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www.thehindu.in ● Regd. DL(ND)-11/6110/2006-07-08 ● RNI No. TNENG/2012/49940 ● ISSN 0971 - 751X ● Vol. 7 ● No. 13 ● CITY EDITION ● 28 Pages ● Rs. 8.00

NEW DELHI: An alleged

paedophile, who had been

making weekly visits to the

Capital for the past 13 years

preying on children, has been

arrested.

Sunil Rastogi, a tailor from

Rudrapur town on the UP-

Uttarakhand border, has been

named in at least six cases of

sexual assault or attempted

sexual assault on children, said

the police.

Man wanted in 6 childabuse cases held

� CITY | PAGE 3

KOLKATA: Six women diedof sufocation during arush to board a vessel atKachuberia on their wayback home from theGangasagar Mela,Sundarban Afairs

Minister ManturamPakhira said on Sunday.More than a milliondevotees had gathered atthe Kapil Muni’s Ashramin the Sundarbans areaon Sunday.

Six Gangasagar pilgrimsdie during rush at jettySPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

� NATION | PAGE 9

monday, january 16, 2017

EDUCATION PLUS— 4 Pages

METRO PLUS— 4 Pages

Petrol price up by 42 paise and dieselby ₨1.03 a litre Page 9

Rajnath reviewssecurity situation inpoll-bound Manipur3

Trump attacks civil rights icon John LewisPage 14

Kohli and Jadhavscintillate in India’ssuperb winPage 17

CHENNAI: Kiran Doshi, a retired

diplomat and educationist from

Gujarat, won The Hindu Prize

2016 on Sunday for his third

major work of fiction, Jinnah

Often Came to Our House. Mr.

Doshi was selected from nearly

60 entries for the seventh

edition of the prize. The award

— a citation and a cash prize of

Rs. 5 lakh — was given away by

Pulitzer Prize-winning author

Geraldine Brooks at the ongoing

The Hindu Lit for Life fest here.

Kiran Doshi gets The Hindu Prize

� LIFE | PAGE 20

BHUBANESWAR: Raids were

conducted by the anti-

corruption vigilance wing at

several petrol pumps and

cooking gas agencies, including

one belonging to the brother of

Petroleum Minister Dharmendra

Pradhan, in Odisha following

allegations of adulteration and

black-marketing. State BJP

general secretary Prithviraj

Harichandan called it ‘misuse of

vigilance’ by the BJD

government.

Oil Minister’s brother’sgas agency raided

� NEWS | PAGE 12

BRIEFLY

NEW DELHI: The Centre hasgranted VIP security coverto four Bharatiya JanataParty (BJP) leaders fromKerala, in response to theState party unit’s allegationthat there has been a spate ofattacks on its cadres after theCommunist Party of India(Marxist)-led governmentcame to power.

BJP State president Kum-

manam Rajashekharan,former State president P.K.Krishnadas, general secret-aries M.T. Ramesh and K.Surendran were granted ‘Y’category security by theHome Ministry a fortnightago.

12 guards per person

This means around twelvepersonnel will give themproximity security cover, asenior Home Ministry oi-

cial said. The Kerala unit ofthe BJP has alleged that therewere more than 400 attacks

on its cadres and workers af-filiated to the RashtriyaSwayamsevak Sangh (RSS)

in the State last year. The Central Reserve Po-

lice Force (CRPF) has beenasked to take up the securitydetail, the Home Ministry of-ficial said. Last year, PrimeMinister Narendra Modi hadraised the issue of attack onBJP and RSS functionariesduring a rally in Kozhikode.

Committees assess risk

There are two committeeswhich decide the allocationof a security category: theProtection Review Groupand the Security Categorisa-tion Committee, bothheaded by the Union Home

Secretary and including In-telligence Bureau oicials.Around 300 individuals aregiven security cover by Cent-ral security forces which in-clude the CRPF, CISF, Indo-Tibetan Border Police(ITBP) and the Border Se-curity Force (BSF).

“We grant security on thebasis of the assessment doneby the intelligence agencies.Their ground reports sug-gested that the four BJP per-sons required protection,”the Ministry oicial.

In December 2016, fourRSS functionaries in Punjabwere also accorded central

security cover. Punjab goesto the polls on February 4.

‘X’ category security

The four RSS leaders —Rameshwar Dass from Lud-hiana, Pramod from Amrit-sar, Ramgopal and KuldeepBhagat from Jalandhar —were given ‘X’ category se-curity. The Central Indus-trial Security Force (CISF),which has a specialised VIPsecurity unit was tasked withproviding cover to the RSSfunctionaries. Under the ‘X’category, about 5-6 armedcommandos are deployedwith each VIP.

Centre throws VIP security shield around Kerala BJP brass The ‘Y’ category CRPF protectioncomes after spate of attacks on cadre

VIJAITA SINGH

A file photo of a BJP protest in Kerala against attacks on itscadre. — PHOTO: S. GOPAKUMAR

NEW DELHI: Despite ArmyChief Gen. Bipin Rawatsounding a warning to sol-diers on Sunday against us-ing social media to air theirgrievances instead of goingthrough the regular chan-nels, a third video surfacedlate in the evening in whichan unidentified jawan breaksinto song to highlight the dif-ficulties the troops face onthe border.

“A few colleagues are us-ing social media to draw themedia's attention to theirproblems. It afects the mor-ale of the jawans and therebythe army... You can be heldguilty of a crime... and getpunished,” Gen. Rawatwarned while addressing theArmy Day parade in DelhiCantonment. His commentscame after a second video ofa jawan went viral, allegingdiscrimination by oicers.

Unlike the earlier ones,the latest video is not self-made by a soldier expressinggrievances but features aSikh soldier singing in Punj-abi to a group of colleagues.The soldier sings of thetough conditions they live in,probably at a border post, the“pickle on roti” they get toeat while people go to the Taj[hotel] in cities and of not be-ing sanctioned leave for over10 months.

“It has been 10 months

now, I am not getting daysof; all the tears have fallenfrom her eyes. One who ismarried to us, she feelsneither married nor unmar-ried,” the song posted onFacebook says.

The jawan also sings thatpoliticians don’t seem tocare about youth in the milit-ary. “They go to sleep afterwishing good night, we cel-ebrate Diwali on borders...”

Ministry to address issue

In a related development,sources said the DefenceMinistry had taken note ofthe incidents which theytermed as “systemic issues”.Steps were being taken to ad-

dress the issue as a whole.“There are thousands ofunits in place. It is diicult tomonitor the issue at everylevel. Hence a mechanismneeds to be put in place. TheMinistry is working on it,”defence sources said.

Last week, Lance NaikYagya Pratap Singh of 42 In-fantry brigade expressed hisgrievances against thesahayak (orderly) system inthe Army and spoke of sol-diers being forced to “washclothes, polish boots andwalk dogs” for seniors. Hesaid he was being victimisedby his superiors for com-plaining against the practice.

In his first formal media

address after taking over asChief, Gen. Rawat last Fridaydefended the sahayak sys-tem. He also announced thata “suggestion and grievance”system would be put in placethrough which soldierscould reach him directlywithout their identity beingdisclosed.

In his video, nursing as-sistant Naik Ram Bhagatspeaks in support of BSFjawan Tej Bahadur Yadav,whose Facebook post com-plaining about the quality offood given to the troops wentviral and forced the govern-ment to order a probe.

Rawat warns of crackdown,but another video surfaces

STERN VIEW: Army chief General Bipin Rawat paying homage at the Amar Jawan Jyoti at IndiaGate on the occasion of Army Day, in New Delhi on Sunday. — PHOTO: PTI

It affects the morale of the jawans and thereby the force, says Army chief

SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

� CONTINUED ON PAGE 12

NEW DELHI: Amazon’s indifer-ence in addressing India’scomplaints about productsthat denigrate Indian iconsand symbols will prove peril-ous for the global e-tailer,Secretary, Department ofEconomic Afairs Shaktik-anta Das said on Sunday.

