VOL. 10, ISSUE 97 | Thursday, 9 April 2015 | New Delhi | Pages 16 | Rs 3.00 N o H a l f T r u T H s

RNI NO.: DELENG/2005/15351REGD. NO.: DL(S)-01/3420/2015-17

millenniumpostmillenniumpost.in

Woman reporter molested, robbed on Mumbai train

MPost Bureau

MuMbai: A woman journalist was alleg-edly molested and robbed of her mobile phone by an unidentified man in the ladies’ compartment of a local train at Kalwa rail-way station in the wee hours of Wednes-day, police said. The incident occurred at around 1.30 am when the woman, work-ing as a reporter with a Hindi daily, was heading to her Dombivali home in neigh-bouring Thane district after winding up her work in Mumbai, railway police said.

She was travelling in the Karjat-bound suburban train when the robber, aged around 30, suddenly got into the ladies’ compartment at Kalwa railway station. As soon as the train started moving, he tried to overpower her in a bid to snatch her phone, police said.

When she resisted his move, the mis-creant tried to pull her out of the train fol-lowing which the woman surrendered her phone, worth around Rs 41,000, to prevent any untoward incident. After threatening the victim with dire consequences, the attacker jumped from the slow moving train on to the platform and fled, police said quoting the victim’s complaint. An FIR has been registered on charges of molestation, criminal intimidation and robbery and a manhunt has been launched to nab the culprit.

IPL-8: HoLders KKr off to fLyIng startDefending champs KKR script comprehensive 7-wicket victory over Mumbai Indian PG14

‘no adequate staff to enforce ngt order’Delhi govt and traffic police said they don’t have adequate staff to implement the ban PG4

two IndIans sHot dead durIng HeIst bId In usThe incidents send shockwaves among the local Indian expat population PG11

sujit Nath

New DelHi: Olympic boxing champion MC Mary Kom has won huge accolades for India, but it seems that the star athlete has failed to garner much fan follow-ing in the North-East, forcing the Centre to reconsider its decision of making her the brand ambas-sador for the North-East.

Mary’s chances of becom-ing the ambassador received a jolt, after civil societies ques-tioned her merit for the position in the midst of other eminent personalities in the region. They questioned that despite having several other renowned people in Assam, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Tripura and Sikkim, why Kom (from Mani-pur) is being pushed for the face of North-East.

According to sources, apart

from the issue of not inducting other well-known dignitaries, the inter-community, commu-nal and inter-ethnic issues are also a matter of concern for the government, which has proposed Mary’s name as the North-East brand ambassador. “There are voices coming against the govern-ment’s proposal to push for her name. At present, the government has decided to put the matter on hold,” sources said.

Concerned over the issue in the North-East, the area to which Prime Minister Narendra Modi has started giving special atten-tion in terms of development, the government is now planning to set up a committee, comprising representatives from all North-East states. “Let them unani-mously decide on who could be an ideal brand ambassador of the north-eastern states and we

will announce his or her name,” sources said.

The importance of having a brand ambassador was felt to promote North-East, which was neglected for years. As per recent statistics, the region offers Rs 2.4 trillion opportunity with 45 mil-lion people looking to consume goods and services. Not the least, there are plenty of opportunities across several sectors in manu-

facturing and services segments under both private and public-private partnership (PPP) mode.

“There are some minor issues and we are working on it,” sources in the Ministry of Development of North-Eastern Region said.

Mary is a five-time World Amateur Boxing champion and the only woman to have won a medal in each one of the six world championships.

N-E ‘cold vibes’ to Mary puts Centre in fix

In today’s paper

...

DhireNDra KuMar

New DelHi: Ceding turf to manufacturers, the govern-ment on Wednesday allowed a 3.84 per cent increase in drug prices. According to a ministry statement, the price of 509 essential drugs used for treating ailments such as diabetes, hepatitis and cancer have been increased to ensure the availability of life-saving medicines.

The National Pharma-ceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) has issued a notifi-cation regarding the price hike in line with the wholesale price index of 2014 under the Drug Price Control Order, 2013. The prices of all essential drugs would be revised from April 1.

“As confirmed by the eco-nomic adviser (Ministry of Commerce and Industries), the annual increase in the wholesale price index (WPI) works out at 3.84 per cent dur-ing calendar year 2014 over the corresponding period in 2013,” NPPA said in a notification.

The 509 medicines that

have become costlier, include Alpha Interferon injection used to treat hepatitis B and C as well as certain types of cancer, Carboplatin injection used for cancer treatment, Flu-conazole capsules indicated for fungal infections, among others.

One pack of Alpha Inter-feron injection will now cost Rs 838.80 against Rs 759.70, while Carboplatin injection of 450 mg/vial will cost Rs 2,677.42 instead of Rs 2,424.93. Also, the prices of anti-tetanus drugs have been increased by Rs 230 each pack as the new rate for anti-D immunoglobin (human injection) will now be available at Rs 2,439.89 against Rs 2,209.80. turn to Pg6

DhireNDra KuMar

New DelHi: In a bid to take farmers by his side ahead of the Parliament session, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday announced a huge compensation package for them. The controversial Land Acqui-sition Bill is slotted for rein-troduction in the Lok Sabha on April 21.

The Prime Minister said farmers would now be eligible for input subsidy if 33 per cent of their crop was damaged against 50 per cent or more, which was the norm till now. Further, the input subsidy given to distressed farmers would be enhanced by 50 per cent of the existing amounts.

This comes after Congress President Sonia Gandhi visited farmers who suffered crop dam-age due to unseasonal rain and wrote a letter to the Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, Ram Vilas Paswan, seeking relaxation in guidelines for the procurement of wheat. “I request the Centre to relax specifications, particularly

with regard to moisture content, for the procurement of wheat,” Sonia stated in the letter.

The Prime Minister also expressed concern over the prob-lems being faced by farmers due to abnormal weather conditions for the last one year. “Helping farmers in this time of distress is our responsibility, and there-fore, the Government had sent teams of Central Ministers to the affected areas to assess the extent of damage,” said Modi, while speaking at the launch of

Mudra (Micro Units Develop-ment and Refinance Agency) Bank unde r the Pradhan Man-tri Mudra Yojana.

Finance Minister Arun Jait-ley said about 30 crore landless people will get employment in industrial corridors, following amendments in the Land Acqui-sition Bill. “I want to make a special mention of poor, dalits, tribals, backwards, those who are landless. The Land Acqui-sition Bill that we are bringing as per that the industrial cor-

ridors, which would be set up in the country, those backward people – 300 million landless people –would get employment opportunities,” he said.

The Prime Minister said the Central and the state govern-ments, banks and insurance companies would do their best to provide relief to farmers. Banks have been asked to restructure loans of farmers hit by unsea-sonal rain and advised insur-ance companies to pro-actively settle claims.

Drug majors have their way, 509 medicines now dearer

Jobs & sops, also unanswered questions

cItyAAP govT To lAunch MohAllA SAbhA 3natIon heARIng AgAInST MAnMohAn DefeRReD 5edIt Poll MAnIfeSToS ARe MeRe PRoMISeS 8AncIenT InDIAn lITeRATuRe, envIRonMenT 9InternatIonaL100 SAveD fRoM buRnIng ThAI boAT 10busInessShell buyS uK’S bg gRouP 12sPortATleTIco bRuSh ASIDe SocIeDAD 2-0 15

Zaidi to be next CeCNew DelHi: Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi is set to become the next Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) of India later this month. The Law Ministry has initiated the file to appoint the next CEC as present incumbent H S Brahma retires on April 19. Highly-placed sources in the government on Wednesday said that the Law Minis-try has cited convention of appointing the senior-most EC as the CEC. Since PM Nar-endra Modi is leaving on a foreign tour on Thursday, there is sense of urgency to clear the paperwork on Wednesday as the file will travel to Rashtrapati Bhawan for the President to appoint the CEC. After Zai-di’s appointment, the government will set in motion the process to appoint two Elec-tion Commissioners to fill vacancies in the three-member body. “But as of now, we are appointing a new CEC. A decision on ECs will come later,” an official said. MPost Bureau

BJP, Congress bite the dust on Naveen turf

Against forcible acquisition, says MamataPM, FM gift-wrap Land Bill for farmers

MPost Bureau

bHubaNeswar: Putting paid to any hopes that the two national parties – the Congress and the BJP, may have had in making a return to the mainstream of Odi-sha politics, the ruling BJD on Wednesday swept elec-tion in eight urban local bodies. The elections for the three municipalities and five notified areas were held on Tuesday.

In all the eight civic bod-ies, BJD has been able to secure majority, state election commission sources said. The BJD has won absolute majority at Daspalla, Dhar-magarh, Balimela, Tusra, and Redhakhol Notified Area Councils (NAC) and three municipalities in Paradip, Belpahar and Sunabeda.

Opposition Congress and BJP secured 11 and 12 wards respectively out of total 129 wards spread over the eight urban local bodies. The BJD candidates won in 103 wards

while Independents bagged three. While Congress candi-dates failed to open account in three urban bodies like Daspalla, Tusara and Raira-khole, no BJP candidate won in Dharmagarh notified area council, the sources said.

“I express my gratitude to the people in eight ULBs and thank BJD workers and lead-ers for the victory,” said BJD President and Chief Minis-ter Naveen Patnaik. OPCC President Prasad Harichan-dan thanked the voters in all the eight civic bodies and accepted defeat. “We

are identifying the weakness in the party,” he said, add-ing that the party targets the next panchayat polls in 2017.

BJP state President K V Singhdeo, however, blamed the party’s failure on the money power of BJD. “I have never seen any party using choppers during campaign-ing in urban polls. The BJD has done this,” Singhdeo said. After declaration of the elec-tion results, BJD workers were seen distributing sweets and smearing colour on each other besides congratulating the winning candidates.

NaNDiNi Guha

KolKaTa: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, seen as a champion of farmers due to her long agitation for farmer rights in Nandigram and Singur in the state, returned to the streets on Wednes-day with a protest march against the Narendra Modi government’s con-troversial land ordinance.

The lower house of the Parlia-ment has already passed the Right to Fair Compensation and Trans-parency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Amendment) Bill, 2015, with nine amendments. However, it could not be passed in the Rajya Sabha where Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is in minority.

Mamata led her party MPs and MLAs in a march from Moulali to the Gandhi statue on Mayo Road in Kolkata to protest against the Bill which according to her will aid forcible land acquisition.

“We were the first to take up the issue of land acquisition. We have always said we are against forceful land acquisition. We will never bow down before any pressure. We are

consistent in our land policy,” she said on the controversial ordinance that has seen a united opposition aggressively taking on the BJP gov-ernment at the Centre.

Banerjee’s party came to power in 2011 riding a wave of popular-ity she gained because of the anti-land acquisition movements she led.

“The Trinamool Congress took shape because of its struggle against land grabbing. A farmer’s identity depends on his land. After his land is taken away, compensation doesn’t matter. How can we compromise on this ever?” party MP Sisir Adhikari told Millennium Post.

Interestingly, several parties

have decided to protest the Cen-tre’s land ordinance. The Congress has planned a huge rally at Delhi’s Ramlila Maidan, with Rahul Gan-dhi as the main speaker. RJD chief Lalu Prasad has promised a “Mahab-harat-like battle” against the ordi-nance. Anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare too has joined the land bill protests.

TMC sources said that the party will fight oppose the Bill tooth and nail within and outside the state. Bengal is also getting into election mode on April 18, when the civic polls for Kolkata will be fought between the Trinamool, BJP, CPM and Congress.

whilE pM Modi aNd fM jaitlEy go oN CharM offENsivE to woo farMErs, MaMata stEps up laNd battlE iN wEst bENgal

shahenshah honoured

pnIfTy 8,714.40 (+54.10) pSenSeX 28,707.75 (+191.16) pDoW JoneS 17,916.89 (+41.47) pnASDAQ 4,949.72 (+39.49) pRuPee/DollAR 62.24 (+0.02) pRuPee/euRo 67.38 (+0.15)qgolD/10gM 27,150.00 (-80.00) <SIlveR/K 38,000.00 (00.00)

president pranab Mukherjee presents padma vibhushan to amitabh bachchan at the rashtrapati bhavan on wednesday PtI

pM Narendra Modi with union Minister for finance arun jaitley at the launch of the pradhan Mantri Mudra (Micro units development and refinance agency) yojana, in New delhi, on wednesday PtI

Mamata banerjee at a protest rally against the land acquisition bill in Kolkata PtI

braNd aMbassador

DruG olD rate New ratealpha Interferon injection `759.70 `838.80

Carboplatin injection of 450 mg/vial

`2,424.93 `2,677.42

anti-D immunoglobin (human injection)

`2,209.80 `2,439.89

amphotericin B Injection (50 mg/vial)

`4,245.32 `4687.35

anti-tetanus human immunoglobin inj `832.16 `918.80

Condom `6.56 `8.35amoxicillin (250mg) `2.76 `3.04

CiviC polls

Published & printed by Durbar Ganguly on behalf of Front Row Media Pvt. Ltd. from E-137, Okhla Industrial Estate, Phase-III, New Delhi-110 020 & printed at The Indian Express Ltd., A-8, Sector-7, Noida-201 301 (U.P.) RNI NO.: DELENG/2005/15351, REGD. NO.: DL(S)-01/3420/2015-17 Editor: Durbar Ganguly, Executive Editor: Arya Rudra. Tel. No. 011-49211400, Email: durbarganguly@gmail.com, Lucknow Office: 401, Chintels House 16, Station Road, Lucknow Ph: 0522-4013126

Although every possible care and caution has been taken to avoid errors or omissions, this publication is being sold on the condition and understanding that information given in this publication is merely for reference and must not be taken as having authority of or binding in any way on the writers, editors, publishers, and printers and sellers who do not owe any responsibility for any damage or loss to any person, a purchaser of this publication or not for the result of any action taken on the basis of this work. All disputes are subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of competent court and forums in Delhi/New Delhi only.

New Delhi|thursDAy, 9 April 2015 |millennium post 2 |

Around Town

A R Rahman and Kailash Kher during a music launch naveen sharma

TAlKing music

mp

Our COrrespOndent

Meghalaya - On The Paths of Prosper-ity, a book authored by Bibek Debroy, will be launched at the India Habitat Centre on April 10 by the Chief Minister of Meghalaya, Mukul Sangma.  Glimpse of the Indigenous Terra Madre 2015 will also be shown during the ocassion. Celebrating slow food, the festival is coming to India for the first time, being held only for the second time in the world. 

The book talks about the dynamic growth journey of Meghalaya has just begun and this rapidly evolving environment has to be cap-tured with a holistic perspective. This perspec-tive is not just about facts, figures and numbers or rationalised data to represent information but is a window into the lives and souls of its citizens, a window to peep into what the future holds for them, tomorrow.

The book is not just be a factual representa-tion of what, where, when, why and how but an author’s journey dwelling into the heart and the soul of Meghalaya. The book captures the aspi-

rations of the people of Meghalaya and provides an insight into hardworking and never-say-die spirit of its citizens. Interspersed with photo-graphs, maps, graphs, tables, etc. the book aims to present its readers with broad realities of the State. It also showcases the efforts already taken by the State to nurture entrepreneurship and to provide a sustained livelihood for one and all.

The author critically examines the role played by various stakeholders in their endeavours to realise the vision of Poverty Free Meghalaya by 2030. The book also examines vital factors like health, education, gender parity that are detri-mental to the overall governance setup of the State and are a major factor in the overall satis-faction of its citizens.

Over 100 dancers will take the Capital by storm to celebrate World Dance Day on April 29. Head over...

Our COrrespOndent

To commemorate World Dance Day, Sadhya once again brings the dance extravaganza No Bound-aries . Over 100 talented artistes

will take the stage at Kamani Auditorium on April 29 to celebrate the spirit of dance.Sadhya enters the fifth year of its devotion towards dance with this event. The artistes will create a visual treat of different dance styles from traditional to contemporary.

Along with Sadhya, different compa-nies and dancing gurus including Guru Saroja Vaidyanatha and Group, Guru Ran-jana Gauhar and group, Kalashram, The Danceworx, Big Dance Centre, Urshilla Dance Company, Aayam Dance Company and Banjara School of Dance will enthrall the audiences with their performances. The purpose of this event is to bring upcoming artistes and established gurus at one place.

Santosh Nair, Artistic Director, Sadhya said, “The event was initiated four years back and we have been celebrating it ever since. Earlier it was held in association with vari-ous cultural organisations of the government like Sangeet Natak Academy, Indian Council for Cultural Relations and National School of Drama. 

We expect equally renowned artistes to perform this year too and upscale both its presentation and reach. Through this event we aim to foster mutual respect, appreciation and a positive outlook towards this wonder-ful profession and art.”

Sadhya – A Unit of Performing Arts is one of the popular dance companies of India. It has established as the company

that provides a platform to upcoming talents and promote the passion of dance in young. Since its inception the company has taken up many challenges and has evolved as a con-temporary dance company that bridges the tradition and modern dance forms.  Sadhya which means excellence is not only expertise in contemporary but also has the prowess

in traditional, a perfect blend of traditional and contemporary. Stage productions, work-shops and collaborated projects too are its integral part.

celebrating the spiRiT of dAnce

When: April 29Where: Kamani AuditoriumTiming: 5 pm onwards

Meghalaya is a State in India’s North-East, and the name means “abode of

the clouds”. While books exist on Meghalaya’s culture, history, society and

tourist attractions, not much has been written about the State’s economy

and development. This is a book on Meghalaya’s economy, constrained as

the State is, by its physical location and connectivity problems.

This book is about Meghalaya’s governance and human development and about the role of the government, institutions and private enterprise in embarking on those paths to prosperity. It’s about the constraints, but it is also about means to overcome those. There are plenty of success stories in Meghalaya, not known as well as the obstacles. There are successes of individual enterprise in agriculture, horticulture, floriculture and animal husbandry and there are also successes in reinventing government schemes and improving delivery. These may not have been universally replicated, but the momentum and seeds of change are visible. This book is also an attempt to communicate that message of change. There are plenty of maps and photographs to make the book attractive and readable. The North-East is often ignored in mainstream India’s discourse. That is not acceptable. Apart from anything else, the North-East is an integral building block in India’s bridges towards neighbouring countries in the East. India cannot prosper if the North-East remains bypassed. Meghalaya is one of those Seven Sisters in the North-East. If this book succeeds in making more people aware of the whiffs of change in

Meghalaya, it will have served its purpose.

ISBN No. 978-81-929512-1-8

Published by

MEDIA SERVICES

meg

hal

aya

meghalayaOn the paths to prosperity

Bibek Debroy

Bib

ek

De

br

oy

Tribute to Meghalaya

Our COrrespOndent

Famous For his Vara-nasi and Rajasthan series, artist Yashwant Shirwadkar continues to free the Indian landscape from the European genre. Most frequent amongst Shirwadkar’s works titled Glimpses from Varanasi are scenes from the city of Vara-nasi in Uttar Pradesh, India. His current works revolves around recreating the typi-cal scene one witnesses on a Banaras Ghat, or the steps that lead down to the river. The show also provides a glimpse of Rajasthan at the same time. Oil on canvas is this artist’s favourite medium, although he has painted sev-

eral  watercolour  works as well. Sometimes a  palette knife instead of the regu-lar brushes serves as a tool in helping him to create his realistic landscapes. 

His paintings shows Vara-nasi in all of its glory. He paints people taking dips in the river or praying and meditating on its banks, the multitude of small temples almost falling off the cliff face and the narrow streets teeming with life and activ-ity. Shirwadkar manages to blend his colours so well in all his paintings, that we actu-ally see the radiance from a setting or rising sun lighting up the city and transform-ing it into a shimmering and almost breathing, beautiful creature.

Yashwant Shirwadkar is extensively traveled and has held 92 solo exhibitions of his work across the globe. His works are also regularly included in domestic and international auctions of Indian Art, breaking records at auction houses like Sothe-by’s and Christie’s.

glimpses from Varanasi

Where: Dhoomimal Art Center, Connaught placeWhen: On till April 25 Timings: 11 am till 7 pm

Our COrrespOndent

2 TO Tango 3 To Jive prom-ises to be theatre at its best! Directed by the actor, direc-tor and screenwriter Sau-rabh Shukla, the play tells the story of what hap-pens when the proverbial midlife crises knocks and then barges through the doors of Parminder Singh Sethi’s mundane existence. Caught between continu-ing with his monotonous life and the enticing prospect of turning things around; this play chronicles Parmind-er’s journey as it ebbs and flows with practical, comic, ambivalent, confusing and passionate tides. Each of us has a different way of deal-ing with a crisis. But how does Parminder, tangled in the web of mixed emotions and vexed choices, deal with

his midlife crisis? And what happens when three women enter the picture...complica-tions galore or does his life take another twist? For bet-ter or for worse! What’s guar-anteed is that these flaming personalities when thrown together in the cauldron of life turn up the heat – leaving

things more complex than ever, it takes — 2to Tango, 3 to Jive.

The cast of the play includes established film and television stars Achint Kaur, Sadiya Siddiqui, Pre-iti Mamgain and Saurabh Shukla himself. Shukla pro-fessional career began in

1984 with his entry into the-atre. He began serious the-atre in 1986 with lead roles in plays like A View From The Bridge (Arthur Miller), Look Back In Anger  (John Osborne), Ghashiram Kot-wal  (Vijay Tendulkar) and  Hayvadan (Girish Karnad).

Shukla has written five full length plays and 11 short plays. His play Uljhan based on Vijay Dandetha’s short story by the same name was critically acclaimed. Till Now Shukla has featured in close to 75 feature films and 10 Television series. He has penned 6 tele-series and 14

feature films. Achint Kaur is an Indian television actress who comes from a Sikh and Punjabi background and is best known for playing the antagonist in operas. Besides working in some of the pop-ular drama series, she has also played many roles in Bollywood movies. She has also won numerous awards for her strong character driven roles. Sadiya Sid-diqui is an Indian film and television actress who won various awards in different categories. Preeti Mamgain is a renowned actress, appeared in various plays and movies like Barfi and Luck By Chance.

Treat to theatre lovers!

When: April 19 Where: Kamani Audito-rium, Copernicus MargTiming: 4 pm and 7 pmTickeTs price: rs 200

glimpses from the previous performances

Bibek debroy

Works on display

cast of the playA scene from the play

|3millennium post | new delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015

mp

City

Our COrrespOndent

NEW DELHI: Union Minister and BJP leader Kalraj Mishra met with a minor accident on Wednesday morn-ing, while returning from the Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport, when his car was hit by a cab from behind.

Mishra suffered minor bruises and returned home soon after the incident. “The incident took place around 9:30 am near Centaur hotel when a cab hit Mishra’s car. It was a minor accident and we have arrested the driver of the

offending vehicle,” said DCP (IGI) M I Haider.

Police have registered a case under Section 279 of IPC (Rash and negligent driving) and the driver of the cab iden-tified as Ashu Sharma, who is around 30 years old has been arrested.

In June last year, then Rural Devel-opment Minister Gopinath Munde had died of injuries in a road accident in the heart of the national Capital. Munde (64) was on his way to the airport when the SX4 he was travelling in was hit by a speeding Indica car at the Aurobindo Marg-Tughlak Road intersection.

BJP protestors force open toll booths on DND flyway

Cause severe congestions and chaos coupled with loss of revenue

siddheshwar shukla

NEW DELHI: The prepara-tions are on full swing for the first Mohalla Sabha on bud-get in Patpargunj Assembly constituency of East Delhi scheduled to be held on April 19, Sunday. According to sources, the direct consulta-tion on budget with the pub-lic through Mohalla Sabha will be launched in Sanjay Lake Park with slum dwell-ers of adjacent J J cluster - Jawahar Colony.

“The Mohalla Sabhas organised on April 19, will be like pilot Mohalla Sabhas and models for rest of the Mohalla Sabhas to be organ-ised in the city to get input of the people for the drafting of the budget,” said a senior officer of East district.

According to sources, the district administration is working in tandem with the volunteers of Aam Aadmi Party to identify the venue as per the requirement of

the meetings. Earlier, four Mohalla Sabhas were planned in Patpargunj but now the officers are focussing on three Mohalla Sabhas due to lack of proper venues in Chandra Vihar area. “As the first Mohalla Sabha will be launched by the Chief Minister, it is likely to wit-ness huge public gathering besides officers and media persons. We will need a larger space to accommodate them and Sanjay Lake Park seems to be a better place,” said another officer involved in the preparations.

The launch will be fol-lowed by two more Mohalla Sabhas in the Patpargunj Assembly segment repre-sented by Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia. The venues of the rest of the two Mohalla Sabhas will be Pocket-E, Mayur Vihar Phase-II and West Vinod Nagar. According to senior officers, the responsibility to supervise the first Mohalla

Sabha has been given to the District Magistrate of East Delhi. “A sector mag-istrate (tehsildar) level offi-cer will be in-charge of the Mohalla Sabhas held in his area. Besides, Sector District Magistrates and Additional District Magistrate will be coordinating the meetings,” added the officer.

“The Mohalla Sabhas will have the power to decide upon the use of Rs 50 lakh allocated to them through voting. Their demands and grievances will be forwarded to the concerned depart-ments for necessary action. The officers of all the con-cerned government agencies will be present in the Mohalla Sabha meetings,”he added.

The government has selected 12 Assembly seg-ments for the Mohalla Sabha meetings on budget. As each of the 12 Assembly segments have been divided into 40 Mohalla Sabhas, there will be 480 budget meetings.

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday said the Delhi Uber cab rape case was of far reaching conse-quences and it was going to lay down the law on whether or not witnesses could be recalled at the instance of the accused.

