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Heatwave shattered allrecords in Delhi on

Monday as Palam observatoryrecorded 48 degrees Celsius,highest temperature in theCapital’s history while mercuryat Safdarjung settled at 45.6degrees Celsius. The nationalCapital had witnessed 47.8degrees Celsius, recorded atPalam, on June 9, 2014.

Chief of IndiaMeteorological Department(IMD) Kuldeep Srivastava said,“The Palam Observatoryrecorded an all-time high of 48degrees Celsius on Monday.The factors that led to this aredry westerly winds, no effect ofa western disturbance in theplains and intense heating inthe month of June.”

The IMD forecast the“severe heatwave” situation forthe entire north India onTuesday. It marked the area“Red” on the weather forecastindex which indicates — heat-wave situation.

“Southwesterly winds onTuesday may cause the tem-perature to drop by one or twonotches. However, the heatwave will persist,” IMD said.

As per the private weatherforecast agency Skymet, a low-pressure area that is expectedto intensify further will movealong the west coast i.e. fromSoutheast Arabian Sea toNorthwest Arabian Sea. Due tothis, humid southwesterlywinds are reaching up to Delhiand the National Capital

Region (NCR) area. Thus, theincrease in humidity and hightemperatures will result in

thundercloud development andsubsequent rainfall.

These weather activities

will continue over Delhi-NCRtill June 14 or 15. Thereafter,pre-monsoon weather activitieswill not subside and with a gapof one or two days, anotherspell of rain and thunder-shower activities will occurover Delhi, Noida, Gurugram,Faridabad and Ghaziabad.

Lodhi Road, Ridge, Sports

complex and Ayanagar areasrecorded 45 degrees Celsius onMonday.

The SafdarjungObservatory, official figuresfor the city, recorded a high of45.6 and a low of 27.2 degreesCelsius. The maximum tem-perature at Delhi Airport set-tled at 43 degrees Celsius.

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Afast-track court inPathankot on Monday

awarded life sentence to threepersons for the horrific gan-grape-and-murder of an eight-year-old girl in Jammu &Kashmir’s Kathua district.Three other convicts have beensentenced to five-year impris-onment.

However, the court acquit-ted the seventh accused, VishalJhangotra — son of mainaccused Sanji Ram — in theabsence of any credible evi-dence. The eighth accused, ajuvenile, is being tried inKathua.

Sanjhi Ram, a former rev-enue officer and caretaker ofthe temple where the crimetook place, special police offi-cer Deepak Khajuria, andParvesh Kumar, a civilian, havebeen given life-term impris-onment after conviction underthe Ranbir Penal Code sectionspertaining to criminal con-spiracy, murder, kidnapping,gangrape, destruction of evi-dence, drugging the victimand common intention, thelawyers said. The three havealso been fined �1 lakh each.

Three accomplices — sub-inspector Anand Dutta, headconstable Tilak Raj and specialpolice officer Surender Verma— who were convicted fordestruction of evidence havebeen handed over five yearsimprisonment, they added.

In his 400-page judgment,Pathankot District and Sessions

Judge Tejwinder Singh said,“Perpetrators of the crime haveacted in such a manner as if a‘law of the jungle’ prevailed.Heaven and hell are not geo-graphical locations. Ourthoughts, actions and charac-ter create a situation of heavenor hell for us. Needless to saythe commission of this devilishand monstrous crime has sentshock waves across society,which means the guilty need tobe brought under the sword ofjustice.”

Lawyers defending Vishal

said he was away at college inMeerut, where he is pursuinga BSc degree in agriculture, atthe time of the crime.

J&K Crime Branch’schargesheet, however, said,“In the course of investigation,it transpired that Vishal active-ly took part in the rape andmurder of the victim and latertried to create an alibi byresorting to manipulatingattendance records of his col-lege in connivance with SanjhiRam and a relative KishoreKumar.”

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Ahigh-level panel headedby Delhi Lieutenant

Governor Anil Baijal onMonday submitted its report toUnion Housing and UrbanAffairs (MoHUA) MinisterHardeep Singh Puri on how togive land titles to nearly onethird of the Capital’s populationliving in unauthorised colonies.

The Centre formed thepanel in March and sought itsreport within 90 days. Puri onMonday tweeted: “I am delight-ed to announce that Hon’bleLG Shri Anil Baijal Ji has hand-ed over the report of the com-mittee to me today in the stip-ulated time frame of 90 days.We will now proceed for nec-essary approvals.”

Sources said theCommittee has suggestedtransfer of ownership on the

basis of categorisation ofcolonies. “It seems that theCentre is keen to implementthe recommendations ahead ofthe Assembly polls next year inDelhi,” sources added.

There are over 1,797 unau-thorised colonies in the nation-al Capital. Nearly 4 millionmigrant population living inthem play a vital role in decid-ing the fate of political partiesduring elections.

Apart from the L-G, thecommittee consisted of DDAVice-Chairperson, AdditionalSecretary of the Ministry ofHousing & Urban Affairs,Delhi Chief Secretary,Commissioners of East, North

and South Delhi municipalcorporations, Prof PSN Rao,who is chairperson of theDelhi Urban ArtsCommission, Prof SanjayGupta from the School ofPlanning & Architecture(SPA), Jagan Shah fromNational Institute of UrbanAffairs, GC Mishra, director,Delhi Fire Services, and DDAPrincipal Commissioner.

As per the regulations ofMarch 24, 2008 and subse-quent modifications, the DelhiGovernment had to play thelead role in identifying and car-rying out the Total StationSurvey (TSM), but it wasstopped in March 2018.

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Eight years after he prevent-ed cancer from dictating his

life choices, a tearful YuvrajSingh on Monday brought thecurtains down on a roller-coaster international career,the pinnacle of which was hisexploits in India’s 2011 WorldCup triumph.

Tall, willowy and ethereal,his unlimited talent and charis-ma made him a limited overslegend, but he will walk into thesunset feeling he has not doneenough in Tests.

“After 25 years, in andaround 22 yards, and afteralmost 17 years of internationalcricket on and off, I have decid-ed to move on. Cricket hasgiven me everything and is thereason why I stand here today,”the 37-year-old cricketer toldthe media in the extravagantinteriors of a star hotel thatquite resembled his flamboyantbatting.

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Ahigh level committee setup on the request of CM

Raghubar Das today gavegreen signal to the proposal ofempowering DeputyCommissioners and GramPanchayats for verification oflineage (family tree) of farm-ers for the purpose ofenabling them for getting thebenefits of Pradhan mantraKisan Samman Nidhi scheme.The decision is set to benefit25 lakh farmers in Jharkhand.

The CM today took partin the committee meetingand it was decided that forPMKSN scheme the basis offarmers’ selection will be theirlineage (family tree), whichwill be verified by the Gram

Panchayats and DeputyCommissioners of their dis-tricts. Union AgricultureMinister Narendra SinghTomar, Minister of State forFinance Anurag Thakur,

Union Agriculture SecretarySanjay Agrawal, Niti Ayogmember Professor RameshChandra, ResidentCommissioner, JharkhandMR Meena, Principal

Secretary to CM SK Barnwalalongwith others were presentin the meeting.

The CM also met UnionDefence Minister RajnathSingh, Health and FamilyWelfare Minister DrHarshvardhan, Women andChild Development andTextile Minister Smriti Iraniand greeted them on behalf ofthe people of Jharkhand.

In the meeting with UnionTextile Minister Smriti Irani itwas decided that foundationstone for the permanent cam-pus of NIFT will soon be laidin Jharkhand. Also, under theSamarth scheme of the

Central government centresfor skill development for tex-tile, handloom and handi-craft will be set up in the State.

The whole amount offunds for the purpose will begranted by the Central gov-ernment and these centreswill be apart from Centre’salready running skill devel-opment centres in the State.

The Chief Minister alsodiscussed in detail with UnionHealth Minister DrHarshvardhan as to how theState can achieve fast pace inthe health sector. He alsoasked for required help fromthe Centre on the matter.

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In a heart-rending road acci-dent on Monday early hours,

11 persons were killed and 25other suffered injuries after aspeeding double-decker busrammed into a truck followingbrake failure of the bus atNational Highway 2 inHazaribag district.

The incident occurred atDanua Ghati notorious for roadaccidents under Chouparanpolice station area on Mondayearly morning. According toHazaribag DeputyCommissioner, Ravi ShankarShukla, the accident occurredafter the bus rammed into atruck laden with iron bars mov-ing at slow speed followingbrake failure at NH 2 inChouparan area. The private busof Maharani Travels was on itsway from Ranchi to Gaya.

Shukla said, “I met one ofthe injured person admitted atgovernment hospital atHazaribag. He told me that thebus was running at high speed.The bus driver tried to controlit when he came to know that

the brakes of the vehicle werenot functioning, but it rammedinto the truck.”

Shukla further said, “Thecollision was so huge that thelower deck of bus got completelydamaged. The driver who toowas killed in the accident evenshouted that the brakes of thebus was not working alerting thepassengers that passengersshould save themselves, but thedriver failed to stop the bus asthere was no way to stop thespeeding bus.”

Nine persons died on thespot while two others suc-cumbed to injuries atChouparan hospital. The injuredhave been admitted at HazaribagSadar hospital, Chouparan hos-pital while others having minorinjuries were discharged after

providing first-aid. The DC alsoassured to provide compensa-tion as per government norms.

Nitin Kumar Singh, theSHO of Chouparan police sta-tion said, “The impact of colli-sion was so huge that largenumber of people from nearbyvillagers when they heard thescreams of people crying for helpassembled at the spot. The pas-sengers trapped in the bus wererescued by villagers and localpolice.”

Chief Minister RaghubarDas has expressed grief over theaccident. Meanwhile the StateGovernment has announced Rs1 lakh as compensation each forthe family members killed in theaccident and assured to providebest medical treatment to thoseundergoing treatment.

Former Chief MinisterHemant Soren too has expressedgrief over the accident. Hemattweeted: “Absolutely shockingand heart wrenching incident.Road safety & transport regula-tion in #Jharkhand should bereviewed urgently by @das-raghubar jee.”

As the news of the accidentspread large number of leadersvisited the spot. BJP MLANagendra Mahto, formerBagodar MLA Vinod KumarSingh and others too visited thespot.

Danua Ghati, the spotwhere accident occurred hasbeen declared as ‘Black Spot’because at least 100 people havedied in road accidents in last sixmonths.

A team of officials from dis-trict administration andNational Highway Authority ofIndia (NHAI) visited the spottrying to find out the reasonsmaking the spot accident pronearea. The spot where accidentoccurred has steep gradient dueto which speed of vehicle goesup.

Due to road accident, theNH 2 witnessed traffic jam withlong queues of vehicles strand-ed on both sides of road. Thelocal police had to face a toughtask in clearing the traffic.

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The rising level of mercuryhas also added to water

woes in Jamshedpur so muchthat the district administrationhas geared up to tackle thedrinking water crisis with anaction plan.

In order to redress thewater woes of the citizensduring the summer season,the East Singhbhum admin-istration is gearing up to pre-pare an action plan thatincludes repairing of handpumps, distribution of waterthrough tankers.

According to the infor-mation, the water problem ismore severe in the areas locat-ed at the tail-end of watersupply system and on thecity outskirts.

In order to end the waterwoes of the resident, the dis-trict administration hasdecided to distribute waterthrough tankers in the areasof Baghbera, Jugsalai ,Pursudih and Karandih,which are the worst-affected.

The district administra-tion expects that due to thescanty rainfall last year, moretube wells could dry up as thegroundwater recedes further.To ensure water supply in theaffected area, the public

health and engineeringdepartment will increase thewater tankertrips.

Moreover, the water reser-voirs of the city have not col-lected rainwater due to scantyrains. To deal with the situa-tion, the district administra-tion is getting ready with itsplan, which would be imple-mented when the water crisisintensifies in the next comingmonths.

A senior district officialsaid that said if the water cri-sis in the city increases, theywould increase the water sup-ply through tankers.

“It is really difficult timesfor us. The scorching heatalong with decreasing waterlevel has made life difficult forus. Long queues of womenstanding for waters at handpumps are regular feature,”said Yohesh Sharma, a resi-dent of Baghbera.

Now, as the water crisis is

looming large since the cityreceived scanty rain last year,the supply of water throughtankers would be increased byaround 30 lakh litres.

According to the districtadministration, water tankertrips daily will ensure thesupply of water in the slumareas of the city, where thewater crisis is looming largebecause the tube wells andhand pumps have dried up.

According to the infor-mation, the water problem ismore severe in the areas locat-ed at the tail-end of watersupply system and on thecity outskirts.

In order to end the waterwoes of the resident the dis-trict administration hasdecided to distribute waterthrough tankers in the areasof Baghbera, Jugsalai ,Pursudih and Karandih,which are the worst affectedareas.

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XLRI–Xavier School ofManagement on Monday

welcomed the new batch of stu-dents of the new academicsession of 2019 at a formal cer-emony of commencement. Atotal of 522 students joined theillustrious XLRI student fra-ternity, including the threeflagship programmes.

The new students werewelcomed at a solemn, inau-gural prayer service function atXLRI Campus in presence of allthe current students, facultyand staff members. The wel-come ceremony was addressedby Fr. P. M. Joseph Christie S.J.-new Director of XLRI in pres-ence of Dr. Ashis K Pani, Dean[Academics] and Fr. JerryCutinha, S.J, Dean[Administration & Finance] atXLRI.

Father P. M. JosephChristie S.J., Director, XLRIwelcomed the new batch of stu-dents. In his welcome address,he emphasised on the fourimportant hallmarks of Jesuiteducation. Elaborating on thefour themes, he said, “XLRI’ssuccessful growth over sevendecades has been guided bythese four important hallmarksof Jesuit education and we willcontinue to place a strongemphasis on them. The first

aspect being ‘Excellence’—tostrive continuously for the best,without getting easily satisfiedand without become compla-cent with our achievements; thesecond aspect being ‘Integritycoupled with Ethics’—whichdescribes the ethos of XLRI.One cannot achieve excellence,long-term success withoutintegrity & Ethics, both gohand in hand; the third aspectrelates to ‘Whole persongrowth in all quotients’—Growth of an individual acrossintellectual, social, emotionaland spiritual levels; and thefourth hallmark being ‘SocialConsciousness’-to be sensitiveto the needs of the less privi-leged around us.

“Excellence and Ethics areimportant elements of XLRI’sDNA and is passed on to everystudent of the institution. Oneof the goals of XLRI is to pro-duce women and men for oth-

ers, people with great sensitiv-ity to the needs of the poor andthe disadvantaged and the mar-ginalised. We need to be con-scious of the needs of theunderprivileged section of oursociety, in our decision makingas business leaders so that wecan work for inclusive andsustainable growth of India”, hefurther added.

The new students will betaken through a SpecialOrientation Programme drawnup by XLRI to update theirknowledge before regular class-es commence.

The first year students willalso be taken for XLRI’s com-pulsory Village ExposureProgramme and the OutboundAdventure Programme. Boththe programmes have beenspecially designed for the stu-dents to create awareness aboutthe realities rural India and fos-ter a sense of team spirit.

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Shocked over the death ofhis father, son ended his life

by hanging himself at hishouse at Gandhi Nagar underDhansar police station inDhanbad last night, policesaid.

The deceased MukeshAgarwal (32) was depressedafter the death of his fatherMahabir Agarwal. His fatherdied last Wednesday. Mukeshwas also reeling under acutefinancial crisis and irked overthe incident, Mukseh com-mitted suicide, said OC ofDhansar police station.

“Mukseh was working ina private firm at Dhanbad. Ataround 8 pm, Mukseh rushedto the house and went into hisroom straight and locked thedoor, said RK Agarwal, a rel-ative of the deceased. A fewhours later when I knocked onthe door, he did not open it.Later with the help of neigh-

bours, we broke the door,found Mukesh hanging fromthe ceiling,” he added.

Immediately, we rushedhim to the local hospitalwhere doctors declared himbrought dead, said Agarwal.

Following a series of inci-dents, Sangeeta Devi (wife ofthe deceased) also tried tocommit suicide. Whileattempting to commit sui-cide, she cut his veins (hands).Soon after the incident, shewas immediately rushed to thehospital where her conditionis said to be stable, said a fam-ily member.

Parents, neighbours andhis friends are in a state ofshock after a series of inci-dents. Police recovered thebody and sent for post-mortem. “A UD (unnaturalDeath) case has been regis-tered and we are investigatingthe matter,” said P Pandey in-charge of the local police sta-tion.

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Former students of LoyolaSchool of 1977 batch have

joined hands to launch 'Mast 77Legacy Trust' to contribute inthe field of social service.School’s alumni senior jour-nalist Kanchan Gupta, vicepresident Tata Steel SudhanshuPathak, Amresh Sinha, seniormanager, corporate communi-cations, Tata Steel along withother several former studentson Monday registered theirtrust.

“The former students ofthe school today are into cor-porate, leading doctors, scien-tists, businessmen. This is oursmall attempt to give back tothe city which has given us somuch,” said Gupta, while inter-acting with media at Centre forExcellence.

He said that they want toserve the society in whatever

way possible. Right fromempowering less privileged tospreading awareness, steps willbe taken in the society by thetrust. Recollecting memoriesfrom the past, he said that hisalma mater played a uniquerole in the success of the entirebatch. Most of the 1977 batch

students cracked engineeringand medical exams.

“Students from the batchare keen to lend a helpinghand and also catch up with oldschoolmates, ex-teachers andJesuits. We will soon come upwith projects,” said AmreshSinha, who is also trustee of the

trust.Talking about his experi-

ences in the field of media,Gupta said that authenticity ofthe news is very important asit has direct impact on the soci-ety. He said that social mediain the fast changing scenario ofnews world.

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Koderma DistrictAdministration has

launched “Koderma App” forthe first time by any district inthe State. The App can be eas-ily downloaded from GooglePlay Store. This App is a begin-ning towards going paperless.With the help of the applica-tion, the citizens of Kodermacan use the online medium anddo their work without invest-ing much time in office.

At present, the App con-sists of 13 different types ofschemes like MukhaymantriKrishi Aashrivad Yojana,Mukhaymantri Jan Samvad,Swachh Bharat Mission,Kodarma ElectionManagement, Ration Cardrelated, Prime Minister JanArogya Yojna, District News,Water Apps, Residence andCaste Certificate related infor-mation, Disaster Managementrelated, Education Department,

district website related infor-mation, Registration for meet-ing with the DeputyCommissioner are given inthe App. Through this apppeople can approach directly tothe Mukhaymantri Jan Samvadand can file any complaint. Inaddition to this, the App alsoimbibes information related toone of the State government'sambitious plans,Mukhaymantri KrishiAashrivad Yojana.

The App also has detailedinformation regarding plan D,the list of revenue workers andthe circle inspector, who arerelated to the scheme so thatmore and more farmers canbenefit from theMukhaymantri KrishiAashrivad Yojana.

A water App has been cre-ated to deal with the water cri-sis in the village and panchay-at of Koderma District. If incase any hand pump is dys-functional, any person can

record this via photographs andupload on the App. This willthen be repaired by the districtadministration within 72hours. About 20 complaintshave been received through thisapp and repair work has beeninitiated.

Keeping in mind the youth,education related informationis listed in the App. The districtadministration is conducting aSchool Chale Chalayen cam-paign in the whole district andthe detailed information aboutthe same is given in the app. Astudent or any other person,who is required to make resi-dential/caste certificates, canapply online through the App.

Apart from this, informa-tion related to the ration cardis also given in the app.Through this app, any personcan apply online for gettingration cards, which will beprovided by the district admin-istration at the earliest.

The App has a link to thedisaster App. If unpleasantincident happens in andaround the Koderma district, acomplaint can be lodgedthrough the App.

Appointments can also betaken through the App formeeting the DeputyCommissioner. In addition tothis information regardingSBM's "Chuppi Todo, SwasthyaRho" mission is available in thisapp. This includes cleanlinesscampaigns, awareness amongstwomen regarding menstrua-tion in different part of the dis-trict etc. Videos showcasingmenstruation hygiene andrelated issues for creatingawareness are also present inthe App.

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Jharkhand Government is allset to give a strong boost to

higher education in the Stateand has given nod to open anengineering college atChandenkiyari at Bokaro dis-trict. The district administra-tion handed over 20 acres ofland for construction of the col-lege building at Chandankiyari.With an estimated expenditureof �35.38 lakhs, an engineeringcollege is proposed atChandankiyari, while theGovernment has approved

�39.17 crore for engineeringcollege at Godda, informed anofficial.

A tender has been execut-ed by Jharkhand State BuildingConstruction Corporation; ten-der might be opened on July 2,he said.

Engineering college atBokaro is an eagerly awaiteddesire of the local residents,now soon to be fulfilled, saidAmar Bauri State Revenue andLand reforms Minister.

It will keep a check on themigration of the students. Weare at work so that construction

work could be completed on itsscheduled time. Hope acade-mic session might be startedfrom 2022, he said.

Notably, students are con-tinuously migrating out of theState in search of technicalcourses, which results in theloss of revenue to the State.

