kumar as acandidate for the seat, a sure seat for theCongress.

The deal between the DMK and theCongress was struck amidst reportsabout the possibility of Congress castingits lots with the Makkal Neethi Meyyamled by actor-turned-politician KamalHaasan.

“We have reached an agreementwith the DMK with an intention to leaveno room for the BJP to win. We are inthis alliance not for the Government, butto keep our ideology alive,” Gundu Raotold reporters when asked about thereduction in the number of seats allocat-ed for his party. Rao and Alagiri direct-ed their ire at the BJP, terming it as a bigdisease than coronavirus that has struckthe country.

The DMK-led alliance is featuringthe MDMK led by Vaiko for the first timein an Assembly election. The MDMK wasformed in 1984 after Vaiko was expelledfrom the DMK for posing a challenge toMK Stalin’s rise in the party.

The VCK’s presence in the DMK-ledfront is being seen as an inauspiciousdevelopment. The front featuring theVCK had lost all the Assembly electionsin the past.

With the signing of the seat alloca-tion agreement with the Congress, theDMK is ready to take the field to fightthe 2021 Tamil Nadu battle. Other par-ties like the Vaiko-led MDMK andThirumavalavan-led VCK have beenallocated six seats each. The DMK wouldfield its candidates in 180 constituencies.

Now that the AIADMK and theDMK has completed the seat allocationtalks, Tamil Nadu electorate is ready forthe month-long campaign exercise.

�� 3� 4� ��4 1�� >��2�� 1� and oceanography.

GISAT-1 will facilitate near real-timeobservation of the Indian sub-continent,under cloud-free condition, at frequentintervals, ISRO said.

The planned launch of GISAT-1,weighing about 2,268 kg, comes close onthe heels of the successful February 28PSLV-C51 mission that orbited Brazil’searth observation satellite Amazonia-1and 18 co-passengers, including five builtby students.

Secretary in the Department ofSpace and ISRO Chairman K Sivan toldPTI last week that the technical issues thatled to postponement of GISAT-1 missionhave been resolved and the further delayin the launch was due to Covid-19-induced lockdown which affected normalwork.

According to sources, GISAT-1 willbe followed by the maiden flight of SmallSatellite Launch Vehicle, ISRO’s compactlauncher, likely in April.

SSLV has been designed to meet“launch on demand” requirements in acost-effective manner for small satellitesin a dedicated and ride-share mode.

It is a three-stage all solid vehicle witha capability to launch up to 500 kg satel-lite mass into 500 km low earth orbit(LEO) and 300 kg into Sun SynchronousOrbit (SSO).

By comparison, PSLV — the work-horse launch vehicle of ISRO — can takeup to 1,750 kg payload into SSO of 600km altitude.

With lower per kg launch cost, themini launcher will have multiple satellitemounting options for nano, micro andsmall satellites.

Sivan had earlier termed the SSLV aninnovative vehicle which can be assem-bled in just 72 hours.

“Instead of 60 days (for building aPSLV), it (SSLV) will be assembled inthree days; instead of 600 people (need-ed to build a PSLV), it (SSLV) will bedone by six people”, he had said.

��=� ��5�� *?� � ;@ �� surpassed the one-crore mark onDecember 19.

According to the ICMR, 22,14,30,507samples have been tested up to March 6with 7,37,830 samples being tested onSaturday.

The 100 new fatalities include 47from Maharashtra, 16 from Kerala and12 from Punjab.

A total of 1,57,756 deaths have beenreported so far in the country including52,440 from Maharashtra followed by12,517 from Tamil Nadu, 12,359 fromKarnataka, 10,919 from Delhi, 10,277from West Bengal, 8,729 from UttarPradesh and 7,173 from Andhra Pradesh.

The Ministry stressed that morethan 70 per cent of the deaths occurreddue to comorbidities.

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The second wave spurt of Covid-19 cases con-tinued in Maharashtra on Sunday, as the num-

ber of daily infections crossed 11,000 mark, whilethe daily coronavirus toll came down to 38.

After infections breached the 10000-mark fortwo consecutive days, Maharashtra on Sundaytouched a new high of 11,141 in the second roundof intense spread of the Covid-19 ever since it firstbroke out in March last year.

A cursory look at the increase in the numberof cases being witnessed in the state since March1 this year ( March -1: 6397, March 2: 7863, March3: 9855, March 4: 8998, March 5: 10,216, March 6:10,187 and March 7: 11,141) reveals that there hasbeen a steady increase in the number of cases dur-ing the past one week.

There has been a mixed trend as far as deathsare concerned during the last one week. While therewere 30 deaths on March 1, the death tally ever sincethen has been: March 2-54, March 3—42, March4—60, March 5- 53, March 6—47 and March 7—38. With the 11,141 new cases reported on Sunday,the total number of infections climbed from22,08,586 to 22,19,727. Similarly with 38 freshdeaths, the total number deaths rose from 52,440to 52,478.

As 6013 patients were discharged from the hos-pitals across the state after full recovery, the totalnumber of people discharged from the hospitalssince the second week of March last year went upto 20,78,044. The recovery rate in the state droppedmarginally from 93.36 per cent to 93.17 per cent.

With four fresh deaths, the Covid-19 toll inMumbai rose from 11,500 to 11,504, while theinfected cases went up by 1361 to trigger a jumpin the infections from 3,32,208 to 3,33,569.

Meanwhile, the number of “active cases” totalcases in the state went up from 92,897 to 97,983.The fatality rate in the state dropped from 2.37 percent to 2.36 per cent.

There are a maximum of 20,347 “active” casesin Pune, followed by Nagpur (11,635), Thane(10,294), Mumbai (9319), Amravati (5037), Akola(4811), Jalgaon (4538), Aurangabad (4264) andNashik (3741).

Pune district, which continued to be theworst-affected city-district in Maharashtra, saw thetotal number of cases increase from 4,19,162 to4,21,162, while the total number of deaths in Punewent up from 8087 to 8092.

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Tension prevailed in theNaini Central Jail after for-

mer MP of Jaunpur DhananjaySingh having a reward of�25,000 on his arrest wasbrought to jail in case of Ajitmurder case of capitalLucknow.

Within a short while, theentire jail premises have beentaken on high alert. Apartfrom the jail police, PAC hasalso been deployed and the bar-racks of Dhananjay Singh arebeing monitored everymoment with the help ofCCTV cameras. Those comingto meet him are being closelymonitored.

Apart from many muscle-men and hardcore criminals,many opponents of former

MP Dhananjay Singh are alsolodged in Naini Jail. Shootingshave taken place outside theNaini jail in the past. In view ofthe possibility of any untowardincident, the jail administrationhas made elaborate arrange-ments for the security system.A deputy jailer has been spe-cially put under the protectionof Dhananjay Singh. CCTVcameras are being monitoredaround the prison and activi-ties are being monitored.Former MP Dhananjay Singhhas been kept in the jail likenormal prisoners.

It may be pointed out herethat in an earlier case,Dhananjay Singh, having bro-ken his bail, surrendered inMP-MLA Special Court ofPrayagraj on Friday. The policehad announced a reward of Rs

25,000 with the issuance ofnon-bailable warrants againsthim. After the surrender, thecourt sent him to Naini jail.Colonelganj police shifted himto jail amidst tight security.

Senior Jail Superintendentof Naini Jail, PN Pandey saidthat according to the jail man-ual, adequate security arrange-ments have been made forDhananjay Singh. A deputyjailer is put in charge of hissecurity. The PAC is guardedwith captive defenders. The jailadministration is on alert inview of security.

FPOS SHOLUD BEFORMED AT ALL PLACES:The first step to developmentis the village. Farmer ProducerOrganisations (FPOs) shouldbe formed at all places. Eachvillage should also have its

own development plan. BJPworkers should try for this.This view was expressed byCabinet Minister SiddharthNath Singh in a meeting heldwith BJP workers in Puramuftiand Ganja villages on Friday.He said that BJP workersshould get organised and goamong the people in the pan-chayat elections and strive forall-round development.

There should be cleanlinessin the village, there should beno illiterate, there should alsobe proper treatment. Solarlights should also be arranged.Adequate resources will have tobe created for drinking waterand irrigation. Some work isalso necessary in the hands ofevery man. Not everyone canget a job. Small industries willhave to be set up for this.

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On the eve of InternationalWomen’s Day, the mem-

bers of Varanasi Divisionalunit (North Eastern Railway) ofWomen’s Welfare Organisationand women ticket checkingstaff launched an extensiveticket checking drive atVaranasi City railway stationhere on Sunday under theleadership of Senior DivisionalFinance Manager (SDFM)Preeti Verma. During the drive,various trains including DadarExpress, Sarnath Express andKrishak Express were checked.A total of 23 passengers werecaught travelling without validtickets and a fine of � 8,040 was

realised. Along with this, theyorganised the passengers’ assis-tance centre and their counsel-ing regarding precautionsunder the corona guidelines.

The passengers who fin-ished their journey at the sta-tion were also apprised of fol-lowing the social distance,wearing the masks correctly,using soap and sanitiser andadopting the corona guide-lines avoiding any negligence.Also, some passengers wereprovided with masks who didnot have the same. On theoccasion, the station securitywas looked after by the womenRailway Protection Force (RPF)personnel apart from makingthe station premises clean by

women safai employees. Theprogramme was also attendedby Parveen Alam (member, AllIndia Women’s Federation),Rinku Srivastava (senior sec-tion officer, Finance), ShailPandey (reservation supervi-sor), Reena Srivastava (chiefticket inspector), Jameela Bano(chief ticket inspector),Priyanka Patel (senior ticketexaminer) and many others.Besides, Scouts and Guides ofNER District Association tookout a Prabhat Pheri from ScoutDen to railway colonies inview to create awarenesstowards women’s rights.

Besides, a felicitation func-tion was organised on thisoccasion at Vikas Intermediate

College, Parmanandpur inwhich social worker VipinSingh was the chief guest whilethe function was also attendedby school’s director RN Singhand Regional Sports Officer RPSingh. Famous magician RRSingh presented his magictricks to mesmerise all theaudience.

The college studentsincluding Nivedita Yadav whogot fifth rank in Class X in thedistrict, Khushi Singh (ninthplace) and Garima Gupta whotopped school’s rank in ClassXII apart from some handballand wrestling players among200 were also honoured.Principal AK Singh proposedthe vote of thanks.

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Amassive cleanliness drivewas conducted at 84-odd

Ganga ghats right from SantRavidas Ghat to Rajghat hereon Sunday in which apart fromhundreds of volunteers, senioradministrative officers alsooffered their ‘shramdaan’. In2016, the Prime Minister (PM)Narendra Modi had himselflaunched the Clean IndiaMission by offering shram-daan at Assi Ghat in his parlia-mentary constituency and priorto that in 2014 a cleanlinesscampaign was also organisedunder the auspices of BharatiyaJanata Party (BJP). In this cam-paign, hundreds of volunteerswere engaged apart from theDivisional Commissioner (DC)Deepak Agrawal, DistrictMagistrate (DM) Kaushal Raj

Sharma and senior officers ofNagar Nigam and Forestdepartment.

Nagar Nigam entrusted 10safai employees to every sani-tation supervisor. About 700volunteers from differentorganisations including 700municipal employees and 600sweepers of rural areas partic-ipated in it. On the ghats, fiveto five metres blocks werelooked after by every supervi-sor. Along with cleaning theghats, wastes of flowers andothers were taken out of theriver water. The collectedgarbage from all the ghats wascarried out to Khirkhia Ghat onthe boats and from there thesame was shifted to KarsaraSolid Waste Management Plantfor its disposal under the guid-ance of health officer of NagarNigam Dr NP Singh.

Photography and videographywere conducted from the droneto evaluate the situation beforeand after cleaning.

On the occasion, the socialworkers took out an awarenessrally under the leadership ofpresident of Srijan SamajikSanstha Anil Singh and themembers of many other organ-isations including NamamiGange, Malviya Mission,Brahmveda Vidyalaya, KashiFoundation etc also participat-ed in the cleanliness pro-gramme, apart from the mem-bers of Kinnar Samaj. The DMsaid that the campaign hasbeen initiated to create aware-ness among the people and thesame would be conducted onone Sunday of every month. Headded that the cleanliness drivewill also be carried out inrivers Varuna and Assi. The

DC said that to make the PM’scleanliness campaign a success,we will continue to organiseprogrammes by connectingpeople so that the dream ofcleanliness can be made a real-ity.

Under the leadership ofconvenor of Swagatam KashiFoundation, a drive waslaunched at Darbhanga Ghatand they also pledged to keepthe ghats clean. Similarly, mem-bers of the Arpan SocialFoundation offered shramdaanat Ravidas Ghat.

According to NeerajMishra, controller of CivilDefense, about 1600 volunteersincluding 300 Civil Defencemembers took oath ofcleanliness and offered shram-daan. The Civil Defence volun-teers were divided into 24teams.

VARANASI (PNS): In a daringincident, some unidentifiedcriminals shot at a tea seller atNadesar area, under the Canttpolice station on Sunday. Theinjured was admitted to a pri-vate nursing home in Maldahiawhere his condition was said tobe critical. According to infor-mation, the injured AshokGupta was at his tea stall in theabove mentioned area onSunday afternoon and in themeantime, some miscreantsreached there and opened firetargeting him. He sustainedbullet injury at his shoulder.Hearing the gunshot, the localsreached the spot and rushedthe injured to Shiv Prasad

Gupta Divisional GovernmentHospital in Kabirchaura wherethe doctors referred him to aprivate nursing home inMaldahia. On getting informa-tion, the SSP Amit Pathakreached the hospital and tooka stock of information aboutthe incident. The police collect-ed the footage of CCTV cam-eras to identify the criminals.The police teams were consti-tuted to nab the criminals andthe raids were also conductedsome place in search for theattackers but to no avail.

2 WOMEN REPORTINGOUTPOST: In a gift towomen, the Police departmenthas decided to establish two

women reporting outpost inthe district on the occasion ofInternational Women Day onMonday. The InternationalWomen Day which falls onMarch 8 each year. Meanwhile,the district administration willhold various programmes tomark the day. There is only oneMahila Thana in the districtwhich is situated on the cam-pus of Kotwali police stationnear Maidagin crossing and so,the women particularly of ruralareas face inconvenience tolodge their complaints. In orderto facilitate the women of bothurban and rural areas, thePolice department decided toopen two women reporting

outposts, one in the premises ofLanka police station and anoth-er in the premises of Badagaonpolice station.

FIVE MORE TEST POS-ITIVE: Five more have testedCOVID-19 positive, increasingthe tally of confirmed cases to22,028 by Sunday evening.With no COVID-19 deathbeing reported in the last 24hours, the death toll remains at377.

With 8 COVID-19 patienthaving been cured in home iso-lation, the number of COVID-19 patients recovered in the dis-trict so far is 21,601 including18,620 in home isolation and2,982 in Covid hospitals.

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Newly appointed DivisionalCommissioner Sanjay

Goyal met the students ofAbhyudaya Yojana running atGovernment Inter College onSaturday. Along with knowingthe methods of their studies, healso gave them a mantra of suc-cess.

The commissioner saidthat the government has givena better platform to preparecompetitive students of eco-nomically weaker sections.‘There is no alternative to hardwork. Honest effort will leadyou to the goal. We are all try-ing to give you better direc-tions. You should study yoursubject seriously. Till yesterdaywe were also preparing likeyou. With our hard work, weachieved the place. You can also

do this’, Goyal added.Chief Development

Officer Shipu Giri, Additional

Divisional Lord Sharan, DIOSRN Vishwakarma, DistrictProbation Officer Pankaj

Mishra, Social Welfare Officer,etc. were present on the occa-sion.

The Jwala Devi SaraswatiVidya Mandir Inter CollegeGangapuri held a Matri ShaktiJagran programme. Chief guestProf Archana Chahal gracedthe occasion. The programmewas chaired by Kiran BalaPandey, member of the SchoolManagement Committee.Distinguished guests SI AmritaSingh, Sona Nishad, Rani Devias patrons were also present.The programme started withlighting of lamps by PrincipalVikram Bahadur Singh Pariharand guests. Presently, there is aneed to focus on the safety ofdaughters along with theirhealth. Anamika Kushwaha,Archana Kushwaha, AkankshaMishra, Babika Rai etc werepresent on this occasion.

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With an objective to upliftthe students’ conscious-

ness to a greater spiritual andmoral height as well as tostrengthen teacher-taught rela-tionship, Patanjali Rishikulconducted an online event hereon Saturday highlighting thesignificance of Bhagwad Gita asthe most powerful instrumentto attain this height and to nur-ture a relationship of under-standing, and love betweenthe teacher and the taught.

Dignified members of theManagement Committee, DrKrishna Gupta, RavindraGupta, Rekha Baid Gupta, ShriYashovardhan along with thePrincipals of Patanjali Group ofSchools, Sushmita Kanungo,Principal, MPVM, Alpona Dey,Principal, MPVMGangaGurukulam, Vibha Srivastava,Head Mistress, PatanjaliNursery School and Ganga-Gurukulam Play School, gracedthe occasion with their benignpresence.

The online presentationbegan with the blowing of theconch-shell which emitteddivine energy into the atmos-phere making it more sereneand bringing positivity.Thiswas followed by a musical ren-dition invoking LordKrishna.Teachers threw lighton the educational significanceof Gita as well as portrayinguniversal human values

enshrined in the holy-scrip-tures through a PPT, dialogu-ing andoration. Rishikul teach-ers participated in a panel dis-cussion, wherein they soughtanswers to their queries relat-ed to day to day teaching-learn-ing issues, from the BhagwadGita.

The essence of Swadharmaand Swabhava was also dis-cussed during the event. Whenboth teachers and students fol-low their respective swadhar-ma and swabhav, a positive,creative and joyful learningenvironment automaticallycomes into existence.Theteachings of Gita on teacher-taught relationship, as followedby the contemporary teachersand mentors like RamkrishnaParamhansa and SwamiVivekananda, Swami Tapovanand Swami Chinmayananda,Vikram Sarabhai and APJAbdul Kalam etc. was broughtto light by differentorators.Next there was a melo-dious bhajan that enchantedthe audience. This was followedby an interactive session where-in the teachers of PatanjaliGroup of Schools interactedand discussed various aspectsof teaching-learning, teacher-taught relationships andhu-man values as explained in theBhagwad Gita.

Vice-President, PatanjaliRishikul, Dr. Krishna Guptaappreciated the efforts of theteachers of Patanjali Rishikul

for a wonderful presentation.She also emphasised that eachteacher is a value educator andthus, the teachers must live upto those values for students toemulate. She also threw light onthe significance of detachmentfrom one’s ego, anger, negativ-ity and demonic traits.

Nityanand Singh,Principal, Patanjali Rishikul,drew the attention of the audi-ence towards the need of self-exploration and self-observa-tion. He laid emphasis on cre-ating a conducive learningenvironment with relationship,positivity and understandingbetween the teacher andthetaught, for the holistic devel-opment of the students. Heproposed the vote of thanks.