“We are going to lay down the law if witnesses can be recalled at the behest of an accused,” said the bench of Justice JS Khehar and Justice SA Bobde, as it directed that the record of the trial court proceed-ings be transferred to the apex court before the next date of hearing on April 22. The court told the coun-sel of accused cab driver Shiv Kumar Yadav to sub-mit the records that were in vernacular language to the office of Attorney Gen-eral Mukul Rohatgi within three days and they would be translated into English in a week’s time. The court said this during the hear-ing of two petitions — one by the rape victim and the other by Delhi Police chal-lenging the March 4, 2015 Delhi High Court order permitting the recall of 13 witnesses, including the vic-tim, for re-examination. The Apex Court on March 10

had stayed the high court order permitting the re-examination of the victim and other witnesses by the accused driver.

The SC had also stayed trial court proceedings in the case. The court also asked all parties to inform it about the judgments they were going to rely on in support of their pleas so that the bench can look into them in advance.

“Judgment that you wish to cite, if you give us we will come prepared,” the court told counsel Colin Gonsalves appearing for the victim, the Attorney General appearing for the state and the counsel for the accused. IANS

Uber case: SC to see if witnesses can be recalled

at accused’s instance

Kalraj Mishra suffers minor injuries in road mishap

Our COrrespOndent

NEW DELHI: Slamming Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for indulging in “pol-itics over death”, AAP on Wednesday threatened to take legal action against the party after it accused a Delhi minister of patronising the accused in Turkman Gate road rage incident.

AAP leader Kumar Vish-was hit out at the Delhi Police, which comes under the Centre, for alleged “inaction”. He claimed that police came to the spot very late. He alleged that BJP was resorting to politicising the issue as it was scared after the Assembly polls verdict.

BJP on Tuesday demanded action against state Environment minister Asim Ahmad Khan.

A man, Shahnawaz, was beaten to death in a road rage incident two days ago in front of his two minor

children by a group of men after his motorcycle grazed their car in central Delhi’s Turkman Gate on Sunday night.

“The Delhi Police is not under us. It comes under the Centre. We challenge the BJP to provide evidence if any AAP volunteer was involved in the incident,” Vishwas said at a press con-ference here.

Sanjay Singh, another AAP leader, said the party was contemplating taking legal against the BJP.

“The SMSes sent by the BJP to some journalists were objectionable and we are contemplating to take legal action against those involved,” Singh said.

AAP threatens legal action against BJP, hits out at police

GurGaoN: A section of the newly-built flyover on the Delhi-Jaipur-Mumbai highway here again sank a few feet on Wednesday, said an official. A police officer blamed it on poor quality construction.

The incident took place near Rampura. The contrac-tor enforced diversions on the highway, affecting move-ment of traffic.

“We have asked the con-tractor to put up proper signs on the damaged stretch to avoid any accident at night,” a traffic police offi-cer said.

An official of Pink City Expressway Pvt Ltd said that bitumen at two stretches of the flyover was damaged due to leakage of diesel from a vehicle.

“We have diverted traf-fic and put up signs to avoid accidents,” he said. “We will repair the stretch in a day or two.”

The flyover became func-tional nearly four months back.

A villager said it was the second time in two months that a section of the flyover had been damaged. A police officer who did not want to be identified blamed it on the low quality construction material. IANS

Flyover sinks in Gurgaon, traffic hit

NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court on Wednesday asked the Centre to inform it on the status of appoint-ment of the chief informa-tion commissioner and three information com-missioners, the posts lying vacant for nearly a year.

A division bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice RS Endlaw asked Additional Solicitor Gen-eral (ASG) Sanjay Jain to take instructions from the central government on the appointment of chief information commissioner and infor-mation commissioners and apprise the court on Thursday.

The court was hearing a PIL filed by Right to Infor-mation (RTI) activists R.K. Jain, Commodore (Retd.) Lokesh Batra, Subhash Chandra Agarwal.

The plea said under the Right to Information Act, 2005, the Central Information Commission (CIC) was created as a statutory body to decide appeals and complaints against public authorities for non-compliance with the act.

The proper function-ing of the CIC is essential for the proper implemen-tation of the RTI Act, the plea said, adding that the government has attempted to stifle the functioning of the RTI Act by failing to do its statutory duty — to appoint chief information commissioner and infor-mation commissioners at the CIC.

The post of chief infor-mation commissioner at CIC is lying vacant since August 23, 2014, and the posts of three informa-tion commissioners have also been lying vacant for almost a year, it said. PTI

HC asks Centre on appointment of information commissioners

AAP govt to launch Mohalla Sabha on April 19 from Sanjay Lake Park

Our COrrespOndent

NEW DELHI: Delhi Police have managed to arrest the prime accused, Ameen Pehal-wan, in connection to the murder of the 37-year-old man, who was beaten to death by five persons in front of his two children on Sunday night in Turkman Gate area.

According to police, Ameen Pehalwan has more than a dozen criminal cases registered against him. The cases include robbery, attempt to murder, rioting. In 1995, he was first arrested for an

attempt to murder, later he was held in 1999 and then in 2001. In 2010, after being released from jail, he started a construction business in the area. Earlier, the Delhi Police had arrested the other four accused in the case. The inci-dent took place on Sunday night when Shahnawaz was returning home with his two sons. Mid-way, he hit an i20 car, after which the argument turned violent. Shahnawaz was beaten to death and when he was rushed to LNJP hos-pital, he was declared dead.

On Wednesday, Delhi BJP

chief Satish Upadhyay met the family members of the deceased.

Meanwhile, the family members of the victim met CM Arvind Kejriwal at the Delhi Secretariat on Wednes-

day. The minister of Home Jitender Singh Tomar and minister of Environment Asim Ahmed Khan were also present. Kejriwal assured the family of all possible help on behalf of the government.

Prime accused arrested, Kejriwal assures help to deceased’s family

Don’t take action against tobacco sellers: HCNEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court on Wednesday sought response of city gov-ernment on a plea of man-ufacturers against ban on sale of chewable tobacco in the national Capital from March 30.

Justice Rajiv Shakdher issued notice to Food Safety Commissioner of the Delhi government while restrain-ing it from taking any action against sellers till the next date of hearing on May 20.

“Issue notice. The respondent should not take any coercive action the sell-

ers and the manufacturers till the next date of hearing,” the judge said. The court’s notice was issued on a plea

by a manufacturer Sugandhi Snuff King Pvt Ltd, which has sought quashing of the notification by the Arvind

Kejriwal government, ban-ning sale, purchase and stor-age of all forms of chewable tobacco including “gutkha, khaini and zarda” in Delhi.

Senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, assisted by Vivek Kohli, appearing for the manufac-turer, contended that the state government has no power to issue such a noti-fication under the Food Safety and Standards Act.

The counsel further stated that Sugandhi Snuff King Pvt Ltd was manufac-turing a pure tobacco prod-

uct governed by Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Prod-ucts (Prohibition of Adver-tisement and Regulation of Trade and Commerce, Pro-duction, Supply and Distri-bution) Act, 2003.

The manufacturer also said only the Centre has the power to regulate sale or ban and not the state gov-ernment. The manufacturer moved the high court after the Delhi government had on March 27 announced the ban on sale, purchase and storage of chewable tobacco in the city. PTI

anup Verma

NoIDa: Commuters, using the Delhi-Noida Direct (DND) flyway, had a free ride as the BJP workers freed the toll plaza on Wednesday. The BJP workers, who pro-tested at the plaza for four hours, forced open the toll booths on both sides of the carriageway.

The BJP agitation also paralysed traffic of the fly-way and commuters ply-ing between Noida and Delhi faced massive traffic jams and more than 10,000

vehicles plied during the free hours. With the high-speed road blocked, com-muters thronged on other roads joining both the cit-ies, resulting chaos across most parts.

Early in the morning, more than one thousand people reached the DND flyway and started protest-ing against the toll operators. The protesters sat at dharna near the toll booths. When the DND staff resisted their move, the protesters forcibly opened toll the barriers.

Led by BJP leaders Vimla

Batham and Nawab Singh Naagar, the party workers blocked both sides of the road. This continued for four hours. They pointed out that the Gurgaon express-way toll, which started after the DND toll, had been dis-continued, but the Noida toll still continues.

“We have given a notice to the district administra-tion, asking them to free the carriageway within 15 days. We will intensify our protest if our demand is not accepted,” said Batham.

Due to the protest, vehic-

ular movement on the car-riageway was paralysed between 9 am to 1 pm. Traf-fic was gridlocked between Ashram in New Delhi and Mahamaya flyover in Noida. Vehicles inched along the 7.5 km stretch as well as the 1.5 kilometres long Mayur Vihar link.

Within hours of protest, traffic volume increased on the Kalindi Kunj road and Jhundpura road. “It nor-mally takes me 45 minutes to reach Noida from Sarojini Nagar but today (Wednes-day) it took me nearly two

hours. All the bus routes were diverted because of the demonstration,” said Amit Kumar, an execu-tive working with a private company.

The DND official said that they have been “incur-ring heavy losses and have not been able to recover the cost”, hence, with due per-mission from the authori-ties, they would continue to levy the tax. “With the opening of the toll barriers, the toll company faced an estimated revenue loss of around Rs 6 to 8 lakhs.”

FACT SHEET the court’s notice was issued on a plea by manufacturer sugandhi snuff king pvt ltd

they have sought annulment of the notification by the arvind kejriwal government, banning sale, purchase and storage of all forms of chewable tobacco in the national Capital.

the advocate appearing for the manufacturer contended that the state government has no power to issue such a notification under the Food safety and standards act.

the manufacturer also said only the Centre has the power to regulate sale or ban and not the state government.

Agitators (pic left) ransack the toll barriers at DND flyway on Wednesday while there was unprecedented traffic jam (right) at the carriageway. PIC/MPoST

Kalraj Mishra

Arvind Kejriwal with the victim’s family

Kumar Vishwas hit out at Delhi Police, which comes under

the Centre, for alleged “inaction”

An official of Pink City Express-way Pvt Ltd said that bitumen at two stretches of the flyover was damaged due to leakage of diesel

from a vehicle

Court asked all parties to inform it about the judg-ments they were going to rely on

in support of their pleas so that the

bench can look into them in advance

4|

mpnew delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015 |millennium post

City

30-yr-old dead, 2 others injured after container explodesNoida: lack of basic working conditions and facili-ties resulted in the death of a 30-year-old man due to severe burns in Greater noida on wednesday. two people were also injured in the incident which occurred at around 12 in the noon in a fiber plant when the workers were pouring acid and the con-tainer exploded. rajesh patel, along with Jeev Chand (26) and Om Kumar (27), were immediately rushed to the hospital where patel was declared dead, while the other two have been admitted. “we are inves-tigating the case with malleable suspect, the victims family members will be contacted. action would be taken accordingly,” said a police official.

Man held in GurGaon for Bulandshahr MurderGurGaoN: a 35-year-old man who was allegedly involved in the killing of a man in Bulandshahr in ut-tar pradesh three years ago has been arrested here, police said on wednesday. rahul alias Cheeku was taken into custody by the Crime Branch from himgiri Chowk on pataudi road. he was involved in the killing of nahar singh of puthri village in Bulandshahr, a se-nior police officer said. rahul, along with raj Kumar, amit and Munender, gunned down nahar singh on March 11, 2012, apparently over a land dispute. a locally made pistol was recovered from rahul. the other three accused are in the custody of uttar pradesh police.

Bses puts up caMps across capital to address custoMer issuesNEW dELHi: in a step to strengthen its grievance redressal mechanism, power major Bses has lined up a series of camps across the national Capital to resolve pending cases and customer queries issues on the spot. Officials said that the camps, launched last month, would continue throughout april in several areas of south, west, east and Central delhi, manned by empowered team of officials. “these camps try and amicably resolve pending cases, if any, of accumulated arrears, metering, billing etc. in addition, these camps also try and resolve cus-tomer queries on multiple topics, including new con-nections, name change, duplicate bill, lpsC, etc,” a statement said.

Briefscity

SUNIL THAPLIYAL

New Delhi: The Delhi Chief Minister’s office asked Delhi police commissioner, vice-chairman of Delhi Development Author-ity, MCD commissioners (North, East and South), secretary of environment and forest department, chairperson NDMC, trans-port commissioner, director of Education to ensure that the pending cases of griev-ances in their respective departments within 7 days. The letters were written on Tuesday to these depart-ments by the CM office.

A total of 2,864 cases were received by the Pub-lic Grievances Management System (PGMS) between February 14, 2015 to April 6, 2015. Among them, the Delhi Police was at the top of the list, with 1252 regis-tered cases – 349 cases were

disposed off, while 194 were overdue and the rest of the cases were pending.

North MCD is the sec-ond on the list with 547 reg-istered cases, 252 disposed and 46 overdue, followed by DDA with 217 regis-tered cases, 9 disposed and 47 overdue. The East MCD

has 289 registered cases, 140 disposed and 13 overdue. The environment and for-est department has 27 regis-tered cases, 2 disposed and 7 overdue. The NDMC has 99 registered cases, 41 disposed and 12 overdue; Transport has 115 registered cases, 49 disposed and 8 overdue,

while the Education depart-ment has 318 registered cases, 142 disposed and 41 overdue cases till April 6 of this year. The Chief Minis-ter’s secretary, in his letter to the respective departments heads, asked them review the Public Grievances Man-agement System personally

to ensure that the pending/overdue grievances are dis-posed off qualitatively in a timely manner (7 days).

Meanwhile, the CM office praised the Delhi Jal Board for dealing with the grievance cases with effi-ciency. The CM’s secretary, in his letter to the CEO of Delhi Jal on Tuesday, wrote: “It has been found that the Delhi Jal Board has ensured that there is no overdue in Public Grievances Manage-ment System of the cases from February 14, 2015 to March, 2015. The efforts made by Delhi Jal Board are commendable.” He further added, “The feedback on the grievances received will start shortly through call centre services to know about the quality of disposal. In the meantime, Delhi Jal Board may by itself call upon the complaints to know about the quality of its disposal.”

New Delhi: A day after National Green Tribunal banned all diesel-run vehi-cles, which are more than 10 years old in the national Capital, both Delhi govern-ment and traffic police said that they don’t have ade-quate staff to enforce it.

Delhi government, cit-ing staff crunch, has written to traffic police to imple-ment the NGT order but the police said that it will be extremely difficult for them to implement this new order with its current resources and manpower.

According to a senior government official, the transport department has only 150 staff in enforce-ment section and in view of this, the department cannot implement NGT’s order on its own.

The department’s officials said that there are 1,18,776 private vehicles and 34,659 commercial vehicles which are more than 15-year-old.

“Six to seven teams are deployed at different parts of the city every day and night. We are already facing staff crunch as there are 600 posts

vacant lying for a long time. We cannot implement the green court’s order alone,” said a senior official request-ing anonymity.

The official said that keeping this in mind, “we have written to Delhi Traf-fic Police to launch a crack-down against vehicles which are more than 10 year old.

“Traffic police looks after the traffic management of the city. Transport depart-ment will also deploy teams at 11 entry points with lim-ited resources but traffic police should also be roped in to strongly implement this order,” the official said.

On the other hand, the traffic police said that implanting the green court’s order will be difficult for them with the current resources and manpower.

“We are still struggling to implement last year’s order of ban on vehicles more than 15 years old. Now, imple-menting this new order of banning diesel vehi-cles which are more than 10 years old will be even tougher,” said a senior police official. PTI

ANUP VermA

New Delhi: The North and East Municipal Corpo-rations have criticised the Delhi government for mis-leading people in the name of releasing funds to the corporations.

The cash-strapped cor-porations have said that the state government has not released any funds for paying salaries to safai kar-mis (sanitation workers) as against the announcement made by them on Tuesday. The corporation has alleged that the government has released is Rs 226.66 crore in the education head under non-plan schemes, which can only be used for edu-cation-related works.

The funds released form 25 per cent of the share and the first installment of the corporation’s funds under education head for 2015. “The Delhi government is trying to mislead the peo-ple, safai karamcharis and the media by announcing that it has released funds for paying salaries to safai karamcharis,” Chandolia said, adding that Arvind Kejriwal should stop lying and tell the truth.

The non-plan schemes can be used only for education-related works like paying salaries to teach-ers, maintenance of schools, etc.

The Delhi government, on Tuesday, had informed of the release of a grant

worth Rs 138.28 crore for salary purposes and Rs 11.82 crore for other non-plan heads, bringing the total to Rs 150.10 crore for the North MCD, while the EDMC has been given Rs 51.96 crore for dissension of salaries and Rs 36.42 crore for other non-plan heads. The total amount to EDMC is Rs 76.56 crore.

A letter written by the Delhi government to Urban Development Min-istry revealed that a total of Rs 150 crore was released for North MCD for the implementation of non-plan schemes. Around Rs 128.37 crore was released as grant-in-aid for primary education, Rs 5.75 crore for maintenance of school

buildings, Rs 11.01 crore as grant for maintenance of resettlement colonies and Rs 4.96 crore as grant for maintenance of capital assets.

The amount has also been allocated to the East agency under similar heads.

The corporation officials added that the Delhi gov-ernment is trying to gain undue credit for helping out civic bodies. The funds released under the educa-tion head is the right of the corporation.

Besides, the total funds to be released for education has also been reduced by the Delhi government from Rs 620 crore in 2014-15 to Rs 513.49 crore in the out-lay Budget for 2015-16.

New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Wednesday asked the government to suggest measures to regu-late the huge inflow of pesti-cide-laced vegetables, fruits and other edible items from neighbouring states to the national Capital.

A bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw said the peti-tioner and the government should suggest steps on how to regulate the inflow of pesticide-laced fruits and vegetables grown in neigh-bouring states into Delhi.

“Is it possible to regu-late the huge influx of pesti-cides laced vegetables, fruits and other edible items from neighboring states to Delhi.

Can you suggest any mea-sures how the court could pass directions to check such items,” the bench asked the petitioner and the government.

The bench sought the suggestions after one of the petitioners said there was no mechanism for con-stant monitoring of such items and there was a huge influx of such vegetables, fruits and other edible items grown in states like Uttara-khand, Himachal Pradesh and Haryana.

Earlier on February 11, a report was submitted by amicus curiae, appointed by the court, in the case which said that many countries have banned the import of

vegetables and fruits from India due to the excessive use of pesticides.

The report had said that in a number of vegetables and edible items, pesticide residue was found to be beyond permissible limits.

It had further said that despite an excessive use of pesticides in edibles sold across Delhi, little has been done to curb the menace. It also said the problem was not limited only to Delhi but a “pan-India” one.

The report had said that large quantity of vegeta-bles and fruits sold in the national Capital contained dangerous pesticides that could cause serious health problems. PTI

OUr COrreSPONdeNT

New Delhi: The Signature Bridge at Wazirabad con-ceived as a tourist destina-tion, will soon add to Delhi’s skyline. It is being built with a view to make it as a tour-ism hub and the landmark bridge of the city that is likely to ease traffic conditions for commuters.

Jitender Singh Tomar, minister for Tourism, Delhi and Ramesh Tiwari, MD and CEO of Delhi Tourism, along with other senior officials vis-

ited the bridge on Wednesday to review the pace of undergo-ing construction. The minister expressed his satisfaction on the progress and said: “The bridge has conceivable poten-tial to develop recreational facilities for encouraging tour-ists to visit the site.” The con-struction of the bridge and its approaches amounting to Rs 1131.00 crore was accorded to the government of Delhi during 2010. The project is being accomplished by Delhi Tourism and Transportation Development Corporation

(DTTDC) with Gammon India Ltd to execute the work of approaches, whereas the work of the main bridge over River Yamuna is a joint ven-

ture of M/s Gammon-Con-strutora Cidade-Tensacciai.

The proposed bridge will join NH-1 (Road No 45) on the Western side and Mar-

ginal Bund Road at Kha-juri Khas intersection on the Eastern side. To ensure signal free movement in the adjoining area, the three exist-ing intersections on NH-1 at Timarpur, Nehru Vihar and Wazirabad bridge have been integrated and a com-prehensive scheme has been evolved comprising loops, ramps and flyovers. The road from Wazirabad Bridge to ISBT is at the advance stages of completion and is likely to be opened for traffic in April 2015. The embankment

and cross drainage works for connecting the flyover with Signature Bridge is in prog-ress. The remaining activities of approaches are likely to be completed by June 2015. There is a proposal to develop a tourist destination, where they would be able to enjoy activities like water sports and boating along with an amphi-gallery and panoramic view-ing points along the bridge. The bridge can also be one of the ideal locations for film shootings. It is likely to be completed by March 2016.

OUr COrreSPONdeNT

New Delhi: Within 72 hours of its re-launch, the Anti-Corruption Helpline of Delhi government answered a total of 26,712 telephone calls till 5 pm on Wednesday evening.

So far the facilitators working with the helpline team have found 59 com-plaints of serious nature, which have been for-warded to the Anti-Cor-ruption Branch (ACB) for further probe and neces-sary action.

“The helpline team has so far referred 150 calls to the facilitators for further action and of these, 59 have been found to be fit for fur-ther probe by the ACB,” said in official release.

The re-launched

helpline is functioning on a 24x7 basis and it will remain open all 365 days of the year.

The Delhi Chief Min-ister’s office claimed that efforts are being made to ensure that no call made on 1031 helpline number remains unanswered.

The helpline staff-ers have been instructed to provide all possible encouragement to the callers for registering their complaints against corruption.

Even in cases where the complainant is unable to provide details of sus-pects, the call should be forwarded to facilitators so that they can get the details and ensure the sting oper-ation of officials seeking bribe from the public.

New Delhi: Delhi High Court on Wednesday lam-basted the East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) for “fooling” over 30,600 disabled, widowed and aged persons by not paying any pension to them since March 31, 2013 and asked it to cancel the scheme if they did not have money.

“Why do you make promises? Why do you make fools out of them? You are swindling them,” said a bench of justices B D Ahmed and Sanjeev Sachdeva as it asked the EDMC why it had promised to pay the pension if it cannot fulfill the promise. In response to EDMC’s claim that it was facing financial crisis

as it was getting the least amount of funds among the three MCDs, the court said “then say you do not have the money and cancel the scheme. You should have the guts to say that.”

The bench also said that the municipal body should cancel the scheme before the MCD elections and then see how the people react.

It also noted advocate Ashok Aggarwal’s submis-sion that most of these peo-ple looked forward to the pension which was their only source of income.

The court also said that it was not just the MCD, but every department “promise people the moon and then give them hell”. PTI

cM to Meet delhi farMersNEW dELHi: delhi Chief Minister arvind Kejriwal will meet farmers of the national Capital in the wake of unseasonal rains, which have damaged the standing crops in north india. Besides, Kejriwal is likely to lay out his government’s roadmap for the dwellers of the unauthorised colonies in the capital, government sources said. “the Chief Minister will address the sahyog rally in Mundka on saturday. he would listen to their problems especially of those whose crops have been damaged by rain,” he said. the rally will be held at Mundka in north west delhi where a size-able number of farmers live. “Kejriwal will also share with those living in unauthorised colonies his government’s plans for them,” an official said, adding that he will meet them and listen to their problems on sunday.

OUR CORRESPONDENT

Pending cases of grievances to be addressed within 7 days: AAP

Delhi govt, traffic police: No adequate staff

to enforce NGT order

Funds released under education head, not for salary pay-out: MCDs

‘Suggest measures to check pesticide-laced veg, fruits’

Delhi minister for tourism visits Signature Bridge at Wazirabad

59 complaint calls forwarded to ACB for further probe

Why make promises you can’t deliver: HC to EDMC

reMove illeGal Banners froM residences: hcNEW dELHi: the delhi high Court on wednes-day asked the civic bodies to immediately remove illegal hoardings and banners put up on residential buildings in the Capital in violation of the outdoor advertis-ing policy and the delhi prevention of deface-ment of property act. a division bench of Justice Bd ahmed and Justice sanjeev sachdeva is-sued notice to the city government, police, east, south and north delhi municipal corporations, the new delhi Municipal Council and the delhi Cantonment Board and asked them to file their responses on this. PTI

delhi govt, citing staff crunch, has written to traffic police to implement the NGT order but the police said that

it will be extremely difficult for them to implement this new order with its current resources and manpower

an artist’s impression

pGMs GrievancesaGency case reGistered disposed overdue

DDA 217 9 47

MCD (East, North, South 1347 521 138

Environment & Forest Deptt.

27 2 7

NDMC 99 41 12

Transport 115 49 8

Education Department 318 142 41

Delhi Police 1252 349 194

Total 2864 1104 447

|5millennium post | new delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015

mp

Nation

Our COrrespOndent

New Delhi: The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Wednesday has issued orders on revision of the items and norms, in respect of the cen-trally notified disasters like floods, cyclones, drought, hailstorm, tsunami, earth-quake etc.

The revised orders include various aspects of response and preparedness like ex-gratia to the next of kin of persons who may lose their precious lives, ex-gratia in cases of persons suffering

severe disability, gratuitous relief for families whose livelihoods may seriously be affected due to disasters, agricultural input subsidy to farmers, replacement of dif-ferent categories of animals, procurement of search, res-cue, evacuation and com-munication equipment, etc.

“The centre has permit-ted up to 10% of allocation under the State Disaster Relief Fund to be spent on equipment. A maximum of 5% of SDRF allocation can be spent on capacity build-ing,” MHA sources said.

Centre issues revised norms for disaster relief

IndIa regIsters record productIon of nuclear fuelNew Delhi: in a major milestone for the nuclear industry, india has registered a record production of over 1,252 Mt of uranium bundles, manufactur-ing close to double the annual fuel requirement of atomic reactors in the country. the production has also exceeded country's annual fuel require-ment of 650 Mt for the pressurised heavy water reactors (phwrs), which means the country has surplus nuclear fuel, for at least a few months. the hyderabad-based nuclear Fuel Complex, which produces fuel for nuclear reactors in the country, has produced over 30 per cent more fuel compared to its 961.023 Mt production in 2013-14.

govt to sc: set up separate bench to test companIes law New Delhi: Government on wednesday urged the supreme Court to constitute a larger bench for deciding on the constitutional validity of certain provisions of the Companies act, dealing with setting up of national Company law tribunal (nClt) and its appellate panel. attorney General Mukul rohatgi mentioned the matter before a bench headed by Chief Justice h l dattu and said, "by virtue of the pendency of the lis (dispute), the functioning of the Company law Board (ClB) and Board for industrial and Financial reconstruction (BiFr) is stuck up". "Give me a day's time," the Chief Justice said.

ed attaches rs 101 crore bank balance In speak asIa caseMuMbai: the enforcement directorate (ed) has attached over rs 101 crore worth of bank bal-ance in connection with its money laundering probe in the speak asia online marketing scam case. the central probe agency had registered a criminal case against the firm, its officials and few others in 2012 under the provisions of the prevention of Money laundering act (pMla). "the attached assets are bank balances in the accounts held by the firm and others. the agency considers them the proceeds of crime. the total amount under the latest attachment is about rs 101 crore," sources in the agency said.

