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U nion Home Minister and former BJP president Amit Shah on Sunday launched the poll campaign for the year-end Bihar Assembly polls address- ing a political rally via video conference and slammed the Opposition for doing politics over the migrants’ crisis in the country in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. Shah claimed that his address has nothing to do with Bihar elections but was just another way to consolidate fight against the pandemic. He took a dig at Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) workers who clanked ‘thalis’ to ridicule BJP’s symbolic measure to counter coronavirus saying he was glad that Opposition had finally heard Prime Minister’s appeal to show gratitude to Covid-19 fighters. Hours before Shah’s virtual ‘Bihar Jansamvad Rally’, RJD leaders and workers staged protests, beating utensils and blowing conches against what their leader Tejashwi Yadav dubbed as the ruling party’s cel- ebration of the devastation caused by Covid-19 and the lockdown. “The Opposition is doing politics. What did it do for peo- ple,” Shah asked at the virtual rally. He said Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s welfare steps such as cash transfer, free ration helped the migrant workers in at this time of the crisis. “The Central Government safely ferried 1.25 crore migrants to their destinations after health infrastructure was ramped up to meet their needs,” Shah said. The former BJP president started his address by saying, “This virtual rally has nothing to do with Bihar poll campaign, aimed at connecting with peo- ple in the fight against Covid-19.” “I must say that they final- ly endorsed what PM Modi had earlier appealed for the people to coronavirus in India and around the world. I salute coronavirus warriors,” he said. The Union Home Minister said, “It’s the land of Bihar where first Republic Government was formed. This land of Bihar has always led India.” Continued on Page 2 A group of five terrorists led by a top commander of pro-Pakistan Hizbul Mujahideen terror outfit was eliminated in a successful oper- ation by the joint teams of secu- rity forces in the Reban area of Shopian on Sunday. Since January 2020, the security forces have killed over 90 terrorists, including sever- al top commanders, in anti-ter- rorist operations. During the intense gun- fight, which continued for sev- eral hours during the day, the security forces eliminated all the hiding terrorists without suffering any collateral damage. However, two houses in the area were completely destroyed. Incidents of stone pelting were also reported in the area to prevent the security forces from carrying out anti-terror operations. At the same time, local police officers were seen mak- ing announcements from loud speakers warning people against stepping out of their homes to disrupt the anti-ter- rorist operations. An A++ category terrorist, Farooq Ahmed Bhat alias Nali, hailing from Yaripora in kul- gam is believed to have been killed in the encounter. However, a police spokesman claimed they were still ascer- taining the identity of the ter- rorists. Continued on Page 2 B razil’s Government has stopped publishing a run- ning total of coronavirus deaths and infections in an extraordi- nary move that critics call an attempt to hide the true toll of the disease in Latin America’s largest nation. The Saturday move came after months of criticism from experts saying Brazil’s statistics are woefully deficient, and in some cases manipulated, so it may never be possible to gain a real understanding of the depth of the pandemic in the country. Brazil’s last official numbers showed it had record- ed over 34,000 deaths related to the coronavirus, the third- highest number in the world, just ahead of Italy. It reported nearly 615,000 infections, putting it at the second-high- est, behind the United States. Brazil, with about 210 million people, is the globe’s seventh most populous nation. On Friday, the federal Health Ministry took down a website that had showed daily, weekly and monthly figures on infections and deaths in Brazilian states. On Saturday, the site returned but the total num- bers of infections for states and the nation were no longer there. Continued on Page 2 I ndia’s Covid-19 caseload zooms past 2.50 lakh on Sunday, a week after crossing the 1.75 lakh milestone, as new infections touched 10,770 and 261 deaths in the last 24 hours. India at 2,57,392 is now the sixth worst affected coun- try by the coronavirus pan- demic with over 7,207 total deaths. While Maharashtra con- tinues to hold the tag of the badly-affected State, recording 3,007 new cases and 91 deaths taking the total count to 85,975, including 37,390 discharges and 3060 deaths, Jammu & Kashmir, for the first time reported highest spike of 620 more Covid-19 cases on Sunday, 37 from Jammu divi- sion & 583 from Kashmir divi- sion. Total number of cases in the UT is now at 4087, includ- ing 2830 active cases, 1216 recovered and 41 deaths. After Maharashtra, the sec- ond-worst hit State, Tamil Nadu saw 1,515 more coron- avrius cases and 18 deaths, tak- ing the total cases to 31,667 while the death count rose to 269. Delhi reported 1282 more cases in the last 24 hours. Total number of cases in the nation- al capital is now at 28936, including 17125 active cases, 10999 recovered/dis- charged/migrated & 812 deaths. The national capital is like- ly to see at least one lakh Covid-19 cases by end of June as per a projection made by the five-member committee formed by the Delhi Government. As many as 480 fresh cases and 30 deaths were reported in Gujarat in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of cases to 20,097 and toll to 1,249 while Kerala on Sunday reported 107 new cases taking the number of active cases in the state to 1,095. 803 persons have recovered in the state so far. Uttar Pradesh registered 370 fresh cases on Saturday, taking the number of con- firmed cases to 10,103 even as the number of casualties rose to 268, with 11 fatalities. Rajasthan was at sixth position among worst-hit States as it reported 262 new cases and 9 deaths on Sunday. Total num- ber of cases in the State is now at 10599, including 2605 active cases and 240 deaths. Madhya Pradesh recorded 9,228 cases with 399 death while 93 new fresh cases and one death was reported in Punjab in the last 24 hours, tak- ing total number of cases to 2608 and deaths to 51. Odisha too reported its highest single-day spike in Covid-19 cases after 173 more people tested positive for the disease, taking the total tally in the state to 2,781. Of the 173 new cases, 150 were in quar- antine centres, where people returning from different States are staying. Continued on Page 2 D elhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday announced that the hospitals run by the Delhi Government and private entities will only treat Delhiites during the coro- navirus crisis while the city’s borders will be reopened from Monday. Addressing an online media briefing, Kejriwal said the hospitals run by the Centre will have no such restriction, and if the people from other states come to the national cap- ital for specific surgeries, they can get medical treatment at private hospitals. The announcement comes a day after a five-member panel constituted by the AAP Government suggested that the health infrastructure of the city should be used only for treating Delhiites in view of the raging Covid-19 crisis. Till March, all the hospitals of Delhi were open to all. The residents of Delhi never denied treatment to any person ever, the Chief Minister said, adding that at any given time nearly 60-70 per cent of patients in Delhi hospitals are from other States. “Nearly 7.5 lakh people have sent their suggestions to us and over 90 per cent people want Delhi hospitals to treat patients from the national Capital during the coronavirus pandemic. “Hence, it has been decid- ed that Government and pri- vate hospitals in Delhi will only treat patients from the national Capital,” Kejriwal said. The Chief Minister had last week sought views of the peo- ple in Delhi on the issue, while announcing the decision to close the city’s borders. “Delhi’s health infrastruc- ture is needed to tackle the coronavirus crisis at the moment,” Kejriwal said on Sunday. There are around 40 Delhi Government-run hospitals in the national Capital including LNJP Hospital, GTB Hospital and Rajiv Gandhi Super Speciality Hospital. Among the major Centre- run hospitals in the city are RML Hospital, AIIMS and Safdarjung Hospital. The Delhi Government hospitals have around 10,000 beds while the Centre-run hos- pitals have almost the same number of beds, Kejriwal said, adding that it will strike a bal- ance and protect the interest of those belonging to the nation- al Capital and other States as well. Continued on Page 2 O nly five per cent of patients affected by Covid-19 require hospitalisation, Indian Council of Medical Research Director-General Balram Bhargava said on March 22. The Union Health Ministry slightly revised the figure on May 21. At a Press briefing, Joint Secretary in the Health Ministry Lav Agarwal said out of the total number of active Covid-19 cases in the country, 6.39 per cent needed hospital support. Out of these, about 2.94 per cent needed oxygen support, three per cent intense care units (ICU), and 0.45 per cent required ventila- tor support. On June 6, Delhi had a 27,654 active cases. If we go by the ICMR assessment of five per cent hospitalisation requirement, Delhi should need around 1,400 beds. If we follow the national trend of hospitalisation of 6.3 per cent, then Delhi should need around 1,700 beds. On June 5, Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain claimed that Delhi has 5,000 hospital beds, nearly six times more than what the State required, going by the assess- ments of the ICMR and Health Ministry. That raised the all- important questions: Why crowding in the hospitals when so many beds are on offer? Now take the case of Mumbai. According to a daily Covid-19 report published by the State Government, 16,801 coronavirus patients were admitted in hospitals across Maharashtra on Friday last when the total number of cases in the State stood at 80,000. It means around 20 per cent of the patient required hospitali- sation in Maharashtra. In Mumbai, which had 37,500 positive cases on Friday, of the total bed capacity of 9,092 in dedicated units, 8,570 beds were occupied whereas of the 1,097 ICU beds, except 20 all beds were occupied. In addition, 378 patients were on ventilators. That means around 10,600 hospitalisations, which comes to more than 30 per cent of the confirmed cases. In Haryana, around 30 per cent of the total Covid-19 patients were admitted in 12 health institutions as on Friday. Of them, 12 patients, consti- tuting less than 0.6 per cent of the total active cases, are crit- ically ill and have been put on the ventilator and oxygen sup- port. The reports from these affected States make a mockery of the ICMR estimate of the hospitalisation requirement. The figures also show that in all these three States, four to five times more patients have land- ed in hospital as against the national average. What could explain such a mad rush to hospitals in the last few weeks? Panic of the patients, the greed of hospitals, connivance between labs and hospitals, and a possible under- reporting of cases. A senior official of the ICRM told The Pioneer on the phone that 5-6 per cent hospi- talisation is a universal trend. He felt that throwing the hos- pitals open for all patients was the reason behind the highly inflated figures in these States. “It’s not for me to comment on this issue. Hospital author- ities will better speak about it. But I do feel that not all cases require hospitalisation. In Japan and several other counties, they never admitted mild or asymptomatic cases in hospi- tals. Why are we doing it in India?” he asked. Not surprisingly, the Delhi Government has directed hos- pitals to discharge all mild and asymptomatic patients and not admit such cases in the future. “Fever and coughing would fall under mild symp- toms. If a person’s breathing rate is more than 15 counts in a minute, it indicates moderate Covid-19 infection whereas over 30 breathing counts in a minute would fall into the severe category,” the Delhi Health Minister said at a Press conference on Saturday. It’s shocking that the hos- pitals kept admitting such cases when the Union Health Ministry on May 14 issued a set of revised discharge guidelines which said Covid-19 patients with mild and moderate symp- toms need not be tested before discharge. The guidelines said all mild and moderately-ill patients should be discharged without testing from hospital 10 days after onset of symptoms — if there is no fever and no oxygen support needed for three days. In the case of the severely ill patients, negative testing is must after clinical recovery. Before these guidelines, two consecutive negative tests within 24 hours was a must before a patient could be dis- charged. It’s obvious that Delhi hos- pitals willfully flouted the Healthy Ministry’s discharge policy because they treated the Covid-19 pandemic as a wind- fall. That’s why States such as Maharashtra, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu have fixed a cap on the fees the hospitals could charge from the patients for their stay. Continued on Page 2 New Delhi: Two days after an FIR was filed against Sir Ganga Ram Hospital (SGRH) for allegedly violating Covid- 19 regulation norms, sources at the facility on Sunday said there was a “clerical mistake” and the matter is “being sort- ed out”.

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Page 1: English News Paper | Breaking News | Latest Today News in ......2020/06/08  · eliminated in a successful oper-ation by the joint teams of secu- rity forces in the Reban area of Shopian

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Union Home Minister andformer BJP president Amit

Shah on Sunday launched thepoll campaign for the year-endBihar Assembly polls address-ing a political rally via videoconference and slammed theOpposition for doing politicsover the migrants’ crisis in thecountry in the wake of thecoronavirus pandemic.

Shah claimed that hisaddress has nothing to do withBihar elections but was justanother way to consolidatefight against the pandemic.

He took a dig at RashtriyaJanata Dal (RJD) workers whoclanked ‘thalis’ to ridicule BJP’ssymbolic measure to countercoronavirus saying he was gladthat Opposition had finallyheard Prime Minister’s appealto show gratitude to Covid-19fighters. Hours before Shah’svirtual ‘Bihar Jansamvad Rally’,RJD leaders and workers stagedprotests, beating utensils andblowing conches against what

their leader Tejashwi Yadavdubbed as the ruling party’s cel-ebration of the devastationcaused by Covid-19 and thelockdown.

“The Opposition is doingpolitics. What did it do for peo-ple,” Shah asked at the virtualrally. He said Prime MinisterNarendra Modi’s welfare stepssuch as cash transfer, free rationhelped the migrant workers inat this time of the crisis.

“The Central Governmentsafely ferried 1.25 croremigrants to their destinationsafter health infrastructure wasramped up to meet theirneeds,” Shah said.

The former BJP presidentstarted his address by saying,“This virtual rally has nothingto do with Bihar poll campaign,aimed at connecting with peo-ple in the fight against Covid-19.”

“I must say that they final-ly endorsed what PM Modi hadearlier appealed for the peopleto coronavirus in India andaround the world. I salutecoronavirus warriors,” he said.

The Union Home Ministersaid, “It’s the land of Bihar wherefirst Republic Government wasformed. This land of Bihar hasalways led India.”

Continued on Page 2

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Agroup of five terrorists ledby a top commander of

pro-Pakistan HizbulMujahideen terror outfit waseliminated in a successful oper-ation by the joint teams of secu-rity forces in the Reban area ofShopian on Sunday.

Since January 2020, thesecurity forces have killed over90 terrorists, including sever-al top commanders, in anti-ter-rorist operations.

During the intense gun-fight, which continued for sev-eral hours during the day, thesecurity forces eliminated allthe hiding terrorists withoutsuffering any collateral damage.

However, two houses in thearea were completely destroyed.

Incidents of stone pelting

were also reported in the areato prevent the security forcesfrom carrying out anti-terroroperations.

At the same time, localpolice officers were seen mak-ing announcements from loudspeakers warning peopleagainst stepping out of theirhomes to disrupt the anti-ter-rorist operations.

An A++ category terrorist,Farooq Ahmed Bhat alias Nali,hailing from Yaripora in kul-gam is believed to have beenkilled in the encounter.However, a police spokesmanclaimed they were still ascer-taining the identity of the ter-rorists.

Continued on Page 2

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Brazil’s Government hasstopped publishing a run-

ning total of coronavirus deathsand infections in an extraordi-nary move that critics call anattempt to hide the true toll ofthe disease in Latin America’slargest nation.

The Saturday move cameafter months of criticism fromexperts saying Brazil’s statisticsare woefully deficient, and insome cases manipulated, so itmay never be possible to gaina real understanding of thedepth of the pandemic in thecountry. Brazil’s last officialnumbers showed it had record-

ed over 34,000 deaths related tothe coronavirus, the third-highest number in the world,just ahead of Italy. It reportednearly 615,000 infections,putting it at the second-high-est, behind the United States.Brazil, with about 210 millionpeople, is the globe’s seventhmost populous nation.

On Friday, the federalHealth Ministry took down awebsite that had showed daily,weekly and monthly figures oninfections and deaths inBrazilian states. On Saturday, thesite returned but the total num-bers of infections for states andthe nation were no longer there.

Continued on Page 2

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India’s Covid-19 caseloadzooms past 2.50 lakh on

Sunday, a week after crossingthe 1.75 lakh milestone, asnew infections touched 10,770and 261 deaths in the last 24hours. India at 2,57,392 is nowthe sixth worst affected coun-try by the coronavirus pan-demic with over 7,207 totaldeaths.

While Maharashtra con-tinues to hold the tag of thebadly-affected State, recording3,007 new cases and 91 deathstaking the total count to 85,975,including 37,390 dischargesand 3060 deaths, Jammu &Kashmir, for the first timereported highest spike of 620more Covid-19 cases onSunday, 37 from Jammu divi-sion & 583 from Kashmir divi-sion. Total number of cases inthe UT is now at 4087, includ-ing 2830 active cases, 1216recovered and 41 deaths.

After Maharashtra, the sec-ond-worst hit State, TamilNadu saw 1,515 more coron-avrius cases and 18 deaths, tak-ing the total cases to 31,667while the death count rose to269.

Delhi reported 1282 morecases in the last 24 hours. Totalnumber of cases in the nation-al capital is now at 28936,

including 17125 active cases,10999 recovered/dis-charged/migrated & 812deaths.

The national capital is like-ly to see at least one lakhCovid-19 cases by end of Juneas per a projection made by thefive-member committeeformed by the DelhiGovernment.

As many as 480 fresh casesand 30 deaths were reported inGujarat in the last 24 hours,taking the total number ofcases to 20,097 and toll to1,249 while Kerala on Sundayreported 107 new cases taking

the number of active cases inthe state to 1,095. 803 personshave recovered in the state sofar.

Uttar Pradesh registered370 fresh cases on Saturday,taking the number of con-firmed cases to 10,103 even asthe number of casualties rose to268, with 11 fatalities.Rajasthan was at sixth positionamong worst-hit States as itreported 262 new cases and 9deaths on Sunday. Total num-ber of cases in the State is nowat 10599, including 2605 active cases and 240deaths.

Madhya Pradesh recorded9,228 cases with 399 deathwhile 93 new fresh cases andone death was reported inPunjab in the last 24 hours, tak-ing total number of cases to2608 and deaths to 51.

Odisha too reported itshighest single-day spike inCovid-19 cases after 173 morepeople tested positive for thedisease, taking the total tally inthe state to 2,781. Of the 173new cases, 150 were in quar-antine centres, where peoplereturning from different Statesare staying.

Continued on Page 2

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Delhi Chief Minister ArvindKejriwal on Sunday

announced that the hospitalsrun by the Delhi Governmentand private entities will onlytreat Delhiites during the coro-navirus crisis while the city’sborders will be reopened fromMonday.

Addressing an onlinemedia briefing, Kejriwal saidthe hospitals run by the Centrewill have no such restriction,and if the people from otherstates come to the national cap-ital for specific surgeries, theycan get medical treatment atprivate hospitals.

The announcement comesa day after a five-member panelconstituted by the AAPGovernment suggested thatthe health infrastructure ofthe city should be used only fortreating Delhiites in view of theraging Covid-19 crisis.

Till March, all the hospitalsof Delhi were open to all. Theresidents of Delhi never deniedtreatment to any person ever,the Chief Minister said, addingthat at any given time nearly60-70 per cent of patients inDelhi hospitals are from otherStates.

“Nearly 7.5 lakh peoplehave sent their suggestions tous and over 90 per cent people

want Delhi hospitals to treatpatients from the nationalCapital during the coronaviruspandemic.

“Hence, it has been decid-ed that Government and pri-vate hospitals in Delhi willonly treat patients from thenational Capital,” Kejriwal said.

The Chief Minister had lastweek sought views of the peo-ple in Delhi on the issue, whileannouncing the decision toclose the city’s borders.

“Delhi’s health infrastruc-ture is needed to tackle thecoronavirus crisis at themoment,” Kejriwal said onSunday.

There are around 40 DelhiGovernment-run hospitals inthe national Capital includingLNJP Hospital, GTB Hospitaland Rajiv Gandhi SuperSpeciality Hospital.

Among the major Centre-run hospitals in the city areRML Hospital, AIIMS andSafdarjung Hospital.

The Delhi Governmenthospitals have around 10,000beds while the Centre-run hos-pitals have almost the samenumber of beds, Kejriwal said,adding that it will strike a bal-ance and protect the interest ofthose belonging to the nation-al Capital and other States aswell.

Continued on Page 2

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Only five per cent of patientsaffected by Covid-19

require hospitalisation, IndianCouncil of Medical ResearchDirector-General BalramBhargava said on March 22.

The Union HealthMinistry slightly revised thefigure on May 21. At a Pressbriefing, Joint Secretary in theHealth Ministry Lav Agarwalsaid out of the total number ofactive Covid-19 cases in thecountry, 6.39 per cent neededhospital support. Out of these,about 2.94 per cent neededoxygen support, three per centintense care units (ICU), and0.45 per cent required ventila-tor support.

On June 6, Delhi had a27,654 active cases. If we go bythe ICMR assessment of fiveper cent hospitalisationrequirement, Delhi shouldneed around 1,400 beds. If wefollow the national trend ofhospitalisation of 6.3 per cent,then Delhi should need around1,700 beds.

On June 5, Delhi HealthMinister Satyendra Jainclaimed that Delhi has 5,000hospital beds, nearly six timesmore than what the Staterequired, going by the assess-ments of the ICMR and HealthMinistry. That raised the all-important questions: Whycrowding in the hospitals whenso many beds are on offer?

Now take the case ofMumbai. According to a dailyCovid-19 report published bythe State Government, 16,801

coronavirus patients wereadmitted in hospitals acrossMaharashtra on Friday lastwhen the total number of casesin the State stood at 80,000. Itmeans around 20 per cent ofthe patient required hospitali-sation in Maharashtra.

In Mumbai, which had37,500 positive cases on Friday,of the total bed capacity of9,092 in dedicated units, 8,570beds were occupied whereas ofthe 1,097 ICU beds, except 20all beds were occupied. Inaddition, 378 patients were onventilators. That means around10,600 hospitalisations, whichcomes to more than 30 per centof the confirmed cases.