SELF-DEFENCE TRAIN-ING MODULE STARTED:Officials of the Educationdepartment have started self-defence training modules at1001 upper primary schoolsand 20 Kasturba Gandhi BalikaAwasiya Vidyalaya across thePrayagraj district in UP. Theself-defence training modulethat started from the first weekof this month will continue tillMarch 30. Sportsteachers\sports instructors —assigned to impart self-defensetraining to girl students —have also been instructed to fol-low the COVID-19 protocolstrictly. Taj Mohammad, dis-trict coordinator (girls educa-tion), said that apart from

studies, girl students of classVIth to VIIIth are being givenself-defense training by thesports teachers\sports instruc-tor at their respective schools.

He further added that theself-defence training modulewas taken up at all upper pri-mary schools and KasturbaGandhi Balika AwasiyaVidyalaya. Over 10,000 sportsteachers or sports instructorswere imparted training to traingirl students for self-defencemechanisms last year. Headded that sports instructorshave been roped in at all upperprimary schools and KasturbaGandhi Balika AwasiyaVidyalaya to train girls.

Mohammad, meanwhile,said that limited strength ofgirls was being trained sched-ule wise during the trainingprogramme due to COVID-19protocol. He, however, said itwas a three-month programmeto impart self-defense trainingto girls studying between VIthand VIIIth classes but due toCovid pandemic, it could notbe formalised. The Educationdepartment, however, has nowtaken up the exercise in March.It is estimated over 22,000 girlstudents would be impartedtraining during the pro-gramme. A senior Educationdepartment official said thatteachers of school respectivelywill be compiling the entiredata of girls being trained forself-defense mechanisms.

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Prayagraj DevelopmentAuthority on Sunday freed

300 sq yard Nazul land fromthe illegal possession of mafiadon Atique Ahmed. This landis situated behind the office ofAtique in Kareli area.

Besides this many otherswho had encroached land inthat area were ousted and theirconstructions were razed toearth by the bulldozers.

The PDA took the aboveland in its possession.

Heavy police deploymentmakes things easy for the PDAofficials who work quitesmoothly without any obstruc-tion. Atique Ahmed had devel-oped a stable on that illegallyoccupied land for his horses.The PDA demolished this con-struction.

MURDER IN HANDIA:A youth was done to death in

Rahimpatti village in the trans-Ganga area of Handia onSunday morning. He had beenattached by sharp edgeweapons by some unidentifiedpersons.

Reports say that RahulPatel, son of Suresh Patel wokeup in early hours and went outto have a cup of tea. BeforeRahul could reach the tea stall,some unidentified miscreantsattacked him with sharp edgedweapons. Villagers found himlying in a pool of blood andrushed him hospital, but thedoctors could not save him.

The police have registereda case and are trying to reachthe real culprits.

GOVT IN STATES MUSTFOR BENEFITS OF CEN-TRAL SCHEMES: There isBJP government in the coun-try and the state. It is necessaryto have a government in thestate for the benefits of the

Central schemes to be availableto the public. In states wherethere is no BJP government,people are not getting the ben-efit of the schemes of theCentre. This was said byLaxman Acharya, member ofthe Legislative Council.

MLC Laxman Acharyaheld a meeting with BJP work-ers in Prayagraj. He said that ifthere was a BJP government inWest Bengal, the people wouldget the benefit of all theschemes properly. The samesituation is with other statesincluding Maharashtra.

Local state governmentsare not allowing the centralschemes to reach the generalpublic for their benefit. In thiscontext, if the benefit of thescheme is to reach the last per-son really, then the BJP govern-ment is necessary in the villagetoo.

It is because if the BJP has

a majority in the panchayats,they will do better according tothe government. Due to thetendency of pulling legs toone another right now, thegeneral public is not getting asmuch profit as it should. Thisshould be understood by thecommon people along withthe BJP workers.

BJP city uint presidentGanesh Kesarwani, whoattended the meeting, said thatevery party worker would haveto stay organised. The situationof mutual tussle will have to beavoided.

If there is any problem, itshould be intimated to thehigher officials. Each problemwill be resolved. All of us havesucceeded in forming a govern-ment in the Centre and thestate by getting organised. Thissequence will have to becontinued even further, headded.

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To ensure BJP's victory in theupcoming assembly elec-

tions in West Bengal, a religiousprogramme includingRudrabhishek and Havan-Pujan was performed in thecity here on Sunday. DevKumar Chatterjee, senior BJPleader of West Bengal andnational general secretary ofthe Prime Minister's PublicWelfare Planning Promotion

Committee, duly offeredprayers at the famousSiddheshwar Mahadev templeat Assi and sought Mahadev'sblessings for the party's victo-ry in Bengal. SiddheshwarMahadev's Rudrabhishek wasperformed by theShodashopchar method by fiveVedic Brahmins under theguidance of Acharya PanditChandan Tiwari. After that, theHavan was performed.

Speaking on the occasion,

Dev Kumar Chatterjee saidthat the people of Bengal havebecome frustrated over thepolicies of Chief MinisterMamata Banerjee and her 10years of misrule. ‘On May 2,under the leadership of PrimeMinister Narendra Modi, theBJP will form a strong major-ity government in West Bengal,’he expressed his confidence.The BJP leader, who was on aone-day personal visit here,also attended a meeting of BJP.

In addition to the Ganga Aartiin the evening, he also wor-shiped at Kal Bhairav, KashiVishwanath, Batuk Bhairav andBharat Mata and other temples.He was mainly accompaniedby Sandeep Chaurasia,Vidyasagar, Sumit andSiddharth Upadhyay, whileHavan-Pujan was performedby Acharya Chandan Tiwari,Bhrigunath Tiwari, SunilPathak, Gautam Tiwari andShailendra Tiwari.

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District Magistrate ManishKumar Verma along with

Chief Development Officer(CDO) Anupam Shukla inspect-ed the work of under construc-tion overbridge near the citystation recently. During theinspection, the DM directed

Project Director JP Gupta tocomplete the bridge withinthe stipulated time period.He asked the project direc-tor to ensure progress inwork with quality. He addedthat the work should becompleted as soon as possi-ble and no negligence wouldbe tolerated in it.

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In NTPC’s Rihand station theNational Safety Day was

observed at Safety Park with apledge recently. The functionwas inaugurated ExecutiveDirector (Rihand) BalajiIyengar, who was the chiefguest, by hoisting the safetyflag. Subsequently, the theNTPC song was presented. Onthe occasion, Iyengar adminis-tered the safety pledge,expressed his views related tosafety, concerns and expecta-

tions before people. He madean appeal to meet the zero acci-dent target and gave necessaryguidelines to all departmentsand companies concerned forcompliance with safety stan-dards. During the functionGM (O&M) KN Reddy spoke

about adopting safe workingstyle. Earlier, Manager(Security) Mukesh Kumar, whoconducted the programme,welcomed the guests and oth-ers. The annual progress ofSafety department was putbefore people. The programmewas mainly attended by GMs,heads of departments, repre-sentatives of various unionsand associations, officers ofCISF besides other officersand employees of Safety depart-ment. Mukesh Kumar pro-posed the vote of thanks.

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Due to the construction work of LimitedHeight Subway (LHS) between

Dominagarh-Jagatbela and Chureb-Munderwarail sections under Luckow Division of NorthEastern Railway (NER) the following trains willbe run by being diverted and controlled, ChiefPublic Relations Officer (CPRO) PK Singh said.The 09037 Bandra Terminus-Barauni specialtrain to depart from Bandra Terminus on March9 will be diverted via Gonda-Barhni-Gorakhpur.The 03020 Kathgodam-Howrah special train todepart from Kathgodam on March 10 and 17will be diverted via Gonda-Barhni-Gorakhpur.The 05118 Mathura Jn-Chhapra special trainto depart from Mathura Jn on March 10 and 17will be diverted via Gonda-Barhni-Gorakhpur.The 02569 Darbhanga-New Delhi special trainto departing from Darbhanga on March 11 and18 will be diverted via Gorakhpur-Barhni-Gonda.

Likewise the following trains will run by

being controlled on March 11:- the 02512Trivandrum Kochuveli-Gorakhpur special trainwill be run on NER by controlling it by 50 min-utes, the 05212 Amritsar-Darbhanga specialtrain will be run on NER by controlling it by 55minutes, the 02563 Saharsa-New Delhi specialtrain will be run on NER by controlling it by 55minutes, the 05273 Raxaul-Anand ViharTerminus special train will be run on NER bycontrolling by 55 minutes and the 02565Darbhanga-New Delhi special train will be runon the NER by controlling it by 15 minutes.

Likewise the following trains will run bybeing controlled on March 18:- the 02512Trivandrum Kochuveli-Gorakhpur special trainwill be run on NER by controlling it by 110 min-utes, the 05212 Amritsar-Darbhanga specialtrain will be run on NER by controlling it by 90minutes, the 02563 Saharsa-New Delhi specialtrain will be run on NER by controlling it by 20minutes, the 02542 Lokmanya Tilak Terminus- Gorakhpur special train will be run on NERby controlling it by 50 minutes.

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AHindi essay competitionwas organised under the

aegis of Rajbhasha Departmentof Varanasi Division, NorthEastern Railway (NER) atBharatendu auditorium underthe direction of DivisionalRailway Manager (DRM) VijayKumar Panjiar and under the

leadership of AdditionalDivisional Railway Manager(Operations) and AdditionalChief Rajbhasha Officer ShivPratap Singh Yadav. Its topicswere ‘Role of Indian Railwaysduring Covid-19 pandemic’and ‘Human compassion dur-ing Corona period.’ A total of25 employees working at thedivision and various stations

participated in it enthusiasti-cally. The competition wasconducted by senior translatorRahul Radheshyam Dongre.On the occasion AssistantDivisional Safety Officer andRajbhasha Officer DS Meena,senior translator Manoj KumarDubey, junior translatorsPoonam Tripathi and MamtaYadav were present.

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Acrime meeting and SainikSammelan was jointly held

by DM Praveen Kumar Laxkarand SP Ajay Kumar Singh atPolice Lines on Saturday. Themeeting started with the hearingthe grievances of police person-nel of all branches and officialsconcerned were directed by the SP to redress themwithout inordinate delay. In the meeting the copswere directed by DM to keep more vigilance in thearea regarding panchayat election and take instantaction even in disputes on petty issues. He saidpolice should not be involved in groupism of vil-lages. He directed the cops to identify nuisancevalues, deposit arms, bound down the potentialtrouble makers under 107/16 and identify thepolling stations where any problem had beenreported in the past. The officers were provid-ed masks and sanitisers for distributing fourmasks and one sanitiser to each police person-nel. The SP directed the SOs to intensify actionagainst mafias and continue confiscation ofproperties accumulated through illegal means.But such actions should be taken following legalnorms, he added. The SP directed the SOs to con-tinue the drive against illegal manufacture andtrade of liquor and cooperate with the excisedepartment as per the requirement. Regardingother actions, the SP directed the cops to submitchargesheets timely with proper preparation sothat criminals could be punished by court. Themeeting was attended by the ADM(F&R), ASPs,COs, SDMs, DGC criminal, DFO, CommandantHomeguard, SOs, SO GRP, superintendent jail,RI Police Lines and others.

PROGRAMME: With the purpose of mak-ing women aware about their rights and instill-ing self-confidence among them an awarenessprogramme was held under Mission Shakti cam-

paign at KasturbaGandhi BalikaVidyalaya, Newadhia,Vindhyachal, onSaturday. The pro-gramme started withthe welcoming of SHOMahila Thana SeemaSingh by NandiniMishra of Prabodhini

Foundation and her team. Addressing the girlstudents the speakers said it was the right ofevery girl to live with dignity without any dis-crimination. The speakers elaborated on the useof helpline numbers 1076, 1098, 1090, 108, 112,102 and 108 through which help was availableat any time. An appeal was made to girls to usehelpline numbers as per the need without anyhesitation not only for themselves but for otherneedy persons too.

REVIEWED: MP and incharge of Kashiregion of BJP Subrat Pathak in a meeting onSaturday reviewed party’s preparation for pan-chayat election. He said it was the need of thehour that we fight the election unitedly. Heappealed to workers to work hard to win all seatsof Jila Panchayat as well as of block pramukh.The meeting was conducted by Hari ShankarSingh Patel and presided over by BrijbhushanSingh president of district unit and attended byall party MLAs, chairman NPP Mirzapur ManojJaiswal and other senior leaders. On his first visitto the district Pathak was accorded a warm wel-come at Vindhyachal. He performed rituals atthe temple of Goddess Vindhyavasini.

SIX HURT: Six persons, including the dri-ver and shopkeeper, were injured when a pick-up rammed into Ramavtar Maurya’s shop inJudiya village under Madihan police stationrecently. The police brought the injured toRajgarh PHC from where they were referred todistrict hospital, last reports received here said.

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The railway administration will for the con-venience of passengers run the 05065/

05066 Gorakhpur-Panvel-Gorakhpur specialtrain as per changed timings. All coaches in themwill be of reserved category and passengers trav-elling in them will have to follow the Covid-19prevention guidelines, Senior Public RelationsOfficer (SPRO) CP Chauhan said.

The 05065 Gorakhpur-Panvel special willfrom March 9 as per the changed timingdepart from Gorakhpur at 05.30 hrs, fromAnandnagar at 06.20 hrs, from Siddharthnagar06.47 hrs, from Shohratgarh at 07.08 hrs, fromBarhni at 07.55 hrs, from Tulsipur at 08.35 hrs,from Jharkhandi at 08.59 hrs, from Balrampurat 09.20 hrs, from Gonda at 10.35 hrs, fromBarabanki to 12.50 hrs, from Lucknow(Northern Railway) at 14.05 hrs, Kanpur Centralat 16.05 hrs, Orai at 17.32 hrs, from Jhansi at19.58 hrs, Vidisha at 23.50 hrs, from Habibganjat 00.50 hrs on the second day, from Itarsi at02.40 hrs, from Harda at 03.34 hrs, fromKhandwa at 05.40 hrs, Bhusaval at 07.30 hrs,

Nashik Road at 10.55 hrs and Kalyan at 13.45hrs Panvel at 14.50 hrs. Whereas 05066 Panvel-Gorakhpur special will from March 10 as perchanged timing leave Panvel at 15.50 hrs,Kalyan at 16.20 hrs, Nashik Road at 19.25 hrs,Bhusaval at 22.55 hrs, Khandwa on the secondday at 01.10 hrs, Harda at 02.26 hrs, Itarsi at03.40 hrs, Habibganj at 05.10 hrs, Vidisha at06.00 hrs, Jhansi at 09.23 hrs, Orai at 11.10 hrs,Kanpur Central at 13.50 hrs, Lucknow (NorthernRailway) at 15.45 hrs, Barabanki at 16.55 hrs,Gonda at 19.25 hrs, Balrampur at 20.08 hrs.Jharkhandi at 20.17 hrs, Tulsipur at 20.58 hrs,Barhni at 21.55 hrs, Shohratgarh at 22.14 hrs,Siddharthnagar at 22.37 hrs, Anandnagar at23.11 hrs and reach Gorakhpur the third day at00.20 hrs.

CANCELLED: Due to unavoidable reasonsthe run of 05074 Tanakpur-Singrauli special trainfrom March 8 to 31, the 05076 Tanakpur-Shaktinagar special train from March 9 to 30,the 05073 Singrauli-Tanakpur special trainfrom March 9 to April 1 and 05075 Shaktinagar-Tanakpur special train from March 10 to 31 willremain cancelled, Senior PRO CP Chauhan said.

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Hundreds of workers ofSamajwadi Party staged a

semi-nude dharna-cum-demonstration at Bakarganjcrossing on Sunday in protestagainst the uncontrolled infla-tion and the insensitivity of theBharatiya Janata Party govern-ment in controlling it.

The SP workers sat ondharna with banners andposters along with LPG cylin-ders and empty food contain-ers, and threatened to intensi-fy their agitation if the gov-ernment did not check therise in prices of essential com-modities and the zooming

inflation.Addressing the gathering at

the dharna venue, SP city pres-ident Dr Imran said todaypetrol and diesel price hike haddangerously hit the commonman below the belt as theprice rise of fuel had impactedeach and every commodity.

He said the fare of trans-port and public transport hadbeen increased and the middleand lower income group peo-ple were suffering the most. Hesaid due to the hike in freightcharges, the price of everycommodity had shot up andwas in the process of going fur-ther up but the BJP govern-ment was sitting with eyes and

ears closed .Imran said from the time

Prime Minister Narendra Modihad appealed to the masses tovote the BJP to power and hadassured the people that theprices would be brought downand employment will beincreased, the government wasdoing the opposite by pavingthe way for all-round increasein prices and ending employ-ment opportunities.

He said the promises madeto the people had proved to bea hoax and the people werefeeling cheated. He said distri-bution of free cooking gas con-nection to the poor under theUjjwala scheme was baffling as

the poor were given freeconnections but had to pur-chase LPG refills at a very highrate.

He said with nearly noemployment opportunities andall-round inflation, it hadbecome a major problem of thepoor to pull on. He saidtoday the majority of thefamilies were on the verge ofstarvation as there were hard-ly any employment opportu-nities and survival was very dif-ficult.

Abhishek Gupta, AmitMalhotra, Bunty Yadav, DeepakKhote, Arpit Trivedi, AmitChaurasia and Anil Chaubeyalso addressed the dharna.

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Merchants Chamber ofCommerce President

Mukul Tandon while address-ing a meeting on tourism pro-motion at Merchants ChamberHall on Sunday said as per lit-erature, myths and legendscould play an important role asa tourism resource and there-fore institutional communica-tion should pay more attentionto them.

He said Kanpur had a richmythological background andit had been proved beyonddoubt that legends could addvalue to a region's core prod-uct.

Tandon said the Chamberhad decided to promotetourism in Kanpur because ithad several ancient templeswhich were the centre of attrac-tion and had religious senti-ments attached to them.

He said apart from havingthe river Ganga which wasconsidered the most sacred byHindus, the temples in Kanpurand around the district were ofheritage value and they could

certainly be a great cause ofinterest of tourists visitingKanpur and its surroundingdistricts. He said on March 14,a car rally would be organisedwith a route covering these her-itage buildings to promotetourism in Kanpur.

He said cultural tourismwas a sub-sector of generaltourism that focused on theculture and cultural environ-

ments of a region, includinglandscapes, values and lifestylesof the community, heritage,visual and performing arts,industries, traditions andleisure pursuits of the localpopulation and above all thecenturies-old temples.

He said places and collec-tions of heritage significanceshould be promoted and man-aged in ways which protect

their authenticity and enhancethe visitor experience.

Tandon said the signifi-cance of religious tourism wastourism, when the individualsvisit different places for reli-gious purposes. He said UttarPradesh was famous for mytho-logical places and Kanpur hap-pened to be one.