News briefs

M pOst Bureau

New Delhi: The working of committees to check sexual harass-ment at workplace will be reviewed by the Centre in order to speed up the dis-posal of cases received by them. The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) has been issuing guidelines from time to time in the aftermath of a Supreme Court judge-ment in the Vishakha case to ensure that all depart-ments take prescribed steps for functioning of the complaint committees in their establishments.

It has been decided to convene a meeting with the chairpersons of the sexual harassment com-plaint committees set up in the ministries or depart-ments on April 16, a DoPT official said. The DoPT has earlier asked all the minis-tries to include informa-tion on the various cases filed and disposed in their annual reports.

M pOst Bureau

New Delhi: India's avia-tion safety ranking was on Wednesday upgraded to Category-I by US aviation watchdog Federal Aviation Authority (FAA), paving the way for the domestic airlines to expand in the US skies.

The restoration of status comes more than 14 month after it was downgraded to Category-II following failure of aviation regulator DGCA to meet the international safety norms.

Announcing the upgrade here on Wednesday, US Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said that India has worked hard to get back the status.

"I enjoyed a very produc-tive series of meetings with Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju on Wednes-day. I want to congratulate India on achieving Category-I status in their civil aviation system," Foxx told reporters after the meeting.

"This is a big news, because India has worked

very hard over the last one year to achieve that status," he said. US encourages India to continue sustaining that status, Foxx said.

The FAA had downgraded India's aviation safety rank-ing, bringing it below Paki-stan and on par with countries like Ghana, Barbados and Bangladesh in January last year after the Directorate General of Civil Aviation failed to meet the safety stan-dards set by the UN body International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO).

M pOst Bureau

New Delhi: The recording of defence evidence in a 2G scam-related money launder-ing case began on Wednes-day before a special court which recorded testimonies of two officials of accused firm Kalaignar TV (KTV). KTV's Vice President (opera-tions) Humayun Ali Ahamed and its Manager (Finance) K Uma Shankar appeared before the court to testify as defence witnesses and made their depositions on the func-tioning of the Chennai-based TV channel.

Ahamed told Special CBI Judge O P Saini that he was working with KTV since the inception of channel in July 2007 and was currently report-ing to P Amritham, a top offi-cial of the channel who is one of the accused in the case.

During his cross-exami-nation by ED's special pub-lic prosecutor N K Matta, Ahamed said he had no idea regarding the return of any funds by KTV to another accused firm Cineyug Films (P) Ltd. Another defence wit-ness, Shankar told the court that he knew about the Rs 200 crore transaction between KTV and Cineyug Films (P) Ltd .

M pOst Bureau

New Delhi: Senior IAS officer Nilam Sawhney has been appointed as secretary, Central Vigilance Commis-sion, replacing Alok Kumar who has been made Addi-tional Secretary in Niti Aayog.

Sawhney, a 1984 batch IAS officer, is presently serv-ing in her cadre-- Andhra Pradesh. She has been appointed in the rank and pay of Additional Secretary for a period of four years from the date of assump-tion of charge of the post, an order issued by Depart-ment of Personnel and

Training (DoPT) said. Sawh-ney replaces her batch-mate Alok Kumar who has been appointed as Additional Sec-retary, NITI Aayog for the balance period of his central deputation tenure i.e. upto December 13, 2016, it said.

New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) chair-person Jalaj Shrivastava has been appointed as Addi-tional Secretary in Depart-ment of Agriculture and Cooperation. Shrivastava, a 1984 batch IAS officer of union territories cadre, has been appointed for a period of four years from the date of assumption of charge of the post, it said.

New Delhi: Train passen-gers can now sleep soundly without worrying about miss-ing their station as the Railways has launched a new service which will ensure that they get a "wake-up call" on their mobile phones half-an-hour before the scheduled arrival at their destination.

Similarly, another feature - 'train destination alarm call' - has also been introduced through which passengers will get an alert call 30 min-utes before the train reaches their destination station.

The service, a joint initia-tive of the IRCTC and Bharat

BPO, is available through voice call on Railways enquiry num-ber 139.

"The user needs to enter the required data such as PNR number, station name, STD code of station while calling up 139 for getting the wake-up alarm," a senior Railway Ministry official said.

Wake-up alarm shall be

made to the passenger 30 min-utes before the train reaches the the station. Similarly, the train destination alert call shall also be available 30 minutes before train reaches the des-tination station, he added.

According to the official, after getting all the inputs like PNR and station name on 139, the system will check current

position of the train before sending the alert call.

'139', a crucial train enquiry service, has undergone trans-formative changes over the years providing round-the -clock services on real-time basis. One can find out the schedule of train arrival or departure, current position of train, fare inquiry through dialling 139. One can also book a meal on certain trains through 139, the official said.

139 customer service also provides information related to Tatkal seat availability, can-cellation, refund rules and platform position. Agencies

M pOst Bureau

New Delhi: All central government departments have been asked to do due diligence while processing Leave Travel Concession (LTC) claims of employees as part of fresh set of guide-lines issued by the Centre.

"As per LTC rules, a gov-ernment servant may travel only by vehicles operated by central or state government or local bodies or by any cor-poration in the public sec-tor owned or controlled by central or state government. Journey on LTC by taxi, auto-rickshaw etc, are per-missible only between places not connected by rail," the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) said in an order. The move comes after the DoPT received a large number of recom-mendations for relaxation of some or the other provi-sion of the LTC rules in indi-vidual cases.

It is seen that, in most cases the situation arises as due care had not been exer-cised by the government ser-

vant or the administrative authority in claiming LTC or in examination, the order issued to secretaries of all departments said. "In this connection it may please be noted that the primary responsibility for ensuring compliance with the rules is that of the government ser-vant. The of-repeated plea of ignorance of rules cannot be a valid ground for relaxation of rules. "At the same time it has also been noticed that the administrative authori-ties have also shown laxity and due diligence on their part could have prevented such situations from aris-ing," the DoPT said.

M pOst Bureau

New Delhi: A special court on Wednesday fixed July 15 for hearing a coal block allo-cation scam case in which the Supreme Court had on April 1 stayed the summons issued against former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, industri-alist Kumar Mangalam Birla and others.

Special CBI Judge Bharat Parashar, who had on March 11 summoned Singh and oth-ers as accused for on Wednes-day, deferred the hearing, observing that the operations of the order passed by him have been stayed by the apex court. "In terms of order dated April 1, 2015 of the Supreme Court, the operation of orders dated December 16, 2014 and March 11, 2015 have been stayed. Accordingly the mat-ter be now put up on July 15," the judge said.

The special court had on December 16, last year refused to accept the CBI's closure report filed in the case and had directed the agency to

further investigate the mat-ter and examine Manmo-han Singh and other PMO officials. The CBI had later filed its supplementary final report in the court, which had on March 11 summoned Singh, Birla, former Coal Sec-retary P C Parakh, Hindalco Industries Ltd and its two top officials Shubhendu Amitabh and D Bhattacharya in the case pertaining to allocation of Talabira-II coal block in Odisha in 2005.

On April 1, the apex court had stayed the trial court order summoning them as accused and the proceedings before it. "We issue notice on

all six petitions. The trial court order shall remain stayed," a bench of justices V Gopala Gowda and C Nagappan had said, adding the consequential proceedings "arising out" of the summoning order shall also remain stayed.

Singh's plea in apex court had contended that the trial court had exceeded its juris-diction by attributing crim-inality in administrative decisions of the Prime Minis-ter, who was also holding the Coal portfolio then.

It had said the trial court's decision to summon the for-mer Prime Minister was a "grave mistake both in law" and "understanding of evi-dence". The apex court had also issued notice to Cen-tre on a separate plea filed by Hindalco Industries Ltd challenging the constitutional validity of section 13 (1)(d)(iii) (public servant obtaining for any person any valuable thing or pecuniary advantage without any public interest) of the Prevention of Corrup-tion (PC) Act.

Court defers hearing in coal scam against Manmohan

On April 1, SC had stayed the trial court order summoning Singh, KM Birla as accused and the proceedings before it

New Delhi: Government plans to bring the amended Real Estate bill, which seeks to protect property buy-ers against unscrupulous real estate developers and agents, in Lok Sabha dur-ing the second half of the Budget session beginning April 20.

"It is a priority bill. Our intention is to bring the bill in the second half of the Budget session itself," sources in the Parliamen-tary Affairs Ministry said.

Immediately after the Union Cabinet approved amendments to the bill last

evening paving the way for regulation of realty busi-ness, Parliamentary Affairs Minister M Venkaiah Naidu had tweeted, "Happy that Cabinet approved amend-ments to Real Estate Bill on Wednesday. Now it will be taken up in forthcom-ing session of Parliament. Sources in the ministry said though there is a constraint of timing due to short period of the second part of the Budget session and pending legislative business, the "intention of the govern-ment is to pass this bill in Budget Session itself." Agencies

Aviation upgrade opens up Us skies to domestic players

ed grIlls koda In coalgate KolKata: the en-forcement directorate (ed) on wednesday interrogated former Jharkhand chief min-ister Madhu Koda in coal scam case. Koda was interrogated for more than four hours by ed officials, sources in it said. ed started the case against him under prevention of Money laundering act (pMla) for his alleged involve-ment in allotment of coal and iron-ore mines in Jharkhand when he was the chief minister in exchange of favours. Koda, who held office as chief minister from september 2006 till august 2008 was ar-rested by state police's vigilance wing on november 30, 2009 in connection with the scam. Agencies

'centre to review sexual harassment

committees'

centre relaxes quality norms for wheat procurement in 3 states

M pOst Bureau

New Delhi: In a major relief to wheat farmers affected by unseasonal rains and hailstorms, the Centre on Wednesday relaxed qual-ity norms for wheat procure-ment in Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan and would ease the norms in other states after testing the grain samples.

Unseasonal rains and hailstorms, being witnessed from February-end, have damaged rabi (winter-sown) crops in about 113 lakh hectares of area in about 14 states. Total cultivable area in rabi season stands at 600 lakh hectares and wheat is a major rabi crop.

Announcing this deci-

sion, Food Minister Ram Vilas Paswan said: "The cen-tral government is sensitive about the loss and dam-age to crops due to unsea-sonal rains and hailstorms in various states. Hence, has relaxed wheat procure-ment norms on the basis of requests received from states".

Earlier this week, Con-gress President Sonia Gan-dhi wrote to Paswan seeking relaxation in specifications

for procuring foodgrains.Paswan also said he has

"received letters from Con-gress President Sonia Gan-dhi and others demanding relaxation in moisture con-tent also". "As per norms prescribed under the Food Safety and Standards Act, we permit moisture content in the grain upto 14 per cent. Beyond this level, it is not fit for human consumption," he added. Paswan said the quality norms related to 'lus-tre lost grains' and 'shriv-elled and broken grains' have been relaxed in these three states where procurement has started, but the moisture content level in the grain has not been changed and kept at the permissible limit of up to 14 per cent.

Don't be lax, follow LTC rules: Govt to depts

now, passengers to get 'wake-up' call from Rlys

Real Estate Bill to be tabled in LS

Sawhney appointed new CVC secretary

2g PMLA case: 2 KTV officials depose as defence witness

dhirendra KuMar

New Delhi: With the objec-tive to control the prices of medical devices, the Centre is mulling to set up medical devices parks on the lines of Make in India campaign. Talking to reporters, Union Minister of Chemicals and Fertilisers Ananth Kumar said that even though there is a steep rise in the demand of medical instruments, the presence of indigenous medi-cal devices is negligible in the country.

“The report submitted by the task force constituted on promotion of domestic pro-duction of high end medical devices and pharmaceutical manufacturing equipment

has suggested setting up of medical devices parks. The ministry is committed to pro-vide best medical devices to patients and that too at afford-able rate,” the Union Minis-ter said.

Kumar also announced setting up of a first ever medi-cal devices park in Gujarat, which is known as the hub of pharma majors. “Talks are going on with Tamil Nadu

government to set up second medical devices park in Chen-galpattu,” the Union Minister said after releasing the task force report. Kumar further added that only 30 per cent of the country’s requirement of medical devices is being met through indigenous pro-duction, and that of low end category. “The government is taking several steps to boost the domestic production of

high end medical devices and pharmaceutical manu-facturing equipment. The NIPER, Ahmedabad will be the nodal institute for under-taking research and develop-ment in the area,” Kumar said, adding that the recommenda-tions made by the task force would be implemented in a time bound manner.

Replying to a question, the Union Minister said that need is being felt to have a sepa-rate department to handle the issues of facilitation and reg-ulation of high end medical devices and pharmaceutical manufacturing equipment, as their consumption is increas-ing very fast and there is need to make India self-dependent in the sector.

guj to have first medical devices park: Ananth Kumar

the move comes after the DoPt

received a large number of rec-ommendations

for relaxation of some or the other provision of the

ltC rules in individual cases

train destination alarm call - has also been introduced through which

passengers will get an alert call 30 minutes before the train reaches their

destination station

only 30% of india’s requirement of medical devices

is being met through indigenous production and that of low end category

food minister ram vilas paswan

manmohan singh

6|

mpnew delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015 |millennium post

Nation

Vyapam scam: ED attcahEs Rs 3-cRoRE assEts of main accusEDBhopal: the enforcement directorate (ed) has at-tached assets worth over rs 3 crore of an alleged mastermind of the ‘Vyapam’ scam in connection with its money laundering probe in the case. Official sources said 21 acres of land, four luxury cars and jewellery and cash worth rs 3.33 crore in the name of Jagdish sagar were attached by the indore office of the agency under the provisions of the pre-vention of Money laundering act few days ago.

sEna sEEks to moVE pRiVilEgE motion against shobha DEMuMBai: the shiv sena on wednesday objected to columnist shobha de’s tweet regarding Maharash-tra government’s decision to make it mandatory for multiplexes to screen Marathi films during the prime time slot, and sought to move a breach of privilege motion against her. sena legislator pratap sarnaik-said she had hurt the sentiments of the house, which had welcomed Culture Minister Vinod tawde’s an-nouncement that screening of Marathi films would be made mandatory during the prime time slot.

panDEmonium in bihaR housE oVER inDiRa awas funD REDuctionpatna: the Bihar assembly witnessed a pandemo-nium, following heated exchanges between ruling and opposition benches on the Centre’s cutting down of funds under indira awas yojna for the poor, on wednesday. rural development minister shrawan Kumar said the Centre had reduced allocation under indira awas yojna by 54 per cent in 2014-15 com-pared to 2013-14, hampering the programme of providing home to poor in the state.

44 DEaD in J&k flooD, says minJaMMu: a total of 44 people were killed and 25 injured in the recent landslides and flash floods in J&K, the state government said on wednesday. landslides, flash floods and avalanches triggered due to incessant rain caused severe loss to life and property, revenue Minister Javaid Mustafa Mir said.

mobilE JammERs in maha Jails MuMBai: Maharashtra CM devendra Fadnavis on wednesday said his government was considering to install mobile jamming towers in prisons across the state. he said despite installing mobile jammers in prisons, cases of phones being sneaked in for the use of prisoners are not decreasing.

news Briefs

Political parties, rights groups condemn incident, demand actionM Post Bureau

Chennai/TirupaTi: Protests continued in several parts of Tamil Nadu a day after 20 alleged red sander smugglers were killed in an encounter in Chitoor dis-trict of Andhra Pradesh on Tuesday. Many of those killed are said to be from Tamil Nadu. Several politi-cal parties and rights groups condemned the incident as a violation of human rights and are demanding action.

The Tamil Nadu gov-ernment announced a sola-tium of Rs 3 lakh each to the kin of labourers who were killed in police action. “The Tamil Nadu government has ordered a solatium of Rs 3 lakh to the families of each of those killed yester-day from the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund,” said an official statement.

A team of Tamil Nadu revenue and police officials have been sent to Tirupati in Andhra Pradesh to bring back the bodies of those killed. Meanwhile, Andhra Pradesh Revenue officials said they have made all arrangements to ensure that bodies are promptly handed over to the kin of those killed.

Hearse vans of the TN Health Department have also

been sent to AP to bring back the bodies, the government said. Bus services to and from Andhra Pradesh were sus-pended by both the Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh State transport corporations with a posse of police per-sonnel deployed at bus sta-tions, following stone-pelting incidents.

Protests continued across the state, with PMK chief Dr S Ramadoss alleging that “this (encounter) was pre-planned and there was enough evidence to prove this.” “Since the killings are pre-planned, it is not fair for AP to probe it. The probe should be done by a sitting Supreme Court judge,” he

said. The issue should also be taken to the notice of President Pranab Mukher-jee, PM Narendra Modi and the “victims’ kin should get justice,” he added.

Officials in Hyderabad said the combing operations continued on Wednesday in Seshachalam hill ranges of AP to nab “absconding woodcutters and smugglers”.

Police said 14 red sander smugglers in Chittoor have been nabbed since Tuesday night and 3.5 tonnes of pre-cious wood and five vehicles, all estimated to be worth Rs 1 crore have been seized from their possession.

Meanwhile fringe outfits like Naam Tamilar Katchi and others staged protests in front of Andhra Bank in Chennai and other estab-lishments, having AP link. Students of the Govern-ment Vellore Law College also staged protests on the Vellore-Chittoor Road.

Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi cadre blocked a train in Walajah Road railway junciton near Vellore and 50 men were detained by police. Scores of advocates staged protests in several towns, including Mayiladuthrai and Tirunelveli. Several TN leaders have also flayed the incident.

Continued from page 1Even the prices of con-

doms, which are also part of the list of essential medicines, have also gone up. After price revision, a single condom will now cost Rs 8.35 against Rs 6.56. Besides, antibiotics have become costlier. One capsule of Amoxicillin (250mg) will cost Rs 3.04 against the exist-ing Rs 2.76.

At present, the govern-ment caps prices of 348 essen-tial medicines based on the simple average of all medi-cines in a particular therapeu-tic segment with sales of more than 1 per cent. Besides, the government regulates prices of all other medicines and companies are allowed to hike the prices of such drugs by only up to 10% in a year.

agarTala: An FIR has been lodged against 17 health officials, including the present chief medical officer of Unakoti district, for the alleged misappropri-ation of the National Rural Health Mission outlay.

Official sources said in the course of departmental inquiry it was revealed that Rs 4.47 crore had allegedly been siphoned off from 2006 to 2014 by five CMOs and 10 medical officers in-charge (MOICs) in the undivided North district.

Sandeep N Mahatme, the Mission Director of National Health Mission (NHM) who carried out the departmen-tal probe into the alleged NRHM scam, has said Rs

4.47 crore of the national flagship programme was misappropriated by some health officials.

“In course of the probe, all CMOs and MOICs had been asked to submit papers showing utilisation of fund but they could not produce till the date prompting me to lodge FIR against 17 per-sons,” said Mahatme.

Chief Medical Officer of Unakoti district Alok Dewan was one of them.

Earlier, Congress MLA Birajit Sinha and party sup-porters had gheraoed the Dewan demanding imme-diate arrest of those who were involved in the mis-appropriation of NRHM funds. Agencies

Protests against AP encounter, TN offers relief to victims’ kin

FiR against 17 health officials in nRHM scam

Drug majors force govt hand, 509

medicines dearer

MalappuraM: A 49-year-old Keralite has been taken captive alleg-edly by a six member armed group at Sanaa in strife torn Yemen, according to infor-mation reaching the family.

Salman, from Malappuram, has been in Yemen with his wife and five children for the past seven years. His father Abdu Rehaman said Salman’s wife informed him that a rebel group carrying arms had stormed into their flat on March 24 and taken him and five others into custody.

The other captives have been released later, but there has been no information about Salman yet, he said. “We have sent e-mail complaints to CM Oommen Chandy and Exter-nal Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, seeking urgent steps to bring back our son,” he said. Agencies

Keralite being held captive by

suspected rebels in Yemen panaji: Fabindia offi-

cials, including its manag-ing director and the chief executive officer, will appear before the crime branch of Goa Police in “two to four days”, the company said on Wednesday.

“Over the coming two to four days, other members of the team who have been asked to attend the proceed-ings, including the CEO and the MD, will be meeting with the police authorities as per schedule,” Fabindia said.

The manager of the store in Goa’s Candolim vil-lage, where Union Minister Smriti Irani had alleged a CCTV camera was intru-sively placed near the trial room, will be questioned by the crime branch officials on the second successive day, it added.

“Fabindia has been in touch with the investigat-ing team at Goa in respect to

providing a direction for the appearance of all 15 officers, including the MD and CEO.” The company also said that the statements of three of the Fabindia officials had already been recorded by the inves-tigating authorities.

Four junior employees of Fabindia were arrested last Friday but granted bail a day later after the police could not conclusively prove that the employees had tweaked the CCTV’s angle at the trial room where the minister was trying out clothes. The store’s manager, however, secured anticipatory bail. Agencies

hyderabad: A spe-cial court, trying the multi-crore accounting fraud in erstwhile Satyam Computer Services Ltd (SCSL), will pronounce its judgement in the CBI-probed case on Thursday.

During the last hearing on March 9, Special Judge BVLN Chakravarthi had said, “On April 9, the judge-ment will be pronounced. I am making it very clear. April 9 will be the final date for the verdict. No question of further adjournments.

Court will not wait.” Touted as the country’s biggest accounting fraud, the scam had come to light on Janu-ary 7, 2009, after the firm’s founder and then Chairman B Ramalinga Raju allegedly confessed to manipulat-

ing his company’s account books and inflating profits over many years to the tune of crores of rupees.

Raju was arrested by AP Police Crime Investigation Department two days later after he allegedly confessed to the fraud, along with his brother Rama Raju and oth-ers. All 10 accused in the case are currently out on bail. Around 3,000 docu-ments were marked and 226 witnesses examined during the trial that began nearly six years ago. Agencies

hyderabad: Viquar Ahmed, one of the five undertrials gunned down by the police in Telangana on Tuesday, had expressed an apprehension that they might kill him, his lawyer said on Wednesday.

Viquar had filed a petition in the trial court six months ago, expressing his appre-hension that the police may kill him in a staged gunfight while bringing him from Warangal Central Jail to Hyderabad. “He had complained that policemen are trying to attack him while transporting him and oth-ers from Warangal,” said Abdul Azeem, who

was representing Viquar and two others.The defence counsel said Viquar’s father

had also submitted a petition to the Chief Justice of the high court and human rights commission, stating that Viquar was facing a threat to his life from the police.

On April 6, Viquar had requested the court to transfer him to a jail in Hyderabad. The court was to pronounce orders on it on April 7, the day when he and four oth-ers were killed. Meanwhile, the police have handed over the bodies of the slain men to their families. Agencies

paTna: Around 2,000 men were arrested in Bihar for impersonation during the constable recruitment exam, police said on Wednesday.

Officials said the num-ber of arrests made in the last three weeks are the high-est for one exam in the state so far. The men were held for impersonating candi-dates during checking of documents.

Last year, the state gov-ernment initiated the process for recruitment of 11,783 constables and written exams were held. Around 52,000 candidates were called for screening of documents at the Patliputra Sports Com-plex here.

A preliminary investiga-

tion found that the imper-sonators were hired by the aspirants for taking the phys-ical test. All those arrested were presented in court and sent to jail, said Anand Prakash, an official of the police recruitment board.

It was also found that 150 women were unfit for recruitment as they were pregnant, police said on Wednesday. The screening of documents for 16,600 women began last week.

“We had applied for the post last year in April-May

and it took nearly a year to invite us for screening of documents for a physi-cal test. In this period, sev-eral women aspirants were married and got pregnant, and that cost them their life time opportunity,” said Nir-mala Devi, who was declared unfit after being found to be pregnant.

In 2014, around 150 people were arrested for impersonation during the statewide written examina-tion for the recruitment of police constables. Agencies

twenty alleged red sander smugglers were killed in an encounter by the andhra pradesh police in chittoor district on tuesday

bus sERVicEs fRom anDhRa to tn hithyderaBad: Bus services from ap to tamil nadu have been hit following protests in the wake of gun-ning down of 20 people in a police operation in Chittoor. “since last night our buses are not operating to Chennai and other places of tamil nadu. apsrtC buses, plying from Chennai and other places to our state, have also not been operating,” ap road trans-port Corporation’s tirupati regional Manager G Ma-heshwara said. as many as 150 bus services, mostly from Chittoor have been stopped and discussions are on with tamil nadu police for restoring them, the apsrtC official said.

hyderabad: The Hyderabad High Court on Wednesday directed the Andhra Pradesh govern-ment to submit a report in two days on the killing of 20 woodcutters by police in an alleged gun battle.The court asked the gov-ernment and the Director General of Police to submit the report, giving details of Tuesday's incident in Chit-toor and also whether it fol-lowed the guidelines issued by the Supreme Court for the states to follow in case of such encounters.The high court, which is serving both the states of Andhra Pradesh and Telan-gana, gave the direction on a petition filed by a human rights activist, seeking a probe by the CBI into what he said was a fake encounter.Raghunath, the counsel for the petitioner, said the court asked the govern-ment to give details of the people who were killed. The petitioner alleged that the labourers were murdered by the police in cold blood. He said the police fired to kill the innocent labourers.