Meanwhile, a medical col-lege is also proposed at BokaroSteel City. Ministry of Steel hasalready been granted 25 acresof land near Biada Colony atSector 12 in Bokaro Steel Cityfor establishing a medical col-lege. On the directive of State

Government, the districtadministration has identifiedthe land for establishing aMedical College.

Then Bokaro DC RaiMahimapat Ray had written aletter to Bokaro Steel Plant(BSL) management in this con-cern on November 2016 andasked for earliest transfer for-malities for the aforesaid land.

Bokaro Steel Plant, whichruns a 910-bed Bokaro GeneralHospital (BGH), was keen onopening a medical college since2004-05; got MCI nod in theyear 2012 for establishing and

upgrading BGH as a medicalcollege after the needful veri-fication, later the managementinitiated the process to enterinto JV talk with several med-ical institutions like Chennaibased Sri Ram Chandra

Medical College, DY PatilMedical College Mumbai,Manipal Medical Collegeincluding others for setting upthe college. But talk delayedover stake tussle and projectwas hindered.

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More than 8 tonnes of illegalcoal have been seized by

police here on Monday lateevening. Coal smugglers weretotally taken in by surprise onMonday evening, when theInspector-cum-Officer-incharge, Umesh Kumar Thakuralong with other forces launcheda sudden raid on Jarandih rail-way siding. Some feel that thecoal smugglers had already gotwing of the impending raid.

Seeing the police partythe smugglers beat a hastyretreat, nearly 8 tonnes ofsteam coal was kept near buseswas recovered from the inten-

sive operation.while the Policesources said coal is carted onbicycle and others communi-cation and dumped in theJarandih residential colonyfrom where it is transported toother destinations.

With the sudden raidspanic seems to have spreadamong some of the illegaltraders in the locality.

Bokaro superintendent ofPolice P.Murogaon said heconveyed to all the officer-in–charges of all police stationsof the Bokaro that he will notallow illegal mining and hismovement against illegal min-ing of coal in Bokaro will con-tinue unabated.

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After Janta Dal United(JDU) deciding to contest

the upcoming Assembly elec-tions in four States ofJharkhand, Delhi, Haryana andJammu & Kashmir (J&K) on itsown, the JDU State unit hasstarted preparations for year-end Assembly elections. At theJDU national executive meet-ing in Patna on Sundaypresided by JDU national pres-ident and Bihar Chief MinisterNitish Kumar, the Central lead-ership asked its respective Statepresidents to start prepara-tions for elections after identi-fying the seats to contest in fourStates.

JDU Jharkhand unit pres-ident, Salkhan Murmu whoattended the national executivemeet talked about the prioritiesand challenges of JDU inJharkhand. He said, “Jharkhandsince its inception has seen alldifferent Governments. TheseGovernments at different peri-od of times have been directlyor indirectly supported by BJP,Congress, JMM, JVM andAJSU party. But all these par-ties who had tasted the powerhave failed to address people’sissues, especially those of trib-als and Moolvasis.”

Murmu further said, “Wewill go to people on this issueurging the people that theyhave seen successive govern-ments headed by differentpolitical parties, but all theseparties have failed to fulfill theaspirations of people. As theyhave given chances to all polit-ical parties they should at leastgive a chance to JDU too.”

The JDU State unit plans toreach out to people on Nitish’sdevelopment model and partypledge to protect Jal JungleJameen. Nitish Kumar has been

Chief Minister of Bihar sinceNovember 2005 till date. Onlyfor a brief period (May 2014 toJanuary 2015) Jitan RamManjhi was chief minister ofState, when Nitish resignedfrom his post taking moralresponsibility after facing defeatin Lok Sabha elections.However, in 2015 Assemblyelection he bounced back topower.

Nitish’s developmentmodel revolves around girlsand women empowerment,apart from keeping a tab on lawand order situation in State.

The JDU to strengthenedparty in Jharkhand has decid-ed to carry out membershipdrive which will be launched byJDU Jharkhand in-charge RamSewak Singh on June 16. Aspart of membership drive, theparty leaders will be given thetask to enroll at least six mem-bers from every village in Stateto party fold.

Similarly, the party will setup booth committees at all 81Assembly constituencies. TheAssembly in-charge will begiven the task of making boothcommittees.

The JDU’s strategy is tostrengthen the party in tribaldominated Assembly segmentsas in Lok Sabha election BJPperformance was not good.Out of five tribal Lok Sabhaseats, while the BJP lost two thethree seats which the Saffronparty won with slender mar-gin.

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Jharkhand UrbanInfrastructure Development

Company Limited (JUIDCO)proposed infrastructure devel-opment projects worth Rs.1850 crore to private investorsunder Public-PrivatePartnership (PPP) policyframework in a summit held ina hotel here on Monday. Underthe proposed plan, ISBT, busstations, and market complex-es are to be built in threeimportant cities – Ranchi,Dhanbad, and Jamshedpur.Investors from Ranchi andGujarat were present in thesummit.

A total of 5 bus terminalprojects are to be built inRanchi, Jamshedpur, andDhanbad. Ranchi is to get a

new bus station in Dubaliya,and the Khadgarha bus standwill be renovated under thenew proposal. Two new busterminals will be constructed inDhanbad, and one inJamshedpur. K VenkateshKumar, Vice President,Infrastructure DevelopmentCorporation (Karnataka)Limited (iDeCK) outlined theprojects, the total cost of whichis estimated to be around Rs.250 crores.

Four market complexes inJamshedpur are also to berevamped under the proposedplan. Varsha Pandey from IIDCLimited presented a back-ground to the dilapidated con-dition of the old market com-plexes in main areas of the city,like Sakchi, Bistupur, andGolmuri. A phase-wise devel-opment of the markets was

proposed, keeping in mind theamount of business to be affect-ed by the project.

Ameet Kumar, Director ofState Urban DevelopmentAgency (SUDA) highlightedthe salient features of PPP pol-icy to attract the investors pre-sent at the summit. He outlined

the obligations of the govern-ment under a PPP contract.“The government will facilitatethe developer in obtaining nec-essary project related approvalsand clearances along withensuring availability of projectsite for development,” he said.He remarked that State

Government is already suc-cessful in PPP in various sec-tors.

Urban Development andHousing DevelopmentMinister C.P Singh, who wasthe Chief Guest at the event,spoke about the necessity toattract private investment byguaranteeing returns to theinvestors. “The investor is nota social worker; they demandreturns for their investment.The government shouldapproach the investors accord-ingly, so that everybody bene-fits from the deal. Urban devel-opment is the responsibility ofthe government. I hope thissummit produces results,” hesaid. He also cited the exampleof the bus terminals con-structed under PPP in Baroda,Gujarat, and hoped the samefeat could be reproduced here.

Urban Development andHousing DevelopmentSecretary Ajoy Kumar Singhstressed on the importance ofsecuring private investment in

the urban development sector.“We have implemented manypolicies to attract privateinvestment, but this meet isequally important. All doubtsand suggestions are welcome.We’ll be preparing a draftinvestment policy after thismeet. Upon its approval fromthe ministry, we will streamlinethe ISBT plans before October.These new bus terminals willbe planned with on the lines ofour airports, and with a visionof the coming 40 years,” he said.

However, many investorsexpressed concerns regardingthe financial viability of theprojects, which was not out-lined properly in the variouspresentations. Issues of bank-ability were also raised byinvestors. Urban Developmentand Housing DevelopmentSecretary Ajoy Kumar Singhassured the investors that thefinance aspect of the projectswill be discussed thoroughlywith various banks’ represen-tatives at a later date.

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State Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) on Monday termed

Rghubar Government’s fourand half years tenure as gold-en period for the State, whileHemant Government’s 14month tenure as blot in the his-tory of the State.

Addressing a press meet onMonday State BJPSpokesperson Pratul Shahdeosaid that Raghubar govern-ment has done tremendousjob in development of the State.“With a view to realise resolu-tion of ‘Sabka Sath Sabka Vikas’the State government haslaunched numerous welfareprogrammes. The Governmenthas tried to uplift the weakestof the society along with devel-opment for all,” he added.

“Mukhyamantri KrisiAshirwad Yojna has proved a

boon for the farmers of theState. Through this schemethe State Government is direct-ly sending �5,000 to theaccounts of farmers. Thisamount is addition to theamount sending by the Stategovernment. The ChiefMinister Sukanya Yojana is aunique scheme for all rounddevelopment of daughters, inwhich initiatives have beentaken in the direction of pre-vention of marriage and earlymarriage. �5,000 at the birth ofgirl, �5,000 at the enteringtime in standard five in theschool, �5,000 at standard 10and if she is unmarried in 18years there is provision of�10,000 in her account,” saidShahdeo.

Lauding the StateGovernment’s developmentprogramme, Shahdeo said thatthe smart phone scheme for thefarmers, the traditional village

heads, the standard, the pro-motion of the Munda, thebeautification of Sarna MasanaHatgari, the arrangement ofstreet lights in every village,clean drinking water, pebble

block roads are landmarkworks by the government.

Informing on the initiativetaken by the State Governmentin the field of electricityShahdeo said that the con-

struction work of new grids,transmission lines and sub-stations is in final stage.“Concrete measures have beentaken in the 2,250 colonies ofprimitive tribes to sort outwater problem. Till Septemberwater will be provided,” headded.

“Apart from this, theGovernment has dedicated topeople the most beautiful Hajhouse in India. For the firsttime the Schedule TribeCommission and the BackwardClasses Finance DevelopmentCorporation were formed, pay-ment of insurance premiums ofthe farmers was ensured.Around 17 lakh women got selfemployment by gettingattached with Sakhi Mandal,formation of Tana BhagatCorporation, transfer of prop-erty up to �50 lakh in onerupee and reach of electricity inremote villages like Pesrar,

Gudri and Guru are notableachievements,” said Shahdeo.

He said to protect theState’s culture tradition, thegovernment has done a lot ofwork by making anti-conver-sion law.

Hitting hard on formergovernment led by HemantSoren, the BJP Spokespersonsaid that Hemant Governmentshould remember his tenure, inwhich there was no jobs, thegovernment fell on local poli-cy issue, sand mines were soldto businessmen of Mumbai,then State GovernmentMinister, Dadai Dubey hadtermed government as indus-try of transfer posting.“Talking on local policy is notgood for those who sent out-sider to Rajya Sabha.

This was the government,in which Hemant deputed out-siders on all important posts,”he added.

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For the first time in 12 years,after establishment of its

office in the State Capital,Reserve Bank of India (RBI) onMonday organised ‘RegionalMedia Workshop, to impartgood understanding of rationalbehind RBI’s policy decisionsand giving journalists broaderand better functioning of RBI’spolicy.

Addressing media person onthe occasion RBI ExecutiveDirector Surekha Marandi saidthat a bank account holdershould not reveal details of hisbank account to anybody notdisplay it anywhere because it ismain reason of hacking theaccount and fishing out moneyfrom the account.

“A certain level of compro-mise is main reason of bankaccount hacking and fishing outmoney from the account inIndia. Don’t rely even on yourclose relatives also like wife-hus-band, father-son-daughter thesecan also cause harm to youraccount. If someone becomevictim of fishing out money fromhis account by other sources only

because of his own fault or mis-take because he only knowsabout secrets of his accountnumber, pin number, card num-bers and others provided by thebanks, even bank officials don’tknow about it,” said Marandi.

Informing about the rea-son to organise the workshop,she said RBI organised theworkshop to meet media per-

son at regional level as itannounce its policy on nation-al level. “RBI form policies andimplement it but it can be exe-cuted through media and thisis the main reason to organisethe media workshop inregional places like Ranchi,”she added.

Speaking on the issue off inancial inclusion the

E x e c u t i v eDirector saidthat it is neces-sary to addpeople with for-mal bankingsystem becausethey can easilyprovide benefitof governmentrun pro-g r a m m e s .“Before 2006there was only10 to 15 percent populationof India haveaccess of banks.With a view to

provide benefits ofG o v e r n m e n t ’sprogramme thegovernment had

opened a large numbers ofnew branches and a largenumbers of people added withbanks. This effort of govern-ment has resulted in holisticgrowth of the country,” sheadded.

Numerous informationand basic ideas wereexchanged during the questionanswer hour of the workshop.

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In a bid to ensure that theman’s best friend doesn’t suf-

fer in the hands of people in theState, the Jharkhand AnimalWelfare Board has issued asocial information notice onSaturday keeping in mind thedog breeding and marketlicensing under provision ofprevention of cruelty to ani-mals.

A total amount of �5,000will be charged as the registra-tion fee from the dog breeders.Under the Act it is stated thatremission of the fee will be inthe form of demand draft. Thepermit will be viable for twoyears.

Chitranjan Kumar,Director of State AnimalHusbandry Department said,“The dog breeding and mar-keting law has certain bound-aries for the protection of ani-mals. Thus violation of theselimits may lead to certainsevere action that will be takenunder the Prevention ofCruelty of Animals Act.”

Kumr said that he has writ-ten to the DeputyCommissioners and theSuperintendents of Police of allthe districts of the State point-

ing out the mishaps with theAnimals in the trade market.His letter was to inform the twoabout the menace the unregis-tered traders have created.

The board has asked theDCs and SPs to get the detaileddata of all the Dog BoardTraders and Handlers in thecity. Kumar stated that thisunprofessional and unautho-rized breeding of dogs is pun-ishable. Stern steps should betaken by the officials on thesecases. If the permit is notowned by Dog Breedingtraders and pet owning Kennelslegal action is expected to beenacted.

Dr. Shivanand Kanshi,Veterinary Doctor of theBoard, said “The dog breedingand trading rules state thatthere are specific listed ages forbreeding. The count of the

breeding of abitch is once in ayear and fivetimes in a lifespan. This lawregulates thebreeding stylesan individualtrader uses forprofit, which isharmful for the

animal. There are even sever-al artificial techniques or surg-eries for breeding are bannedunder this law. ”

This non- registration ofBreeding Animal Traders is adirect act of forgery towards theanimal keepers. The permit willrestrict and put a stop to all theunprofessional ways of breed-ing and marketing.

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Radiologists acrossJharkhand will be on a

three day protest starting onMonday midnight for 72 hoursagainst the arrest of Dr. SeemaModi- a radiologist on May 28for allegedly conducting a sexdetermination test in her clin-ic in Koderma. The State unitof Indian Medical Association(IMA) was offended that noinquiry had been made beforethe arrest. The doctors decid-ed on Sunday that no ultra-sonography for pregnantwomen will be conducted inany private or Governmenthospital during this time.

The members of IMAKoderma, Ranchi andJharkhand met State HealthMinister, RamchandraChandravanshi and demandedan unbiased inquiry withinthe next three days. IMAJharkhand along withJharkhand Health Association,Federation of GynecologicalSociety of India- Jharkhandchapter want Modi to be

released immediately if proveninnocent.

“The decision of a strikewas taken by the radiologistsociety. We are putting pressureon the Government and wanta committee to be formed forthe inquiry. A message to theSecretary of Health Ministerhas been conveyed that if nosteps are taken in three days,then we will take drastic action.The problem is with ultra-sonography of pregnantwomen so we have not stoppedthe services for any general casebut only for pregnant ladies,”

said IMA Jharkhand President,Dr. Arun Kumar Singh.

A committee chaired byDr. Sanjay Kumar- DirectorIPH, Ranchi was to be formed.Other members included DrRakesh Dayal- technical advi-sor to the Director, HealthDirectorate, Dr Deepali- med-ical officer maternal healthNHN Ranchi and RafatFarzana- consultant PCPNDT,NHM Ranchi. The committeewas also directed to come to aconclusion in three day timeand present a copy of thejudgment to the department.

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On the occasion of‘International Yoga Day’ –

June 21, preparations for themain event at Prabhat TaraMaidan, Ranchi are in fullswing. This is in line with theexcitement among the peopleof the city to participate in theprogramme. More than 1,000people have registered onlineso far to perform yoga with PMNarendra Modi, who will bearriving on June 20 and will cel-ebrate the occasion with thepeople of Ranchi.

Ranchi DeputyCommissioner (DC), RaiMahimapat Ray chaired ameeting on Monday with theofficials at his office giving nec-essary instructions and essen-tial guidelines for its successful

execution.The DC instructed the

District Transport Officer(DTO) to arrange for 500 busesfor the participants performingon the occasion. The traffic SP,traffic DSP and DTO werealso asked to identify sitesaround the venue for parkingthe buses. They were also givenimportant guidelines for traf-fic management.

Director of AYUSH, Meera

Choudhary was given neces-sary instructions regarding thepreparations for the curtainraiser on June 13 at Raj Bhavan.

For those participating onInternational Yoga Day, passeswill be issued. The nodal offi-cers will issue the passesthrough their institutes, where-as those making an online reg-istration will be issued a sepa-rate pass. Ray also instructed toimprove the online system.

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With the aim of speedingup the developmental

schemes in the district,Palamu Commissioner ManojKumar Jha held a reviewmeeting with the officialshere on Monday.

In the meeting Jha toldthe officials that the benefitsof the schemes run by theCentral and State govern-ment must reach the last per-son, so al l of f icers andemployees should work withtheir full potentials.

Jha directed to the offi-cials that whatever directionshave been given by the ChiefMinister for the developmentof the villages, should becompleted.

He said that whoevercomes under the standardcreated for taking advantageof the scheme implementedby the Central and StateGovernment, be sure to givethem benefits.

He said that there is a lotof time for the development,in such a way, by workingtogether to achieve the timebound benefits by establishingmutual coordination.

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Luck eludes the massivesearch and rescue operation

mounted by the IAF to locatethe AN-32 aircraft, with 13 onboard, that is missing sinceMonday last week.

The plane went missingnear the Mechuka advancedlanding ground in ArunachalPradesh after taking off fromJorhat. Aircraft, helicopters,satellites and unmanned aerialvehicles (UAV) besides groundtroops patrolling the rugged anddensely forested mountainousarea where the plane was fearedto have crashed are workingrelentlessly but success evadesthe operation.

The IAF also announced areward of Rs 5 lakh to anyoneproviding information aboutthe location of the aircraft overthe week end. IAF Chief BSDhanoa visited Jorhat last weekto review the search efforts and

also met the families of miss-ing personnel. DefenceMinister Rajnath Singh hadalso met some of the familymembers in New Delhi somedays back and assured them ofall possible help.

As regards the search oper-ation, bad weather on Sundaydue to rains and low clouds didnot allow the two MI-17 heli-copters and four advancedlight helicopters to carry outlow level sorties over the areawhere the ill-fated AN-32 couldhave gone down. On Monday,the helicopters along with C-13J special operations planesbesides UAVs resumed theeffort but no sighting of theplane so far, officials said laterin the day.

In all two SU-30 fighterjets, two C-130Js, one longrange P-8 I reconnaissance air-craft and satellites of the IndianSpace Research Organisation(ISRO)are mapping the area forthe last seven days to find the

AN-32. The plane took offfrom Jorhat at 12.25 pm forMechuka and lost radio contactat about one pm. As the flyingtime is about 50 minutesbetween Jorhat and Mechuka is50 minutes and when the AN-32 failed to land at its destina-tion, the IAF launched thesearch operation. The distancebetween Jorhat and Mechukais206 km as the crow flies.

Located at an altitude ofnearly 6,000 feet, the Mechukaadvanced landing ground inWest Siang district is the life-line for troops stationed at theLine of Actual Control (LAC)facing China. The planes andhelicopters ferry personnel,

food and ammunition for thetroops and the landing groundis located about 30 kms fromthe LAC as the crow flies there-by making it strategicallyimportant for maintainingoperational readiness.

As regards the effort, offi-cials the area of search is moun-tainous and heavily forestedwith thick undergrowth. Theweather in the area has beeninclement with low clouds andrain during most hours.

Combined with the inhos-pitable terrain, the weather hasposed serious challenges to aer-ial search operations, they said.

Unable to the find the AN-32 in a triangular area near

Mecuka, the IAF has nowincreased the deployment of itshelicopters and transport air-craft and has expanded thesearch area significantly theysaid adding more and morearea is being covered by air-borne sensors and satellitesand the imaging is being fol-lowed up by close analysis ofthe data. Moreover, the IAF isregularly keeping the familiesof the missing personnelabreast of the rescue operation.

The AN-32 is a Russianorigin twin-engine turbopropaircraft and the IAF currentlyoperates about 100 planes.Incidentally, an AN-32 hadcrashed near Mechuka in 2009killing all 13 passengers. Thesame year India inked a 400-million dollar contract withUkraine for upgrading theentire fleet and 50 of them havebeen retrofitted. However, theill-fated AN-32 which wentmissing last week is notupgraded.

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Farmers’ welfare, drought,farm distress and trans-

forming agriculture with spe-cial emphasis of AgriculturalProduce Marketing CommitteeAct would be the main agendaof the first meeting of theNITI Aayog’s GoverningCouncil, chaired by PrimeMinister Narendra Modi.