In Haryana, around 30 percent of the total Covid-19patients were admitted in 12

health institutions as on Friday.Of them, 12 patients, consti-tuting less than 0.6 per cent ofthe total active cases, are crit-ically ill and have been put onthe ventilator and oxygen sup-port.

The reports from theseaffected States make a mockeryof the ICMR estimate of thehospitalisation requirement.The figures also show that in allthese three States, four to fivetimes more patients have land-ed in hospital as against thenational average.

What could explain such amad rush to hospitals in the lastfew weeks? Panic of thepatients, the greed of hospitals,connivance between labs andhospitals, and a possible under-reporting of cases.

A senior official of theICRM told The Pioneer on thephone that 5-6 per cent hospi-talisation is a universal trend.He felt that throwing the hos-pitals open for all patients wasthe reason behind the highlyinflated figures in these States.

“It’s not for me to commenton this issue. Hospital author-ities will better speak about it.But I do feel that not all casesrequire hospitalisation. In Japanand several other counties,they never admitted mild orasymptomatic cases in hospi-tals. Why are we doing it inIndia?” he asked.

Not surprisingly, the DelhiGovernment has directed hos-pitals to discharge all mild andasymptomatic patients and not

admit such cases in the future.“Fever and coughing

would fall under mild symp-toms. If a person’s breathingrate is more than 15 counts ina minute, it indicates moderateCovid-19 infection whereasover 30 breathing counts in aminute would fall into thesevere category,” the DelhiHealth Minister said at a Pressconference on Saturday.

It’s shocking that the hos-pitals kept admitting such caseswhen the Union HealthMinistry on May 14 issued a setof revised discharge guidelineswhich said Covid-19 patientswith mild and moderate symp-toms need not be tested beforedischarge.

The guidelines said all mildand moderately-ill patientsshould be discharged withouttesting from hospital 10 daysafter onset of symptoms — ifthere is no fever and no oxygensupport needed for three days.In the case of the severely illpatients, negative testing ismust after clinical recovery.

Before these guidelines,two consecutive negative testswithin 24 hours was a mustbefore a patient could be dis-charged.

It’s obvious that Delhi hos-pitals willfully flouted theHealthy Ministry’s dischargepolicy because they treated theCovid-19 pandemic as a wind-fall. That’s why States such asMaharashtra, Kerala, and TamilNadu have fixed a cap on thefees the hospitals could chargefrom the patients for their stay.

Continued on Page 2

New Delhi: Two days after anFIR was filed against SirGanga Ram Hospital (SGRH)for allegedly violating Covid-19 regulation norms, sourcesat the facility on Sunday saidthere was a “clerical mistake”and the matter is “being sort-ed out”.

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Page 2: English News Paper | Breaking News | Latest Today News in ......2020/06/08  · eliminated in a successful oper-ation by the joint teams of secu- rity forces in the Reban area of Shopian

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Lucknow: The Uttar PradeshAnti-Terrorist Squad onSunday arrested an allegedarms supplier to Khalistaniterrorists, a senior officer said.

Additional DirectorGeneral of the ATS, DhruvaKant Thakur, said,

"The UP ATS has arrestedJaved, an arms supplier toKhalistani terrorists, fromHapur. Javed is a resident of theKithore area of Meerut. Hisinterrogation is on and thePunjab Police has beeninformed about the arrest."

Thakur said Javed has alsosupplied illegal arms to crimi-nals in Amritsar.

He was arrested followingan input from the state specialcell, Amritsar, the ADG said.

In a statement issued here,the UP ATS said,"Javed hadsupplied illegal weapon toDharminder Singh, a residentof Ludhiana, who was involvedin the murder of a senior RSSoffice-bearer of Punjab, Brig

(retd) Jagdish Kumar Gagneja.The NIA is probing the case.Ashish, an accomplice of Javed,was arrested earlier."

Dharminder Singh is amember of the KhalistanLiberation Force (KLF) andcurrently lodged in the TiharJail.

In November 2019, Javedon the instructions ofDharminder Singh, had giventhree pistols to his aide, theATS said in the statement.

ATS officials said a numberof pro-Khalistan terrorists havebeen caught in western UP andthe Punjab Police was search-ing Javed for quite some time.

In May, in a joint operationby the Uttar Pradesh ATS andthe Special Operation Group ofthe Punjab Police, Tirath Singh,a suspected terrorist owingallegiance to the Khalistanmovement was arrested fromThapar Nagar in Meerut. Hewas handed over to the PunjabPolice after interrogation. PTI

Chandigarh: Targeting Delhi ChiefMinister Arvind Kejriwal over hisdecision to reserve hospitals run bythe city Government and privateentities for Delhiites only during thecoronavirus crisis, Haryana HealthMinister Anil Vij on Sunday said thestate will not deny treatment to out-siders as it cannot be "harsh" like theAAP supremo.

"We cannot put restrictionsand deny treatment to anyone ifhe/she, who is from outsideHaryana and falls ill in the state oris taken ill while in transit. We willtreat such patients. We cannot beharsh like Kejriwal," Vij said.

He was asked to comment onKejriwal's announcement that thehospitals run by the Delhi govern-ment and private entities will onlytreat Delhiites during the coron-avirus crisis while the city's borderswill be reopened from Monday.

With the raging Covid-19 cri-sis in Delhi, Vij said he had gotrequests from some people in their

individual capacity who were want-ing to know if beds were availablein Haryana for coronavirus patients.

"In the past few days, manyhave contacted me saying theywere not getting beds in Delhi," hesaid. Vij said the recovery rate andrate of doubling of Covid-19 casesdropped in Haryana as a number ofcases has been reported during thepast over a week. He, however,hoped there will be some improve-ment once these patients are dis-charged.

The state's recovery rate has fall-en to nearly 31 per cent from over65 per cent about a fortnight backwhile the rate of doubling of infec-tions has come down to 7 days from16 earlier. Asked to comment onspurt in cases during the past overa week, Vij said these cases eitherhave a travel or contact history.

Replying to a question, theHealth minister said there is nocommunity spread in any of the dis-tricts in Haryana. He said the state

will ramp up the number of tests permillion population to 10,000 fromthe present nearly 5700.

Haryana is conducting 5,669tests per million population.

"I think we must be in the topfour states in the country in termsof number of tests we conduct. Weare planning to take it to 10,000 testsper million in the coming days," Vijtold reporters.

Around 1.5 lakh people in thestate have been tested for the diseaseso far. According to the 2011Census, the population of Haryanais 2.53 crore.

The total number of coron-avirus cases in Haryana has crossed4,000 and the state has reported 24Covid-19 deaths. Most of the caseshave been reported from Gurgaon,Faridabad and Sonipat districts, allof which fall in the National CapitalRegion (NCR).

The worst-hit Gurgaon alonehas close to 1,800 Covid-19 caseswith four deaths. PTI

Guwahati: The flood situationin Assam remained serious onSunday with nearly 60,000 peo-ple still affected by the delugein six districts, officials said.

The flood waters recededfrom Lakhimpur district butentered two new districtsDhemaji and West KarbiAnglong, they said.

According to the dailyflood report of the Assam StateDisaster ManagementAuthority (ASDMA), 59,840people have been affected dueto floods in Dhemaji, Goalpara,Nagaon, Hojai, West KarbiAnglong and Cachar districts.

Goalpara is the worst hitwith over 42,000 people affect-ed followed by Hojai withmore than 13,000 people andWest Karbi Anglong witharound 3,000 persons, it said.

Till Saturday, more than59,000 people were affected infive districts.

So far, the total number ofpersons losing their lives in thefirst wave of flood stands at 10across the state.

The SDRF has rescued fivepersons in the last 24 hours inGoalpara, ASDMA said.

At present, 103 villages areunder water and 6,439 hectaresof crop areas have been dam-aged, it said. It said authoritiesare running 11 relief camps and

distribution centres in two dis-tricts, where 1,727 people aretaking shelter currently.

Embankments, roads andmany other infrastructureshave been damaged at variousplaces in Biswanath andBarpeta districts.

Massive erosions have beenwitnessed at different places ofDibrugarh and Lakhimpur,ASDMA said. PTI

Jammu: Defence Minister Rajnath Singh will addressthe first ever 'virtual rally' in Jammu on June 14 tospeak about the Centre's achievements, Jammu andKashmir BJP president Ravinder Raina said onSunday.

This was disclosed by Raina while reviewing thearrangements for the 'virtual rally' at a meeting withsenior functionaries at the party headquarters here,a party release said.

The defence minister will address the partyactivists and general public through a digital rally onJune 14 at 10.30 am.

"He will share the achievements of the Centralgovernment, its landmark decisions and also shed lighton other issues of national and regional importance,”Raina said.

The BJP has decided to conduct its most of its pro-grammes online due to the prevailing crisis follow-ing the outbreak of coronavirus pandemic, the partyleader further said.

“Party's organisational meetings and regularinteraction to take feedback are being done throughaudio and video bridges. Even all the senior party lead-ers are guiding ground level activists through digitalmodes,” he said. PTI

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Haryana Board of SchoolEducation will declare

results of Class 10 examinationon Monday, officials said.

"Haryana Board of SchoolEducation will declare resultsof 338,096 candidates, whoappeared for the secondaryexamination, on June 8," aBoard spokesperson said.

Out of 338,096 secondarystudents, 186,153 are boys and

151,943 are girls. The exam forscience subject could not beconducted as the coronaviruslockdown was imposed.

He said the result would bedeclared on the basis of eval-uation of four subjects byincluding the average marks ofthe fifth subject (science sub-ject).

The candidates opting forscience stream in Class XI,however, will have to take theexamination later.

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Mumbai: In apparent signs of flattening ofthe coronavirus curve, Dharavi, believed tobe Asia's largest slum located in Mumbai andalso a hotspot, has reported not a singleCOVID-19 death in the last six days while939 of the total 1,899 patients have recov-ered, Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation(BMC) officials said on Sunday.

While 34 people tested positive for coro-navirus on June 1, the number has now comedown to 10.

"Dharavi has not reported a singledeath in the last six days, which is the firstmajor indicator that we are on the righttrack. The number of people getting dis-charged is also increasing," said KiranDighavkar, assistant municipal commis-sioner of G north ward of BMC.

He said 939 of the total 1,899 cases havebeen recovered.

"Dharavi area has reported 71 deaths sofar. But the real change is (reflected) in thedaily testing of samples. A total of 34 peo-ple had tested positive for coronavirus onJune 1 which has now come down to 10,"said Dighavkar.

This is at a time when Mumbai city hasbeen reporting a rise in cases and deaths. Asof June 6, Mumbai's tally of COVID-19 casesstood at 47,354 cases and 1,577 deaths.

Meanwhile, Dighavkar attributed thelower number of cases to aggressive screen-ing and testing of suspected cases in Dharaviwith activation of fever clinics.

"With the help of fever clinics, wecould identify the people showing symptomssimilar to that of coronavirus infection. Weisolated them immediately which helped ineither containing further transmission of thevirus or spreading any kind of infection fromthose who are feeling unwell," he said.

Dharavi in central Mumbai had report-ed the first coronavirus case on April 1,almost a week after the national lockdowncame into force.

Since then, the area has became a focalpoint as it has been the home to many small-scale industries. Dharavi is also a major sup-plier of informal labour.

Other BMC officials said the largescaleexodus of people during the lockdown couldhave also contributed to lower number ofcases.

"Dharavi offers jobs to hundreds of thou-sands of people. With continued extensionsto the lockdown, a sizable number of peo-ple have left the slum for their homes. Thishelped us in ensuring physical distancing tosome extent," an official said. PTI

Jaipur: An inquiry has been initiatedagainst staff of a private hospital inRajasthan's Churu district after receiv-ing screenshots of a purportedWhatsApp chat in which they alleged-ly discussed about not attending toMuslim patients affected by COVID-19,police said on Sunday.

Screenshots of the chat between thehospital staff had gone viral followingwhich an investigation has been initi-ated, they said.

Dr Sunil Choudhary, who runs theSrichand Baradiya Rog Nidan Kendrain Sardarshahar and whose staff pur-portedly wrote the messages, apologisedthrough a Facebook post, saying thehospital staff did not have any intentionto hurt any religious groups.

"We have received a complaint fol-lowing which we are taking action toregister FIR in the matter," ChuruSuperintendent of Police TejaswiniGautam said. Sardarshahar police sta-tion SHO Mahendra Dutt Sharma saidthe police control room had received acomplaint regarding screenshots of thechat being circulated on social media.

"We are inquiring into the matter.An FIR will be registered against thenames mentioned in the WhatsAppchat," Sharma said. PTI

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From Page 1Official sources said Farooq

Bhat was trapped by the secu-rity forces along with a group offour other local HizbulMujahideen terrorists earlySunday morning. The HMcommander had earlier man-aged to give slip to the securityforces during cordon and searchoperations.

The operations in the areawere launched on the basis of aspecific intelligence input devel-oped by the Jammu andKashmir police about the pres-ence of one of the top com-

manders in the area.Police spokesman in a state-

ment said, “On a specific inputgenerated by Shopian Police, ajoint cordon and search opera-tion was launched by Shopianpolice, 1 RR and 178 Bn CRPFin Reban area of district Shopianon Sunday morning”.

During the search opera-tion, the hiding terrorists firedon the joint search party. Thefire was retaliated leading to anencounter.

“In the ensuing encounter,05 terrorists were killed andtheir bodies have been retrieved

from the site of encounter. Theidentification and affiliation ofthe killed terrorists is beingascertained. However, as percredible sources the killed ter-rorists belonged to proscribedHM terrorist outfit and oneamong the killed terrorists isbelieved to be a top comman-der”.

Since all the killed terroristswere locals from Kashmir val-ley, police spokesman said, “Incase any family claims the killedterrorists to be their kith or kincan come forward for the iden-tification”.

From Page 1There is another interesting

side to this crowding of hospi-tals. A Covid-19 testing lab inThane has been accused ofchanging negative reports intopositive ones and sending thepatients to a particular hospital.The Thane MunicipalCorporation has sent a notice tothe lab and asked why its licenseshould not be revoked.

Social media is abuzz withaudios and videos clips showing

doctors and hospital officialstaking advantage of the panic tofleece the Covid-19 patients.

In fact, it’s panic more thananything else that’s driving peo-ple to hospitals even in caseswhere a homestay is enough forhealing.

Conflicting guidelines andstatements from the authoritieson the need for hospitalisationshave not helped the matter,either.

A spate of media report hasalso shown that hospital beds areempty but kept as a reserve for

VIP patients. The common mancan die in a corridor!

There are serious reasons tobelieve that the actual numbersof cases are at least tenfoldmore than shown by testing. Inthat case, the number of peoplewho require hospitalisation isbound to be proportionatelyhigher.

Victims of panic, greed,and sleaze, and possible under-reporting of cases, Covid-19patients have a harrowing timerunning between hospitals andhome.

From Page 1“It is because you voted for

Prime Minister Modi not onlyBihar but all eastern India nowhas set off its journey to devel-opment,” Shah said.

Shah asserted that “Thesweat of people of Bihar and itsmigrants is ingrained in thiscountry’s foundation...thatcannot be forgotten. I mustacknowledge their contribu-tion to the country’s develop-ment,” he said.

Shah reeled off figures ofCentral Government’s flag-ship economic schemes as healso counted its ‘politicalachievements’.

“About 1 crore people ofthe country have been bene-fitted from Ayushman Bharathealth scheme,” and 25 crorepeople have been providedwith safe drinking water, hesaid.

The Union Minister fur-ther said, “LED bulb is illu-minating in 2.5 crore house-hold today. It’s not the lanternage today but of LED bulb.”

“The biggest work theModi Government has donewas to take country’s pride tothe world,” he further said inhis digital address.

Shah said, “The ModiGovernment on August 5,2019 dared to scrap Article370 and 35A.” He also said,“This Modi Governmentthrough court’s judgment,processed construction of

Ram Janmabhoomi temple.”The BJP leader said,

“Janata curfew will be imprint-ed in country’s golden histo-ry for following a leader’sappeal. After former PrimeMinister Lal Bahadur ShastriI have not seen a leader otherthan PM Narendra Modi onwhose appeal the whole coun-try got united.”

Shah said, “I would alsolike to thank Bihar ChiefMinister Nitish Kumar and DyChief Minister Sushil Kumarfor taking every step to battleagainst coronavirus pandem-ic.” Talking about BiharAssembly election 2020, Shahexpressed confidence that theNDA will get two-third major-ity under Nitish Kumar’s lead-ership.

“There are elections inBihar in the coming days, Ibelieve that under NitishKumar ji’s leadership NDAwill form the Governmentwith 2/3rd majority but thisisn’t the time for politics. Weall should fight Covid-19under Modi ji’s leadership,” headded.

Taking a dig at Congressleader Rahul Gandhi, Shahsaid that some NGO has toldRahul Gandhi that speakingloudly will get him more votes.

He said that theOpposition leaders dismissedModi’s efforts to unite thecountry in the fight againstCovid-19 as political propa-ganda, the nation followedhis appeals.

From Page 139 new Covid-19 cases

were reported in Karnataka,taking the total number to5452, Haryana reported 191COVID-19 cases on Sunday,including 78 from the worst-affected Gurgaon district, as theinfection tally breached the4,000-mark. As many as 92 newCovid-19 positive cases werereported in Assam in the last 24hours to reach a tally of 2,565.

Goa, too, recorded a rise as71 new infections took theCOVID-19 case count in thestate to 267, including 202active cases.

The worldwide death tollfrom COVID-19 has surpassed4,00,000, according to a tally byJohns Hopkins University thathealth experts say is still anundercount because many whodied were not tested for thevirus. Worldwide, at least 6.9million people have beeninfected by the virus, accordingto Johns Hopkins. A total of46,66,386 samples have beentested till now for coronavirus,according to the IndianCouncil of Medical Research.

From Page 1He said that the Centre-run

hospitals will continue to treatpeople belonging to other statesand his government has notissued any separate order for thesame.

“We are going to reopenDelhi’s borders tomorrow.Malls, restaurants and religiousplaces will open but hotels andbanquets will remain closed aswe might need to convert theminto hospitals in the comingtime,” Kejriwal also said.

In its report, the panel hadpointed out that Delhi will need15,000 beds by the end of Juneand if people of other states areallowed to get treatment, allbeds here will be occupiedwithin just three days, Kejriwalsaid during the online confer-ence.

“Till March, Delhi used totreat all people of the country,but at the time of this crisis,Delhi hospitals need to bereserved for the people of Delhi,”he said.

The panel, headed byIndraprastha University vice-chancellor Dr Mahesh Verma,

had on Saturday submitted itsreport to the government.

The Delhi government hadasked the panel to guide it onhealthcare infrastructure aug-mentation and overall pre-paredness of hospitals to battleCOVID-19 in the national cap-ital.

The panel was also asked toguide the government on anyother area where strengtheningof infrastructure is required tobetter manage the pandemic inDelhi. He also asked people tokeep following social distancingand other norms even duringrelaxations.

“Relaxations do not meanthat coronavirus disease hasended,” said the chief minister.

“Wearing a mask is foryour own safety. I am still get-ting reports that people aregoing out without masks. Youhave to wear a mask, maintainsocial distancing and wash yourhands to keep yourself safefrom COVID-19 infection,” headded.

He also urged senior citi-zens to observe extra caution,and reduce interaction “evenwith family members” as muchas possible.

From Page 1The site now shows only

the numbers for the previous24 hours. Brazilian PresidentJair Bolsonaro tweetedSaturday that disease totals are“not representative” of thecountry’s current situation.

A Bolsonaro ally contend-ed to the newspaper O Globothat at least some states pro-viding figures to the HealthMinistry had sent falsified data,implying that they were exag-gerating the toll. Carlos Wizard,a businessman expected toassume a high-level post in theHealth Ministry, said the fed-eral government would be con-ducting a review intended todetermine a “more accurate”’toll.

“The number we havetoday is fanciful or manipulat-ed,” Wizard said.

A council of state healthsecretaries said it would fightthe changes by Bolsonaro, whohas dismissed the gravity of thecoronavirus pandemic andtried to thwart attempts toimpose quarantines, curfewsand social distancing, arguing

those steps are causing moredamage to the economy thanthe pandemic.

“The authoritarian, insen-sitive, inhumane and unethicalattempt to make the COVID-19 deaths invisible will notprosper,” the health secretariescouncil said Saturday.

While precise counts ofcases and deaths are difficultfor governments worldwide,health researchers have beensaying for weeks that a series ofserious irregularities withBrazilian government statis-tics was making it impossibleto get a handle on an explod-ing situation.

Around the world, coron-avirus deaths are being under-counted to varying degreesdue to lack of universal testing.Academic groups in dozens ofnations have tried to figure outthe magnitude of the under-count by studying the totalnumber of deaths in a set peri-od compared to the average ofprior years in a particularnation, state, province or city.Where they find unexplainedsurges in deaths, it is likely duein large part to undiagnosedcases of the coronavirus.

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Page 3: English News Paper | Breaking News | Latest Today News in ......2020/06/08  · eliminated in a successful oper-ation by the joint teams of secu- rity forces in the Reban area of Shopian

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The rapid increase of coron-avirus cases in Gurugram

continued on Sunday with 230fresh positive cases emerging inthe district.

On Saturday 129 positivecases were reported in the dis-trict with majority of them incontainment zones. Officialssaid that on an average, 7 to 10cases are appearing every hourin Gurugram.

The total number of caseshas now reached 1,922 in thedistrict including 1,467 activepatients admitted in differenthospitals while 451 have beencured and discharged.The offi-cials further said that the con-dition of two patients isextremely critical. Gurugram

district has already registered 4deaths.