Mr. Das’s comments pub-lished on a social media net-work came a day after theMinistry of External Afairssaid the Indian ambassadorin Washington DC wasreaching out to the company.

“Amazon, better behave.Desist from being flippantabout Indian symbols andicons. Indiference will be atyour own peril,” Mr. Das saidon his Twitter handle. Thecomment drew a large num-ber of responses promptingMr. Das to explain his re-marks.

“Comment on Amazonwas as a citizen of India as Ifelt strongly about it. Noth-ing more should be read intoit. Remain committed to eco-nomic reforms, ease of doingbusiness & open trade.Sometimes get touchy whenour icons are involved,” Mr.Das said in subsequent mes-sages. His intervention onthe issue came days after Ex-ternal Afairs MinisterSushma Swaraj threatenedvisa boycott for Amazon’semployees in India after so-cial media sites showed theIndian flag on doormats thatthe company sold in Canada.

Behave, Economic

Afairs Secretary

tells Amazon



CHANDIGARH: Ahead of the Pun-jab Assembly polls, formerBJP leader Navjot SinghSidhu on Sunday joined theCongress party.

The ex-cricketer wasformally inducted into theparty by Congress vice pres-ident Rahul Gandhi in NewDelhi on Sunday.

Soon after joining theCongress, Mr. Sidhutweeted: “Beginning of a newinning. On the front foot..Punjab, Punjabiyat & everyPunjabi must win!”

Punjab Congress chiefCapt. Amarinder Singh, whowas not present at the occa-sion, said it was “great news”and that Mr. Sidhu's joiningwould further strengthen theCongress in the run-up to theState Assembly elections.

“Besides being the party’schoice for contesting the

Amritsar East seat, Mr. Sidhuwill be star campaigner inthe Punjab Assembly pollsfor the Congress,” he said.

Mr. Sidhu, who hails fromPatiala, became MP for thefirst time contesting on BJPticket from the Amritsar in2004. He later successfullycontested the Amritsar bye-election and retained theseat in the 2009 general elec-tions.

In April 2016, he took oathas a member of the RajyaSabha, but resigned in July2016, saying he was beingsidelined in the party. Soon,thereafter he also quit fromthe BJP and later formed anew political front – Awaaz-e-Punjab, along with formerhockey player Pargat Singh.

He had been in talks withthe Aam Aadmi Party also.However, the talks failed.

TEAM PUNJAB: Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi welcomes Navjot Singh Sidhu into the party at his residencein New Delhi on Sunday. — PHOTO: PTI


Sidhu begins hisCongress innings


PATNA: With four more bodiesrecovered on Sunday, thedeath toll in Saturday even-ing’s boat tragedy in Biharrose to 24.

The boat carrying over 60people capsized in the Gangawhile coming to the NITghat in Patna from Sandalpurdiara (riverine) area. Thou-sands of people had gone tothe riverine area to enjoy thethree-day kite festival organ-ised by the State TourismDepartment to mark theMakar Sankranti festival.

Overloaded, says oicial

Patna district magistrateSanjay Agrawal said the boatcapsised as it was“overcrowded.”

Eyewitnesses told TheHindu that a large number ofpeople had gathered at theriverine area “but there wasno proper arrangement tomanage the crowd or to ferrythem back.”

“When a sudden an-nouncement was made thatafter dusk no boat would plyto ferry the passengers back,a commotion broke out tograb a seat on the boat,” saidRamendra Kumar, friend of avictim, Abhishek KumarSharma, of Chowk-Shi-karpur area of Patna City.

Friends and family mem-bers of victims blamed thegovernment for the tragedy.“It was on the open invita-tion of the Tourism Depart-ment that people had goneacross the river… but, the

government had not madeany arrangement for thesafety of those people… itwas a murder by the govern-ment,” said a relative of fourmembers of a family killed inthe accident.

Later in the day, the rescueoperation launched by theNational Disaster ResponseForce and State Disaster Re-sponse Force teams wascalled of.

Meanwhile, Prime Minis-ter Narendra Modi ex-pressed his condolencesover the tragedy and an-nounced ex gratia of ₨2 lakhto the family of each victimand ₨50,000 each to those in-jured.

Earlier, the Bihar govern-ment had announced ₨4 lakhcompensation to the kin ofthose who died.

The Prime Minister alsopostponed a programme tomark the resumption of workat the dilapidated riverbridge, Mahatma GandhiSetu, which he was to ad-dress through videoconferencing.

Chief Minister Nitish Ku-mar ordered a high-levelprobe. A case was registeredagainst the boat owner andthe owner of DisneylandMela, organised at thenearby kite festival venue.

The Opposition BJP de-manded the resignation ofthe Chief Minister.

Bihar boat tragedy toll rises to 24AMARNATH TEWARY

PAYING HOMAGE: People hold a candlelight vigil for the boataccident victims in Patna on Sunday. — PHOTO: RANJEET KUMAR

� DROWNED BY STATEFAILURE | EDITORIAL

� ‘SAVING LIVES, MYRELIGION’ | PAGE 9

NEW DELHI: Bahrain and Indiaheld urgent consultationsafter a large protest by Indianworkers in Manama onSunday turned violent, leav-ing one worker dead and anunknown number injured.

Minister of State for Ex-ternal Afairs V.K. Singh metwith Bahraini Ministers inManama to defuse thesituation.

“The Indian worker diedduring a protest by over 200Indian workers for paymentof salary,” a highly placeddiplomatic source con-firmed to The Hindu.

‘Died of natural causes’

Bahrain, however, refusedto acknowledge that thedeath was due to the policeaction against workers whobegan protesting aroundnoon on Sunday.

“Police and Bahraini au-thorities have said that theIndian national died of nat-ural causes,” the oicial toldThe Hindu, explaining thatnon-payment of dues andsalaries was the main issuebehind the protest.

Indian workerdies in Bahrainduring protestKALLOL BHATTACHERJEE


KALIKAPUR (BANKURA): At least

four persons have died and

several others are missing after

an illegal coal mine collapsed in

the Mejhia block of Bankura

district of West Bengal on

Thursday night. Rescue work is

yet to start, villagers said. Even

as district police officials

claimed that “no such incident

occurred”, villagers said nearly

60 workers were in the mine

when it collapsed.

Four killed in minecollapse in Bengal

� NATION | PAGE 9

581

2 |THE HINDU MONDAY, JANUARY 16, 2017

NOIDA/DELHI

CMYK

ND-ND

CITYMetro spins a web to connect people

Right now, the Metro lines cut across the city with limitedstations. Once Phase III's Pink and Magenta Lines beginoperation later this year there will be more options Page 4

Water supply hit as ammonia levels rise

Water supply in north, north-west and central Delhi wasaffected due to high ammonia levels in the raw watersupply on Sunday Page 5

Calling all readers to connect with us for all things Delhi at

twitter - @DelhiConnect www.facebook.com/NewDelhiConnect

DELHICONNECT

NEW DELHI: The schedule forthe lecture series on socialjustice titled "Democracyand Social Justice: Accessand Equality" to be organ-ised between January 18 andJanuary 25 at FreedomSquare in JNU has beenreleased.

The JNU Teachers' Asso-ciation has chosen to “re-claim Freedom Square”which has now become aspot where public meetingshave been banned by the ad-ministration. The lecturesscheduled to be heldbetween 4 p.m. and 6 30p.m.will include topics such as“Crisis of democracy andthe question of rights” byBezwada Wilson, “The newgrammar of caste by Ash-wini Despanede and Adi-vasis and the politics of theRight by Archana Prasadwill be held on the first day.Other speakers scheduled tospeak include SohailHashmi and Madhu Prasadon “JNU's deprivationpoints system-history andpolitics”, Yogendra Yadavon “UGC, universiyautonomy and socialjustice” and Rajani Tilak on“Caste and gender intersec-tion in the idea of socialjustice” among others.