High court seeks report from Andhra

on deaths

2,000 held for impersonation during Bihar police exam

in 2014, around 150 people were arrested for impersonation during the statewide written examination for the

recruitment of police constables

Undertrial had feared murder by police: Lawyer

Fabindia bosses to be quizzed on April 10

luCknow: A relative of Home Minister Rajnath Singh was shot in a Vara-nasi village, police said on Wednesday.

The victim, Arvind Singh, a petrol pump owner, was returning home after dropping his wife at the airport when three motor-bike-borne men intercepted him at Makhsudanpatti in Phoolpur late Tuesday. They had a verbal duel with Singh, after which they shot at him and fled.

According to eyewit-nesses, one of the assailants sat in the car with Arvind Singh for a few minutes and then shot him a point-blank range. Agencies

Rajnath singh’s relative shot

dead in Varanasi

four junior employees of fabindia were arrested last friday but

granted bail a day later

dehradun: The Utta-rakhand government has sent an ‘internal report’ to the Centre on the fake IAS official case that rocked the hill state over the last week.

An official said the report was prepared by the state’s chief secretary, the man-agement of the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Administra-tive Academy and the district administration of Mussoorie.

The report, highly placed sources said, details the inci-dent in which a woman was caught residing in the high-security academy, that trains IAS probationers from all over the country, with a fake ID card and false credentials.

The woman, Ruby Chow-dhary, now under a five-day police remand, had alleged that Kerala cadre IAS and deputy director at the academy Saurabh Jain had facilitated her entry into the academy. She had also accused the senior IAS offi-cer of seeking a bribe of Rs 20 lakh to get her a job in the academy’s library.

Meanwhile, in a sting operation done by a TV channel, a guard of the academy Deo Singh has also spoken of the “proximity” between Chowdhary and Jain and said it was at the behest of the official in ques-tion, that a room was allot-ted to her. The Uttarakhand Police have constituted a special investigation team (SIT) to probe the case and take into account how the security lapses took place in the high-security area.

Chowdhary had also appeared in a group pho-tograph of IAS probation-ers with President Pranab Mukherjee, during his visit to the academy. Agencies

U’khand sends report to centre on fake woman iAs

Ruby chowdhary

Verdict in Satyam case today

west central Railways’ general manager Ramesh chandra, along with chief Engineer of the department Jogesh singh sondhi and other offi-cials, launched a booklet on the guidelines related to Elastic Rail clip (ERc)

b Ramalinga Raju

HRD not satisfied with DU VC reply new delhi: The HRD Ministry is believed to be dissatisfied with Delhi Uni-versity (DU) Vice-Chancellor Dinesh Singh’s reply to a showcause notice on the roll-out of the controversial FYUP programme.

While the VC has strongly defended his position on the Four year Undergraduate Pro-gramme, sources said the ministry has flagged the issue of the valid-ity of such courses, saying no "notification" was issued neither any "preparations" made for its implementation.

The FYUP was scrapped in June last year after the NDA government came to office

and following pressure from UGC that it be done away.

Indicating that the VC could be held guilty on this count, the sources also dis-missed his contention that the four year B.Tech programme does not require AICTE

approval as it was being offered by the university itself.

The ministry in particular is "peeved" over the fact that the varsity has repeat-edly ignored its directive to seek AICTE affiliation and undermined the pro-test of the students who are seeking the same, they said. Agencies

fyup showcausE

|7millennium post | new delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015

mp

Nation

Govt formulatinG new policy to increase international tourismNew Delhi: union tourism Ministry on wednesday held a meeting to formulate the “new national tourism policy, 2015 with the representatives of tourism departments of state governments and union territories in new delhi. addressing the repre-sentatives, the Minister of state for Culture (indepen-dent Charge), tourism (independent Charge) and Civil aviation, dr. Mahesh sharma said that the new tourism policy should become the instrument for sub-stantially increasing india’s share in global tourism beyond the current share of 0.64 percent.

petroleum minister DharmenDra praDhan leaves for mozambiqueNew Delhi: the Minister of state (independent Charge) for petroleum and natural Gas, dharmendra pradhan left for Mozambique on a three-day official visit to have bilateral meetings with his counterparts and other leaders. he will also interact with the cap-tains of oil and gas industry and associated sectors of Mozambique. “Mozambique is a resource rich friendly country in eastern africa with which india enjoys warm political and robust economic and trade relationship.

amit shah asks partymen to surrenDer lpG subsiDyNew Delhi: BJp president amit shah has asked his party’s Mps, Mlas and office bearers who are eco-nomically well off to surrender their subsidised lpG cylinders immediately. shah on wednesday wrote letters to them in this regard saying that subsidy amount saved on this way could be used for other welfare schemes.

News briefs

m post bureau

New Delhi: Minister of State for External Affairs VK Singh has landed himself in another controversy over his remarks dubbing newsmen as "presstitutes", evoking strong reaction on Wednesday from a media association and the Opposition which demanded that he be "dismissed".

Singh, who is currently in Djibouti to oversee evacuation of Indians from Yemen, had on Tuesday compared the res-cue operation from the war-torn country with his visit to the Pakistani mission recently, saying the evacuation was "less exciting". However, he later made snide remarks against a TV channel for playing up his comparison remarks.

"Friends what do you expect from presstitutes," he said in a tweet late Tuesday night adding that last time the TV anchor thought there was 'O' in place of 'E'.

His remarks elicited sharp reactions from political par-

ties as well as a media body.Congress' spokesperson

Abhishek Singhvi said this is an "extreme situation" which "shows the utter intolerance, the incapacity to hear dissent and criticism of oneself ".

According to former Union minister Manish Tewari, what Singh has said was "completely reprehensible" and needs to be condemned in strongest possible terms. "It's an assault on the freedom of the press," he said, demanding his dis-missal as minister.

Condemning the remarks, Broadcast Editors Association (BEA) said it was "lowering" the image of the government as Singh has been making comments, which are beyond the "normal behavioural decency".

General Secretary of BEA N K Singh said that he was surprised that a Union min-ister could use such words for a democratic institution of the country.

"Can there be a person in the Union Cabinet, who

can use such words for an institution? BEA not only condemns it but also expects that the Prime Minister puts a check on such ministers. This is not only damaging democ-racy but also hurting his own image," he said. .

"V K Singh is known for such things. We have seen in last three-four years how he makes comments, which are below normal behavioural decency. It is lowering the government's image.

Using such words for media does not denote a

healthy mindset," the BEA General Secretary said.

NCP general secre-tary Tariq Anwar dubbed Singh's remarks as "cheap" and said coming from a min-ister it deserves all the more condemnation.

JD(U) general secretary K C Tyagi said the statement by Singh is "shameful and shocking" and hoped he does not repeat such "derogatory" remarks in future.

This is the second time in less than fortnight that Singh has courted controversies for

his remarks.A major row had erupted

when Singh had attended Pakistan's National Day on March 23 at the High Com-mission here when several separatist leaders from Kash-mir too were present.

bJp Distances itself from rowNew Delhi: Bharatiya Janata party (BJp) on wednesday distanced itself from the contro-versial tweet of union minister VK singh, say-ing twitter is personal and not a party forum and the meaning of the tweet can best be ex-plained by the person concerned. "twitter is a personal platform and not a party platform and the meaning of the tweet can best be deciphered by the person concerned," BJp national spokesperson sambit patra said.

New Delhi: Essar Group promoter Ravi Ruia, who is facing trial in a case arising out of the probe into the 2G scam, was on Wednesday allowed to go abroad by a special court which gave liberty to the CBI to take steps to cancel his bail if he persists with filing pleas in "casual" manner.

"Having allowed the appli-cation (to travel abroad), I wish to add that accused is repeatedly filing such applica-tions in a casual and cavalier manner drafted in a language which is vague and uncertain and as such, unbecoming of the court proceedings," Spe-cial CBI Judge O P Saini said.

"If the accused persists with such behaviour in future, prosecution is at liberty to take steps seeking cancellation of his bail. I sincerely hope that the accused would not let the situation come to such a sorry pass at the fag end of the trial," the judge said. The court's observation came while deciding Ruia's plea seeking permission to travel to Rus-sia to attend a meeting with VTB Bank on April 13. In its order, the court observed that the applications filed by Ruia were "vague" and "meaning-less" but as he has to attend an urgent meeting in Russia and as the matter is not listed for hearing during the relevant dates, he is permitted to travel abroad from April 11 to 15.

m post bureau

New Delhi: Prime Minis-ter Narendra Modi will leave tomorrow on a nine-day tour of France, Germany and Can-ada with focus on inviting investments, particularly in infrastructure and defence sectors, besides cooperation in nuclear and a variety of other areas.

In the first leg of the tour, Modi will travel to France where economy, defence and energy will be high on the agenda of his talks with Presi-

dent Francois Hollande.He will also have two

back-to-back meetings with French business leaders, one focussing on cooperation in infrastructure and another on defence technology, Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar told reporters here while brief-ing on the visit.

The government here has given top priority to infra-structure development and French companies have lot of expertise in this area, he said.

Similarly, French com-panies have capabilities and

experience in the field of defence.

India is hoping that French companies will participate in the 'Make in India' pro-

gramme initiated by Modi.A highlight of the four-day

stay in France will be a boat ride by Modi and Hollande, which is being described as 'naav pe charcha' (discussions

on a boat). Earlier, Modi has earlier had 'chai pe charcha' (discussions over tea) with foreign leaders, including President Barack Obama dur-ing his visit here in January.

m post bureau

New Delhi: Hopeful of bringing the opposition on-board to get the much-debated land legislation passed, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on Wednesday said the government is not averse to more changes to the Bill.

"We are not averse to more amendments to the Land Bill provided they are good and substantial in nature. There is no restriction on fresh changes," Road Transport and Highways Minister Gad-kari told a news agency.

But at the same time, he cautioned that amendments aimed at delaying the mea-sure and scoring political points against the govern-ment would certainly not be considered.

"We accepted nine amend-ments to the bill after discus-sion in the Lok Sabha. We are obviously open to new changes," he said.

Asked about NDA gov-ernment's lack of numbers in the Rajya Sabha, Gadkari said that he is hopeful of get-ting support from the Upper House.

"I believe members will support the Bill in Rajya Sabha.

Let us hope positively. We are confident," he said.

Amendments to the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2014 have been approved by the Lok Sabha but could not be passed in the Rajya Sabha as the ruling NDA govern-ment is short of numbers in the Upper House.

However, pending the pas-sage of the amendment bill

by Parliament, the Ordinance was re-promulgated to ensure continuity in legislation.

Since the re-promulgated ordinance carries the nine amendments approved by the Lok Sabha and is different from the one issued earlier, a fresh bill will be moved in Lok Sabha again.

Opposition parties are against the Bill in its present form and have been opposing it both within and outside of Parliament.

VK Singh stokes controversy: Calls newsmen ‘presstitutes’

m post bureau

New Delhi: With the Government tightening norms of fundings to Non-Governmental Organisa-tions, security agencies alleged that nearly 200 for-eign donors were indulging in money laundering under the garb of donating money to some of the NGOs.

Economic wing of cen-tral security agencies has shared a list of 188 foreign donors to the Home and Finance ministries as well as relevant departments for keeping a check on their donations, official sources said. The list has been handed over to Enforce-ment Directorate (ED) and Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) for neces-sary action as deemed fit by the departments, they said.

Immediately after Nar-endra Modi government

took charge at the Centre, some of the NGOs which were allegedly indulging in stalling power and nuclear projects were issued notices to submit their returns of funding received from abroad.

The NGOs have decried the move of the government saying that it was indulging

in witch hunting and try-ing to throttle the opposi-tion to projects, that these groups perceived as threat to environment.

However, unfazed by the opposition voiced by the NGOs, the Government has been scrutinising the NGOs and licenses for collecting foreign funds of over 100 such groups, mostly belong-ing to Andhra Pradesh, were cancelled earlier this year.

India Inc has alleged that the NGOs indulging in malafide agenda against them by unnecessarily high-lighting unverified issues to halt industrial projects across the country.

The Home Ministry had issued notices to more than 31,000 NGOs for not filing mandatory annual returns on their foreign contribu-tion under Foreign Con-tribution Regulation Act (FCRA), the sources said.

New Delhi: Amid a row over increasing the size of pictorial warnings on tobacco products, India and other SAARC nations on Wednesday "reaffirmed" their commitments to ensure that such warnings cover 50 per cent or more of dis-play area as recommended by a WHO Framework Convention.

According to the "Delhi Declaration" on public health challenges adopted at the 5th meeting of health ministers of SAARC nations here on Wednesday, the countries have reaffirmed their com-mitments under the World Health Organisation (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). The reaffirmation of the commitment on tobacco control was one amongst a host of other agreements listed in the declaration. The WHO FCTC is the first inter-national treaty negotiated under the auspices of WHO. It was adopted by the World Health Assembly on May 21, 2003 and came into force on February 27, 2005. Agencies

New Delhi: Indian gov-ernment will soon decide on the "correct" time to notify a new law to replace the much- criticised collegium system of appointment of judges after considering various pros and cons, Law Minister D V Sadananda Gowda said on Wednesday.

A day after the Supreme Court refused to stay the implementation of the National Judicial Appoint-ments Commission Act (NJAC), he said government has so far not taken a decision on when to notify it.

"I will talk to my senior colleagues (in the Union Cab-inet) and the Attorney Gen-eral to discuss the pros and cons...the matter is under consideration. We will soon take a decision on whether to notify it or not," Gowda told a news agency. He said over the next few days, the gov-ernment will ascertain as to

what is the "correct time" to notify the new law which was signed into an Act by Indian President Pranab Mukherjee on December 31, 2014.

The Law Minister said the government would like to have a "united show" in running the new body to recommend appointment and transfer of Supreme Court and High Court judges with the judi-ciary as it will be headed by the Chief Justice of India (CJI). He said from nominating two eminent persons to the NJAC to ratifying the rules, the CJI has an important role. Agencies

KaNpur: Objecting to the large secu-rity cover provided to him, Indian Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar on Wednesday said only one security vehicle was enough for him as more number of cars cause inconvenience

to commuters.Parrikar, who attended a Bharatiya

Janata Party (BJP) programme at BNSD Shiksha Niketan here, told his security personnel to leave only one vehicle for him and take away the rest.

"I do not need so much of security, one security vehicle is enough for me. Anything more than that causes incon-venience to people," Parrikar later told reporters at a press conference.

At the programme, Parrikar also objected to a larger chair placed for him and smaller ones for others and insisted on sitting in smaller chair.

Meanwhile, claiming that there has been a decline in the number of infil-tration bids along the Indo-Pak border, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar on Wednesday said the country is giving a befitting reply to militants and this year around 30 insurgents have been killed in encounters.

“India has started giving a befitting reply to the Pakistani militants. One Indian soldier and a few police person-nel have been killed during infiltration bids by militants but in response our army killed 28 to 30 of them in encoun-ters,” he said. Agencies

Land Bill: gadkari says govt not averse to more amendments

Misusing NGOs: 188 foreign donors under scanner for laundering

court allows Ravi Ruia to go abroad

Business, technology high on PM’s agenda during 3-nation tourcontinue with German in kvs as per sc orDer: Germany to inDiaNew Delhi: ahead of prime Minister narendra Modi's visit to Berlin, Germany on wednesday asked india to continue with teaching of German language in Kendriya Vidyalayas as per an order of the supreme Court. German ambassador Michael steiner said the supreme Court has allowed teaching of German language in KVs from class Vi to Viii and government should implement the order.

Parrikar uneasy over large security coversAARc nations reaffirm commitments on tobacco warning

‘govt to take call soon on correct time to notify nJAc’

economic wing of central

security agencies has shared a list of 188 foreign donors to the

home, finance ministries as

well as relevant departments for keeping a check

on their donations, sources said

We are not averse to more amendments to the Land bill provided they are good and substantial in nature. there is no restriction on fresh changes. We accepted nine amendments to the bill after discussion in the Lok sabha. We are obviously open to new changes

nitin Gadkari

our Correspondent

New Delhi: In an attempt to empower themselves to take action independently against “big cases”, CBI has written a letter to the PMO claiming that such move is required for the speedy and smooth disposal of sensitive cases.

Presently, CBI, country’s premier probe agency looks after those cases which are being referred to them by the government or courts. Also, the fact is CBI can only take up a case based on FIRs registered in police station in India. In most of the cases, it was found that lack of teeth to CBI hampered sensitive cases because the time they take over such cases there are possibility of tampering with the evidences. Therefore to secure more investigate power, CBI has demanded that it should become the

nodal agency to investigative big financial frauds beside other big cases. The probe agency also demanded for an amendment in the Delhi Spe-cial Police Establishment Act. It draws its powers to inves-tigate cases from the Delhi Police Act. Sources said, the matter will soon be discussed with other cabinet ministers to take the final call.

Recently during a book launch, anti-corruption cru-sader Prashant Bhushan expressed concern over CBI being denied more power to investigate any case with-out any external pressure. CBI functions under Depart-ment of Personnel, Ministry of Personnel, Pension & Public Grievances, and it is the pre-mier probe agency in India. It is also the nodal police agency in India which coordinates inves-tigation on behalf of Interpol Member countries.

cBi writes to PMO for greater autonomy

Broadcast Editors Association, Opposition demand his dismissal

vk singh

nitin Gadkari

ravi ruia

sadananda Gowda

manohar parrikar

8 |

mpnew delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015 |millennium post

EditEDITORIAL

Rediscovering Mahatma Gandhi in today’s age

It’s been almost a month since British Foreign Secre-tary Philip Hammond vis-

ited India, a few days before Mahatma Gandhi’s statue was unveiled at Parliament Square in London in the presence of Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. Call it a coincidence, the visit was appropriately timed on March 12, the day 85 years ago when Gandhi launched his mass saty-agraha movement from Sabar-mati in Gujarat to the banks of the Dandi and broke the unjust salt law that, to a large extent, signalled the beginning of the end of the British Raj in India. It was at this point of time Gan-dhi drew worldwide sympathy in this (non-violent) battle for ‘right against might’.

One could argue that though mass civil disobedience move-ments - a term borrowed by Gan-dhi from Henry David Thoreau, a 19th-century American writer and used as ‘satyagraha’ in the Indian context - led by Gandhi to end the monopoly of the British Empire upon the Indians did not produce a constitutional change; it demonstrated that ordinary Indians had the power to drive events. In several parts of India, nationalists succeeded in weak-ening the imposed structures. Moreover, people began to defy - as well as challenge - these injustices.

In their book A Force More Powerful: A Century of Nonvi-olent Conflict, Peter Ackerman and Jack DuVall write, “While the campaign did not wreck the raj, it did succeed in shredding the legitimacy of British rule. For over a century the regime had represented itself as benign, standing for sound economy and gradual reform - and likely to bring home rule in the long run. As long as Indians went about their business and cooperated

with its laws and institutions, the British could maintain this facade. But civil disobedience shattered it”.

The greatest example of this was the Salt March that brought people from different classes and regions - wherever Gandhi made his presence and from fur-ther distance too - and forged a durable link among Indians, who put aside their personal inter-ests to promote national inter-est. Mahatma Gandhi became the embodiment of that national pur-pose for millions of Indians who non-violently fought for ‘truth force’ vis-a -vis ‘brute force’.

And here was Philip Ham-mond addressing the media on Britain’s growing relationship with India. “That statue will be a tribute to the inspiration Gan-dhi provided not only to India but to the people of the world,” Hammond said, while referring to the unveiling. “It is fitting that the man (Mahatma Gan-dhi) who founded the world’s largest democracy should look across the Square at the world’s oldest parliament (in Britain),” he added.

This would be a befitting

acknowledgement - rather than tribute - to a man who as an 18-year-old touched upon a land, which threw before him an entirely different world (19th cen-tury England). Never in his life, had he seen something so splen-did, so ornate and so polished that made the young Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi abandon his habitual modesty to pres-ent himself as an English gentle-man, what author Robert Payne in his book “The Life and Death of Mahatma Gandhi” called as an ‘infatuation’, which ultimately would pass. It cannot altogether be denied that the British recog-nised the good points in a rebel and it was worthy. As the English journalist, novelist and educator Edmund Candler recorded in 1922: “Gandhi’s honesty of pur-pose has been generally admitted by the Indian Government, by the Viceroy, as well as by the Secre-tary of State. The rage of a certain section of the British press with Mr. Montagu, when he admitted that Mahatma Gandhi was his friend, is understandable.”

In the 67 years - after Gandhi’s death - that separate us from him, humanity has witnessed breath-

taking achievements in science and technology and even the texture and rhythm of our lives have been altered. Some see it as a model of development; others perceive it as a race against time.

As India celebrates 100 years of Gandhi’s return from South Africa (1915-2015) and gears up for the centenary celebrations of the historic ‘Champaran Saty-agraha’ in 2017, the satyagrahi Gandhi seems to be little awed by the dynamism of the events that are to unfold. For the Gan-dhi, who returned in 1915 saw India as a whole and not in parts and fragmented, if not externally to the world, yet too demanding.

The culture wars occurring in multicultural societies - and India is an integral part - is just a microcosm of the global con-flict. No country today seems to have been left untouched by the phenomenon of violence. The world - because of frequent con-frontations and violent eruptions despite the rapid and globalised progress - has become one physi-cal unit, but not an integrated entity.

While rediscovering - and more so repackaging Mahatma Gandhi in this globalised era - it will be apt to realise that the spirit and legacy of Gandhi demand bold, courageous and connected initiatives, which reach the last man in society. The spiritual Gan-dhi has today become not only a national leader but a missionary of civilization. Or is it that the repackaging has transformed this mass leader into a facade, which only exists temporarily, but soon dissipates?

Also to the unimaginative - or the disbelievers - the Mahatma remains insincere or insignifi-cant. Can a remoulded Gandhi be a guiding force to the East and the West alike, as human civiliza-tion stands at a crossroad? IANS

Log on to write letters to the editor or send them to

letters.mp@gmail.com You can also send your comments to

The Editor,Millennium Post,

E–137, Okhla Industrial Estate,Phase–III, New Delhi–110020

millenniumpost.in

dearEDItOR

Vijayendra PatraVia email

EntitlEd VViPS?i fail to understand why politi-cians, especially in india, think that they are above rules and regulations. aviation minister Gajapathi raju has shown just this when he confessed that he carries matchboxes to flights since he is exempted from frisking. what was he trying to show? that he is not a common citizen anymore? Must the citizens of this country remind him that he is a minis-ter because they voted for his party? this is another instance of the lal batti culture of our country. where do we stop at enabling perks and entitle-ments given to polictians. why do politicians think that they can flout rules with impunity? and lastly what message is Mr. raju sending out? while his government tries to curb smok-ing by imposing heavier and heavier taxes on the cost of cigarettes, he himself is tacitly promoting the smoking habit amongst thousands of impres-sionable people.

As India celebrates 100 years of Gandhi’s return from South Africa, Rajdeep Pathak explores the significance of his message today

Poll manifestos are mere promises

the political manifesto or its idea thereof has a long history. As early as 1848, the Commu-

nists released their manifesto; in 1850, the Anarchists, believing in a stateless society, released their manifesto. Then it was the Fas-cists who issued the Manifesto of 1919, propagating the right for women to cast votes, propor-tional representation on the basis of religion, minimum wages, etc. as pertinent social issues.

In our democratic system, political parties celebrate with great vigour, while issuing pre-election manifestos. If they lose, no one speaks of the manifesto. However, if they win and come to power, isn’t the electorate justified to see that the manifesto is imple-mented by the incoming govern-ment? If one does want the party in power to implement the prom-ises laid out in their manifesto, the question of the correct forum and channel for the ensuring implementation arises. Should they repose their faith in the political system or take the legal path? The issue has been consid-ered by the courts. The political class, who make such promises, however, have not made efforts to take them forward.

Considering the issue, as to whether promising to distribute certain articles, if a political party wins, would amount to a corrupt practice, the Supreme Court (in 2013) held that it amounted to

influencing the mind of peo-ple but refused to interfere and directed the Election Commis-sion of India to come up with guidelines for the same. The Commission came up with guide-lines stating that the voter’s trust should only be sought on prom-ises, which can be fulfilled. Ear-lier, the Delhi High Court (1995) had taken a view that an election manifesto, howsoever boldly and widely promulgated and publi-cised, can never constitute prom-issory estoppels or become the foundation of legitimate polit-ical and governance-related expectations.

Every citizen, in a representa-tive democracy, has a legitimate expectation from the government. On various occasions, despite the unclear legal position, citizens of the country have approached the Higher Courts and have enforced various undefined privileges as a matter of right, including the elements as set-out in the Direc-tive Principles of States Policy in the Constitution of India. Many a time on the political front, citi-zens have peacefully protested and have been able to influence public policy. Here, political par-ties make their public declara-tions, either orally or in writing, to form the government and if they succeed, their future public policy should also be guided by their pre-declaration, i.e. their election manifesto. Such public declarations certainly influence the decision making process of the voter. The moment this pub-lic declaration is made, a majority of citizens vote them to power, i.e. a position from where they can actually implement their pub-lic declaration. Why can’t this be understood as the foundation of legitimate expectations? By elect-

ing them, one should understand that the general will of the coun-try has opted to make the mani-festo as the governing principle and that has to be understood as an implied or tacit contract between the elected and the citi-zens of the country.

Thomas Hobbes, a politi-cal philosopher of 17th century, described humans to be natu-rally self interested, yet they were rational and would chose to sub-mit to the authority of a sover-eign in order to be able to live in a civil society. As per the concept, men constructed a social con-tract which would afford them a peaceful life in place of uncer-tainty that existed in the State of Nature, where human beings constantly sought to destroy each other in an incessant pursuit for power. Thereafter, John Locke, another thinker, partly disagree-

ing with Hobbes, stated that the State of Nature-the natural condi-tion of mankind- allowed individ-uals complete liberty to regulate their own lives in ways that best suited them. Then Rousseau came up with the concept of norma-tive social contract. A normative social contract in India’s case is the Constitution of India. This Constitution has given power to political parties to come for-ward; make public declarations in advance to persuade the citizens to favour them by exercising one of their most valuable rights, i.e. the right to vote.