"We are registering morethan 100 cases everyday. It is aconcern for us. We are work-ing hard to contain spread inlimited places," said a healthofficial.

According to officials, thecases sharply increased fromMay 26 when total cases werejust 317. Since then, health offi-cials have detected 20 cases onMay 27, 68 on May 28, 115 onMay 29, 157 on May 30, 97 onMay 31, June 1 saw 129 cases,June 2 at 160, June 3 at 132, 215on June 4, June 5 at 153, 129 onJune 6 and 230 on June 7.

Gurugram district admin-istration added 3 more con-tainment zones on Friday as thedistrict now has 66 such zonesincluding 63 in Gurugram

block, 2 in Pataudi and 1 inSohna block.

The decision was takenduring a review meeting of dis-aster management unit andcontainment observation com-mittee under chairmanship ofDistrict Magistrate AmitKhatri.

In view of the rising cases,Khatri has suggested homeisolation.

"It has been observed that80% corona-infected patientsmay recover from it if they fol-low necessary guidelines ofthe health department," Khatrisaid.

"The district administra-tion has already constituted aseparate medical team whichwill call every patient daily andregister progress reports. Ifneeded, the team will also visit

them for medical assistance," hesaid.

Apart from this, GurugramMLA Sudhir Singla ordered aninquiry in a death case of acorona patient. The victim wasa resident of Adarsh Nagar. Thedeceased family alleged that thepatient was ignored by the

govt health facilities and didn'tget timely treatment whichresulting his death.

“I have given an order tochief medical officerGurugram, Dr. JS Punia toenquire about the matter andtake strict action against theguilty, "Singla said.

�33������ ���� 4;8�

The Noida on Sunday tested fourty one morepeople for coronavirus, pushing the infec-

tion count in the district to 632. So far, theGautaum Budh Nagar has reported eight infec-

tion deaths.According to Sunil Dohare, the district sur-

veillance officer, on Sunday, 41 people tested pos-itive for COVID-19.

"The total number of positive cases till datestands at 632 and 31 people were dischargedfrom hospitals after treatment, taking the num-ber of recovered patient to 413 till date. Thereare 211 active cases now," he said.

According to a statement, the fresh casesincluded three minors, aged 12 and 14. Fourelderly people--aged 67, 68, 71 and 72 were alsofound infected with the virus, it said.

Among those discharged, 16 were undertreatment at the Government Institute ofMedical Sciences (GIMS); 10 at Sharda Hospital;and five at Kailash Hospital, all three in GreaterNoida.

The recovery rate of patients on Sundayimproved to 65.34 per cent from 64.63 per centthe previous day, according to official statistics.

�33������ ���� 456��57'8

The Delhi Congress onSunday demanded to seg-

regate district-wise hospitals inthe National Capital for treat-ment of Covid-19 and non-Covid patients to prevent themfrom becoming hubs of coro-navirus infections.

Congress Delhi unit pres-ident Anil Kumar said that thegovernment created total con-fusion among people and themedical fraternity by not seg-regating Covid and non-Covidhospitals. Patients are nowafraid of visiting hospitals fortreatment of other diseases, hesaid..

Kumar also accused theDelhi Government of passingthe buck to divert peoples’attention. “The Covid cases inDelhi have risen to 1329 per 10lakh, which is the highest in thecountry and instead of ramp-ing up the testing facilities inDelhi.

The Kejriwal Governmentkeeps indulging in blame game

despite the fact that the dou-bling rate of Covid cases inDelhi is going up at a faster ratein 11.39 day,” he said.

Criticising the DelhiGovernment for “penalizing”labs for conducting more Covidtests, Delhi Congress termedthe decision to reduce thenumber of testing labs is“shocking”.

“There are over 27,000Covid cases in Delhi with 761deaths which is an alarming sit-uation but the government isbusy in creating chaos by intro-ducing new guidelines.

The Congress presidentfurther said that the five-mem-ber committee, appointed bythe Delhi Government hashighlighted in its report theneed of at least 15000 beds bythis month dedicated to treatCorona patients. As presentlythe Capital has only a little over8000 Covid beds, thoughKejriwal had boasted in Aprilthat the city hospitals havearound 30,000 Covid beds,” headded.

�33������ ���� 456��57'8

The Delhi Police on Sundaydetained Delhi Bharatiya

Janta Party (BJP) presidentAdesh Gupta and his party'sMLAs for alleged violation oflockdown norms. Gupta andMLAs had gathered at Rajghat

to protest against the AamAadmi Party (AAP) led DelhiGovernment over "deteriorat-ing" healthcare services in thecity.

According to a seniorpolice official, Gupta, alongwith 14 others, was detained fororganising the protest in vio-lation of the lockdown norms.

"The detained BJP leaderswere taken to Rajender Nagarpolice station and releasedlater," said the senior policeofficial.

Leader of Opposition inthe Delhi Assembly RamvirBidhuri said that the BJP willcontinue to protest against theAAP government over alleged

deteriorating healthcare ser-vices in the national capital.

"The Delhi BJP presidentwas detained by the DelhiPolice at Rajghat during aprotest against the Kejriwalgovernment for collapse ofhealth services in Delhi," astatement by the party said.

�33������ ���� 456��57'8

In a tragic incident, two youths diedafter the bike, they were riding,

apparently lost balance while theyweren descending from a flyover inwest Delhi. Police said that the inci-dent occurred near Vikaspuri flyoveron Saturday night when the two werecoming from Peera Garhi side.

The deceased have been identifiedas Gulshan (23), who was an e-rick-shaw driver, and Sunny (24), both wereresidents of Hastsal Vihar, UttamNagar.

Police said that witnesses told

police that the rider was driving withhigh speed and lost balance. A con-stable who was patrolling in the areainformed the police station about theaccident, according to police.

"The spot was inspected by a crimeteam and the two were declared deadon the spot by the staff of the cen-tralised accident and trauma services(CATS)," said Deepak Purohit, theDeputy Commissioner of Police(DCP), West.

The bodies will be handed over tothe family after post-mortem, theDCP said, adding that an investigationwas on.

Delhi: The national capitalwitnessed another bout of rainon Sunday morning as strongand cold winds swept acrossthe city. The rains and cloudyweather are expected to restrictthe maximum temperaturearound 36 degrees Celsius.

The SafdarjungObservatory, which providesrepresentative figures for thecity, has been recording a belownormal maximum tempera-ture for the last few days,owing to light rains.

On Saturday, it recorded ahigh of 36.8 degrees Celsius,which was three notches belowthe normal.

Kuldeep Srivastava, thehead of the regional forecasting

center of the IndiaMeteorological Department,said the region is not likely towitness a heat wave till June 15.

The maximum tempera-ture will rise by two to threedegrees Celsius but it is expect-ed to remain below the 40degrees Celsius-mark till June10, he said.

Thereafter, moisture-ladeneasterly winds due to a proba-ble low pressure area in the Bayof Bengal will bring rains inDelhi-NCR on June 12 andJune 13, he said.

There is a possibility of athunderstorm on Saturday andminimum and maximum tem-peratures will hover around 37and 26 degrees Celsius.

�33������ ���� 456��57'8

Delhi Cabinet has decided towithdraw the special coro-

na fee levied at 80 per cent onthe MRP placed on the sale ofall types of liquor in the State.The order will come into effectfrom June 10 onwards.

The Confederation ofIndian Alcoholic BeveragesCompanies (CIABC) had beendemanding from the Delhigovernment to roll back 70 per-cent special corona fee put onliquor sales for the last week.

The organisation has saidthe high tax rate was drastical-ly affecting the sale of alcoholin the national capital. It want-ed the government to bringdown the cess to a realistic andsustainable level, but now thegovernment has decided toremove it altogether.

The liquor manufacturers'association had stated that thesale of alcohol in the nationalcapital dropped 58 percent ascompared to what it was last year.

Alcohol sales of neigh-bouring states like UP and

Haryana seem to be bouncingback as there was only a 10-15percent additional tax imposedon alcohol in these states.

In a letter written toDeputy Chief Minister ManishSisodia, CIABC Director-General Vinod Giri hadclaimed that national capital'salcohol business was slowlyshifting to Haryana and UttarPradesh due to the differencein retail prices caused by taxes.

It may recalled that in May,the Delhi government hasimposed a 70 percent corona feeon the MRP on types of liquor.

By the end of May, theexcise department witnessed atotal sale of Rs 234 crore, whichtotalled up to Rs 150 crore incorona fees and almost thesame amount as excise duty.

�33������ ���� 456��57'8

The Delhi police CrimeBranch has filed another

chargesheet in connection withthe communal riots in Northeast Delhi against six people forsetting ablaze a house inBhajanpura area, in whichAkbari Begum, an octogenari-an, was killed. While othermembers of the family climbedto the rooftop, the deceased dueto her old age was unable toreach the rooftop and subse-quently died due to suffocation.

Begum, an 85-year old

woman, was choked to deathwhen her house was torchedduring the communal violencein northeast Delhi in February.Police filed the charge sheetbefore Metropolitan MagistrateRakesh Kumar Rampuri againstsix persons who were alleged-ly part of a mob that set fire toAkbari Begum's house leadingto her death.

The court has put up thematter for consideration of thecharge sheet on June 21.

The crime branch has filed13 charge sheets till now incases related to northeast Delhi

riots. It was investigating 59cases related to murder andrioting.

According to the chargesheet, on February 25, when themob torched Begum's house,while other members escapedto the roof, the octogenariancould not reach the rooftop.

She subsequently died dueto asphyxia (suffocation toinhalation of smoke) and hercharred body was found on afolding bed, police said.

The FIR was registered onthe complaint of her son SaeedSalmani who had a garment

shop on the ground floor of thebuilding.

In his complaint, he said hisfour-storey building wasallegedly torched by the mob,destroying his garment work-shop, burning his house andlooting jewellery and cash fromthem too. Salmani had gone outto purchase milk when theincident took place, the com-plaint said.

Begum's charred body wasrecovered when the police offi-cials and the fire departmentwere able to douse the fire suc-cessfully, the police said. Her

family members were rescuedfrom the rooftop.

The charge sheet said sixpersons were arrested based onthe videos that went viral onsocial media, statements ofpolice officials who rescuedher family members, state-ments of eyewitnesses and othertechnical evidence includingcall detail records.

Further investigation isgoing on to identify otheraccused in the case, policeadded. The chargesheet wasfiled against Arun Kumar,Varun Kumar, Vishal Singh,

Ravi Kumar, Prakash Chand,and Suraj Singh for offences ofrioting (147 an 148), unlawfulassembly (149), murder (302),attempt to murder (307),dacoity with murder (396),mischief by fire (436), trespass(455), causing disappearance ofevidence (201), disobedience ofpublic servant's order (188)and common intention (34)under the Indian Penal Code.All the accused are in judicialcustody.

The offences entail a max-imum punishment of deathpenalty.

�33������ ���� 456��57'8

Delhi Fire Services (DFS) onSunday said that the fire-

related calls have increasedsince the mid week of May.DFS Director, Atul Garg citedthe rise in temperature and eas-ing of the lockdown for thesurge in fire-related calls.

There were 2,328 fire-relat-ed calls in May as compared to3,316 last year. "In the startingof May, the calls were compar-atively less due to the strictenforcement of lockdown, dur-ing which factories and busi-ness were shut, people weremostly at homes and steppedoutside only in case of anemergency or for essential

needs," said a DFS official. But, later, there was an

increase in calls towards sinceMay 15, he said.

According to Garg, whenDelhi recorded a maximum of47.6 degrees Celsius on May 26,the department received 145fire-related calls, which was thehighest for the month. "Thesame day, the city also wit-nessed two major fire incidents.However, no casualties werereported," he said.

A major fire broke out in athree-storey shoe factory atKeshav Puram in northwestDelhi in the early hours of May26. Twenty-three fire tenderswere rushed to the spot and theblaze was brought under con-

trol within four hours with thehelp of around 50 firefighters.

The incident occurredhours after around 250 shantieswere gutted in a blaze thatbroke out at a Tughlaqabad vil-lage in southeast Delhi around12.50 am. The maximum fireincidents were either reportedfrom shanties, buildings, shutoffices or houses either due toshort-circuit or leakage in LPGcylinders among various otherreasons.

As malls, restaurants andother avenues will reopen fromMonday, the Delhi Fire Serviceshas advised everyone to do ser-vicing of air-conditioners andother electrical appliances, aswell as the fire-fighting systems

checked before opening offices.Garg said the fire depart-

ment was facing a two-foldchallenge to rescue the peopleand also save the personnelfrom the deadly coronavirusdisease (COVID-19).

"In cases, where human lifeis involved, our first priority isto save the life with due pre-

cautions against Covid," theofficial said. "Presently, wehave an internal protocol thatis followed."

In case, rescue is needed,two firefighters will ventureinside with proper gears likemask, gloves, face shield. Afterrescue, they will immediatelysanitise themselves thorough-

ly, Garg said.One such important res-

cue-operation was carried outat Cygnus Orthocare hospitalin south Delhi on May 23.Eight coronavirus patients wereevacuated safely after a firebroke out in an operation the-atre and recovery room at thethird floor of the hospital.

Unlike healthcare work-ers, the firefighters cannot wearpersonal protective equipment(PPE) since it contains plastic,Garg added.

"We do not know if theperson likely to be rescued isinfected with the virus or not,"Garg said, while elucidatingabout the challenges faced dur-ing rescue operations.

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���� 456��57'8�

Following continuous set-backs in the terror ranks

due to sustained liquidation ofultras, including HizbulMujahideen’s Riyaz Naikoorecently, the terror groups havesought to forge an alliance toboost the dwindling morale ofthe cadres as well as developfertile atmosphere for therecruitment of gullible youthinto the jehadi fold.

In their bid to instil freshdose of confidence amongst thedemoralised cadres the groupshave been directed to carry outsuicide attacks against theforces and resist the setting upof Hindu colonies following theabrogation of Article 370 thatgranted special status to Jammu& Kashmir.

Hizbul Mujahideen chief inValley Gazi Haider has in astatement urged all theKashmiri fighters of terrorgroups like Lashkar-e-Tayyeba(LeT), Jasih-e-Mohammad

(JeM), Ansar Ghazwatul Hind,Tehreek ul Mujahideen, AlUmar Mujahideen, Al Bad andThe Resistance Front aredirected to do only suicideattacks on the Indian forces.

Everyone is directed to dosuicide attacks like Lethporaattack because the forces arenot even handing over thebodies of the terrorist killed in

the Valley to their families,according to the statement cir-culated in the Valley, a copy ofwhich has also been recoveredby the security agencies.

The Hizbul has also artic-ulated the setting up of Hinducolonies in Kashmir as rallyingpoint to amalgamate cadres ofdifferent groups.

While there is no propos-

al to set up any Hindu coloniesas such, the terrorist groups areseeking to amalgamate thecadres amid the continuousreverses at the hands of thesecurity forces by claiming thatsuch colonies pose a challengeto save Islam.

The Hizbul Mujahideenhas been at the receiving endamong the terrorist groups

because of its links with theIndian Army with which it hasplayed friendly cricket match-es in the past and has been amajor source of inputs foreliminating terror comman-ders of other groups.

Terror groups like JeM andLeT are also suspicious of theHizbul’s role in leaking infor-mation about its leaders andthe ISI had recently plotted toeliminate Hizbul chief SyedSalahuddin whose familymembers have been beneficia-ries of government jobs andfacilitation from the forces in

the Valley.

���� 456��57'8

The State Governments haveso far lifted more than

105.10 lakh metric tonnes(LMT) of foodgrains underthe Pradhan Mantri GaribKalyan Anna Yojana(PMGKAY) under which 88crore people in the countrywould be given free ration forthree months. For the month ofApril 36.98 LMT (92.45 %), forthe month of May 34.93 LMT(87.33%) and for the month ofJune 6.99 LMT (17.47) hasbeen distributed.

According to the Ministry ofFood and Consumer Affairs, theCentre is bearing 100 percentfinancial burden of approxi-mately Rs 46,000 crore under thisscheme. "Wheat has been allo-cated to 6 States/UTs, — Punjab,Haryana, Rajasthan,Chandigarh, Delhi and Gujaratand rice has been provided to theremaining States/UTs," it said.

"As regards Pulses, thetotal requirement for the threemonths is 5.87 LMT. TheCentre is bearing 100% finan-cial burden of approximately Rs5,000 crore under this scheme.So far, 4.71 LMT Pulses havereached the States/UTs, while2.67 LMT pulses has been dis-tributed," the Ministry said ina statement.

Officials say that Bihar,Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra,and West Bengal are among thestates that have fallen behind indistributing their April quota offree pulses under the PrimeMinister’s Garib Kalyan pack-age, even though two months

have lapsed since the schemecame into force.

Overall, States have man-aged to distribute less than halfthe pulses received by themfrom the Centre, say officials.West Bengal is among theworst performers. The Statehad to distribute 14,500 tonnesof free pulses under the GaribKalyan package in each of thethree months, but until the endof May. From April to June,states had to distribute around1,90,000 tonnes of pulses eachmonth, but in some states,even the April quota has notbeen distributed, although twomonths have lapsed.

As per the data of FoodCorporation of India, it cur-rently has 269.79 LMT rice and537.46 LMT wheat. Hence, atotal of 807.25 LMT food grainstock is available (excluding theongoing purchase of wheatand paddy, which have not yetreached the Godown). About55 LMT food grains is requiredfor a month under NationalFood Security Act and otherwelfare schemes.

Besides, a total of 13.01LMT pulses (Toor-6.07 LMT,Moong-1.62 LMT, Urad-2.42LMT, Bengal Gram-2.42 LMTand Masur-0.47 LMT) is avail-able in the buffer stock as onJune 4, 2020.

New Delhi: A plea has beenfiled in the Supreme Courtseeking probe by the CBI or aspecial investigation team (SIT)into the recent death of a preg-nant wild elephant after it atea fruit containing firecrackersin Kerala’s Silent Valley Forest.

The 15-year-old elephantfell victim to an act of humancruelty after the fruit filledwith powerful crackers, offeredallegedly by locals, exploded inher mouth when she chompedit. The elephant died in theVelliyar River on May 27.

The plea filed in the apexcourt has alleged that primafacie it appeared to be a "cal-culated and organised" racketto kill elephants and that theauthorities have failed to pre-

vent such killings of protectedanimals.

Referring to media reports,the plea filed by Delhi-basedadvocate Avadh Bihari Kaushikhas said that in April this yeara similar incident had come tolight in which an elephant,which was found with mouthinjuries in Pathanapuram for-

est range in Kerala’s Kollam dis-trict, had died.

The plea has also urged theapex court to call for the entirerecord of these cases along withsimilar incidents, if any, regard-ing killing of elephants inKerala and in other states.

It has sought a direction fortransferring the case of killingof the pregnant elephant andsimilar incidents to the CBI"under the constant monitor-ing" of the top court.

The plea has said that alter-natively, the court should directsetting up of an SIT, headed bya former judge of the apexcourt, to probe into the cases ofrepeated killings of elephants invarious parts of the country.

PTI

���� 456��57'8

At least three persons in theNational Investigation

Agency (NIA), including a ter-ror accused, Hina Bashir Beg have tested positive forCovid-19.

About 30 other persons,including the entire probe teamand Control Room personnel,have home been home quar-antined.

Meanwhile CBI SP RohitKapoor has also tested positivefor Covid-19, his doctor wifeand mother have also alsoinfected with the novlCoronavirus. Residents of theCBI colony here who havebeen traced to be in contactwith the infected official havebeen advised home quarantine

for 14 days.After the Central

Paramilitary forces that have sofar reported over 1,300 positivecases, the infection is nowspreading to the Central PoliceOrganisations (CPOs).

Besides the CPOs like NIAand CBI, the Bureau of PoliceResearch and Development, afederal think tank on policereforms, has reported one pos-itive case besides four cases inthe National Disaster ResponseForce (NDRF).

The elite Central paramil-itary force National SecurityGuards has also reported 18Covid-19 positive cases. Allthese NSG personnel besidesthose in the BPR&D and NIAare undergoing treatment at theCAPF Referral Hospital of theITBP at Greater Noida here.

Beg was presented before adesignated court here onSunday. The court directedimmediate hospitalisation ofthe accused in the ISISKhorasan terror case.

Besides quarantining thepersons in contact with Beg orthe officials involved in ques-tioning her, the agency has alsoclosed the Control Room at theNIA headquarters here fol-lowing the report of infection.Reports of others are alsoawaited, sources said.

The CAPF Referral

Hospital, Greater Noida is cur-rently managing treatment of23 ITBP, seven BSF and 13CRPF personnel besides a civil-ian and seven family membersof paramilitary personnelincluding five of ITBP men andone each of CRPF and SSB per-sonnel.

Presently, there are 26active Covid19 positive cases inITBP and 186 others haverecovered from the disease.

Beg, (39), a Kashmiriwoman was arrested by theDelhi police in early March onsuspicion of being associatedwith Islamic State and organ-ising anti-CAA protests.

The NIA had taken cus-tody of Beg and her husbandJahanzaib Sami (36) on May 29in connection with its probeinto the Islamic State(Khorasan) terror conspiracycase involving Hyderabad-based youth Abdullah Basith.