UGC notification

The lecture series wasplanned after the ExecutiveCouncil of the university de-cided to implement theUGC notification of May 5that makes the interview thesole criteria for admissioninto MPhil/PhD courses.Various internal commit-tees of the university has re-commended that theweightage given to the inter-view be reduced so that theadmission process could bemore inclusive.

Earlier, after a successfultwo-day university strike,nine students that were sus-pended by Jawaharlal Nehru

University for allegedly dis-rupting the 142nd AcademicCouncil (AC) meeting

held on December 26were allowed to registerthemselves for the wintersemester 2017.

Suspension contradictory

However, the inquiryagainst them still continues.Calling the development astep ahead for the unitedstruggle of the JNU com-munity, the JNU Student-s’Union said that it rejectsany such “vindictive in-quiry” and will resist anyfurther attempts to victim-ise the students.

The nine students, whobelong mostly to marginal-ised and oppressed com-munities, were protestingoutside the venue of the ACmeeting against the discus-sion of an item on theagenda to increase the im-portance of the interviewfor admission into MPhil/PhD courses in accordancewith a UGC notification ofMay 5, 2016 and a hike in theadmission process.

The students were servedsuspension notices onDecember 27, the day after

the meeting without theusual democratic process ofsetting up an inquiry com-mittee.

The suspension came aday after the administrationreleased a statement sayingthat the AC meeting hadbeen conducted peacefullyand it was only after thatmeeting was over that a fewstudents entered the meet-ing room and shoutedslogans.

‘Suspensions vindictive’

The students found sup-port from teachers and stu-

dents for what they called a“vindictive and arbitrarymethod of slapping studentswith suspension notices onfalse and trumped upcharges” by the proctors of-fice.

Some of the teachers whocame out in support of thenine students were alsoserved notices for speakingat a public meeting outsidethe administration block.

The JNUSU also lashedout at the administration for“structurally killing socialjustice and destroyingJNU's inclusive character.” .

Suspended students allowed to register for next semester, inquiry against them to continue

JNU protest lectures to begin on Jan 18STAFF REPORTER

VOICING DISSENT: Students had demonstrated outside the venue of the academic councilmeeting that voted on key changes to the university’s admission process. FILE PHOTO

NEW DELHI: A survey conduc-ted by the Indian Medical As-sociation (IMA) on consult-ant specialist doctors hasrevealed “a frightening seriesof violence against doctors”,with as high as 80 per cent ofdoctors haveing faced somedegree of violence or aggres-sion from patients and theirrelatives across the country.

Assault post surgery

Dr K.K. Aggarwal, nationalpresident IMA, said thatmaximum violent outburstswere faced by doctors work-ing in emergency care. Ac-cording to 90 per cent of thedoctors surveyed, patient’srelatives often subject doc-tors to unruly behaviour,

verbal abuse and physical as-sault post surgery.

Doctors are now increas-ingly talking about the needfor a secure working environ-ment and this survey wasconducted to document theconcerns of consultant spe-

cialist doctors regarding in-creasing incidences of viol-ence and aggressivebehaviour aimed at them,noted a release issued by theAssociation.

In the survey, 83 per centdoctors said that their pa-

tients get upset if the doctorsare late in their appoint-ments, 30 per cent of the pa-tient’s relatives do not standup when the doctors enter apatient’s room and nearly 17per cent of the consultantsfelt that fee splitting isunethical.

Incidents not reported

“One other problem in thiscontext is under-reporting ofsuch incidences by doctors.While doctors may feel con-fident in voicing their con-

cerns under the veil of an an-onymous survey, when itcomes to routine practicethey are often reluctant to re-port such behaviour eitherout of fear or due to regardfor patient’s distress andwell-being. Most of the re-ported cases were when theissue had gone out of hand,and the doctors feel that theirown or family’s life is underthreat,” said Dr. Aggarwal.

The Association has notedthat the rising incidences ofsuch cases highlight the ur-gent need to boost securitymeasures on hospitalpremises. Strengtheningdoctor- patient relationshipsto ensure accountability andopenness is also likely to playa key role in reducingviolence.

Survey conducted by IMA shows that 80 per cent of doctors report having faced some degree of aggression from patients

Most doctors concerned about violence at work

BINDU SHAJAN PERAPPADAN

WORD OF CAUTION: The survey says rising incidences of suchcases highlight the urgent need to boost security. FILE PHOTO

The survey showedthat maximum violentoutbursts were facedby doctors working inemergency care

NEW DELHI: A clear, windySunday provided the perfectsetting for day two of thefourth Delhi InternationalKite Festival that is beingconducted by Delhi Tourismat DDA Ground, Sector 10,Dwarka. The event contin-ued past sunset with expertsflying kites fitted with LEDlights to enthral vistors.

The three-day event hasnumerous kite flyers fromIndia and abroad showcas-ing their flying and kite-making skills. A special kite-making demonstration wasorganised where profes-sional kite flyers showcasedtheir expertise and demon-strated the art of kitemaking.

Music and dance shows

OverNic O’Neill, an inter-national kite flyer from USAsaid she was “amazed to seethe overwhelming re-sponse” to the festival andwas equally excited to “wit-ness music and dance showsorganised as part of the kitefestival for the first time”.

S.P Singh, MD and CEO,Delhi Tourism said, “Thepositive aura and vibe of theKite Festival will make you

smile and forget about allyour worries. No matterwhat the status of the peopleare, everyone is happy. Littlechildren running aroundhappy and joyously flyingtheir kites. It will make yourealise how a day of such cel-ebration helps people forgetall about their busy lives andhardships they face on adaily basis.”

International participants

Famous kite flyers fromGermany, Korea, USA,

China, Thailand, Ukraine,Canada, New Zealand, Aus-tralia, Netherlands andMalaysia participated. In-dian participants from Gu-jarat, Maharashtra, Jaipur,Chennai, Kerala and Punjabjoined the visitors.

To go with the flying, foodstalls and music perform-ances by Ravinder Grewal ofPunjabi Academy, a craftbazaar, magic shows, puppetshows, quiz contest, andcomedy shows added to thefestivities.

‘Overwhelming’ response to kite festival on Day 2 STAFF REPORTER

WITH STRINGS ATTACHED: Professional kite flyers showcased their expertise and alsodemonstrated the art of kite making at the three-day festival. PHOTOS: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

NEW DELHI: Bringing respitefrom the cold wave in theCapital, the maximumtemperature on Sundayrose to 24 degrees Celsius,four degrees above theseason's average andwarmer than the 19.6degrees recorded onSaturday.

Minimum at 3.2°C

The minimumtemperature that wasrecorded at 3.2 degreesalso rose to settle at 8.6degrees Celsius, onedegree above the season'snormal.

Forecast for cloudy sky

The MeT departmenthas forecast partly cloudysky with mist or shallowfog in the morning forMonday with thelikelihood of light drizzleand rain/thunderstorm inthe afternoon.

The rise in temperaturewas due to the onset of awestern disturbance, theMeT department

informed.Western disturbance is

a phenomenon that bringsin moisture-laden windsand cloud cover.

Temperature onMonday is likely to settle

between 23 and 10 degreesCelsius respectively.

The humidity oscillatedbetween 95 and 56 percent and visibility wasnormal throughout theday.