The vote of thanks wasproposed by Atul Kanodia.

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Sports and Youth WelfareMinister Upendra Tiwari

while addressing sportsper-sons at Green Park Stadiumhere on Saturday said the UttarPradesh government hadreleased funds to promotesports at every level and a sumof Rs 15 lakh had been releasedfor the division.

He said apart from this Rs60,000 for the tehsil level hadalso been released and this wasbeing done with an objective to

motivate youth towards sports.The minister had come

here to dedicate the renovationand construction of GreenPark Stadium, done at a cost ofRs 36 crore.

He said the stadium nowhoused a world class dressingroom and a gymnasium. Hesaid the COVID-19 pandemichad brought a major setback tosports. He said 39 mini stadiawere in the process of comple-tion and they were being con-structed by the government.

He said the process was

already on to increase GreenPark capacity and expertcoaches. He said the process toprepare sportspersons at thestate and national levelwould be given furthermomentum.

He said it had also beendecided to expose sportspersonto the sportsperson ofadvanced nations for firsthandexperience. He said the GreenPark would have all 5 starfacilities. He said every effortwould be made to ensure thatproducts of Kanpur excelled

not only at national level butalso at the global level.

He said incentives wouldbe given to sportspersons tobring them on the field and toensure that boys and girls tookpart in sports in large numbers.

Kanpur DivisionalCommissioner Raj Shekhar,Satish Mahana, SurendraMaithani, Abhijeet Sanga,Arun Pathak, Sports DyDirector Mudrika Pathakand hundreds of others alongwith sports enthusiasts werepresent

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5��!��6�!��!�� 7��;��KANPUR (PNS): DistrictLegal Service AuthoritySecretary Aishwarya PratapSingh said women had to takeup challenges relating toinequalities so as to bring inpositive changes in society andattitudes. Addressing a virtualliteracy programme for womenin CSC, Sachendi, he wasspeaking on the topic ‘I chooseto challenge’, a campaign whichwas launched on WorldWomen's Day. Singh saidwomen had to stand up to theirrights. He said the law had sev-eral sections to protect womenfrom injustice, violence anddomestic violence and thusthey need to be aware of themto avail themselves of the facil-ity to be treated at par in

home, society and workplace.He said it was unfortunatethat women, especially womenin rural areas, were the worstaffected and the main reasonwas illiteracy and the ignoranceof their rights. He said this yearthe theme was ‘I choose tochallenge’ and thus moreawareness was needed aboutthe Domestic Violence Act,2005. He said more womenshould join the mainstream soas to protect the interests oftheir counterparts. Speaking ondomestic violence, Singh saidactions which harmed orinjured the women, includingmental torture, were consid-ered to be domestic violence.He said unfortunately womenwere facing coercion and were

even threatened for vested rea-sons. He said it was unfortunatethat there was no letup in vio-lence against women thoughthe government had providedfull protection to them underthe Domestic Violence Act.He said women in rural andremote areas reported the high-est prevalence of domestic vio-lence mostly by spouse and in-laws. He said this engendered theneed for empowering ruralwomen economically so theycould successfully reduce theirabuse and strengthen theirindependence. He said tradi-tional and political leaders andlocal governments could play avital role in community life andprevent domestic violence to

quite an extent.YAJNA: The five-day

Samved Parayan Yajna wasstarted at the Arya SamajSatsang Hall in Govind Nagaron Sunday. Acharya Somdev,Brahmchari Vikasji andBrahmchari Akshayji SwamiAtmanandji described theimportance of Vedas and theirstudy. They also delivered reli-gious discourse. Musicologistand bhajan singer BhanuPrakash Arya presented devo-tional bhajans. Prominentamong others who gave 'aahuti'in the yajna were ShubhaVohra, Ajay Kapoor, VirendraMalhotra, Prakash Vir Arya,Shammi Kapoor, Vira Chopra,Surendra Gera and SatyaketuShashtri.

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Arape accused lodged in thetemporary Chaubepur jail

succumbed to his injuries onSunday morning.

According to reports, theaccused, Subodh Bajpai (35),had allegedly raped a 25-year-old girl in a field in Sachendipolice area on Friday night.After an FIR was lodged in thisconnection, the police hadlaunched a hunt to nabSubodh. However, he wascaught by villagers the samenight in a field and they bru-tally beat him up and handedhim over to the police.

The accused was producedin the court on Saturday morn-ing which sent him to jail.

Subodh’s father RameshBajpai alleged that seven per-sons of the village brutallythrashed his son, leading to hisdeath. He also alleged that thelocal police and the doctors didnot provide proper treatmentto his son before sending himto jail.

Ramesh said Subodh wasmarried about 10 years ago anddue to his addiction to drugs,he had enmity with some localvillagers. He said on Saturdaymorning, after forcing him toconsume liquor, the villagershaving enmity with Subodhbrutally beat up and framedhim in the alleged rape case. Heaccused the doctors at thecommunity health centre ofignoring serious injuries onSubodh’s body.

Jail Superintendent RKJaiswal said as the medicalcertificate did not mention anycritical injury, the accused waslodged in the jail. He saidwhen Subodh complained ofacute pain late Saturday night,arrangements were made forhis treatment but before thetreatment could start, he suc-cumbed to his injuries.

Superintendent of Police(Rural) Brijesh Kumar Singhsaid the accused was caught byvillagers in the field late Fridaynight and brutally beaten up bythem. He said as doctors hadrefused to admit him due tominor injury marks, theaccused was produced in thecourt on Saturday morningwhich sent him to jail where hemay have died due to somehidden injury.

The SP (Rural) said on thebasis of autopsy report andcomplaint of the kin, if filed,further investigations would bemade.

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An assistant company com-mander of Home Guards,

who was missing for the pastthree days, was killed and hisbody was dumped in the jun-gle in Moosanagar police sta-tion area of Kanpur Dehat.

The body was recoveredlate Saturday night and theson of the deceased identifiedit. He alleged the involve-ment of three of his father’sfriends in the murder. Afterrecovery of the deceased’sbike from the house of one ofthe alleged accused, policealso suspect the role of hisfriends in the killing.

Home Guards AssistantCompany Commander RamChandra Verma (54) ofGirdaun, Bhognipur (KanpurDehat) was posted in Malasa.On March 3 evening, hereturned home and soonleft on a bike to meet a rela-tive. Thereafter, he did notreturn home and his mobilephone was also foundswitched off.

On failing to trace him,the Home Guardsofficer’s son Ratan Vermafi led a complaint withBhognipur police about hisdisappearance.

Late Saturday night, thepolice recovered his bodyfrom the jungle of Vijayipur(Moosanagar). There weremarks of injury on the faceand other parts of the body.His bike was recovered fromthe house of Chetram inDingh village.

Ratan Verma alleged hisfather’s three friends hadcalled him on the pretext ofattending a programme on thenight of March 3.

Station House Officer ofMoosanagar, Deepak Singh,said the exact cause of deathwould be ascertained byautopsy.

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New Delhi: The SupremeCourt has asked the Centre asto how much financial liabili-ty will a divorced daughter ofa freedom fighter incur if givenfamily pension like an unmar-ried or a widowed daughter.

A bench of justices UULalit and KM Joseph posed thequestion after the Centre toldit that if at all the court allowsfamily pension to divorceddaughters of freedom fightersbesides the unmarried andwidowed daughters, then itwill incur a financial liabilityand open a Pandora’’s box.

“How much will be thefinancial liability? Divorceddaughters’’ cases would bevery minimal and thus mini-mum liability would be incur-ring. Divorce daughter casesare hardly of any number inthe country”, the benchobserved.

The top court was dealingwith a question whether adivorced woman is entitled toher freedom fighter father’’sfamily pension like an unmar-ried or widowed daughter astwo different high courts have

given contradictory opinionson the issue.

The matter was broughtbefore the top court byHimachal Pradesh residentTulsi Devi (57), who has chal-lenged a high court verdict oflast year dismissing her plea forgrant of freedom fighter fam-ily pension on grounds thatthere was no provision made inthe rules.

During the hearing, advo-cate Dushyant Parashar,appearing for Devi, said thedivorced daughter of freedomfighter should be put on a parwith the widowed or unmar-ried daughter.

He said that his client’’sfather has sacrificed his life forthe country and she cannot beallowed to lead a life of penuryin view of no source of incometo sustain herself and survive.

Parashar said that a circu-lar of the Ministry of Defence(MoD) dated December 14,2012 records the intent forextending the benefit todivorced daughters on a parwith widowed or unmarrieddaughters. PTI

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Prime Minister NarendraModi on Sunday said the

poor and needy have been ableto save �50,000 crore annuallydue to various health-relatedmeasures taken up by hisGovernment like providingaffordable medicines, healthcareand reducing the prices of med-ical devices. He was addressingthe virtual conference on‘Janaushadhi Week’ and dedi-cating 7,500th JanaushadhiKendra at North Eastern IndiraGandhi Regional Institute ofHealth & Medical Sciences(NEIGRIHMS) in Shillong.

Jan Aushadhi Kendras werelaunched by the ModiGovernment in 2015 to provideaffordable medicines. In a vir-tual address at the ‘JanaushadhiWeek’ celebrated across thenation from March 1 to March7 to create awareness about the‘Jan Aushadhi’ scheme, thePrime Minister said it is help-ing countrymen living in trib-al areas in the North East andthe mountainous areas.

The Prime Minister, whoalso interacted with peoplefrom different parts of thecountry, further said, “It isclear from my discussion withpeople who run theJanaushadhi centres at everycorner of the country and someof its beneficiaries, that thisscheme is becoming a very bigcompanion of poor and mid-

dle-class families. This schemeis becoming the medium ofboth service and employment”.Underlining the various stepstaken up by his Government tomake healthcare affordable tothe poor and needy, he saidprices of essential drugs as wellas medical devices such asstents and knee implants havebeen reduced manifold.

“It has led to the saving of�12,500 crore per year for theneedy people. The AyushmanBharat scheme is helping 50crore people get �5 lakh worthof treatment. Over 1.5 crorepeople have already taken thisbenefit. It is estimated that ithas led to savings of around�30,000 crore for people. “Itmeans that if we collate the sav-ings being affected byJanaushadhi, Ayushman Bharatand decline in prices of drugsand stents (medical devices) if

we only take Governmentschemes in the health sector,then poor and middle-incomegroups are saving around�50,000 crore per year,” thePrime Minister said.

To enhance medical edu-cation, he said before 2014,where there were about 55,000MBBS seats in the country. In6 years, it has been increased bymore than 30,000. Similarly, inthe PG seats — which used tobe at 30,000 — more than24,000 new seats have beenadded. The Pradhan MantriBhartiya JanaushadhiPariyojana aims to providequality medicines at an afford-able price. Sales in the financialyear 2020-21 (up to March 4,2021) have led to a total savingof around �3,600 crore for cit-izens, as these medicines arecheaper by 50-90 per cent thanmarket rates.

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With high-voltageAssembly election cam-

paigns going on, the month-long second part of the Budgetsession of Parliament begins onMonday to focus on debates ondemands of grants to manydepartments. The main focus ofthe Government in the secondpart of the session is to get thevarious demands for grants forthe year 2021-22 passed alongwith the Finance Bill which car-ries various tax proposals.Besides these mandatory agen-das, the Government has listed

various bills for passage in thesession which concludes onApril 8.

Some of the bills listed by

the government include thePension Fund Regulatory andDevelopment Authority(Amendment) Bill, National

Bank for FinancingInfrastructure andDevelopment Bill, Electricity(Amendment) Bill, Crypto cur-rency and Regulation of OfficialDigital Currency Bill. The parttwo of the session is takingplace at a time when politicalparties have their focus onelections in West Bengal, TamilNadu, Assam, Kerala andPuducherry. Senior leaders ofvarious parties, especially theregional ones, are likely to skipmost of the House sittings tofocus on campaigning.

The first part of the Budgetsession started on January 29

with the President’s address tojoint sitting of both houses ofParliament. The address wasboycotted by over 20 oppositionparties, including the Congress,in support of the demand of theprotesting farmers for the repealof the three farm laws.

The Union Budget wastabled on February 1.Thereafter, House proceedingswere washed out for four con-secutive days over the opposi-tion’s demand for separate dis-cussion on farm issues. Tocompensate the session’s losttime, the House sat till mid-night for several days.

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With the Parliament all setto reconvene on Monday

after a brief interval during theBudget Session, the CongressParliamentary committee meton Sunday to discuss the issuesto be raised in the House tocorner the Government.

Chaired by Congress par-liamentary party chairmanSonia Gandhi, the virtualmeeting of the party leadersalso had the participation of G-23 members like AnandSharma and Manish Tewaribesides newly appointedLeader of opposition in RajyaSabha, Mallikarjun Kharge andleader of the party in LokSabha Adhir RanjanChaudhary.

Former Prime MinisterManmohan Singh, AK Antonyand Jairam Ramesh alsoattended the meeting in whichthe Congress discussed thestrategy to counter theGovernment on issues likefarmers’ agitation, fuel pricehike and unemployment.

Former Congress chiefRahul Gandhi targeted thegovernment on farm laws andtweeted: “Livelihood is rightnot favour, PM Modi, pleasegive MSP.”

Recently, Sonia had tar-geted the Government over the

disinvestment of PSU by theGovernment. In an article, shewrote: “The Modi governmentis using the economy’s collapsesince the pandemic to rushheadlong into its mission ofhanding over large portions ofIndia’s wealth to its favouritecrony capitalists. It hasannounced its intent tobecome cash rich by selling thefamily silver, through hasty pri-vatisation of India’s public sec-tor undertakings (PSUs).”

She said the Modi govern-ment has explicitly embraced“privatisation”, instead of “dis-investment”.

On the issue of newlyfloated social media rules, theCongress has demandedanswers from the government.

Congress SpokespersonSupriya Shrinate said: “It isabsolutely certain that at thetime of corona, when the entireworld including all of us werestanding rock solid with theGovernment and hoping thatthe Prime Minister is thinkingabout our lives, our livelihood,he was thinking about how tosort out this crisis, he was actu-ally preparing to stab us in theback by first compromisingwith the freedom of speechand expression in the countryby first controlling free press.”

Mallikarjun Kharge, thenewly appointed Leader of

Opposition, said: “They arechoking agriculture and mostimportantly, they have no planto address the growing concernof unemployment in the coun-try.”

According to a RajyaSabha bulletin, the reports ofStanding committees ofHealth, Energy, Science andTechnology, Forests and cli-mate change will be presentedin the Upper House.

On the first day of theParliament, the newly appoint-ed members will take oath andreports of parliamentary com-mittees will be presented.Besides, Union Law MinisterRavi Shankar Prasad will movethe Arbitration andConciliation Act, 1996, whichhas been passed by the LokSabha.

The Congress and LeftMPs are planning to move aResolution that this Housedisapproves the Arbitrationand Conciliation(Amendment) Ordinance,2020 (No. 14 of 2020) pro-mulgated by the President ofIndia on November 4, 2020.

While the Law Ministerwill move the Bills for consid-eration and passing, to amendthe Arbitration andConciliation Act, 1996, aspassed by the Lok Sabha, betaken into consideration.

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Worried over a marketflooded with Iranian red

apples which is cheaper, anorganisation of fruit and veg-etable growers from hilly Statesand union territories onSaturday demanded impositionof 100 per cent duty on applesimported from Iran and othercountries via Afghanistanunder the South Asian FreeTrade Agreement (SAFTA).

Kashmir-based applegrowers have expressed con-cern over what they call an ille-gal import of Iranian applesfrom Afghanistan to India.They say Iranian produce isbeing sold in mandis acrossIndia and it is inflicting heavylosses on apple traders ofKashmir.

“To safeguard the interestsof the domestic growers andassociates, the import duty onapple should be levied 100% onrealistic basis and importshould be fixed. Otherwise, thisundervaluation of duty willresult in losses of revenue to therespective Government,” HillStates Horticulture Forum(HSHF) said. The forum said ithas also decided to firstapproach the respective gov-ernments for redressal of the

vital issues which include “ille-gal and unlawful import ofapples from Iran and otherneighbouring countriesthrough Afghanistan underSAFTA at Zero per cent importduty.”

The colour and texture ofthe Iranian apple closely resem-bles the Kashmiri apple, whichis famous for its juiciness anddistinct flavour. Kashmiri hor-ticulturists are worried aboutlosing market share to theimported apple this year –because it is cheap.

The forum said this is notonly harmful but will provefatal for small and marginalfruit growers. “The sale ofthese apples in Mandis ... hasresulted in 30%-40% decreasein prices for domestic farmersthis year and there is an antic-ipation that if this continuesfarmers in these apple growingstates will have no market leftand will have no means of sus-tenance,” it added.

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Coming to the rescue of a55-year-old man suffer-

ing with Cerebral Palsy andwhose premises has been ille-gally occupied by a Delhi ladycop for the past one year, theCourt of Commissioner ofPersons with Disabilities(CCPD), under the SocialWelfare Ministry, hasexpressed displeasure at theDelhi Police’ failure to actagainst its personnel for cheat-ing the person with disability(PwD).

“…this is not merely amatter of civil nature but a mat-ter of abuse of a person withdisability by a representative ofthe Government and provi-sions of Section 7 of the Rightsof Persons with DisabilitiesAct, 2016,” said the court in a

recent hearing in a petitionfiled by PwD Brijesh KumarJhamb.

Jhamb had alleged thatexcept initiating departmentalenquiry (DE) the police hadnot taken any action againstthe erring cop Manisha post-ed at Security Line, VinayMarg who was neither payingher rent nor vacating thepremises.

On the basis of the Jhambcomplaint, the CCPD issuednotice to Delhi police whichwas represented by ACPSatveer Singh (Security) duringthe case hearing on February 2,2021.

Commissioner for Personswith Disability UpmaSrivastava expressed shockthat in “cases where a proper-ty is occupied illegally, it isnormally police approached

for eviction. However, con-trary to this in the presentcomplaint, a lady constable ofpolice is herself harassing thecomplainant”, this despite thatthe complainant’s conditionwas pathetic who was tryinghard to make the two endsmeet in the absence of rentalincome, his only source ofincome.

The Court has now direct-ed the Delhi police to expeditethe DE against the erring copas well as deduct rentalamount from her salary toensure that Jhamb can live adignified life.

Given the seriousness ofthe situation and the assurancegiven by the respondent thatnecessary action will be takentowards redressal of the com-plainant’s grievance,Commissioner Srivastava has

also suggested imposition ofconsiderable penalty on thelady police constable includingsuspension from the serviceand recovery of the entire dueamount of rent for cheating aperson with disability.

Initially Jhamb hadapproached the district DCP(South East) and SHO of thearea who dismissed the mattercalling it ‘tenancy disputebetween landlord and tenant,which is civil in nature and nopolice action is required”.