As a representative case, say that a political party makes a public declaration promising to address under-nutrition or mal-nutrition. Then once it is elected it will have to facilitate rural-employment along with continu-ing or enhancing the subsidy on

food grains for the poor. Similarly if the promise is made to make higher education available to the last man in the line, then once elected the party would have to increase budgetary allocations for higher education. Nobody would deny that a vast majority of voters gets easily influenced with such attractive promises. Most of these voters belong to impoverished backgrounds with low literacy levels and can be easily misled through unrealistic promises and bribes. When the same vot-ers realise that promises have not been fulfilled, they feel betrayed. Nobody would deny that there would be certain exceptions to this proposition, like in foreign policy, unprecedented issues relating to internal security etc., which are traditionally not the focal point of election manifestos.

The obvious consequences of non-fulfillment of public declara-tions is that the incumbent gov-ernment is booted out whenever the next elections come around. Is that sufficient? An individual has wasted five years with one party, hoping that things would change. Subsequently another political party comes around promising the moon and the merry go-around of hope and dashed expectations begins for five years with another political party. The offers in a manifesto can be seen as a sort of political bargain in lieu of votes. Therefore it is imperative that there has to be a mechanism to enforce prom-ises, failing which, the Election Commission needs to be granted the power to take action against the political party which has failed to fulfill a majority of its promises.

The author is advocate-on-record in the Supreme Court

The election manifesto should be an enforceable social contract between political parties and citizens

Quality is not an act, it is a habit

Quote Martial

AriStotlE

The mosT infamous sandalwood smuggler to have existed in India was a rather thinly built man with a disproportionately big moustache. He was allegedly involved in the murder of close to 184 people-most of them police officials. So big was his smuggling empire that he maintained a private army and was one of India’s richest criminals. Given his infamy, not many tears were shed when on October 18 2004, Veerappan and two of his associates were killed by the tamil Nadu Special task Force. Red Sanders is a tree which takes more than two decades to reach maturity. Once it grows to its full potential, its deep, red wood becomes vulnerable to assorted woodcutters and organised smugglers, who try to export the wood and earn a hefty profit. Apart from Japan and China a number of other countries in the East are known to import red sanders, for making musical instruments and medicinal purposes. It is this wood which became a catalyst for a massacre. Yesterday 20 labourers were hunted down and summarily executed in the Seshachalam forests near tirupati in Andhra Pradesh. Neither were these labourers were armed bandits nor were they dollar millionaires with big moustaches like Veerappan.

According to the police, these 20 labourers had attacked them with sickles, axes and stones and the police had gunned them down in self-defense. This claim is perplexing on many levels. The police was not involved in a skirmish with highly trained and heavily armed militants; they were dealing with a group of underpaid minimum wage labourers. If it was indeed in self defence as they claim, where are the injuries of the task force members? Reportedly, only two members of the task-force were injured. It’s not as if the Andhra Pradesh police has a clean record, when it comes to sandalwood smuggling. An inquiry by the AP Vigilance Department in September last year revealed two senior officers, who were tasked with protecting forest officers, were in fact taking large bribes and allowing them to enter the forest. This complicity of some elements of the police force has been instrumental in making a bad situation worse. Further disheartening is the inefficacy of our legal system in resolving encounter killings. Out of the 555 recorded encounter killings till 2013, only 144 cases have been resolved so far. It would seem that these poor and hapless woodcutters are the latest scapegoats in the Andhra Pradesh Police’s quest to rid its forests of the scourge of smuggling. The fact, however, is that neither smuggling kingpins are never arrested nor are the local politicians, who tacitly profit from the sandalwood trade. A judicial probe into the matter needs to be announced at the earliest. The truth behind this murky incident must come through.

A sessions court in Patiala on tuesday sentenced for-mer chairman of Punjab Public Service Commission Ravi Sidhu to seven years rigorous imprisonment, along with a fine of Rs 1 crore in the infamous cash-for-job scam that was unearthed by the Punjab Vigilance Bureau in 2002. Investigators had caught the errant official red-handed in Chandigarh, while accepting a bribe of Rs 5 lakh from an excise inspector in lieu of nominating him to the Pun-jab Civil Service. Both participants in this exchange had reportedly struck a deal worth Rs 35 lakh. The investiga-tors had also unearthed Rs 8.16 crore during a raid they conducted on Sidhu’s bank lockers in April 2002. The biggest fallout of the scam, however, was that the state government was forced to cancel the recruitment of 639 persons, who had been selected during the errant offi-cer’s tenure. The cash-for-job scam in Punjab is reminis-cent of the current corruption saga unfolding in Madhya Pradesh. The multi-billion rupee scam in the latter relates to the Madhya Pradesh Professional Examination Board, which is responsible for conducting tests for admission into the state’s medical colleges and for recruitment to gov-ernment departments. An investigation into the case has implicated numerous officials and politicians, including the State Governor and his son. Even Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan’s name has done the rounds after senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh submitted a 15-page affidavit before Justice Chandresh Bushan-led Special Investigation team (SIt), constituted by the Madhya Pradesh High Court. The current scam unfolding in the Madhya Pradesh Professional Examina-tion Board and the indictment of a former Punjab official presents a pathetic picture of how state-level institutions induct their cadre. One can only imagine the level of com-petency available in state institutions, if someone has to pay a bribe worth Rs 35 lakh for a job in the state civil ser-vices. Somewhere along the line State governments will have to fix their institutions, especially after the Centre decided to give away a large share of its tax revenue to them. Questions, however, remain whether they possess the requisite political will to tackle high-level corruption. This judgment should serve as a reminder.

Murky nexus

Criminals or scapegoats?

politoon

budhachandra

to the unimaginative - or the disbeliever - the Mahatma remains

insincere or insignificant

Senior BJP leaders with the party manifesto for the Lok Sabha Elections

MR ShaMShad

Every citizen, in a representative democracy, has a legitimate expectation from the

government. on various occasions, despite the unclear legal position, citizens of the country have approached the Higher Courts and have

enforced various undefined privileges as a matter of right

The unveiling of Mahatma Gandhi’s statue in London

|9millennium post | new delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015

mp

In FocusBarun Das Gupta

As the Sino-Indian rivalry for extending influence in South and South-East Asia heats up, significant

changes are taking place in the for-eign policy of our neighbouring countries. Sri Lanka and Afghani-stan provide a representative example of these changes.

In Sri Lanka, Mahinda Rajapaksa-led government was replaced by that of Maithripala Sirisena as a result of the presidential election held in Jan-uary this year. On coming to power, Sirisena decided to strike a balance in his country’s foreign policy by giv-ing up the previous ruling dispen-sations pronounced pro-China and anti-India stance. He has ordered a ‘review’ of the $5 billion investments offered by the Chinese, including the Colombo port city project. His newly appointed Foreign Minister, Mangala Samaraweera, announced in Febru-ary in no uncertain terms – to India’s intense relief – that Chinese subma-rines would no longer be allowed to dock in Sri Lankan ports. Obviously, whether the ‘review’ would lead to the cancellation of Chinese backed proj-ects, would depend on India’s willing-ness to fill the gap.

In Afghanistan, however, the reverse has happened. In the pres-idential election held in Septem-ber last year, Ashraf Ghani replaced Hamid Karzai. He also introduced a change in his country’s foreign policy: from being overtly pro-US and pro-India, he began to give emphasis on coming closer to Pakistan and China. In fact the US now finds itself mar-ginalised in Afghan affairs.

Nothing highlights this better than the fact that on assuming power, Ghani made a marked departure from the normal practice of every new president – to visit Washington first. He visited Beijing instead. There he declared that China is Afghani-stan’s strategic partner “in the short, medium, long and very long term.” His sentiments were warmly recip-rocated by the Chinese president Xi Jinping. Not only that. Ghani sought the good offices of Beijing to facilitate peace talks with the Taliban. In the past few months, a Taliban delegation has visited Beijing twice.

Meanwhile, Beijing has offered

$327 million in economic aid to Afghanistan. It may be mentioned that eight years ago, during the Karzai regime, a consortium formed by the Metallurgical Corporation of China and the Jianxi Copper Corporation, won a $4.4 billion contract for min-ing copper at Aynak near Kabul. Four years later, China National Petroleum Corporation, set up a joint venture with the Afghan Watan Oil and Gas and won the contract for develop-ing three oil blocks in north-west-ern Afghanistan with an investment of $400 million. So, Afghanistan’s economic cooperation with China

began during the previous regime. Under Ghani, it is likely to get a fil-lip. At the same time, Ghani has ‘sus-pended’ Karzai’s request to India for supplying heavy weaponry, includ-ing heavy artillery. What does it sig-nify? Does Afghanistan not need to

strengthen its armed forces? A staff member under Abdullah Abdullah, Chief Executive Officer of Afghani-stan, made a cryptic comment: “If the President has rejected this (the request earlier made to India), there is the possibility that he has thought of

another place to get these arms from.” As Ghani is also trying to mend his country’s relations with Pakistan, speculation is rife whether the offi-cial hinted at Pakistan or China by ‘another place’.

The Sino-Indian rivalry is also centering on Maldives, an archipel-ago comprising 1190 islands of which only 198 are permanently inhabited. The strategic importance of this small country of about four lakh people lies in its close proximity to the major sea lanes in the Indian Ocean. Both China and India are interested in set-ting up a naval base here.

The internal politics of the country has undergone a sea change in recent years with the rapid rise of Islamic fundamentalism. The young people, who go to attend madrasas in Paki-stan and Saudi Arabia, come back thoroughly indoctrinated by radi-cal Islam. Article 142 of the Maldiv-ian Constitution says that on matters where there is no codified law, the Shari’ah will decide.

Lately, the country has departed from the policy of friendship with India followed by the ousting of for-mer president Mohamed Nasheed, who has since been charged with terrorism. If convicted, he may be sentenced to fifteen years of impris-onment. Nasheed’s arrest and prose-cution was a travesty of justice. When New Delhi expressed its ‘concern’ the reaction of Abdulla Yameen’s Govern-ment was: “We will not take instruc-tions from a foreign government.” India responded by freezing all aid promised to Maldives.

In 2012, Maldives summarily can-celled a $511 million contract (the country’s biggest foreign investment project) awarded to an Indian com-pany for building an international airport at Male and the company was served with a peremptory order to get out of Maldives in seven days. The company said the decision was ‘unilateral and completely irrational.’

The Indian High Commissioners in Maldives have been targeted time and again. In 2012, an official spokes-man of the Maldivian Government made an unprovoked verbal attack on the then incumbent DN Mulay, following which New Delhi withdrew him. Later, Maldives tendered an offi-cial apology. A year later, in 2013, his successor, Rajeeve Sahare’s car was damaged by a stone-pelting mob.

By contrast, Li Changchun, a politburo member of the CPC, vis-ited Maldives and assured the coun-try that Beijing would continue to help promote Maldives’ social and economic growth in every way pos-sible. In September last year, Chinese president Xi Jinping visited Maldives and held parleys with its president Abdulla Yameen.

India will have to tread carefully in Maldives. A show of pique will be counter-productive and against India’s larger and long-term strategic interests. IPA

how to compensate and provide relief to tenant farmers who suffered crop losses remains the biggest question mark. #unseasonalrains

devinder sharma@devinder_sharma

no right minded Kashmiri will oppose the return of Kashmiri pandits to their homes in the valley

Omar abdullah@abdullah_omar

you voted for vikas, didn't you, you idiots ? now you are getting vikas so enjoy it. after all, you asked for it.

marKandey Katju @mkatju

responding to needs of 140 nurses india extends air evacuation from yemen by a day. Fights planned for tomorrow also, subject to clearances

syed aKbaruddin@meaindia

tweetRETWEET

Change of governments in South Asia and its effects

The geopolitics of the region has undergone many twists and turns

Why did you decide to translate the Jatakamala?

There are 540 Jataka tales in the Buddhist canon. While most of the stories are in Pali, some are in San-skrit. Over the past several centuries, the Pali Jatakas have been translated into different languages and are well-known. But the Sanskrit Jatakas have remained ignored. Nearly half the stories in the Sanskrit Jatakamala are not available in the Pali canon. So I chose to translate this section of the Jatakamala. I thought people should know about it. Besides, the last time the Jatakamala was translated into English was over 100 years ago.

In how many of his births in the Jatakamala is the Buddha a non-human character?

There are 34 stories in the San-skrit Jatakamala. In 14 of these sto-ries, the Buddha is incarnated as an animal, a bird or a fish.

You have also translated the Pan-chatantra and Hitopadesa. Do these texts depict anthropomorphism?

You can put it that way. They discuss animals in terms of human qualities and vice versa. These tales have that satirical dimension to them. The Hitopadesa, the Panchat-antra and the Jatakas depict animals and human beings in such a man-ner that they have a lasting attrac-tion. So they have been translated into various languages and are now popular in large parts of the world.

The Jatakamala was translated into Chinese, Tibetan and Japanese more than 1,000 years ago and those translations are still around. The Hitopadesa and Panchatantrahave been famously translated into Old Persian and through Persian, they have gone to Europe. Now scholars know that many fables that persist in

Europe have their origins in the Pan-chatantra, so there is a connection.

Can these anthologies be classi-fied as environmental folklore?

I would prefer not to call these anthologies environmental folklore. Instead, I would describe them as folklores with a strong environ-mental sense. They cover different aspects of nature but are not con-fined to that.

Underlying these tales is the belief that unity encompasses human as well as non-human forms. These stories display a fairly exact knowl-edge and understanding of environ-mental phenomena, of seasons, of climatic changes, of birds, beasts and vegetation. While describing animals and plants, the writers of these anthologies show a great sym-pathy towards them.

On many occasions, they give the impression that underlying all

these phenomena is a common force which can manifest itself as human beings. So, a human being can incar-nate as an animal or a plant in the next birth and vice versa.

What do these anthologies tell us about Vedic and post-Vedic society and their views on the environment?

Vedic and post-Vedic are ter-minologies of current discourse, which we have borrowed from the Western knowledge of India, which they call the science of Indology. This knowledge has developed only over the past 200 years or so, while environment is much more funda-mental and real.

What relevance does this ancient wisdom hold for modern India where the environment is being consistently degraded for com-mercial gains?

One important lesson is that the environment has been there from the beginning of the creation and has been noticed and commented upon since then. It is not something which has just appeared on the scene to be discussed and debated.

The second lesson is a reminder that there is a basic continuity and unity between human environment and non-human environment.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently stirred up a debate over ancient India’s scientific feats. What’s your opinion on this?

I have no comments to offer on the political aspect of such claims. But I can tell you what little I have been able to discern through my readings. Certain forms of science do have a history in this country.

What is known as Arabic numerals are called Indian numerals in the

Arab world. The present numerical system and decimal system origi-nated in this country.

In surgery, we do have old sci-entific treatises or “samhitas” and they are named after two thinkers, Charaka and Sushruta. Though we do not have the originals of these texts, they do exist in subsequent commentaries written on them. This is because the traditional academic and scholarly practice in this part of the world was always by writing commentaries on previous texts.

Much of our knowledge sys-tem in India is based on commen-taries on the original texts. And it so happens that one of the earliest commentaries which was written on these treatises was in Kashmir and it still exists. The first Indian book of medicine, Charaka Sam-hita exists only in the revised ver-sion made by Dhridabala in the 8th century Kashmir.

I remember being contacted by the Royal College of Surgeons in London, who were trying to recon-struct surgical techniques prescribed by Sushruta on human cadavers just to see how correct or incorrect they were. The texts included tech-niques for restitching severed body parts. They found that the texts were correct in that they were based on human anatomy and the persons who had written those had studied human anatomy.

Such evidence indicates that sci-ence had developed in this country a long time ago. But the fact remains that if in our literature there is a ref-erence to a head being replaced, like in the story of Ganesha, or people flying in aeroplanes, like the Push-paka Vimana, it does not mean that they existed but that human think-ing had developed to an extent that they could imagine that such things were possible. DOWN TO EARTH

Ancient Indian literature and the environmentRetired diplomat and well-known translator of ancient Sanskrit texts, Aditya Narayan Dhairyasheel Haksar

recently released the reprint of his 2003 translation of the Jatakamala, the stories from the Buddha’s previous births. He speaks to Rajat Ghai about the importance of the environment in ancient Sanskrit literature. Edited excerpts:

The Sino-Indian rivalry is also centering on Maldives, an archipelago comprising 1190 islands, of which only 198 are permanently inhabited. The

strategic importance of this small country of about four lakh people lies in its close proximity

to the major sea lanes in the Indian Ocean

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi (R) with Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena

Aditya Narayan Dhairyasheel Haksar

10 |

mpnew delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015 |millennium post

International

Nairobi: The Kenyan government on Wednes-day published a list of 86 organisations and individu-als and froze the accounts of 13 financial institutions suspected of financing ter-rorism in the country.

In a gazette notice, the government also ordered all licensed banks and micro-finance institutions to deny the organisations and individuals financial services and to file transac-tion reports with the central bank within 48 hours, Xin-hua news agency reported.

Treasury Principal Sec-retary Kamau Thugge told journalists in Nairobi that the government also sus-pended informal money transfer systems popular with the Somali community.

Kamau asked the trad-ers to instead use commer-cial banks as part of the crackdown to block pos-sible revenue sources and systems that facilitate ter-ror activities in the country. “The government relied on an international list of per-

sons and institutions which support terrorism activities and those blacklisted are being interrogated by the investigative institutions,” Kamau told journalists. He said the government has suspended the licences of 13 forex exchange bureaux and money transfer service firms (hawalas) it accuses of financing terrorism.

Citing the crime and anti-money laundering act of 2009, Kamau said the information obtained on the 13 institutions renders their

business untenable as they have been accused of aiding economic crimes.

The list came in the wake of the massacre at the Gairssa University College last week where 148 people were killed and over 70 oth-ers were injured by Al Sha-baab militants.

In the gazette notice dated April 7, govern-ment listed a group of ter-rorist organisations which include Al Shabaab, Boko Haram, Islamic State (IS) and the Mombasa Republi-

can Council (MRC) among others.

Defence Cabinet Secre-tary Raychelle Omamo said the government has put in place measures to eliminate terrorism on Kenyan soil.

Omamo said the fami-lies of the victims would be given $1,100 and that the government would meet funeral expenses. Kenyan leaders from the clash-hit northern region had vowed to compile in a month’s time a list of suspected terrorists behind a spate of attacks across the East African nation. The political lead-ers from the three counties of Mandera, Garissa and Wajir, which have suffered terror attacks in the recent

past, promised to release the names of radicalised youths suspected to be members of Al Shabaab, their financiers and those supporting terror-ism activities in the country.

“We must tell the truth, that the radicalisation and training of these terrorists is not done in the bush, it is done in some mosques with the help of some rogue imams. We must ask where the political leaders are when this is happen-ing,” Adan Dusale, major-ity leader in the National Assembly, said. The polit-ical leaders who included lawmakers and governors said that some mosques have been used as places of radicalization. agencies

List of 86 companies, individuals out; A/Cs of 13 financial institutions freezed

Kenya cracks down on financial companies over terror links

Egypt court sEntEncEs IslamIsts to lIfE for murdErCairo: an egyptian court on wednesday handed down life imprisonment to 10 Muslim Brotherhood members for killing a man in Mansoura city following the bloody dispersal of islamist protesters in Cairo in 2013. the incident took place in december, 2013 af-ter supporters of ousted islamist president Mohamed Morsi organised a protest in a street in Mansoura.

a taxi driver hit a number of protesters with his car, who forced him to leave the car and then killed him.

the defendants were charged with killing the driver, belonging to a terrorist group and possessing weapons. in a separate case, the Court of Cassation confirmed life imprisonment on 9 other Muslim Broth-erhood members for inciting violence, rioting, murder, attempted murder, among other charges, following the dispersal of the sit-ins in 2013. it also confirmed three years in prison for 5 others and one year for 56 others on the same charges.

pak court suspEnds musharraf ar-rEst warrant In lal masjId casEislamabad: a pakistani court on wednesday suspended the non-bailable arrest warrant against former military dictator pervez Musharraf in con-nection with the killing of cleric abdul rashid Ghazi during the military siege of the lal Masjid in 2007. the arrest warrant was challenged in the islamabad high Court which suspended the orders of the lower court on an assurance by Musharraf’s lawyer that he would attend the next hearing. the district and ses-sions court in islamabad last week issued the arrest warrant against Musharraf in the case of killing of Ghazi when the army stormed the mosque here to flush out militants.

dEath warrant for B’dEsh war crImInal rEachEs jaIldhaka: the death warrant for the execution of con-demned Bangladeshi war criminal Muhammad Qua-maruzzaman was on wednesay received at dhaka’s central jail where the radical Jamaat-e-islami leader is imprisoned. “the order (death warrant) has reached us,” a jail official said hours after reports said the international Crimes tribunal (iCt), which originally tried him, issued the warrant after receiv-ing an apex court order rejecting Quamaruzzaman’s petition to review the verdict. the official said jail authorities were set to formally ask the 63-year-old death-row convict if he wanted to seek a presidential clemency, the only formality to be exhausted before carrying out the execution.

IndIan among two ulfa mEmBErs sEntEncEd to lIfE In BangladEshdhaka: an indian national, who belonged to the banned separatist outfit ulFa, and his Bangladeshi aide were on wednesday sentenced by a court on terrorism charges. the court in Kishoreganj sentenced ulFa leader ranjan Chowdhury alias Major ranjan and his Bangladeshi aide pradip Marak who were arrested in July, 2012 from lakhsmipur area of Bhai-rab with a number of weapons in their possession.

Chowdhury had been staying in Bangladesh since 1997 and maintained contact with the group, the police had then said. a pistol, a revolver, four rounds of ammunition and four grenades were seized from them.

world briefs

a kenyan holds a candle and flowers as she listens to the names of each of the victims of the garissa attack being read out aloud, during a vigil at uhuru park in nairobi, kenya ap/pti

beijiNg: On a fence mending mission to China after an year of torrid ties over maritime dispute, top Vietnamese Communist leader Nguyen Phu Trong and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed to make joint efforts to manage the South China Sea row.

Rolling out the red car-pet for General Secretary of the ruling Communist Party of Vietnam, Xi high-lighted the close relations between the two Commu-nist nations and called for efforts to control maritime disputes and safeguard peace and stability in the SCS.

Xi, also General Secre-tary of Communist Party of China, said he wanted Vietnam to be part of his mega 21st Century Mar-

itime Silk Road (MSR) project launched by him recently to improve China’s maritime connectivity with South and East Asia.

During their meeting yesterday, Xi said China welcomes Vietnam’s par-ticipation in the MSR and Trong said Vietnam is studying it, state-run Global

Times reported.The two leaders agreed

on making joint efforts to control maritime disputes and safeguard peace and stability in the SCS which has become a point of bit-ter discord between the two countries last year when Beijing tried to drill oil in the disputed SCS. agencies

president Xi jinping highlighted the close relations between china and Vietnam, and called for efforts to control maritime disputes

baNgkok: More than 100 people, including many for-eign tourists, have been res-cued from a tour boat that caught fire in the Andaman Sea off Thailand’s southwest-ern coast.

Police Col Sompong Thip-apakul said the acci-dent occurred on the Ao Nang Princess 5 ferry trav-eling from Krabi to Phuket, two of Thailand’s most pop-ular beach resort areas. He said a 12-year-old Western child was missing but was thought to have been res-

cued by another boat that was going to Phuket.

Most of the rescued pas-sengers and crew were taken to Krabi, several miles (kilo-

meters) from where the fire occurred. Thailand’s tourism industry has suffered recently from domestic political vio-lence and several high-pro-

file killings and unexplained deaths of Westerners, but seri-ous marine accidents are uncommon. agencies

kathmaNdu: A day after calling off their nationwide strike, Maoist top brass on Wednesday met Prime Min-ister Sushil Koirala to resolve the impasse over the prom-ulgation of Nepal’s constitu-tion through dialogue.

The withdrawal of strike created a conducive atmo-sphere for talks with the gov-ernment to end the ongoing political stalemate as life returned to normal today across the country, Nepali Congress (NC) spokesper-son Dilendra Prasad Badu

said.Krishna Bahadur Mahara

and Barshaman Pun along with UCPN- Maoist spokes-person Top Bahadur Ray-amajhi met Koirala at his office in Singhdurbar here, assuring that the opposition is ready for holding talks for drafting the Constitution by forging consensus with the ruling parties to end the cur-rent deadlock, he said.

Maoist leaders led by Mahara have taken initia-tives for reaching a con-sensus in the constitution

drafting process with the ruling parties, Badu said.

He said the team called on Koirala and other NC leaders to reach an agree-ment prior to the Constit-uent Assembly meeting scheduled for April 13.

Koirala welcomed the move of calling off the strike, saying he was ready for holding talks with the oppo-sition alliance for resolving the political crisis.

“I have repeatedly urged for dialogues. Many disputes have been resolved, remain-

ing will also be resolved,” Koirala was quoted as say-ing by Badu.

The 30-party opposi-tion coalition had enforced a general strike yesterday, demanding ethnic identity based federal structure to be incorporated in the new Constitution. Over a dozen vehicles were vandalised and 50 people were arrested during the shutdown called by the opposition par-ties demanding consen-sus on promulgating the constitution. agencies

kirkuk: The Islamic State group has freed more than 200 members of Iraq’s Yazidi minority it held captive for months, a commander in the Kurdish peshmerga security forces said on Wednesday.

“We have received 227 Yazidis, among them women and children” in the northern province of Kirkuk Wednesday, Major General Westa Rasul told AFP.

“We negotiated for days with tribal sheikhs in Hawi-jah and were able to free the kidnapped Yazidis,” Rasul said, referring to an IS-con-trolled town in Kirkuk.