Respite from cold wave in CapitalSTAFF REPORTER

WARM MEAL: People cook food on a cold Sunday night in New Delhi. PHOTO: SUSHIL KUMAR VERMA

NEW DELHI: The month-long“nationalism lecture series”that was conducted last yearby JNU Teachers’ Association(JNUTA) after the February 9incident has been publishedin a book titled ‘What the Na-tion Really Needs to Know’.The lecture series was organ-ised at Freedom Square to de-bate and discuss the defini-tion of “nationalism” at a timewhen the university was be-ing branded as“anti-national”.

Twenty four lectures de-livered by eminent academi-cians, intellectuals and histor-ians including Romila Thapar,Harbans Mukhia, TanikaSarkar, Jayati Ghosh, PrabhatPatnaik, Amit Sengupta,Mridula Mukherjee,Makaranad Paranjpe and Ap-porv Anand, have been com-piled and edited in the bookpublished by HarperCollinsIndia. Janaki Nair, Rohit Azad,Mohinder Singh and Mal-larika Sinha Roy have contrib-uted to the editing of the es-says while the pictures takenby students during the lectureseries have also been in-cluded in the book.

Launch on Jan 25

The 368-page book will belaunched at JNU on January25 when the third series of lec-tures — “Democratising so-cial justice” will conclude.The second series was on“Azaadi“.

The lecture series on SocialJustice titled "DemocratisingSocial Justice" will be organ-ised between January 18 andJanuary 25 at Freedom Square,JNU which has now become aspot where public meetingshave been banned by theadministration.

JNU lecture seriesset to be madeinto a book

STAFF REPORTER

NEW DELHI: With privateschools free to make theirown nursery admission cri-teria as long as they stayclear of a “banned” list of 51criteria, Salwan School inwest Delhi’s Rajendra Nagarhas mentioned as a condi-tion in the registrationforms issued by its twobranches — SalwanMontessori and GD Salwan— that parents having morethan two children will not beable to apply for admissionin their schools.

Applicable for teachers

The move, the school saidin its guidelines, was to mo-tivate people to have fewerchildren.

The clause barring thosewith more than two childrenis also applicable for teach-ing positions at the schoolsand candidates with morethan two children cannotapply for a job there.

The school informed that

keeping in mind the increas-ing population in the coun-try, it was their endeavour tomotivate people to havefewer children.

Nursery admissionsbegan on January 2 with theprocess for 298 privateschools and EWS and DGcategories commencing onJanuary 10.

First list on Feb 28

The application processfor the first category willconclude on January 23while for the remaining twocategories will end on Janu-ary 31.

The first list will be dis-played on February 28 andsubsequent lists are sched-uled to come out on March15 and March 31.

‘Parents with more thantwo children can’t apply’

STAFF REPORTER The move, the schoolsaid in its guidelines,was to motivatepeople to have fewer children

West Delhi school comes up with odd criteria

581

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CITY | 3THE HINDU MONDAY, JANUARY 16, 2017

NOIDA/DELHI

Published by N. Ram at Kasturi Buildings, 859 & 860, Anna Salai, Chennai-600002 and Printed by S. Ramanujam at HT Media Ltd. Plot No. 8, Udyog Vihar, Greater Noida Distt. Gautam Budh Nagar, U.P. 201306, on behalf of KASTURI & SONS LTD., Chennai-600002. Editor: Mukund Padmanabhan (Responsible for selection of news under the PRB Act).

D E L H I

Jan 16, Mon Jan 17, Tue Jan 18, Wed

RISE 07 15 SET 17 48 RISE 07 15 SET 17 48 RISE 07 15 SET 17 49

RISE 21 51 SET 09 54 RISE22

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39SET 11 07

Talk: Panel Discussion on ‘The Good,the Bad and the Ugly of Technical Edu-cation’; panelists: Dr. Puneet Azad,HOD and Associate Professor, MSIT;Anil Gupta, CEO-IL & FS (Environ-ment); Akanksha Rai Sharma, B.Tech.student, MSIT; Dr. Poonam Bansal,Deputy Director, MSIT; Dr. Roopa Va-jpeyi, academic and consumer activ-ist; Dr. Jayashree Gupta, president,Consumers India, at Gulmohar Hall, In-dia Habitat Centre (IHC), 7 p.m.

Dance: “Nritya Trayee”, a dance fest-ival featuring three solo Indian clas-sical dance performances of artistesSharanya Chandran (Bharatanatyam);Radhika Samson (Odissi), SamikshaSharma (Kathak), at The Stein Audit-orium, IHC, 7 p.m.

Exhibition: A show of paintings by

Shahanshah Mittal, at Triveni KalaSangam, 205, Tansen Marg, 11 a.m. – 7p.m.Exhibition: “The Past Was Yester-day”, a show by Akhilesh, at Aakriti ArtGallery Pvt. Ltd, F-213/A, Old M .BRoad, Lado Sarai, 11 a.m – 7 p.m.Exhibition: “Penal Colony”, a show ofMadhusudhanan, at Vadehra Art Gal-lery, D-53 Defence Colony, 11 a.m. - 7p.m.Exhibition: “Folk and Tribal Art”, agroup exhibition of folk and tribalpaintings, at Visual Arts Gallery, IHC,11 a.m. – 7 p.m.Paintings: Retrospective show ofParamjeet Singh, Chairman, AIFACS,at All India Fine Arts & Craft Society, 1Rafi Marg, 11 a.m. – 7 p.m.(Mail your listings for this column [email protected])

DELHI TODAY

NEW DELHI: An alleged paedo-phile, who had been makingweekly visits to the Capitalfor the past 13 years preyingon children, has beenarrested.

Sunil Rastogi, a tailorfrom Rudrapur town on theUP-Uttarakhand border, hasbeen named in at least sixcases of sexual assault or at-tempted sexual assault onchildren, said the police.

“He mainly targeted thosegirls whose parents did noraccompany them on theirway to school or home andthen took them with himselfon diferent pretexts, alwayslooking for a secluded placeto sexually assault them,”said Deputy Commissionerof Police (East) Omvir SinghBishnoi.

Three recent cases werereported in east Delhi’s NewAshok Nagar — one onDecember 13 and two otherson January 12 — where he al-legedly targeted girls agedbetween seven and 10 years.

Trap laid

“In the first case, he toldthe girl that her father hadsent him to pick her up. Hethen took her to an isolatedunder-construction build-ing, where he sexually as-saulted her,” said Mr.Bishnoi.

The man’s image was,however captured on aCCTV camera on the build-ing’s premises.

The initial clues that thepolice gathered pointed to

the involvement of a ha-bitual ofender.

His details were talliedwith that of some criminalswho had been recentlyreleased.

But even as the police

were in the process of nar-rowing down the list, thesecond incident happened.

Accused flees

On January 12, Rastogitried to abduct a 10-year-old

girl outside the governmentschool where she studies.

As the girl cried for help,he fled, but his next stopoverwas another governmentschool, barely a kilometreaway from the first.

“The second victim, too,raised an alarm, forcingRastogi to flee,” said Mr.Bishnoi.

Based on technical sur-veillance and the versions ofthe victims, the police then

identified Rastogi.“When the three incidents

happened, Rastogi was outon bail in a Protection ofChildren Against Sexual Of-fences Act,” said Mr.Bishnoi.

Accused mainly targeted girls outside schools; 3 cases reported from east Delhi

Man wanted in 6 child abuse cases heldSHUBHOMOY SIKDAR

NABBED: The accused in police custody. PHOTO: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

NEW DELHI: After producingquality cookies and durablefurniture for years, Tihar Jailinmates have now startedvoicing their opinions in theform of handwrittennewspapers.

Apart from raising theproblems they face insidethe jail, the prisoners are us-ing the monthly newspapersto share news related to lifein prison, jokes and cartoons.

Currently, two newspa-pers — Shakti Times andKaragar Samachar — runby the inmates of sub-jailsone and two, respectively,are in circulation.