Before taking the duo’scustody custody, the NIA hadgot them tested for Covid-19and they were found negative.However, during interrogationBeg developed symptoms andwas tested again along with herhusband and Basith. Whilethe two other accused testednegative, Beg contracted theinfection. She has. now beenshifted to LNJP Hospital herefor Covid management.

���� 456��57'8

The India MeteorologicalDepartment (IMD) on

Sunday said low-pressure areais likely to be formed over east-central Bay of Bengal in thenext 48 hours. And under itsinfluence, widespread rainfallis expected in Odisha, northAndhra Pradesh and Telanganafrom June 9 to 11.

According to IMD, outh-west monsoon is said to arrivein Mumbai by June 11. As alow-pressure area is formingover the Bay of Bengal aroundJune 8, it is expected to increaserainfall over the coast, includ-ing Mumbai.

The IMD said the low-pressure area will become moremarked in the next 24 hoursand will move west-northwest-wards. The IMD predictedheavy to very heavy rainfallover Odisha, north coastalAndhra Pradesh, Telangana,Vidarbha region ofMaharashtra, Gangetic WestBengal, and Gujarat betweenJune 9 and June 11. The IMDsaid that a low pressure area waslikely to develop over east cen-tral Bay of Bengal during thenext 48 hours. "It is likely tomove west-northwestwards andbecome more marked duringsubsequent 24 hours," it said.

The Western Disturbanceas a trough persists as alsocyclonic circulation over north-west Rajasthan & neighbour-hood, north Punjab, Bihar andadjoining East Uttar Pradesh,northeast Uttar Pradesh&neighbourhood and CentralGujarat. A cyclonic circulationlies over Southeast Arabian

Sea off Kerala Coast at 5.8 kmabove mean sea level.

Mrutyanjay Mohapatra,Director General, IMD said, "Itis a positive development as itwill allow the further advance-ment of monsoon, and mostprobably it will meet its newnormal onset date of June 11

for Mumbai. "The IMD also predicted

heavy rainfall in the Vidarbharegion, Gangetic West Bengal,Gujarat and South MadhyaPradesh on June 10 and 11.

It added the southwestmonsoon has advanced tosouth Karnataka, and conditionare becoming favourable for itsadvancement into parts ofMaharashtra, Telangana andcoasta, Andhra Pradesh. TheNorthern Limit of Monsoon(NLM) now passesthroughKarwar, Shimogha,Tumukuru, Chittoor andChennai.

���� 456��57'8

Over 800 central monumentsacross the States that dou-

ble up as places of worship willbe opened to the public startingMonday, after being closedsince March due to the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdown.

Union Culture MinisterPrahald Singh Patel tweetedthat the Ministry, under whichthe Archaeological Survey ofIndia (ASI) functions, haddecided to open certain monu-ments and that safety proce-dures announced by the UnionHealth and Family Welfare andHome ministries would apply.

He said all coronavirus-related protocols on temples andplaces of worships issued by theUnion Health Ministry will befollowed by the monumentauthorities. Wearing masks,social distancing and online

booking might be made thenorm at such sites for visitors.

In directions to the ASI, theMinistry wrote that theCentrally-protected monuments"under worship" would beopened to the public. The gov-ernment had decided last week

to open all places of worshipfrom Monday. The remainingmonuments of the ASI’s total3,691 protected sites, includingthe Taj Mahal in Agra, willremain closed to visitors for now.

According to a list of 821monuments released by the

Ministry, 114 were in the Northregion, 155 in Central, 170 inWest, 279 in South and 103 inEast.

While the Taj Mahal willremain shut, the FatehpuriMasjid on the south-west cor-ner of its entrance, the mosqueinside its premises and theKali masjid near it will beopened. In Delhi, Fridayprayers would be allowed in theQutub archaeological area andat Afsah-wala-ki Masjid outside

the west gate of Humayun’sTomb, the list said.

The Shankaracharya templein Srinagar, the gurdwara inBhatinda Fort in Punjab, theBuddhist monastery inLamayuru, Leh and St. Mary’sChurch in Fort St. George inChennai would also be opened.The 3,691 Centrally-protectedmonuments and archaeologicalsites maintained by the ASI wereshut from March 17 in view ofthe Covid-19 crisis.

���� 456��57'8�

The Central Reserve PoliceForce (CRPF) has report-

ed the third Covid-19 relateddeath among its ranks. Ajawan suffering from cancersuccumbed to Covid-19 acouple of days ago, taking thetotal number of deaths due tothe disease in the country’slargest paramilitary force tothree, officials said on Sunday.

They said the jawan, aconstable of the 141st battal-ion, died at a hospital here on

Friday.The jawan was under

treatment for oropharyngealcancer since April and waslater found infected with thenovel coronavirus that claimedhis life, the officials said.

This is the third death dueto Covid-19 in CRPF, whichhas about 3.25 lakh personnel,and 11th among the CentralArmed Police Forces (CAPFs),or the paramilitary forces.

The Central IndustrialSecurity Force has reportedfour deaths, the Border

Security Force two and theSashastra Seema Bal and theIndo-Tibetan Border Policeone each.

The CAPFs, according tothe latest data, had over 1,550coronavirus cases, out ofwhich more than 1,100 haverecovered.

These forces, with a com-bined strength of about 10lakh, are deployed in a varietyof roles in internal security andborder guarding domainsunder the Union HomeMinistry.

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Page 5: English News Paper | Breaking News | Latest Today News in ......2020/06/08  · eliminated in a successful oper-ation by the joint teams of secu- rity forces in the Reban area of Shopian

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With 1,515 personstesting positive for

coronavirus on Sundaywhich took the total num-ber of positive cases in theState to 31,667, ChiefMinister EdappadiPalaniswamy had to comeout with a statementclaiming that all was wellwith Tamil Nadu.

According to the med-ical bulletin issued by theGovernment of TamilNadu on Sunday, therewere 14, 396 active cases ofCovid-19 in the State. Tilldate 16,999 persons havebeen discharged from hos-pitals fully cured and thisis being shown as a posi-tive development.

The number of per-sons tested positive onSunday is the highest to beregistered in the State tilldate. The day also saw 18persons succumbing tothe pandemic, taking thedeath toll till date to 269.

The bulletin said that76 laboratories were work-ing round the clock to test

the samples collected bythe team of health workers.A total of 15, 671 personswere tested across the Stateon Sunday while the num-ber of persons tested tilldate reached 5.66 lakh.

Chennai continued tobe the district which test-ed the highest number ofpositive cases. Out of the1,515 persons tested pos-itive on Sunday, 1,155 werefrom Chennai.

This shows that thedeployment of a team offive ministers and onemore IAS officer to mon-itor and streamline theprogress of the virus hasnot paid off.

As the number ofcovid patients movedupwards, the ChiefMinister issued a releasestating that the pandemicwas fully under controland there was nothing tobe worried about.

“The lockdown andrelated curbs have helpedkeep the pandemic undercheck. Moreover, 86 percent of the covid-19 casesin the State were found tobe asymptomatic,” theChief Minister said.

Palaniswamy said thatthe mortality rate in TamilNadu was the lowest whencompared to even foreigncountries besides otherIndian States. “We have thebest recovery rate too,”said the chief minister. Healso said that the State’seconomy has been affect-ed badly because of thepandemic. But we haveinitiated many measuresto being the economy backto its original health. Manycompanies are going tomake big time investmentsin the State because of thesteps taken by theGovernment,” said theChief Minister.

“So far, the govern-ment has allocated over Rs4,033 crore towards vari-ous efforts regardingCovid-19, even as thehealth infrastructure hasbeen strengthened withmeasures, includingappointment of more doc-tors and nurses,”Palaniswamy disclosedand further stated that thenumber of testing labs andhospitals in public andprivate sectors have beenincreased.

���������������� �;�'8

The name Union of SovietSocialist Republics (USSR),

Soviet Union as it was knownearlier, is alien to the new gen-eration. The collapse of theCommunist Party resulted inthe disintegration of USSR intosmaller countries and thebeginning of a new worldorder. Gone are the memoriesof Josef Stalin, NikitaKhrushchev, Leonid Brezhnev,the leaders who ruled SovietUnion with their iron hands.

The USSR was the biggestsupplier of armaments toIndian defence forces. Fromaircraft to artillery, fromarmoured vehicles to heavyload trucks, you ask for any-thing with the Made in USSRtag, the Indian forces had them.

Sunday saw people inKerala-Tamil Nadu borderwatching in awe as a young vin-tage and classic car restorerdrove a USSR built ZiL 131truck retired from the IndianArmy with the characteristic

roar of a military vehicle. The3.5 tonner Zil had joined theIndian Army in 1967 and wasin service till 1982. This six-wheel drive truck could be usedeven as a mobile rocket launch-er.

Doraiswamy Naveen, avehicle aficionado based nearValayar in the border, boughtit from a dealer who got thetruck in an auction. “When Igot the truck, some of theparts had been worn out and ittook me a while to get the brake

liner and clutch plater etc,” saidNaveen explaining how herestored the truck to showroomcondition.

“The ZiL trucks have beenbuilt for life long use. That’s theuniqueness of Russian tech-nology. Only parts that getworn out need be replaced.This 3.5 tonner truck is a dou-ble axle vehicle with singleleaf spring system which makesmanoeuvring an easy job.There are six tyres and each ofthem is equipped with inflator.

We need not go in search ofservice stations to fill them withair. Even if the tyres get punc-tured , there is a system whichhelps us to drive the vehicle tillthe nearest puncture specialist,”said Naveen about the ‘six-wheel drive’ truck which hasjoined the fleet of his classicand vintage collection.

But the ZiL will not idleaway his time in the garage.Naveen is planning to use thetruck as a recovery as well as acarry away vehicle whichwould help him to ferry vintageand classic cars from far awaylocations to his restore shop.The truck has a diesel tank of500 litre capacity. “You may

require �40,000 fora single fill. I am yetto check themileage but it is notthat important. Avehicle like thiswho has seen manyactions has its ownimportance,” hesaid.

ZiL stands forZavod Imeni Likhachyovawhich went bankrupt followingthe disintegration of the SovietUnion. In its heydays, the com-pany used to manufacture ZiLlimousines for the exclusive useof the rulers and polit bureaumembers of the CommunistParty of Soviet Union . TheUSSR and Indian communistshad claimed that they were theSoviet equivalent of Rolls Royceand Mercedes Benz. The ZiL131 in possession of Naveen gota number of red salutes in theKerala side of the border onSunday. “It is as comfortableand safe as driving a moderncar,” Naveen says about his new“toy”.

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With the State Governmentdeciding to allow all the

sectors including Governmentand private offices, malls, hotelsand restaurants to open up,Bengal is going to be almostfully operational from Mondaybarring cinema halls and edu-cational institutions.

According to Governmentsources the public sector unitswill start operating fromMonday with 70 percent staffstrength though it was earlierdeclared by Chief MinisterMamata Banerjee that thesewould be functioning with

hundred percent attendance. The malls too would open

to their regular business butwith a rider. According to thenew regulations entry insidethese super markets would berestricted for people beyond 10years of age and below 65years, sources said adding foot-fall at a time would also be con-trolled.

At Lake Mall one of thelargest such facilities in SouthKolkata the entry of the visitorswould be restricted to nearabout 7,000 people at a time.

“We have a capacity tohost about 25,000 people but inthe changed circumstances thatnumber has been broughtdown to about 7,000,” a seniorfunctionary said adding “social

distancing norms will be strict-ly adhered to almost to theextent that the people will nothave to handle the switches ofthe lifts even as they have beendesigned to run on sensors,” hesaid.

At a voguish restaurantaround Park Street sourcessaid “no personal contact willbe required while we acceptorders and serve foods… Wehave created barcodes throughwhich the menu will be fur-nished and orders will be taken.Accordingly a waiter donningpersonal protective equipmentwill serve the food from a dis-tance. There will be only oneperson inside the hall.

“The cutleries will be san-itized and certified before being

put to use and after each visitof customers the entire deskand the area around will besanitized.” The sitting arrange-ments have been extensivelychanged with one table placedmore than two metres awayfrom the other the managersaid, adding, the entire cashtransaction would be doneonline.

On the effectiveness ofsocial distancing and relatedaffairs inside the kitchen asenior functionary of a starrestaurant said “the guests arefree to visit the interiors any-time without notice and if afault is found then we willundertake to bear the dam-ages.”

A senior cook of another

big hotel said “we have CCTVsfixed inside the kitchen so thatthere is no doubt in the mindsof the guests who will howev-er not be allowed inside therestaurtant without mask, faceshields and caps etc.”

Notwithstanding the elab-orate arrangements for publicmovement and jumpstart theeconomy a dull transport sys-tem post lockdown continuedto bother the administrationwith people standing for hoursto avail of bus services that wererunning far and few between.

With the Governmentrefusing to hike bus fares — theoperators have demanded athree-fold increase from � 7 to�20 as minimum fare — a largemajority of private transport

was not operating in Kolkataand districts leaving large sec-tion of people stranded onroads waiting for buses forhours on end. The Governmenthas allowed only sitting pas-sengers inside buses.

Though the StateGovernment created a fare reg-ulatory board it could notmake any headway tillSaturday. However on Sundayone of the functionaries of theState private bus operators’association said “we will ensurethat at least 2,000 buses ply inKolkata from tomorrow whenmost of the PSUs and privateoffices open,” adding the asso-ciation will iron out differenceswith the Government throughtalks.

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Coronavirus cases continuedits unabated hike in Kerala,

despite the State Government’sclaim that it has done an excel-lent job to check the spread ofthe pandemic in its initial stageitself. Sunday saw 107 personstesting positive for Covid-19pandemic. This is the third dayin succession the State is expe-riencing an increase of morethan 100 cases in the numberof persons tested positive.

According to a releaseissued by the Government ofKerala, as on date there were1,095 patients undergoingtreatment in the State. OnSunday, 277 persons were hos-pitalised with complaints offever, cough and respiratoryissues.

There are 1.91 lakh personswho are under observation ason date. Thrissur, the districtwhere the first coronaviruscase was detected in the Stateway back in January, saw 26persons testing positive for thepandemic with eight membersof a same family getting afflict-ed with the disease.

The number of hotspots in

the State went up to 144 asmore and more places cameunder the spell of the coron-avirus. Hotels in Kozhikodeand Kannur districts decided tosuspend operations for thenext one week in the backdropof the increase in the numberof cases.

The Government releasesaid that out of the 107 casestested positive on Sunday, 71were those who reached theState from foreign countrieswhile 28 were from other Statesin India.

A total of 1.87 lakh personshave reached the State by air,sea, rail and road. Till date 83,875 samples have been sent fortesting. Though theGovernment had allowed theopening up of places of worshipfrom Monday, many religiousgroups have decided not toopen their institutions in theprevailing situation.

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The Pakistan Army onSunday resorted to multi-

ple ceasefire violations alongthe line of control in Keranand Rampur sectors of frontier Kupwara andBaramulla districts in Kashmirvalley.

According to groundreports, the Pakistan Armyinitiated ceasefire violationsaround 11.00 a.m in Keransector followed by similar vio-lations in Rampur sector ofBaramulla district after a gapof more than one and halfhour. In both the locations,Indian army gave a befittingreply and targeted enemypositions with high

precision. Damages suffered by the

Pakistan Army were notknown immediately but localresidents in the area claimedthey saw a thick screen ofsmoke billowing out fromenemy positions across theline of control.

Srinagar based DefenceSpokesman, Col Rajesh Kaliain a statement said, “at about11.00 and 12.40 p.m Pakistaninitiated an unprovokedceasefire violation along theline of control in Keran andRampur sectors of Kupwaraand Baramulla district”.

“Army retaliated befit-tingly and targeted enemypositions with high precision”,he added.

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Guwahati: A three-member central team, ona week-long visit to Assam, is studying thestate's Covid-19 management and has helda series of discussions with senior state offi-cials, a top official said on Sunday. With 92fresh cases on Sunday, Assam's coronavirustally climbed to 2,565 with 1,943 of themactive cases.

Principal Secretary, Health and FamilyWelfare, Samir Kumar Sinha said that thethree-member team from the Union Healthand Family Welfare Ministry, is now study-ing disease management in Assam.

“The central team has been in the statesince Thursday and held a series of discus-sions with senior officials including ChiefSecretary Kumar Sanjay Krishna over theCovid-19 situation in the state. After visit-ing the State, the central team would sub-mit a report,” Sinha told IANS over phone.

Another senior Health Departmentofficial said that the central team, during thepast four days, had visited various medicalcolleges and hospitals, Covid-19 care cen-tres and quarantine facilities in and aroundGuwahati and various other districts.

The central team comprises Ajay Tiwari,Joint Secretary, Labour and Employment andtwo senior public health specialists -- N.N.Naskar and Snigdha Basu from All IndiaInstitute of Hygiene and Public Health.AssamHealth Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma saidthat around 2.50 lakh people returned toAssam so far from 14 states across south andnorth India, leading to the heavy rise in coro-navirus patients in the State. IANS

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Amajor controversy brokeout on Sunday over Sonu

Sood’s recent efforts to helpmigrant workers reach theirrespective States fromMaharashtra, with the rulingShiv Sena accusing theOpposition BJP of using theBollywood actor as a “face” to project a picture thatthe Uddhav ThackerayGovernment had failed in help-ing the stranded migrant workers.

In his Sunday column‘Rokhtok’ in the Sena mouth-piece Saamna, Shiv Sena’s MPand Sanjay Raut – who is thenewspaper’s Executive Editor –said: “Using Sonu Sood as aface, a political outfit inMaharashtra is attempting toproject a picture that theThackeray Government hasfailed. To an extent, the outfithas succeeded in painting SonuSood as ̀ Mahabali’ , ̀ Bahubali’and ̀ Super hero’. Some sectionsof the BJP have adopted Sonuin an effort to win over themigrant workers”.

Raut, in his headlined“Ekta Sonu Sood Khara”, (OnlySonu Sood is real), alsoslammed the actor by sayingthat as an actor, the latter wasused to taking money to deliv-er dialogues and he was beingused by the BJP.

“The Maharashtra govern-ment had set up a special cellto transport migrant workers totheir native states. At that time,a campaign was run – underwhich the migrant workerswere told – those wanting to goback home should send a mes-sage on a particular number with your mobile number.Sonu Sood will send you home.For this, a huge politicalmachinery was put on the jobfrom behind. A picture wassought to be created to projectthat the Thackeray govern-ment is doing nothing but it isSonu Sood who is doing every-thing,” Rautwrote. “At one stage during theCorona crisis, the BJP wasfighting a battle for its ownexistence. Because of its con-tinued criticism of the

Thackeray government, theBJP’s credibility had gone downin the minds of the people. Atthe same time, there was con-siderable anger about the Modigovernment in the minds of themigrants. But, in Maharashtra, the BJP put theThackeray government in thedock. Making use of the con-fusion, has the BJP made Sonu Sood wear the mask of a great social worker?,”Raut asked.

Sood has come in for praisefrom various quarters in recentefforts to reach the strandedmigrant workers to theirrespective states from Mumbai.So much so that Sood metMaharashtra Governor BhagatSingh Koshyari on May 30 atRaj Bhavan in Mumbai andbriefed the Governor abouthis ongoing work to providefood and help the migrantpeople to reach their homestates The Governor applaud-ed Sood for his good work andassured him of his fullest sup-port in his efforts.

“We would like to know asto what kind of machinery thatSonu had to reach thousands ofmigrant workers to theirhomes.... He is the president ofRashtriya Banjara Seva Sangh.He is just a face. Who is behindhim? To that extend that theM a h a r a s h t r aGovernor calls Sonu to RajBhavan, seeks informationabout the work he is doing,appreciates him and offers theactor fullest from Raj Bhavan,”Raut said, wondering as to why the actorwas getting such preferentialtreatment at a when doctors,nurses, police personnel, civicbody workers and NGOs wered o i n gso much work to battle Covid-19 in the state.

“I would not be surprisedif Sonu’s name figures in PrimeMinister’s Man Ki Baat. I wouldalso not be surprised if Soodmeets Prime MinisterNarendra Modi in Delhi. Iwould also not be surprised ifhe will move around inMumbaI, Delhi, Uttar Pradeshand Bihar as a star campaign-er of the BJP,” Raut wrote.

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The Union Territory of Jammu &Kashmir on Sunday recorded

the highest ever tally of 620 freshcases of coronavirus and two moredeaths across Kashmir valley. Withthis, the total number of positivecases have surpassed the 4,000 markand the total number of active casesare now inching closer to 3000.Over 54 percent positive cases inJammu and Kashmir have beenreported from across five districts ofSrinagar, Kulgam, Anantnag,Baramulla and Kupwara. Out of4,087 positive cases, 2,247 cases arereported from these five districtsonly.

The situation turned grim in thelast 10 days. Between May 28 andJune 7, the total number of cases havedoubled in Jammu and Kashmir.

According to the media bulletin,on May 28, the total positive caseswere 2,036 and on June 7 the tallytouched 4087 cases, recording ajump of 2051 cases.

Meanwhile, the active casesrecorded a jump of 1,680 cases dur-ing the same period as active cases

rose from 1,150 cases on May 28 to2830 on June 7.

According to the media bulletin,with two more deaths the death tolldue to covid-19 has gone up to 41 inJammu and Kashmir.

According to the media bulletin,37 cases were reported from Jammudivision while 583 cases were report-ed from Kashmir division on sunday.

Moreover, 90 more Covid-19patients were recovered and dis-charged from various hospitals, 9from Jammu division and 81 fromKashmir division.