According to Jhamb, hehad rented out his premises atGovind Puri, Kalkaji toManisha in October 2019 on amonthly rent of �8,500. Healleged that she stopped givingrent from February, 2020.Jhamb also alleged thatManisha behaved rudely withhim and threatened him of dire

consequences if he reportedthis matter to any one further.

Unhappy at the policeresponse, the court noticedthat “miscarriage of justice isbeing carried out by a repre-sentative of Delhi Police whichshould not be taken lightly byher superiors.

“As evident from the hear-ing held, the condition of thecomplainant is pathetic whohas been reduced to a hand tomouth existence on account ofloss of the basic source of hislivelihood, i.e. the rental fromhis flat,” said the court in a fivepage order.

“Till such time the inquiryis over, the rental amount bededucted from the salary of thelady constable and deposited inthe account of the complainantto ensure that he can live a dig-nified life,” it further said.

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The National MedicinalPlants Board (NMPB),

under the Ministry of AYUSH,has filed patent for bio-pro-duction of secondary metabo-lites from Bel (Aegle marme-los), in-vitro production ofsecondary metabolites fromtree species of Dashamoola(10 roots used in ayurveda)through hairy root culturesand development of anti-can-cer and anti-inflammatoryagents from Dioscoria flori-bunda.

“While the first two pro-jects belong to the Institute ofForest Genetics and TreeBreeding (IFGTB),Coimbatore, the third projectis being carried out by CentralInstitute of Medicinal and

Aromatic Plants (CIMAP),Lucknow. The CIMAP filedpatent is titled as “A synergis-tic polyherbal formulationexhibiting potential canceractivity,” said JLN Sastry, CEO,National Medicinal PlantsBoard in a statement here.

Filing of the patent is theNMPB part of a special drive toidentify the patentable pro-jects which are sponsoredunder the ‘Research andDevelopment Component’ ofCentral Sector Scheme (CSS)

on “Conservation,Development and SustainableManagement of MedicinalPlants”.

NMPB generally sponsorsvarious R&D programs underCSS to both Governments aswell as private organizationsacross the country, said the offi-cial.

Sastry said “this is just thehumble beginning for NMPB’steam and will file more patentsin the coming times.”

The NMPB has also devel-oped e-CHARAK, an e-chan-nel for herbs, aromatic rawmaterial, and knowledge as avirtual market place for tradeof medicinal plants produceand also enable informationexchange between variousstakeholders involved in thesector.

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New Delhi: Prime MinisterNarendra Modi will on Tuesdayinaugurate the ‘Maitri Setu’between India and Bangladesh— a bridge built over the Feniriver, the Prime Minister’s Office(PMO) said.

He will also inaugurate andlay the foundation stone ofmultiple infrastructure projectsin Tripura during the event, itsaid.

Prime Minister Modi willinaugurate the ‘Maitri Setu’between India and Bangladeshon March 9 at 12 noon via videoconferencing, the PMO said ina statement.

The bridge ‘Maitri Setu’has been built over the Feni riverwhich flows between the Indianboundary in Tripura andBangladesh.

The name ‘Maitri Setu’

symbolises growing bilateralrelations and friendly tiesbetween India and Bangladesh,the PMO said. The constructionwas taken up by the NationalHighways and InfrastructureDevelopment Corporation Ltdat a project cost of �133 crore,it said. The 1.9 km long bridgejoins Sabroom in India withRamgarh in Bangladesh.

It is poised to herald a newchapter for trade and people topeople movement betweenIndia and Bangladesh, the PMOsaid.

With this inauguration,Tripura is set to become the‘Gateway of North East’ withaccess to Chittagong Port ofBangladesh, which is just 80Kms from Sabroom, it said.

Prime Minister Modi willalso lay the foundation stone for

setting up an Integrated CheckPost at Sabroom.

It will help ease the move-ment of goods and passengersbetween the two countries, pro-vide new market opportunitiesfor products of North Eaststates and assist seamless move-ment of passengers to and fromIndia and Bangladesh, the PMOsaid.

The project is being takenup by the Land Ports Authorityof India at an estimated cost ofabout �232 crore, the state-ment said.

The Prime Minister willalso lay the foundation stone ofNational Highway (NH)-208connecting the Unakoti districtheadquarters at Kailashaharwith the Khowai district head-quarters. It will provide an alter-native route to the NH-44. PTI

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New Delhi: President RamNath Kovind on Sundayappealed to all countrymen towork relentlessly towardswomen’s safety, education andindependence, on the eve ofInternational Women’s Day.

Kovind said “we will beable to pavethe way forwomen, espe-cial ly ourdaughters, tobecome moreactive, capableand empow-ered only by doing so. Let usdedicate this occasion ofInternational Women’s Dayto the honour, safety andempowerment of women andresolve that we will supportthem in changing every tra-dition and policy that hinderstheir progress,” the Presidentsaid in a statement.

He extended congratula-tions and best wishes to allwomen on the occasion, say-ing “women are an inspirationto our family, society and thenation”. IANS

New Delhi: External AffairsMinister S Jaishankar and USspecial envoy for AfghanistanZalmay Khalilzad spoke overphone on Sunday and dis-cussed the latest developmentspertaining to the Afghan peacetalks.

Last November also,Jaishankar and Khalilzad hadheld talks during the latter’sIndia visit on the historic peacenegotiations between theTaliban and the AfghanGovernment and related issues.

“Received a call from USSpecial Representative ZalmayKhalilzad @US4AfghanPeace.Discussed latest developmentspertaining to peace talks. Wewill remain in touch,’Jaishankar tweeted on Sunday.

India has been keenly fol-lowing the evolving politicalsituation after the US signed apeace deal with the Taliban inFebruary last year.

The deal provided for thewithdrawal of American troopsfrom Afghanistan, effectivelydrawing curtains on

Washington’s 18-year war withTaliban in the country.

India has also been main-taining that care should betaken to ensure that any suchprocess does not lead to any“ungoverned spaces” whereterrorists and their proxies canrelocate.

India has been a majorstakeholder in Afghanistan andit has extended developmentalassistance to tune of around $3billion in the last few years tothe country. PTI

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ue to this day. The fact that theGovernment has done nothingto resolve matters, and insteadresorted to issuing misleadingstatements and even violenceagainst them, is undoubtedly aprecursor as to how thisGovernment will handle thefarmers’ protest in the long run.

At the end of the day, theissue is very simple. All thatthe veterans demand is achance to live out their retire-ment with dignity, feasibleonly if their pensions areprotected from rising infla-tion as the majority retires rel-atively young; that thisGovernment is unwilling todo so reeks of hypocrisy.

For example, even whilethis Government opposesOROP for its military veterans,it lost little time in ensuringthat all Members of Parliamentreceive pensions calculated inmuch the same manner thatmilitary veterans have beendemanding. In 2018, it amend-ed Clause 8A of ‘The SalaryAllowances and Pension ofMembers Act, 1954’, to providefor an increase in the autho-rised pension every five yearson the basis of the CostInflation Index, which clearlylinks pensions for all formermembers to what is receivedby the incumbent.

This unfair treatment, espe-

cially the Government’s refusalto put in public domain theJustice Reddy Committee (tolook into anomalies in OROP)Report, submitted in October2016, forced the military veter-ans to approach the SupremeCourt. Over four years later, thecase has made tardy progressmainly due to theGovernment’s efforts to delay.

By not taking cognisanceof this issue, the Bench has notbeen kind to the veterans, whocontinue to suffer and losehope as each day passes. Whatis worse, the Justices hearingthe case, now in the final argu-ments stage, have repeatedlypostponed the hearing on thegrounds they have not had therequisite time to study andunderstand the case in detail.The next hearing is in a fewdays and one hopes the Benchwill actually hear the case andnot kick it down the road.

Oddly enough for the vastmajority of us, not particular-ly conversant with the intrica-cies of the judicial process, thishearing in itself appears to becompletely superfluous. This isbecause the Supreme Courthad on September 9, 2008, inits judgment in the case ofUnion of India and Maj GenSPS Vains and Others, ruled:“No Defence personnel seniorin rank can get lesser pension

than his junior irrespective ofthe date of retirement andsimilarly placed officers of thesame rank are to be given thesame pension irrespective ofthe date of retirement.” Theseare directions that the DefenceMinistry has yet to fully imple-ment and which in no uncer-tain terms accede to what theveterans have been demanding.

Interestingly enough in2014, when the SupremeCourt was passing directionsto the Government to correctthe anomalies in the pensionsof High Court Justices, thenChief Justice of India PSathasivam directed that “onerank one pension must be thenorm in respect of a consti-tutional office”, a benefitwhich Justices of the SupremeCourt already enjoyed.

Finally, can it really be thecase that in a democracy likeours, the constitutionalauthorities do not see them-selves as mere public servantsand believe themselves to besuperior to other Governmentservants and ordinary citizens?

(The writer is a militaryveteran, who is a consultantwith the Observer ResearchFoundation and SeniorVisiting Fellow with ThePeninsula Foundation,Chennai. The views expressedare personal.)

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One issue that distin-guishes the NarendraModi Governmentfrom its earlier itera-

tions is the manner in which ithas used the military, quitesuccessfully at that, to portrayan apparently muscular for-eign policy, not least for thedomestic audience. This hasallowed it to reap rich dividendsat the hustings. Yet ironically,apart from praising the militaryin public, Modi has done littlefor them on the ground, display-ing little concern for the moraleor well-being of its personnel.

Take the issue of welfare ofour servicemen. TheGovernment has reducedCanteen facilities, is intent onopening up and monetisingCantonment lands, adding tothe insecurity of families ofservicemen separated over longperiods due to their spousesbeing deployed either opera-tionally or on training. In addi-tion, he has refused to authorisethe Non-Functional FinancialUpgrade (NFFU), which isauthorised to other CentralGovernment services, includingthe Central Armed PoliceForces, thereby lowering theirstatus and emoluments in com-parison to the other services.The plain fact is that the grantof NFFU to bureaucrats allowsthem to get OROP, through theback door as it were, becausenearly all of them now retire inthe Apex Grade.

All these little pinpricks ran-kle and more so thisGovernment’s unwillingness toimplement OROP in letter andspirit as envisaged by theParliamentary Committee head-ed by veteran BJP MP BhagatSingh Koshyari: A definitionthat had been accepted by bothHouses of Parliament and thethen UPA Government in power.What is particularly galling isthat Modi used this very issue togalvanise the serving and veter-an community during the 2014general elections.

His sanctioning of a distort-ed version of what had beenpromised earlier forced the vet-erans to launch peaceful protestson June 14, 2015, which contin-

�� Sir — The Government must step up itsawareness drive with respect to COVID-19vaccination as many people are still notaware of the importance of getting vaccinat-ed. Most of these people are from villageswho don’t follow the safety protocols. Theyneither sanitise their hands regularly norwear a face mask.

The Government must advertise the listof the centres where jabs are being provid-ed in vernacular newspapers across thenation. It must also announce it on radio andtelecast the list on national television. Theinformation will help ensure that senior cit-izens choose their nearest hospital forimmunisation in a hassle-free manner.

Further, just imposing a fine on thosewho err is not enough. There should bestrict punishment for not wearing themask. It is also seen that police officials oftenmisuse their powers and threaten the poorin the name of not adhering to the guide-lines. They extort money from poor vendorswho fail to wear mask or who do not wearit properly. The Government needs to dis-seminate information with respect toCoronavirus vaccination through all medi-ums of communication. It is also theresponsibility of the citizens to maintainsocial distancing and get themselves vacci-nated when their turn comes. Even for thosewho have taken the jab, precaution is firstand foremost. We have no idea how thevirus mutates or changes its form andbecomes lethal. We must remember thatprevention is always better than cure.

Varun Dambal | Bengaluru

�� Sir — The ongoing farmers’ protest is theresult of the Government’s arrogance as itis not ready to agree to the demand of thegrowers. The farmers are demanding com-plete repeal of the three contentious farmlaws and are not ready to settle for anythingless. The Government, on the other hand,is hell-bent to impose these laws as it is inconsonance with its agenda of rampant pri-vatisation. It will be a setback to the prevail-ing Minimum Support Price (MSP) system

for the crops and will finish off theAgricultural Produce Marketing Committee(APMC) mandis in India.

The 100-day period of protest is a bloton India’s democracy and the treatmentmeted out to the protesters is simply inhu-mane. However, the Opposition is with thefarmers. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi hitout at the Centre over the farmers’ protestand said nails were laid at Delhi’s bordersfor those, whose sons risk their lives at thecountry’s borders.

Farmers, mostly from Punjab, Haryanaand western Uttar Pradesh, have beencamping at several border points of Delhi,including Tikri, Singhu and Ghazipur,since November 28 last year but farmersacross the India are now coming out in theirsupport.

Yash Pal Ralhan | Jalandhar

�� Sir — Companies signing celebrities as thebrand ambassadors for their products seems

to be the trend. While the intended purposeof such a move is to push up the sales, whena product has a fair market share, what is theneed for brand ambassadors?

Further, when a company can achievea sizeable market share for a product on itsown strength, why should it spend unnec-essarily? And naturally, such expenditure willhave a bearing on the buyers as product pricewill go up, for where else will the companyfind money to meet such heavy expendi-tures?

To sum up, a product does not need anyendorsement if it has a fair share of accep-tance in the market. Even if celebrities areroped in, seldom does it help boost the sales,for the people know better about the prod-ucts than the celebrities. The product mustbe of such quality that consumers purcahseit even if a celebrity doesn’t endorse it.

V S Jayaraman | Chennai

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This year, two women created history by join-ing the Telangana Southern PowerDistribution Corporation Limited (TSSPD-

CL) as junior powerline workers and becominga part of a workforce that has solely comprised menin the State. The women did so after qualifyingtests, including climbing up an electric pole. Stillthe job didn’t come on a platter. The duo had toknock on the High Court’s door, challenging thecorporation’s stand that “such posts are reservedfor men.”

Nevertheless, despite such occupational seg-regations and archaic rules, many women daredto storm male bastions. Surely, Delhi’sMehrunnisha Shokat Ali is one of them. She hasbeen working as a bouncer for the last 15 years,demolishing the notion that women belong to theweaker sex and need men’s protection. “I wasalways fascinated by people in the Army and thepolice. But I couldn’t nurture any such ambitionsas my highly orthodox father was totally againstgiving any of his daughters an education.Thankfully, my mother sent us to school”, remi-niscences Mehrunnisha. “When I joined the NCCin school, my father got furious and burnt my uni-form. Luckily, by that time, I had learnt some basicsof judo and boxing. Later, after seeing a posse ofwell-built men in black suits in the show IndianIdol, I wanted to become one of them”, sherecounts.

However, after her father suffered a loss inbusiness, the responsibility of becoming the fam-ily’s breadwinner was thrust on her. Luckily shemet Arun Rana, who owns a security agency anda restaurant in Hauz Khas, South Delhi. Ranaengaged her in his restaurant as he was “lookingfor women bouncers to put female customers atease and found her very capable of easing any ten-sion.” Now, in her mid-30s, Mehrunnisha, whomaintains a strict workout regime, has earned theexperience of working with many high-profilewomen and men in the world of film, entertain-ment and business. She looks forward to launch-ing her own security agency with her sisterTarannum, who is also a bouncer.

Unlike the Ali sisters, for 24-year-old Sabinaworking for a top global brand in Gurugram, thepath was less bumpy. Sabina confidently says: “Ilearnt martial arts in order to become a bouncer.I am not in the profession for money alone, I geta lot of respect in my workplace. I shall marry, onlyif I am allowed to work.” Now, the vice-presidentof a security agency with a pan-India clientele,Sabina admits that “there is a growing demand forwomen security personnel and many clients con-sider them safe, more disciplined and efficient.”

The security business is not the only glass ceil-ing that women are breaking. While, in the Indianpsyche, alcohol, cocktails, booze are still taboowords and going to a bar is a strict “no, no” forgirls, there are many women like Delhi’s SuchanaBera Sharma, who are breaking the barriers heretoo. A management degree-holder, Suchana is amixologist and currently the India brand head ofa major player in the global spirits industry. A pro-lific travel, cuisine and lifestyle writer with a hugeInstagram following, Suchana explains that“mixology is not only about creating a uniqueblend, but delving deep into the history and cul-ture of each drink by continuously educating one-

self, along with hands-on experi-ence.” A young mother, she gives thecredit for her success to her parents,husband and two siblings and says“more women are now shaking offinhibitions, coming forward andsupporting each other.”

Though women at the steeringwheel may not be a uncommonsight, but, choosing it as a vocationis. Notwithstanding age-old biasesabout women drivers, Delhi’sAnjana, Kolkata’s Manasi andJaipur’s Ganga are professional dri-vers. Leaving behind their traumat-ic past, all of them got their train-ing under the ‘Women at theWheels’ programme of the AzadFoundation, a multi-city-basedNGO. Anjana, who has been drivingcommercial cabs for the last eightyears, now confidently says that, “Ienjoy my work. I got my heavy vehi-cle driving licence in 2020 and amready for any challenging job.”Trapped in an unhappy marriagewith a drunkard husband who hadno fixed income, Anjana was des-perately looking for a job to feed hertwo children when AzadFoundation came to her aid. Anjana,now, in her late-30s, says that “mylife’s only mission is to fulfil thedreams of my two children. My hus-band no longer interferes in my life,though the separation suit is stillpending in the court.” Manasi, a vic-tim of child marriage, proudly says,“I use my Alto 300 car for commer-cial rides, which I got under the

West Bengal Government’sGatidhara scheme in 2019. This wayI can feed my family.” She lost herhusband even before her first childwas born. Manasi was soon thrownout of her in-laws’ house, while, herimpoverished father was equallyunwilling to bear her burden. Insearch of a living, she left herfather’s home for Kolkata, got a jobat a loan financing company for apaltry sum, which enabled her toput her son at a care agency. In herlone struggle, she was duped by anunscrupulous man with falsepromises of marriage, who desert-ed her once she became pregnant.The local church came to her res-cue and her life got irrevocablychanged once she came in touchwith the Azad Foundation. Now,her elder son is in a boardingschool, the younger one studies ina reputed school in Kolkata andManasi is saving money for a houseof her own.

While, Ganga’s poor father mar-ried her off at an early age, and ather in-laws’ place, she faced contin-uous harassment, initially, for dowry,and later, for giving birth to two girlchildren. When she came to livewith her husband in his workplaceat Jaipur, she attempted to commitsuicide along with her daughterswhen she couldn’t bear the mentaland physical torture any more. Shewas rescued from the railway stationand given shelter at a welfare home,where she worked for some time,

and put her daughters in an orphan-age. Today, her daughters stay withher, study in good schools, and sheis the owner of two cars. She drivesone herself while the other one isdriven by her sister. Ganga says that“I don’t want to look back, and Iwould like to help more womenwho suffered like me.”

Amrita Gupta, director, researchand advocacy, Azad Foundationsays that in order to encourageresource-poor women, who aremostly first generation learners, aflexible training mode is followed,covering technical skills for thelicence test, and also transformativeaspects like spoken English, self-defence, basic etiquette. On anaverage, about 300-400 women gettraining every year and about 50 percent of them get placements.