Aiming high

A third newspaper, TiharAkhbaar, will be launched inthe next few weeks. The jailauthorities said each of thenine sub-jails in Tihar wouldbe running their own public-ations by the year-end.

The idea of newspapers byand for Tihar inmates wasput forward by several pris-oners, prominent amongthem being MahmoodFarooqui, co-director of filmPeepli Live and a convict in arape case; S.S. Rathi and AnilKumar, former police of-ficers serving time for a fake

encounter; and BhupinderSingh Bisht, bodyguard ofmurdered liquor baronPonty Chadha.

It, however, did not take alot of efort to obtain permis-sion from the jail authoritiesto sanction the publicationof newspapers.

“The exercise helps us tounderstand the problems ofthe prisoners. The inmates,meanwhile, are able to utilise

their time productively,” saida senior jail oicial. Since thejail lacks a printing press andprinting costs are too high,the prisoners have to dependon handwritten newspaperswhich are photocopied.

Close coordination

“The prisoners hold edit-orial meetings among them-selves to decide on the con-tent. But our oicers monitor

everything that goes into thepapers,” said the oicial.

The two issues that havecome out so far have focusedon a range of subjects such asthe shifting of prisoners tothe newly-inaugurated Man-doli Jail, demonetisation,death of Tamil Nadu ChiefMinister Jayalalithaa, crickettournaments, classes and ex-ams, and success stories ofinmates.

Tihar inmates wield the penSTAFF REPORTER

POWER OF WORDS: After producing cookies and furniture for years, Tihar inmates have nowstarted voicing their opinions in the form of handwritten newspapers. FILE PHOTO: AFP

NEW DELHI: Two men and a ju-venile have been arrested forallegedly bludgeoning a manto death with stones beforepartially burning his body.

On Tuesday, the police hadreceived a call about a bodylying on a hillock in southDelhi’s Dakshinpuri. Giventhe absence of any docu-ments near the body and theextent of the burns on its, thepolice took two days toidentify the deceased asChetan Kumar. The policethen apprehended two per-sons— Vikram and Suraj—and a juvenile in connectionwith the case.

Money dispute involved

Their interrogation re-vealed that Vikram had lent₨35,000 to Chetan in 2015.Since Vikram had recentlygone unemployed, he askedChetan to return the money,but the deceased allegedlyrefused. Vikram then al-legedly roped in his friendSuraj and a juvenile to killChetan. On January 9, the triocalled the victim to an isol-ated spot, and the four con-sumed alcohol. Once Chetangot inebriated, they allegedlykilled him.

Juvenile among 3held for murder

STAFF REPORTER

FARIDABAD: A labourer al-legedly set his two minordaughters on fire before im-molating himself at their res-idence in Deeg village herelate on Saturday night.

Dhan Singh (38) and hisdaughters — Savita (4) andKari (2) — were later de-clared brought dead at ahospital.

‘Man was drunk’

Singh’s wife Lalita pur-

portedly told the police thather husband was drunkwhen the incident tookplace. Neighbours rushed tothe victims’ help and tried todouse the flames, but to noavail.

Wife hurt

Lalita, meanwhile,sufered burns while tryingto rescue the victims.

“The woman is undergo-ing treatment at SafdarjungHospital,” said a policeoicer.

Labourer sets self,daughters on fire

STAFF REPORTER

TRAGEDY: The house where the incident took place. PHOTO: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

NEW DELHI: The Delhi govern-ment’s Excise Departmenthas arrested 1,250 people inthe last three months forconsuming liquor in theopen.

The department also im-pounded several cars inwhich violators were foundto be consuming alcohol inpublic places. On November7, 2016, Deputy Chief Minis-ter Manish Sisodia hadlaunched a campaign statingconsumption of alcohol inthe open, particularly near li-quor vends and in vehicles,was not only a safety hazardbut also threatened women’ssecurity.

1,250 arrested for consumingliquor in openSTAFF REPORTER

NEW DELHI: Sunil Rastogipurportedly believed inomens which he thoughtwould help his planscome to fruition. Thesewould range from hischoice of clothes to theareas where he targetedhis victims.

“He would visit theCapital wearing clothesthat were very similar,”said DeputyCommissioner of Police(East) Omvir SinghBishnoi.

Favoured route

For the past 13 years,Rastogi had also beentaking the sameJansamparkkranti trainto come to the city. Hewould also alight only atthe Ghaziabad railwaystation. He told thepolice that he believedthat the route portendedsuccess for him.

The police said theaccused was familiarwith areas in east Delhias he had lived there

between 1990 and 2004.Among the places wereKhoda, Kalyanpuri,Trilokpuri and NewAshok Nagar

“Once, Rastogi wasforced to leave from aslum where he lived as hehad sexually assaulted aminor girl there. Hewould, however, keepgoing there,” said Mr.Bishnoi.

In the “hundreds oftrips” that he claims tohave made to the city, heallegedly attemptedsexual assault on 2,500girls.

Mr. Bishnoi said theclaims were beingverified.

He was arrested in aPOCSO case in Rudrapurin February 2016, but wasgranted bail six monthslater.

Sources said the casewas in the final stages oftrial.

The accused was alsoallegedly booked fortheft and under theNDPS Act in Rudrapur,Delhi and Ghaziabad.

Accused ‘guided’by omensSHUBHOMOY SIKDAR

In solidarity

MARK OF RESPECT: People pay tribute to the victims of the 1984 anti-Sikh riots during theinauguration of a memorial, ‘The Wall of Truth’, on the premises of Gurdwara RakabGanj Sahib in New Delhi on Sunday. PHOTO: SUSHIL KUMAR VERMA

NEW DELHI: A woman was al-legedly raped by her hus-band’s employee in south-west Delhi’s Chhawla onSaturday.

According to the police,the victim’s husband hadlocked her in a room at theirresidence following a fight.

“The man then went up-stairs to his room,” said a po-lice oicer.

The accused, upon find-ing the woman trapped, al-

legedly raped her.

Husband unaware

Although the womanraised an alarm, her hus-band could not hear her ashe was sleeping.

She later confided in himthe ordeal and they ap-proached the police.

Based on the woman’sstatement, a case under Sec-tion 376 (rape) of the IndianPenal Code was registeredat the Chhawla police sta-tion.

Woman raped byhusband’s employeeSTAFF REPORTER

NEW DELHI: Colourful roomswith toys and children’sbooks could soon be seen inpolice stations in the Capitalas part of eforts to put youngvictims, survivors and crimesuspects at ease.

For this, the Delhi Policeare collaborating with theNational Commission forProtection of Child Rights(NCPCR) and UNICEF,which will help them designa set of guidelines.

An entrance and exit sep-arate from the police station,plain clothed policemen,mandatory deployment ofwomen police personnel,toys, colourful rooms andcartoons are some of the sug-gestions being discussed.

Meeting held

A meeting in this regardwas held with the AssistantCommissioner of Police-

SJPU (Special Juvenile PoliceUnit) from all 13 districts,NCPCR oicials and aUNICEF representative lastweek. “We have instructed allthe districts to identify policestations where we can have achild-friendly corner. Wewill first set up a model po-lice station and then replicateit in one police station in eachof the districts,” said In-spector S.S. Malhan, SpecialPolice Unit for Women andChildren. The initiative islikely to be launched inFebruary.

“In a case where a child hasbeen badly treated, his or herfirst point of contact is thepolice. It is important, there-fore, to sensitise the oicersabout what their responseshould be when a childcomes to them,” said NCPCRChairperson StutiKacker.—PTI

Toys, children’s booksat police stations soon

NEW DELHI: The victim’sfamily members said theywere shocked to learn thecriminal history ofalleged paedophile SunilRastogi.

The mother of the10-year-old girl who wassexually assaulted inDecember said she hadlost hope that the policewould be able to nab the

accused.She recounted how her

daughter’s behaviour hadchanged after the incidenttook place.