According to the media bulletin,out of 4087 positive cases, 2830 areActive Positive, 1216 have recoveredand 41 have died; 05 in Jammu divi-sion and 36 in Kashmir division.

According to the media bulletin,in Kashmir valley, out of 583 positivecases, Kulgam district recorded amaximum number of 160 cases tak-ing the district tally to 527 cases, fol-lowed by 132 cases from Baramullaand 87 from Srinagar.

Jammu district has so far report-ed 222 positive cases followed byRamban with 168 cases andUdhampur with 130 cases.

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Congress slammed the BJPfor online Bihar rally by

Home Minister Amit Shah,saying that promises made inpandemic are unfulfilled by thegovernment and voters aregoing to punish the rulingalliance of the BJP-JD(U)'Thugbandhan' in Bihar forbetraying the people.”

Former Union Ministerand senior Congress leaderAkhilesh Prasad Singh saidthe Prime Ministerhad locked the country to savethe countrymen from Covid-19but those people do not seeanything other than politicsand the result of that is despitepandemic BJP has started pol-itics in Bihar even the date ofthe election not announcedyet.

“The kind of language andspeech by Home Minister in hisparty rally is nothing but des-peration that they now under-stand they have a very bleakfuture in the State. His rally isvirtual but the real problem ofBihar has been put under wrapswith all false promises andfake Governance over the years.The ruling alliance both atCentre and State are Thugs,”Singh said through a videoPress conference from Bihar inreaction to Shah's poll call inthe state.

“Whether the election willbe held on time or not due tothis epidemic but these people are doing a virtu-al rally in Bihar,” Singhremarked.

The Rajya Sabha memberalleged that the Shah as secondhead of the Union govern-ment should have addressedthe real problem but he wasbest in jumlas.

“Where are the talks ofpackage announced by theCentre earlier in a massiveway. The Government hadannounced industrial corri-dor, where are these. But theydid best they are know for.Only creating a virtual worldand the BJP workers distrib-uted mobile phones in ruralareas to enable them to listento the speech of Amit Shah. Butthis time people in Bihar havemade up their mind and wouldteach this NDA gang a lesson,”Singh said.

����9���� �������> 8

In a drop in the number offatalities and increase in

the infected cases, as manyas 91 people died of Covid-19 and 3,007 others testedpositive for the pandemic invarious parts of the state.

A day after 120 peoplesuccumbed to the pandem-ic and 2739 others testedpositive for Covid-19, thenumber of deaths camedown to 91, while theinfected cases rose to 3,007in the state.

With fresh deaths andinfections, the total numberof deaths mounted to 3060and the total number ofinfected cases rose to 85975in the state.

After taking intoaccount 3060 total deathsand 39314 patients dis-charged from various hos-pitals ever since the out-break of pandemic in thestate, the state healthauthorities pegged thenumber of “active cases” in

the state at 43591. Of the deaths reported

on Sunday, Mjumbaiaccounted for 61, whilethere were eight deaths inSolapur, six deaths in Pune,five deaths in Ulhasnagar,four deaths in Mira-Bhayandar, two deaths inKolhapur and one deatheach in Palghar, Nashik,Jalna and Akola. In addi-tion, one person from WestBengal died in Mumbai.

*Out of those dead, 64were men while 27 werewomen. Forty six of thedeceased were aged over 60years, 41 were from the agegroup 40 to 59 years and 4were aged below 40 years.“Sixty seven out of 91patients (73.6%) had high-risk co-morbidities such asdiabetes, hypertension,heart disease,” a state healthbulletin said.

There have been a totalof 1289 deaths inMaharashtra during theprevious 13 days. On May26 (Tuesday) the state hadwitnessed 97 deaths, while

there were 105 deaths onMay 27, 85 deaths on May28, 116 deaths on May 29and 99 deaths on May 30, 89deaths on May 31, 76 onJune 1, 103 on June 2, 122on June 3, 123 on June 4,139 on June 5, 120 on June6 and 91 on June 7.

With 61 new deathsand 1420 fresh infections,the total number deathsmounted to 1638, while thetotal infected cases rose to48774. The BrihanmumbaiMunicipal Corporation(BMC) said that there were25,940 “active cases” in themetropolis.

Some of the key obser-vations made in Sunday’sreport were: The recoveryrate in the state is 45.72 percent and the case fatalityrate in the state: 3.55 percent. Currently, as many as5,58,463 people are in homequarantine. There are77,654 beds available inquarantine institutionswhile 28,504 people are ininstitutional quarantinenow.

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Page 6: English News Paper | Breaking News | Latest Today News in ......2020/06/08  · eliminated in a successful oper-ation by the joint teams of secu- rity forces in the Reban area of Shopian

Last Thursday, a District andSessions Judge at Patiala House,New Delhi, denied bail to a 27-year-old sociology student,Safoora Zargar, now six months

pregnant and one who has been accused inthe Delhi riots along with many others. Inits order, the court examined the facts asplaced by the prosecution. Taking note ofit, the court said that there is evidence thatthere existed a “conspiracy” to block a road,which the accused was involved in. The toneof the order, especially the words used there-in, give an impression that Zargar, alongwith others, “conspired to cause disruptionof an unprecedented scale.”

Some WhatsApp messages and disclo-sure statements were enough for thelearned judge to come to the conclusionthat on the face of it, a “conspiracy” washatched to cause “disruption” to such anextent and such a magnitude that it wouldlead to disorderliness and disturbance oflaw and order at an “unprecedented scale.”The judge said, “...when you choose to playwith embers, you cannot blame the windto have carried the spark a bit too far andspread the fire” and that consequently, the“acts and inflammatory speeches of the co-conspirators are … admissible against theaccused.”

Presumably, he pointed out that theembers of this conspiracy led to theengulfing flame, ie, the Delhi riots, wheremore than 50 people lost lives. I will nottalk about the legal merits of such an orderbecause frankly, I am not the best personto do so. However, I recommend oneshould read what legal experts have saidabout it over the past few days. They havetalked at length about the legal shortcom-ings of the order. In this article, I want totalk about how the executive deals with twosets of people differently. One in favour ofits yes men, often those part of the rulingparty, and the second critics of theGovernment. Along with this, it is alsoimportant to reflect on who we can hopewill check this arbitrary exercise of power.

The Delhi police charged Zargar withthe non-bailable Unlawful Activities(Prevention) Act (UAPA). This means thatat some level, the State believes that byblocking a road during the anti-CitizenshipAmendment Act (CAA), Zargar, as alsoanother accused in the case, threatened theunity and sovereignty of the country.However, this treatment is not unique toZargar alone. Take the example of humanrights activist and lawyer Sudha Bharadwaj,against whom the National InvestigationAgency (NIA) has slapped charges underthe UAPA. She, too, was recently deniedbail despite the fact that she had diabetes.She also came under a vulnerable catego-ry of people, who are at risk of contract-ing COVID-19 while being incarcerated.What’s more amusing is the fact that oneof her bail applications was opposed on the

ground that she had formed an“anti-fascist front” along withsome of the co-accused andthat this front planned to,among other things, “topple thedemocratically electedGovernment.”

I am not sure what the NIAis admitting here. But I’ll let thereaders make their own infer-ences. Then there is also theexample of Bittu Sonowalagainst whom the NIA hasslapped charges under theUAPA for using phrases like lalsalam and “comrade” as proofto show that he is a Maoist.Even owning books written byKarl Marx or Lenin that arefreely available could possiblybe a reason to slap chargesunder the UAPA now. It’s sur-prising then that books by MSGowalkar (a proponent ofmaintaining the caste system)are not taken as evidence forbeing casteist.

This is where the problemlies: The Government oftenacts brazenly in treating somepeople as rioters and slapscharges under the UAPA. Isthere any difference in the wayit treats its leaders like KapilMishra or Anurag Thakur? Tocite an example, with referenceto the threat issued by KapilMishra against anti-

Government protesters,Facebook has said that hisstatement “serves as an exam-ple” of the kind of content thatthey would take down becauseit, in a more direct way, encour-ages supporters to be violent.

Further, as opposed toZargar or Bharadwaj, doesAnurag Thakur’s videos, wherehe is seen shouting, “Desh kegaddaron ko,” while the crowdchimes in repeatedly with thephrase “goli maaro saalo ko,”not form part of a conspiracyto carry out disruption at anunprecedented scale?

This is just about the exec-utive. Unfortunately, one hadexpected the police and theNIA to act more in the imageof the Government but thejudiciary has been foundextremely wanting, too, interms of laying down clearjurisprudence for bails. Theyare, of course, not helped by theexecutive, which sought tocharge dissidents under theUAPA. But it boggles one’smind that BJP MP PragyaThakur, also an accused underUAPA for the Malegaon blasts,was granted bail while close tosix-month pregnant Zargarwas not.

However, heads in the BJP’ssocial media cell compare this

refusal of bail with how anaccused in the Rajiv Gandhiassassination case, who waspregnant, was refused bail. Orwhat do we say of videos cir-culated by social media headsof Zargar, which were severalmonths older, where she wasseen raising slogans, to showthat she seems completely fine.I do not want to comment onthe intelligence of these obser-vations but I’ll let the readersmake their own inference.

So what is the way for-ward? Where should the com-mon man go? Is it a given thatthe State’s position is alwaysright? When the district judgesays, “When you choose to playwith embers, you cannot blamethe wind to have carried thespark a bit too far and spreadthe fire”, are we supposed toblindly trust the Governmentto be the weatherman telling uswhere the wind blows?

One thing that can be doneis that when the Governmenttells us where the wind is blow-ing, I recommend we step outand see for ourselves. And thepillars of our democracy shouldnote that what we sow in thewind, we reap in the whirlwind.

(The writer is a former IPSofficer, a former MP and cur-rently a member of the AAP)

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Sir — It was heartening to readabout the Rajya Sabha parliamen-tarian, Sanjay Singh, who used the34 domestic flight tickets he isannually entitled to as a Memberof Parliament to fly 33 migrantworkers from Delhi to Patna. Thisis the sort of exemplary service weexpect from our elected represen-tatives. Leaders must use theirpower and privileges to helpordinary people, which is whatSingh is doing.

Delhi Chief Minister ArvindKejriwal, too, lauded this move.He took to the social media andsaid that Singh’s gesture will set aprecedent and that it is inspiringfor all. Thousands of migrantworkers have been stranded inmany parts of the country owingto the lockdown that was put inplace to combat the Coronaviruscontagion.

Migrant workers are in direneed of the kind of help extend-ed by Singh. One hopes that otherleaders, who have been blessedwith means and privilege, will usetheir resources in the service ofothers.

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Sir — This refers to the editorial,“Elephantine problem” (June 4).The death of a pregnant wild ele-phant in Kerala’s Palakkad districtafter it bit into concealed explo-sives that exploded in its mouth isa gut-wrenching incident. In the

instant case, the elephant tragical-ly turned out to be a case of col-lateral damage as the explosive wasactually intended for wild boarsravaging fields with standingcrops. Though this is no justifica-tion for the painful death of theelephant, it cannot be denied thatwild boars account for almost 70per cent of crop loss in some parts

of the country. While electricfencing is expensive, oppositionfrom conservationists to theculling of small wild animals hasleft the farmers in the lurch, forc-ing them to protect their crop andlivestock through unconvention-al means, often leading to thedeath of endangered species.Unless States adopt an integrated

approach instead of taking shelterunder the excuse of man-animalconflict, tragic incidents like theone in Kerala will keep occurring.

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Sir — It is an undeniable fact thatthe Coronavirus pandemic hasemerged as the single biggestchallenge that the modern worldhas faced in many decades. Witha majority of the countries underpreventive lockdown, severalfunctions of everyday life havetaken a hit. Children being mostsusceptible to infections and edu-cational institutions being crowd-ed places where social distancinggoes for a toss, colleges andschools were the first to be shutdown. The Government has beenpro-active in managing the epi-demic till now. It should beequally conscious of providingadequate infrastructure neededfor practising social distancing ineducational institutions.

Mohd Najib Patna

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Given the precarious combination of pop-ulation density, poverty and poor sanita-tion, India’s urban areas have long been

susceptible to infectious diseases. The world’s firstcholera outbreak began in Kolkata in 1817 andIndia saw an excess mortality of 4.5 per cent dur-ing the 1918 flu pandemic. This is almost twiceas high as any other developing country for whichdata is available. Now, more than 100 years later,the country is standing in the middle of a con-tagion, facing a storm of virus waves infectingmore than 9,000 people every day. With the eas-ing of the lockdown, the country is ascending theglobal list of worst-hit countries fast. But in spiteof the numbers, India is now reopening its econ-omy even as the hospitals are getting inundatedwith COVID-19 patients.

Among countries with a death rate of morethan 4,000, India has recorded the fastestincrease in confirmed cases and the biggest jumpin the death count over the last week. The num-ber of deaths has nearly doubled in the last 17days and the number of infections is twice whatit was 15 days ago. It took about 111 days to reachthe first one lakh cases but it only took 14 daysto hit the two lakh mark. Though socio-econom-ic and administrative factors are the major con-tributors to this surge, there are other factors aswell that may have been impacting the diseasecurve.

Over 60 per cent of the total cases are in justfive cities — Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai,Ahmedabad and Thane — and more than halfthe total number of cases across the country aretraceable to these cities. Delhi ranks the first interms of the highest spike in cases in the last sevendays. Mumbai holds the first position in the num-ber of deaths and total infections.

India’s response to the current pandemic hasarguably been swifter and more decisive than thatof other developing countries. But in spite of allefforts, with the phase-wise easing of the lock-down over the last couple of weeks, the numberof cases started soaring exponentially, raising theCorona curve. Though the lowest in the worldat 2.8 per cent, the death rate is also on the rise.The country was adding on an average 15 deathsper day in the first week of April, it has nowincreased to 225 deaths per day as on June 2.

Policy makers crafting the lockdown exit planpartially attribute the worsening status to migrantlabourers bringing the virus into suburban andrural India. Besides these migrants, vegetable ven-dors and vegetable/fruit and flower markets areknown to be a major source of spread of the con-tagion. Resumption of cross-country trans-portation and industry has led to previously greenStates confronting imported cases. Test results forthousands of migrant workers who travelled fromMaharashtra and New Delhi to Bihar last monthfound that one in every fourth person had con-tracted COVID-19. Bihar now has one of thesteepest infection curves in India (next toDelhi) and infection clusters have also beentracked to labourers travelling to their homes inUttar Pradesh (UP).

The disease trajectory of the contagion inIndia has emerged differently from other coun-tries. In contrast to China, US or European coun-tries that saw a steep initial rise of cases followedby a lockdown and then flattening of the curve,there has been a gradual increase of infectionsin India since mid-March and then a steep riseof the curve from mid-May when the lockdown

was eased off. There are two other crit-ical observations that are unique to ourcountry: First, most of the cases areasymptomatic/of limited clinical sever-ity and second there are higher recov-ery rates which are indicative of theeffective adaptive immunity fighting thepathogen as well as inherent innateimmunity. A major area of concern/sus-picion of the disease worsening is viralmutations. The COVID-19 is a single-stranded RNA virus with a protein shell.When the virus enters the humanbody, it starts making new copies ofitself within a cell in order to infect othercells. In the process, the virus makesmistakes in its genomes leading to per-manent mutations.

Mutations are part of a virus’ lifecycle and in general, RNA viruses tendto have high mutation rates than DNAviruses. Most mutations do not causeany advantages or disadvantages eitherto the virus or the host. As of now, theCOVID-19 virus is said to be mutatingslowly. COVID-19 originated frommutations within the Coronavirus fam-ily which leads to the thoughts that asit spreads around the world, itmight/will have mutated into variousforms in various geographies leading toa more transmissible, more virulentform or both. This apparently poses athreat of worsening the global healthcrisis.

Scientists have explored this byanalysing about 13,000 samples inBritain since mid-March and found thatnew mutations appear roughly twice amonth. The rate of mutations is impor-tant because the faster a virus mutates,the more unpredictable it is. Thoughmost mutations have little effect, someof them — single or multiple mutations— can build up over time making thevirus more successful in thriving in peo-ple of varied ethnic origins and genet-ic variations.

So far SARS-Cov2 is known to bea stable virus in terms of the rate ofmutation. According to experts, theCoronavirus has differentiated intoabout 10 clades as it spread globally.

Scientists at Hyderabad’s Centre forCellular and Molecular Biology havediscovered that a clade (I/A3i) is foundin about 41 per cent of genomessequenced in India and is a milder formthan strains found in other parts of theworld. This clade (I/A3i) has four vari-ants out of which one variant, C13730T,is a more virulent strain, which may becausing the surge in deaths and the rateof infections recently.

This strain is likely to have emergedthrough a mutation in India in differ-ent genetic material. The study is cur-rently under peer review by BioRxivjournal and clade (I/A3i) is not knownto be seen in any other country.

As we dive deeper into the causesof the steep rise of the positive caseswith gradual easing of the lockdown, therelation of air quality index of our high-ly-polluted cities to disease vulnerabil-ity needs to be considered, too. In apaper published in Elsevier’s journal ofEnvironmental Pollution on April 4, sci-entists pointed out that mortality was12 per cent in northern Italy, as com-pared to 4.5 per cent in the rest of thecountry. Northern Italy is one ofEurope’s most polluted regions based ondata from NASA’s Aura satellite.

Another recent study explains howair pollutants cause hyper-activation ofthe innate immune system. A smallcohort of mice was exposed for monthsto air pollutants. The fine particulatematter (PM 2.5) are seen to impact theimmune response, causing significantincrease in inflammatory cytokines inboth serum and as well as lungparenchyma. This leads to high systemicinflammation, impairing heart functionas well. In the current context, Indian

scientists should now focus on develop-ing strategies against the virus recruit-ing innate and adaptive arms of theimmune system. A recent study foundthat some people who have never beeninfected with COVID-19 harbour T-cells (part of our innate immune sys-tem) that fight this virus, indicating thatthey might have previously been infect-ed with other Corona viruses sharingsimilar characteristics.

Researchers should work on mak-ing a skin test akin to the Mantoux testfor tuberculosis available to test T cellresponse (type-IV cellular response).The serological antibody tests may beweak and wane off over time but a T cellresponse measured by a skin test willremain with a longer memory.

Scientists around the world observethat India may be seeing a lesser viru-lent disease due to a non-specificallystrengthened T cell response from theroutine use of BCG vaccination atbirth.

Lastly and most importantly, inspite of better recovery rates in ourcountry, there is still a concern for peo-ple who have recovered or had a sub-clinical disease. Viral infection seque-lae are quite common and can beworse than the initial disease which maybe mild. Sequelae observed in SARSoutbreak were pulmonary damage (attimes permanent) and osteonecrosis(from high dose steroid treatment).

Given the panoply of symptomsseen in sick patients and one prominentdisease sequela MISC (multisysteminflammatory syndrome in children)seen in the western world, I hope thathealthy, young people will restrain theurge to “go out and have fun” as thereis every reason to worry that theremight be an Act-II in this contagiondrama waiting to unfurl.

(The writer is an author and doctorby profession)

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On May 25, a White Minneapolispolice officer, Derek Chauvin,pressed his knee into the neck

of a Black man George Floyd as the lat-ter begged that he could not breathe.The Black man ultimately died and thevideo of the murder by the man in uni-form has gone viral on the internet,leading to widespread protests notjust in the US but in Australia, Braziland Canada, too. Indian celebrities andstudents too, condemned the racist USpolice force on social media. It is goodthat there is universal condemnation ofthis outrageous incident. But the ques-

tion is what moral right do we Indianshave to condemn racism or any kindof discrimination in any part of theworld? Because we ourselves are racistto the core and discrimination of everykind thrives in our midst. We discrim-inate on the basis of colour, race, gen-der, religion, caste, region and evensocial class.

To quote from The Holy Bible:“Why do you look at the speck of saw-dust in your brother’s eye and pay noattention to the plank in your own eye?”So how can we point at the West andshout “racism” and “discrimination”when caste discrimination and atroci-ties against Dalits, Scheduled Castes(SC) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) con-tinue unabated in India even today?

Even over seven decades afterIndependence, for a Dalit daring to fallin love with a non-Dalit is inviting ahorrible death. Can we stop this infamyin our own country? Can we eat, playand live equally with every human wecome across in India? The answer is aresounding “no.”

In America, if a Black man marries

or has an affair with a White woman,it may be frowned upon by some racistsbut it is unlikely that the couple will bephysically attacked. In India, if a Dalitboy marries or has an affair with a non-Dalit girl, the likelihood is that both willbe killed by the girl’s relatives or hercaste members who feel they have been“dishonoured.”

Articles 15, 16, 17, 23 and 29 of theConstitution, all of which serve as mea-sures against both caste and racial dis-crimination, remain only on paper. Weare still not able to abide by ourConstitution which “guarantees” equal-ity irrespective of caste, creed, colourand gender.

These racial prejudices that Indianshave also take the form of colourism,which the number of “fairness” prod-ucts available in the market testify to.Then we also have to contend withregionalism and gender discriminationwhich starts with the killing of the girlchild in the womb itself.

The social stigma created in soci-ety to victimise a Dalit has never seena full stop. The problem assumes an

altogether different dimension whenthe institutions of law-governed soci-eties themselves become a site ofracism.

A few years ago an unelected all-male village council in India ordered a23-year-old SC woman and her 15-year-old sister to be raped. The “sen-tence” was handed down as punish-ment after their brother eloped with amarried non-SC woman. They had alsoordered for the sisters to be paradednaked in the village with blackenedfaces. Nothing could justify this abhor-rent punishment, humiliation andabuse of human rights of the innocentvictims of hate.