The Yazidis were actually freed Monday in Nineveh province, northwest of Kirkuk, but did not make their way to a Kurdish-con-trolled territory until two days later, he said.

The mass release of the Yazidis, kidnapped in Nineveh last year, is the sec-ond of its kind, after some 200 mainly elderly people were set free in January.

A sweeping IS offensive overran large areas north and west of Baghdad last June. A second drive in August targeted areas in the north that were home to many of Iraq’s minorities.

The Yazidis, who are neither Muslims nor Arabs, practice a unique faith and are considered infidels by the jihadists.

They were hit harder than others.

They looked in danger of being wiped out of their ancestral land until a US-led air campaign turned the tide on IS advances in northern Iraq. agencies

KABUL: An Afghan soldier opened fire at a group of US troops in the city of Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday, killing an Ameri-can soldier and wounding at least two others before he was shot dead, a US official said.

The incident happened after a meeting between Afghan provincial leaders and a US Embassy official in the compound of the pro-vincial governor in Jalalabad. All US Embassy staff were accounted for and returned safely to their mission head-quarters, the embassy said.

NATO confirmed that one of its soldiers died in the attack, without providing the nationality of the slain soldier, as is the coalition’s policy. The Washington official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak before the official announce-ment was released. agencies

adeN: Fighting in Yemen’s southern port city of Aden has intensified as the Saudi-led coalition forces launched more than 10 airstrikes against military bases controlled by forces allied with Houthis across the city on Wednesday.

A number of military offi-cials confirmed to Xinhua news agency that the Houthi gunmen supported by some troops stepped up their offen-sive against pro-Hadi forces in several districts of Aden province and deployed heavy armoured vehicles every-where in the city. The fierce street fighting has reached a critical stage in Aden city, where heavy shelling tar-geted residential buildings on Wednesday afternoon, killing at least eight civilians and injuring dozens others.

Aden’s deputy governor confirmed to Xinhua dur-ing an exclusive interview that the random shelling also damaged several electricity substations, water tanks and destroyed about seven private houses in Cirater district in Wednesday’s fighting.

The pro-Hadi side lost five people with 15 others being wounded, destroyed three tanks and seized some small weapons from the

Houthi gunmen in Aden. Sources close to Houthis

claimed earlier that they man-aged to occupy a number of strategic hills in Aden prov-ince in their offensive over the last week against pro-Hadi tribal militia with heavy weapons, deploying well-trained snipers on the hills in order to help their forces on ground.

Due to the occupation of these hills overlooking Aden’s main port located in Mu’alla district, the Houthi gunmen could reopen blocked roads and support their forces to impose full control over key govern-ment facilities there and secure roads to bring more reinforcements, according to the sources. agencies

smoke billows from a saudi-led airstrike in sanaa, on wednesday ap/pti

Fighting in Yemen’s southern port city of aden intensifies

Iran fm In pak to dIscuss conflIctislamabad: iranian foreign minister Javad Zarif on wednesday arrived in pakistan to exchange views on the situation in yemen, a day after prime Minister nawaz sharif called on iran to get involved in a debate on security in the war-torn country. the visit is taking place when pakistan’s parliament is mulling a request by saudi arabia to provide troops, jets and warships to join its coalition fighting in yemen against shia houthi rebels, allegedly supported by iran. an official of the foreign office said that Zarif was having a meeting with pakistan’s advisor on foreign affairs sartaj aziz. agencies

Naypyidaw: Myanmar’s President Thein Sein will host rare talks on Wednes-day with influential allies and rivals including oppo-sition leader Aung San Suu Kyi as she intensifies efforts to lift a constitutional ban on her bid for the presidency.

The long-awaited talks in the capital Naypyidaw, which follow a similar meet-ing of key political figures in October, come as the country braces for elections seen as a key test of recent reforms in the former junta-run nation.

The President’s office director Zaw Htay said the discussions would likely include maintaining order around the elections, slated for November, as well as details of a landmark draft ceasefire agreement with multiple ethnic armed groups last week.

“There could be dis-agreement, it’s impossible to be of one mind. But the more meetings there are, the more the talks can find common ground to bene-fit the people,” he told AFP, adding that army chief Min

Aung Hlaing was expected to attend the meeting.

Suu Kyi declined to com-ment on the talks when approached by AFP in par-liament before the meeting, but her opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) party confirmed she would attend. It did not give further details of the content of the discussions.

The NLD is expected to hoover up votes in Novem-ber’s election, the first coun-trywide poll that the party will have contested in 25 years.

Despite her star power, Suu Kyi is barred from the top job under a provision in the junta-era constitution barring those with a foreign spouse or children from the presidency. The 69-year-old’s two sons are British, as was her late husband. agencies

100 saved from burning Thai boatPolice Col sompong Thip-apakul said the accident occurred on

the ao Nang Princess 5 ferry

traveling from krabi to Phuket, two of

Thailand’s most popular beach

resort areas

in a gazette notice, the government also ordered all licensed banks and micro-finance institutions to deny the organisations and individuals finan-cial services and to file transaction

reports with the central bank within 48 hours, Xinhua news agency reported

Vietnam, china to make joint efforts to manage scs

IS frees over 200 Yazidis in Iraq

afghan soldier fires at Us troops, kills 1

Maoist leaders meet nepal pM, say ready for dialogue Myanmar to hold talks as suu Kyi pushes for charter

Margaret thatcher’s boMbproof bus goes on sale in uKLondon: Former UK prime minister Margaret Thatcher’s 18-tonne bombproof bus used during her 1983 election campaign has been put up for sale for 25,000 pounds. The armoured vehicle was used by the Iron Lady as she dodged potential attacks. The 80mph bus, which is powered by a 12-litre Rolls-Royce engine has two-inch thick bulletproof glass, while the two-foot deep, honeycomb macrolite floor is capable of withstanding a landmine blast. The coach also had its own auxiliary, roof-mounted motor that could pump clean, carbonised air to the sealed cabin in the event of a chemical, biological or nuclear weapon being deployed. The vehicle is being sold by current owner, military vehicle dealer Nick Mead who bought it be-cause it was a fascinating vehicle but now he feels it is big and ugly.

israeli soldier hurt in stabbing, attacKer KilledJerusaLem: An Israeli soldier was badly wounded in a stabbing in the northern West Bank on Wednesday with the Palestinian attacker killed shortly afterwards, military sources said. “A soldier was seriously wounded after being stabbed in the neck near Shilo” settlement, a source said adding that the Palestinian attacker had been “eliminated”. He said two other soldiers had also been wounded and one was in moderate condition. The incident took place on route 60, the main road linking the West Bank cities of Ramallah and Nablus. Israel’s emergency services confirmed paramedics had responded to a call about a stabbing near the entrance to the Maale Levona settlement near Shilo. “Paramedics are transferring a young man of around 20 to (Jerusa-lem’s) Shaarei Tzedek hospital in serious condition with a stab wound to his upper body,” a statement said.

spain: police arrest 10 people for suspected jihadi linKsmadrid: Police in northeastern Spain say they have arrested 10 people for suspected links to jihadi terror activity and the Islamic State armed group. A Catalan regional police statement said the arrests took place today in five northeastern towns, including the regional capital of Catalonia, Barcelona. It said some 360 Mos-sos d’Esquadra regional police officers took part in 13 raids in one of the region’s biggest operations against jihadi activity. The operation was coordinated by the National Court in Madrid. Spain has arrested dozens of suspected jihadi militants and recruiters in recent years.

syrian-born forMer iMaM found shot dead in london: bbcLondon: A Syrian man living in Britain described as a prominent activist opposed to President Bashar al-Assad was found shot dead in his car in north-west London, the BBC reported on Wednesday. Police were called by paramedics after a man was found with what were thought to be bullet wounds to the chest, the broadcaster said. “The BBC understands the victim was Abdul Hadi Arwani, a chef and former imam at a Lon-don mosque,” it reported. London police did not confirm the identity of the victim, but said a murder investiga-tion was underway after a man in his late 40s was found dead in a car in Wembley, north-west London.

“Detectives believe they know the identity of the deceased, however formal identification awaits,” the London Metropolitan Police said in a statement. “A post mortem examination will be arranged in due course.”

|11millennium post | NEW DELHI|THURSDAy, 9 APRIL 2015

mp

International

worLd Briefs

Two Indians shot dead during heist bid in US

New York: Two Indians have been gunned down dur-ing apparent robbery attempts in two separate incidents at gas stations in the US within 24 hours, sending shockwaves among the local population.

Sanjay Patel, 39, who worked as a clerk at the gas station in New Haven in Connecticut, was shot three times in the chest and once in the hand by two masked men on Monday night dur-ing an apparent robbery attempt.

Patel was rushed to a nearby hospital where he died an hour later. Police said they were searching for the two men as the investigation continued.

Patel’s wife was pregnant with their first child.

A report in NBC Connect-icut said quoted New Haven Police as saying that a gunfire broke out at the gas station around 7:30 pm local time during the apparent robbery.

Gas station-owner Raj Ali told NBC that the robbers

took Patel’s life “for a couple hundred dollars. It’s not worth it. It’s bad.”

Witnesses said they saw two masked men running from the scene after the incident.

“We are looking for two people that may be involved. We don’t necessarily believe

that two were firing guns. We know at least one was,” New?Haven police spokesman Officer David Hartman said.

The second incident took place in the US state of Illi-nois, where Rajesh Madala, 35, who worked at an auto gas station in a small town in Peoria, was shot and killed

by an unidentified man dur-ing an apparent robbery, who was later tracked down by the police and killed in exchange of gunfire with the cops in a remote area near the town of Lowpoint.

A report in the Peoria Journal Star said the suspect in the killing of Madala was a white male.

Residents expressed shock at the news of the killing and described Madala, known as ‘Raj’ to customers, as an “awe-some guy” who was inviting and conversational to anyone who walked into the station.

Robyn Williams, a clerk at the nearby General Store Bayview, said Madala always worked the mid-afternoon to night shift and was well-liked in the community.

The suspect drove up to the gas station in a white car, according to materials released by the Woodford County Sheriff’s Department. The car was later tracked down to the remote area near Illinois river. agencies

The incidents send shockwaves among the local population

sanjay Patel, 39, who worked as a clerk at the gas station in new Haven in Connecticut, was shot three times in the chest and once in the hand by two masked men on monday night during

an apparent robbery attempt

file photo of sanjay patel

Paris: Hundreds of flights to and from France were expected to be cancelled on Wednesday as air traf-fic controllers launched a two-day strike over work-ing conditions.

The civil aviation authority has asked air-lines to scrap around 40 percent of flights, warn-ing of “disruption across the whole country.” Flag carrier Air France warned of “very severe disrup-tion” to its flight sched-ule. Although it pledged to operate “almost all” long-haul flights, medium and short-haul services would be badly affected, it said.

“We cannot rule out last-minute delays and cancellations,” the airline added. Low-cost operator Ryanair said it had been forced to cancel more than 250 flights due to the indus-trial action. “It’s grossly unfair that thousands of European travellers will once again have their travel plans disrupted by the self-ish actions of a tiny number

of French ... workers,” the Irish airline fumed.

Passengers had been warned well in advance and seemed to have made other plans. The situation in Paris terminals was rel-atively calm. “The compa-nies have done what was needed. For the moment, there are no difficulties,” one airport source said.

The strike was called by the main air traffic union SNCTA, which wants talks over the specific working conditions of their mem-bers. A particular bone of contention is the pushing back of the retirement age for air traffic controllers from 57 to 59. The union insists that for the past 10 years, talks over working conditions have taken place outside the formal struc-ture for union-manage-ment negotiations. agencies

LoNdoN: In one of Britain’s biggest jewellery heist, robbers have made off with an estimated 200 million pounds worth of jewels from the most exclusive jewellery district here.

In a scene reminiscent of a Hollywood thriller, the thieves raided a safe-deposit company in central London.

The gang used the calm of the Easter holiday weekend to tear through the vault at Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Ltd before making off with the contents of around 300 safe deposit boxes, used by the area’s jewellers to store their stock.

The robbers are thought to have clambered down or abseiled through a lift shaft, with detec-tives investigating whether they were already inside the Hat-ton Garden Safe Deposit com-pany when an alarm went off on Good Friday. Police were told of the crime yesterday when staff returned from their holidays.

Officers confirmed that the gang used heavy cutting equip-ment to get through the vault’s 18in-thick door.

A source at the safe deposit company told ‘The Times’ that a member of staff checked the alarm on Friday but gave the all-clear when the front and back doors of the building appeared to be secure. It is understood that the main caretaker, who would have been likely to call the police, was not informed about the alarm. agencies

washiNgtoN: Police in the US state of South Caro-lina charged an officer with murder after video showed him apparently gunning down a fleeing black man, a rare arrest in a string of shootings of unarmed black men that have raised allega-tions of police racism.

South Carolina state police yesterday arrested offi-cer Michael Slager, 33, and charged him with murder, a felony that carries a sen-tence of up to life in prison or the death penalty, according to official documents. “The Defendant (Slager) did shoot the victim multiple times in the back after an altercation. All this is based upon video evidence and the investiga-tion of the State Law Enforce-ment Division,” reads a South Carolina court document.

A number of killings of unarmed black men by police officers in recent months have sparked pro-tests across the United States with protesters alleg-ing racism in the nation’s police and raising accusa-tions that officers use exces-sive force. agencies

MeLbourNe: The body of a 26-year-old Indian stu-dent in New Zealand who drowned in the sea will now be sent back with help of pub-lic donations worth $23,000 after his family in India could not afford to pay for funeral and transport costs.

Boobesh Palani, 26, was pulled from the harbour off the coast of Eastbourne in Wellington at 10.30 pm on March 30. He was taken to

Wellington Hospital, where he died on Friday.

Friends and members of Wellington’s Indian commu-nity heard that his family in India could not afford the funeral and transport costs to repatriate his body, and so set up a fund to help.

Senthil Kumaran Kathire-san, Rama Ramanathan and Moorthy Sukari had raised $3,800 towards the costs by Monday, but were still well

short of their &25,000 target $15,000 for the funeral and transport costs, and $10,000 for the family to cover extra expenses, the Dominion Post reported. But after news of their appeal, about $20,000 was raised overnight. Ram-anathan said today that the fund had reached $23,000 and enough money had been pledged to make them confi-dent of sending Palani home at the earliest. agencies

Pretoria: Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe visited South Africa on Wednesday in his first state trip to the country since 1994 as he seeks to drum up foreign investment to revive his nation’s moribund economy.

Mugabe, 91, who was accompanied by his wife Grace, has visited South Africa regularly in the past but his two-day stay will be his first official state visit in 21 years. Zimbabwe’s econ-omy has been on a downturn for more than a decade due to low growth, low liquidity and high unemployment.

In March, the Interna-tional Monetary Fund said that the country faced a “dif-ficult” economic outlook with growth set to weaken again this year. Late last year the Zimbabwean finance minis-ter led a team of officials on a visit to South Africa to try to convince potential inves-tors that the country was finally on the mend.

The Zimbabwean offi-

cials said it was in the inter-est of South Africa to help grow its neighbour’s econ-omy to stop the tide of eco-nomic refugees who have crossed the border seeking work. Zimbabwe’s econ-omy entered a tailspin after the launch of controversial land reforms 14 years ago. By 2008, inflation had offi-cially peaked at 231 million percent before the govern-ment stopped counting. The South African government said President Jacob Zuma and Mugabe would hold talks today before a bilateral business forum scheduled for Thursday. agencies

MadisoN: Watergate his-torian Stanley Kutler, who successfully fought for the release of President Richard Nixon’s secret tapes, died in Wisconsin. He was 80.

Kutler, who had been in declining health, died in hospice care in the Madison suburb of Fitchburg, accord-ing to his son, Andy Kutler. Andy Kutler said his father “just had a love and a pas-sion for the United States Constitution” and consid-ered the Watergate scan-dal that drove Nixon from office in 1974 “an affront to the Constitution.” “He wanted to make sure the whole story was heard,” Andy Kutler said. Stanley Kutler taught for 32 years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, retiring in 1996, and remained a professor emeritus. He was author of several books, includ-ing two on Nixon. agencies

Flights scrapped as French air traffic controllers strike

Us cop charged with murder over shooting

black man

Robbers flee with 200 million pounds jewels in UK heist

Mugabe in s africa for first state visit in 20 yrs

Funds raised to bring drowned Indian’s body back from NZ

Watergate historian stanley Kutler dies

robert Mugabe and his wife grace arrive in pretoria

12 |

mpnew delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015 |millennium post

Business

Digital mega-deal: Snapdeal buys mobile transactions platform FreeCharge

New Delhi: To ‘fund the unfunded’ self- employed as well as small businesses, Prime Minister Naren-dra Modi on Wednes-day launched the MUDRA Yojana that will offer loans of up to Rs 10 lakh at low rate of interest. The Micro Units Development and Refinance Agency Ltd (MUDRA) will focus on the 5.75 crore self-employed who use funds of Rs 11 lakh crore and pro-vide jobs to 12 crore peo-ple, he said. “A look at the details reveals the reality that only 1.25 crore people find employment in large industries, whereas small enterprises employ 12 crore people... MUDRA scheme is aimed at funding the unfunded,” Modi said.

The Pradhan Mantri MUDRA Yojana, which has a corpus of Rs 20,000 crore, can lend between Rs 50,000-Rs 10 lakh to small entre-preneurs. It has been set up for development and refi-nancing activities relating to micro units.

It will provide refinance to banks and other institu-tions at 7 per cent. Explaining the functioning of MUDRA,

Financial Services Secretary Hasmukh Adhia said micro finance institutions (MFIs) and non-banking finance companies (NBFCs) can avail of loans from MUDRA for onlending to the borrowers.

MUDRA has been regis-tered as an NBFC with the Reserve Bank, Adhia said, adding that within a year, the government intends to come out with a legislation to convert the NBFC into a bank. He further said that MUDRA would act as a sub-sidiary of SIDBI and there would be no overlap with the functioning of the two. It will also help in developing MFI sector. “We would encourage

more MFIs to be created. So the purpose of MUDRA is to create as many MFIs as pos-sible which can actually give same kind of eco-system and services which are avail now to these poor people. It will provide much needed fund at poor people doorsteps at a reasonable rate of interest,” Adhia said.

He added: “We rely too much only on commer-cial banks and unfortu-nately commercial banks are comfortable lending to people who want more than Rs 10 lakh. Their main forte has never been micro finance and that is what we are targeting.” PTi

Yojana to give low-cost loans of up to ̀ 10 lakh to 5.75 cr self-employed

PM Modi launches Mudra to ‘fund the unfunded’

New Delhi: DLF on Wednesday filed an appeal before Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) against cap-ital market watchdog Sebi’s order slapping Rs 26 crore penalty on it for indulging in “fraudulent and unfair trade practices”.

In the biggest-ever pen-alty in a single case, Sebi, in February, had imposed pen-alties on DLF, its top execu-tives, their family members and various other related entities for entering into “sham transactions”.

The violations were found with regard to sup-pressing key information at the time of the realty major’s IPO in 2007. DLF said in a regulatory filing that it has filed an appeal before SAT against the order. Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi), through the order on February 26, had imposed a cumulative penalty of Rs 26 crore on the company. DLF said the appeal would come up for hearing before the tribunal in “due course” and added that a copy of the appeal has been served on

Sebi. Apart from DLF, its chairman K P Singh, his son and Vice Chairman Rajiv Singh, daughter Pia Singh, as also three “housewives” married to ‘key manage-ment personnel’ of the DLF group were also penalised for “fraudulent and unfair trade practices”.

The realty major had ear-lier said that it did not vio-late any laws. In the same case, Sebi in October last year barred DLF and its six top executives, including Singh and his two children, from markets for three years for suppressing key informa-tion at the time of its IPO in 2007, including about cer-tain “sham transactions” involving an associate firm, Sudipti Estates. PTi

DLF files appeals with SAT against Sebi’s ̀ 26-cr fine

BeNgaluru/ New Delhi: Snapdeal on Wednesday said it has acquired mobile transac-tions platform FreeCharge in a ‘cash and stock’ deal, marking “one of the largest acquisitions” in the Indian digital commerce space.

The company claimed this to be one of the biggest acquisitions in the history of the Internet industry in India but did not disclose the deal size.

With the acquisition, Snapdeal becomes the larg-est mobile commerce com-pany in India, offering the widest range of products and services, including financial services and mobile recharge with an exponentially grow-ing user base of over 40 million, the company said. “Snapdeal and Freecharge combine to form the largest m-commerce company in

India now,” Snapdeal CEO & Co-founder Kunal Bhal told reporters here. Speak-ing on the structure of the deal, Bahl said, “it is a cash plus stock deal... majority of it is stock and minority is cash. With this game-changing partnership with FreeCharge, we have sig-nificantly enhanced our user base and now offer all our customers access to the

widest selection of products and services online, making digital commerce an even more intrinsic part of their lives,” he said. He said Snap-deal has about 5,000 peo-ple and FreeCharge about 200, adding all FreeCharge team members are con-tinuing and will continue as “actually we are going to grow the team at FreeCharge significantly over the next

one year.” FreeCharge will continue to function as an independent platform and all aspects of FreeCharge’s shopping experience will remain intact. The firms will collaborate to offer a seam-less shopping experience to customers across both the platforms offering an even wider range of products and services, it said.

The New Delhi-based firm has been on an acquisi-tion spree as it looks to build its distribution and technol-ogy platforms to compete with marketplace players like Flipkart and Amazon. Last week, Snapdeal had picked up majority stake in digital financial products platform -- RupeePower -- for an undisclosed amount through a stock and cash deal, foraying into the Indian online financial ser-vices market. PTi

New Delhi: In a boost to Coal India Ltd, the gov-ernment has increased the quantity of coal that the state-owned miner can sell through e-auction.

Coal India Ltd, which had last year sold 7 per cent of the total sales through e-auction. The government had in a letter dated April 1 written to Coal India stating that the modalities of e-auc-tion of coal beyond March 31, 2015 was considered by the ministry.

“With the approval of the competent authority, it has been decided to revert to the old system (on e-auc-tion)...,” the letter said. Under the old system, Coal India was allowed to sell up to 10 per cent of coal through e-auction. According to the source, Coal India may take a decision of allowing the e-auction of coal up to 10 per cent. Under e-auction, coal is sold at spot market price. Last year, Coal and Power Minister Piyush Goyal had asked CIL to reduce the

quantity offered in e-auctions so that power utilities can get more supplies of the fuel. The company was directed to limit e-auctioning of coal to 25 million tonnes in the last year from 57 MT.

However, according to the sources, in the last fis-cal 49 million tonnes of coal was sold through e-auction as it was asked by the min-istry to e-auction the sur-plus coal from those mines that have been facing evac-uation constraints. “Coal which is found surplus at the said mines (having seri-ous evacuation constraints) after meeting the require-ment ...shall be e-auctioned,” the Coal Ministry had ear-lier said in a letter to CIL. There has been a large accre-tion of coal during this peak production season at mines which have serious evacua-tion constraints, the ministry had said. At the same time, coal needs to be made avail-able to the FSA (Fuel Supply Agreement) holders on pri-ority, it added. PTi

Centre lets CIL sell more coal through e-auctions

New Delhi: the rs 20,000-crore Mu-dra yojana, launched by prime Minister narendra Modi on wednesday to fund the “unfunded” with micro-lending of up to rs 10 lakh, may be converted into a bank in next 12 months with passage of a bill in this regard in parliament. the Mudra Bill will seek to create a financial institution for providing collateral-free funding to 5.77 crore micro and small business entities engaged in manufacturing, trading and services.

the roles envisaged for the proposed Mudra (Micro units develop-ment and refinance agency) Bank include laying down policy guidelines for micro enterprise financ-ing business. PTi

Govt to pLaCe MUDRa BILL In HoUSe In a yeaR

hyDeraBaD: e-Com-merce major Amazon has chosen Telangana over the neighbouring state of Kar-nataka to set up its largest fulfilment centre (FC) in the country.

The US-based firm, which has been facing taxation issues in Karnataka, said it has put its proposed investments in the state on hold till the mat-ters are resolved. The e-com-merce major last year had announced investment of $2 billion (about Rs 12,500 crore) in the country. The new FC in India will come up near Kottur, on the out-skirts of Hyderabad. Spread over 280,000 sq ft, the unit will become operational by

May this year. This will enable Amazon to ensure faster and quicker delivery of products to stay ahead as it competes head on with domestic rivals like Flipkart and Snapdeal.

No investment details were disclosed. “This is the largest investment in infra-structure in any single state, to date, by Amazon in India. “

“The FC will allow Ama-zon to offer its Fulfilment by Amazon (FBA) service to thousands of small and medium businesses in the state and empower them to gain access to and service customers across the country at significantly low operating costs,” Amazon Seller Services said in a statement. PTi

FIRStCRy RaISeS $36 Mn In FReSH vC FUnD RoUnDNew Delhi: On-line portal for baby products, FirstCry on wednesday said it has raised $36 million (about rs 224 crore) in a fresh round of funding led by VC funds Valiant Capital partners and new enterprise associ-ates. with this round, the firm has raised a total of around $70 million. the firm will utilise the funds to invest on technology and increas-ing its product line-up as well as double the number of its branded franchise stores to 200 in the next 12 months. PTi

Amazon picks T’gana over K’taka for fulfiment centre

MuMBai: Acting against listed firms without a man-datory woman director, reg-ulator Sebi on Wednesday announced a minimum Rs 50,000 fine on them and warned of further action, including against promoters and directors, if they remain non-compliant beyond six months.

Without naming the companies that failed to appoint at least one woman director within the stipu-lated deadline of March 31, Sebi announced a four-stage penalty structure wherein fines would increase with the passage of time.