Girl threatened

“He had warned herthat he would harm her ifshe told anyone about theassault. So scared she wasthat she did not go toschool for a few days,”said the victim’s mother.

Another victim wasapproached by theaccused on the pretextthat her father haddaughter clothes for herand that he was taking herto his tailoring shop to getthe measurements right,said her parents

“But she did not believehim and started crying,which attracted theattention of others,” thegirl’s mother said.

Victims’ families in shockSTAFF REPORTER

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NEW DELHI: Water supply innorth, north-west and cent-ral Delhi was afected due tohigh ammonia levels in theraw water supply on Sunday.Operations had to be sus-pended in Chandrawal andWazirabad treatment plants,which supply water to the af-fected areas.

By evening, however,Delhi Jal Board (DJB) oi-cials said that the water sup-ply will be restored byMonday morning.

The worst afected areasare old Delhi, Karol Bagh,Punjabi Bagh, RajouriGarden, Tilak Nagar, Burariand other adjoining areas.Lutyens Delhi will be par-tially afected as water fromthe Sonia Vihar treatmentplant is being supplied there.

Raw water

Operations at the plantshad to be suspended onSunday morning due to leak-age in the carrier lined chan-nel (CLC) that brings waterfrom Haryana to Delhi.

To plug the leakage, thewater supply in the CLC hasbeen diverted to the Yamunariver, the water of which isextremely contaminatedwith levels of ammonia ran-ging between 3.5 ppm and 4ppm.

Carrier lined channel

“The CLC is leaked inHaryana. We get raw waterthrough CLC. Haryana is re-pairing it so we need to shutCLC. Now water comingthrough main river coursewhere ammonia is danger-ously high. So productionfrom two plants stoppedtemporarily. No compromiseon water quality. Supply tobe afected for one day inareas covered byChandrawal and Wazirabadplants. I am personally mon-itoring the situation and weare in constant touch withauthorities in Haryana,” DJBchief Kapil Mishra said in aseries of tweets.

Mr. Mishra later tweeted:“Supply to be afected forone day in areas covered bychandrawal and wazirabad

plants. Repair of CLC will becompleted by 9 pm tonight(Sunday). Supply to be re-stored by tomorrow(Monday) morning 7 am inmost parts [sic].”

The DJB plants treataround 900 million gallonsof water a day (MGD), ofwhich Wazirabad andChandrawal plants accountfor about 220 MGD. Watertankers are being providedin the afected areas. TheDJB has also asked the Cent-ral Pollution Control Board(CPCB) to check the qualityof raw water samples.

Toxic

Mr. Mishra told the mediathat the ammonia treatmentplant, which was inaugur-ated by Chief MinisterArvind Kejriwal last year,cannot treat anything bey-ond 1-2 ppm. The water withvery high ammonia levelscannot be treated withagents like chlorine as aftercoming in contact with am-monia it will produce triha-lomethane, which is carcino-genic in nature.

North, north-west and central Delhi affected, Delhi Jal Board says situation to improve today

Water supply hit as ammonia levels rise STAFF REPORTER

Emotional appeal

Arguments in a courtroomare not always about thelaw. They vary from legalto emotional statements.What happened recently ina courtroom at the DelhiHigh Court is one suchcase in point. Counsel forvendors of a weeklymarket, which faces a shiftin timings, pleaded withthe judge to understand theplight of vendors.The lawyer shared how hehimself was once a vendorat a weekly market whilestudying in school. “I canshare their misery with youas I am one of them. I knowhow their life is,” he said .He made fervent appeals ashe cited verses and shortpoems about the misery ofthe poor, even drinkingtwo glasses of water asbeads of sweat rolled downhis face.“Mr. counsel, you aregetting too emotional. Butas a lawyer, you have todetach yourself. You haveto assist the court,” saidone of the judges. Evenafter repeated calls fromthe Bench to argue on law,the counsel persisted. “If

my lordship grants me therelief that if this weeklymarket is shifted, all suchmarkets will be shifted, Iwill bow down and moveout of this court,” he said .“Unfortunately Mr.counsel, the judges cannotsay that if you say this or dothat, we will move out ofthis court,” said one of thejudges after listening to thehour-long argument.■ ■ ■

Maintainingsuspense

The much awaited andalready delayed annualpress conference of theDelhi Police waspostponed again last week.There was no formalannouncement of theinitial date (January 10)and venue (a new one thistime) as has been thepractice in the past, but atender posted on the DelhiPolice website had the datemarked on it. As the day approached, itbecame clear that the eventwould be pushed furtherand that is what eventuallyhappened. Even now, nofixed date has beenannounced, but sources

suggest that it will nothappen till the next CBIchief is decided, a post forwhich the selection panelwill meet on Monday. Thepanel will discuss manynames, among which thecurrent top cop, AlokVerma, also figures. For thescribes, the “what to ask”has now changed to“when” and “to whom”.■ ■ ■

Mother’s day

Chief Minister ArvindKejriwal keeps attackingPrime Minister NarendraModi over many issues,even when they do notconcern Delhi per se.However, this past week,Mr. Kejriwal claimed thathe takes more care of hismother than PM Modi. ThePM, on January 10, hadtweeted: “Skipped Yoga &went to meet mother.Before dawn had breakfastwith her. Was greatspending time together[sic]”. Mr. Kejriwal, whokeeps competing with thePM, reacted by tweeting: “Ilive with my mother andeveryday take her blessings(aashirvaad). But I do notpublicise it. I don’t use my

mother for political gainsby making her stand inbank queues.”■ ■ ■

Everyone’sproblem

The disposal of solidmunicipal waste hasemerged as a majorchallenge for rapidlyurbanising Gurugram, andseveral citizens andcommunities have taken itupon themselves to fightthis menace. Manyresidents have taken upwaste management in theirown houses, while a fewhousing societies havetaken up the task insidetheir premises. Recently, the Sikhcommunity also showedthe way by putting upposters at gurdwaras andasking communitymembers to perform“Green Seva” and protectthe environment. Thoughthe citizens of theMillennium City arewilling to do their bit tomake their city clean, theadministration seems tohave utterly failed to rise tothe occasion. The opendumping and burning of

waste continues across thecity despite the ban by theNational Green Tribunaland subsequent orders bythe Municipal Corporationof Gurugram and theHaryana UrbanDevelopment Authority.Not just this, a wastemanagement activist evencomplained of harassmentby the police and theadministration when shecomplained about opendumping and burning ofwaste. The activists believethere is a great level ofawareness and willingnessamong the citizens on theissue of wastemanagement, but theadministration has failed tocash in on this. “With thecitizens willing to do somuch without any helpfrom the administration, alittle push from thegovernment can bringabout a huge change. Butthe administration seemsto be least interested inbringing any change,”remarked a wastemanagement activist.Contributed by AkankshaJain, Shubhomoy Sikdar,Maria Akram and AshokKumar

CORRIDORS OF POWER

BULANDSHAHR: Ahead of the UPAssembly elections, a truckcarrying publicity materialof the BJP — worth lakhs ofrupees — was seized by theBulandshahr police.

The Bulandshahr adminis-tration has booked the truckowner, driver and trans-porter for violation of themodel code of conduct.

Model code of conduct

Bulandshahr sub-divi-sional magistrate Arun Ya-dav said that the truck wasbound from Delhi toBhubaneshwar. A team con-ducting checking near DAVschool T-point pulled thetruck over.

During inspection, the po-lice found BJP flags andother publicity material. Of-ficials said there were nearlytwo lakh flags and other pub-licity material in the truck,worth ₨40 lakh.

“A case has been filedagainst the truck driver,owner and transporter for vi-olation of the model code ofconduct,” the oicial said.