The meeting will be held atCultural Centre, RashtrapatiBhawan, on June 15. Farmers’welfare has been at the top of theagenda of PM Modi during hissecond term. In his first cabinetmeeting, the Modi Governmenthad extended the PM-Kisanscheme to all farmers.

As per the agenda paper,Modi will discuss drought sit-uations in the country andrelief measures being taken upby the State Governments withChief Ministers of all States andUnion Territories. The Centrehas released Rs 4,714.28 croreto Maharashtra Rs 949.49 croreto Karnataka, Rs 900.4 crore toAndhra Pradesh, Rs 127.60crore to Gujarat as central assis-tance tackle drought situations.Chief Ministers of drought-hitStates will brief the PM andsteps being taken for it.

Chief Ministers and con-cerned officials of all States andUnion Territories (UTs) havebeen invited for the meeting.However, West Bengal chiefminister Mamata Banerjee hasalready refused to attend themeeting.

Sources said the primaryresponsibility of managingdrought, however, is with theState Governments. The role ofCentre is to help the States ineffective management of dis-asters and provide additionalresources in the form of food-grain or financial assistance tocombat the situation. As per theguidelines, State Governmentsare required to send weeklyreport on monsoon rains andits impact on agriculture fromMay 15 until the end of

September to MahalanobisNational Crop Forecast Centre(MNCFC), which has the man-date to prepare multiple-in-sea-son crop forecasts and assess-ments of drought situationusing state-of-the-art tech-niques and methodologies forselected major crops.

According to data, from theDrought Early Warning System(DEWS), a real-time droughtmonitoring platform, about 42per cent of India’s land area isfacing drought, with 6 per centexceptionally dry — four timesthe spatial extent of drought lastyear. Andhra Pradesh, Bihar,Gujarat, Jharkhand, Karnataka,Maharashtra, parts of theNorth-East, Rajasthan, TamilNadu and Telangana are theworst hit.

About 6 per cent of theland area of the country is cur-rently in the Exceptionally Drycategory, which is nearly fourtimes the 1.6 per cent area atthe same time last year. Thearea in Extremely andExceptionally dry categories is11 per cent of the entire coun-try, more than double the 5 percent area in March 2018.

While the CentralGovernment has not declareddrought anywhere so far, theState Governments of AndhraPradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka,

Maharashtra, Odisha andRajasthan have declared many oftheir districts as drought-hit. Theparts of the country facingdrought have been divided intosix categories-Exceptionally Dry,Extremely Dry, Severely Dry,Moderately Dry, AbnormallyDry and No Drought’.

During the Southwestmonsoon, between June 1,2018, and September 30, 2018,nine per cent deficit in rainfallwas recorded as compared tothe long period average (LPA)across the country. SouthernPeninsula and Northwest Indiahave received 98 per cent of theLPA, while the central Indiareceived 93 per cent of the LPA.However, East and NortheastIndia have received only 76 percent of the LPA.

To improve farmers’income, PM Modi will also dis-cuss on the transforming agri-culture-need for structuralreforms with special emphasisof Agricultural ProduceMarketing Committee Act asseveral states have not adopt-ed the Act. Officials of agri-culture ministry said that someStates and UTs either did notadopt APMC Act or revoked it.They include Bihar, Kerala,Manipur, Daman and Diu,Dadra and Nagar Haveli,Andaman and Nicobar.

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To give a fillip to the ongo-ing infrastructure sector,

the Centre is likely to rope inan adviser for asset monetisa-tion and offer attractiveschemes to the private players,make the vehicle scrappingpolicy more attractive besidesexpediting the land acquisitionprocess to create a network ofexpressways and highways dur-ing the next few years.

Road Transport andHighways Minister NitinGadkari said there are plans tomake the vehicle scrappingpolicy more attractive. “Weare planning to rope in anIndian expert with experiencein global economy for advisingNHAI on asset monetisation,”Gadkari said.

The adviser, apart fromasset monetisation, will guidethe NHAI on innovative waysto meet funding requirements.This comes in the wake of pastexperience where after thehuge success of the maidenbundle of nine highway pro-jects under TOT (toll, operateand transfer) totalling 681 kmsof roads in Andhra Pradeshand Gujarat in 2018 thatfetched NHAI Rs 9,681 crore,the second tranche of 586 kmswas cancelled in February 2019due to lukewarm response.

TOT is a model for mon-etising operational nationalhighway projects. The investormakes a lumpsum payment inreturn for long-term toll col-lection rights backed by asound tolling system. The con-cession period is 30 years.

While the Road Ministeralso announced that the Delhi-Meerut Expressway will befully completed in next twomonths, he said there are plansto take up work worth Rs 15lakh crore in the highwayssector over the next five years.

Gadkari added theGovernment will attract privateplayers into highways buildingand has already identified 3,000kms to be bid out under thebuild operate and transfer(BOT) mode. “For private sec-tor revival in highways building,we have identified 3,000 kms ofhighways that have 17,000 pcu(passenger car unit) traffic. Weplan to bid this out under BOTmode,” the Minister said.

On the vehicle scrappingpolicy, Gadkari said it would bemade more attractive with sug-gestions from the FinanceMinistry and the PMO. The

policy aims to pave the way formandatory scrapping of oldvehicles from April 1, 2020.

In May 2016, theGovernment had floated a draftVoluntary Vehicle FleetModernisation Programme (V-VMP) that proposed to take 28million decade-old vehicles offthe road. A committee of secre-taries (CoS) had recommendedto the ministry redesigning ofthe scheme for greater partici-pation of states with partialsupport from the Centre.

About other plans, theMinister said the land acquisi-tion process has been expedit-ed and it has seen a three-foldjump. “This will facilitate ourplans of fast-tracking projectsbesides building 22 greenexpressways,” he said.

There are also plans tocreate a highways grid on parwith the power grid.

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Former Civil AviationMinister and NCP leader

Praful Patel on Monday wasgrilled for eight long hours ashe appeared before theEnforcement Directorate (ED)in connection with a moneylaundering probe related tomulti-crore aviation scaminvolving irregularallotment of prof-itable routes to for-eign airlines to thedetriment of the national carrierAir India.

Patel appearedbefore the agencyon Monday and his statementwas recorded under thePrevention of MoneyLaundering Act (PMLA),sources said. Patel’s role comesunder the scanner following acriminal complaint registeredby the ED for alleged irregu-larities in allocation of airroutes for international air-lines that purportedly led tolosses for Air India.

Patel, a Rajya Sabha mem-ber, has also been named in arecent charge sheet filed by theED before a court as a personknown to alleged aviation lob-byist Deepak Talwar, arrestedby the Central agency earlier.

The Nationalist CongressParty (NCP) leader, who washeading the civil aviation min-istry between 2004 and 2011, isnot a named accused in thecase. ED had already ques-tioned a number of sus-pects/witnesses in the seniormanagement of Air India.

Patel was quizzed about thestatements and revelations

made by Talwar. TheED charge sheet in thecase named Talwar andclaimed that he was inregular touch withPatel. Talwar allegedlyfinalised various com-munications addressedto Patel on behalf of

Emirates and Air Arabia.Talwar obtained undue favoursfor the private airlines using hiscontacts, according to thecharge sheet.

The agency has also allegedthat Talwar was engaged in lob-bying with politicians, minis-ters, public servants and offi-cials in the civil aviation min-istry for Emirates, Air Arabiaand Qatar Airways in order tosecure undue benefits to theseairlines. “He (Talwar) illegallymanaged to secure favourabletraffic rights for these airlinesduring 2008-09 at the cost ofthe national carrier Air India,”the ED has alleged.

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The CPI(M) will mobilisethe Opposition to ensure

that Election Commissionersare appointed by a collegium-led by the President ratherthan by the Government.

Party general-secretarySitaram Yechury said the recentLok Sabha elections under-lined the need for far reachingelectoral reforms, adding theElection Commission couldnot implement its assurance toconduct “free and fair polls”.

“When the Right goesstrong, the Left has to go strongand that will be the new polar-isation in the country. SoftHindutva is not the answer tohardcore Hindutva and that iswhy Left is the only option,”Yechury argued. The CPI(M)will mobilise all willing sectionsof the political spectrum toensure that election commis-sioners are appointed by a col-legium-led by the President, hesaid. “We will mobilise theOpposition parties and seek tourgently reform the ElectionCommission so that it canplay an impartial role,” he said.

The decision was taken inthe preliminary review of the LokSabha elections in which the Leftparty identified four reasons ofBJP’s victory.

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France on Monday welcomed PrimeMinister Narendra Modi’s

proposal for a global conference totackle the threat of terrorism, sayingthe fight against terror is at the heartof its priorities.

Minister of State for Europe andForeign Affairs of France Jean BaptisteLemoyne made the remarks on thesidelines of an interaction with Indianalumni of French institutions in thefields of business administration,engineering and design here.

“Every single initiative to fight ter-rorism is welcome because it is a threatto every country in the world... So,everything that can be done to uniteefforts is welcome. It’s (terrorism) aglobal challenge like climate change.We will be closely looking at this ini-tiative,” he said.

“Fight against terrorism is at theheart of our priorities... France standsalongside India on this... And I can saythat we have strong relations on thisfront,” he said.

Lemoyne’s trip is the first Frenchministerial visit to India after theNarendra Modi Government assumedoffice for a second term.

The French Minister said thefirst Rafale fighter jet will land in Indiain September and it will be a strongsignal of Indo-French cooperation.

Thereafter, 35 Rafale jets will bedelivered one by one, he said.

On the controversy surroundingthe Rafale deal, he said, “The FrenchGovernment doesn’t care about con-troversies and we’ve a roadmap, wejust want to deliver. It’s in the inter-est of the two countries. Rafale is a toolfor better sovereignty for India.”

Replying to a query on anattempted break-in at the Indian AirForce’s Paris office, which is oversee-ing the procurement of the 36 Rafalefighter jets for India, last month, hesaid, “Investigation is going on. Indianauthorities will be updated when weget new details.”

Lemoyne on Monday meet UnionExternal Affairs Minister S Jaishankar,Urban Development MinisterHardeep Singh Puri and aConfederation of Indian Industrydelegation before returning to Francelate night.

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The Supreme Court on Monday agreedto hear on Tuesday the plea challeng-

ing the arrest of journalist PrashantKanojia, accused of making objectionablecomments against Uttar Pradesh ChiefMinister Yogi Adityanath on social media.

A vacation Bench comprising JusticesIndira Banerjee and Ajay Rastogi tooknote of the submission of lawyer NityaRamakrishnan, appearing for Kanojia’swife Jagisha Arora, that the plea neededurgent hearing as the arrest was “illegal”and “unconstitutional”.

Arora has filed a habeas corpuspetition (bring the person) challengingthe arrest of Kanojia and sought a direc-tion to the Uttar Pradesh Police to set himfree without any delay.

In the petition, filed through lawyerShadan Farasat, the wife of the vernacu-lar scribe has also sought initiation of thedepartmental action against the police-men, who were not in uniform, for arrest-ing Kanojia from Delhi for allegedly com-mitting “bailable offences”.

The plea has also sought “exemplarydamages” for Kanojia for his “illegalarrest”. “The Hindi journalist was uncer-emoniously taken away by men in civildress on June 8 from his Delhi residence.It transpires that on June 7, police offi-cials of Police Station Hazaratganj atLucknow had lodged an FIR against himunder sections 500 (criminal defamation)of the IPC and 66 of the InformationTechnology (IT) Act and both offences

are bailable,” the plea said. Police was bound to release Kanojia

in Delhi itself as per the provisions of theCode of Criminal Procedure as theoffences alleged were bailable, it said,adding that the accused should have beengranted bail on his arrest by police itself.

“No arrest memo was prepared andneither the petitioner nor her husbandwas told as to why he was being taken andwhy the ‘arresting officials’ were in civildress,” it said.

Two provisions — section 505 (state-ments conducing to public mischief) ofthe IPC and section 67 (Punishment forpublishing or transmitting obscene mate-rial in electronic form) of the IT Act —were added later as earlier the FIR con-tained only bailable offences, it said.These penal provisions prescribe maxi-mum sentences of two and three years jailterm respectively.

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As the niggles in variousState units continue, the

Punjab Congress seems to beheading for serious troublewith Navjot Singh Sidhu reach-ing out to the party top lead-ership complaining againstPunjab Chief MinisterAmarinder Singh.

Sidhu, who has been at warwith Amarinder Singh eversince he joined the grand oldparty after quitting BJP, metCongress chief Rahul Gandhiand submitted a private letter.Sidhu is yet to take over his newministry as assigned byAmarinder days after the latterdivested the former cricketer-turned-MLA of the cruciallocal Government department.

Sidhu took to social mediato share that he met his partychief and apprised him of the“situation” in the State. “Met theCongress president, handed

him my letter, appraised him ofthe situation,” Sidhu tweeted.Sidhu had made attempts tomeet Rahul Gandhi last weekafter he was divested of the localgovernment and tourism and

cultural affairs departments ina cabinet rejig. He was given thepower and new and renewableenergy sources portfolios.

Sidhu also posted a picturein which he seen along withRahul Gandhi, Congress gener-al secretary Priyanka GandhiVadra and senior leader AhmedPatel. Congress while is reelingunder deep crisis following theresignation of Rahul as partychief after the Lok Sabha deba-cle, it is also facing resentmentswithin in the state like Karnataka,Rajasthan and Madhya Pradeshputting the CongressGovernments survival at risk.

The developments cameafter Sidhu, who moved fromthe BJP to the Congress justbefore 2017 assembly polls,had skipped a cabinet meetingand instead chose to addressthe media at his official resi-dence on Thursday.

Tension betweenAmarinder Singh and Sidhu

had come out in the open lastmonth when the chief ministerhad blamed the cricketer-turned-politician’s “inept han-dling” of the local governmentdepartment for the “poor per-formance” of the Congress inthe urban areas in the LokSabha polls.

The chief minister had alsosaid the urban votebank hadbeen the backbone of theCongress in Punjab but Sidhu’s“failure” to do any developmentwork had impacted the party.After the ministry snub, Sidhuwas left out of eight consultativegroups formed by the ChiefMinister on Saturday to expe-dite implementation of the StateGovernment’s schemes.

Sidhu, however, onThursday, had said his depart-ment had been “singled outpublicly” while asserting that hecould not be taken for grantedas he had been a “performerthroughout”.

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Although Sonia Gandhi’s formida-ble personality holds the Congresstogether, the party is beginning toflounder in the absence of clari-ty on whether Rahul Gandhi’s res-

ignation has been withdrawn or accepted. TheWayanad MP offered to quit at the CongressWorking Committee (CWC) meeting on May25, taking full responsibility for the failure todislodge the Modi Government, and for theminiscule increase of eight seats from 2014(44 to 52); top party leaders rejected the res-ignation.

Over two weeks after the CWC meeting,the Congress remains clueless about the rea-sons for its debacle. While an aggrieved RahulGandhi felt that it was because other leadersdid not pick up his refrain of ‘Chowkidar chorhai’ to publicly indict the Prime Minister, thefact is that the Rafale deal failed to excite vot-ers even in States like Madhya Pradesh,Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan where the partyhad seized power only months ago. Unlike theBofors kickbacks scandal, Rafale lacks amoney trail leading to foreign bank accountsof people close to those in power, andseemed a desperate ploy to attract voter atten-tion. The Congress flopped because of thisnegative campaign; the rout could havebeen more severe if other leaders had pickedup this dud slogan. Gandhi’s basic incomescheme (Nyunatam Aay Yojana) was tooobtuse to be understood by party workers,who simply omitted to mention it in theirgrassroots campaigns.

The Congress’ woes have been aggravat-ed by Priyanka Vadra’s failure to deliver in east-ern Uttar Pradesh. The party won only RaeBareli and lost Amethi, even as the BharatiyaJanata Party (BJP) triumphed with 62 seatsand enhanced its vote share from 42.63 percent to 49.55 per cent. Clearly, Priyanka Vadracannot be deputed to succeed Rahul Gandhi.Whispers in the party question her failure toresign after the debacle; her arrogance inmooting a challenge to Prime Minister Modiin Varanasi has boomeranged badly.

The Congress is in crisis. Its recent vic-tories in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh andChhattisgarh are now being attributed tostrong and focussed local leaders who carriedconviction with voters. With Rahul Gandhirefusing to meet senior leaders, the leadershipvacuum is causing problems in the State units,and even at party headquarters in Delhi.

In Punjab, the Chief Minister has chas-tised the loud-mouthed Navjot Singh Sidhuwhom he holds responsible for the party’saverage performance, but Capt AmarinderSingh does not owe his status to the backingof the Congress high command. In Rajasthan,the party is in the throes of a meltdown, withsupporters of Chief Minister Ashok Gehlotand State unit chief Sachin Pilot in a blamegame. Dodging Rahul Gandhi’s accusationthat obsession with his son (Vaibhav) cost theparty in Rajasthan, Gehlot is asking Pilot totake responsibility for Vaibhav’s defeat.

In Madhya Pradesh, Chief Minister

Kamal Nath managed to ensurethe victory of his son, Nakul, butthat is the party’s sole victory.Understandably, supporters ofJyotiraditya Scindia are snappingat his heels, demanding thatScindia be made PradeshCongress Committee (PCC)chief in place of Kamal Nath.Growing demands for the strin-gent application of the ‘one-man-one-post’ norm in Statesruled by the Congress will inten-sify the infighting.

As of now, even office bear-ers at the central headquarters areat sea in the absence of clarity vis-à-vis Rahul Gandhi’s status. If thedirective of the Congress’ corecommittee to all PCC presi-dents to submit reports detailingthe reasons for the debacle ishonestly answered, it will onlyput further question marks onRahul Gandhi’s political acu-men.

Meanwhile, family loyalistand former Union Minister, MVeerappa Moily, has warned thatthe prevailing impasse will costthe party dearly. Urging RahulGandhi to “quell” the currentindiscipline, Moily said that if theCongress president is adamantabout quitting, he should handover the reins “to the right per-son, right hands”. But who couldthat be? With MallikarjunKharge defeated in Gulbarga(Karnataka), Congress’ cup ofsorrows is full.

Pointing out that theCongress has not split in the two

decades since Sonia Gandhiousted Sitaram Kesri in 1998,Moily stresses the importance ofshowing leadership at this stage,otherwise, the party could frag-ment. Aware of the stakes, theparty quickly elected SoniaGandhi as leader of the Congressparliamentary party on June 1this year. Observers say this pro-vides some space in which RahulGandhi can be persuaded to con-tinue as president, to stave off achallenge to the Gandhi family’spreeminence. As expected, theparliamentary party authorisedSonia Gandhi to nominate theleaders of the party in bothHouses. Ghulam Nabi Azad willlikely continue to hold the postin the Rajya Sabha.

However, to look ahead withcontinuity, the Congress needsRahul Gandhi to lead in the LokSabha, possibly also be Leader ofOpposition, should the Speakerextend this courtesy to theCongress, as it is only two seatsshort. At this critical juncture,party workers are not enthusedat the idea of being led byuncharismatic leaders like AKAntony or Ahmed Patel.

More seriously, realisationis dawning in many quartersthat Sonia Gandhi is too unwellto campaign again (she went toRae Bareli only to file hernomination), while RahulGandhi and Priyanka Vadra areindifferent vote-catchers. Thisis why the mother-daughterduo is totally averse to letting

the reins of the party slip fromfamily hands. Many aspira-tional leaders would have donethe math; unsurprisingly KamalNath took his son along whenhe paid a courtesy call on thePrime Minister.

To infuse morale in the rankand file, Sonia Gandhi put on herfighting face and attributed thedefeat to the BJP’s “unlimitedresources, ability to manipulatepublic opinion and the spread ofmischievous propaganda”.Batting fiercely for Rahul Gandhi,she lavished praise on him forrejuvenating the Congress organ-isation in many States and lead-ing it to victory in the MadhyaPradesh, Chhattisgarh, andRajasthan Assembly elections.She asserted that the Congresspresident had highlighted injus-tices against farmers, workers,traders and small businesses,youth, women and marginalisedsections of society and exposedmany misdeeds of theGovernment.

Now, however, the immedi-ate task for the Congress is toward off the challenge to its num-bers in the Rajya Sabha where theBJP will try to make gains in thecoming months by coordinatingwith non-BJP Opposition parties.But it cannot do anything with-out first resolving the RahulGandhi deadlock.

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

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Sir — Congress president RahulGandhi’s renewed attack onPrime Minister Narendra Modi,where he said that the latter’sLok Sabha election campaignwas filled with “lies, poison andhatred”, and that the Congressstood for truth, love and affec-tion, makes it clear that thegrand old party has failed to takelessons from the recent electoraldebacle.

As a matter of fact, Rahul’spre-poll election campaignswere marred by personal insin-uations. He failed to focus onshort or long-term policies thatcould benefit the people orstrengthen the democracy. Hisrepeated use of the ‘chowkidarchor hai’ remark, too, did notyield any dividend.

Even now, he has sought tocontinue with such a vile attack.As the Opposition party, theCongress must let the newGovernment begin work, whilemaintaining strict vigil over thedecisions taken by it. The partyneeds to be in tune with people’saspirations.