While some experts opined that the fine is very small and PSUs being in non-compliance might have been at play, officials said that the non-complaint firms were mostly small ones and Sebi has decided to take an “accommodative” stance. Sebi had warned of “serious consequences” for non-compliance, but a large number of companies, including many state-run

firms, actually failed to meet the deadline. As per data compiled by Prime Data-base, as many as 32 public sector firms have failed to comply and they include GAIL, ONGC, NTPC, SAIL, Punjab National Bank, Bharat Electronics, BPCL, Container Corp, Power Finance Corp and Rural Electrification Corporation, where the government inci-dentally sold 5 per cent stake today for Rs 1,550 crore.

Reacting to Sebi’s action, Prime Database Managing Director Pranav Haldea said that the fine is small, but “at least some action has been taken”. Sebi has asked the stock exchanges to levy the

fines as the violation relates to the Listing Agreement. As a result, fines would multi-ply for companies listed on multiple bourses.

As per estimates, over 1,000 companies on the BSE and 180 on the NSE are in non-compliance of the rule, which was first announced by Sebi in February 2014 with an initial deadline of October 1 that year that was later extended by six months. As per the structure announced on Wednesday, firms will have to pay only the monetary fine and can escape further regulatory action if they comply within next six months, that is till September 30. PTi

Firms sans women directors to face minimum ̀ 50K fine

Yoshita singh

New york: India's direct-to-home service pro-vider Videocon d2h made its debut on Nasdaq, raising $325 million through issu-ance of American Deposi-tory Receipts. The company rang the opening bell at the Nasdaq stock market here on Tuesday on the occasion of its listing.

"Our listing on the NAS-DAQ Stock Exchange is a major corporate milestone for the entire Indian Media industry not just Video-con d2h and a testament to the tremendous prog-ress we have made under the Digital India vision" of Indian Prime Minister Nar-endra Modi, Videocon d2h Managing Director Saurabh Dhoot said.

Videocon d2h has become the first Indian pri-vate company since the year 2000 to list overseas, issu-ing American Depository Receipts worth $325 million to the public. It also became the first sizeable Indian list-ing on US exchanges and the first Indian Media company to be listed at Nasdaq.

At market cap of about $1.15 billion, Videocon d2h has become the most valued Indian company at NASDAQ. PTi

Videocon d2h now on Nasdaq; 1st

indian pvt co in 15 yrs to list overseas

New Delhi; Digital wallet services firm MobiKwik on Wednesday said it has raised $25 million (about Rs 155 crore) from a clutch of inves-tors, including Tree Line Asia, Cisco Investments, American Express and Sequoia Capital.

The start-up, which claims to have over 15 mil-lion users and 25,000 mer-chants (retailers), will utilise the funds to expand its offline presence by increasing physical point of sale (PoS) locations across the country.

The company expects to raise an additional $100 mil-lion (about Rs 620 crore) by the end of this year. PTi

MobiKwik raises $25 mn to fund expansion plans

CoaL InDIa SCRIp SoaRS 6%, aDDS `13K CR to MCapMuMbai: shares of Coal india ltd surged over 6 per cent on wednesday, adding more than rs 13,000 crore to its market valuation, amid reports that the government has lifted the cap on the company’s e-auction sales. Following the buzz, the stock soared 5.73 per cent to settle at rs 380 on the Bse. during the day, it jumped 6.37 per cent to rs 382.30. at the nse, the scrip rallied 6.23 per cent to end at rs 382. the stock was the biggest gainer on the sensex and nifty. Fol-lowing the sharp rally in the stock, the company’s market value jumped rs 13,011.85 crore to rs 2,40,021.85 crore. PTi

loNDoN: In the big-gest oil and gas deal in a decade, Royal Dutch Shell on Wednesday announced acquisition of smaller Brit-ish rival BG Group Plc for about $70 billion to create the world's largest indepen-dent producer of LNG.

Shell will pay a 50 per cent premium to BG's clos-ing share price on Tuesday of 910.4 pence, with an offer consisting of 383 pence in cash and 0.4454 of Shell's B shares for each BG share, the companies said. The deal, first major acquisition since oil prices began to slump last July, would be among the largest oil-and-gas deals of past two decades and the biggest in last 10 years. It will surpass the 44.4 billion pounds all-stock acquisition by Glaxo Wellcome of Lon-don-based SmithKline Bee-cham in 2000 to become the biggest UK deal.

The biggest European deal, however, remains Vodafone AirTouch Plc's $202.8 billion acquisition of Mannesmann AG in 1999. The merged company will surpass Chevron Corp and close gap on market leader ExxonMobil of the US. If approved by shareholders, it will help Shell become the world's largest producer of

liquefied natural gas (LNG). "The boards of Shell and BG are pleased to announce that they have reached agree-ment on the terms of a rec-ommended cash and share offer to be made by Shell for the entire issued and to be issued share capital of BG," said a statement issued by the Anglo-Dutch group.

"The result will be a more competitive, stronger com-pany for both sets of share-holders in today's volatile oil price world," Shell chair-man Jorma Ollila said in the release. BG chief exec-utive Helge Lund said the deal "delivers attractive returns to shareholders and has strong strategic logic". The deal, which values BG at about 47 billion pounds,

will give BG shareholders a 19 per cent stake in the combined company. The deal is expected to close in early 2016, Shell CEO Ben van Beurden said. Shell said the deal would boost its proven oil and gas reserves by 25 per cent. van Beur-den promised a "focused, streamlined company" that "will be able to manage cap-ital discipline with much higher precision."

The acquisitions comes at a time when the cost of a barrel of Brent crude, the global benchmark, has fallen from $114 to less than $60. During the previous oil slump in 1998 when crude hovered below $12 a barrel, BP announced plans to take over Amoco. PTi

Royal Dutch Shell acquires UK rival BG Group for $70 billion

Shell, which will pay a 50% premium to bG’s Tuesday closing share price, is

now all set to create the world’s largest independent producer of lNG

prime Minister narendra Modi addressing the crowd at the launch of the pradhan Mantri Micro Units Development and Refinance agency (MUDRa) yojana in new Delhi on Wednesday PTi

Chairman K p Singh

Snapdeal.com Co-Founder Rohit Bansal, FreeCharge Co-Founder & Ceo Kunal Shah, Snapdeal Co-Founder & Ceo Kunal Bahl and FreeCharge Co-Founder Sandeep tandon at a press conference in Bengaluru on Wednesday PTi

|13millennium post | new delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015

mp

Business

Asim KAmAl

AshgAbAt: India and Turkmenistan on Wednes-day agreed to fast-track the ambitious $10 billion TAPI gas pipeline project, as External Affairs Minis-ter Sushma Swaraj held talks with the top leadership here in “preparatory” meeting for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to this country in July. During the Minis-ter’s maiden visit to the Cen-tral Asian country, the two countries also agreed to col-laborate in the energy sector and discussed key bilateral and regional issues, includ-ing defence cooperation.

“This is my first visit to Turkmenistan. It has been successful. It has exceeded my expectations. India’s development standards are going up and there are so many developmental opportunities,” Swaraj said after co-chairing the fifth India-Turkmenistan Inter-Governmental Joint Com-mission on Trade, Economic, Scientific and Technological Cooperation with her Turk-men counterpart Rashid Meredov. “In that context, our ties with Turkmenistan are not up to potential. I explored all options of coop-

eration,” she added. Swaraj said there were increasing opportunities to collaborate with resource-rich Turk-menistan in areas of energy and fertiliser sectors due to rise in requirement. “Due to ‘Make in India’, our energy needs are rising. Our needs in the agriculture sector and want for fertilisers are also rising. In both these areas, Turkmenistan can be our partner.”

“Having natural gas in abundance, we have talked about setting up a fertil-iser plant in which fertilis-ers will be made here to be used in India. This will be value addition to their gas

reserves and we will get fer-tilisers,” she said. Swaraj, who is here on a three-day visit, also said Turkmenistan is willing to host Indian film-makers in this scenic coun-try for shooting purpose.

“There is also a unique proposal from the (Turk-men) Culture Minister ask-ing Indian film producers to come to Turkmenistan and shoot in this beauti-ful country. Prime Minis-ter Modi is likely to visit Turkmenistan in July and several projects that the two sides take up would be finalised during his visit. “In July, the Prime Minister is going to come here. If we

are able to take certain pro-posals forward in the com-ing months, we will be able to announce them during the Prime Minister’s visit. “This meeting also served as the preparatory meet for the Prime Minister’s visit here,” she told reporters. Earlier in the day, Swaraj called on Turkmenistan President Gurbanguly Berdymuham-edov at the presidential palace here.

“I had a very productive meeting with the honour-able president. We talked about bilateral relations all pervasive and all impor-tant issues. We talked about defence cooperation and the fertiliser plant,” Swaraj told reporters after the over 50 minute-long meeting held on the second day of her visit. An Indian delegation is currently in Turkmeni-stan to explore possibili-ties of setting up the plant. “We are looking forward to

our Prime Minister’s visit to Turkmenistan which has been proposed for July,” she said. Modi is also expected to visit other countries in the region around that time for which details are being worked out, sources said. “We talked about cultural relations and both of us were saying that Turkmenistan and India share cultural and historical linkages. I think with this meeting, the rela-tionship will be deeper and stronger.

“The President also apprised us about the prog-ress in the TAPI project and I told his excellency that this has been possible only because of his personal intervention,” she said. The Turkmenistan-Afghani-stan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas project is a 1,680-km pipeline with design capac-ity to supply 3.2 billion cubic feet of natural gas per annum from Turkmenistan to Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. TAPI will carry gas from Turkmenistan’s Galkynysh field that holds gas reserves of 16 trillion cubic feet. From the field, the pipeline will run to Herat and Kandahar province of Afghanistan, before enter-ing Pakistan. PTI

India, Turkmenistan to speed up $10-bn TAPI gas line projectExternal Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj holds talks with President Berdymuhamedov New Delhi: State-

owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) has reversed a seven-year decline in its crude oil pro-duction, showing a mar-ginal increase in output in 2014-15, a top official said.

ONGC produced 22.263 million tons (MT) of crude oil during April 2014 to March 31, 2015, up from 22.247 MT in the previ-ous fiscal, company Direc-tor (Offshore) Tapas Kumar Sengupta said here.

This is the first increase in production since 2007-08 when the slump started. ONGC had produced 26.05 MT of crude oil 2006-07, which dipped to 25.94 MT in the following year.

ONGC, which produces 59 per cent of India’s crude oil output, has been under critical scrutiny ever since the BJP government took office 10 months back.

Oil Ministry has been on a monthly basis monitoring ONGC’s performance.

ONGC’s production fell to 25.37 MT in 2008-09, 24.67 MT in 2009-10, 24.42 MT in 2010-11, 23.71 MT in 2010-11 and to 22.56 MT in 2012-13. “The out-put has increased primarily due to 1.02 MT additional production from offshore fields,” Sengupta said. Off-shore production rose to

16.196 MT from 15.541 MT in 2013-14 but onshore output was lower at 6.067 MT in 2014-15 as com-pared to 6.706 MT of the previous year.

“Majority of our fields are old and matured and this would be perhaps the only case in the world where there has been an increase in production by over 1 million tons from old fields,” the ONGC offi-cial said.

For 2015-16, ONGC is targeting a total of 26 MT of oil production - 22.732 MT from its own fields and another 3.268 MT from joint venture fields like Barmer block in Rajasthan.

During 2014-15, joint venture fields produced 3.682 MT of crude oil, tak-ing its total oil to 25.945 MT. Natural gas produc-

tion was however lower at 17.27 billion cubic meters in 2014-15 as against 17.96 bcm output in the previous fiscal, Sengupta said.

“We are in the process of developing a series of gas fields on both western and eastern offshore and pro-duction will start to look up sometime in 2016-17,” he added.

The increase in offshore production was mainly due to early monetisation of marginal fields such as D-1, B-193 and CL-7 in western offshore with the help of floating platforms and other innovative tech-nologies, he said.

These fields will con-tinue to boost output in 2015-16 as well, he said, adding that offshore pro-duction in 2015-16 is likely to rise to 16.61 MT. PTI

D K Sarraf powers ONGC to FY15 crude oil output rise

New Delhi: Kicking off its disinvestment pro-gramme for the current fiscal on a robust note, government on Wednes-day mopped up over Rs 1,550 crore by selling 5 per cent stake in power sector lender REC in an offer for sale that was subscribed over 5.5 times.

With strong demand from retail and institu-tional investors, the issue received bids for over 27.31 crore shares as against 4.93 crore shares on offer, result-ing in over- subscription of 5.53 times, as per data avail-able with stock exchanges.

The stake sale in Rural Electrification Corpn (REC) is the first in the government’s disinvest-ment pipeline for the cur-rent fiscal. The government has budgeted to collect Rs 41,000 crore from PSU dis-investment this fiscal.

The REC issue received bids worth Rs 7,621 crore, with retail investors bid-ding for shares worth Rs 3,415 crore. Institutional investors put in bids worth Rs 4,734 crore which include FII bids worth Rs 1,692 crore. The portion reserved for retail investors, who got a 5 per cent dis-count, was subscribed 9.02

times. The general cate-gory portion was over-sub-scribed 4.66 times. “We are very happy with REC issue. We started at beginning of fiscal, we have been study-ing the market and timed it right,” Disinvestment Sec-retary Aradhana Johri said.

As against a floor price of Rs 315 a share for the OFS, REC shares closed at Rs 330.05, up 2.61 per cent over previous close. The share sale received strong response from retail and institutional investors and was fully subscribed within an hour of its opening. The indicative price for retail investors was Rs 325.10 and for institutions Rs 324.73.

At the floor price of Rs 315 apiece, the government would raise over Rs 1,550 crore from the Offer For Sale (OFS). The floor price was at a discount of 2.07 per cent over Tuesday’s closing share price of REC. PTI

New Delhi: The Oil Min-istry has submitted a proposal to the Finance Ministry for paying a premium to natu-ral gas producers for difficult fields, a top official said.

“We will very soon decide” on the premium to be paid for gas discoveries in deepwater, ultra-deep sea or high- temperature and high-pressure fields, Oil Secretary Saurabh Chandra said on Wednesday.

A formula, based on recommendation of the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons, has been approved by Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan and it has now been forwarded to the Finance Ministry for vet-ting. The government, while approving a new gas pricing formula based on interna-tional hub rates in Octo-ber last year, had decided that new gas discoveries in deepwater, ultra-deep sea or high-temperature and high-pressure fields will be given a premium over and above the approved price.

Gas price, according to the formula, was $5.05 per million British thermal unit till March 31 and has subse-quently been cut to $4.66 in line with international move-ments. The premium to gas

from difficult fields will be over and above this rate. An official said that a graded for-mula for the premium based on difficulty of the field is on the anvil.

DGH had in January submitted a formula for calculating the premium on such projects. The Cabi-net headed by Prime Min-ister Narendra Modi had in October approved a revised natural gas price and stated that discoveries made after this announcement in diffi-cult regions would be given a premium as exploration and drilling is costly and challenging.

The official said DGH had suggest different rates of pre-mium based on a formula for deepwater, ultra-deep sea and high-pressure and high-temperature (HPHT) fields. Speaking at the JODI (Joint Oil Data Initiative) Confer-

ence, Chandra said energy security remains a concern as about 77 per cent of oil needs and one-third of gas requirement is imported. While India’s experiments with a production sharing contract (PSC) regime under New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP) have not been so successful, the govern-ment is now exploring the right regime that can bring in private capital.

“The challenge is to find a bidding model to get pri-vate capital into it. The cur-rent model hasn’t yielded the kind of gas and oil that was expected. If we continue to do things the same way, perhaps we would get same results. So you have to do things differently. That is what the biggest policy challenge is. We hope to have an answer soon to that policy challenge,” he said. PTI

Oil Ministry has a premium idea for tough gas fields

New Delhi: State-owned Power Grid Corp on Wednesday said the call to implement the proposed Rs 3,000 crore undersea power transmission link has to be taken by Sri Lanka.

The report on the 500 MW project, to be jointly implemented by Power Grid Corporation of India Ltd and Ceylon Electric-ity Board, has been already sent to the island nation. It will only be the second project of its kind, after the transnational 2,000 MW power transmission line between Britain and France.

“The draft report on the project has been sent to the Government of Sri Lanka from our side...since they (Sri Lanka) will take power, and since under-sea cables are expensive, so they have to finalise what to do next,” PGCIL CMD R N Nayak said here. The India-Lanka undersea cable project, to be implemented at an estimated cost of Rs

3,000 crore, was to be com-pleted by 2013. The line is expected to expand to 1,000 MW later. The 285-km power link, includ-ing submarine cables over a stretch of 50 km, will enable the two nations to trade surplus power. Pow-erGrid offers consultancy services abroad. It has over 100 consultancy clients in the power sector, the ser-vices including new trans-mission lines, substations and project management services.

The company, which is also providing consultancy to neighbouring Bangladesh to set up a 400 Kv HVDC network, besides planning to install transmission lines from the Bangladesh bor-der, is looking for simi-lar opportunities in Nepal and Bhutan. PTI

`3K-cr undersea power link ball in Lanka court: PGCIL

NLC CMD B Surender Mohan and Japanese Kobe Steel Ltd’s GM (Engineering Business) Mitsuhiro Saito signed an MOU for a UBC-based power generation pilot project-feasibility study at Neyveli House on Wednesday

Joint Secretary (Coal) Vivek Bharwdwaj and NTPC GM (Coal Mining) Partha Mazumder signed the allotment agreement for the Chatti-Bariatu and Chatti-Bariatu (South), Kerandari, Dulanga and Talaipalli coal blocks to NTPC

PFC Deputy General Manager (PR) S S Rao receiving the Rashtriya Media Ratan Award from the Media Press Club, New Delhi

COrPOrate KaLeIdOsCOPe

I N Murthy has taken over as Airports Authority of India Regional Executive Director (South) at Chennai

PM Modi is likely to visit the central Asian country in July and finalise several projects that have been

pending for long

New Delhi: The Centre on Wednesday proposed a two-stage bidding process to states for auctioning major minerals like iron ore, with the highest revenue share offered in the first round becoming the base price for e-auction. In the first round, technically qualified bidders will be asked to quote the percentage of revenue they will share with the state gov-ernment. "The highest initial offer submitted by a techni-cally qualified bidder shall be the floor price for the second round of electronic auction," according to the draft rules for auction of major min-eral bearing mines released on Wednesday.

While the state govern-ment will be authorised to conduct the auction, the Union government has sought comments of the stakeholders on the draft rules it has framed for the process. "The last date for receipt of the comments or suggestions is April 23, 2015," it said. Last month, The Mines and Miner-als (Development and Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2015 was passed by Parliament paving way for auction of major mineral bearing mines. PTI

Govt suggests bidding process under Mines Bill

Coal, Power & Nre Minister Piyush Goyal and PowerGrid CMd r N Nayak at the Gridtech exhibit on Wednesday NAVEEN SHARMA

Oil & Gas secy saurabh Chandra

external affairs Minister sushma swaraj with turkmenistan President Gurbanguly Berdymuhamedov at that country’s capital, ashgabat, on Wednesday PTI

REC’s 5% Govt share sale subscribed over 5 times

short takes CSK, DD look to start on a highHosts Kolkata look to thrive on slow nature of Eden surface; hard-hitting players boost MI chances

Chennai: The most con-sistent team across all sea-sons of the IPL, Chennai Super Kings would look to put behind the off-field dis-tractions and do what they are best at when they take on previous edition’s bot-tom-placed Delhi Daredev-ils in their opening match of IPL-8 on Thursday.

CSK were hounded by the spot-fixing scandal, in which their Team Princi-pal Gurunath Meiyappan was indicted by a Supreme Court-monitored probe committee last year. But the team, which has made the last four in each of the previous seven IPL seasons,

including four straight final appearances and two titles, still managed to reach the second qualifier. This edi-tion is expected to be no different as they start afresh under the able leadership of MS Dhoni and coach Ste-phen Fleming once again. Such has been their might that three years without a title is being con-sidered a trophy drought and they would look to bounce back and silence the critics. They have man-aged to retain the nucleus of the side and have invested

in Irfan Pathan, Michael Hussey, Kyle Abott, Rahul Sharma. Boosted by the presence of New Zealand’s Brendon McCullum and Dwayne Smith at the top of the order, CSK should

not face any problem getting off a swift start.

Daredev-ils, on the other hand,

have once again gone for a complete overhaul of their side, but managed to bring in a few big names during the high-profile IPL auction. Showing a lot of belief in India discard Yuvraj Singh,

33, the Delhi outfit pur-chased him for a record Rs. 16 crore after intense bid-ding among four franchises. The team, which finished at the bottom of the table in the last two seasons, would be banking heavily on Yuvraj to deliver with his all-round abilities. Besides Yuvraj, they have also invested in a 36-year-old fast bowler Zaheer Khan, who is also desperate to make a come-back to the Indian national team one last time.

Under the captaincy of Jean-Paul Duminy, the team would be preparing to turn its fortunes around in the 2015 season. Wicketkeeper-

batsmen Quinton de Kock of South Africa and Mayank Agarwal are a good opening option, followed by Duminy, Yuvraj, Kedar Jadhav, Albie Morkel in the middle order.

Their batting also runs deep like CSK and it would

be interesting to see how well these big names live up to their reputation.

In Yuvraj and star Sri Lankan all-rounder Angelo Mathews, the Daredev-ils will have the necessary X-factor. PTI

love bowling against ab: JohnsonNeW DeLhI: After playing a crucial role in Australia’s World Cup victory, Mitchell Johnson is now training his eyes on the challenge of bowling to the fearsome AB de Villiers when Kings XI Punjab take on RCB in the eighth edition of IPL. Johnson, who will once again spearhead the KXIP attack,

termed De Villiers as the “best batsman across most formats” and someone who is a formidable oppo-nent. “I think the most difficult batsman to bowl is AB de Villiers. He has been quite incredible in the last two years. He has excelled as the best player across most formats. For me it has always been a challenge to bowl to AB and a lot of guys love the challenge of bowling to him. Having said that, any quality batsman can have a good day in T20 format,” Johnson, who resumed training on Tuesday, said during an interaction.

‘KXiP stint made me better batsman’NeW DeLhI: Talented South Africa southpaw David Miller’s career has been on the upswing after his spec-tacular 38-ball hundred for Kings XI Punjab against RCB during the 2013 IPL and he admits that his stint with the franchise “has made him a better batsman”.Asked if he feels any differ-

ence for the better as he starts his third season in IPL with Kings XI Punjab, Miller replied in positive. “Yeah definitely. I feel I have improved as a batsman. I have learnt to do the right things and that adds to my con-fidence. But I won’t call myself a finished product. I am still lucky to be learning everyday in my endeavour to get better. IPL is a big tournament and performing for KXIP gives me a huge high. Over the past few sea-sons, I have learnt to assess various situations and play accordingly,” said Miller, who has played 71 ODIs and 31 T20 internationals for South Africa.

wisden lauds sangaKKara, lanningLoNDoN: Sri Lanka great Kumar Sangakkara has been named as the leading cricketer in the world in the 2015 Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack. Meanwhile Australia’s Meg Lanning has been chosen as the cricket ‘bible’s’ inaugural leading woman cricketer in the world, the first time the England-based annual has bestowed such an award in 152 editions of continuous publication dating back to 1864. But editor Lawrence Booth was stinging in his criticism of the England and Wales Cricket Board for their “mishandling” of the Kevin Pietersen af-fair that saw the star batsman axed from the England set-up. Sangakkara joined India’s Virender Sehwag as the only two players to be named as Wisden’s lead-ing cricketer in the world for a second occasion. The 37-year-old left-handed batsman and wicketkeeper won the award after a stellar 2014 that saw Sangak-kara score an all-time record 2,868 international runs in the calendar year, including a triple century.

east bengal thrash bharat FC 3-0PuNe: Six minutes of magical run by Macpherlin Omagbemi Dudu silenced hosts Bharat FC into submis-sion as Kolkata giants East Bengal scored a 3-0 win in a Round 15 of the I-League at the Balewadi Sports Complex Stadium on Wednesday. Dudu made it look so easy scoring in the 17th and 23rd minutes to stun the home team fans. Barring a few chances towards the end, Bharat FC gave up the fight early on as Kol-katans raised the tempo of the match after going 2-0 up midway through the first half. Ranti Martins made it 3-0 well into the second half when he was fouled by Bharat FC goalkeeper Arimdam Bhattacharja in the 71st minute. The win gave EB three points, taking them to number five position behind Pune FC on 16 points. Bharat FC, on the other hand, stayed at number nine position with 11 points from 11 matches.

sChumaCher’s son starts F4 testingBerLIN: Mick Schumacher generated huge amounts of media interest on Wednesday as the teenage son of seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher began official testing before his Formula Four Junior Series debut. Cameras followed the shy 16-year-old wher-ever he went at the Motorsport Arena Oschersleben, between Hanover and Berlin, as he tested with Team Van Amersfoort of the Netherlands. Schumacher Jnr is set to make his junior series debut in the opener to the eight-race season on April 26, also at Oschersleben. His father is still recovering from serious head injuries suffered in a skiing accident in 2013 and Oschersleben is the same track where Michael Schumacher drove his first official motorbike race in 2008. agencIes

KKr owner and bollywood icon shah rukh Khan with son abram at eden gardens during the iPl-8 opener against mumbai indians on wednesday

14 |

mpSports

NEW DELHI|THuRSDAY, 9 APRIL 2015 |millennium post

battle readY (left) Chennai super Kings skipper ms dhoni talks to teammates following a practice session on wednesday; (right) delhi daredevils players at a training session at maC stadium in Chennai on wednesday

Chennai: With a new-look side at his disposal, Delhi Dare-devils skip-per Jean-Paul Duminy con-

ceded that two-time cham-pions Chennai Super Kings have an upper hand in their opening game of the IPL, here on Thursday.

“Definitely CSK has an upper hand going by their track record in the IPL. They have been a consistent per-forming team through out the IPL editions. That gives us an opportunity to play with freedom and express ourselves. On countless occasions I have said we are a revamped team and we are sure to express ourselves and do well under the Delhi ban-ner,” the South African said.