“As per the bills recovered

from driver, it appears thatthe truck was bound fromDelhi to Bhubaneshwar.Ateam has been formed toconduct thorough investiga-tion into the matter,” a seniorUttar Pradesh governmentoicial said on the conditionof anonymity.

More vigilant

The oicials said that allteams working on electionmodel code of conduct havebeen asked to be vigilant.Apart from that clear direc-tions have been given to allprinting press owners andtransporters to ensure thatthe model code of conduct isobserved.

After implementation ofthe model code of conduct inUttar Pradesh on January 4,the UP Police have seizedmore than 1,750 illegalweapons, 39 crude bombsand 1,800 cartridges, andshut down 40 small factoriesthat were manufacturingthese banned items.

The police have recoveredillegals arms and shut downfactories in Shamli,Ghaziabad and GautamBudh Nagar.

BJP’s publicity materialseized in Bulandshahr PURUSHARTH ARADHAK

GURUGRAM: The Gurgaon Cit-izens’ Council (GCC), a cit-izens group, has alleged thatthe limits of existing muni-cipal wards have beentampered with on a large-scale during the recent de-limitation exercise and itmight afect the developmentworks and planning in thefuture.

The Haryana governmentpublished the proposal forthe delimitation of the wardsof the Municipal Corporationof Gurugram (MCF) lastweek and invited any objec-

tions or suggestions to it. GCC president R.S. Rathee

said that the delimitation wasdone keeping in view the in-terests of the BJP with theMCG elections just round thecorner. Mr. Rathee addedthat while some wards had25,000 voters, others had just10,000. Mr. Rathee said thatresidents' welfare associ-ations had already started op-posing the delimitation andwould also get their objec-tions registered in writing.

Highlighting the allegeddiscrepancies in the delimit-ation process, Mr. Ratheesaid that the DLF Phase I-IV

are developed against samelicence, but DLF Phase-IVwas shifted to ward 33. Simil-arly, the five blocks of Sush-ant Lok Phase-I have been di-vided into two wards, he said,adding that the BJP leadersplanning to contest fromwards surrounding ward no.32 had shifted the unwantedareas to this sector.

Refuting allegations

Mr. Rathee said that allmembers of the ad-hoc com-mittee for delimitation be-longed to the BJP and therewas no representation forother parties.

Refuting the allegations, anad-hoc committee membersaid that the delimitation wasdone keeping in view theparameters such as even dis-tribution of population, con-tinuous habitation in thesame ward and major roadsand bridges serving as nat-ural boundaries between twowards. “The wards have beenredrawn in a manner that Na-tional Highway-8, Railwaylines and Assembly Constitu-encies have acted as bound-aries,” the member said.

The panel has earmarked35 wards with clear territorialjurisdiction and these

changes have eliminated theoverlap of wards between theConstituencies of Gurgaonand Badshahpur.

2011 census

The directorate of urbanlocal bodies had notified aprimary delimitation orderunder the Haryana Muni-cipal Corporation Delimita-tion of Wards rules for reor-ganising wards of the MCG inMarch last year citing the2011 Census.

The elections to the Muni-cipal Corporation Gurugramare likely to be held in Marchthis year.

Gurugram citizens’ group protest delimitationASHOK KUMAR

NEW DELHI: The stinky mortu-ary at AIIMS will soon be athing of the past as thepremier medical institute isgoing to have an odourless,modern autopsy facility, afirst-of-its-kind in the coun-try, to help forensic expertsconduct post-mortems withease.

Tenders inviting inter-ested firms have alreadybeen issued by the AIIMS au-thorities in this regard. Theproposed facility will comeup within the existingautopsy centre, head of theAIIMS forensic department,Dr. Sudhir Gupta said. “Gen-erally, the mortuary whereautopsies are conductedhave repellent smells Also,doctors and staf conductingpost-mortems are unable toconcentrate on the highertechnical findings of thebody as autopsies are beingperformed in haste.” — PTI

AIIMS to have an odourlessmortuary soon

NEW DELHI: The Delhi govern-ment is planning to con-struct more foot over bridgesin the city.

However, in order to notincrease the financial bur-den on the government,these projects will be takenup on a public private part-nership (PPP) basis.

Oicials said that the Pub-lic Works Department(PWD) and Urban Develop-ment Minister SatyendarJain has asked the PWD oi-cials to commission a feasib-ility study on the newconcept so that private play-ers could be attracted tobuild more such facilities tomeet growing demand.

Less financial burden

The move is intended toreduce financial burden onthe government, which getsuch bridges constructedthrough its own agencies likethe PWD and others.

“As per the plan, the gov-ernment will give privateplayers advertisement rightson the bridges constructedon the PPP model for a stipu-lated period so that they canrecover the constructioncost. A feasibility study willbe carried out by the PWD,”said an oicial.

More foot overbridges plannedSTAFF REPORTERNEW DELHI: The AAP govern-

ment is likely to notify thenew municipal ward bound-aries later this week after theLieutenant-Governorcleared the final delimitationdraft of 272 civic wards in theCapital.

The notification on delim-itation will be issued by theUrban Development Depart-ment for all the 272 muni-cipal wards that will go topolls later this year.

An oicial said that al-though the number of muni-cipal wards in each of thethree corporations has re-

mained the same, the num-ber of wards in some as-sembly segments hascompletely changed, rangingfrom three to seven wards.

“As the L-G has given hisnod to the draft of delimita-tion, the UD Departmentwill issue a gazette notifica-tion in next few days,” the of-ficial said.

The move comes at a timewhen both the BJP and theCongress have accused theruling Aam Aadmi Party ofdelaying the municipal pollsthat are scheduled to be heldbefore April. —PTI

AAP govt to notify warddelimitation soon

Final touches

BIG JOB: A worker installs LED bulbs at South Block for the Republic Day celebrations, on Sunday. PHOTO: V. V. KRISHNAN

NEW DELHI: With its ambitiousWi-Fi project in ConnaughtPlace and Khan Market los-ing popularity due to poorconnectivity, the New DelhiMunicipal Council (NDMC)has now tied up with MTNLin a fresh attempt to ofer freeinternet in its areas.

The NDMC had partneredwith Tata Docomo in 2014 toprovide the service in innerand outer circles of CP.

Similarly, NDMC hadpartnered with Airtel-Voda-

fone joint venture FireFlyNetworks to provide the fa-cility in Khan Market.

However, visitors andtraders complained that theservice was not functioningseamlessly.

The NDMC has nowsigned a joint venture withMTNL to develop telecomaccess networks in areas un-der its jurisdiction to provideFTTH (Fibre to the Home) tothe residents,” a seniorNDMC oicial said. — PTI

NDMC takes second shotat ofering free Wi-Fi

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SHIMLA: High altitude tribalareas andmountain passes re-ceived another spell of lightsnowfall on Sunday while thepiercing cold wave sweepingmost parts of Himachal Pra-desh continued with someplaces shivering with mer-cury staying between minus17 and 22 degree Celsius.The local MeT had warned

of heavy rain or snow at isol-ated places in mid and higherhills on Sunday and Mondaydue to a fresh western dis-turbance but no report ofheavy snowfall or rain has sofar been received from anypart of the State.Kalpa in tribal Kinnaur dis-

trict recorded 2 cm of freshsnow till Sunday eveningwhile Nehru Kund near Man-ali and Rohtang Pass received2 cm and 5 cm of snow.The sky remained heavily

overcast and strong velocityicy winds swept Shimla andsurrounding areas but therewas no rain or snowfall.The high altitude tribal and

other peaks shivered underfreezing coldwave conditionswith mercury stayingbetween minus 17 and minus22 degree C while KeylongandKalpa in tribal Lahaul andSpiti and Kinnaur district re-corded a low of minus 11.6 de-gree and minus 2.8 degreeagainst minus 13.9 degree andminus 6 degree on Saturday.Similarly Manali was

warmer at 1 degree againstminus 6.8 degree on Saturday,a rise of 7.8 degree, followedbyBunter zerodegree,ManaliShimla 1.6 degree, Solan 1.8degree, Sundernagar 2. 4 de-gree, Dharamsala 6.2 degree,Una 6.4 degree and Nahan 7.4degree Celsius.NewDelhi: A freshwestern

disturbance led to a rise in theminimum temperature in

Jammu and Kashmir, Ra-jasthan and the national Cap-ital though there was no let-up in the intense cold else-where. The weatherman haswarned of rain or snow inJammu andKashmir.