ShashankMumbai

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Sir — This refers to the editorial,“Welcome the rains” (June 10).Despite the devastation caused bythe rains year-after-year and nor-mal life coming to a standstill inflood-hit areas, the fact remainsthat we are fast losing our precious

natural resources due to unpre-paredness and thoughtlessness.

While it is not possible to pre-vent natural calamities, the inabil-ity to take preventive steps byputting in place an effective man-agement system is the cause ofhuman distress. No concrete mea-sures have yet been taken to tack-le the consequences of the recur-

ring calamity. Despite the multi-tude of problems faced due toscarcity of water, we look forwardto intense spells of rains so thatit brings relief from swelteringheat and copious waters toquench thirst and for other usesin daily life.

KR Srinivasan Chennai

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Sir — This refers to the report,“RaGa doubts PM’s ‘Kerala dearto me’ assertion” (June 10).Within less than just three weeksof the announcement of the gen-eral elections results in which theCongress under Rahul Gandhi’sleadership suffered resoundingdefeat at the hands of PrimeMinister Narendra Modi andhis party, the BJP, the Congresschief has resumed his pre-elec-tion malicious propaganda.

Clearly, Rahul has not learntany lessons. On the one hand, hefervently talks of love and respectfor his primary adversary, PrimeMinister Modi, and practices hug-diplomacy. On the other, in a hyp-ocritical display of deep hatred, heis indulging in a relentless cam-paign against Modi. He is unableto grasp an elementary fact that toovertake one’s opponent, what isneeded is better political agendaand a disciplined and dedicatedcadre and party machine.Unfortunately, he lacks both.

M RatanVia email

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India, a mega-biodiversity country with diverseclimate and natural habitats in the world, is thelast hope for the survival of several mega-mam-

mals, including big cats on planet Earth. Of theseven big cats — lion, tiger, jaguar, puma (moun-tain lion), common leopard, snow leopard andcheetah (hunting leopard), five were found inIndia. But one of them — hunting leopard —exterminated from the Indian sub-continent inthe early 1950s. Clouded leopard, a cat occurringin the north-east of India, is also considered a bigcat by some naturalists but it falls slightly shortof the minimum size of the big cat as its averageweight is just below 20 kg.

India’s wildlife richness is incomparable inthe world. It were the invaders, who brought aculture of reckless hunting, impacting the abun-dance of mega-mammals. According to officialrecords, over 80,000 tigers, more than 150,000leopards and 200,000 wolves were slaughteredbetween 1875 and 1925. About 300 lions werehunted around Delhi during 1957-58 a few yearsafter independence. All four big cats have dis-appeared from their previous habitats in Asia orare surviving in restricted habitats in small num-bers. But their story in India is different. Theirsurvival depends on their conservation here inIndia where they still have viable populationsdespite high human population.

The Asiatic lion, which had extensive distri-bution in West Asia to India, has a restricted pop-ulation in the Gir forests in Gujarat. They disap-peared from the northern and western parts ofthe country. At present, over two-thirds of theglobal population of the tiger is found in 17 Statesin India. The number of other sub-species of thetiger in other countries in Asia is very small andnone of them has over 500 individuals. Similarly,out of about 20,000 Asiatic leopards in about twoand half dozen countries in Asia at present, 15,000-16,000 individual leopards are estimated in Indiaalone. Status of snow leopard is not known butthere is no sign of any significant decline of itsnumber in high altitudes of the Himalayas.

Occasionally, scientists and conservationistsplayed the numbergame by providing populationfigures which suited to their academic greatness.Some of the figures quoted by naturalists andreferred in the scientific documents and papersare far from the truth. Hence, the history of thesebig cats needs to be renewed. For example, theNawab of Junagadh and some naturalists quot-ed about dozen remnant numbers of the Asiaticlion in the beginning of the 20th century. It hasalso been quoted in all scientific literature. If Asiaticlion’s number was one dozen in the first or sec-ond decade of the 20th century, then how couldit reach to 287 individuals in the first Asiatic lioncensus in 1936? Annual hunting records alsodenied the low figure. In fact, logically, the Asiaticlion population never dropped below 50 duringits entire history. Scientists and naturalists present-ed distorted and wrong history of this species. Thepresent number of over 600 lions, perhaps over700 as locals believe, is a healthy populationspreading in four districts, although the threatfrom epidemic disease is high due to increasedpredation on domestic livestock, dogs and domes-tic animal carcasses. Loss of habitats outside theProtected Areas is also a matter of concern. The

lion conservation landscape in Junagadh, Amreli,Gir-Somanath and Bhavnagar support about 1,300big cats (over 600 lions and over 650 leopards).The numbers suggest human-wildlife conflict isa matter of concern.

Future of the tiger also lies in India. Althoughits habitat and distribution shrunk in the coun-try, it is still found in about 90,000 sq km area in17 States. In the past, some naturalists quoted afigure of 40,000 individual tigers in India at thebeginning of the 20th century. This figure, too,has no scientific basis. After the declaration ofProject Tiger, the population of this big cat wasestimated over 1,800 individuals, which increasedconsistently and doubled in three decades. Areverse trend started due to massive poaching,after the success of its conservation. The cameraimage trap method for tiger counting in 2006quoted a population of 1,411 individual tigers inIndia. Naturalists played the numbergame again.They publicised a decline by half. There was over-reporting of the number of tigers by some Statesusing the pugmark method of counting, but thedecline was not as drastic as highlighted by non-field conservationists.

Undoubtedly, the disappearance of tigerfrom four reserves, including Panna and Sariska,was a conservation blunder. The hullaballoo thatfollowed resulted in the birth of National TigerConservation Authority. In 2006, tigers were nevercounted in Jharkhand, Sundarbans and North-East of India, Naxalite affected areas and also otherforests area where few nomadic tigers occurred.Also, only sub-adult and adult-tigers were count-ed and cubs below one and half years, which con-stitute about 30 to 35 per cent of the population,were not accounted.

The numbers were again wrongly put. If allthese are accounted logically, tiger population,including cubs, was not below 2,000 individualsin 2006. In 2014, the number of sub-adult andadult tiger was about 2,230 individuals, which wasabout 65 per cent of the global tiger population.

With cubs, the number was perhaps about2,800-2,900 individuals. Initial survey in 2018revealed that the number has gone up due to strictprotection measures India’s tiger habitats can sup-port about 3,000 individuals of sub-adult and adulttigers. With growing human and industrial pres-sure in the previous habitats and around the tigerreserves, protection of dispersing tiger is difficult.

Leopard, a versatile cat, has very high adap-tive capacity. Its population was never estimatedaccurately due to the concealing behaviour of thesmart cat. The surveys of this cat in different Statesreveal that about 15 per cent to 20 per cent leop-ards are found outside the national parks, wildlifesanctuaries and forests. The tea gardens, sugar-cane fields, ravines and agricultural fields havebecome habitats for the leopards. Expanding irri-gation network turned beneficial to this cat. In1964, EP Gee, a known wildlifer, quoted a figureof 6,000 to 7,000 leopards in India. He also men-tioned that the number was 10 times in the begin-ning of the 20th century. This figure is quoted inall scientific documents. However, even withadvanced technology, wildlife managers failed toestimate its accurate population. So, how coulda naturalist guess a population of 6,000-7,000 leop-ards in 1960s? Recently, a conservation organi-sation in collaboration with Karnataka ForestDepartment projected an unbelievable populationof 2,500 leopards in Karnataka. As per the recentreports, Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh andKarnataka each has an estimated leopard popu-lation of over 2,000 individuals. Gujarat andChhattisgarh each has over 1,000 leopards.Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Maharashtra,Tamil Nadu, Kerala, West Bengal and Odisha haveover 500 or nearly 1,000 leopards. Leopardoccurs in 29 States and one Union Territory andits present population is estimated about 15,000-16,000 in the country. Although leopard presenceis in over two and half dozen countries in Asia,none has above 1,000 of the species. Only Iran hasnearly 1,000. It is, thus, a matter of great pride that

about three-fourth of the total Asiatic leopard sur-vives in India.

Conservation achievements of these big catswere possible because wildlife conservation isdeep rooted in the Indian culture and tradition.Indian mythology, ancient art, literature, folklore, religion, rock edicts and scriptures, all pro-vide ample proof that wildlife enjoyed a privi-leged position in India’s ancient past. Kautilya’sArthashastra, a book written in the third cen-tury BCE, reveals the attention focussed onwildlife in the Mauryan period: Certain forestswere declared protected and called Abhayaranyalike the present day ‘sanctuary’. Heavy penal-ties, including capital punishment, were pre-scribed for offenders who entrapped or killedelephants, deer, bison, birds, or fish, amongother animals. Lord Mahavir Jain, GautamBuddha and Mahatma Gandhi always advocat-ed Ahimsa towards living creatures.

The ashrams of rishis, which were sites oflearning in the forests, were frequently visitedby the animals. The Vedas, the Ramayana andthe Mahabharata, the Upanishads, the Puranas,the Arthashastra and the Panchtantra areamong the many texts of ancient India that dealwith the influence of forests and wildlife onhuman society. Ashoka, the most powerful mon-archs, who put lions at the top of rock pillar, wasa staunch wildlife conservationist.

Another key factor for survival of carnivoresin India is never considered in analysis. About524 million livestock in India provide major foodto carnivores such as big cats, canines, hyena,small carnivores and raptors. Nearly half of thefood for lions comes from hunting of domesticanimals or their carcasses. Leopard is largelydependent on dogs, sheep, goats, poultry, otherdomestic animals and their carcasses. Thetigers also extract substantial food from livestockabundantly available around the Tiger Reserves.

(The writer is Member, National Board forWildlife)

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Undeniably, the ever-emergingrole of financial institutionshas stirred everyone in its own

way. It is discoursed widely that futurepositioning of India on the world mapwill somehow depend upon its prospec-tive digital stance. With the advent ofdigitalisation and financial inclusion,one more savings product namely, ‘pay-ments bank’, was announced by theReserve Bank of India (RBI). Despitethe obvious economic relevance of thisproduct, they are not able to break even.Why is it so?

Payments bank is nothing less thana deposit account, a micro-savingsproduct which allows one to securelystore money for a specific purpose orfor an unexpected event in one’s life. In

general, payments bank could facilitatemoney deposit of upto one lakh rupees,further offering remittance service,mobile payments, ATM/debit cardfacility and third-party fund transfer.

It excludes advancing loans or issu-ing credit cards. The sole purposebehind establishing payments bank isto harness technology to take a giantstep towards financial inclusion. Theidea is to propel the usage digitally withthe help of the facilitator (paymentsbank). The reach and penetration tocater to the marginalised sectionswould be the driving factor to decidethe success of payments bank using theelectronic medium.

India’s unbanked population stoodat 233 million in 2015 (PWC report).There are around 81 per cent wirelesssubscribers in India (TRAI, 2019).Urban wireless tele-density stood at155.48 per cent whereas rural tele-den-sity was at 59.15 per cent. Nearly 31 percent of the population uses smart-phones. Its penetration is projected togrow 34 per cent by 2020 (IAMAIreport, 2017). A smartphone is a cru-cial tool of internet diffusion, especial-ly in rural areas. Digital transactions are

expected to grow four times to 8,707crore by December 2021 (RBI report,2019). The RBI’s vision 2021 is focussedupon exceptional payment experienceand cash-lite society. This hints towardsa huge untapped market for paymentsbanks in rural India.

But payments banks have beenreporting huge losses despite similarefficacious initiatives like Safaricom M-Shwari in Kenya. Kenya’s CommercialBank of Africa partnered with a telco,Safaricom, to deliver M-Shwari, aproduct that among other things offersloans through the mobile channel

leveraging telco data for underwriting. Probably, granting micro-credit is

the differentiating factor. The valuedagent network proposition (M-Pesa)used by Kenyans is providing a lever-age effect due to their portability of con-verting cash to electronic money andvice-versa. M-Pesa agents include smallshops, gas stations, post offices and eventraditional bank branches. There aremore than 1,10,000 M-Pesa agents, 40times the number of bank ATMs inKenya. Going by the rule, the Indiancounterparts are not allowed to givecredit that has a trickling impact on

market penetration. All said and done, ‘saving’ is still

very much an afterthought. Until pay-ments bank offer micro-credit facility,they will not be of much help for theunbanked. A Financial InclusionInsights survey conducted byIntermedia, a research company, foundthat the biggest reason for opening asaving account in Kenyan-based pay-ments bank is due to an increase in cus-tomers’ loan limits.

The existing Indian model ofopening only bank accounts and pay-ing utility bills may remain insufficientto ensure long-run sustainability.Recently, Paytm tied-up with CitiBank for credit card facility. The suc-cess of this move, however, needs to beseen. Also, investing 75 per cent of sav-ings bank account money inGovernment securities and 25 per centin a current and fixed deposit of con-ventional commercial banks will notempower sustainable revenue sourcing.Thus, the current business model andsupplementary policy initiatives of theGovernment need a relook.

Last, in a country like India, it iscrucial for payments banks to do

aggressive branding and marketing oftheir product (especially in rural India)to spread awareness and change thedeep-rooted mindset. Where pay-ments banks could serve as the finan-cial service gateways to re-bundle a hostof innovative services.

One such wholesome combinationcould be a tie-up with MFIs. Forinstance, cross-selling water purifiers orLED bulbs, which not only address thechallenge of clean water in ruralareas/energy saving respectively but alsoextends the association beyond trans-actions. Farmers could leverage this ser-vice to connect with suppliers (for fer-tilisers, seeds and animal feeds), agron-omists, information services and evenoutlets to sell their harvest; unleashingthe true potential of payments bank inIndia. Payments bank need smart seg-mentation both at the geographical anddemographical levels to offer tailor-made products for the rural, theunbanked and the women.

(Megha Jain is Assistant Professorand Senior Research Scholar, DaulatRam College, Delhi, and Agnihotri isAssistant Professor, Lal Bahadur ShastriInstitute of Management, Delhi)

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The rupee surrendered all itsearly gains and closed 19

paise lower at 69.65 against theUS dollar Monday amidstrengthening of the green-back against Asian currenciesand rising crude oil prices.

At the interbank foreignexchange (forex), the domesticcurrency opened at 69.40 a dol-lar and gained further strengthto touch a high of 69.38 duringthe day.

The domestic currency,however, could not hold on tothe gains and fell to 69.68. The rupee finally settled at69.65 a dollar, down 19 paiseover its previous close.

The Indian unit had settledat 69.46 against the US dollarFriday.

“Indian rupee was unable tohold the morning gains amidhigher crude oil prices andstronger dollar against Asiancurrencies,” said V K Sharma,Head-PCG & Capital MarketStrategy, HDFC securities.

The dollar index, whichgauges the greenback’s strengthagainst a basket of six curren-cies, rose 0.34 per cent to96.87.

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Benchmark indices Sensexand Nifty logged gains for

a second straight session onMonday, mainly driven by ITstocks amid positive globalcues after the US took trade tar-iffs off the table against Mexico.

The BSE Sensex rose168.62 points, or 0.43 per cent,to close at 39,784.52; and theNSE Nifty gained 52.05 points,or 0.44 per cent, to settle at11,922.70.

However, concerns per-taining to liquidity situation inthe NBFC sector continued tohit overall market sentiments,pulling down financial stocksand benchmark indices.

Top gainers in the Sensexpack were TCS, Bharti Airtel,Infosys, Axis Bank, L&T, ITC,PowerGrid, HCL Tech andTata Steel, ending up to 2.39 percent.

On the other hand, YesBank, Tata Motors, Coal Indiaand ONGC were among thetop losers, falling up to 2.89 percent.

Sectorally, BSE teck,FMCG, telecom and consumerdurables indices were amongthe top gainers, rising up to1.61 per cent.

On the other hand, BSE oiland gas, energy, finance andbanking indices fell up to 1.20per cent.

Broader BSE midcap endedmarginally higher, while BSEsmallcap index ended in thered.

“The gains came on theback of positive global cues asinvestors concerns eased afterthe US and Mexico struck amigration deal last week toavert a tariff war. Sentimentswere further boosted after aweak US jobs data announcedFriday raised hopes of interestrate cuts by the FederalReserve,” said Deepak Jasani,Head - retail research, HDFCsecurities.

Last week, the ReserveBank issued a revised frame-work for resolving stressedassets by offering lenders a 30-day period to label an accountan NPA but has withdrawn allother resolution methods.

Concerned over stress inthe NBFC sector, RBI GovernorShaktikanta Das has said thereis a need to have a fresh look atthe regulation as well as super-vision, and the central bank willcome out with guidelines onliquidity risk managementframework shortly.

Globally, investors heaveda sigh of relief after USPresident Donald Trumppulled back from another tradewar by suspending tariffsagainst Mexico.

Tracking positive develop-ments on global front,Shanghai Composite Index set-tled 0.86 per cent higher, HangSeng rallied 2.27 per cent,Nikkei jumped 1.20 per centand Kospi gained 1.31 per cent

Bourses in Europe werealso trading higher in theirearly deals.

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The corporate affairs min-istry Monday filed fresh

applications at NCLT to debarDeloitte Haskins & Sells andBSR Associates, an arm ofKPMG RPT KPMG — who arethe auditors of IL&FS FinancialServices from auditing for fiveyears and also to appoint a newauditor for the crippled com-pany.

IL&FS Financial Services isof the 348 subsidiaries of thecrippled IL&FS group, whichowes more than Rs 95,000 croreto the lenders. The group got intotrouble after many of its sub-sidiaries began to default sincelast September and on October1 that year, the government hadsuspended its board and takenover the company.

The ministry moved itsapplications through its seniorcounsel Sanjay Shorey.

The ministry has alsomade Udayen Sen of Deloitte,and Kalpesh Mehta andSampath Ganesh of BSR asrespondents as they were thesignatories of the audit reportsof the company.

Shorey said the ministrymade them the respondents asthey as the auditors are requiredto certify the books of its clientsand would have the knowledgeof all financial information ofthe company and the also aboutthe alleged fraud, but failed toor chose not to report.

Deloitte was the financial

auditor for 2017-18, while BSRis still the auditor of the com-pany.

The ministry has alsomade the Reserve Bank, theSecurities and Exchange Boardand the Institute of CharteredAccountants as respondentsso that if such an order ispassed, they can execute thesame.

A two-member NCLTbench of VP Singh andRavikumar Duraisamy askedthe auditors to file their repliesby June 19 and posted the mat-ter for further hearing on June21.

Meanwhile, Ashakiran andAkansha, the wife and thedaughter of RC Bawa who wasone of the directors of theIL&FS group, said they were yetto get the contempt noticefrom the ministry for alleged-ly withdrawing money fromthe frozen bank accounts ofBawa. On this, the tribunaldirected the ministry to servenotice to them and kept thematter for June 21.

On April 26, the ministryhad sought to impleadAshakiran and Akansha,sayingthey were the beneficiaries ofthese funds.

The ministry informed thetribunal that Bawa withdrew/transferred �1 crore and �14lakh from Axis Bank accountsin two instances in violation ofthe December 3, 2018 order ofthe tribunal which had frozenthese accounts.

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Amajority of JaypeeInfratech’s lenders have

voted against NBCC’s bid butmost home buyers wanted thestate-owned company totakeover the debt-laden real-ty firm, sources said.

The development comeshours after the NationalCompany Law AppellateTribunal (NCLAT) clarifiedthat it has not barred lendersfrom voting against NBCC’sresolution plan.

While the exact percentageof votes in favour and againstthe NBCC’s takeover plan wasnot disclosed due to an insol-vency court order, sources saidthe bid possibly has not mus-tered the requisite nod of two-third of lenders and buyers.

The voting result is to beplaced before the NCLAT.

In most bankruptcy pro-ceedings, lenders have the rightto vote for or against a resolu-tion plan for a debt-laden firm.In the case of realty firms,home buyers also have votingrights at par with lenders.

As many as 13 banks andover 23,000 homebuyers havevoting rights in the Committeeof Creditors (CoC) of JaypeeInfratech. Homebuyers repre-sent nearly 60 per cent of vot-ing rights, while banks have therest. For approval of any reso-lution plan, at least 66 per centvotes should be in favour.

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In a major setback to thelenders’ revival/sale plan of

the grounded Jet Airways, twooperational creditors —Shaman Wheels and GaggarEnterprises — Monday movedthe NCLT seeking bankruptcyproceedings against the airline.

The tribunal issued noticesto Jet Airways and bankswhich own the airline now andposted the matter for furtherhearing on June 13 when it willdecide on admitting or reject-ing the bankruptcy pleas.

The development comes ata time when banks are lookingto resolve the once premier air-line’s debt issues outside theinsolvency process.

Jet Airways owes morethan �8,000 crore to a consor-tium of banks led by the StateBank of India, which now runthe airline, while it has a muchlarger debt pile by way ofaccumulated losses to the tuneof �13,000 crore and vendor

dues of over �10,000 crore andsalary dues of over �3,000crore.

The banks have appointedSBI Capital Markets as theinvestment banker to find aninvestor to scout an investor forthe company.