Last year we witnessed the brutaldeath of 25-year-old Haresh KumarSolanki, a SC who dared to fall in lovewith and marry a woman from theupper caste. Eight family members ofhis wife Urmila, who was two monthspregnant, killed this man while awomen’s helpline team was trying tonegotiate with the father, DasrathSingh Jhala, to send his daughter backto her husband’s home.

The brutal killing at Varmor villagein Gujarat’s Ahmedabad district camesix months after Haresh and Urmila gotmarried against her family’s wishes.Even the police force, which is supposedto be neutral and fair to everyone, canno longer be trusted to enforce the lawin a fair and just manner.

Because of this special nature ofracism, which is experienced at everystage, from the initial prejudices andattacks to the police and hospitalauthorities, there is often no choice forthe victims and their supporters but tomobilise and pressurise the authoritiesat every stage to come to a semblanceof justice. People have to come and agi-tate in front of police stations, hospi-tals and courts.

Rohit Vemula’s death once againexposed the deep-seated caste dis-crimination in higher educational insti-tutions — both among students andteachers.

Discrimination and atrocities aredestroying our nation. If we cannotchange the feudal mindsets of our ownpeople, who commit such barbaric

deeds against a section of our owncountrymen/women, we surely have noface to protest and comment over suchincidents of racism that happen glob-ally. Attacks on Dalits are reportedlymost common in Uttar Pradesh andTamil Nadu (TN). In TN, Dalits havebeen attacked for not performing cer-tain humiliating tasks in temples whichthey earlier traditionally performed.There are often clashes between Dalitand non-Dalit students in TN univer-sities and colleges. Educated youth aresurely expected to be more liberalminded, but it is often these who arefound to be the most casteist.

If the youth of the country cannotbe the change and cannot rise above thisfeudal mindset, then the future of thecountry is not very bright. We will con-tinue to live in the dark ages till we don’tstop discriminating on the basis ofcolour, race, gender, religion, caste,region and social class

(Katju is a former judge of theSupreme Court of India and Kapadia isa Solicitor and Advocate-on-Record ofthe apex court)

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����������Vatican City: Pope Francis iscautioning people in countriesemerging from coronaviruslockdowns to keep followingauthorities’ rules for COVID-19 containment.

“Be careful, don’t cry vic-tory, don’t cry victory toosoon,” he said Sunday. Italy’sgradual easing of stay-at-homerules now allows the public togather in St. Peter’s Square onSundays for the pope’s noonblessing, and Francis was clear-ly delighted to see several hun-dred people gathered in thesquare below his window,standing safely either individ-ually or as families.

Francis told the faithful to“follow the rules, they are rulesthat help us to avoid the virusgetting ahead” again.

“Thank God, we’re slowlycoming out” from the coron-avirus pandemic,” he said.

But in his preparedremarks, the Argentine-bornpontiff has also expressed dis-may that the virus is still claim-ing many lives, especially inLatin America. In his off-the-cuff comments to the people inthe square, he didn’t name anycountry, but said that two daysearlier, in one day, a death of aninfected person was registeredevery minute. AP

London: The worldwide deathtoll from COVID-19 has sur-passed 400,000, according to atally by Johns HopkinsUniversity that health expertssay is still an undercountbecause many who died werenot tested for the virus.

The milestone was reachedSunday, a day after the Braziliangovernment stopped publish-ing a running total of coron-avirus deaths and infections.Critics called the move anextraordinary attempt to hidethe true toll of the disease ram-paging through Latin America’slargest nation.

Brazil’s last official num-bers recorded over 34,000virus-related deaths, the third-highest toll in the world behindthe US and Britain.

Worldwide, at least 6.9million people have beeninfected by the virus, accordingto Johns Hopkins. The US hasseen nearly 110,000 confirmedvirus-related deaths andEurope has recorded over175,000 since the virusemerged in China late lastyear. AP

Namanga: They haul food, fuel and otheressential supplies along sometimes dan-gerous roads during tough economictimes. But Africa’s long-distance truckerssay they are increasingly being accused ofcarrying something else: the coronavirus.

While hundreds of truckers have test-ed positive for the virus in recent weeks, thedrivers say they are being stigmatized andtreated like criminals, being detained bygovernments and slowing cargo traffic toa crawl.

That has created a challenge for gov-ernments in much of sub-Saharan Africa,where many borders remain closed by thepandemic, on how to strike a balancebetween contagion and commerce.Countries are struggling to reach commonground.

“When I entered Tanzania, in everytown that I would drive through, theywould call me, ‘You, corona, get away fromhere with your corona!’” said AbdulkarimRajab, a burly Kenyan who has been dri-ving trucks for 17 years and recalls whendrivers were being accused of spreading

HIV during that outbreak.Rajab and his load of liquefied gas spent

three days at the Kenya-Tanzania border,where the line of trucks waiting to becleared stretched into the distance andwound around the lush hills overlookingthe crossing at Namanga.

Tanzania closed the border there thisweek, protesting Kenya’s efforts to re-testall incoming truckers, including thosewho even had certificates showing they hadbeen tested in the previous 14 days. It wasthe second time the frontier was closed inless than a month and was taken after manyTanzanian truckers with negative resultsstarted testing positive at the border.

Many truckers must sleep in unsani-tary motels and interact with many people,increasing their risk of contagion. They’reoften stuck for days at a border waiting forvirus test results, mingling in crowded park-ing lots.

Some told The Associated Press theytry to elude authorities or switch off theirphones when they enter Uganda so theycan’t be ordered to pull over. AP

Beijing: A beleaguered China onSunday exonerated itself from theglobal allegations of delay in report-ing the coronavirus outbreak, say-ing the virus was first noticed inWuhan on December 27 as a viralpneumonia and human-to-humantransmission was discovered onJanuary 19, after which it took swiftactions to curb it.

A whitepaper released by theChinese government gave a lengthyexplanation to refute the allegationsof cover up and delay by Beijing onreporting the COVID-19 outbreaklast year in Wuhan.

US President Donald Trumpand leaders of several countries haveaccused China of not being trans-parent in reporting the deadly dis-ease, leading to huge human casu-alties and economic crisis across theworld.

According to Johns HopkinsCoronavirus Resource Center, the

coronavirus has infected over68,00,000 people and killed nearly4,00,000 across the world. The USis the worst affected country withover 1.9 million cases and morethan 1,09,000 deaths, while the totalnumber of cases in China stand at84,177.

The contagion has also batteredthe world economy with the IMFsaying that the global economy,which was in a sluggish recoveryeven before the coronavirus out-break, is now bound to suffer a“severe recession” in 2020. TheWorld Bank has also called forcountries to step up efforts to fightthe disease and improve the econ-omy.

According to the whitepaper,after the COVID-19 was identifiedby a hospital in Wuhan onDecember 27, the local governmentcalled experts to look into thecases through an analysis of the

patients’ condition and clinical out-come, the findings of epidemio-logical investigations, and prelim-inary laboratory testing results.

“The conclusion was that theywere cases of viral pneumonia,” itsaid.

Researchers from a high-levelexpert team organised by theNational Health Commission(NHC) confirmed that the viruswas transmissible among humansfor the first time on January 19,hours before they notified the pub-lic, and less than a month before theexperts were alerted by the newly-discovered disease, it said.

Before January 19, there wasnot sufficient evidence to indicatethat it could be transmitted byhumans, said Wang Guangfa, aleading Chinese respiratory expertwho was among the first group ofexperts dispatched by the NHC toWuhan in early January. PTI

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The much-needed vaccine tocombat the coronavirus will

take at least one year before itbecomes available widely,Singapore Prime Minister LeeHsien Loong said on Sunday,urging the people to “learn tolive” with COVID-19 for along time.

He asked Singaporeans toplay their part in limiting thespread of the virus by main-taining personal hygiene, wear-ing masks, observing safe dis-tancing rules and avoidingcrowded gatherings.

“It will take at least a year,probably longer, before vaccinesbecome widely available,” saidLee in the first of six nationalbroadcasts on Singapore’s futureafter the COVID-19 pandem-ic in the coming days.

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As other nations in Europereport sharply lower new

coronavirus cases, Russia hasrecorded nearly 9,000 newinfections over the past day.

The number is roughly inline with those reported overthe past week as the spread ofthe virus may be reaching aplateau in Russia.

The national task force forthe pandemic said 8,984 newcases were recorded in a day,and 134 people died of thevirus. New cases of the virushave hovered around 9,000 per

day since the middle of May.As the worldwide coron-

avirus death count surpasses400,000, Russia has tallied 5,859deaths overall, a number thathealth experts question as beingmuch too low. Russian author-ities say it’s due to their efficientwork at handling the pandem-ic and method of counting thevirus-linked dead that differsfrom other countries.

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Berlin: Thousands of peopletook to the streets of Barcelona,Madrid and Rome on Sundayin support of the Black LivesMatter movement, which hasdrawn large protests againstracism and police brutalityaround the world.

The rally in Rome’s sprawl-ing People’s Square was noisybut peaceful, with the majori-ty of protesters wearing masksto protect against coronavirus.Participants listened to speech-es and held up handmade plac-ards saying “Black LivesMatter” and “It’s a WhiteProblem.”

The rally came a day afterlargely peaceful anti-racismprotests took place in citiesfrom Australia to Europe to theUS in response to the May 25death of American GeorgeFloyd.

Floyd, a black man, diedafter a white Minneapolispolice officer pressed a knee onhis neck even after he pleadedfor air while lying handcuffedon the ground.

More demonstrations werebeing held Sunday across theUK, including one outside theUS Embassy in London justsouth of the River Thames.

In Berlin, police said 93people were detained in con-nection with a demonstrationin the German capital onSaturday — most of them afterthe main rally of 15,000 hadended.

Police said several officersand one press photographerwere injured in Berlin whenbottles and rocks were thrownfrom a crowd that had gathereddespite police orders to clearthe city’s Alexander Square. AP

Washington: President DonaldTrump says he’s given the orderfor National Guard troops tobegin withdrawing from thenation’s capital, saying every-thing now is “under perfectcontrol.”

The District of Columbiagovernment requested someGuard forces last week toassist law enforcement withmanaging protests after thedeath of George Floyd. ButTrump ordered thousandsmore troops and federal lawenforcement to the city to

“dominate” the streets aftersome instances of looting andviolence. DC Mayor MurielBowser last week called onTrump to withdraw NationalGuard troops that some statessent to the city.

Trump tweeted on Sundaythat “They will be going home,but can quickly return, if need-ed.” He also ordered more than1,000 active duty troops to beflown to the D.C.-area in reserve,but they have begun returningto their home bases after days ofpeaceful protests. AP

Sydney: A 60-year-old surferwas attacked and killed by a 10-foot shark off the coast ofnorthern New South Walesstate on Sunday, Australianpolice said.

Several people tried to helpthe surfer and fought off theshark before taking the injuredman to shore at Salt Beach inSouth Kingscliff, police said.

He was given first aid forserious injuries to his left legbut died at the scene.

Nearby beaches werecleared of swimmers andsurfers and will remain closedfor 24 hours.

Kingscliff resident StuartGonsal had just arrived at thebeach ready for a surf, when hefound out about the fatal attack.

“We came down and wehadn’t got in the water and policewere immediately hauling peo-ple in,” Gonsal told AustralianBroadcasting Corp. Radio.

“We found out there was afatal shark attack on the southside of the rock wall. We weregoing to get in, we’re not goingto now for sure.” It was at leastthe third fatal shark attack inAustralia this year. AP

Berlin: Germany’s top diplomatsays ties with the United Statesare “complicated” and he fearsthat America’s domestic dis-cord could further fuel interna-tional tensions.

Foreign Minister HeikoMaas said in an interview pub-lished Sunday that if the US goesahead with plans to withdrawthousands of troops stationed inGermany then Berlin would“take note of this.” Maas toldweekly Bild am Sonntag thatGermany “values the coopera-tion with US forces that hasgrown over decades.

It is in the interest of bothour countries.” The Wall StreetJournal reported Friday thatPresident Donald Trump hasordered the Pentagon to reducethe number of U.S. Troops inGermany by 9,500.

Currently there are 34,500American service members per-manently assigned in Germanyas part of a long-standingarrangement with America’sNATO ally. Maas said Germanyand the United States are “closepartners in the trans-Atlanticalliance. But it’s complicated.” Hevoiced concerns that the U.S.Presidential election campaigncould further polarize Americaand stoke populist politics. AP

Islamabad: Pakistan hasapproved the strategic $7.2 bil-lion railway line upgradationproject between Peshawar andKarachi under the CPEC,paving the way for the finalnegotiations with China for thefinance, a media report said onSunday.

The approval of the projectto upgrade the 1,872 km-longrailway track from Peshawar toKarachi is a big milestone forthe second phase of the ChinaPakistan Economic Corridor(CPEC), said LieutenantGeneral (retired) Asim SaleemBajwa, chairman of the CPECAuthority.

The Central DevelopmentWorking Party (CDWP) onSaturday approved the PakistanRailways’ Mainline-I (ML-1)Project, The Express Tribunereported.

The approval by the key

government body has set thestage for the final negotiationswith China for financing theproject and talks with theInternational Monetary Fund(IMF) to address its concernover a big loan from Beijing.

Pakistan will also have toseek relaxations from the IMF,as under the existing deal withthe global financial body, itdoes not have space to providesovereign guarantees to thetune of Rs 1.2 trillion (USD 7.2billion), the report said.

It was for the fourth timethat the project came before theCDWP for approval. TheCDWP considered the projectfor the first time in 2016.

After the approval, the pro-ject would go to the ExecutiveCommittee of NationalEconomic Council for furtherapproval, the Ministry ofPlanning said. PTI

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Houston: Houston’s policechief says the body of GeorgeFloyd has arrived in Texas fora final memorial service andfuneral. Police Chief ArtAcevedo tweeted early Sundaythat Floyd’s family also arrivedsafely.

A six-hour viewing forFloyd is planned for Monday inHouston, followed by funeral

services and burial on Tuesdayin the suburb of Pearland.

Floyd, who was handcuffedand black, died May 25 after awhite Minneapolis police offi-cer pressed his knee into Floyd’sneck for several minutes asFloyd begged for air and even-tually stopped moving.

His death has inspiredprotests around the world andserved as a rallying cry againstinstitutional racism.

Previous memorials wereheld for Floyd in Minneapolisand Raeford, North Carolina,which is near where he wasborn. AP

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Detroit: Black activists believethe police killing of GeorgeFloyd and the nationwide civilunrest that followed could bethe catalyst for overhauling thecriminal justice system.

Following Saturday’s mas-sive demonstrations againstracism and police brutality,some are pushing for incre-mental change, such as requir-ing more rigorous training,reviewing policies and man-dating that officers live in thecommunities in which they

work to deepen their relation-ship with residents.

But others are advocatingfor more sweeping responses,such as defunding law enforce-ment agencies or even disman-tling police departments.

Tens of thousands of peoplemarched in places from coast tocoast Saturday in what wasperhaps the largest one-daymobilisation since Floyd died onMay 25. “What we’re facing is areal reckoning on a lot of levels,”said Alicia Garza, co-founder of

Black Lives Matter.“This (coronavirus) pan-

demic pulled back the curtainson decades of disinvestment,decades of devaluing and alsonow one of the major issues thatblack communities face is vio-lence at the hands of the police.”

Many activists believe theunrest could be an opportuni-ty to press Democratic leader-ship, including presumptivepresidential nominee Joe Biden,to address criminal justice in adeeper way. AP

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Reliance Industries onSunday said it sold 1.16 per

cent stake in its digital unit toAbu Dhabi InvestmentAuthority (ADIA) for �5,683.50 crore, taking thecumulative fund raising to �97,885.65 crore that will helppare debt at the oil-to-telecomconglomerate.

“This investment valuesJio Platforms at an equity valueof �4.91 lakh crore and anenterprise value of �5.16 lakhcrore. ADIA’s investment willtranslate into a 1.16 per centequity stake in Jio Platforms ona fully diluted basis,” the com-pany said in a statement.

With this investment, JioPlatforms has raised �97,885.65 crore from leadingglobal investors includingFacebook, Silver Lake, VistaEquity Partners, GeneralAtlantic, KKR, Mubadala andADIA in less than seven weeks.

The AIDA deal comeswithin days of Abu Dhabi sov-ereign wealth fund MubadalaInvestment Co picking up 1.85per cent in Jio Platforms for �9,093.60 crore on June 5. Onthat day, private equity fundSilver Lake invested another �4,546.80 crore for additional

0.93 per cent stake in JioPlatforms.

With these investment,Reliance has sold all of the tar-geted 21 per cent equity in JioPlatforms ahead of a potentialIPO.

Jio Platforms, a wholly-owned subsidiary of RelianceIndustries Ltd, is a next-gen-eration technology company.Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd,with 388 million mobile sub-scribers, will continue to be awholly-owned subsidiary ofJio Platforms.

The deals follows Facebook

picking up a 9.99 per cent stakein the firm that houses India’syoungest but largest telecomfirm on April 22 for �43,574crore. Within days of that deal,Silver Lake - the world’s largesttech investor — bought a 1.15per cent stake in Jio Platformsfor �5,665.75 crore on May 4.

On May 8, US-based VistaEquity Partners bought 2.32per cent stake in Jio Platformsfor �11,367 crore. On May 17,global equity firm GeneralAtlantic picked up 1.34 per centstake in Jio Platforms for �6,598.38 crore. This was fol-

lowed by US private equitygiant KKR buying 2.32 per centfor �11,367 crore.

On June 5, Silver Lakemade an additional investmentto take its stake to 2.08 per cent.

Established in 1976, ADIAis a globally-diversified invest-ment institution that prudent-ly invests funds on behalf of theGovernment of Abu Dhabithrough a strategy focused onlong-term value creation. Itmanages a global investmentportfolio that is diversifiedacross more than two dozenasset classes and sub-categories.

Mukesh Ambani,Chairman and ManagingDirector of Reliance Industries,

said, “I am delighted thatADIA, with its track record ofmore than four decades ofsuccessful long-term valueinvesting across the world, ispartnering with Jio Platformsin its mission to take India to digital leadership andgenerate inclusive growthopportunities.

This investment is a strongendorsement of our strategyand India’s potential”.

The transaction is subjectto regulatory and other cus-tomary approvals.

“Jio Platforms is at theforefront of India’s digital rev-

olution, poised to benefit frommajor socio-economic devel-opments and the transforma-tive effects of technology on theway people live and work.

“The rapid growth of thebusiness, which has establisheditself as a market leader in justfour years, has been built on astrong track record of strategicexecution.

Our investment in Jio is afurther demonstration ofADIA’s ability to draw on deepregional and sector expertise toinvest globally in market lead-ing companies and alongsideproven partners,” HamadShahwan Aldhaheri, ExecutiveDirector of the Private EquitiesDepartment at ADIA, said.

Morgan Stanley acted asfinancial advisor to RelianceIndustries and AZB & Partners,

and Davis Polk & Wardwellacted as legal counsel.

Ambani, 63, chairman andmanaging director of Reliance,had in August last year set a tar-get of March 2021, to make hisconglomerate net debt-free.But thanks to the Facebookdeal, a �53,125 crore rightsissue, private equity invest-ments, and more stake sale tocompanies such as SaudiAramco, the target is likely tobe achieved by December.

At the end of March quar-ter, Reliance had an outstand-ing debt of �3,36,294 crore andcash in hand of �1,75,259 crore.After adjusting cash, the netdebt came to �1,61,035 crore.

Of the outstanding debt, �2,62,000 crore is on Reliancebooks and �23,000 crore is withJio.

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Adani Group ChairmanGautam Adani is of the

view that there may not be abetter time to bet on India thannow.

In his message as theChairman in the annual reportof Adani Gas for the financialyear 2019-20, the billionaireindustrialist said that as thecoronavirus crisis subsides,new opportunities, new leadersand a few stronger nationswould emerge.

“If there was a time tomake a bet on India, theremay not be a better timethan now. What I can predictis that on the other side of thiscrisis will emerge massivenew opportunit ies , wil lemerge great new leaders,will emerge terrific business-es, and will emerge a fewstronger nations.

Those that succeed will bethe ones that understand thatresilience is built on the otherside of the tunnel of crisis andwe are already getting ready for

this,” his note said.Noting that there is no

way of predicting the short ormid-term possible economicoutcomes of COVID-19 hesaid, there cannot be any deny-ing of the fact that India overthe next several decades will bea market continuously on theup and one that simply cannotbe ignored.

“It will be one of the world’stop consumption centres, man-ufacturing and service hubsand a beacon of stable demo-cratic governance.”

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Software TechnologyParks of India (STPI),

an autonomous organi-sation under the Ministryof Electronics andInformation Technology(MeitY), commemorat-ed its 29th FoundationDay on June 5, 2020.

Speaking on the occasion DrOmkar Rai, Director General, STPIshared “The exports clocked by STP-registered units stands at �4, 21,103crore during 2019-20 from �52 crore in1992-93. In last 3 decades, the deter-mined efforts of STPI in promoting ITindustry and boosting software exportsessentially reflect STPI’s commitmenttowards economic progress of thenation, and team STPI will unswerv-ingly continue to fulfil the aspirationsof the ‘New India’ in times to come”.