Sadly, in spite of women’s forayinto many non-traditional fields,only one-quarter of Indian women,compared to 82 per cent of men, arein the labour market, says a WorldEconomic Forum, 2020 report.Worryingly, this is likely to shrinkfurther by 23.5 percentage points inthe post-pandemic phase, saysOxfam.

This major gender gap inemployment can only be reversedby turning the focus on women ineconomic revival strategies andadopting a gender-sensitiveapproach in a post-pandemic world.Only then will we be able to createa ‘New India.’

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It is quite customary to seethe world applaudingwomen achievers around

the time of the InternationalWomen’s Day, which is today.Scores of felicitation cere-monies where women trail-blazers are recognised fortheir contribution are organ-ised across the length andbreadth of the country andaround the world. It isencouraging to see the acco-lades and to learn about thewomen who are finally beinggiven their space under theSun.

But this article is a storyabout a young woman whomfew know and as of now, herpublic face is limited, to saythe least. She is not part of alarge organisation. She is thedaughter of the woman whohelps to keep the wheels ofmy domestic set-up movesmoothly. Her name is Shilpaand she is all of 23.

I first heard about Shilpawhen her mother startedhelping me out at homearound six-and-a-half-yearsago. She is the eldest of foursiblings, all girls. Her moth-er would often tell me sor-rowfully about how shewould be taunted by othersfor not having borne a sonand I would pacify her andtell her that I, too, was one offour daughters. It was alwayswonderful to hear about herdaughters and slowly as theanecdotes were narrated, Ilearnt about Shilpa.

I learnt that she couldsing Hindi, English and evenPunjabi songs. Soon I wasdelighted to actually hear hersing and she sang with herfather, a man who makes hisliving by setting up a foodstall where he sells the mostdelicious biryani among otherdelicacies. The father sangmelodiously but Shilpa’s voice

simply held me spell-bound. It was powerful,it was musical and it waslike liquid gold. Not anote out of place. Andthe felicity with whichshe sang English songsquite took my breathaway.

Shilpa was neverinterested in studies butcompleted her schooleducation till the 12thstandard. Hearing hertalk in English and listen-ing to her sing, in threedifferent languages with equalfluency, I understood as neverbefore that the university oflife is as educative as actualinstitutions of repute andconcrete.

Shilpa tells me, and Iquote her own words, inEnglish, “I did not learn tosing. I used to sing on myown and listen to the songson radio and TV. I heard a

brother (boy) singing, hisname is Vijay. He took me tohis NGO named Ideal YouthHealth and Welfare Societyand when we went there, hetold me that we could singthere. That platform becamemy identity for me.”

As time went by, Shilpamet like-minded people at theNGO, people who nurtured apassion for singing like her-self. And with them, she

formed a band, theSavitribai Phule Band. Imarveled at the appropri-ateness of the name: Whobetter than the greatIndian social reformerand educationist,Savitribai Phule oftencredited as being themother of Indian femi-nism, to name one’s bandafter. The band membersare Shivraj, Raja, Aman,Varsha, Neha, Sunil,Rohit and Shilpa herself.Shivaraj is the

Coordinator. Sunil plays thecohone, Aman and Varsha,the guitar and Neha and Rajaform the chorus. Shilpa is thelead singer of the band and isaccompanied by Rohit. Theyhave performed professional-ly at various places in Delhiincluding the Viswa YuvaKendra where their perfor-mance was hugely appreciat-ed and also at Lucknow and

Chandigarh. Shilpa is a representative

of women who dare to dream,who are powerhouses of tal-ent and creativity, who do notallow their social standing tocome between them and theworld. If we look around us,in the communities closest tous, we may find many suchwomen, who are preciousgemstones, shining beneaththe rubble of class, caste andpoverty.

The college which I havebeen a part of for close tothree decades has many suchstudents. Students who comefrom the most underprivi-leged situations but that didnot prevent Aisha frombecoming a writer, Smridhifrom becoming a police offi-cer and Shweta from becom-ing a professional photogra-pher (names have beenchanged). One may have beena Delhi Road Transport bus

driver’s daughter, anothermay have had a sex worker asher mother and yet anothermay have a parent whosweeps the road. But theybecame who they are today,after beating all odds. On thesheer dint of their talent andhard work.

When I asked Shilpa whather dreams and plans for thefuture are, she answered fear-lessly and confidently, “I wantto be a very big singer in thefuture. I want to take my bandforward and perform abroad.”

She trains daily. Singswherever called. Her passionburns bright. She is undaunt-ed by circumstances. Failuresnever dim her ebullient spir-it. So she may have no defin-itive plan of action but some-how, I know she’s going tomake it big, as big as thedreams she has. If she is onlyallowed to sing, the way shewants.

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The writer is formerDirector-General,

Doordarshan,and All India Radio.She was also Press

Secretary, President of India.The views expressed

are personal.

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The writer is Principal,Janki Devi

Memorial College,University of Delhi. The views expressed

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Stock markets will focus onlong term bond yield trends,

crude oil prices and macro-economic data this week asinvestors look for cues amidvolatility, according to ana-lysts.

Besides, investments byFPIs (Foreign PortfolioInvestors) as well as domesticinvestors, movement of rupeeagainst the US dollar and devel-opments on the coronavirusfront are likely to be closely

watched for cues.“The US 10 Year G-Sec

yields have surpassed 1.5 percent on a closing basis which issomewhat negative for globalequities.

The Dollar Index has alsomoved up from 90 to 92 level,which is seen as a negative foremerging market currenciesand also equities.

“In the absence of anymajor domestic trigger Indianmarkets could take a cue fromglobal developments and theUS markets,” said Rusmik

Oza, Executive VicePresident, Head ofFundamental Research atKotak Securities.

The tone of the marketseems to be on the downside,for now, Oza added.

On March 5, benchmarkBSE Sensex tumbled over 440points and the NSE Niftycracked below the psycholog-ical 15,000-level amid relentlesssell-off in global equities as USbond market turmoil contin-ued to rattle investors.

The 30-share Sensex plum-

meted by 440.76 points or0.87 per cent to close at50,405.32, continuing its fallingtrend for the second day onFriday due to concerns overbond yields. The NSE barom-eter Nifty ended lower by142.65 points or 0.95 per centat 14,938.10.

“In the coming week, themarket will be mainly focusingon the expectations on whetherthe Fed, in its upcoming meet-ing, will maintain its accom-modative stance in a risingbond yield market.

��

The Department ofTe l e c o m mu n i c at i o n s

(DoT) will issue demand notesto telcos next week on anupfront payment for spectrumacquired in the just-concludedauctions, sources said.

The demand note followsauctions raking-in winningbids of over �77,800 crore, for855.6 MHz of spectrum.Billionaire Mukesh Ambani’sReliance Jio spent the most inthe auction, picking up 488.35MHz spectrum in bands suchas 800 MHz, 1800 MHz and2300 MHz for �57,122.65 crore.

Bharti Airtel bid about �18,699 crore to acquire 355.45megahertz (MHz) out of thetotal 855.60 MHz of radiofre-

quency acquired by all telcos,while Vodafone Idea, bought11.80 MHz of spectrum worthRs 1,993.40 crore.

DoT sources told PTI thatthe demand notes will be sentout to the three companies thisweek, and entails largely theupfront payment for spectrumthat is ready to be allocated.

Spectrum will be offeredfor assignment for a validityperiod of 20 years. As per theauction terms, successful bid-ders can pay entire bid amountin one go, or exercise an optionto pay a certain amount (25 percent for spectrum won in 700MHz, 800 MHz, 900 MHzbands or 50 per cent for spec-trum won in 1800 MHz, 2100MHz, 2300 MHz, 2500 MHzbands) upfront with remaining

amount in a maximum up to16 equated annual instalments,after a moratorium of twoyears.

A DoT official said thedemand notes together totalabout Rs 20,000 crore, but didnot provide operator-wisebreak-up.

About 2308.80 MHz ofspectrum, that carry telecomsignals in seven bands worthnearly Rs 4 lakh crore at startprice, was up for bidding in theauction held recently. Althoughthe spectrum finally acquiredby telcos fell woefully short ofthis overall kitty and bids hov-ered at reserve price, DoT said,and analysts concurred, thatauction outcome and responsehad surpassed initial expecta-tions.

��

Prime Minister NarendraModi on Sunday said the

poor and needy have beenable to save Rs 50,000 croreannually due to various health-related measures taken up byhis government like providingaffordable medicines, health-care and reducing the prices ofmedical devices.

Modi, who dedicated to thenation the 7,500th JanaushadhiKendra at North Eastern IndiraGandhi Regional Institute ofHealth & Medical Sciences(NEIGRIHMS) in Shillong,also said the move to provideaffordable medicines throughthe Janaushadhi scheme isspreading across the lengthand breadth of the country.

In a virtual address at the‘Janaushadhi Week’ celebratedacross the nation from March1 to March 7 to create aware-ness about the ‘Janaushadhi’scheme, the Prime Ministersaid it is helping countrymenliving in tribal areas in theNorth East and the mountain-ous areas.

“Today when the 7,500thcentre has been inaugurated, ithas been held in Shillong. It isclear from this how much pub-lic health centres are expand-ing in the North East,” Modisaid.

The Prime Minister, whoalso interacted with peoplefrom different parts of the

country, further said, “It isclear from my discussion withpeople who run theJanaushadhi centres at everycorner of the country andsome of its beneficiaries, thatthis scheme is becoming avery big companion of poorand middle-class families. Thisscheme is becoming the medi-um of both service andemployment”.

Underlining the varioussteps taken up by his govern-ment to make healthcareaffordable to the poor andneedy, he said prices of essen-tial drugs as well as medicaldevices such as stents and kneeimplants have been reducedmanifold.

“It has led to the saving ofRs 12,500 crore per year for theneedy people. The AyushmanBharat scheme is helping 50crore people get Rs 5 lakhworth of treatment. Over 1.5crore people have already takenthis benefit. It is estimatedthat it has led to savings ofaround Rs 30,000 crore for peo-ple.”It means that if we collatethe savings being affected byJanaushadhi,

Ayushman Bharat anddecline in prices of drugs andstents (medical devices) if weonly take government schemesin the health sector, then poorand middle-income groups aresaving around Rs 50,000 croreper year,” the Prime Ministersaid.

��

Multiplex major PVR plansto invest Rs 150 crore to

open up to 40 screens acrossthe country in the next fiscal.

The company’s target ofhaving 1,000 operationalscreens has been pushed by ayear due to the outbreak of theCOVID-19 pandemic to theend of fiscal 2022-23, a topcompany official has said.

“We had to push back ourplan by exactly a year becauseof the pandemic ... By the endof the financial year 2022-23,we should be able to reach1,000 screens,” Sanjeev KumarBijli, Joint Managing Director,PVR Ltd told PTI.

The company, whichadded 9 new screens this weekin Mysuru and Kanpur, plansto add 30-40 new screens in thenext financial year beginningApril 1.

Bijli said Rs 150 crorewould be outlay for the open-ing of new screens in the nextfiscal.PVR at present operatesover 844 screens at 177 prop-erties in 71 cities (India and SriLanka).

Bijli said a strong contentpipeline of star-studded Indianand regional films as well asforeign language films alongwith an aggressive vaccinationdrive in the country will bringback audiences to the cinema.

“We have had a mixedcouple of last months. Notvery exciting because no big

Hindi movie got released.Hindi movies will start releas-ing from March 11. We have astrong content pipeline. Theyear (next fiscal) looks verypromising,” he added.

When asked if the compa-ny is also looking for acquisi-tion opportunities for addingscreens, Bijli said the companyalways looks at the optionsavailable.

“There is no one approachfor growth. We keep an eye outfor all sorts of opportunities aslong as they make sense interms of numbers, location,” henoted.

The multiplex industry hasbeen one of the worst impact-ed segments due to the out-break of the COVID-19 pan-demic. The governmentallowed cinema halls across thecountry to operate at full capac-ity from February 1 with adher-ence to COVID-19 safety pro-tocols.

Prior to that, multiplexesand cinema halls were operat-ing at 50 per cent sitting capac-ity in accordance with theUnlock-5 guidelines issued bythe government following thepandemic. Multiplexes andcinema halls were closed foralmost seven months andopened in October last year.

PVR had reported a con-solidated net loss of Rs 49.10crore for thethird quarterended December 2020, as itcontinued to be impacted bythe COVID-19 pandemic.

��

The CBIC has directed itsfield offices to exercise

utmost prudence and maxi-mum caution in attachment ofproperty of a taxpayer andsaid that such a remedy can beconsidered in cases involvingGST evasion, fake invoicingand delay of more than threemonths in depositing tax col-lected.

The Central Board ofIndirect Taxes and Customs(CBIC) has come out withguidelines for provisionalattachment of property underGST Act which tasks theCommissioner to exercise duediligence and carefully exam-ine all the facts of the case,including the nature of offenceand amount of revenueinvolved, and also record on filethe basis on which he/she hasformed such an opinion toattach property of the taxpay-er.

“It is reiterated that thepower of provisional attach-ment must not be exercised ina routine/mechanical manner... The remedy of attachmentbeing, by its very nature, extra-ordinary, has to be resorted towith utmost circumspectionand with maximum care andcaution,” the CBIC said.

In the guidelines the CBIClisted out types of cases whereprovisional attachment can be

considered to be resorted tosubject to specific facts of thecase.

These include where a tax-able person has supplied anygoods or services or both with-out issue of any invoice with anintention to evade tax; or issuedinvoice or bill without supplyof goods or services or both; orfraudulently availed input taxcredit.

Also cases where a tax-payer has collected any amountas tax but has failed to pay thesame to the governmentbeyond a period of threemonths from the date on whichsuch payment becomes due; orfraudulently obtained refund;or passed on input tax creditfraudulently to the recipientsbut has not paid the commen-surate tax would qualify forprovisional attachment of prop-erty.

The provisional attach-ment of property would bevalid for a period of one year.

“It should be ensured thatthe value of property attachedprovisionally is not excessive.The provisional attachmentof property shall be to theextent it is required to protectthe interest of revenue, that isto say, the value of attachedproperty should be as near aspossible to the estimatedamount of pending revenueagainst such person,” the CBICsaid.

��

As the demand scenarioimproves and economic

activities gather momentum, aFICCI survey shows that con-fidence among Indian busi-nesses and entrepreneurs issignificantly high and the busi-ness confidence index is at adecadal high.

The Overall BusinessConfidence Index stood at 74.2in the current round, againstthe index value of 70.9 report-ed in the previous survey and59 reported a year back.

“The recently announcedUnion Budget 2021-22 hasbeen forward looking.

This together with mea-sures announced as a part ofthe ‘Aatmanirbhar Bharat’package has infused optimismamong the industry membersand the same is corroborated inthe improved outlook for var-ious operational parameters,”said a statement by the indus-try body.

In the current survey,though the proportion ofrespondents anticipating bettersale prospects in the near term

remained unchanged at 66 percent from the previous surveyround.

However, the companieswere buoyed to regain somecontrol over pricing power.

Nearly 27 per cent respon-dents expect an increase in theselling price of their productsover the next six months ascompared to 21 per cent stat-ing the same in the previousround and 14 per cent a yearback.

The statement saidimproved economic conditionsand greater pricing power islikely to drive profits of cor-porate India over the next twoquarters.

The percentage of partic-ipants citing higher profitsover next six months increasedto 36 per cent in the latest sur-vey from 33 per cent respon-dents stating likewise in theprevious round.

Further, the outlook onemployment and exports alsoreported a discernible improve-ment.

Nearly 35 per cent respon-dents were optimistic aboutbetter hiring prospects over the

next two quarters (up from 22per cent stating the same in theprevious round).

Export prospects were alsoreported to be better in the cur-rent round with 41 per centrespondents indicating higheroutbound shipments.

The corresponding num-ber in the previous round was27 per cent.

Furthermore, the propor-tion of respondents citing‘higher to much higher’ invest-ments in the coming sixmonths witnessed an upswingin the current survey whencompared to the previousround.

Nearly 31 per cent partic-ipants said they foresee ‘high-er to much higher’ investmentsover coming six months ascompared to 19 per cent par-ticipants stating likewise inthe previous round.

The present survey drewresponses from a wide array ofsectors and was conductedduring the months of Januaryand February 2021. The surveygauges expectations of therespondents for the January toJune 2021 period.

��

E-commerce logistics firmShiprocket on Sunday said

it has recorded several foldjump in women entrepreneursthat directly ship products toconsumers which range fromhealthcare to personal care,electronics, etc.

The logistics firm regis-tered a 273 per cent growth in

the volume of shipmentsyear-on-year done by womensellers when compared toFebruary 2020.

“Shiprocket observed thatthere was a nearly 700 per centincrease in the women sellercount on its platform betweenFebruary 2020 and February2021 with the count goingfrom a little over 2,000 to morethan 20,000 women sellers in ayear, taking the total to almost23,000,” Shiprocket said in areport.

The new report compilesvarious trends observed byShiprocket

from February 2020 toFebruary 2021 with a samplesize of over 23,000 womensellers across India highlightinggrowth of Women in D2C(direct to consumers) sectorand opportunities for ‘wom-enpreneurs’, the company said.

The D2C sellers may getorders from famous e-com-merce portals, their own web-site or over phone and shiptheir products directly to con-

sumers. “D2C has become a seg-

ment with immense traction inrecent times among women.More and more women arenow venturing into entrepre-neurship through online sell-ing. On our platform, there hasbeen a major uptick in thenumber of women D2C sellerssince early last year,” Shiprocketco-founder and CEO SaahilGoel said.

Shiprocket observed thata large chunk of the tractionfrom women sellers, over 24per cent, came from socialmedia while online storesaccounted for more than 12 percent, offline channels com-prising nearly 10 per cent.

The least traction wasobserved from marketplaceswhich accounted for a littleover 3 per cent. The logisticsplatform also identified thatTier-I cities, with nearly 55 percent, had the maximumwomen sellers while Tier-IIcities followed closely withover 45 per cent.

Shiprocket identified thetop 5 categories in whichwomen sellers operate to beHealthcare, comprising over 39per cent, Personal Care, con-sisting of more than 25 percent, apparel, comprising ofnearly 19 per cent, over 10 percent women in electronics,and kitchen products account-ed for almost 7 per cent ofwomen sellers, the report said.

�� 2��

As the rising bond yields inthe US cause panic in the

global markets, foreign port-folio investors (FPI) haveturned to sell their holdings.FPIs have pulled out a net Rs 881crore from the Indian equitymarket in the first week ofMarch. They have pulled out anet investment of Rs 5,595 crorefrom the debt segment, showedNSDL data. However, the netinvestment in the debt-VRR seg-ment was at Rs 1,320 crore dur-ing March 1-5.The rising bondyields have nearly brought a haltto the bull run both in the glob-al and the domestic equity mar-kets.