Bankers, after taking overthe airline late March hadinvited bids on April 8 to sellup to 75 percent stake in thecrippled carrier that formallystopped operations on April17.

Though it had receivedinitial bids from parites-Ethihad Airways, two privateequity players TPG Capitaland Indigo Partners, and thesovereign wealth fund NIIF,none of them chose to submitthe final bids.

Currently the bankers aretrying to stave off bankruptcyeven as media reports saidEtihad Airways, which alreadyowns 24 percent in the airline,has teamed up with theHindujas to buy the airline.

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China on Monday hopedthat President Xi Jinping

and Prime Minister NarendraModi would discuss theirrespective trade frictions withthe US and the two “goodfriends” could reach a con-sensus on opposing “tradeprotectionism” during theirvery important meeting duringthe SCO summit in Bishkekthis week.

This year’s summit of theShanghai CooperationOrganisation (SCO) will beheld in the Kyrgyz capital ofBishkek on June 13-14 whereModi and Xi are scheduled tomeet and discuss bilateral andinternational issues.

The meeting assumes sig-nificance as this is the firstmeeting between the two lead-ers after Modi-led BJP’s mas-sive victory in the recent elec-tions in India.

Xi had congratulated Modion his re-election through aletter on May 23.

“Once again we congratu-late Prime Minister Modi.President Xi and Prime

Minister Modi are goodfriends. They had very suc-cessful informal summit atWuhan last year,” Chinese ViceForeign Minister ZhangHanhui told a media briefinghere answering a question onthe Modi-Xi meeting.

He said the Wuhan sum-mit has provided strategicguidance for the developmentof India-China ties, pavingthe way for stable growth ofChina-India relations in thelong run.

The April 27-28 Wuhansummit between Modi and Xiwas largely credited to haveturned around the bilateralrelations soured by the 73-dayDoklam standoff in 2017, trig-gered by Chinese troops’attempt to build a road close tothe Indian border in an areaalso claimed by Bhutan.

After the Wuhan summit,both the countries stepped upefforts to improve relations indifferent spheres including themilitary-to-military ties.

When asked about theplanned Modi-Xi meeting onthe sidelines of the SCO sum-mit, Zhang said, “While the

details for the meeting areunder discussion, I believeevery bilateral meetingbetween President Xi andPrime Minister Modi is veryimportant. From the Chineseside, we will make good per-petrations for the success ofbilateral meeting.”

He also said the China-UStrade war and the “spectre” ofemerging trade frictionsbetween the US and Indiacould become important partof the discussions between thetwo leaders.

“Whether they will talkabout trade fictions betweenChina and the US and thespectre of trade frictionsbetween the US and India,such things are not surprising.I believe this could become animportant topic in his bilater-al meetings with the relatedleaders,” he said.

The two countries havebeen in an escalating conflictover trade for the past year.The scope of the battle hasexpanded in recent months asWashington has tightenedtrade restrictions on Chinesetelecom giant Huawei.

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Bharat Heavy ElectricalsLimited (BHEL) has won

three major orders in quicksuccession, for setting up SolarPhotovoltaic (SPV) PowerPlants totaling to 135 MW, onEngineering, Procurement andConstruction (EPC) basis, inMaharashtra and Gujarat.

Cumulatively valued atRs.520 Crore, the orders havebeen secured fromMaharashtra State PowerGeneration Company Ltd.,(MAHAGENCO), GujaratState Electricity CorporationLtd (GSECL) and GujaratNarmada Valley Fertilizers &Chemicals Ltd., (GNFC).

The order received fromMAHAGENCO envisages set-ting up a 50 MW SPV plant atKaudgaon, Dist. Osmanabad inMaharashtra. Notably, BHEL isalso associated withMaharashtra’s renewable ener-gy ventures with its SPV mod-ules being installed in the solar-isation of agricultural feeders.

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The verdict of a SpecialCourt in Pathankot on the

rape and murder of a eight-year-old girl last year in Kathuaconvicting six of the sevenaccused on Monday wasreceived with relief and satis-faction in the Kashmir Valley.

The widely reportedheinous crime against a minorgirl of the nomadic ‘Bakarwal’(Goatherd) community inRasana village of Hiranagararea had resulted in a public out-rage against the perpetrators.

The minor was abductedon January 10 and her muti-lated body was found in thebushes of the Rasana village onJanuary 17.

According to the

chargesheet, the girl was kid-napped and held captive at avillage temple in Kathua dis-trict on January 10 last year.

The 15-page chargesheetagainst the accused alsosaidthat the eight-year-old wasraped in captivity in a small vil-lage temple in Kathua districtafter having been sedated forfour days before she was blud-geoned to death.

She was drugged, starvedand repeatedly raped for days.She was finally strangled andher head was bashed in with arock. Her mutilated body wasfound in a forest area onJanuary 17. Three days later,one of the accused — report-edly a juvenile — was arrestedby police, the chargesheet said.

An ugly dimension was

added to the demand forexemplary punishment for theguilty when two BJP leaders,Choudhary Lal Singh andChandar Prakash Ganga, whowere ministers at that time inthe ruling PDP-BJP coalition,stood up in support of theaccused trying to polarise theHindu dominated Jammuregion and the Muslim domi-nated Valley.

Subsequently, these twoBJP Ministers were droppedfrom the Council of Ministersheaded by the then ChiefMinister Mehbooba Mufti.

It was because of the senti-ments stoked by supporters ofthe accused that the prosecutionwas prevented from presentingthe chargesheet against theaccused in the Kathua court.

The Supreme Court thenordered that the trial of thecase be shifted to Pathankotand directed the trial court tohear the case in camera on adaily basis.

Former Chief MinistersOmar Abdullah andMehbooba Mufti received thejudgment with relief and asvindication of the country’sjudicial system.

“Amen to that. The guiltydeserve the most severe pun-ishment possible under law.And to those politicians whodefended the accused, vilifiedthe victim and threatened thelegal system no words of con-demnation are enough,”Abdullah tweeted.

Mufti too welcomed thejudgment. “High time we stop

playing politics over a heinouscrime where an 8-year-oldchild was drugged, rapedrepeatedly and then blud-geoned to death.

“Hope loopholes in ourjudicial system are not exploit-ed and culprits get exemplarypunishment.”

Senior separatist leader,Mirwaiz Umar Farooq alsowelcomed the judgment. Hetweeted: “Welcome the courtverdict on the Kathua gangrape-murder case. I hope thatexemplary punishment is givento the culprits.”

People in Kashmir saidthat it was ultimately the truththat has prevailed and thejudgment by the trial court hasproved that nobody is abovethe law.

“If anybody had any mis-givings about the delivery ofjustice in this case, those mis-givings have been set to restfinally,” said Suhail Mir, a locallawyer.

Mehrajuddin, a fruit sell-er in Srinagar said, “The peo-ple who can even think of sucha heinous crime have no reli-gion. Justice has finally beendelivered to the innocent vic-tim in this case”.

Others felt that exemplarypunishment to perpetrators ofsuch crimes would go a longway in preventing their recur-rence. “Making an example ofthe guilty will ensure that ourdaughters are safe to whatev-er region or religion theybelong to,” said Bashir Ahmad,a retired bank employee.

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Union Minister VK Singhhailed the court verdict in

the Kathua rape-and-murdercase on Monday and said itgave hope that such brutalitieswould not go punished.

He also stressed on theneed to educate boys on how totreat and respect women.

“Guilty from #Kathua rape-

murder case are convicted-itgives me hope that such bru-talities will not go unpunished.But it also makes me think ofour collective consciousnessas a society-why should Kathuaor Aligarh happen? Need toeducate our boys on how totreat & respect women,” theMinister of State for RoadTransport and Highways saidin a tweet.

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Holding that perpetrators ofthe gangrape and murder

of a girl in Kathua acted as ifthere is a “law of jungle” preva-lent in the society, judgeTejwinder Singh summed upthe enormity of the crime witha touching couplet by MirzaGhalib which says that huntershad placed the net near a nestand the young one was caughtbefore it could take its first flight.

In his judgment after hear-ing arguments from both sidesfor 367 days, Singh sentencedthree accused to life imprison-ment for criminal conspiracyand murder and three more tofive years in jail for destructionof evidence. One accused wasacquitted.

Singh started his orderwith the couplet from Ghalib’s ghazal — “Pinha thadaam-e-sakht qareeb ashiyaanke, udhne hi nahi paye the kigirftar hum hue”.

Also cited by the SupremeCourt in a 2011 case of murderof a sex worker in West Bengal,

the couplet poignantlysummed up the Kathua casewhich shook the conscience ofthe nation.

Singh said the coupletapplies squarely to the facts ofthe present case.

“An unfortunate kidnap-ping, drugging, wrongful con-finement, rape and murder ofan eight-year-old girl has set thecriminal law into motion andhave put the accused personsunder ‘Sword of Damocles’ fora fair trial,” he said.

After an in-camera trialwhich was held out of mediagaze as per instructions of the

Supreme Court, Singh deliv-ered his judgment on Monday.Sanji Ram, the mastermindand caretaker of the ‘dev-asthanam’ (temple) where thecrime took place in January lastyear, Deepak Khajuria, aSpecial Police Officer, andParvesh Kumar, a civilian —the three main accused —were given life term.

Three police officers weresentenced to five-year impris-onment for cover up anddestruction of evidence whileRam’s son Vishal was acquitted.

“In the present case, factsare many but truth is one that

under a criminal conspiracy, aninnocent eight-year-old minorgirl has been kidnapped,wrongfully confined, drugged,raped and ultimately mur-dered. The perpetrators of thiscrime have acted in such amanner as if there is a ‘law ofjungle’ prevalent in the society,”Singh said.

The 15-page charge sheetfiled in April last year said thegirl was kidnapped on January10 that year and was raped incaptivity in a small village tem-ple, exclusively manned byRam, after keeping her sedat-ed for four days. She was laterbludgeoned to death, it said.

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Prosecution lawyers in theKathua gangrape-and-mur-

der case were heckled outsidethe court premises by the fam-ily members of the six men con-victed on Monday for the ghast-ly crime. Harminder Singh andBhupinder Singh, the lawyers forthe Jammu & Kashmir CID whosecured justice for the eight-year-old girl, faced visibly agi-tated kin of the accused whohurled abuses at them as theycame out from the court ofPathankot District and SessionsJudge Tejwinder Singh.

The Punjab Police came totheir rescue, pushing the crowdaside so that the lawyers couldleave safely.

After a trial lasting 367days, the court sentenced to lifeimprisonment the three mainaccused while it awarded fiveyears in jail to three others fordestruction of evidence.

The court complex washeavily fortified as the statepolice and its special units threwa strong security ring, antici-pating incidents of violence andprotests, which have been aregular feature in this sensitivecase which took political colour.

Relatives of the mainaccused Sanji Ram, the care-

taker of the devsthanam (tem-ple) where the crime took place,and special police officerDeepak Khajuria collapsed inthe court complex as they heardthe verdict. According to eye-witness accounts from inside thecourtroom, where media wasbarred, Ram and Khajuria werevisibly shaken after hearing thejudgment. The crime branch ofJ&K Police had filed thechargesheet against eight per-sons, including a juvenile.

According to the 15-pagechargesheet filed in April lastyear, the girl was kidnapped onJanuary 10, 2018, and was rapedin captivity in a small villagetemple, exclusively manned byRam, after having been keptsedated for four days. She waslater bludgeoned to death.

The day-to-day trial com-menced in the first week of Junelast year at the District andSessions court in Pathankot inthe neighbouring state ofPunjab, about 100 km fromJammu and 30 km from Kathua,after the Supreme Court orderedon May 7, 2018 that the case beshifted out of Jammu &Kashmir. The apex court ordercame after lawyers in Kathuaprevented Crime Branch offi-cials from filing a chargesheet inthe sensational case.

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The father of the eight-year-old nomadic girl, who was

gangraped and murdered inJammu & Kashmir’s Kathua,welcomed the Monday judg-ment convicting six men in thecase, but said his family wasexpecting that the culprits wouldbe handed down death penalty.

He also expressed unhappi-ness over the acquittal of the sev-enth accused. The court sen-tenced three men including atemple caretaker to life impris-onment till last breath after con-victing them along with three

others for the ghastly crime thatshook the nation 17 months ago.

“We were expecting thatthey (culprits) will be hanged forthe heinous crime which theyhave committed with my daugh-ter,” Mohammad Akhtar, bio-logical father of the minor, toldPTI over phone from the upperreaches of Verinag in Anantnagdistrict of South Kashmir. Thefamily is presently on bi-annu-al migration in search of green-er pastures in the Valley.

Reacting to the judgment,he said they were surprisedover the acquittal of one of themain accused, Vishal, by the

court. “I have been hearing allalong that he is one of the mainculprits, then why was hereleased,” he asked.

However, he quickly addedit is the “will of God and whatcan we do”. On fast track trial ofthe case, he said, “We were ear-lier told that we will get justicewithin 90 days. “After waiting forall these months, we were hop-ing that the culprits behind theincident will meet the same fate(death)... We welcome the judg-ment but are not unable to cometo terms with one of the accusedbeing set free.”

Sanji Ram, mastermind

and caretaker of ‘devasthanam’(temple) where the crime tookplace in January last year,Deepak Khajuria, a SpecialPolice Officer, and ParveshKumar, a civilian — the threemain accused — were spareddeath penalty, a punishmentsought by the prosecution dur-ing the year-long in-cameratrial in the court of judgeTejwinder Singh here. Threeothers were given five yearsimprisonment for destructionof evidence. The court acquit-ted the seventh accused VishalJangotra, son of Sanji Ram, giv-ing him the ‘benefit of doubt’.

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The Congress welcomed thecourt verdict in the Kathua

rape-and-murder case onMonday and hoped that thevictim’s family would be able to“find justice” in it.

A court in Punjab’sPathankot sentenced the threemain accused in the gangrape-and-murder case of an eight-year-old nomadic girl inJammu &Kashmir’s Kathua tolife imprisonment on Monday,while awarding a five-year jailterm to three others fordestruction of evidence. “Wewelcome the High Court’sjudgment in the Kathua rape &murder case (sic),” theCongress wrote on its Twitterhandle, adding that it hopedthat through the verdict, thegirl’s family could “find justice”.

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Like his character, Fails is athird-generation SanFranciscan whose family

lost their home in a once-flour-ishing African American neigh-borhood called ‘the Harlem of theWest’. His relatives scattered ashousing prices skyrocketed andhe struggles to get by in a citythat’s not as black as the one hegrew up in.

“It’s often like you’re the lastBlack man in the restaurant, thelast Black man in the barbershop,” Fails, 24, says. “SanFrancisco feels like a woman thatyou loved that doesn’t love youback, that you’re trying to getback.”

In The Last Black Man in SanFrancisco, a 2019 Sundancefavourite that opened nationallyrecently, Fails is a skateboarderand home caregiver who crash-es at night in his best friendMont’s room at his grandfather’shouse in San Francisco.

All the while, Jimmie dreamsof reclaiming the grand Victorianhome he says his grandfatherbuilt in the Fillmore District,before his father lost the home todrugs.

Black people once migratedto San Francisco, drawn by itsreputation for tolerance. But thecity shed nearly 3,000 low-income black households, a 17per cent, decrease, between 2000and 2015, according to a reportby the Urban displacement pro-ject at the University ofCalifornia, Berkeley. Many weredriven out by rising costs and re-development.

It’s a decline seen in othermajor US cities. The AfricanAmerican populations in NewYork City, Los Angeles andChicago have shrunk since 2000and Washington, DC is no longera Black-majority city.

The film won a Sundancedirecting award for Fails’ child-hood friend and collaborator, JoeTalbot. It features another SanFrancisco native, Danny Glover,as Mont’s grandfather.

Talbot, who is white, says ithas become that much harder tomake ends meet, even in the fiveyears they’ve taken to make thefilm.

San Francisco companiesLyft, Uber and Pinterest havegone public this year, driving upfears that masses of millennialmillionaires will take up all thecity’s already scarce housing.Themedian sales price of a house was$1.4 million and the medianrent for a one-bedroom wasnearly $3,700 in April, accordingto analytics firm CoreLogic and

listing site Zumper. Meanwhile,the city’s one-night count ofhomeless increased 17 per cent intwo years.

“I have friends that workthree jobs to get by in the shad-ows of the bigger industries, thebig money makers here,” saidTalbot, 28.

San Francisco never had alarge African American popula-tion, hitting its peak of 95,000 inthe 1970 US Census, or 13 percent. That figure tumbled to 11per cent in 1990 and then to justunder 8 per cent in 2000.

A recent estimate has theBlack population at a smidge overfive per cent, the US Censusbureau’s American communitysurvey reports. Moreover, theUrban displacement projectreports San Francisco lost peopleacross all racial groups in the lowto middle income groups, gain-ing only in the extremely poorand high-income households.

“All of our concerns aboutSan Francisco becoming a superexclusionary place have cometrue,” said the project’s director,Miriam Zuk. Other Bay areacities have shed black residents ashousing costs rise. AfricanAmericans made up nearly half ofOakland, birthplace of the Blackpanther party , through the 1980sand part of the 1990s. They are

only a quarter of residents today.African Americans started

moving to San Francisco in the19th century, drawn by its repu-tation for tolerance, writes AlbertS. Broussard in ‘Black SanFrancisco’. Among those wasWilliam Alexander Leidesdorff,who came to San Francisco beforeit was called San Francisco andserved on its first town council.

Migration ramped up in the1940s when wartime work luredblack people from the South.They moved into homes in theFillmore vacated by JapaneseAmericans who were incarcerat-ed by the US government.

The ‘Harlem of the West’flourished with nightclubs,churches and shops catering toAfrican Americans.

But waves of redevelopmentsapped the neighborhood andresidents left.Virginia Smyly, aboard member of the SanFrancisco African American his-torical and cultural society, saysit’s been difficult for AfricanAmericans to hold on to the fewhomes they were allowed to pur-chase in the city. Children andgrandchildren inherited familyhomes in the 1980s and 1990s,she said, but sold the property orlost the homes as unable to keepup with taxes and mortgages.

“Vanishing blacks are only

part of the story. It’s not justAfrican Americans who havedisappeared. It’s the workingclass people who were in manu-facturing and in some servicejobs that don’t exist any longer,”she says.

In the film, Jimmie regular-ly sneaks over to the Victorian totend to the yard and touch uppainting. When the White peo-ple who live there move out, hemoves in and marvels that he hasa home in which to read a news-paper. He’s crushed when thehouse hits the market at an esti-mated $4 million and pleadswith a lender at one point for apredatory loan. “That’s not yourold house and that’s not yourneighborhood,” his father says.

“We built these ships,dredged these canals in the SanFrancisco they never knew exist-ed,” says Mont’s grandfather.“This is our home.”

The making of the film is acelebration of an older SanFrancisco, says Talbot, one wherekids from different schools andbackgrounds becamefriends.They released a concepttrailer to raise money and wereinundated with offers from artistswanting to help.

“There was a lot of love thatgot pumped into this,” he said.

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He has made everyone fromShah Rukh Khan to MadhuriDixit to Abhishek andAishwarya Rai Bacchan dance

to his tunes. But then Shiamak Davar isa legend in his own right. Recently, healong with his troop performed inPune to celebrate 25 years of his work-shop, Summer Funk. The ace choreog-rapher believes that dance is a waythrough which positive energy can betransformed. It improves social commu-nication and helps in building concen-tration level, self-determination andteam spirit. “People learn in groupswhen they join my classes. This encour-ages them to build a sense of team spir-it and also proves to be conducive inovercoming their hesitation,” says Davar.

The trained ballet dancer, who hasbeen awarded for his choreography inthe Tom Cruise-starrer MissionImpossible - Ghost Protocol, finds inspi-ration in everything be it music beats,books, noise, nature, animals, silence.He feels that each piece of music com-municates, which he translates intodance movements. Davar adds, “Mybasic principle is to build a platformwhere anyone can express themselvesthrough movements, without beingjudged. That’s what my team tries topursue globally through our danceworkshops.”

This year’s annual show of SummerFunk gives an overview of a dancer’sjourney including his struggles, spiritu-al connections, and the way to appealto people through the various danceperformances. Many celebrities includ-ing Bachchan couple along with theirdaughter Aaradhya, Vanita and OmungKumar, Ruslaan Mumtaz, Meghna GhaiPuri attended the workshop.

Davar enjoys choreographingwhether it’s with Bollywood or with

ordinary people. But he always prefersstages over films since dancing onstage is live and natural while films haveretakes. He feels ‘agile’ while perform-ing on the stage. Everything is contin-uous while performing and it receivesinstant reactions from audiences.“Whether one is Shahrukh Khan or anyother regular human, everyone learns onstage. I treat each and every individualthe similar way. It offers a sense of sat-isfaction which can’t be expressed inwords. I have seen elderly people per-forming on stage or even those who arewheelchair-bound. Dance actually canrejuvenate anyone’s soul,” says the pro-foundly spiritual choreographer.