A day-long webinar witnessed livestreaming of sessions on three topicsviz. ‘Role of Government in DrivingInnovation & Product Development’,‘Rechristening the Narratives of IndianIT Industry’ and ‘India Ahead withTransformational Ideas, DisruptiveInnovations and Pool of Talent.’

In the inaugural address, AjayPrakash Sawhney, Secretary, MeitY,reminisced the STPI journey of threedecades.

“STPI is designed to succeed anddesigned to help the industry succeed,both of which go hand in hand. STPIhas been our partner in implementingmany exciting schemes we are recent-ly brought out. It has been instrumen-tal in aiding the growth of BusinessProcess Outsourcing industry not onlyin cities but also in rural hinterlands.E-governance and digital expansion insectors such as health, agriculture,education present huge opportunitiesfor India. It is time to reimaging the roleof STPI for the coming decade.”

Established on June 5, 1991, SoftwareTechnology Parks of India has sinceemerged as one of the growth driver ofIndian IT/ITeS/ESDM industry.

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The gross direct tax collec-tion in 2019-20 fiscal

dipped 4.92 per cent to � 12.33lakh crore on account of reduc-tion in corporate tax rate,increased standard deductionand personal I-T exemptionlimit, the Income Tax depart-ment said on Sunday.

The Central Board ofDirect Taxes (CBDT), in astatement, said the fall in taxcollection is on expected lineand temporary in nature. Thegross direct tax collection in2018-19 fiscal stood at�12,97,674 crore.

The Govt had lowered thenet direct tax collection targetfor 2019-20 fiscal to �11.70 lakhcrore in the Revised Estimates,from �13.3 lakh crore project-ed in Budget presented in July2019. Although CBDT has notmade public the actual netdirect tax collection in 2019-20,adjusting the gross collection(�12.33 lakh crore) withrefunds (�1.84 lakh crore) shownet collection of around �10.49

lakh crore during the fiscal. Netcollection is gross collectionminus income tax refunds.

In 2018-19, net direct taxcollection stood at �11.36 lakhcrore. “It is a fact that the netdirect tax collection for FY2019-20 was less than the netdirect tax collection for the FY2018-19. But this fall in the col-lection of direct taxes is onexpected lines and is temporaryin nature due to the historic taxreforms undertaken and muchhigher refunds issued duringthe FY 2019-20,” the CentralBoard of Direct Taxes said.

As per data released by theCBDT, the actual gross corpo-rate tax and Personal IncomeTax (PIT) revenue mop upstood at �6.78 lakh crore and�5.55 lakh crore, respectively,in 2019-20, taking the actualgross direct tax collection to �12,33,720.

In FY 2019-20, refundsworth �1.84 lakh crore weregiven by CBDT, a 14 per centincrease over �1.61 lakh croregiven in FY 2018-19. However,gross collection would haveclocked a 8 per cent growth to�14.01 lakh crore in 2019-20 ifrevenue foregone in corporatetax and PIT is taken intoaccount.

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Chennai-based public sectorbank Indian Overseas

Bank (IOB) on Sunday saidthat it has reduced its interestrate on loans linked to MCLRby 30 basis points (bps) inovernight tenor and by 20 bpsin one month to one yeartenors with effect from June 10.

In a statement, the banksaid that loans linked to mar-ginal cost of funds based lend-ing rate (MCLR) will becomecheaper. IOB has also reducedits interest rate on loans linkedto repo-linked lending rate(RLLR) from 7.25 per cent to6.85 per cent per annum.”Retailloans (housing, education,vehicle etc.), loans to micro,small enterprises and mediumenterprises, which are linked toRLLR will now be available atcheaper rates,” it said.

����� 456��57'8

Public sector banks (PSB)have so far sanctioned �

17,705.64 crore worth of loansunder the 100 per centGovernment guaranteedEmergency Credit LineGuarantee Scheme.

The scheme is part of theAatmanirbhar Bharat eco-nomic package. As per thegovernment, banks would pro-vide collateral-freeloans to theeligible MSMEs loans upto � 3lakh crore in total in a bid toovercome the financial crisiscaused due to the coronaviruspandemic and the nationwidelockdown.

As of Friday, June 5, out ofthe sanctioned amount, �8,320.24 crore has been dis-bursed, said a tweet by FinanceMinister Nirmala Sitharaman’soffice.

“As of 5 June 2020, #PSBshave sanctioned loans worth�17,705.64 crore under the100% Emergency Credit LineGuarantee Scheme, out ofwhich �8320.24 crore havebeen disbursed,” said the tweet.

Data shared in the tweetshowed that the State Bank ofIndia (SBI) contributed a majorchunk of the amount sanc-tioned and disbursed so far.SBI, as of Friday sanctioned atotal of �11,701.06 crore anddisbursed �6,084.71 crore ofloans.

The sanctioned and dis-bursed amounts under the 100per cent government guaran-teed scheme are the highest inTamil Nadu so far.

� ��� 456��57'8

Gujarat, Tamil Nadu andMaharashtra have topped

an index that ranked Statesensuring food safety in 2019-20, Food Safety and StandardsAuthority of India (FSSAI)said on Sunday.

The index ranks states onfive parameters of food safety:human resources and institu-tional data, compliance, foodtesting facility, training andcapacity building besides con-sumer empowerment.

Gujarat, Tamil Nadu andMaharashtra have topped inthe list of larger States on theindex.

Among the smaller States,Goa came first followed byManipur and Meghalaya.Among UTs, Chandigarh,Delhi and Andaman Islandssecured top ranks, FSSAI saidin a statement.

This is the second index onfood safety, which FSSAIreleased on the occasion ofWorld Food Safety Day withthe theme “Food Safety iseveryone’s business” that wasdedicated to those in the sup-ply chain who have ensured theuninterrupted availability ofsafe food during this COVID-19 pandemic. “Food safety is ashared responsibility. The callto action for safe food on thisday is: Ensure it’s safe, Grow itsafe, Keep it safe, Eat it safe andTeam up for safety,” HealthMinister Harshvardhan saidin a webinar organised byFSSAI.

� ��� 456��57'8

Traders’ body CAIT onSunday said it would

launch a nationwide campaignto boycott Chinese goodsacross the country from June10. The campaign call by theConfederation of All IndiaTraders, which claims to rep-resent 7 crore traders and40,000 trade associations,comes amid border tensionsbetween India and China.

Under the campaign, CAITwill not only motivate tradersto not sell Chinese goods butalso urge Indian consumers tobuy indigenous products inplace of Chinese goods, and inthis way PM Narendra Modi’scall ‘Vocal for Local’ will alsobe fructified, the traders’ bodysaid in a statement.

CAIT Secretary GeneralPraveen Khandelwal said thetraders’ body has been con-tinuously campaigning from

time to time for boycottingChinese products for the lastfour years on the back of gov-ernment’s strong push for‘Make in India’ programme.

“As a result of these ini-tiatives, imports from Chinahave dropped from $76 billionin 2017-18 to $70 billion at pre-sent. This $6 billion importdecline tells the true story of theuse of indigenous goods andchanging consumer senti-ments,” Khandelwal said.

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Despite the lockdown, thelargest private sector

lender HDFC Bank has been

able to add 2.5 lakh new cus-tomers in the last 40 daysthrough an online facilitywhich helps open savingsaccounts instantly, sources said.

� ��� 456��57'8

Telecom operator Airtel hassaid its retail stores have

now opened across most loca-tions and that measures such as‘Concierge Service’ have beenrolled out for delivery of SIMcard at customers’ doorsteps orfor installation of broadbandand DTH. In a note to sub-scribers, Airtel CEO GopalVittal said that while restric-tions are lifting in large parts ofthe country, “there seems to beeven more uncertainty” as peo-ple are worried about safety oftheir loved ones, and there isgrowing concern aboutincomes and jobs.

“At Airtel, we empathizewith this uncertainty.

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Pakistan witnessed the high-est inflation in the world in

the fiscal year 2020, forcing pol-icy makers to increase interestrate, the State Bank of Pakistan(SBP) said on Sunday.

According to the InflationMonitor for April issued by theSBP, Pakistan witnessed high-est inflation not only in com-parison with the developedeconomies but also withemerging economies, the DawnNews reported.

The SBP pushed up inter-est rates to cool down theinflationary pressure duringthe fiscal year but high ratesproved counterproductive asthey further increased inflationwhile the private sector stoppedborrowing costly money ham-pering industrial growth andservices.

� ��� ���> 8

Disruption in the airlineindustry due to COVID-

19 has not impacted GoAir’splan to retire its AirbusA320ceo f leet and it remains on track, an airlineofficial has said.

The Wadia group-ownedairline has at present 43A320neo planes and the rest 13A320s in the fleet of 56 aircraft.

GoAir had launched theairline in November 2005 with A320s but later switchedto more fuel-efficient A320neoin 2016.

Of the 19 such planes theairline inducted in the firstphase of its fleet expansion, ithas already phased out six as part of the plan,which is aimed at cost-cuttingby way of fuel saving and low-maintenance cost, the offi-cial said.

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Recently, on World EnvironmentDay, various Bollywood celebri-

ties, business leaders and sports starslend their support to various envi-ronmental campaigns.

Adding one more to the list isanother digital campaign by AhimsaTrust — Plants are Power, to educatepeople on the multiple benefits of aplant-based diet and inspire them tomake a switch for a healthier, moresustainable and ethical living. Kick-starting the campaign, Lisa Haydon,Neha Dhupia, Kris Srikkanth,Naveen Jindal and Sunil Munjal willsoon be seen taking part in a seriesof social media activities to encour-age people’s participation.

Speaking on it, Lisa Haydensays, “If you agree that it is ourresponsibility as keepers of theearth to protect our planet, then wemust accept that waste, greed andover-consumption are habits wecan no longer indulge in. I believemy children deserve a healthy plan-et and so do yours. There is some-thing we can do about this. Rightnow. we can be more conscious inour consumption of animal productsto drive towards a change.”

The co-founders of the trust,Sethu Vaidyanathan and ParagAgarwal say, “The current health cri-sis due to COVID-19 is a starkreminder to us that we need to

change our food habits. There aremyths around the food we eat.Most people believe that a plant-based diet does not provide adequate

nutrients like protein and vitamins;there is also a misconception that weneed to eat meat to build musclesand become stronger to do well in

sports or be healthy. This is not true.Some of the top sportspeople do not

consume any animal products.These myths have been around

for so long that we havestarted believing in them.

This needs to change.Therefore, Plants are

Power is a movementto remind all of usthat plants have apower that otherfoods don’t have.This is to inspireIndians to switchto a healthierlifestyle and tohelp us realisethat in doing sowe make ani m m e d i a t e

impact on theplanet and the ani-

mals.” Consumption of

meat and other animalproducts is damaging

our planet, apart fromraining cruelty on the ani-

mals. Most of us what happensin slaughterhouses – it is cruel and

unhealthy. The campaign aims tobring the goodness of plant-baseddiet in the spotlight and debunkmyths associated with consumptionof animal products. It advocates thebenefits of a plant-based diet forhuman health and its cascadingeffect on animal and environmen-tal health. Emphasising on this verynotion the campaign goes by#ForYourBodyForEverybody.

To facilitate the switch the cam-paign brings a 21-day challenge,backed by the Federation of IndianAnimal Protection Organisations(FIAPO), which urges people to signup for a plant-based diet for 21 days.Participants can either go for theirown dishes or can use the recipesprovided on the campaign websiteand through e-mailers. This chal-lenge can be the first step towardsa healthier lifestyle, with a positiveimpact on our planet.

As the lockdown is now being liftedlayer by layer, it appears to be a stag-gered re-opening of the country. The

government is making an attempt to walkthe fine line between ‘saving lives’ and ‘sav-ing livelihoods’. The recent MHA order,allowing restaurants to reopen, is a step inthat direction — one that brings hope aswell as monumental challenges for therestaurant industry.

MHA guidelines specific to re-open-ing of restaurants are as follows:

SEATING CAPACITY TO BEREDUCED TO 50 PER CENT

Purpose: To facilitate social distanc-ing within the premises.

Even at 100 per cent capacity, mostrestaurants struggled to eke out a mea-ger profit. Add to this, the substantiallosses during the period of completelockdown. With capacity reduced to 50per cent, losses would mount. No restau-rant would be able to afford rents, staffcosts and other fixed expenses requiredto operate at a 50 per cent capacity.

Impact: It would be difficult for mostoperators to survive with the restrictionin place. The longer this restrictionlasts, the faster would restaurants disap-pear.

Alternate solution: Allow restau-rants to operate for longer hours, there-by staggering guests over time andhence, achieving the purpose of socialdistancing as a factor of time rather thanas a factor of only space.

HOURS OF OPERATION TO BE CURTAILED

Purpose: Not yet clear.The concept of curfew from 9 pm to

5 am requires a re-look. Majority ofrestaurant sales happen between 8 pm to12 midnight. Hence, re-opening withthese time restrictions would serve nopurpose as the revenue-generating hourswould be eclipsed by the curfew.

Impact: While restaurants wouldopen during the day, the dinner seatingwould be inconsequential since lastorders would have to be taken by 7 pmto ensure diners as well as staff reach backhome without violating the 9 pm curfewdeadline.

Alternate solution: Consider theoption of doing away with the curfewentirely, as the logic behind imposing thesame is anyway unclear.

BAR OPERATIONS NOT ALLOWEDPurpose: Not yet clear.There are enough restaurants that do

not serve liquor. For these operators, thisrestriction is immaterial. However, forliquor licensed-restaurants, alcohol salesaccount for as high as 50 per cent of totalsales, sometimes even higher. Furthermore,the purpose of this restriction contradictsthe re-opening of liquor vends across thecountry. If liquor can be sold at vends(where long queues were witnessed), thenit would be fair to assume that the sameliquor can be sold and enjoyed safely in theconfines of a licensed premises that followsall norms.

Impact: With the bucket of liquor sales

empty, sustainability for bars would nowhave to rely entirely on food sales, whichis going to be a tough shot. For a customerwho enjoys his/her tipple, the experiencewould be compromised. As a result, it’llimpact the very basis of re-opening, whichis to kick-start the economic activity.

Alternate solution: Allow sale ofliquor in licensed premises that havesocial distancing norms in place.

USE OF DIGITAL / ONE-TIME USEMENUS AND ONLINE MODES OFPAYMENT

Purpose: To minimize touch-basedinfection spread.

Restaurants would have to re-engineer

their ordering and payments softwares toincorporate the same. There would be cer-tain added costs to building the digitalinfrastructure, but it’s something wellworth the money spent.

Impact: Use of technology in this fash-ion would foster a sense of security for con-sumers, thereby building trust and conve-nience. The entire experiential flow whiledining out would change for the better withjudicious use of technology.

Alternate solution: None, since theguideline is bang-on and logical.

SAFETY AND HYGIENEPurpose: To minimize contagion.Temperature checks, hand sanitisation,

periodic disinfection of high touch sur-faces, wearing of masks, kitchen supply dis-infection, social distancing, protection forpeople over 60 and under 10 years of ageare some of the guidelines that would haveto be adhered by all. These are welcomesteps and essential in providing a safe andsecure environment for things to return toany semblance of normalcy.

Impact: These measures would helpreduce the fear psychosis among people ingeneral, and help bring confidence backfor businesses to rebuild. Therefore, it’svery essential to kick-start the economy.Costs of operating a business wouldincrease and operators would have to fac-tor the same while pricing their servicesand products. The age of discounts wouldcede ground to a philosophy where cus-tomers would be willing to pay a premi-um for safety.

Alternate solution: - None, since pro-tection and safety are non-negotiable.

For restaurants to weather this stormand revive, the government would have toease restrictions with a sense of pragma-tism and practicality to ensure that thedesired objectives of economic revival aremet.

In a nutshell, the move to kick-startthe economy, opening restaurants is amuch-awaited and welcome step.However, some of the above restrictionsplaced on operability and sustainability ofthe restaurant sector is something thatneeds a quick, logical and decisive re-lookbefore it becomes too late. While restau-rants have suffered mammoth losses dur-ing the lockdown that can never berecovered, the glimmer of hope at re-open-ing also seems shrouded under darkclouds, as explained above.

A lot has changed since that historicaddress to the nation on March 24. Thesunk cost of the lockdown, the anticipat-ed operational losses during the re- open-ing phase coupled with poor consumerconfidence would debilitate restaurant bal-ance sheets and possibly push many toextinction.

It is only logical to assume that therewould never be a perfect time and strat-egy to re-open. A start needs to be madesomewhere, and therein lays the silver lin-ing. Hopefully, the dark clouds would clearsooner than later, and the sun would shinein all its glory on the sector.

Till then, most restaurants wouldprobably serve your favourite cappuccinowith a smile, the one that hides more thanit reveals.

(The author is the director of PebbleStreet.)

�������With Rio de Janeiro under a zombie attack, reality

show contestants shelter in a TV studio, where theymust deal with more than flesh-eating hordes. StarringAna Hartmann, Sabrina Sato and Luellem de Castro, itreleases on June 10 on Netflix.

���� ��Evidence found on the body of a homicide victim

sparks hope in a prosecutor that his sister whodisappeared 25 years earlier could still be alive. StarringGrzegorz Damiecki and Agnieszka Grochowska, it isadapted from the novel by Harlan Coben. Season 1releases on June 12 on Netflix.

��� �After 17 years, a woman returns home with her teenage

twins. When she mysteriously vanishes, her children mustreckon with a shadowy family legacy. Starring Valeria Bilello,Luca Lionello and Federico Russo, the Italian show releas-es on June 10 on Netflix.

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Recently, two back to back cyclones in India –Amphan and Nisarga — reminded us of an

important lesson that, nature, like time, is a greatleveller and highly unpredictable. In May 2020, theeast Indian city of Kolkata was devastated by a pow-erful cyclone, which killed at least 84 people acrossIndia and Bangladesh. Thousands of trees wereuprooted in the city, electricity and telephone lineswere brought down, and houses were flattened.Many of Kolkata’s roads were flooded and majori-ty of the people were left without power. In onestroke, nature dealt a blow that evened out not onlycertain geological edges but also a lot of human irreg-ularities.

Historically, humankind has been ravaged bynatural disasters and every single one of them hassomehow influenced the way our society hasturned out. That applies to the recent cyclonic stormsas well as the worldwide natural disasters that shookthe earth tens of thousands of years ago. But whatcan we learn from these natural calamities? Well,one thing that humans should understand clearlyis that for sheer power, nature has no rival. Withina few minutes, any one of the nature’s elements canerase all traces of life, property and habitation onany scale. Days after the cyclone, the governmentsof respective states are stilltrying to pick up someclues from the shambles forpre-empting such disastersin future. Several scientificstudies and technical inter-ventions have been pro-posed to this end but wecannot overlook the factthat natural disasters havetheir origin in human activ-ities.

But how? It’s simple!We humans have beenslaughtering the elements of nature like the gold-en egg-laying goose. For long, nature has been bear-ing the ruthless onslaught by greedy humans on itsvital resources. It is this over-exploitation that hasresulted in grave ecological imbalances, which havebrought the world to the brink of unpredictable dis-asters. Since years, scientists and environmentalactivists, on their part, have been warning us aboutthe unpredictable disasters that our callous activi-ties could bring. However, despite their repeatedwarnings, the truth seems to elude human reason-ing. The blind carnage wrought upon nature by ourcrass consumerism continues unabated. We still con-tinue to over-indulge in materialistic pleasures, con-tinue to make bigger cars, dams and buildings, digdeeper into the earth and ocean for resources, releasemore and more toxins into the air, water and soiland explode deadlier bombs under the earth andthe ocean. Instead of taking serious note of ourwrong actions and corrupt attitude, we have beentrying to explain away calamities as aberrations thatcan be tackled by some technology or smart calcu-lations. Isn’t it pathetic?

Recent cyclones, brought in their wake, disas-ter management measures for future like better earlywarning systems, etc. But that does not strike at theroot of the problem. If humans do not stop med-dling with nature, one day, all its elements may reacttogether with greater force, making the predictionsof the doom’s day a reality. Then it will be impos-sible even to provide relief and rehabilitation.

We should never forget a fact that the outerworld is a reflection of our inner world. In reality,the epicentre of natural calamities lies in the humanmind. It is mental pollution that leads to environ-mental hazards. The human minds of today havebecome so vicious that natural disasters of muchgreater magnitude are imminent. Most of the excess-es committed by humans upon nature stem fromvices such as greed, ego, anger, lust and attachment.Hence, the lasting remedy to all these problems liesin the purification of human minds by the removalof these vices. It’s still not too late. Even now, thereis time to change our course towards more sustain-able, nature-friendly practices. It only requires achange in our mindset — from that of acquisitionand consumption to one of sharing and caring.Remember, the recent hazardous events may wellbe nature’s warnings for us. If we continue living theway we have so far, we may very well bring biggerdisasters upon ourselves and of the kind that willchange the face of the earth, forever.

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With the spread ofCOVID-19 in India,governments had

announced the shutdown ofschools and education institu-tions in March, before the nation-wide lockdown was implemented.

Two months later, on May 30,2020, the Ministry of HomeAffairs (MHA) released a notifi-cation saying that in the secondphase of lockdown relaxation,opening of schools and collegeswill be possible. It added, “Thedecision will be undertaken in Julyafter consultation with states andunion territories.” The suggestion,however, is being opposed byparents across the states who fearthat re-opening of schools will riskthe lives of their children.