��

Oil marketing companies(OMC) kept fuel prices

unchanged for the eighth con-secutive day across the fourmetros on Sunday.

In the national capital,petrol was sold for �91.17 perlitre on Sunday.

Similarly, in Mumbai,Chennai and Kolkata, the fuelwas priced at �97.57, �93.11and �91.35 per litre, respec-tively, all unchanged from theprevious levels.

The surge in the retailprices comes despite a surge incrude oil prices. Brent crudefutures are currently over $69per barrel.

After a spike in global oilprices seen over the last twoweeks with crude price jump-ing close to $67 a barrel, priceshad fallen to around $63 a bar-

rel but it rose again to cross $69a barrel mark now after theOPEC+ decision to continuewith crude production cut inApril.

In tandem with petrolprices, diesel prices too wereunchanged in Delhi, Mumbai,Chennai and Kolkata at Rs81.47, Rs 88.60, Rs 86.45 and Rs84.35 per litre, respectively.

Petrol and diesel priceshave been rising continuouslysince February 9.

In the 14 increases sincethen, prices have gone up by Rs4.22 per litre for petrol whilediesel rate has risen by Rs 4.34a litre in Delhi.

The increase in the previ-ous weeks has taken petrol tocross historic high levels of Rs100 a litre in several citiesacross the country.

The petrol and diesel priceshave increased 26 times in2021 with the two auto fuelsincreasing by Rs 7.46 and Rs7.60 per litre, respectively so farthis year.

Oil companies’ executivessaid that petrol and dieselprices may increase further incoming days as retail pricesmay have to be balanced in linewith global developments toprevent OMCs from makingloss on sale.

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With a view of listing thestate-run insurance

major Life InsuranceCorporation of India (LIC), thegovernment has proposed toraise the authorised capital ofLIC to Rs 25,000 crore.

As per the amendmentsproposed under the FinanceBill 2021, the authorised sharecapital of LIC shall be Rs25,000 crore divided into 2,500crore shares of Rs 10 each.

The share capital of thecorporation shall consist ofequity shares and preferenceshares, which may be fullypaid-up or partly paid-up, saidthe Finance Bill.

“The corporation mayfrom time to time increase itsissued share capital, with theprevious approval of theCentre, whether by public issueor rights issue or preferentialallotment or private placementor issue of bonus shares toexisting members holdingequity shares, or by issue ofshares to employees pursuantto share based employee ben-

efits schemes, or by issue ofshares to life insurance policy-holders of the Corporation, orotherwise,” it said.

However, the central gov-ernment shall at all times, notless than 51 per cent of theissued equity share capital ofthe corporation and for fiveyears after the IPO, the Centrewill hold not less than seven-ty-five per cent.

The mega IPO is likely totake place around Diwali thisyear. Presenting the UnionBudget for FY21-22, FinanceMinister Nirmala Sitharamanhad said that all the announceddisinvestment processes,including the LIC IPO will becompleted in the upcoming fis-cal.

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6/�! ��/� ��% ��8 )�( � �/( + &� �� (� ��# �/(�#�!��' �� E ��< 3�%!��New Delhi (PTI): There is goodnews for consumers who aregoing to junk their old vehiclesand buy a new one under theVehicle Scrapping Policy asautomakers will give about 5 percent rebate on the new purchase,Union minister Nitin Gadkarihas said.

The voluntary vehicle scrap-ping policy announced in theUnion Budget for 2021-22 pro-vides for fitness test after 20 yearsfor personal vehicles while com-mercial vehicles would require itafter the completion of 15 years.

“Automobile manufacturerswill provide about 5 per centrebate on new car purchases” tothe consumers in lieu of scrap-ping of the old, Road Transport,Highways and MSMEs MinisterGakdari told PTI.

“There are four major com-ponents of the policy...Apartfrom rebate, there are provisionsof green taxes and other levies onold polluting vehicles. These willbe required to undergo manda-tory fitness and pollution tests inautomated facilities. For thisautomated fitness centres wouldbe required through out in thecountry and we are working inthat direction,” Gadkari said.

Automated fitness tests willbe set up under public privatepartnership (PPP) mode whilethe government will assist privatepartners and state governmentsfor scrapping centres, he said.

Driving such vehicles that failto pass automated tests will

attract huge penalties and also beimpounded, the minister said.

This policy is going to be aboon for the automobile sector,making it one of the most prof-itable sectors which in turnwould generate huge employ-ment, the minister said.

The policy is touted as amajor step to boost the Indianautomobile sector, reeling underthe adverse impact of theCOVID-19 pandemic.

The minister said it wouldlead to a 30 per cent boost to theIndian automobile industryturnover to Rs 10 lakh crore inthe years to come from the pre-sent about Rs 4.5 lakh crore.

Gadkari said: “Automobileindustry turnover which is Rs 4.5lakh crore at present is likely toswell to Rs 10 lakh crore in yearsto come with India becoming anautomobile hub.” The exportcomponent of this which at pre-sent is Rs 1.45 lakh crore will goup to Rs 3 lakh crore, he said andadded that once the policy comesto practice availability of scrappedmaterial like steel, plastic, rubber,aluminium etc will be used inmanufacturing of automobileparts which in turn will reducetheir cost by 30-40 per cent.

He said the policy will givea boost to new technologieswith better mileage of vehiclesbesides promoting green fuel andelectricity and cut on India'shuge Rs 8 lakh crore crudeimport bill which is likely toincrease to about Rs 18 lakh

crore. “This policy will result inincrease in vehicle demand whichin turn would boost revenue.Also, ancillary industries wouldcome up in large numbers thriv-ing on junk vehicles,” the minis-ter said.

The minister said initiallyabout one crore polluting vehi-cles would go for scrapping.

Of this an estimated 51 lakhwill be light motor vehicles(LMVs) that are above 20 yearsof age and another 34 lakhLMVs that are above 15 years.

It would also cover 17 lakhmedium and heavy motor vehi-cles, which are above 15 years,and currently without valid fit-ness certificates, he said. It willgive a boost to ‘AatmanirbharBharat’ campaign, he added.

Listing the advantages ofscrapping, the Road Transportand Highways Ministry had ear-lier said that an old four-seatersedan will result in a loss of Rs 1.8lakh in five years while for aheavy vehicle it comes to Rs 8lakh for a period of three years.

“Structure and framework ofscrapping policy is under workand green tax has already beennotified. Many states have noti-fied in ineffective way ....Wewant to advise the state govern-ments through notification underMotor Vehicles Act to considerimposing green tax on older vehi-cles which cause more pollution,”Road Transport and HighwaysSecretary Giridhar Aramane hadsaid last month.

Presenting the Budget for2021-22 in Parliament, FinanceMinister Nirmala Sitharamanon February 1 had said thatdetails of the scheme will be sep-arately shared by the ministry.

Gadkari had said the policywill lead to new investments ofaround Rs 10,000 crore and cre-ate as many as 50,000 jobs.

These vehicles are estimatedto cause 10-12 times more pol-lution than the latest vehicles.

The government had earliersaid it plans to impose green taxon old polluting vehicles soon ina bid to protect the environmentand curb pollution while vehicleslike strong hybrids, electric vehi-cles and those running on alter-nate fuels like CNG, ethanol andLPG will be exempted. The rev-enue collected through the greentax will be utilised for tacklingpollution.

Under the scheme, transportvehicles older than eight yearscould be charged green tax at thetime of renewal of fitness certifi-cate at the rate of 10-25 per centof road tax, as per green tax pro-posal sent to states for consulta-tions after cleared by the ministry.

Industry experts said thepolicy will provide a fillip to theIndian government’s efforts toposition India as a global auto-mobile manufacturing hub, aswell as benefit global automak-ers with manufacturing indus-tries in India, including Japanesegiants Suzuki, Toyota, Nissan,amongst others.

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Anew executive order fromPresident Joe Biden directs

federal agencies to take a seriesof steps to promote votingaccess, a move that comes ascongressional Democrats pressfor a sweeping voting and elec-tions Bill to counter efforts torestrict voting access.

His plan was beingannounced during a recordedaddress on the 56th commem-oration of “Bloody Sunday,” the1965 incident in which some600 civil rights activists wereviciously beaten by state troop-ers as they tried to march forvoting rights in Selma,Alabama.

“Every eligible voter shouldbe able to vote and have itcounted,” Biden says in hisprepared remarks to Sunday’sMartin and Coretta King UnityBreakfast. “If you have the bestideas, you have nothing to

hide. Let the people vote.”Biden’s order includes sev-

eral modest provisions. Itdirects federal agencies toexpand access to voter regis-tration and election informa-tion, calls on the heads of fed-eral agencies to come up withplans to give federal employeestime off to vote or volunteer asnonpartisan poll workers, andproscribes an overhaul of thegovernment’s Vote.gov website.

Democrats are attemptingto solidify support for HouseResolution 1, which touches onvirtually every aspect of theelectoral process. It wasapproved Wednesday on a nearparty-line vote, 220-210.

The voting rights Billincludes provisions to restrictpartisan gerrymandering ofcongressional districts, strikedown hurdles to voting andbring transparency to a murkycampaign finance system that

allows wealthy donors toanonymously bankroll politicalcauses.

Democrats say the Bill willhelp stifle voter suppressionattempts, while Republicans

have cast the bill as unwantedfederal interference in states’authority to conduct their own

elections. The Bill’s fate is farfrom certain in the closely divid-ed Senate. Conservative groupshave undertaken $5 millioncampaign to try persuade mod-erate Senate Democrats tooppose rule changes needed topass the measure.

With his executive order,Biden is looking to turn thespotlight on the issue and is

using the somber commemo-ration of Bloody Sunday tomake the case that much is atstake.

Bloody Sunday proved tobe a conscious-shocking turn-ing point in the civil rightsmovement that led to passageof the Voting Rights Act of1965. Similarly, Biden is hop-ing the Jan. 6 sacking of the U.S.

Capitol by a pro-DonaldTrump mob will prove to be aclarion call for Congress to takeaction to improve voter pro-tections.

“In 2020 — with our verydemocracy on the line — evenin the midst of a pandemic –more Americans voted thanever before,” Biden says in hisprepared remarks. “Yet insteadof celebrating this powerfuldemonstration of voting — wesaw an unprecedented insur-rection on our Capitol and abrutal attack on our democra-cy on January 6th. A never-before-seen effort to ignore,undermine and undo the willof the people.”

Biden’s remarks also paytribute to the late civil rightsgiants Rev. CT Vivian, Rev.Joseph Lowery and Rep. JohnLewis. All played critical rolesin the 1965 organising effortsin Selma and all died in with-in the past year.

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Pope Francis urged Iraq’sChristians on Sunday to

forgive the injustices commit-ted against them by Muslimextremists and to rebuild as hevisited the wrecked shells ofchurches and met ecstaticcrowds in the community’shistoric heartland, which wasnearly erased by the IslamicState group’s horrific reign.

Christian and Muslimleaders in Mosul have wel-comed Pope Francis’ visit to theIraqi city devastated by war andare calling on Christians whofled the Islamic State group’sonslaught to return.

At each stop in northernIraq, the remnants of itsChristian population turnedout, jubilant, ululating, deckedout in colourful dress, thoughheavy security preventedFrancis from plunging into thecrowd as he would normallydo. Nonetheless, they simplyseemed overjoyed that he hadcome and that they had notbeen forgotten.

It was a sign of the des-peration for support among anancient community uncertainwhether it can hold on. The tra-ditionally Christian towns dot-ting the Nineveh Plains of thenorth emptied out in 2014 asChristians — as well as manyMuslims — fled the IslamicState group’s onslaught.

Only a few have returnedto their homes since the defeatof ISIS in Iraq was declaredfour years ago, and the rest

remain scattered elsewhere inIraq or abroad. Bells rang outin the town of Qaraqosh as thepope arrived.

Speaking to a packedChurch of the ImmaculateConception, Francis said “for-giveness” is a key word forChristians.

“The road to a full recov-ery may still be long, but I askyou, please, not to grow dis-couraged. What is needed is theability to forgive, but also thecourage not to give up.” TheQaraqosh church has beenextensively renovated afterbeing vandalized by IS mili-

tants during their takeover ofthe town, making it a symbolof recovery efforts.

Iraq’s Christian popula-tion, which have exited heresince the time of Christ, hasdwindled from around 1.5 mil-lion before the 2003 US-ledinvasion that plunged thecountry into chaos to just a fewhundred thousand today.

Francis’s visit to Iraq, whichwas on its last day Sunday,aimed to encourage them tostay and help rebuild the coun-try and restore what he calledits “intricately designed carpet”of faith and ethnic groups.

Earlier Sunday, Francis, dressedin white, took to a red carpet-ed stage in the north’s maincity, Mosul, surrounded by thegrey hollowed-out shells offour churches nearly destroyedin the war to oust ISIS fightersfrom the city.

It was a scene that wouldhave been unimaginable yearsearlier. Mosul, Iraq’s secondlargest city, was at the heart ofthe IS so-called “caliphate” andwitnessed the worst of thegroup’s rule inflicted onMuslims, Christians and oth-ers, including beheadings andmass killings.

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Police in Myanmar’s ancientformer capital, Bagan,

opened fire on Sunday ondemonstrators protesting lastmonth’s military takeover,wounding several people,according to witness accountsand videos on social media.

At least five people werereported wounded as policesought to break up the Baganprotest, and photos showedone young man with bloodywounds on his chin and neck,believed to have been caused bya rubber bullet. Bullet casingscollected at the scene indicatedthat live rounds were also fired.

The city, located in the cen-tral Mandalay region, is aUNESCO World Heritage Sitein recognition of the morethan 2,000 pagodas or theirremnants still situated there,dating from the ninth to 13thcenturies, when it was the cap-ital of a kingdom that later

became known as Burma andis now Myanmar.

Bagan is best known forbeing one of the country’s toptourist attractions, but it hasalso been the scene of largeprotest marches against themilitary’s February 1 seizure ofpower. Large protests have

occurred daily across manycities and towns in Myanmar,and security forces haveresponded with greater use oflethal force and mass arrests. Atleast 18 protesters were shotand killed on February 28 and38 on Wednesday, according tothe UN Human Rights Office.

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Nepal’s Supreme Court onSunday quashed the uni-

fication of the erstwhileCommunist Party of Nepal(Unified Marxist–Leninist) ledby Prime Minister K SharmaOli and the Communist Partyof Nepal (Maoist Center) led byPushpa Kamal Dahal‘Prachanda’, in a huge blow tothe two warring leaders amidsta tussle for power.

The CPN-UML and CPN(Maoist Centre) merged inMay 2018 to form a unifiedNepal Communist Party fol-lowing victory of their alliancein the 2017 general elections.

On Sunday, an apex courtbench of justices Kumar Regmiand Bam Kumar Shresthaissued the verdict givingauthenticity of the NepalCommunist Party (NCP) toRishiram Kattel, who had reg-istered the party at the ElectionCommission (EC) in his nameprior to the formation of NepalCommunist Party (NCP) ledby Oli and Prachanda, TheKathmandu Post newspaperreported. Kattel had challengedthe Election Commission’sdecision to register NepalCommunist Party (NCP)

under Oli and Prachanda inMay 2018. The Bench saidthat a new party cannot be reg-istered with the ElectionCommission when it alreadyhas a party registered with asimilar name.

“The Supreme Court haspassed a verdict in our favour,”Kattel’s lawyer DandapaniPoudel was quoted as saying bythe paper. “We have won thecase.”

�� F��G

ABritish-Iranian woman heldin an Iranian prison for five

years on widely refuted spyingcharges ended her sentence onSunday, her lawyer said,although she faces a new trialand cannot yet return home.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffewas able to remove her anklebracelet for the first time sinceshe was released from prisonon furlough last March becauseof the surging coronavirus pan-demic, the lawyer said. She hasbeen under house arrest at herparent’s home in the capital ofTehran since. Iranian state-run media on Sunday that shehas been summoned to courtagain on March 13 over murkynew charges, including “spread-ing propaganda,” which werefirst announced last fall.

Her long-running case,playing out against the back-drop of a decades-old debtdispute between Britain andIran, has strained diplomaticties between the countries andsparked international outrage.

UK Foreign SecretaryDominic Raab on Sunday wel-comed the removal of Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s ankle tag but called forher to be allowed to return home.

“Iran’s continued treatmentof her is intolerable,” he said onTwitter.

“She must be allowed toreturn to the UK as soon aspossible to be reunited with herfamily.”

Zaghari-Ratcliffe, 42, wassentenced to five years in jailafter being convicted of plottingto overthrow Iran’s govern-ment, a charge that she, hersupporters and rights groupsvigorously deny.

��

Aparticularly spectacularblast from Italy’s Mount

Etna volcano belched out atowering cloud of ash and lavastone Sunday onto Sicilian vil-lages, the latest in a series ofexplosions since mid-February.

Italy’s national geophysicsand volcanology institute INGVsaid the powerful explosion at 2a.m. was the 10th such big blastsince Feb. 16, when Europe’smost active volcano started giv-ing off an impressive demon-stration of nature’s fire power,coloring the night sky in shock-ing hues of orange and red.

Tehran: Iranian PresidentHassan Rouhani said Sundayhis country was prepared totake steps to live up to mea-sures in the 2015 nuclear dealwith world powers as soon asthe United States lifts eco-nomic sanctions on Iran.

In a meeting with IrishMinister of Foreign AffairsSimon Coveney, Rouhani said:“Iran is ready to immediatelytake compensatory measuresbased on the nuclear deal andfulfill its commitments justafter the U.S. Illegal sanctionsare lifted and it abandons itspolicy of threats and pressure.”

Rouhani criticised the

European signatories of thehistoric nuclear deal for whathe said was their inaction ontheir commitments to theagreement. He said Iran is theonly country that kept its sideof the bargain. AP

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The time has finally come foraudiences to hear Meghan

and Harry describe the back-story and effects of their tumul-tuous split from royal life.

Sunday night’s airing of atwo-hour special hosted byOprah Winfrey will provide thefirst, and unprecedented, peekinto the couple’s departurefrom royal duties and thestrains it has placed on them.

How it’s received is likely todepend on which side of theAtlantic Ocean viewers are on.

The show, which includesWinfrey’s interviews withMeghan and Harry, will air firstin the United States — Meghan’shome country — at 8 p.M.Eastern. Hours earlier, Harry’sgrandmother, Queen ElizabethII, will deliver a royal address

before Commonwealth Day.British audiences will wake

up Monday to headlines andsocial media posts about

Winfrey’s special, but won’t beable to see the full interviewuntil Monday night when it airson ITV. Royal interviews that

aren’t tied to a specific topic arerare, and prior televised ses-sions have often proved prob-lematic. Prince Andrew’s 2019BBC interview about his linkswith convicted sex offenderJeffrey Epstein led to his owndeparture from royal dutiesafter he failed to show empa-thy for Epstein’s victims.