According to Davar, his spiritualguru — Bhavnagris holds a special placein his life. It was his spiritual guide whoinfluenced him to embrace the powerof art through dance. From him, Davarlearnt that money can only bring tem-porary happiness. He shares, “My mainaim is to serve people by helping themto reach the level of contentment thateveryone is looking for today.” But dotoday’s youth understand this deep phi-losophy? He continues, “I make sure toconduct prayer meetings before and atthe end of each class. This helps in com-bining discipline with fun, which thendirects them towards attaining deeperstrength. This is deliberately reflected inmy choreography as well. During thisprocess, it doesn’t bother, if I’m gener-ating money through this or not.”

The trained classical and westerndancer believes that Bollywood hasmodified itself to the changing trendsin music. Whether it was influenced bythe era of Rock n Roll, Disco, jazz, pop,and more recently Hip-hop, the hindifilm industry has transformed with thepassage of time. But, he thinks that theessence of Indian classical dance cul-

tures has its own prominence, which cannever be replaced by any other style.

So which style holds primacy in thehindi film industry? “One should knowhow to balance everything. For perioddramas, there is a strong classical influ-ence, which was seen in the recentrelease Kalank. It basically depends onthe requirement of the song that definesthe dance style,” says the 57-year-old, whois known for his charming smile.

Even the music industry is combin-ing popular hits from the yesteryears innew forms with new beats.

Having choreographed several bigstars in films like Dil to Pagal hai, Taal,Bunty aur Babli and Dhoom 2, Davarexpresses his opinion on changes in thefilms that have taken place. “Now, the

demand for more varieties of danceforms has emerged. Songs have becomemore lyrical. Dancing around trees wasa way to Express a sense of romance ear-lier, rather than interpreting emotions,”Davar says.

Davar is amazed to see a lot of peo-ple take up dancing as a career nowadaysespecially since the majority are acknowl-edging it as a serious commitment.“There are people choosing to be danceinstructors, choreographers, perform-ers or an entrepreneurs in the field of arts.It’s fascinating to observe how it hasimpacted a positive change in their lives,not just physically but also mentally andemotionally. Arts and culture have nowbecome tremendously popular and peo-ple so not hesitate to pursue it as their

profession,” he says.Davar’s journey started accidentally.

He was a trained ballet dancer when hechanced upon into the dance classes inLondon. There was no looking back andhe started western dance classes in India.

Meanwhile, he also admits that it’simpossible for everyone to be a traineddancer, but also denies that ‘everyone can’tdance’.

Davar doesn’t like watching films inthe cinema halls. He rather prefers bing-ing on Prime video releases at home. Heclaims, “I’m most partial towards showsthan films. I have a ritual of catching themevery night post my work. Recently, Iwatched many musical shows and playsin Mumbai, as I am fond of arts and thishugely encourages me.”

�,#��((2�&�! ��.��(!��Actress Taapsee Pannu started

her journey from the southIndian film industry, and hascemented her space in the Hindifilm industry with multiplereleases and commercial suc-cess. The actress considers ither strength that she is an “out-sider” in the industry.

Asked how she deals with the‘outsider’ tag, Taapsee said, “Yes,I am an outsider and I don’t seeit as a bad thing. I am a happyoutsider. I am not popular amongthe creme of our fraternity, andwhen I am not shooting, I trav-el and observe people who havea regular life, out of the filmworld.

“I think it is mystrength that I am anoutsider who can bringa lot of real elements inthe performancebecause of a normallife. Also, I go to bedearly and wake upearly, so partying latenight does not suit mylifestyle... I am in ahappy space, really.”Last year, Taapsee hadfour Bollywood releas-es including Mulk,Manmarziyaan andone Telugu filmNeevevaro. This year,after Game Over, shehas Mission Mangaland Saand Ki Aankh.

Recently, she giftedherself a new apartmentin Mumbai. How does shelook at the success?

“It was on my buck-et list that I want my owncar, an apartment and asteady career by the timeI am 30 years old. Sothankfully I have managed to ful-fil all of it. Now, I have a biggermilestone to achieve in whichproducers will not stop them-selves to invest money in myfilms thinking it is an ‘unconven-tional’ and ‘female-centric’ film,”shared the Pink actor.

“I know it is a success-drivenindustry but I also know that ifI keep delivering content-drivenfilms that are commercially suc-cessful, change is bound to hap-pen... it will happen and I can seeit,” Taapsee asserted.

Directed by AshwinSaravanan, Game Over is releas-ing on June 14 in Tamil, Telugu

and Hindi.Explaining the need to

release the film in multiple lan-guages, Taapsee said, “If we lookat the story, it is a journey of a girlwho is a rape victim... It is a uni-versal story and that incident canhappen to anyone, in any part ofthe world. So the makers thoughtthat the film deserved to beshown nationwide. Of course, itwas my wish too.”

Taapsee’s last release Badlahad done well commercially, butit did not have enough buzz onsocial media, especially amongthe film fraternity. It is alsosomething that megastarAmitabh Bachchan had pointedout.

Asked if such things affecther, Taapsee said, “Look, you aretalking about the Twitter buzzfrom the verified account. The

fact of the matter is, theyare not the people whowill make my film earnmoney at the box office.If a film is running inthe theatre for weeks,that means people arewatching it and wordof mouth works as thebest buzz. Then whyshould I complain?

“I want apprecia-tion from the audi-ence and by makingthe film survive in

the theatre for weeks,they have given me val-idation. It was a silentsuccess.”

Is working withBollywood’s Khans onher wish-list? “As an

actress, I would love to doso... As a kid, I have grownup watching their films, butI cannot choose onefavourite. I loved watching

Salman Khan because ofhis larger than life per-sona, Shah Rukh Khan

and romance... Any younggirl would dream to have aboyfriend like Rahul. I lovewatching Aamir Khan because heis a very interesting actor.

“Initially I waited for long toget an offer opposite any one ofthem, but since I did not get achance, I explored the opportu-nities that came my way so thatI can make my space here in thefilm industry.”

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Christie’s celebrates an Indian summerof the last 100 years in London this

June 11. Christie’s annual summer auc-tion of South Asian Modern plusContemporary Art comprises 77 lots,almost entirely from private collectionsfrom Europe, India, Asia, US andAustralia. Following India’s participationand Pakistan’s debut at this year’s VeniceBiennale, this year’s auction will celebrateart from both countries.

�6�� !� �!'�The auction is led by the striking

Falling figure with bird painted in 2002by Tyeb Mehta (1925-2009). This com-pelling composition manifests the senseof angst, helplessness and fear that he feltat the societal violence and tragedy heexperienced in the aftermath of parti-tion. The image draws its power froma cinematic sense of suspense, freezingthe action in an eternal moment of help-less free fall. Both, deeply personal andpolitically poignant, this virtuoso paint-ing distils complex psychological andmetaphysical notions of suffering as wellas trauma with the economy of line, formand colour characteristic of Mehta’swork. Here, the entwined avian andhuman figures draw perhaps from lit-erary characters like Icarus or Phaethon,who failed in their quests of flight andunion with divinity (£1,500,000-£2,000,000).

��'��6��The auction offers two exceptional

works by Sayed Haider Raza (1922-2016) from the early 1950s coming fromthe collection of his close friend andclassmate at the École NationaleSupérieure des Beaux Arts in Paris, LydiaLavrov-Nordentoft. Through recentlydiscovered letters it is revealed thatNordentoft’s support and friendshipsustained Raza during the early 1950sallowing him to develop into the mod-ern master he is recognised as today.

Even after she returned to Swedenin 1952, Nordentoft and Raza remainedclose friends regularly corresponding insupport of each other’s artistic careers.The ever-supporting friend offered tobuy Raza’s paintings and they eventual-ly agreed that she would pay for one andbe gifted another. In a touching letterfrom January 1955, Raza proudlydescribes each work as he prepares tosend his two favourite paintings to hisloyal friend. Each painting extolls Raza’slove of his quintessential genre, landscapein unique and contrasting ways. Untitled(Church in Landscape), estimated at

£150,000-£200,000 is an iconic exampleof Raza’s early landscapes on canvas.

The bold palette in red and black,and geometric flattened forms betray thepost-impressionist influences he soadmired. This painting was so dear tothe artist that he stood carrying it in aphotograph that now appears on thecover of SH Raza Catalogue Raisonné1958- 1971 (Volume I). The Untitled(Cityscape) (estimated: £150,000-£200,000) is a delicate rendering ofrooftops executed in gouache. It was thiswork that Raza sent as a token of his grat-itude and affection. It is from a smallseries of experimental works producedin 1951-53. These flattened cubist formsof Parisian rooftops float across a paleblue sky. These were most likely therooftops seen from Raza’s apartment’swindow in Paris.

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The auction will also feature a keyexample of Ram Kumar’s restrained por-traits of the 1950s Untitled that express-es the artist’s despondent reaction to theharsh realities of urban life that he cameface to face with at the time in Franceand India. In this painting dating fromthe 1950’s (£180,000- 250,000), the cen-tral figure, a young man in a grey suit,

becomes a universal symbol of this dis-enchantment, and sense of individual-ism being subsumed by the anonymoushomogeneity of the city Kumar portrayshim in. The painting was acquireddirectly from the artist by the eminentauthor and critic Sham Lal who authoreda series of monographs on Indianartists, known as the Sadanga Series onmodern and contemporary Indian art.

�'��&'(��)�'(&Another brilliant gem is Francis

Newton Souza’s figurative image thattranscends tradition and modernity.

Souza’s The Prophet was painted in1955 at the apex of his career in London.Souza depicts an austere, anguished mandressed in a business suit, pierced by asingle arrow in his neck, representing thefundamental themes of religion, sinners,saints and martyrdom. The arrow in theneck betrays Souza’s allusion to St.Sebastian, the martyr and venerated saintof the Catholic Church. Historically, St.Sebastian importance grew during theplague in the 14th Century when peo-ple prayed to him as their protector andsource of recovery from pestilence.

In the painting, he reinterprets therenowned religious icon by depicting StSebastian as an autobiographical prod-uct of 1950s London.

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Why do plays and play-wrights remain relevantand alive even after so

many years of their establishmentand demise? Why doesShakespeare still stand justifiedwhen we talk about society as awhole after 400 years? Why haveKalidasa’s quotes been repro-duced time and again withouteven realising?

From being one of the pio-neers in contemporary Indiantheatre to dabbling easily in theSouth Indian and Bollywoodblockbusters, actor and play-wright Girish Karnad’s workshave been ever relevant to theIndian society, creating an impactover millions of theatre connois-seurs, amateurs and novices. Thelegend passed away on Mondaymorning, succumbing to multi-organ failure at his residence, andit has been a huge loss to theIndian theatre scene and commer-cial cinema. The news has surelycome as a shock to his loved onesas well for the Indian film andtheatre fraternity.

Impresario Shobha DeepakSingh believes that talking aboutthe loss of such legends bringsonly one thing to our conscience— “people like him are not borneveryday.” She adds, “Karnad,one of my personal acquain-tances, has been a very talentedactor and playwright. It is onlyrare that we find such artistsacross.”

Gowri Ramnarayan, authorand a theatre critic, believes thatthe loss of such legends is the firstand foremost question and some-how, very “cliched.”

She says Karnad will bemissed for not just his contribu-tions to the Indian theatre scenebut also for bringing about achange in people’s outlooks onthings. She adds, “He was one ofthose people who intellectuallymade a huge contribution to peo-ple’s change of mindsets. This issomething we are definitely goingto miss because we don’t easilyfind such artists. He had thecourage to speak out. He was notan intellectual in just the way heworked, but as well on how heinf luenced the way peoplethought and acted upon things.He made them think. But thenevery life has to end one day, it’s

inevitable. But the legacy that hehas left behind is that of courageand conviction, which is veryrare.”

Hailing fromM a t h e r a n ,B o m b a y(British India),the play-wright isknown forhis immensecontributionsto not just theSouth Indiantheatre, but aswell in the north.“Well, he didn’t takehis works or theatre any-where else. He just translated hisKannada works into English,which were later adapted by var-ious authors and playwrights andperformed in different languages.It’s the people who valued hisworth who took forward hisworks,” says Ramnarayan.

Apart from multiple nation-al film awards and a SahityaAkademi honour, Karnad wasalso honoured with the Padma

Shri and Padma Bhushan. Fromrecreating the charm of the OldFort in the city with Tughlaq and

creating Hayavadana andDeath by Beheading ,

showcasing the revoltand rebellion in the

12th centuryKarnataka, to fray-ing into the Hindicinema withShyam Benegal’sNishant oppositeShabana Azmi,

Naseeruddin Shah,Smita Pati l and

Amrish Puri, the legendis known for his inim-

itable on-screen as well as on-stage presence. His stern portray-al of WT Srinivasan as Swami’sfather was like a recreation of RKNarayan’s Malgudi Days, makingthe 1980s’ kids reminisce of theirchildhood.

Talking about his plays, shesays that he was valued becausemost of his works stay relevanteven to the present times. Eventhough there are countless phe-nomenal works by him, she says,

but the one she considers as themost important one is, Death byBeheading. “The play which waswritten in 1990. It’s about a poetwho was a minister to the king inthe 12th century. He writes aboutthe extraordinary rebellion andrevolt that happened at that timein Karnataka. And it is so relevantto people even in today’s time.They protested for the individualliberty of thought and need foraction.”

While one might try to lookupon how did he influence otherplaywrights and directors,Ramnarayan says, “Karnad didn’tinspire people to follow him. Hecreated some brilliant plays andpeople saw the possibility of themedium. He only influenced peo-ple to start writing plays andencouraged them to think aboutdirecting and creating a play. Hemade theatre a medium of expres-sion for them, giving the freedomto actors and directors to interprethis plays with their own talent,imagination, initiative and expe-rience and do not mistake it forunderstanding of the subject. Byinitiative and imagination, Iwould mean interpreting his playsthrough my experiences. Nobodyknows what Shakespeare thoughtwhen he was writing a certainplay. We have interpreted itthrough our own imagination.”

Actress and playwrightJalabala Vaidya, feels that thepassing of Karnad has left a largevoid in the contemporary Indiantheatre. “It is a void that can befilled only by his considerablebody of work — from plays likeTuglak and Hayavadana fromthe 70s to the more recent oneslike Naga Mandala and otherplays, as well as his films inHindi and Kannada,” says she.

Expressing his grief and con-dolences, theatre director ArvindGaur, who also adapted Karnad’sTughlaq, says, “A salute to Karnad,a brilliant storyteller and a fear-less fighter. His demise has left mea deep scar on my life. He hadinspired me to present and re-interpret Tughlaq in my own andimagination.”

He recalls the time in 1995when he staged the play’s adapta-tion. “All the tickets to the playhad been sold out and it was noless than a miracle.”

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Islamabad: Pakistan’s formerpresident Asif Ali Zardari wasarrested on Monday from hisresidence here in the fake bankaccounts case by the country’stop anti-corruption body, evenas his party appealed for calm.

A team of the NationalAccountability Bureau (NAB)accompanied by police, includ-ing female officials, entered thePakistan People’s Party co-chairman’s house hours afterthe Islamabad High Courtrejected his bail plea.

However, his sister FaryalTalpur was so far not arrested.

The brother-sister duo nowhave the option of appealingthe order in the SupremeCourt.

Initially, Zardari’s support-ers and political aides resistedthe arrest but later the securi-ty team was allowed to enterthe house and the 63-year-oldleader surrendered after nego-tiation.

TV footage showedZardari coming out of hishouse and embracing his

younger daughter Aseefa beforegetting into a blackLandcruiser.

A number of party work-ers and Zardari’s son Bilawalsaw him off as the formerpresident was driven away inthe vehicle.

The vehicle took him to theNAB compound in Islamabad’sMelody areas where he wouldkept till he would be producedbefore the court.

Zardari, the 11th Presidentof Pakistan from 2008 to 2013,has denied any link with the fakeaccounts. He has said the alle-gation was part of a vilificationcampaign by the ruling party tomalign Opposition leaders.

He was elected as a mem-ber of the National Assemblyfrom the NA-213 Nawabshahseat of Sindh province in lastyear’s general election. Zardariand his sister are two of themain accused in the moneylaundering scandal whichutilised fake bank accounts tochannel illegally gained fundsout of Pakistan. PTI

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Hong Kong: Hong Kong’sleader signaled on Mondaythat her Government will pushahead with amendments toextradition laws despite a mas-sive protest against them thatunderscored fears about China’sbroadening footprint in thesemi-autonomous territory.

Chief Executive Carrie Lamtold reporters the legislation isimportant and will help HongKong uphold justice and fulfillits international obligations.Safeguards added in May willensure that the legislation pro-tects human rights, she said.

In what appeared to beHong Kong’s largest protest inmore than a decade, hundredsof thousands of people marchedthrough central Hong Kong onSunday, three days before theLegislative Council is slated totake up the bill.

Hong Kong was guaranteedthe right to retain its ownsocial, legal and political sys-tems for 50 years under anagreement reached before its1997 return to China fromBritish rule. But China’s rulingCommunist Party has beenseen as increasingly reneging onthat agreement by pushingthrough unpopular legalchanges.

The extradition bill amend-

ments would allow Hong Kongto send people to mainlandChina to face charges, spurringcriticism that defendants inthe Chinese judicial system

won’t have the same rights asthey would in Hong Kong.Opponents contend the pro-posed legislation could makeHong Kong residents vulnera-

ble to vague national securitycharges and unfair trials.

Lam said Sunday’s protestshows Hong Kong’s enduringcommitment to its people’s free-

doms. She denied that she is tak-ing orders from the centralgovernment in China’s capital.

“I have not received anyinstruction or mandate from

Beijing to do this bill,” shesaid. “We were doing it — andwe are still doing it — out of ourclear conscience, and our com-mitment to Hong Kong.” HongKong currently limits extradi-tions to jurisdictions withwhich it has existing agree-ments or to others on an indi-vidual basis under a law passedbefore 1997. China was exclud-ed because of concerns over itspoor record on legal indepen-dence and human rights.

Lam was elected in 2017 bya committee of mostly pro-Beijing Hong Kong elites. Critics have accused her ofignoring widespread oppositionto the extradition law amend-ments.

She said Monday that thebill seeks to prevent Hong Kongfrom becoming a haven for fugi-tives and is not focused onmainland China. Westerndemocracies have accused HongKong of failing to address issuessuch as money laundering andterrorist financing, Lam said.

Sunday’s demonstrationwas mostly peaceful, thoughthere were some late-nightclashes between some remain-ing protesters and police. Threeofficers and one journalist wereinjured, according to HongKong media reports. AP

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Colombo: A top Tamil leader inSri Lanka has called for an inter-national investigation into thealleged injustice meted out tothe minority Muslim commu-nity in the country in the after-math of the massive EasterSunday bombings.

The fundamental rights ofthe Muslims are being abusedusing an act of terror, C VWigneswaran, former chiefminister of the Tamil-dominat-ed Northern Province, toldreporters on Sunday, referringto the difficulties faced by theminority community, whichconstitutes nine per cent of thepopulation, following the dead-ly April 21 suicide bombings.

Following the attacks thatclaimed 258 lives, some Muslim

politicians representing the gov-ernment came under criticismfor their alleged support extend-ed to the rising militancy.

“Muslims are a part of theSri Lankan community, they arebeing subjected to injustice inviolation of the country’sConstitution,” Wigneswaransaid in Jaffna, once the hotbedof the over three-decade longconflict with the LiberationTigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE).

A large number of Muslimshave been arrested by the anti-terror agencies for questioningalong with those having links tothe banned National ThowheedJamaath (NTJ).

Wigneswaran expressedsolidarity with the Muslim min-isters who resigned last week

claiming that the governmenthad failed to ensure the safety ofthe minority community in thecountry.

Nine Muslim ministersholding top positions in the SriLankan government resignedlast week to allow authorities toinvestigate allegations againstsome of them on links to theNTJ.

There are 19 Muslimsamong the 225-memberParliament and nine of themheld Cabinet, state and deputyministerial positions.

“Charges against theMuslim politicians have notbeen proved. The Governmentmust take responsibility fortheir resignations,”Wigneswaran said. PTI

(��+�� .�� .��!��Tehran: Iran’s Foreign Minister

warned the US on Monday thatit “cannot expect to stay safe”after launching what hedescribed as an economic waragainst Tehran, taking a hard-line stance amid a visit byGermany’s top diplomat seek-ing to defuse tensions.

A stern-faced MohammadJavad Zarif offered a series ofthreats over the ongoing ten-sions gripping the Persian Gulf.The crisis takes root inPresident Donald Trump’s deci-sion over a year ago to with-draw America from Iran’s 2015nuclear deal with world pow-ers. Trump also reinstatedtough sanctions on Iran, tar-geting its oil sector.

“Trump himself hasannounced that the US haslaunched an economic waragainst Iran,” Zarif said. “Theonly solution for reducing ten-sions in this region is stoppingthat economic war.”

He also warned: “Whoeverstarts a war with us will not bethe one who finishes it.”