On composition of the

team, he said, “We have not necessarily decided on the playing eleven yet. It is a revamped pitch, we first wanted to have a look at the strip and see what is the possibility of on Thurs-day is and then decide.” On being questioned about big buy Yuvraj Singh’s lack of international presence for a while, Duminy said, “It does not matter if he has not been part of the Indian side. He is a match winner and a strong all-rounder. I have no doubt in this IPL that Yuvraj will win games on his own. We have seen that time and time again that he has put in big performances in IPL events. And I know he takes lot of pride in his own performance. I have no doubt we can expect some big things from him repre-senting Delhi this year.”

On the team’s chances, he said, “We should find a way to get two full points from on Thursday match. We spoke on Wednesday about getting dirty and put-ting our bodies on the line. Look there is no guaran-tee in results but we have

to give our best. We have had a really good week of preparation before com-ing here. We have got a fair idea of our strengths and weaknesses. It is all about how we are going to get our two points, whether ugly or pretty.” Duminy admit-ted the nine-match losing streak in the last edition is surely on the minds of the players and they will cer-tainly work towards chang-ing their fortunes.

“We have been talking about it. We know that it is a reality. There is no point in shying away from it. We have got to accept the fact that we were well below par last sea-son. We have put strategies in place that will help us in getting good starts. The start in the tournament will be crucial for us. If we start well on Thursday, it will give us lot of confidence. In going in to the rest of the tourna-ment. We are going to take one game at a time and give our shot. It is always going to be a challenge and as a cap-tain it is a challenge for me and I am looking forward to it,” he said. PTI

skipper Duminy gives csK upper hand

sriKanth, KashYaP reaCh 2nd roundsingaPore: Top Indian shuttler K srikhanth scored a hard-fought victory while commonwealth games

champion Parupalli Kashyap registered an easy win in the men’s singles to enter the second round of the singapore Open super series badminton tournament on Wednesday. World number four srikanth, who won the India Open super series title recently and seeded third in the tournament, met stiff resistance from Tien Minh nguyen of Vietnam, ranked 28th in the world, before emerging 21-18, 19-21, 21-14 winner in the 51-minute first round match. In the second round, srikanth will meet Thailand’s Tanongsak saensomboonsuk who beat Marc Zwiebler of germany 21-19, 17-21, 21-12 in the first round. Kashyap, who won the syed Modi grand Prix gold in Janu-ary this year, however, brushed aside Korea’s Lee Hyun Il 21-11, 21-13 to set up a match with fourth seed son Wan Ho of Korea in the second round. Indonesia Masters champion Prannoy also advanced to the second round after beating Hong Kong’s Wong Wing Ki Vincent 21-15, 21-17 in another men’s singles match. Jwala gutta and ashwini Ponnappa got the better of Korean combo of go ah Ra and Yoo Hae Won 21-12, 21-16 to reach the sec-ond round. However, it was curtains for RMV gurusaidutt and B sai Praneeth after they suffered defeats in the opening round of the men’s singles while Pc Thulasi also met with the same fate in women’s singles. PTI

KolKata: Defending champions Kolkata Knight Riders scripted a compre-hensive seven-wicket vic-tory over Mumbai Indians in the opening match of IPL-8 at a packed Eden Gardens on Wednesday. Set to chase 168, KKR romped home in 48.3 overs with Suryaku-mar Yadav (46*) and Yusuf Pathan (14*) at the crease.

Earlier, put into bat, the visitors lost two wickets in three balls and looked shaky 37/3 after a fiery spell from Morne Morkel (2/18) but Sharma, who had struck an ODI world record 264 here in November last year, was again in his element. Sharma dissected the field with elegance and picked Indian speedster Umesh Yadav as his bunny en route

to his 22nd IPL half-cen-tury. Sharma’s 98 not out came from 65 balls stud-ded with 12 boundaries and four sixes and was ably sup-ported by New Zealand all-rounder Corey Anderson, who remained unbeaten on 55 from 41 balls (4x4, 3x6) in a 131-run undefeated partnership.

After all the hoopla sur-rounding his action, Knight Riders trump card spinner Sunil Narine did not look in his usual self and returned wicketless with 28 runs from his four overs.BRieFSCoReS: Mi 168/3 (Rohit Sharma 98*, Corey Anderson 54*, M Morkel 2/18) lost to KKR 170/3 (G Gambhir 57, M Pandey 47, Surya Kumar Yadav 46*) by seven wickets. PTI

IPL-8: Holders KKR off to flying start

iPoh: India yet again paid the price of some sloppy defending and con-ceded a late goal to lose 2-3 to lower-ranked Malay-

sia and crash out of the title race of the 24th Sultan Azlan Shah Cup on Wednesday.

As has been the story in this tour-nament for India, the Sardar Singh-led side wasted numerous scoring opportunities and their fragile back-line broke down under pressure at cru-cial junctures. India conceded a goal with two minutes remaining in the match to lose the match. Faizaal Saari (17th minute), Haziq Samsul (35th) and Shahrun Abdullah (58th) scored the goals to hand Malaysia their first win in the tournament after two con-secutive defeats. For India, Rupinder Pal Singh (20th, 51st) converted two penalty corners but it was not enough

to give new chief coach Paul van Ass his first taste of victory. With just one point from three games, India are out of the race for Sunday’s final. India play lowly Canada on Thursday before facing world champions Australia on Saturday, while Malaysia will be up against Korea. The match began after almost an hours’ delay as heavy rains

and lightening struck the stadium minutes before the scheduled start. Compared to their first two games, the Indians did not have the best of starts as Malaysia fought stick to stick to give their opponents some tough time.

The initial few minutes of the match was a midfield slugfest as both the tams tried hard to take control of the proceedings. The Malaysians looked sharper and threatening and were the first to attempt on the goal but Faizal Saar’s reverse hit in the fifth minute was just off the target.

In the 11th minute, Satbir Singh squandered a bright chance when he failed to capitalize on a pass by fumbling the opportunity inside the opposition circle. Minutes later, V R Raghunath set it up for Akashdeep Singh with some brilliant stick work but the latter’s reverse hit was kept out by an agile Malaysian goalkeeper Kumar Subramiam, who is playing in his 250th international match. PTI

India lose to Malaysia, out of title race

rupinder Pal singh’s brace went in vain – FILe PIc

irFan inJured, set to miss 1st gameChennai: Injuries seem to be a permanent companion of India discard Irfan Pathan as the Baroda all-rounder has again reported unfit even before the ball has started rolling for chennai super Kings, who will be taking on Delhi Daredevils in their opening IPL encounter on Thursday. Pathan, bought by csK this season, sustained an injury during training and chief coach stephen Fleming confirmed the left-arm seamer will not be available for selection against Daredevils. “Irfan Pathan is not fit. another pacer andrew Tye is also carrying an injury. They won’t be con-sidered for selection at this stage. Their progress will be assessed on a day to day basis,” Fleming confirmed at the pre-match media conference.

delhi hC notiCe to ddCa over ComPlimentarY iPl tiCKetsnew delhi: The Delhi High court on Wednesday issued notice to the Delhi District cricket associa-tion (DDca) and its 25 executive committee members on a plea by another member seeking directions to frame policy for disbursal of complimentary tickets for the Indian Premier League (IPL) matches. The plea filed by n.c Bakshi, a retired Delhi Univer-sity professor, asked the DDca to give a true and fair account of disbursal of complimentary tickets for the IPL season 7 matches held in 2014 at the Feroze shah Kotla grounds as well as the mechanism followed. Justice Rajiv shakdher sought response from the DDca and its 25 members and also asked the DDca to file an affidavit indicating how it distributed the complimentary tickets. The plea said for the purpose of hosting IPL matches every year, DDca enters into an agreement with gMR sports Pvt. Ltd., the company which owns Delhi Daredevils team, to provide the ground and other facilities. gMR issues certain complimentary tickets to the DDca worth several crores in addition to Rs.10 lakh for each match, it said.

morne morkel (C) celebrates after dismissing aaron Finch on wednesday

|15millennium post | new delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015

mp

SportsAtletico brush aside Moyes’s SociedadGriezmann on target as Madrid powerhouse move to within six points of La Liga leaders Barcelona

MADRID: Atletico Madrid moved to within six points of La Liga leaders Barcelona thanks to a comfortable 2-0 win over David Moyes’s Real Sociedad on Tues-day. The champions never looked in danger from the moment Mikel Gonzalez headed into his own net after just two minutes.

Antoine Griezmann then dou-bled the hosts’ advantage against his former club shortly afterwards to end the game as a contest inside the first 10 minutes. Sevilla moved level with Valencia in fourth, just four points adrift of Atletico, with a 2-1 win at Levante thanks to first-half goals from Kevin

Gameiro and Jose Antonio Reyes. Barcelona can regain their

nine-point lead over Atletico when they and closest challeng-ers Real Madrid are in action against Almeria and Rayo Valle-cano respectively on Wednesday.

The defeat all but ends Socie-dad’s outside hopes of qualifying for the Europa League, but the former Manchester United boss insisted he never thought that was a realistic target having taken over the Basque outfit with the remit of

avoiding relegation. “I’ve aways felt like it would be too difficult to make Europe. The distance to make up was too far. We’ve been on a very good run. We’ve had two difficult away games and I think the players have done a lot of good things,” Moyes added.

Sociedad beat Atletico 2-1 when the sides met back in November and came into the game having lost just one of their last eight La Liga games, but were on the back foot straight away as Arda Turan volleyed against the post inside 60 seconds. The vis-itors managed to scramble the

rebound behind but from the resulting corner, Gonzalez could only flick Koke’s in-swinging delivery into the far corner.

Eight minutes later it was 2-0 as Geronimo Rulli could only parry Koke’s fierce drive into the path of Griezmann, who slammed the ball high into the net but refused to celebrate out of respect to the club he spent nine years with prior to his big money move to Atletico last summer.

Griezmann came close to inflicting more pain on his for-mer employers as he was denied by a last-ditch tackle from Gonza-lez before nodding just wide from another dangerous corner. Socie-dad gradually grew into the game, but only seriously threatened Jan Oblak’s goal when Chory Castro’s powerful shot forced the Slove-nian into a smart save. Atletico took the sting out of the game in the second-half with next week’s Champions League quarter-final against Real Madrid in mind. However, they were still char-acteristically solid at the back to secure a fifth consecutive clean sheet. At the other end of the table minnows Eibar ended an 11-game winless run to ease their relegation fears with a 1-0 victory over Malaga. agencies

V Krishnaswamy

AugustA (geoR-gIA): Anirban Lahiri is going the full dis-tance in terms of prep-aration and soaking in the atmosphere as he plays the pre-event traditional Par-3 which opens the offi-cial action at the Mas-ters each year. Lahiri, who has played the Augusta National on each of the past three days alongside differ-

ent players, has got a taste of the famous greens with 18 holes on Sunday, nine on the front stretch on Monday and another nine on the back stretch on Tuesday. Now it is time for the Par-3 contest before the actual show gets underway on Thursday.

Lahiri will have a sense of comfort as he has been paired for the first two rounds alongside Englishman Lee Westwood and Spaniard Miguel Angel Jimenez. The pair-ing would also bring a whole lot of posi-tive memories for the 27-year-old Indian, who played alongside Westwood, in the

final round of the Malaysian Open and then he played the first two rounds with Jimenez at the Indian Open. Lahiri won both the events and rose into the Top-50 of the world. Currently No. 34 in the world, Lahiri is likely to play all four Majors and WGC, which could also give him a chance to gain a status on the coveted PGA Tour. Commenting on his pairings for the first two days, Lahiri said, “Both Lee (West-wood) and Miguel (Jimenez) are experi-enced stars and I have known them. They

are great fun and also very encouraging. I played the final round of the Malaysian Open with Lee and the first two rounds of the Indian Open with Miguel. Both those events have great memories for me.”

Lahiri has played with former Masters winner Vijay Singh, picked the brains of three-time winner, Nick Faldo and on Tues-day played alongside world no. 15 and four-time winner on PGA Tour, Patrick Reed. Armed with the knowledge gleaned over past three days, he is now ready for the big

battle. Meanwhile at the Par-3 contest he will play alongside Bernd Wiesberger, who he beat enroute to Malaysian Open. The Austrian, a Masters debutant like Lahiri, ended second despite leading by a whop-ping shots after three rounds.

“The Par-3 should be fun and I am looking forward to it and it is also good to loosen up. I have played the course twice over three days and have prepared well with my caddie, Cline Laddie, and am all set,” said Lahiri ahead of the Par-3 contest.

Lahiri’s sense of comfort extends to his immediate team around him, as he is accompanied by wife, Ipsa, who is getting used her husband heavy travel schedule. Also present at Augusta is Lahiri’s long-time supporter and sponsor, Pawan Munjal.

“Anirban (Lahiri) is a perfect example of the kind of talent that exists and is wait-ing to be tapped in India and Asia. In the past decade or so, Indians have won more than 60 titles across Asia, Japan, Europe and even in the US. Anirban’s flowering into a world-class golfer will further promote the sport and hopefully his presence at next year’s Olympic Games in Rio will provide the ideal boost to the game in India,” said Munjal, CEO and managing director of Hero MotoCorp Ltd.

Lahiri soaks in atmosphere; paired with Westwood, Jimenez

Juventus storm into italian Cup finalRome: Juventus overcame a first-leg deficit to reach the italian Cup final with a 3-0 win at Fiorentina on tuesday, advancing on 4-2 aggregate. the italian serie a leaders seek their first Cup tro-phy in 20 years, keeping alive hope of a treble. alessandro Matri, in place of the injured Carlos tevez, put Juventus ahead from close range midway through the first half and roberto pereyra doubled the lead just before halftime by knocking in a rebound. leonardo Bonucci capped the victory with a volley inside the near post fol-lowing a corner in the 59th. napoli hosts lazio in the other semifinal on wednesday following a 1-1 opening leg. the final will be played in rome on June 7.

benteke treble keeps villa out of troubleBIRmINGHAm: Christian Benteke scored a potentially priceless hat-trick as aston Villa avoided slipping into the premier league relegation zone by drawing 3-3 at home to Queens park rangers. after Matt phillips put Qpr ahead, a Benteke brace gave Villa control, only for second-half goals from Clint hill and Charlie austin to leave Qpr on the brink of a win that would have taken them out of the bottom three at their opponents’ expense. But Benteke com-pleted his treble with an inch-perfect 83rd-minute free-kick to take the Belgian striker’s tally to seven goals in five games and leave tim sherwood’s side three points above the bottom three.

round-upsoccer

atletico madrid’s antoine Griezmann controls the ball at vicente Calderon stadium

sim bhullar makes nba debutSACRAmeNTo (USA): sim Bhullar became the first player of indian descent to play in the high-profile national Basketball association (nBa) league as he made his debut for sacramento Kings on Wednesday. The 22-year-old came on with 16 seconds remaining in the Kings’ 116-111 victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves at the sleep Train arena. a few days back, the 7-foot-5-inch canada-born centre had become the first player of indian descent to sign an nBa contract. He had signed a 10-day contract to join the Kings’ roster. it was the moment he had been waiting for and Bhullar

said he hoped he could help grow the game in india. “it was a great feeling and i’m happy to be kind of an ambassador. This is just the beginning. i really think on Wednesday was the moment, the big moment for me. There is a lot more to go and hopefully i get another chance like that soon. Hopefully more kids growing up will see there’s a player of indian descent on the court and hopefully they can follow the game a bit more and grow passion for it to pursue it in future and we can get a couple more indian nBa player,” he said. Bhullar, whose family migrated to canada from Punjab, has already made waves in his blossoming career overcoming weight and height issues. Though he lost about 16kg to get in shape for nBa, the Toronto-born player still weighs little over 160kg. He had been playing in the nBa development league for the Reno Bighorns, who are an affiliate of sacramento Kings. not long ago he was at the college level representing new Mexico state. sacramento Kings is owned by indian businessman Vivek Ranadive. PTi

sim Bhullar

tiger Woods (left) hugs miguel angel Jimenez during a practice round for the us masters on Wednesday

anirban Lahiri

16 | new delhi|thursday, 9 april 2015 |millennium post

Entertainmentmp

New Delhi: The illustrious musical journey of Oscar-winning composer AR Rahman has become the subject of Umesh Aggarwal’s documentary, which was screened here today in the presence of the music maestro in a jam-packed auditorium.

The film, Jai Ho, inspired from Rahman’s Oscar-winning composition of the same name, is presented by the Public Service Broadcasting Trust in partnership with External Publicity Diplomacy Division, Ministry of External Affairs and India Habitat Centre. The docu-mentary travels from Rahman’s childhood love for tunes to his present vision for a national orchestra.

It spans more than two decades and presents the Mozart of Madras’ ever-growing romance with music.

A media-shy 48-year-old Roja hitmaker, who came to the venue during the end of the documentary, said, “I don’t like watching my own interviews.

“In fact, when I first saw the film, I tried to skip it after five minutes. Also, it has the people’s perspective of me... But I will be happy if someone gets inspired by seeing this. Umesh has made me appear likeable,” he said. Rah-man said that the documentary gives him an overview of how he has changed over the years.

“As a person you always evolve, I saw (in the film) how I have changed over the years.

“Some of the basic things have remained, but I have realised today that I am a very different person than what I was earlier. And it also gives me an idea how I will be in the next 10 years,” the composer added.

The documentary features interviews with eminent personalities like Shekhar Kapur, Gulzar, Aamir Khan, Subhash Ghai and director Danny Boyle, among others. It also focuses on Rahman’s establishment in the West post the film Bombay Dreams and his growing popular-ity after the Oscar win for Slumdog Millionaire.

“It took me more than six months to reach him, but just five minutes to convince him. “There were many challenges in the making of this film, one of them was making Rahman speak more than two words,” Umesh said before the screening. pti

Jai Ho is a documentary by Umesh Aggarwal on the Oscar winning composer. The film was screened in Delhi and was attended by the maestro himself

New Delhi: It took six months for A R Rahman to understand the kind of score that renowned Ira-nian director Majid Majidi wanted for his upcoming film Muhammad.

Rahman and Majidi have collaborated for the first time and it was an entirely new experience for the Oscar-winner to work with Majidi.

“All the directors that I have worked with know my working style and music, they have seen me for 20-25 years now... But Majidi did not understand what I did, he knew nothing about me.

“So if I played some tune, he would be like ‘What’s this?’. It took me a while, a couple of sessions, to under-stand what he was expect-

ing of me. Then I asked him what else he liked. I made him listen to other people’s work. On that basis, I made a list of his preference and that’s how I gauged his taste and what he wanted,” Rah-man said during the screen-ing of documentary Jai Ho.

The Grammy-winner, however, loved working with Majidi and it was a wish come true for him to have the chance to be a part of Iranian film.

Majidi is known for directing internationally acclaimed films like Chil-dren of Heaven, The Color of Paradise and Baran. pti

Took six months to understand what Majidi wanted: Rahmanmumbai: Actress Kan-

gana Ranaut has slammed the trend of paid entertain-ment news, saying that the focus should be on getting into news due to a film’s content rather than fluff.

The National Award-winning actress expressed her views on the preva-lent trend at the launch of Anupama Chopra’s book The Front Row: Conversa-tions On Cinema here on Tuesday.

“I feel they (paid media stories) are very harmful for the business aspect of our craft. You spend so much to buy these media net sto-ries or full page ads to build perception...you can rather

save this money and put it in the making or marketing of the film,” Kangana said.

The Queen fame actress also added that a film’s suc-cess depends on quality content.

“No one knows how much it is benefiting. If you see, a film like Queen did well on word of mouth and because of its strong con-tent. The content has to be good,” she said.

The actress, who is prep-ping up for Tanu Weds Manu Returns, also high-lighted the adverse effect of the trend on small bud-get films.

“It is true that some people are interested in the buying part of things...They want to buy everything from the movie reviews to the media net to the opin-ions and so on.

“It’s hard for small film-makers to survive in such situations,” she added.

The Actress who is known for playing strong roles had also received the National Award for Mad-hur Bhandarkar’s Fashion in 2008, before Queen. ians

it’s substance over fluff for Kangana

New Delhi: Director-producer Karan Johar today said that though he believes in promoting regional cin-ema, putting restrictions on multiplexes may not be the best way.

Maharashtra govern-ment is planning to make screening of Marathi mov-ies in the state’s multiplexes mandatory during prime time slots. “I do believe in promoting regional cinema be it Marathi or Bengali but I am not sure if putting

restrictions or rules and reg-ulations will help that pro-cess,” said Johar.

“I don’t know many details about the whole strategy behind doing that but I believe empowering Marathi cinema is a way forward. I feel when you force it and not enforce it, there is always a problem,” Johar added. The filmmaker hoped that probably the new rule was an attempt to open up the exhibition sector to regional films. pti

Restrictions on regional cinema won’t help: Johar

KolKata: Describing himself as a ‘late bloomer’, Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan on Tuesday said he failed to follow his father Mansoor Ali Khan’s footsteps to become a cricketer as he was not gifted to be a sportsperson. “I am a late bloomer. I sort of came into my own in my 30s, which I think was far too late for a crick-eting career. I played school cricket. But I don’t think I have a god’s gift kind of natural genius that my father had or all our players have,” said Saif, who is here for the IPL gala opening ceremony. “It’s a gift which you can spot early on. By the time you are 10 or 11, people can see the genius in you. My gifts lie in other areas,” said the national award winning actor. ians

wasn’t gifted to be cricketer: saif ali Khan

GulmarG (JK): Veteran actor Anupam Kher today said it was high time for Kashmiri pandits to return to Kashmir and pitched for promoting the Valley as a shooting destination for Bollywood.

“The people of Kashmir have given me a lot of love and I think it is high time to get Pandits back.

“We were a good mix-ture of sweetness and salti-ness. We were great together. I have great memories of spending time at the places of Muslim friends,” Kher told reporters here.

He said Kashmir needed to be promoted as a shoot-ing destination in Bolly-wood and the government should provide all facilities for shooting films here. pti

its high time for Kps to return to Kashmir:

anupam Kher

Marilyn Manson gets punched, plans

to sue attacker

Rahman down the yeaRs

los aNGeles: Pop stars Taylor Swift and Lorde have shot down reports that they fought about recording a duet together.

While Swift addressed the rumours on Twitter, Lorde shared the Blank Space hitmaker’s post, reported Aceshowbiz.

“Media, when you say ‘Lorde & Taylor are fighting’ - by fighting do you mean ‘FaceTiming constantly from US to NZ and LOLing at you’? Thnx bye,” Swift wrote on Twitter.

Lorde shared the post and added, “Sisters are doin’ it for themselves @taylorswift13.”

The duo apparently had differ-ent opinion about the collaboration.

A media report said that Swift offered Lorde to record a duet together but the Royals singer appar-ently disagreed.“Lorde loves Tay-lor but she thinks that their voices have completely different sounds and they won’t mesh well together,” the report read. pti

los aNGeles: Marilyn Manson is planning to sue his attacker for punching him in the face. The 46-year-old rocker said he did nothing to start the fight on late Sunday, April 5 which resulted in him getting punched for no rea-son, reported Ace Showbiz.

On Sunday, Marilyn was enjoying a dinner at Denny’s in Alberta when two women came to him and asked him for a photo. The musician said that he obliged and never called out names as claimed by witnesses. According to Marilyn, an unknown guy burst out from nowhere and then threw a punch in his face. pti

los aNGeles: Holly-wood star couple Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield have reportedly taken a break from their relationship after three years of dating. It was their hectic work schedules that forced the duo to finally call it quits for the time being, reported People magazine.

“He’s thrown himself in the project to the detri-ment of all else,” a source said about Garfield’s latest film Silence which currently is in production in Taiwan. “But it’s too early to say the rela-tionship is over.” Stone has been seen spending time in Los Angeles after wrapping up production on her new film Aloha. pti

los aNGeles: Rap-per Kanye West has agreed to settle a lawsuit brought by a videographer, Daniel Ramos, whom he allegedly attacked in 2013.

Ramos’s attorney, Glo-ria Allred, stated that West agreed to apologise to Ramos.

West and Ramos were also pictured shaking hands with West giving a smile to Ramos. Along with his apology to Ramos, West gave Ramos an unspecified

amount of money, reported Ace Showbiz.

West was charged with misdemeanour battery, a charge helped by a fellow paparazzo’s video capturing the exchange.

He pleaded no contest to

the misdemeanour battery last year and was sentenced to two years of probation, 24 anger management therapy sessions and 250 hours of community service.

Ramos sued West, 37, after he was being attacked on July 19, 2013 at LAX Airport. West was reported lunging at the paparazzo while trying to get into his car. He allegedly did it after he was being questioned by Ramos, “Kanye, why can’t we talk to you?” pti

Kanye settles videographer lawsuit with apology

swift, Lorde laugh off bickering rumours

los aNGeles: Supermodel and reality TV star Kendall Jen-ner has become a victim of Twit-ter hacking.

Three insensitive tweets were posted via the Twitter account of the 17-year-old model. The tweets were racy messages about Justin Bieber and Bruce Jenner,

reported Ace Showbiz.The first tweet was about

her father’s alleged transforma-tion. It confirmed that Kend-all’s father is now becoming a woman after having sex reas-signment surgery.

Another tweet stated that Kendall was involved with her

rumoured boyfriend Justin Bieber.

Kendall deleted the tweets immediately after she regained control of her Twitter account. However, many of her fans had seen those strange tweets. Some of them even retweeted, gave responses, and got screen cap-tures of the tweets.

The hackers were previ-ously reported hacking Taylor Swift’s Twitter and Instagram by posting bizarre photos and messages. pti

Kendall JenneR’s twitteR hacKed

Emma Stone, Andrew Garfield

on a break?

Majid Majidi

Kangana Ranaut

Karan Johar

Marilyn Manson

taylor swift and lorde

Kanye west