Harry and Meghan’s depar-ture from royal duties began inMarch 2020 over what theydescribed as the intrusionsand racist attitudes of theBritish media toward theduchess, who is biracial.

Clips released ahead of theairings suggest that at leastMeghan will have some point-ed criticisms of royal life. In oneshe describes the royal familyas “the firm,” a nickname thatis sometimes used affection-ately and sometimes critically.

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Kathmandu: Nepal’s reinstat-ed lower house of Parliamentheld its first meeting on Sundayduring which the lawmakersbelonging to the ruling NepalCommunist Party’s (NCP)splinter faction led by PushpaKamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ boy-cotted the session.

President Bidya DeviBhandari last week summonedthe session of the House ofRepresentatives in accordancewith the Supreme Court’s Feb24 ruling which annulledembattled Prime Minister KPSharma Oli’s “unconstitution-al” decision to dissolve it.PTI

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China said on Sunday it willnot change the course of

its close ties with Myanmar nomatter how the situationevolves in the country, rulingout joining the US in impos-ing sanctions against the mil-itary junta which overthrewthe civilian government in abloodless coup.

Myanmar’s military top-pled the government last monthand seized power for one year,detaining top political figures,including de facto leader AungSan Suu Kyi and President UWin Myint in the coup. Manypeople have reportedly diedafter the security personnelfired at protesters duringdemonstrations across thecountry against the coup.

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Swiss voters delivered theirverdict Sunday on a pro-

posal to ban face coverings,both the niqabs and burqasworn by a few Muslim womenin the country and the skimasks and bandannas used byprotesters. A projection afterpolls closed pointed to a veryclose result.

The measure would outlawcovering one’s face in publicplaces like restaurants, sportsstadiums, public transport orsimply walking in the street.

There would be exceptionsat religious sites and for secu-rity or health reasons, such asthe face masks people are wear-

ing now to protect againstCovid-19, as well as for tradi-tional Carnival celebrations.Authorities would have twoyears to draw up detailed leg-islation.

The Swiss governmentopposes the measure and saysthat people covering their faces

is a “marginal” issue. It arguesthe measure could harmtourism — most Muslimwomen who wear such veils inSwitzerland are visitors fromwell-heeled Persian Gulf states,who are often drawn to Swisslakeside cities. And it says thatit wouldn’t help the womenaffected.

It backs instead requiringpeople to show their faces ifrequested to do so by authori-ties. Supporters of the propos-al, which is coming to a votefive years after it was launchedand has come to be known col-loquially as the “burqa ban,”argue that the full-face cover-ings symbolise the repression ofwomen.

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��Widowed soon after marriage, a young woman

grapples with an inability to grieve, quirky relatives anda startling discovery about her late husband. StarringSanya Malhotra, Sayani Gupta and Ashutosh Rana, thefilm releases on March 26.

�� A crew of misfits investigates a series of supernatural

crimes in Victorian London for Dr Watson and hisshadowy associate, Sherlock Holmes. Starring MckellDavid, Thaddea Graham and Jojo Macari, Season 1releases on March 26 on Netflix.

�� From boardrooms to society’s margins, five ambitious

women from various walks of life navigate dreams, desiresand disappointments in modern Mumbai. Starring PoojaBhatt, Shahana Goswami and Amruta Subhash, Season 1releases on March 8 on Netflix.

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Kal aur aayenge nagmon kiKhilti kaliyan chun-ne waleMujhse behtar kehne waleTumse behtar sun-ne wale(Tomorrow there will be more poets

who write better verses than I do.There will be listeners who are moreattentive than you).

When Abdul Hayee, better knownby his pen name Sahir Ludhianvi, wrotethese lines for the film, Kabhi Kabhi in1976, he was drawing attention to theephemeral quality of fame and publicrecognition. But even in the centenaryyear of his birth (and 40 years after hisdeath), we cannot seem to have enoughof the impactful words and verses writ-ten by the poet.

And so, Team Raabta and one of itsmembers, Shamir, decided to stage WoAfsaana based on the life of the poet.

“His nazms and songs are everlastingbecause of the words that he has usedto convey the message. These remainwith you long after you hear them asthey are relevant,” says Shamir who hasdirected the play and also portrays thelead. He quotes the example of the songTu Hindu Banega, Na MusalmanBanega, which he wrote for the film,

Dhool ka Phool, and the song’s relevancein contemporary divisive times. Shamirpoints out that Sahir used words force-fully and these moved the listeners. “Infilms like Pyaasa and Kaagaz Ke Phool,the poetry took precedence over themusic because the director (Guru Dutt)wanted it to be the moving force. Thelyrics were inspired by his own person-

al life and intriguing personality,” he says.Wo Afsaana is being staged today, on

Sahir’s birth anniversary, which also hap-pens to be Women’s Day. Shamir pointsout, “It is appropriate given how closehe was to his mother, the kind ofimportance he gave to women and hisempathy towards them which is evidentin songs like Aurat Ne Janam DiyaMardon Ko.”

The play, which starts at his birth,delves into Sahir’s relationship withAmrita Pritam, the Hindi and Punjabinovelist, essayist and poet. It looks at howthe association moved forward andhow they expressed their feelingstowards each other by way of poetry.

To portray the role and direct theplay Shamir has relied a lot on MainSahir Hun, a book by Dr Salman Abid

and Chander Verma as the poet did notdwell upon himself or his feelings often.Jaishree, a senior theatre artiste who alsoworks with Doordarshan is playingAmrita. “The character of Amritaji didnot need any interpretation. She was anopen book and expressed herself in herautobiography, Rasidi Ticket, and otherbooks. Her personality was way aheadof its time,” says Shamir.

The relationship has been the sub-ject of books. A biopic too has beenannounced though it is yet to get off thefloor. Then there is the iconic play, EkMulaqat, where Shekhar Suman andDeepti Naval played the protagonists.“That is a legend but I haven’t seen it.In the past, when we staged it there weresome in the audience who had watchedboth so comparisons were inevitable. Butwe have attempted to use very simple ele-ments of theatre to present the eventsfrom our viewpoint. We have tried to beauthentic and remain true to what hasbeen documented. We have read andgone into depths of whatever is there inpublic domain,” says Shamir who stagedthe play at Satish Chander DhawanGovernment College, Ludhiana —where Sahir studied — in its centenni-al year.

However, that was then. In timeswhen a pandemic has changed our lifeincluding entertainment, how did theteam go about with rehearsals? “Since itis a play that we have already staged, wedid it over the phones. Physicalrehearsals took place only on two days,”says Shamir, who has been active in the-atre since college.

He points out that during lockdown,people did attempt to do projects onlinebut “the ambience and impact of live the-atre is completely different which does-n’t come through in a recording.” Eventhough theatres can now function withcapacity Team Raabta, which usuallystages literary performance, has decid-ed to maintain social distancing amongthe audience. It had performed DaraShikoh at the Rekhta festival in 2019.

(The play has two shows — 5.00 pmand 7.30 pm — at Akshara Theatre,Delhi.)

If you are neutral in situa-tions of injustice, you havechosen the side of the

oppressor. If an elephant has itsfoot on the tail of a mouse, andyou say that you are neutral, themouse will not appreciate yourneutrality,” once assertedDesmond Tutu.

A recent study onbystander behaviour aimed atunderstanding and providinginsights on bystander’sthoughts and experiences whenthey witness violence in pub-lic and private spaces and howthese inform their decisionsabout whether or not to inter-vene. It was conducted byBreakthrough India and hap-pened in two phases fromJuly-August and September-October 2020 with supportfrom Uber India and IKEAFoundation.

As part of the collabora-tion, Breakthrough launchedthe #IgnoreNoMore campaignto encourage bystander inter-ventions and support collectiveaction to end gender-basedviolence in public spaces. Thecampaign underscored howbystanders can become agentsof change rather than just merespectators. The partnershipfacilitated an idea to create anin depth research to under-stand behaviour of activebystander and also deterrents.

The study was conductedin states such as Jharkhand(Hazaribagh district), Bihar(Gaya district), Haryana(Jhajjar district), Delhi,Maharashtra (Mumbai),Telangana (Hyderabad) andKolkata, covering over 721respondents (digital survey)and 91 in depth interviews.Most participants, particular-ly women, identified violenceas a broad term, consisting of

physical, mental, verbal andsexual abuse. The study alsohighlighted how patriarchalpractices were culturallyembedded in society and itscorrelation between deterio-rating mental health, everydaymisogyny and patriarchy.

Commenting on the find-ings, Sohini Bhattacharya,President & CEO,Breakthrough said, “For us,promoting positive bystanderaction to address ViolenceAgainst Women (VAW) hasbeen a consistent focus area.Our intent in undertakingsuch campaigns is to move thegeneral public from identify-ing violence against womenand girls as a personal issue. Itrequires community action.”

The report revealed thatbuilding safer public spaces for

women requires work at sev-eral structural and systemiclevels. An important aspectamong them is bystander sup-port. The lack of positiveaction from bystanders is notjust because they do not care.The fear of being blamed forthe violence, of getting stuckin police and legal processesare some challenges that stoppeople. Not knowing what todo in such situations is anoth-er hurdle that bystanders oftenface.

Here are the key finding: �Around 54.6 per cent ofrespondents said that theyhave intervened in an incidentof violence against women ina public space.�Approximately 55.3 per centrespondents observed the dis-comfort of the woman/girl

facing violence. �Around 67.7 per centrespondents said that theirintervention resulted in theviolence stopping.

�Why do people intervene?The study found that the

urge to do the ‘right’ thingoften drives bystanders tointervene. A handful ofrespondents revealed that theywere victims of child sexualabuse and domestic violence.But they could not resist theirperpetrators at that time. Itwas this unresolved rage attheir own helplessness thatpushed them to intervene laterin their lives. The respon-dents also said that betterknowledge and awarenessabout gender issues alsohelped them intervene.

�How can people intervene? From an ‘active bystander

perspective, intervention strate-gies and methods are influ-enced by multiple factors suchas gender, age, socio-econom-ic standing, and gender rightsawareness. The survey respon-dents who have had inter-vened at some point in theirlives shared interesting meth-ods of interventions: �Swapping seats with the sur-vivors/victims: The importanceof quietly dealing with a situ-ation of gender violence isimportant, particularly fromthe perspective of the survivor. �Giving one’s mobile numberto connect later (particularlyinvolving cases of intimatepartner violence wherein thewoman might need time toreflect on her next step).�Taking the survivor for med-ical help. �Physically escorting someonehome when she is beingharassed.�Resorting to violence oremploying patriarchal scriptslike ‘don’t you have a motherand sister?’

�Social norms at play�Around 78.4 per cent respon-dents (female or others) saidthat they have experiencedviolence in public spaces (doesnot include public transport).�Another 68 per cent peoplesaid that they have experi-enced violence while taking apublic transport. �Approximately 70 per cent ofthe respondents said that theywould ideally like to help inscenarios of gender-based vio-lence by intervening/speakingout.

The respondents who havehad the experiences ofbystander intervention

expressed their exasperation atthe ‘silence’ of most victims ofabuse and sexual violence. Afew of them acknowledged thecritical role played by structur-al and social conditioning ininfluencing female behaviourand choices. They pointed outhow girls were taught fromchildhood to be submissiveand not challenge their sur-roundings, at least not overtly.The silence of the victims oftendiscourages bystander inter-vention in public spaces.

�Why do people hesitate tointervene? �Approximately 45.4 per centpeople said that they have notintervened in an incident ofviolence against women.�Around 38.5 per cent said thatthey did not intervene becausethey did not know what to do. �Almost 31 per cent of themsaid that they were worriedabout their own safety. �Around 11.5 per cent of themfeel that they would be draggedinto police/legal matters.

Bystander intervention is acritical tool for preventing vio-lence against women in publicand private spaces. The govern-ment should create and pro-mote initiatives to encourageindividual action and behaviourto stop violence againstwomen. Building accessiblereporting systems, dissemina-tion of reporting information,gender sensitisation for policepersonnel and ensuring safetyof the survivor and thebystander will promotebystander intervention. Inaddition, we need to bring insystemic and policy level shiftsfor prevention of violenceagainst women and girls andensure swift action against theperpetrators.

Actor Arshad Warsi recalled memories fromMarch last year, which witnessed the onset of

the COVID-19 pandemic in India. Arshad took tosocial media to remind netizens of the ‘last normalweek’ of their lives before the pandemic hit and thesubsequent lockdown across the nation from endof March.

Arshad Warsi tweeted, “A year ago this was ourlast normal week and nobody knew it.”

“Some day it’ll all be behind us...” added theactor.

Reacting to the actor’s tweet, netizens recount-ed their ordeal how they’ve suffered due to the pan-demic and lockdown.

“I would like to remain optimistic, but the pan-demic has grossly impacted my business which hadalready hit a low post demonetisation. Wish we toohad a generous and compassionate leader like JoeBiden to bail us out,” commented a user.

“Circuit bhai why are youreminding us of the lockdown, I

lost my job during the lock-down period and I remainextremely worried these days,”commented another useraddressing the actor by the

name of Circuit, his character inthe popular Munna Bhai fran-chise.

On the work front,Arshad recently wrapped

up shooting for hisforthcoming f i lmBachchan Pandeywhere he stars along-side Akshay Kumar.

The actor sharedthe news on Twitterjust a few days ago.He wrote,“Wrapped up#BachchanPandey.This film is going

to be very close tomy heart because Imet some of the most

talented and reallywonderful people.”

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Off lately, governments across the globe havecome to accept the fact that the absence of right

values is the cause of various ailments, including theon-going COVID-19 pandemic. Millions and bil-lions have been spent and are still being spent bycountries on re-establishment of values in our pre-sent-day degenerated society, but, as is evident fromthe result, success evades them all. The elderly peo-ple grumble and complain that the millennials havethrown values to the winds. Some allege that thewhole society has become corrupt; others say thatbecause of corruption, the government has becomealmost bankrupt. Newspapers are full of news aboutghastly crime. Religiousleaders say that religion isbeing defamed.

In fact, every individ-ual is an eye-witness to thedegeneration of moralsand all are crying for val-ues. But why are all effortsnot showing any tangibletransformation in even afew thousand people?That’s a million dollarquestion. If we ponderdeeply over the matter,we will find that there is no human being who doesnot adopt any values whatsoever. Everyone doesimbibe some values. However, the values differ fromman to man, depending upon his world-view or hisbelief system because every man has some beliefabout his own identity, about the society, about man’snature, about time and space, etc… Similaryeveryone has some views about religion, education,business, media, government, politics, etc. This net-work of beliefs gives him/her a world-view, differ-ent from the world-view of others. It is this world-view that determines a person’s outlook, attitudesand pattern of behaviour.

People across the world practice values taughtby religious preceptors or some public figure. Forexample, some people put into practice vedantic,buddhist, jewish, christian, muslim values, whilesome others try to imbibe Gandhian values or val-ues taught by some leader. Now, all the above men-tioned set of values were advocated by differentsouls, according to their world-view. However, thereis no universal code of conduct available for all peo-ple to follow. No one has, uptill now, given a com-prehensive, all-inclusive, totally rational andabsolutely correct world-view because such a viewcan be given only by one, for he (god) alone is per-fectly moral, truly knowledgeable, all-virtuous andthe parent of all souls, whichever religion, philos-ophy or world-view they may profess. He is ofimpeccable character, without any weakness, incom-parably just and fair, totally free from prejudice ofany sort, above any sectarian, regional, racial or nar-row view and without any consideration of bene-fit to himself. He has not even the least degree ofselfishness but is overwhelmed with love for all andthe will to be generous, kind, compassionate, co-operative, friendly and ever-helpful.

But what is essentially relevant in the presentcontext is that he has the knowledge of the present,the past and the future in its entirety and withoutany gaps. The knowledge which he has is not divid-ed into any departments or compartments but iswholesome. It does not have any inner contradic-tions. It is final and does not require any researchor future confirmation. It takes into account all reli-gions, culture, geophysical circumstances, humannature, etc. It is theoretical, practical and also expe-riential. It has distilled wisdom, without any impu-rities, fallacies and pseudo elements. It does not haveeven a grain of fake or artificial ingredients. So, theworld-view formed on the basis of that revealedknowledge or divine wisdom is the only one thatis capable of removing a person’s flaws of charac-ter. It is that knowledge which brings right type ofvalues and transformation in one’s life.

It is, therefore, essential that those who earnest-ly and sincerely feel that our society should be value-based should also make all efforts that they them-selves and all others should have the right world-view, for without it, cultivation and development ofright values will remain mere a wishful thinking oran unrealised dream.

Audio has never gone out of vogueas citizens today are able to learnon the move. With the utility of

audio going beyond radio services andentering into the digital realm, people areprovided new learning opportunities. Beit news, entertainment or educationalinformation, audio is converting anytimeinto learning time, considering thataccessibility has become ubiquitous andaffordable. Since radio, the subsequentadvancements in technology movedthe audience towards television and per-sonal computers for their everydayneeds. More importantly, educationand learning through the internet beganto take shape in the early 2000s, layingthe foundations for an EdTech industry.Due to the unexpected COVID-19 pan-demic, students, schools, training insti-tutions, and colleges now view learningoutcomes through a different lens.Within a span of a year, e-learning plat-forms have disrupted the ecosystem.

However, as a developing nation,there are several challenges that we needto cope with. For instance, all the majore-learning platforms require high qual-ity video streaming and internet connec-tivity so that users are able to avail theresources they have to offer.Unfortunately, several corners of Indiaare yet to see the infrastructure that canpresent high-bandwidth content for all.Beyond this, people across generationsare suffering from various health effects

on account of excessive screen times asschool lectures and live interactions areprimarily in the video format.

In fact, recent reports suggest thatthe current average screen time everyweek is around 6.9 hours, on account ofthe ample time available during the pan-demic. Indians access their internetmostly through their smartphones, andwithin a year, it has increased by 25 percent, from 4.9 hours to 6.9 hours fromApril 2020 onwards. Such trends do notindicate a healthy precedent, and audiocould prove to a suitable hands-free alter-native. Even for education, video creationand development are arduous process-es that require time and effort to achievequality. We often forget that a majorityof competitive exam aspirants hail fromtier III, IV cities, and rural areas that lackthe resources to afford video-based ser-vices. Withprice constraints and limit-ed access to the latest technologies, thechances of aspirants who wish to crackexaminations is hindered. On the brightside, the gap is now being addressed byaudio services, through podcasts, audiolectures, and bite-sized audio clips oncourse concepts due to easy productionprocesses and low costs.

�Diversity in course offerings andexam prep

In the last couple of years, we haveseen the proliferation of several EdTechapps, delivering different levels of edu-

cation across all age groups. Similarly,several audio-based learning apps areoffering multiple courses on their plat-forms, making it ideal for candidatespreparing for government exams to beon top in the highly competitive space.Be it courses like current affairs, staticGK, History or English. They are deliv-ered by subject matter experts in theaudio format, which helps in sequenc-ing audio content for exam preparation,and cracking government jobs.