For his part, GermanForeign Minister Heiko Maasinsisted his country and otherEuropean nations want to finda way to salvage the nuclear deal,which saw Iran limit its enrich-ment of uranium in exchange forthe lifting of economic sanc-tions. But he acknowledgedthere were limits.

“We won’t be able to domiracles, but we are trying asbest as we can to do prevent itsfailure,” Maas said.

However, Europe has yet tobe able to offer Iran a way to getaround the newly imposed USsanctions. Meanwhile, a July 7deadline - imposed by Iran -looms for Europe to find a wayto save the unraveling deal.

Otherwise, Iran haswarned it will resume enrich-ing uranium closer to weapons-grade levels.

Though Zarif made a pointto shake Maas’ hands before thecameras, his comments markeda sharp departure for the US-educated diplomat who helpedsecure the nuclear deal, along-side the relatively moderatePresident Hassan Rouhani.

They came after Maasspoke about Israel, an archen-emy of Iran’s government.

“Israel’s right to exist is partof Germany’s founding princi-ple and is completely non-negotiable,” Maas said. “It is aresult of our history and it’sirrevocable and doesn’t justchange because I am current-ly in Tehran.”

Zarif then grew visiblyangry, offering a list of Mideastproblems ranging from al-Qaeda to the bombing ofYemeni civilians he blamed onthe US and its allies, namelySaudi Arabia.

“If one seeks to talk aboutinstability in this region, thoseare the other parties whoshould be held responsible,”Zarif said.

Zarif ’s sharp tone likelycomes from Iran’s growingfrustration with Europe, as

well as the ever-tighteningAmerican sanctions targetingthe country. Iran’s nationalcurrency, the rial, is currentlytrading at nearly 130,000 toUSD 1. It had been 32,000 tothe dollar at the time of the2015 deal. That has wipedaway people’s earnings, as wellas driven up prices on nearlyevery good in the country.

European nations hadpledged to create a mechanismcalled INSTEX, which wouldallow Iran to continue to tradefor humanitarian goods despiteAmerican sanctions. However,that program has yet to reallytake off, something Iran’s for-eign ministry spokesman notedbefore Zarif and Maas spoke toreporters.

“We haven’t put muchhope in INSTEX,” spokesmanAbbas Mousavi said, accordingto Iranian state television. “IfINSTEX was going to help us,it would have done so already.”

Trump, in withdrawingfrom the deal, pointed that theaccord had not limited Iran’sballistic missile program, oraddressed what American offi-cials describe as Tehran’smalign influence across thewider Mideast. Back when thedeal was struck in 2015, it wasdescribed it as a building blocktoward further negotiationswith Iran, whose Islamic gov-ernment has had a tense rela-tionship with America since the1979 takeover of the USEmbassy in Tehran and subse-quent hostage crisis. AP

Vienna: The UN’s nuclearwatchdog said on Monday itwas “worried about increasingtensions” over Iran’s nuclearprogramme, after Tehran said itmight stop respecting moreelements of a 2015 interna-tional deal.

“I... Hope that ways can befound to reduce current ten-sions through dialogue,”International Atomic EnergyAgency director general YukiyaAmano said in a speech open-ing the agency’s quarterly boardof governors meeting.

On May 8, Iran announcedit no longer considered itselfbound to keep to the limits ofstocks of heavy water andenriched uranium which wereagreed as part of the 2015 JointComprehensive Plan of Action(JCPOA).

Tehran’s move came a yearafter US President DonaldTrump pulled out of the deal.Washington has also reinforcedeconomic sanctions against theIslamic republic.

Iran has also said that if theother parties to the JCPOA donot speed up work on mitigat-ing the effects of US sanctions,by early July it may stop abid-ing by restrictions on the levelto which it can enrich uraniumand on modifications to itsArak heavy water reactor.

Two weeks ago, the latestinspections report by the IAEAsaid that while stocks of urani-um and heavy water had

increased, they were still with-in the limits set by the JCPOA.

“As I have constantlyemphasised, the nuclear-relatedcommitments entered into byIran under the JCPOA representa significant gain for nuclearverification,” Amano said.

“It is essential that Iranfully implements its nuclear-related commitments under theJCPOA,” he added.

The latest IAEA reportnoted that “technical discus-sions... Are ongoing” with Iranin relation to its installation ofup to 33 advanced IR-6 cen-trifuges, but did not specify thecontent of these discussions.

Also on Monday, GermanForeign Minister Heiko Maasheld talks with his Iranian coun-terpart Mohammad Javad Zarifin Tehran on the future of theJCPOA. Maas acknowledgedthat the economic benefitsTehran hoped for from the dealwere now “more difficult toobtain” but urged Iran to fullyrespect the agreement.

The JCPOA was struckbetween Iran and six majorpowers — Britain, China,France, Germany, Russia andthe United States — in 2015.

Tensions betweenWashington and Tehran haveworsened in recent weeks.

The United States hasbeefed up its military presencein the Middle East in responseto alleged threats from theIslamic republic. AFP

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Washington: President DonaldTrump said on Monday a secretprovision of the US immigrationdeal with Mexico will require theapproval of that country’s legis-lature and warned US tariffs willbe reinstated if it is not forth-coming.

Trump did not say what theprovision entails, only that itwould be revealed “in the nottoo distant future and will needa vote by Mexico’s Legislativebody.” “We do not anticipate aproblem with the vote but, if forany reason the approval is notforthcoming, Tariffs will bereinstated!” he tweeted.

Trump first alluded to thesecret provision in a tweet lateSunday defending the agree-ment with Mexico against crit-icism it contained little that hadnot already been agreed to.

He lashed out at The NewYork Times, calling its front pagestory on the deal “a FRAUD andnothing more than a badlyreported ‘hit job’ on me ... SickJournalism!” The US presidentplunged relations between thetwo allies into crisis last weekwith an abrupt threat to slap tar-iffs on all Mexican imports overimmigration.

Just as suddenly, a deal wasreached Friday after severaldays of intense negotiations.

The Mexican side agreed tobolster security on its southernborder and expand its policy oftaking back Central Americanmigrants as the US processestheir asylum claims. AFP

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Bamako: Nearly 100 peoplewere killed in a gruesomeovernight attack on a village incentral Mali, in the latest vio-lence to strike the fragileregion, officials said onMonday.

There was no immediateclaim of responsibility but themassacre, targeting a villageinhabited by the Dogon com-munity, bore the hallmarks oftit-for-tat ethnic attacks thathave claimed hundreds of lives.

It came less than threeweeks after nearly 160 mem-bers of the Fulani ethnic groupwere slaughtered by a groupidentified as Dogon.

“Right now we have 95dead civilians. The bodies areburned, we are continuing tolook for others,” an official inKoundou district, where thevillage of Sobane-Kou is locat-ed, told AFP.

The Government, giving aprovisional toll, said 95 peoplehad been killed, 19 were miss-ing, numerous farm animalshad been slaughtered andhomes had been torched.

“Armed men, suspectedto be terrorists, launched amurderous attack on thispeaceful village,” it said in astatement.

A Malian security sourceat the site of the massacre said“a Dogon village has been vir-tually wiped out.” The local

official said the attackers cameand “started shooting, pillagingand burning.”

The village had about 300inhabitants, the official said,speaking on condition ofanonymity.

An association of Dogontraditional hunters, called DanNan Ambassagou, deploredthe “barbaric and vile” attackwhich it described as tanta-mount to genocide.

A brutal cycle of violencein central Mali, an ethnicmosaic, began after a pre-dominantly Fulani jihadistgroup led by preacher AmadouKoufa emerged in 2015.

It started targeting theBambara and Dogon ethnicgroups, which in turn startedto form “self-defence groups”of their own. The Fulani areprimarily cattle breeders andtraders, while the Bambaraand Dogon are traditionallysedentary farmers.

On May 16, the UN peace-keeping mission in Mali(MINUSMA) announced ithad recorded “at least 488deaths” in attacks on Fulanis inthe central regions of Moptiand Segou since January 2018.

In the bloodiest raid, about160 Fulani villagers wereslaughtered on March 23 atOgossagou, near the borderwith Burkina Faso, by sus-pected Dogon hunters. AFP

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Eight years after he preventedcancer from dictating his lifechoices, a tearful Yuvraj Singh

on Monday brought the curtainsdown on a roller-coaster internation-al career, the pinnacle of which washis exploits in India's 2011 WorldCup triumph.

Tall, willowy and ethereal, hisunlimited talent and charisma madehim a limited overs legend, but hewill walk into the sunset feeling hehas not done enough in Tests.

The Punjabi southpaw, though,tried repeatedly to turn back timebefore calling it quits.

"After 25 years, in and around 22yards, and after almost 17 years ofinternational cricket on and off, Ihave decided to move on. Cricket hasgiven me everything and is the rea-son why I stand here today," the 37-year-old said addressing the mediain the extravagant interiors of a starhotel that quite resembled his flam-boyant batting.

"I was extremely lucky to play400 games for India. I could havenever imagined it when I first start-ed playing cricket," he added.

The explosive batter said he nowwants to "enjoy life" and pursue afreelance career in T20 leagues inter-nationally, pending BCCI permis-sion. But he will no longer be seenin the Indian Premier League.

Yuvraj played 40 Tests, 304ODIs and 58 T20Is for India. He puttogether 1900 runs in the longest for-mat, and 8701 in the one-dayers, theformat in which he enjoyed mostsuccess. His one-day runs tally placeshim 22nd in the overall list, and sev-enth among Indians.

A useful left-arm spinner, Yuvrajpicked up 111 ODI wickets at anaverage of 36.55.

"It was a love-hate relationshipwith this game. I can't explain whatit really means to me. This gametaught me how to fight, how to fall,to dust myself off and get up againand move forward," he said.

"I have failed more times than Ihave succeeded, but I never gave up,and will never give up, till my lastbreath, and that's what cricket hastaught me. I gave my blood andsweat to the game once I got on toit, especially when it came to repre-senting my country," he added.

The attacking left-hander listedthe the 2011 World Cup triumph,being Man of the Tournament in theshowpiece, getting six sixes in an overagainst England in the inaugural

2007 World T20 and his first Testhundred, against Pakistan in Lahorein 2004, as the most special momentsof his international career that twist-ed this way and that through 17years.

The battle with cancer soon afterthe 2011 World Cup triumph wasperhaps the biggest challenge that heencountered.

"I was not going to let that dis-ease defeat me," he said.

However, his cricketing formhad been on the wane for a while.Yuvraj last played for India in a T20Iagainst England in 2017. His last Testappearance was back in 2012.

He turned up for MumbaiIndians in this year's IPL but didn'tget many chances.

His exploits at the World T20 inSouth Africa have remaineduntouched till date.

Yuvraj's willow-wielding waysgave nightmares to almost everybowler through the tournament.

Clobbering six sixes in thepenultimate over bowled by StuartBroad in Kingsmead was a momentnot many cricket fans will forget.

That performance againstEngland took Yuvraj on top of thepile of fastest fifties in a T20I match,scoring 50 in just 12 balls, a recordthat has stood the test of time.

As time passed, Yuvraj becamean established middle-order linchpinfor the Indian team, and a man witha golden arm too.

A testimony of his accomplishedall-round abilities was the 2011 50-

over World Cup where Yuvrajbecame the first all-rounder to score300-plus runs and take 15 wickets ina single World Cup.

The feat included four MoMawards and Man-Of-The-Tournament for the 362 runs and 15wickets.

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Yuvraj Singh on Monday revealedthat he was promised a farewell

game by the BCCI provided he failedthe 'Yo Yo' fitness test. However, hepassed it and the swansong neverhappened.

"Mujhe bola gaya tha agar aapse'Yo Yo' test pass nahi hota toh aapretirement match khel sakate ho (Iwas told that if you are not able topass the 'Yo Yo' test, I would get afarewell game)," the 37-year-oldsaid at an emotional press confer-

ence.His contemporary Virender

Sehwag has spoken about the painof not getting a farewell match butYuvraj said he did not want one.Even greats like VVS Laxman andRahul Dravid did not get the farewellgames they deserved.

"I did not tell anyone in BCCIthat I have to play the last match.Agar main accha tha, potential thatoh main ground pe se chale jaata. (IfI was good enough, I would haveretired from the ground). Aur mujheis tarha ki cricket khelna pasand nahi

hai, ki mujhe ek match chahiye (Idon't like to ask for a game, I havenever played the game with thatmindset)," he said.

"Toh maine us time bola kimujhe retirement match nahichahiye, 'Yo Yo' test pass nahi hogatoh main chup chhap ghar chalejayunga… 'Yo Yo' test pass kiya andthen rest is not my call," he said.

A yo-yo test involves a playersprinting between two cones that areset 20 metres apart on the sound ofa beep. It is used to measure an ath-lete's endurance.

Asked for his thoughts on thetest, which must be cleared to makethe Indian team right now, Yuvrajgave a guarded reply leaving thedetails for the future.

"See I am sure now I'll have a lotof time to discuss these things, I'llhave a lot to say. I am not sayingright now because India is playingthe World Cup. And I don't wantany controversies over the players.

"I want the players to be in thebest space, to go in the last four, soI am sure my time will come tospeak and I don't want be in that

You can’t deny it, this has beenan absolutely fabulous start

for India.The batsman are scoring

runs, the bowlers are taking wick-ets and we even got two run-outsagainst Australia in a result thatsuggests everything is right insidethe camp.

This start bodes very well. Weare playing intelligently with bothbat and ball and no-one showedthat more than Shikhar Dhawanagainst Australia.

He said in his interview thathe was felt calm and that heshowed restraint and it is hard todisagree with him.

He was not looking to clearthe boundary, he played low-risk,

sensible cricket and I think thatwas very clever.

He provided the platformfor India to go on and attacktowards the end, which they didso well. I think Dhawan's 117 wasgreat but the key innings for mewas Hardik Pandya .

His knock of 48 from 27 ballsmade all the difference because itensured India set 352 instead of312. The rate he scored at addedso much impetus and carriedIndia to a greater score. It wasprobably the game-changingmoment of the day.

The top three all deliveredruns but we expect them too.Rohit Sharma has already shownhe's in good form, Dhawan has a

superb record at The Oval andVirat Kohli scores heavily againstAustralia.

But they promoted Pandya tofour and that gave him great con-fidence to take the game awayfrom Australia, they lost controlwhen he was in the middle.

Pandya is also weaponAustralia don't have - an all-rounder of the highest quality.England have a box of them,while we have Pandya in what isprobably the most importantposition in the team.

He did not take wickets butthat did not matter, as JaspritBumrah took three. He is at thetop of his game and loves it here,I expect him to end up with so

many wickets at the end of thetournament.

The other major plus forIndia is that Yuzvendra Chahal isin superb form and that makes abig difference because he getswickets with his spin in the mid-dle overs.

The only way you can restrictteams is by taking wickets in themiddle overs and that is whatAustralia did against the WestIndies. They kept taking wicketsand won the game.

They did not do that againstIndia, whereas Chahal led the waywhen he had the ball and tookthose key wickets.

It's now full steam ahead toNew Zealand and that will also be

a very tough match. The condi-tions always play a big partagainst them and I think the tosswill be so important.

The conditions so far havenot aided the bowlers, perhapsaside from Cardiff where it is verygreen. Trent Bridge has alwaysbeen a white-ish surface and weall know about the run-scoringhistory there.

I think New Zealand'sbowlers are a step up onAustralia's and are likely to be ahandful. If Trent Boult gets hisrhythm right, he will get wicketsand so seeing how he plays willbe fascinating.*�� F H��**�;� � �*��!��

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space I have retired inthe World Cup, I havejust retired because Iwant to move on in mylife," said the Man of2011 World Cup.

Yuvraj did not getthe farewell he perhaps

deserved but his fanshave not seen the last ofhim on the field.

He will will be ven-turing into overseas T20leagues provided he getsnecessary clearancefrom the BCCI.

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Skipper Virat Kohli said Indiawere “extra motivated” andhad a point to prove" after his

team notched up a convincing 36-run win over Australia in the WorldCup, avenging their bitter ODIseries loss at home earlier this year.

"We had a point to prove. Wewere more motivated to win todaybecause of the fact that we lost theseries in India, being 2-0 up, andthere was no Mitchell Starc, either.So him (Starc) coming in makestheir bowling line-up even stronger,"Kohli said.

"I couldn't have asked for a bet-ter game in all three departments,set the tone the way we wanted tobat up-front," he said at the post-match press conference.

India posted a massive 352 for5, riding on a professional perfor-mance by the top-order led byShikhar Dhawan (117). In reply,Australia were dismissed for 316.

With wins over South Africaand Australia, India are on a roll butKohli said he doesn't want to thinktoo far ahead about the World Cupsemi-finals though playing strongeropponents up front has put the teamin a better position for the knock-out stage.

"No, I think in my opinion it'stoo early to decide that (semis). Ithink after about six games, we'll bein a better position to know wherewe stand in the tournament, wherewe stand in the table, but we could-n't have asked for a better startagainst two strong sides," he said.

"The good thing is we are play-ing all strong sides up front, so as Imentioned in Mumbai before weleft, if we do well in the first phase,we'll be in a better position toreach the semi-finals," the skippersaid.

The best part about India'sbowling was the 131 dot balls thatAustralia were forced to play.

"Well, we sort of felt like theywere a bit hesitant in going for theboundary option, so the communi-cation was very simple: Bowl at goodlengths but within the stumps andpitch it up, because as a batsman Iknow when you're not looking fora boundary option, the last ball youwant is a length ball on stumpsbecause you have to play a goodshort to get a boundary," Kohliexplained a batsman's predicament.

"I just felt like at that stage they

didn't want to lose wickets was thementality that we felt, like theywanted to keep it so they couldstrike big in the end. But I think thatwas too big a total to play like thatinitially," the skipper also pointedout where the opposition wentwrong.

Having wicket-taking bowlerslike Jasprit Bumrah, BhuvneshwarKumar and Yuzvendra Chahal doesbog the batsmen down, exactlywhat happened on the day as the trioshared the eight wickets amongthemselves.

"In ODIs, when you have strikebowlers, you will have dot ballsbecause the batsmen really giverespect to a guy who can get you out.You just give them the ball in a situ-ation and they know exactly what to

do," said the captain."I literally don't have anything to

plan with these guys because they dotheir skills so well. They are at the topof their game right now for sure."

The middle-order played their

role to perfection as 116 runs camein the last 10 overs.

When asked to compare thepower-hitters from earlier eras, theskipper feels that this middle-ordercomprising MS Dhoni, KL Rahul,Hardik Pandya and Kedar Jadhav isas good as any of the past line-ups.

"Yeah, I mean, look, KL didn'teven play five, six balls in this inningsand he can strike the ball as you sawhe can. Kedar didn't play a ball, andyou're talking about Hardik, MS,Kedar, KL, serious hitting abilityand serious talent with the bat."

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David Warner's unusually slowbatting in the World Cup

match against India was not a newapproach but a result of the qual-ity bowling that kept the flamboy-ant left-hander quiet, Australianskipper Aaron Finch has conced-ed.

Warner scored an unbeaten 89off 114 balls against Afghanistanbut his 56 off 84 balls in a chase of353 against India put pressure onthe batsmen later on.

"No, it hasn't been a plan — ateam plan or an individual plan forDavid (to play slowly). I think theybowled really well early," Finchexplained after the 36-run loss thatthe defending champions enduredon Sunday.

"They bowled nice andstraight, back of the length, wherethe ball was just skidding quite lowto start with, and they just didn'tgive us any width to get away orany length to really work with,either over the top or get a driveaway.

"Their bowling plans werepretty simple but really effective ona wicket like that," Finch comple-

mented Bhuvneshwar Kumar andJasprit Bumrah for keeping theAussies on a tight leash at the start.

The fact that Indian spinnersKuldeep Yadav and YuzvendraChahal used the pitch better com-pared to Glenn Maxwell andAdam Zampa was also a factor,according to Finch.

"Well, they bowled really wellto him early and I think particu-larly playing on a used wicket againfor our second time in threegames played a little bit of a partin that.

"Their spinners probably hada bigger impact than what ours didthrough the middle overs in par-ticular, where the ball was juststarting to hold up," he said.

Nathan Coulter-Nile andMarcus Stoinis have been theweak links in the Australian attackso far and Finch gave indicationsthat there could be some changein the coming games, especiallyagainst Pakistan in Taunton.

"Yeah, like I said before, we'llassess every option, which we dofor each game. We know Pakistanis going to have quite a few left-handers in their side, but you don'tknow.

India against Australia wasalways going to be a highly

charged encounter between twoteams that have met on numer-ous occasions over the past 12months.

This rivalry has revealed noclear dominance by either butIndia’s victory in the pressurecooker of a World Cup clash willprovide them with enormousconfidence as they move forwardin this tournament.

It was an important toss towin for India as the Oval pitchhad previously been used andwas clearly one that slowed downas the match went on.

India’s batting display wasboth measured and calculatedwith their plan clear and well exe-cuted. Their plan is to lay a foun-dation by not losing wickets andthey stuck to it.