An online petition was filedagainst the notification which,within two days, was signed andendorsed by over two lakh parents.They urged the government to notre-open the schools until there arevery less or next to zeroCoronavirus cases. The anxiety ofthe parents is well understood bythose residing in the border dis-trict of Poonch in Jammu andKashmir. Well, they don’t evenhave an easy access to such plat-forms where they can voice theirconcerns regarding their chil-dren’s education.

In states, well-connected withinternet, online classes have keptthe semester running, allowingteachers to provide tuition topupils. Broadband services, 4Gnetwork, cable, etc, help themattend classes being run on a vir-tual platform. In this district,which is separated from Kashmirvalley by the enormous Pir Panjalrange, it is only recently that itsinhabitants have started receivingphone calls on a ‘strong’ 2G net-work in most of its villages.However, to have online classesrunning in these hilly, remotehamlets is still a distant dream.Parents feel helpless for their chil-dren whose education has become

the first thing to suffer come whatmay — a pandemic or a prolongedconflict.

While parents fight for safetyof their children from pandemic,parents in Poonch are facing adouble challenge. The ceasefireviolation is the second devil thatthey are dealing with when theworld is trying to save itself fromthe Coronavirus. On May 30,according to a report published ona national news website, “Pakistanitroops resorted to unprovoked fir-ing and shelling at the LoC in partsof Jammu and Kashmir’s Poonchdistrict on Saturday.” There havebeen many ceasefire violations onthe international border sinceAugust 2019 and have continuedto wreak havoc in the region evenduring the pandemic.”

Abdul Rashid Shahwari, asocial worker from VillageShahpura located near the border,says, “This isn’t the first time thatchildren of our village are forcedto stay at home because of schoolshutdown. Whenever there is aceasefire violation at the border,schools are the first to have beenlocked. This induces fear andpanic among parents who consid-er it appropriate to keep their chil-dren at home instead of sendingthem to school,” even if and whenthey re-open.

According to him, the educa-tion for children residing in suchvillages goes for a toss every timethe cross-border situation getsedgy. “Firing usually takes placewith ringing of the first bell of theclass. Fearing for their lives, teach-ers and children return to theirhouses immediately. This hasseverely affected the quality ofwhatever little education our chil-dren receive, especially our daugh-ters,” shares Abdul, whose daugh-ter is enrolled in a senior sec-ondary school which is five kmfrom their village.

He adds, “As a father, I amalways afraid that somethingmight happen to my daughter.

Every parent residing in these bor-der villages share my fear. Thosewho can afford, send their daugh-ters to study in Poonch city or pro-vide them private tuitions. Othersare simply forced to discontinuesending their daughters to school.”

Apart from border conflicts,the other administrative issues also

mar the education scenario in theregion. Abdul’s village also has aschool located in close proximitywith the border and around 215children from far-off villagesattend it. According to the head-master Lal Hussain, “While theschool was upgraded to Class 10in 2005, they still await the

appointment of high-school staff.Of the six posts allocated to teachstudents of Class 10, only twoteachers have been appointed tilldate. And only eight out of 14posts are filled by teachers who aresupposed to teach the studentsfrom the junior grades. Whateverit is — pandemic, conflict or

administration apathy — it is thechildren who are at the receivingend of suffering.”

While expressing his con-cerns towards the future of chil-dren in Poonch, Abdul Ghani, avillage youth, says, “Here, childrenstart recognising sounds of bulletsquite early in their lives and spendtheir childhood under the uncer-tainty of a prolonged conflict.They hear bullet sounds morethan nursery rhymes, poems andstories. All the governmentschemes aimed at improving theliteracy rate tend to lose the objec-tive here, in these border conflict-prone villages.”

There are also children whoinstead of going to school aremade to sit at their homes with-out any provision of online class-es. There are others who risk send-ing their children to school, fear-ing for their lives. Their concernsget lost amid loud thuds of bullets.This pandemic will, hopefully, getover but the parents in Poonchwant to have a life without vio-lence.

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Yoga is today proving useful to themodern society in many different

ways. It is, of course, a path towards find-ing sublime unity of the body andmind with the spirit which is within usand pervades the whole creation.Simultaneously, it proves to be ofimmense help to the medical system, aswell as, acts as an effective therapy inreform institutions and jails. Some of thecountries most affected by violence andcrime have been discovering the greatvalue of yoga in rehabilitating themselvesas their lives have been disrupted.

Sujata Chatterji and I have travelledacross the world to shoot the film, Yogafor Health & Global Harmony, includingin cities which have suffered fromextreme crime and violence, such as Cali,Medellin and others. Yoga blossoms likea lotus flower, even in the murky watersof difficult and challenging situations. Imight mention that I was also invited togive a lecture on it for the Head Quartersof the National Police of Colombia, atBogota. It is fortunate that they are real-ising the importance of yoga and med-itation for police officers, engaged in themost difficult tasks and against violentcrimes.

In a world where strife and conflicthas been growing, yoga has proved to beof exceptional value. It has providedsolace to prisoners in jails.

In an interview with DanielleDoprado, Government of Sao Paolo,Brazil, he says, “The partnership betweenSao Paulo and India is an amazingopportunity to bring yoga to the women,who are facing conditions of vulnerabil-

ities, in prison.”In another interview, Maria Adelaida

Lopez, NGO Dunna, Bogota, Colombia,says: “In Colombia nowadays, we havearound seven million victims of thearmed conflict. Out of these, 70 per centhave lost their lands, houses, and hence-forth source of income. We are con-vinced that yoga is a very useful tool fordeveloping inner peace. We can not cre-ate peace in our society without innerpeace.”

In an interview in the film, Dr SatBir Khalsa, Brigham & Women’sHospital, Boston, USA, Yoga Researcher& Expert says, “A lot of people that haveadopted the yoga lifestyle are much moreenvironmentally conscious. They aremuch kinder, generous and embodygratitude and compassion in their lives.So basically it helps you become the bestversion of yourself. This transformationmeans better behaviour, better mentalattitude and perspective in life. It meansless violence, henceforth, less crime andless war. So, consequently, when youchange the individual, you change thesociety.”

Yoga takes us back to who we real-ly are. Amidst all the noise and clamourof the material world, it takes us to apeace, which can be found within us, toa stillness, a state in which we havegained mastery over ourselves.

At the end, the path of self-transfor-mation is the reward of true knowledge.When we would be deeply aware of ouroneness with all that there is, only thenwe would have achieved the state ofyoga.

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THUDS OF BULLETS SCAR CLASSROOMS

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Top Afghan players, includingstar all-rounder Rashid

Khan and Mohammad Nabi,resumed training on Sundaywith the Afghanistan CricketBoard (ACB) beginning amonth-long camp despite therising coronavirus cases in thecountry.

According to informationshared by the Board, none of theplayers attending the camp arebeing tested for COVID-19 butonly those who haven’t shownany symptoms like fever, havebeen allowed to join.

“This camp will be heldunder the relevant health guide-

lines and in close coordinationwith the ICC, WHO and theministry of public health ofAfghanistan to avoid the spreadof COVID-19,” an ACB mediarelease said.

On Saturday, a COVID-19awareness meeting was held forplayers and other relevant offi-cials at ACB head office to edu-cate them about health guide-lines to be maintained duringthe camp.

Apart from competing at theT20 World Cup, fate of which isstill shrouded in uncertainty,Afghanistan are scheduled toplay a one-off Test againstAustralia in Perth, startingNovember 21.

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Australian great Ian Chappellfeels India should pickHardik Pandya in the Test

side when they make the tripDown Under later this year as thetemperamental all-rounder wouldbe crucial to handling the challengeposed by a strong home battingline-up.

Pandya hasn’t featured in Testssince 2018 and has only recentlyrecovered from a career-threaten-ing back injury. The big-hittingmedium pacer is a vital cog inIndia’s limited-overs set-up. Indiaand Australia are set to clash in afull series, including four Tests,beginning October and lasting tillJanuary 2021.

“It will help if Hardik Pandyais available. He gives India an extrabowling option to maintain thepressure when the leading fastbowlers need a rest,” Chappellwrote his column for‘ESPNCricinfo’.

Pandya had recently spokenabout the challenge that Test crick-et is for him now given his injury-prone back, which needed surgerylast year. He said that he under-stands his importance in limited-overs format.

“This is Pandya’s chance togradually build up overs in thethree Tests before the SCG match,where he could act as the thirdseamer so that a second spinnercan be included,” Chappell said.

“Having Pandya at seven

would necessitate Rishabh Pantkeeping and batting at six.”

Chappell feels Indian selectorswill have to make tough callswhile zeroing in on spinners withthe likes of Ravichandran Ashwin,Ravindra Jadeja and Kuldeep Yadavto choose from.

“Choosing a spinner will provea major headache for the Indianselectors. R Ashwin has a greatoverall record, but not so much inAustralia.

“Ravindra Jadeja’s all-roundtalents and improved bowlingform make him a legitimate chal-lenger, while Kuldeep Yadav’s wrist-spin is the biggest wicket-takingthreat on Australian pitches. Thedecision will call for brave selec-tions,” he reckoned.

Chappell said India’s biggestchallenge in the Test series will benavigating through a strongAustralian batting line-up, whichnow doesn’t rely too heavily onDavid Warner and Steven Smith.

Under Virat Kohli, Indiascripted history when they earnedtheir maiden Test series triumphDown Under in 2018-19, after try-ing for seven decades.

“India’s biggest challenge willbe navigating a strong Australianbatting line-up. In addition toSmith and Warner, the meteoricrise of Marnus Labuschagne at No.3 has helped solidify the batting,”Chappell wrote.

“Australia are now far lessreliant for success on big contribu-tions from Smith and Warner,” he

added.For the home side, Chappell

feels the choice of bowlers isstraightforward. However, the for-mer captain is not too confidentabout the abilities of opener JoeBurns.

“The pace bowling is in greatshape, with Pat Cummins, MitchellStarc, Josh Hazlewood and JamesPattinson forming a potent quar-tet. The spinner is a simple decision- Nathan Lyon and then daylight.”

“The batting line-up is not asclear cut. The recently announcedcontract list suggests Joe Burns willbe Warner’s opening partner. Burnsis vulnerable early and this isIndia’s big opportunity to first getat Labuschagne and then Smithwhile the ball is new.

“Australia’s middle order is anuncertain quantity, with TravisHead, Matthew Wade and MitchellMarsh vying for two spots. Thatmiddle-order fragility highlightsthe rewards on offer for keepingSmith, Warner and Labuschagne incheck.” “Warner’s opening partneris an area of weakness that Indianeed to fully exploit, but keepingthe 'big three' quiet should be theattack's main focus,” he said.

“Australia’s strong attack shouldrestrict India’s scoring to reasonablelevels despite the daunting presenceof Virat Kohli and CheteshwarPujara.

“This heavyweight bout will bedecided by who punches abovetheir weight - Australia’s ‘big three-’or India's 'big bats’.”

� ��� ���> 8

New Zealandcaptain Kane

Williamson consid-ers himself “fortu-nate” to have playedthe game along sideVirat Kohli, and saidhe has been closelyfollowing his Indiancounterpart's jour-ney from a youngage.

Both Williamson and Kohli featured in the2008 ICC U19 World Cup in Malaysia, whichwas lifted by India and since then went on tobecome modern day greats of the game.

“Yes, we are fortunate to play against eachother. It has been great to meet at a young ageand follow his (Kohli’s) progress as well as hisjourney,” Williamson said on Star Sports show‘Cricket Connected’.

Infact, it was Kohli’s India that beatWilliamson’s New Zealand in a close semifi-nal of the 2008 U19 World Cup, which alsofeatured players like Ravindra Jadeja, TrentBoult and Tim Southee.

Williamson, who led New Zealand to the2019 ICC World Cup final, said he and Kohlihave shared honest opinions about the gameover the last few years.

“It’s been interesting, we’ve had to playagainst each other for a long period of time,”he said.

“But actually, probably over the last fewyears we just shared our views on the game,some honest thoughts and found some com-mon grounds despite, perhaps, playing thegame little bit differently in terms of physical-ly and may be our on-field characters I sup-pose,” added Williamson.

� ��� 9;' 445�>�:%

Cricket can resume normally andeven use of saliva to shine the ball

won’t pose any health risk if the match-es are played inside bio-secure environ-ment, reckons South African pace greatShaun Pollock.

The ICC Cricket Committee recent-ly recommended a ban on the use of sali-va to shine the ball but allowed sweat asan interim measure to counter the coro-navirus threat.

England will make bio-securearrangements to host the West Indiesbehind closed doors for a proposedthree-Test series and Pollock said suchenvironment would not require banningany activity.

“I think the environment that’ll endup being created is almost going to belike a bubble. People will get tested,they’ll go into a two-week camp wherethey’re just going to sit and monitor how

the conditions of their bodies change,”Pollock told the 'Following On CricketPodcast’.

“And if there are no symptoms, itdoesn’t really matter about shining theball then, because you’re in the bubbleand no one you come into contact withwill have coronavirus. So you can just geton with normal proceedings.”

The England and Wales CricketBoard (ECB) is planning to put up a setof safety measures to prevent spread ofthe contagious disease. It includes lim-iting travel by picking venues with on-site hotels, mandatory 14-day quarantineperiod for the visiting team, doing reg-ular check-ups.

“I’d presume that there'd be nocrowds in place, every single environ-ment they go into would be cleaneddown and sprayed, and everything alongthose lines,” said Pollock, who has hasplayed 303 ODIs and 101 Tests for SouthAfrica.

� ��� 456��57'8

India’s Olympic-bound boxers will have towait for some more time before resum-

ing training as the national federation’s planto restart the camp on June 10 in Patiala hasbeen delayed by at least a week because ofadministrative issues.

The camp, which was slated to restartfor both men and women, is yet to get the“requisite clearances”.

“We are awaiting a response from theSports Authority of India (SAI) on our pro-posal and they are awaiting a response fromthe government. The clearance might comein a day or two but we need at least a weekto work out the logistics,” Boxing Federationof India's Executive Director R K Sacheti toldPTI.

The nine boxers, who have qualified forthe Tokyo Games are Amit Panghal (52kg),Manish Kaushik (63kg), Vikas Krishan(69kg), Ashish Kumar (75kg), Satish Kumar(+91kg), M C Mary Kom (51kg), SimranjitKaur (60kg), Lovlina Borgohain (69kg), andPooja Rani (75kg).

The men traditionally train in Patiala,while the women's camp is based in Delhi.The decision to combine the two in Patialafrom June 10 was taken on May 23 after avideo conference between top BFI officials,the boxers and national coaches.

“There are logistics that need to beworked out. The boxers have to be broughtto Patiala, they have to be tested as well. Allthese things will need at least a week, so let’ssee, we are hopeful of things moving aheadin the second half of the month,” Sacheti said.

Sporting activities in the country werehalted after the imposition of a lockdownto contain the deadly COVID-19 pandem-ic in March.

However, the home ministry allowedopening of sports compleaxes and stadia,without spectators, in relaxations announcedlast month.

�3��� >5:784

Borussia Dortmund andHertha Berlin took a knee

in solidarity with the BlackLives Matter protests onSaturday as players across theBundesliga showed support fordemonstrations sparked by thedeath of George Floyd.

With thousands assemblingin Berlin and Munich todemonstrate against police bru-tality and for racial equality,Dortmund and Hertha’s start-ing line-ups gathered aroundthe centre circle at Signal IdunaPark before dropping to oneknee.

Dortmund players alsowore messages on their T-shirtsduring their pre-match warm-

up in honour of Floyd, a blackAmerican man who died inMinneapolis last month whilebeing arrested by police officers.

Jadon Sancho and AchrafHakimi wore the messages “nojustice, no peace”, while mid-fielders Axel Witsel and EmreCan’s T-shirts displayed thewords “black”, “white” and “yel-low” crossed out, with the word“human” below.

Earlier Pierre KundeMalong also took a knee afterscoring the second goal inMainz’s 2-0 win at EintrachtFrankfurt.

The Cameroonian will faceno sanction from the GermanFootball Federation (DFB) forthe gesture after it gave the greenlight on Wednesday to players

who wanted to honour Floyd orsupport the protests which haveraged across the USA.

Sancho and Hakimi hadalso avoided punishment bythe DFB following their on-pitch calls for justice last week.

Union Berlin’s Nigerianstriker Anthony Ujah said hewas “proud” of the Bundesligaplayers who staged on-pitchprotests, and pledged to do thesame if he scores against Schalkeon Sunday.

“I am proud of the playerswho are taking a stand. I amproud of Jadon Sancho. I amproud of Weston McKennie. Iam proud of Marcus Thuram.I am proud of Achraf Hakimi.The whole world saw theirmessage,” wrote Ujah in anarticle for German daily FAZ.

German champions BayernMunich became the highest-profile club in the country toshow their support for theprotests.

“As players, we always havethe same message: we are tol-erant, we are open, we areopen to the world," Bayerncaptain Manuel Neuer told Skyafter the game.

Bayern’s players also woreblack armbands bearing thewords “Black Lives Matter"during the match.

�3��� 758O8%

RB Leipzig on Saturday castdoubt on news that

Germany striker Timo Wernerwas closing in on a move toChelsea, saying that the widelyreported transfer was far from adone deal.

"Timo Werner hasn't trig-gered the (release) clause (in hiscontract), and we haven'treceived a transfer contract fromany club," said Leipzig's sportingdirector Oliver Mintzlaff.

"Timo Werner is in thedriver's seat now, not us,"Mintzlaff said, adding thatWerner "indicated a few weeksago that he was looking into atransfer".

According to media reports

in Germany and England thisweek, Werner has agreed tomove to Chelsea at the end ofthe season, with the PremierLeague club ready to pay around50 million euros (£44.5 million).

On Saturday, Mintzlaff saidhe was pleased that Werner hadrenewed his contract last sum-mer to avoid Leipzig losinghim on a free transfer.

He added that he did notexpect any complications overWerner's departure due to thechanges in the football calendarbrought about by the coron-avirus crisis.

"We are sure that we willfind a solution with his new clubwhich allows us to end theBundesliga season with Timo,"he said.

�3� ������� ��

Manchester City’s appealagainst a two-year ban

from European competition willbe heard by the Court ofArbitration for Sport (CAS)from Monday in a case of wide-reaching repercussions.

City are accused of overstat-ing sponsorship revenue to hidethat they had not compliedwith UEFA’s financial fair play(FFP) rules between 2012 and2016 and were also handed a 30million euro ($34 million, £27million) fine.

UEFA’s case was promptedwhen German magazine DerSpiegel published a series ofleaked emails in 2018 that pur-ported to show how City man-ufactured extra sponsorship rev-enue from a series of companieswith connections to the club'sAbu Dhabi-based owner SheikhMansour.

Under the Sheikh's owner-ship, City's fortunes have beentransformed from perenniallyliving in the shadow of localrivals Manchester United towinning four Premier Leaguetitles in the past eight years.

However, billions of invest-ment in players and managershas not yet been able to deliverthe club's first ever ChampionsLeague title.

City are still involved in thisseason’s competition and will beallowed to compete should the2019/20 edition of ChampionsLeague return in August no mat-ter the outcome of the appeal.

3���������� �But a two-season ban from

the competition would representa huge blow to the club's pres-tige, finances and hope of hang-ing onto manager Pep Guardiola

and key players like Kevin deBruyne and Raheem Sterling.

“Two years would be long.One year is something I mightbe able to cope with,” De Bruynetold Het Laatste Nieuws lastmonth.

City banked 93 millioneuros from prize money andtelevision rights alone by reach-ing the quarter-finals of last sea-son’s Champions League.

The added loss of gatereceipts and commercial rev-enue would make it extremelydifficult for the club to meet FFPregulations in the future withoutcutting costs.

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Ambitious rookie West Indiespacer Oshane Thomas wants

to be counted among greats andknows that Test cricket is the routehe needs to follow to realise hisdream.

Thomas was named a reservein West Indies’ 25-member squadfor the England tour.

The 23-year-old has so far rep-resented West Indies in white-ballcricket after bursting onto thescene in 2018 but he is yet to playin the traditional format, consid-ered to be the holy grail.

“I definitely want to play Testcricket; I want to do well in all threeformats,” Thomas, who has played20 ODIs and 12 T20Is for WestIndies so far, was quoted as saying

by ‘Jamaica Observer’.“Test cricket is really the ulti-

mate that everyone wants to playto be great. You don’t want to justbe an average cricketer; you wantto be among the greats.” Thomashad earned a call-up in the Testsquad during last year’s homeseries against England which WestIndies won 2-1 but the youngsterdidn’t get a game.

“I didn’t get to make my debut,but hopefully (I will) this timearound,” he said.

Besides the 11 reserves, WestIndies have announced a 14-mansquad to tour England next weekfor the proposed three-Test serieswhich will be held behind closeddoors in a bio-secure environmentto reduce the risk of transmissionof the coronavirus.

Thomas said he has receivedsome words of encouragementfrom West Indies head coach PhilSimmons.

“Coach Phil (and I), we alwayshave a talk. He says I can't be bowl-ing that fast — probably bowlingthe fastest in the Caribbean — andnot play in his Test team,” said theJamaican, who has so far scalped27 wickets in 20 ODIs and claimed15 wickets in 12 T20Is.

“I just want to relax, bowl, putthe ball in the right areas and let theball do the work. Even if I'm notplaying I’ll be training and keepingmy fitness up. If I’m not playing Iwant to learn as much as a can.”

Thomas was in good nickbefore the coronavirus pandemicforced a cricket shutdown acrossthe globe.