Moreover, some of these apps alsohave versions that cater to feature phoneusers, which function on low bandwidthsand affordable data packs. It makes it eas-ier for users to download or stream con-tent while consuming far lesser data ascompared to video services. In fact,exclusive exam preparation content isavailable in vernacular languages likeHindi, Bengali, and others as well,reaching a wider audience beyond thebig cities. In addition to this, careercoaches and teachers realise the quali-ty, reach and potential of audio-basedlearning. The students are increasinglyexpressing a desire to learn from the best,and short audio content and clips fromexperts is the preferred format, and it isredefining their approach towards jobseeking.

�Effectiveness of audio-based learn-ing

The quality learning programmes

are often unaffordable even in the realmof digital. Here is where audio is play-ing a transformative role as it is bring-ing inexpensive services into the deepcorners of the country by merely util-ising existing infrastructure. In fact, sev-eral players in the podcasting andaudio-based educational space are serv-ing millions of students every day, mak-ing it an effective medium for consum-ing good quality exam preparationcontent.

The critics often question the effi-cacy of audio as a medium of learning.They argue that providing both text andaudio material for preparation couldoverwhelm aspirants. However, there isenough evidence from the scientificworld that points towards audio’s rolein improving the cognitive abilities oflisteners. The argument is that repeti-tive listening can lead to better reten-tion of concepts. Analytical reasoningtoo can be understood through audio,which is contrary to popular notionsthat audio’s role in imparting educationis inadequate for attaining reasoningabilities.

Going by examples from the realworld, we can understand how cus-tomer care services, doctors and medics,and musicians develop an ear forsound, structure, and form. Similarly,even in audio-based learning, itbecomes easier by replaying audio filesand practicing concepts by visualisation.

This trend is identifiable in India asmore and more users are consumingaudio content in their native languages,ensuring better retention.

�Reasons for audio’s resurgence andhow the future looks

One of the most impressive aspectsof audio that has only been rediscov-ered during the pandemic is the posi-tive effect of passive listening. Since thelockdown and COVID-19 restrictionswere imposed, a majority of citizensremained indoors, relying on all thetools at their disposal to bring their livesback to normal. Audio-streaming ser-vices and apps underwent astoundinggrowth, thanks to the increase in con-tent consumption by users while stay-ing home.

It further justifies the fact thatpeople feel comfortable carrying outtheir daily chores and listen passive-ly to educational content, thereby, sav-ing precious time. Further to this, itis enabling the conversion of non-study time into learning time, due tohands free devices that play audio filesthrough voice commands. Therefore,whether a person is preparing for gov-ernment jobs or upskilling to reachgreater heights in their career, audiowill continue to influence learning,and impact even the future genera-tions.

(The writer is the COO of Khabri.)

Chalhan is a nondescript ham-let located one and a half kilo-

meters from the main road inShalla Gram Panchayat of Goharblock of Mandi district in the hillystate of Himachal Pradesh.Agriculture is the main source oflivelihood for the residents of thisvillage who own five to sevenbighas of land on an average. Tilltwo years ago, the village did nothave a link road and was consid-ered a major development chal-lenge by its inhabitants.

Anybody who fell sick had tobe taken on a chair or charpoy(cot) by at least four men to themain road from where they couldbe taken to the nearest hospital.The farmers had to hire ponies forcarrying their produce to nearbymarkets. It became a tedioustask, especially during the mon-soon. The tough, hilly twistedtrails become muddy, slipperyand risky to commute. The gov-ernment’s commitment to worktowards connecting rural India,the long-standing demand of thevillagers for the link road finallymaterialised two years ago.

“The link road has trans-formed our lives,” saysPurnanand, a resident of the vil-lage. Now the pickup vans andambulances can easily come onthis road which is connected tothe state highway. “We are nowable to save money that we usedto pay for hiring ponies.Sometimes our vegetables wouldperish or we had to sell them atthrow away prices. Now we can

sell them at a much higher pricebecause of which our income hasgone up,” shares Purnanand.

This is the story of everyhousehold in 35 small and big vil-lages in Shalla Gram Panchayat.All these villages have been con-nected by link roads to their mainroad heads for transportation. Asingle household hamlet of Jeyogtoo was connected via a link roadone year ago.

Hetram recalls the day hismother fell sick. He had to waitfor a day to get help from men

from nearby villages to carry hismother to the main road fromwhere she was taken to the hos-pital. They carried her on a chairon the steep path on hilly terrain.It took them almost an hour tocover the small distance.Overwhelmed by the Panchayat’sconcern,

“It took almost five years toconnect every single village andhamlet in all the seven wards ofthis Gram Panchayat with roadheads,” informs Raj Kumar, thePanchayat Pradhan. The last vil-

lage that was connected by a linkroad was a few months ago inNovember 2020. Shalla GramPanchayat is indeed a remote areaof Mandi district tucked away ina difficult mountainous terrain.The process to get these link roadswas equally difficult.

“It wasn't easy at all - makingrounds of the concerned depart-ments for sanctions and clear-ances, pleading villagers to partwith their land for the sake of theconvenience of all others. One hasto apply every method from

cajoling to counselling to getconsent for using their land forthe benefit of the villages other-wise everyone in the village hasto struggle,” says Raj.

The roads have undoubted-ly changed the lives of the vil-lagers. Many farmers in these vil-lages are today earning a decentincome by growing cash cropslike peas and other vegetables.This wasn’t doable earlier becauseof the fear that their produce willperish before it could be trans-ported to the market. Anotherconstraint was the moneyrequired to be paid for the ponieswhich cost them a lot.

The construction of a 16-kilometer-long road has solvedconnectivity issues of a popula-tion of over 1,000 people in fivevillages. It has given a boost totourism as it connects them to afamous temple. This road has alsobeen metaled. With lakhs of peo-ple travelling here, opportunitiesfor employment have openedup. The Gram Panchayat has alsobeen able to increase its revenuefrom parking fees for the vehicles.

For Udham Singh, a residentof Village Chatti, it is a matter ofenvy as his village is located on theboundary of Shalla and TulnaGram Panchayat. A home guardwith agricultural land, Udhamhas been running from pillar topost to get a link road sanctionedfor his small village but has notbeen successful in his endeavorsso far.

“My village, with nearly half

a dozen families, is approximate-ly five kilometers from the near-est road head. Since my villagedoes not fall under Shalla GramPanchayat, they can’t constructthe road from their allottedfunds,” shares Udham Singh.

The challenges of this villageare also the same. The health andtransportation of agricultureproduce are the main concern ofthe villagers here as well.

Connecting villages to roadheads in this state, especially inextremely remote and hilly ter-rains is a tedious task. Gettingclearances, especially for the vil-lages that come under forestareas is not that easy, carving outroads through mountains is timeconsuming, costly and difficult.

According to the informa-tion available on the officialwebsite of The Public WorksDepartment (PWD) ofHimachal Pradesh government,6,948 out of its 17,449 villageswere not connected by road tillthe end of October 2020, whichmeans that nearly 40 per cent ofthe villages in the state were notconnected. Their challenges areendless. Monsoon and winterbecome even more difficult dueto the lack of connectivity. Seeinghow the lives of inhabitants ofShalla Gram Panchayat has beentransformed through these linkroads, villagers of other remoteregions are full of hope that soontheir prayers will see the light ofday.

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The Indian eves markedtheir international return

on a losing note as the hostswere crushed by the SouthAfrican team by eight wicketsin the first One-DayInternational at the BharatRatna Atal Bihari VajpayeeEkana International Stadium inLucknow on Sunday.

Chasing a modest target of178 runs, the opening pair ofvisitors — Lizelle Lee (83*) andLaura Wolvaardt (80) — put upa partnership of 169 runs butit was player-of-the-matchShabnim Ismail, who set it upfor South Africa claiming witha 3-wicket haul to push Indiaon the back foot.

Asked to bat, India got offto a disastrous start when theylost both the openers for 18runs in 5.4 overs. SmritiMandhana’s thick bottom edgewas brilliantly taken by wick-et-keeper Trisha Chetty. In thevery next over, JemimahRodrigues’ leading edge offAyabonga Khaka while tryingto play on the leg side went intothe hands of Lizelle Lee at gully.

Punam Raut and skipperMithali Raj tried to stay on thewicket and played sensiblybefore Shabnim Ismail, who is4th ranked in current ICCbowlers’ rankings, banged inone shot towards Raut (10),who mistimed the pull and wascaught comfortably at fine-legby Khaka.

Then arrived HarmanpreetKaur at the crease, who wasplaying her 100th match andstraightaway edged the first ballby Ismail, but dropped short ofthe diving slip fielder.

South African captain SuneLuus, a leg spinner, introducedherself in to the attack in the17th over, but both experiencedIndian players decided tocounter-attack and scored mag-nificent boundaries each toKlopp on the off side. Harmanthen scored back-to-backboundaries on de Klerk, fol-lowed by a delicate cut shot fora boundary off Mlaba. The duoadded 50 runs off just 58 ballswith the run-rate touching just

under four per over.Harman then pulled Mlaba

for another boundary to takepast India’s score to 101 in 25overs, before getting out toLuus. Harman wanted to hit asix straight over the bowler’shead but didn’t get the elevationand was holed out to Ismail atlong-off.

After that, Mithali andDeepti added 52 runs and theIndian skipper completed herhalf-century before hitting afull-toss to the point fielder.After Mitahli’s departure, theremaining batters could man-age only 23 runs. Ismail pickedthree prized wicket of PunamRaut, Mitahli Raj and Jhulan

Goswami. In reply, the visitorsachieved the target for the lossof two wickets in 40.1 overs.BRIEF SCORES:India: 177/9 in 50 overs (MithaliRaj 50, Harmanpreet Kaur 40,Deepti 27; Shabnim Ismail 3/28,Mlaba 2/41) SA: 178/2 in 40.1overs (Lizelle Lee 83*, Wolvaardt80; Jhulan Goswami 2/38).

�� 2��

Ravi Shastri was bothSunil Gavaskar and

Kapil Dev’s ‘go to man’with his all-round abilitiesduring the ‘80s and Indiahead coach firmly believesthat young WashingtonSundar could play a simi-lar role in the current Testteam.

The left-handed spe-cialist batsman, who alsobowls mean off-breaks,scored three half centuriesin his four Tests along withsix wickets which includesprized scalps of Steve Smithand Joe Root.

Do you see glimpses ofyou in him?

“I think Washy has farmore natural ability than Ihad,” said the veteran of 80Tests who had close to4000 runs and 150 pluswickets.

“He has the ability andhe belongs at this level andhe can go a long way. If hecould focus on his bowling(in Tests), India could havea very good number six foroverseas conditions.

“Someone who can getyou those 50s, 60s and 70sand then bowl for you 20overs and can pick up 2-3wickets. That was my roleoverseas (during whole of1980s) and I think he cando that role easily,” thehead coach said during avirtual press meet onSunday.

Washington shouldstart batting in the top fourfor Tamil Nadu across for-mats, suggested Shastri.

“Definitely, he shouldbe batting in the top fourfor his state. There is noquestion about that. Iwould like to have a wordwith Tamil Nadu selectorsor DK (captain DineshKarthik) for that matter. Ithink he should be battingin the top four,” Shastri said.

For Shastri, Sundar’sinnings of 96, coming in at153 for 6 was a bettereffort than his 85 not outin Chennai.

“Washington Sundar,this is unreal. Facing someof the toughest bowlers inthe world. I would say thisinnings was far better asthe WTC was on line,” hesaid.

�-�� 3��

Acentury opening stand by Martin Guptilland Devon Conway saw New Zealand

clinch their T20 series against Australia inWellington on Sunday after the tourists fal-tered in the face of an experimental spinattack.

Set a target of 143 for victory, GlennPhillips hit the winning runs with a six to sealNew Zealand’s victory by seven wickets andto take the series 3-2.

Guptill, who had been out of form goinginto the series, led with a masterful 71, includ-ing seven fours and four sixes, while Conwaycontributed 36 with the pair putting on 106for the first wicket.

New Zealand stumbled slightly whenKane Williamson went first ball but a Guptillsingle denied Riley Meredith the hat-trick.

Phillips, unbeaten on 34, guided NewZealand home with 27 balls to spare.

With the first four games in the series wonby the team batting first, New Zealand cap-tain Kane Williamson needed to be innova-tive when he lost the toss and was told to bowl.

He put his faith in spin with his slowbowlers sending down 12 overs, the most forNew Zealand in a T20 match, and they tookfour of the eight wickets.

�� 2��

World Champion P VSindhu finished a distant

second best in the Swiss Openfinal after being completelyrouted by Olympic Goldmedallist Carolina Marin ofSpain in a lop-sided women’ssingles title clash here onSunday.

The 25-year-old Indian,who had won the covetedWorld Championship Goldmedal here in 2019, couldn’tmatch the speed and accuracyof Marin during her 12-21, 5-21 defeat in the final that last-ed only 35 minutes.

It was Sindhu’s third suc-cessive loss to Marin, who hadwon both the Super 1000 events

in Thailand in January beforefinishing runners-up at theHSBC BWF World Tour Finals.

Playing her first final in 18months, Sindhu, ranked 7th in

the world, entered the matchwith a 5-8 head-to-head recordagainst Marin, having lost herlast two matches against the for-mer world No 1.

The world No 7 Indian,who didn’t drop a game in thelast four matches this week,however, failed to summonher ‘A’ game under pressure asMarin came up trumps toclaim her third title of theyear. She seemed completelyclueless against a rampagingMarin, who outclassed theIndian with her pace, powerand precision during the sum-mit clash.

Sindhu will next competeat the $850,000 All EnglandChampionships to be held fromMarch 17 to 21.

�- � 3��3��

Rangers’ first ScottishPremiership title for 10

years was confirmed Sundayafter Celtic’s drew 0-0 at DundeeUnited to stand 20 pointsbehind their Glasgow rivalswith six games left to play.

Steven Gerrard’s men havestormed to the title without los-ing a game to end Celtic’srecord-equalling nine consecu-tive Scottish league titles.

Rangers were not even inthe top-flight for four of thoseseasons after the club wasdemoted to the fourth tier fol-lowing liquidation in 2012 dueto financial troubles.

“This club has been to helland back over the past 10 years,”said Gerrard after Saturday’s 3-0 win over St Mirren putRangers on the brink of a firstmajor trophy since 2011.

“I’ve only been part of it forthree, but I can certainly relateand I’ve got that feeling and thataffection with the fans and Iknow what they have beenthrough.”

The former England andLiverpool captain never won aleague title during his legendary17-year career at Anfield.

However, Gerrard hastransformed Rangers’ fortunes,both domestically and inEurope, since taking his firstsenior managerial role in 2018.

The newly crownedScottish champions havereached the last 16 of theEuropa League for the second

consecutive season and faceSlavia Prague on Thursday.

Rangers were denied thechance to rub salt into Celticwounds by winning the title atCeltic Park in two weeks’ timein their next league fixture.

Celtic dropped points forthe 12th time in the league thisseason with caretaker managerJohn Kennedy taking charge forjust the second time since NeilLennon resigned last month.

The issues that have doggedCeltic all season cost them atTannadice as they dominatedbut failed to find the net with 27attempts on goal.

“Our objective was to get to10, but Rangers have been bet-ter than us this season,”Kennedy told Sky Sports. “We’vebeen champions for so long, butwe’ve not been good enoughthis season.”

Thousands of Rangers fans

ignored coronavirus restric-tions to descend upon Ibrox onSaturday to get the title celebra-tions going early.

“Once we got close orachieved our first big part ofsuccess together, which wasalways going to be the hardest,I had a good idea what the reac-tion would be like,” saidGerrard.

“I think what you’ve seentoday is 10 years of what thesesupporters have been through.I'm delighted for them andreally proud of the playersefforts because they’ve beenoutstanding this season.

“From a league point ofview, they’ve been close to per-fect.”

The Scottish Governmentcondemned the scenes outsidethe stadium on Saturday andpleaded with supporters not tocongregate again on Sunday.

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Indian women’s ODI vice-captain Harmanpreet Kaur

on Saturday said the team waslacking match practice andwill need time to get back intorhythm after being away fromInternational cricket for a yeardue to the Covid-19 pandem-ic.

“We didn’t get anyInternational cricket for a year.Apart from three IPL games wedidn’t get much time to workas a unit. As a team you needto spend time and get ready forany series,” Kaur said at thepost-match press conference.

“Nowadays everybody islooking for a big total, everygame we want to score more

than 250 but for that you needsome time and matches.

“In the past few years wehad built a rhythm but we willneed time to create thatrhythm and next game we willtry to do that as a unit,” addedKaur, who was playing her100th ODI.

The Indian team lastplayed on March 8 last yearwhen they lost to Australia inthe T20 World Cup final.

Additionally, they got onlytwo days of nets before theseries, making it tougher forthe players to be at their bestfrom the word go which wasvisible as India struggled withthe bat, managing 177 for ninein the designated 50 overs.

The 31-year-old conceded

that her side was guilty ofthrowing away their wicketsand lacked partnerships withboth bat and ball.

“When you are playingafter a long time there arechances were you can collapsebut they bowled well and wethrew our wickets. As a bowl-ing unit, there were no part-nership, you need partnershipwhether it is bowling or bat-ting,” she said.

“Today I felt our bowlingwas also not upto the mark,our spinners are good but itcan happen if you are playingafter a long time, sometimesthings cannot be in yourfavour. We had a bad daytoday, whatever we were doing,we couldn’t execute it.”

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Unseeded American teenager Zane Khan shattered thedouble crown dream of top seeded Saketh Myneni to winthe singles title at the UP Open World Tennis Tour ITFMen’s $15000 event at the Vaijyantkhand Mini Stadiumtennis here on Sunday.

In the final, the 19- year-old American came back from3-5 deficit in the first set to register a 7-6(3) ,6-3 win overformer Davis Cupper 33-year-old Saketh Myneni in 1 hourand 56 minute final.

In a match, which saw good baseline rallies and 10 acesthe Indian top seed raced to a 5-3 lead breaking the youngAmerican in the 8th game. But Saketh who was servingwell till then was broken almost immediately by Zane khanin the 9th game. Khan held on to the 10th game to levelscores 5-5.

In the tie-breaker, Khan took the tiebreak at 7-3 andwon the set. In the second set, Saketh looked little tiredand was broken in the 8th game of the set by Khan to goup 5-3. Khan held on to the 9th game to win the set andthe match and also his first career professional singles titleKhan 10 points and $2160. Principal Secretary (Transport)RK Singh gave away thr prizes.

�.��%��/�� &��C��$�Abhishek Mishra slammed a ton while Rajiv Anand

played an 88-run knock as Media XI defeated IndianDental Association by 61 runs in a league match of PPTikku Memorial Tournament at KGMU ground onSunday. Batting first, Media XI scored 221 for the loss offour wickets in 20 overs. In reply, IDA were bowled outfor 160 runs. Anish Oberoi took three wickets.

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