When they get off to solidopening partnership, as they didagainst Australia, they then havethe luxury of seeing Virat Kohliorchestrate the remainder of theinnings.

But it's the innings of HardikPandya that will send shiversdown opposition spines.

This guy might just be theequivalent of Lance Klusener inthe 1999 World Cup. He has theability to begin his innings likemost finish with clean hittingthat no opposing captain canprotect.

If that's not enough, thecunning and sheer brilliance ofMS Dhoni rarely fails to deliverand again he timed his assault onAustralia to post a 350 plus tar-get.

Australia will be disappoint-ed that they missed some crucialchances in the field and their

bowling was at times loose andnot as disciplined as expected.

Chasing such an imposingtotal requires a solid platformbefore launching an all-outassault in the last 15 overs. Youhave to stay in touch whenyou're chasing such a big score.

Australia were never quite on

track to create history with DavidWarner and to a lesser extentSteve Smith struggling for theirusual rhythm and control at thecrease.

To win against the oddseverything must fall into placeand the turning point came earlyin the innings with the run out

of Aaron Finch who looked inimperious touch and looked setfor a big hundred.

Both he and Alex Careyshowed superb shot selection tosuggest they will be crucial toAustralia's chances in this cam-paign.

The cameo of GlennMaxwell will increase calls for hiselevation up the batting order ashe is a match-winner that canturn a game in a few overs.

Leadership reveals itself inmany forms but I though ViratKohli's gesture in calming downthe rough reception given toSteve Smith from the Indianspectators was a class act thatcalmed a volatile situation.

India will walk away fromthis match full of confidence asmost of their key players didexactly what needed to be doneunder extreme pressure and theirgame plan was executed perfect-ly.

Australia won't be too disap-pointed as they have time to dis-sect this loss, fine tune theirprocess, tinker with battingorders and bowling options andmanoeuvre things around beforethe semi-finals come around.

This World Cup is wideopen right now with up to sixteams believing they have achance to lift the Cup at Lord's.*�� FH��**�;� � �*��!��

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Australia all-rounderGlenn Maxwell said

missing out on "keymoments" against Indialed to their first defeatin the ongoing WorldCup.

Reflecting on the36-run loss, Maxwellsaid: "Yeah we probablyjust missed a few keymoments during thegame. Couple ofdropped catches,missed run-out frommyself. I could haverun out ShikharDhawan with a littleback-flick there.

"Just a few littlemoments like that in aWorld Cup game can beheightened by the endof the game," he said.

One of the missed opportunities for Australia waswhen wicketkeeper Alex Carey dropped a regulation catchof Hardik Pandya early on as he went to score a whirl-wind 48 of 27 balls.

Maxwell also lavished praise on the lethal Indian paceduo of Jasprit Bumrah (3/61) and Bhuvneshwar Kumar(3/50).

"Two of the best death bowlers going around, two ofthe best opening bowlers going around. To give ourselvesthe chance of almost chasing that down. We just misseda few, little key moments."

Australia were in contention of becoming the firstteam to successfully chase 353 runs in the World Cup. Butapart David Warner (56), Steve Smith (69) and Carey (55not out), other batsmen including Maxwell were unableto star with the bat.

Maxwell felt the complexion of the game could havechanged had one of the players in the top order scored aton.

"But they (India) batted extremely well to get them-selves to 350. It's always going to be a hard ask, chasing350 and defying history at the ground," he said.

"We gave a really good crack and probably if we couldget someone to make a hundred, I supposes in that top-4. It could potentially be a different game."

However, Maxwell is optimistic that Australia can turnthings around if they work on winning vital battles.

"We lost wickets at the wrong time, the run-out at thetop to lose your captain. Just a few, little moments likethat if you can turn those around I'm sure our fortuneswill turn around as well," Maxwell said.

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Australia captain AaronFinch said Adam Zampa

was merely using hand-warm-ers in his pocket during theWorld Cup match against India,rejecting social media specula-tion that the leg-spinner mighthave been tampering with theball. A few pictures of Zampashowed him putting his hand inhis pocket just before a deliv-ery and social media was abuzzwith talk of ball tampering.

With the last year's scandalwhich led to bans on SteveSmith David Warner still cast-ing a shadow on the Aussies,skipper Finch had to clarifyafter his team's 36-run loss toIndia.

"I haven't seen the photos,

but I know that he has handwarmers in his pocket. He hasthem every single game heplays. I honestly haven't seenthem, so I can't comment toomuch on it. But I know for afact that he has hand warmersevery game," Finch told medi-apersons.

Zampa, who was a revela-tion on Australia's limited-overs tour of India, was takento task by the Indian openersand was out of the attack aftergiving away 50 runs in sixovers.

"I think he just started hisspell poorly today, which gave

them an opportunity to get ontop of him, and when you'rebowling to world-class playersand they get on top of you early,it can be quite hard to comeback," Finch defended the 27-year-old.

The fact that other bowlerscouldn't get a breakthroughalso affected his performance,felt Finch.

"He never had the chanceto really bowl at a new batter ahell of a lot, which probably wasthe difference in the Indianseries where we managed to getsome wickets up front andthere would be an opportuni-

ty that he could really go towork on a new batter," heexplained.

Finch wants the India gameto be treated as one bad day inoffice for Zampa.

"Today that just didn't hap-pen, and as a leg-spinner, it's anincredibly tough craft. It's thehardest thing to do in thegame. So you can forgive himfor not having his best day outonce every now and then.

"He's been exceptional forus for quite a long time now,since he's come back into theside. So yeah, I am not con-cerned about that."

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Smarting from con-secutive defeats,Bangladesh will

look to get their WorldCup campaign back on

track when they take on aninconsistent Sri Lanka here

on Tuesday.Bangladesh made a perfect

start to their World Cup cam-paign, posting their highest one-

day international score of 330-6during the 21-run win over SouthAfrica.

However, the Tigers were notable to take forward the

winning momentum andwere handed a two-wick-

et loss by New Zealandfollowed by a massivea 106-run defeat tohosts England.

In the battingdepartment, wicket-keeper MushfiqurRahim has beenimpressive but open-ers Soumya Sarkarand Tamim Iqbal havesquandered theirstarts, failing to play

impactful knocks.Star all-rounder

Shakib Al Hasan, who isin fine form with the bat,having scored two half-centuries and a hundredin the tournament, isexpected to play the keyrole again for his side.

Bangladesh’s mainconcern will be their

bowling that cameunstuck in their pre-vious game againstEngland who

amassed 386.“We are disappointed in the

manner we actually bowled. Ithought we bowled really, really wellagainst South Africa and againstNew Zealand. We were expecting abetter bowling performance in thismatch,” Shakib had said after thematch.

Sri Lanka, on the other hand,will be optimistic of their chancesafter recovering from a crushing 10-wicket defeat in their openingmatch against New Zealand.

The Dimuth Karunaratne-ledside beat Afghanistan in a rain-shortened game to breathe life intotheir campaign but the island nation

were forced to split points withPakistan after the match was calledoff due to heavy rains.

Sri Lanka’s batting unit hasfailed to last the full 50 overs in boththeir matches.

They lost five wickets for 14runs against New Zealand andthen seven wickets for 36 runsagainst Afghanistan and the 1996champions will be wary of anoth-er middle-order batting collapse.

In the bowling department, SriLanka will miss the services ofpacer Nuwan Pradeep, who wasthe architect of their win againstAfghanistan, claiming four wick-ets for 31 runs.

In his absence, the onus will bemore on veteran pacer LasithMalinga to guide the side to vic-tory against Bangladesh.

�O'��Bangladesh: Mashrafe

Mortaza (c), Abu Jayed, LitonDas, Mahmudullah, MehidyHasan, Mohammad Mithun,Mohammad Saifuddin, MosaddekHossain, Mushfiqur Rahim,Mustafizur Rahman, RubelHossain, Sabbir Rahman, ShakibAl Hasan, Soumya Sarkar, TamimIqbal.

Sri Lanka: DimuthKarunaratne (c),Dhananjaya deSilva, Nuwan Pradeep, AvishkaFernando, Suranga Lakmal, LasithMalinga, Angelo Mathews, KusalMendis, Jeevan Mendis, KusalPerera, Thisara Perera, MilindaSiriwardana, Lahiru Thirimanne,Isuru Udana, Jeffrey Vandersay.

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Bangladesh captain MashrafeMortaza can live without the

respect of his opponents so long as hisside are winning matches at theWorld Cup.

The Tigers launched their cam-paign with an impressive win overSouth Africa but afterwards Mashrafewas annoyed by suggestions the resultconstituted an upset.

"Do you think this was a sur-prise?," he asked pointedly. "If we candeliver our best we knew what wecould do. I'm sure some people don'tthink well of our cricket. We are con-centrating on our game and lettingother people talk."

Since then Bangladesh have suf-fered an agonising two-wicket loss toNew Zealand before being on thewrong end of a 106-run thrashing bytournament hosts and favouritesEngland in Cardiff last weekend.

Those defeats make Bangladesh'smatch against a struggling Sri Lankain Bristol on Tuesday all the moreimportant.

"I'm not worried about who isrespecting us, I'm more worried aboutour performance," Mashrafe toldreporters in Bristol on Monday.

"Winning matches is more impor-tant for us. I don't think respect isgoing to work in the 22 yards (of apitch). It all depends on how we reacton the ground.

"If we can win two points, this is

more important than respect at themoment," added the 35-year-old vet-eran paceman.

Bangladesh knocked England outof the group stage on the way to reach-ing the quarter-finals of the 2015World Cup.

But this year's format is different,with 10 teams taking part in a round-

robin group stage that will see the topfour qualify for the semi-finals.

"If you are asking all 10 captainsthis question, they will look to thesemis, which is an honest call," saidMashrafe as he answered a queryabout Bangladesh's ambitions for thisWorld Cup.

"Obviously we would like to be inthe semis but right now, the calcula-tion is difficult.

"But again I'd say it's very muchpossible. We have to make sure wecome back onto the winning track."

Sri Lanka were overwhelmed bychampions Australia and then suffereda batting collapse before just doingenough to beat outsiders Afghanistan.

But Mashrafe insisted he felt noextra pressure with Bangladesh beingregarded as favourites to beat SriLanka.

"Even the New Zealand match,even the England match, I'm not surewhat other people were thinking, butwe were expecting to win," he said.

"I think the pressure will be thereevery match. I don't want to say there'sno pressure — 100 percent pressurewill be there.

"But at the same time we have tocope with that pressure and make surewe deliver." Forecast rain in Bristol,however, could scupper the hopes ofboth sides for a morale-boosting win.

"I hope that we'll play a fullmatch tomorrow," said Mashrafe."The boys are really hungry to winmatches."

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Astruggling South Africagot their first point ofthe World Cup after

their game against the WestIndies was abandoned due topersistent rain yesterday. SouthAfrica were 29 for two in theeighth over when rain stoppedplay at the Hampshire Bowland intermittent showersmeant no play was possible forthe rest of the game.

Both teams shared a pointeach for the called-off game,giving South Africa their firstpoint of the tournament afterthree back-to-back lossesagainst England, Bangladeshand India.

The West Indies, who beatPakistan before losing toAustralia, have three pointsfrom as many games. TheWest Indies, who opted tobowl in overcast conditions,were on top before the rainarrived as pacer SheldonCottrell removed HashimAmla (6) and Aiden Markram(5) after the West Indies optedto bowl.

Quinton de Kock and cap-tain Faf du Plessis were battingon 17 and 0 when rain lashedthe ground.

“Rain-affected matches arethe worst. Both teams wanteda result, but you can’t controlthe weather,” said du Plessis atthe post-match interaction.

�What’s the mood in the camp like withthe squad at the moment?

The mood’s pretty good. Obviously,you’re right, to be here five or six days agoand not get a chance to play was frustrat-ing, but we’re still off the back of the winagainst Afghanistan. So we needed that,because we were possibly a little bit lowbefore that. In effect we’re still off the backof last win. The last game we played as awin. No, we are in pretty good shape. Slightdisappointment maybe when Nuwan gotinjured, �What’s it been like for you working withSri Lankan players?

Cricketers are cricketers to be honest.There are cultural differences, no doubtabout it, between Sri Lanka and England,probably in all countries. It’s been a hugehonour for starters, have to acknowledgethat, and the players have been fantastic,very welcoming, very easy for me to workwith, despite the fact that there are occa-sional language difficulties. But the rest ofthe staff helped me out and some of thesenior players helped me out when thereis difficulty.�What is it that the team is lacking thatthey can’t put some good scores?

The last game, as you say, a good start.Part of that good start was probablycaused by— we played some good cricketbut Afghanistan probably weren’t at theirbest at the start with the new ball. As theyimproved, we probably didn’t recognise thefact that they had improved, and weexpected them to carry on the same level.So when we opened the door, which we did,they pushed on through. It was our fault.They put a lot of pressure on us.�How do you rate the Bangladesh team?

They are a very good side, there’s nodoubt about it. They have had a tough startto the World Cup in terms of the fixtures,some difficult ones, but they have obvious-ly put in some good performances even ingames they haven’t won, they have put ingood performance which have suggestedthey are going to be a tough opposition foreverybody, so we know that. But our focuswill be on u.�How much is it easy or tough?

It will be tough and as you sayBangladesh have had a couple of decentresults against Sri Lanka, but you know, thisis a World Cup. The situation is very dif-ferent. You’ve seen that maybe WorldCup cricket isn’t the same as bilateral one-day tournaments. No doubt at all thatthere’s a hell of a challenge ahead of us, butwe also do have a lot of confidence in theplayers that we have in our dressing roomand a lot of faith in them. So we are stillconfident.�How do you lift Mendis and Mathewsout of their modest scores?

With Angelo, you’ve got to have faithin the guy who has done as much as he hasover such a long period of time, and he tellsme that he’s in a good place. At this stageI’ve got no reason to doubt that the runswill come for him. Thisara could do witha little bit of a confidence boost. For himit’s just a case of getting through those first20 balls, because in the buildup to the game,to the World Cup.�How is the team camp thinking aboutbringing Avishka Fernando for a short-ened game, instead of Thirimanne?

Avishka could be a candidate for a longgame or a short game. He is practising well.It’s a little bit unfortunate, he picked up aniggle which caused him to miss one of thewarm up games. He got his highest-everODI score there. It was a while ago, but hislast ODI innings and he got 70-odd.�What does Mendis have to do to trans-late test form into this format?

He’s a talented player. His T20 recordis quite good as well, actually. 50 overs, hisnumbers aren’t where a player of his abil-ity should be, yet, he’s still quite early in hiscareer to be fair to him.

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Three wins from three is amajor confidence boost forNew Zealand — but the

next game against India is simplymassive.

To be able to go into that onewith six points is a big boost andwhile the wins were probablyexpected, they can still be reallysatisfied with getting over the lineand setting up a really greatgame.

You know that matchesagainst India are going to have agreat atmosphere and be a realpressure situation.

India are perhaps the bestteam in the world and it’s excit-ing to play in front of a big-matchcrowd that is so into the game andso passionate about cricket.

Lots of the guys will haveexperienced that in the sub-con-tinent but to have that in Englandis going to be something that’snew to them and something theyneed to get used to as the tour-nament goes on, particularly ifthey want to reach those semi-finals.

Because they’ve performed sowell for a long time, New Zealandwon’t be defined by the result orperformance in this game, win orlose.

They’ll back themselves to beconsistent throughout the tourna-ment so irrespective of how indi-vidual games or moments go,they’ll back themselves to beable to deliver in the next gameas well.

It’s a World Cup, if you putyourself under pressure then youmake things difficult, but nowwith three wins they’ve beenable to afford themselves someluxuries.

The win against Afghanistanlast time was once again impres-sive, everybody played their partin a positive performance.

But the real stand-out camefrom Jimmy Neesham and LockieFerguson, nine wickets betweenthem is a really impressive perfor-mance, and Neesham’s figures inparticular were amazing.

If everyone’s honest, theyprobably see Jimmy’s role as to fillin a few overs here and there,keep things tight and to pick upthe odd wicket here or there if hecan.

But if he can become amatch-winner like he has in thisgame, New Zealand will take thatevery day of the week.

The fact that he got fivewickets didn’t surprise me, despitehis record — it was the fact he gotfive of the Afghanistan top seven.

He had the opportunity tobowl early and for him to go onand be regular wicket-takerthrough that innings, it’s notsomething Kane Williamsonwould have expected but it’s a bigboost for him to have that.

You can see New Zealandwant to go with two all-rounders

and they really back their bat-ting, so these types of perfor-mances just give them another

option for how they play theirgame.

It takes pressure off the other

bowlers — not all of them canand will perform on any givenday so to have those options andfor different people to be threat-ening could be really significant.

It was interesting to see thatMitch Santner didn’t bowl, par-ticularly with how he went in thewin over Bangladesh.

As a spinner you alwayswant to bowl when you’re inform so he may have been a lit-tle disappointed, but it’s credit tothe pace bowlers that he wasn’tneeded this time around.

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Portugal added the inaugur-al Nations League title to

their Euro 2016 triumph asGoncalo Guedes's strike on thehour won an underwhelmingfinal 1-0 against theNetherlands.

The Dutch defensive pair-ing of Virgil van Dijk andMatthijs de Ligt largely keptCristiano Ronaldo quiet, butValencia winger Guedes provedthe match winner as his shothad too much power for JasperCillessen in the Netherlandsgoal.

"I am sure this tournamentwill become a classic because itis a tournament for the entireEuropean family," said Portugalcoach Fernando Santos onSunday.

"To be the first winner willgo down in history. It is a joy tohave won the first edition, nowwe must continue to work andpursue further goals."

Portugal had the advantageof an extra day's rest and notbeing forced to extra timeagainst Switzerland in theirsemi-final as the Dutch were inseeing off England on Thursday.

And the hosts looked thefresher throughout with RonaldKoeman's men jaded at the end

of a long season."If we were tired I don't

know, but we were not goodenough," admitted Koeman.

"They defended well and thewere very compact in theirgame, but you have to be betterwith the ball and we were not."

The match had been billedas a showdown betweenRonaldo and Van Dijk but withthe Dutch captain again rocksolid at the back, Portugal'smain threat came from midfieldwith Bernardo Silva rightfullywinning player of the tourna-ment.

"I'm very happy, very proud.It's my first title with my coun-try," said Silva, who also won anEnglish domestic treble withManchester City this season.

"Thank you to thePortuguese people, what a nightfor us, what a night for the coun-try!" Silva provided the onetrue moment of quality to decidethe game.

He broke through the Dutchdefence and then picked outGuedes, who bravely ignoredplaying in Ronaldo to drill a lowshot past Cillessen himself.

"If you want to win you hadto play well, and if Portugal wonwe had to play well whether itwas handsome or not," saidSantos.

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Veteran batsman Mohammad Hafeez has urgedhis side to take the confidence from their win

over hosts England into their next World Cup matchagainst champions Australia.

The 38-year-old was Pakistan's saviour in theirsensational 14-run win over England in Nottingham,riding his luck on the way to a match-turning 84 off62 balls.

That helped Pakistan post a challenging total of348-8 and set up a confidence-boosting win after theyflopped badly in their opening seven-wicket defeatby the West Indies.

"I think all 10 teams are beatable," Hafeez saidon Sunday. "If you look at England they were play-ing top cricket and people were thinking it wouldbe hard to beat them."

Hafeez, speaking before Australia suffered a 36-run loss to India at the Oval on Sunday, added: "Butall teams are beatable ... If you talk of our next oppo-nent (Australia) they are also playing very good crick-et but they too can be defeated."

Pakistan, who face the title-holders at Tauntonon Wednesday, have a dismal recent record againstAustralia — they've won just one of the last 14 one-day internationals between the teams dating back toOctober 2014.

"Yes, we don't have a very good record againstAustralia because they play tough cricket but everyday is a new day," said Hafeez.

"This is a World Cup and we now have momen-tum after our win over England."

Pakistan were left to rue persistent rain in Bristolon Friday, which led to a no-result washout in theirmatch against Sri Lanka with both teams receivinga point. "Yes, that was frustrating but you cannot domuch about the weather and now we have movedon. But I am sure when we play again we will putup the same game that we played against England,"Hafeez promised.

Hafeez said Pakistan's remarkable turnaroundin their first two games — they were bowled out fora paltry 105 by the West Indies in Nottingham —was down to acknowledging their mistakes.

"I think we realised that we played a very badgame and we gave confidence to each other and con-vinced each other that we can win and that positivethinking helped bringing the change," said Hafeez,a veteran of 212 ODIs.

Their win over England, who defeated them 4-0 shortly before the start of the World Cup, endedPakistan's sequence of 11 consecutive defeats sincelosing the fifth and final one-dayer against SouthAfrica in January.

"Yes, we had been losing but we were playinggood cricket," Hafeez explained. "The best thingabout the England win was that everyone con-tributed."Even Hasan Ali, who didn't get a wicket,but his last three overs were good and brought usback," said Hafeez of the medium-pacer who finishedwith 0-66 in 10 overs. "When you play like that youget confidence and momentum."

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