26 trains delayed

The chill kept up its intens-ity in Punjab, Haryana, UttarPradesh and Delhi. Twenty-six trains were delayed andsix rescheduled due to fog.Flight operations though con-tinued uninterrupted.The onset of a western dis-

turbance took the minimumtemperature in the nationalCapital a notch above the sea-son’s average at 8.6 degreesCelsius. The maximum tem-perature upped by fournotches to settle at 24 degreesCelsius.Gulmarg, Pahalgam, Kup-

wara and many areas inhigher reaches of Kashmirwitnessed a fresh bout ofsnow though intense coldabated due to an overcast sky.The forecast of more pre-

cipitation in the next three

days has prompted authorit-ies to put in place a mechan-ism to respond quickly to anyexigency arising out of it.Leh town in Ladakh region

was the coldest place inJammu and Kashmir at minus13.7, while Srinagar had a lowofminus 2.3 degrees Celsius.Kargil town gauged a min-

imum of minus 10, Gulmarg10.5, Pahalgam minus 4.6,Kokernag minus 4.7, Kupwaratown2.8 andQazigund4.6 de-grees Celsius.Meanwhile, in a respite for

residents in Rajasthan, a“slight” increase was recor-ded in the minimum temper-ature across the state thoughAlwar continued to be in thegrip of chill at 1.4 degreeCelsius.The weatherman said the

minimum temperature roseby 1 to 3 degrees Celsius.Mount Abu had a low of 2

degrees Celsius, Banasthali2.7, Chhittorgarh 3.2, Dabok 4,Sriganganagar 4.3, Pilani 4.5,Jaipur 5, Bundi 5.5, Swai Mad-hopur 5.8, Kota 6.8 and Ajmer8.5 degree Celsius.-PTI

No let-up in the intense cold wave conditions in North

Fresh snowfall inHimachal areas

LIFE GOES ON:A shepherd carries a lamb as hewalks on a snow-coveredmountain ridge near Gund, about 80 kmnorth ofSrinagar on Sunday. PHOTO: NISSAR AHMAD

SHIMLA:When the entireHim-alayan region is reeling un-der a massive cold wave andsnowy conditions, about 50unlucky families in the re-mote Tangnu village of Chir-gaon Block of anteriorShimla district becamehomeless when a big fire inthe early hours gutted theirhouses on Sunday.Althoughno loss of life has

been reported, the villagerslost all their belongings andwooden houses. Some headof cattle have also died in theinferno. Short-circuitingfrom one of the houses is be-lieved tobe the reason for themassive fire.About 30 of the hundred-

odd homes in the villagewere completely burnt downand more than 200 peoplewere directly afected. Theyare being given shelter in aschoolbuildingnow.The firetenderswere stationedabout40 km from the village atRohru tehsil, said the oi-cials. Local residents andpeople from nearby villagesplayed a major role in savingother houses and someshops in the area.“The fire has also des-

troyed the local Mahasutemple and there is a bigproperty loss,” said BhagatChand, the village Pradhan.The fire tenders reachedafter two hours despite oursbeing a roadside village, hecomplained. The district ad-ministration has given an im-mediate relief of ₨40,000 tothe victim families. It hasalso provided blankets,stoves, gas cylinders and ne-cessary bedding to the af-fected families.

‘30 houses gutted,53 familiesrenderedhomeless’STAFF CORRESPONDENT

JAIPUR: Politics has started inRajasthan over the arrest offive persons, includingformer Congress MLA JugalKabra, in connection withthe alleged irregularities inrecruitment of teachers at JaiNarayan Vyas University inJodhpur during the previousCongress regime in 2012.Mr. Kabra, a former MLA

from Jodhpur, was the JNVUniversity's Syndicatemem-ber when the appointmentswere made allegedly byflouting the UniversityGrants Commission's normsto favour some influentialcandidates. The then Vice-Chancellor, B.S. Rajpurohit,is also among the accused ar-rested by the Anti-Corrup-tionBureau (ACB) onFriday.The Opposition Congress

has takenstrongexception tothe arrests and termed them“politically motivated”,while alleging that the ACBhad acted under pressurefromChiefMinister Vasund-

hara Raje. Congress leadersalleged that the BJP govern-ment was misusing the oi-cial machinery to settlepolitical scores.

‘False cases’

Senior Congress leaderand former Chief MinisterAshok Gehlot said Ms. Rajehad instructed the ACB of-ficers during her recent visitto Jodhpur to take actionagainst her political oppon-ents by pursuing false casespending against them. “Ms.Raje's instructions had be-come public. Similar arrestswere earlier made in a caserelating to Jodhpur Develop-ment Authority.”While Mr. Gehlot said Mr.

Kabra's arrest was part of a“political conspiracy”, Pra-desh Congress Committeepresident Sachin Pilot saidMs. Raje was misusing themandate given to the BJP tocreate an “atmosphere of ter-ror” by targeting the leadersof Opposition parties.In a strongly-worded reac-

tion, Leader of Opposition inthe State Assembly Ramesh-warDudi said if theACBwasallowed a free hand in prob-ing scams and scandals, notonly Ms. Raje would have tovacate her oice, but half ofher Council of Ministerswould also be in jail on seri-ous charges of corruption.He charged that Mr. Kabrahad been arrested to divertattention from the State'sbiggest-ever Rs.45,000-croremining scam.However, the ACB, which

has obtained four-day cus-tody of the five accused, hasindicated that it may arrestsome more persons in thecoming days, as there areabout 30 accused named inthe FIRs, including deans,heads of departments, syn-dicate members as well assome selected candidates.ACB Superintendent of

Police Ajay Pal Lamba saidthe arrests hadbeenmadeonthe basis of incriminatingevidence against all the ac-cused.

Politics over arrests inJodhpur recruitment caseMOHAMMED IQBAL

CUTTACK: The city police onSaturday successfully detec-ted a major cyber crime andarrested five persons, includ-ing two BSNL employees, inthis connection.The other three accused

are natives of West Bengaland were brought here ontransit remand after theywere apprehended by theCuttack police last week.City DCP Sanjiv Arora said

the accused hacked into thebank account of one ShaliniDas of Markat Nagar here byobtaining her internet bank-ing user name and password.“Subsequently using fakedocuments in the name ofShalini’s father Sanjiv Das,the accused managed to get aduplicate SIM card of Sha-lini’s mobile numberwith thehelp of two BSNL employeesof neighbouring Salepurcircle,”MrArora said.Using her banking details,

including the cloned SIMcard, the accusedmanaged totransfer more than ₨25 lakhfrom Shalini’s bank accountto five other bogus accountsfor more than 70 timesbetweenNovember 26 and 28last year. Sanjiv brought thesefraudulent transactions to thenotice of the police whenShalini’s phonewas blocked.Investigating into the case,

the city police arrestedAkhilesh Pandey, Satish Ya-dav and Arun Mishra fromWest Bengal. In this connec-tion, the police also arrestedBSNL employees -- DhrubaCharan Khatei and KrutibasKandi.

Two BSNLstafers arrestedCORRESPONDENT

NEW DELHI: A panel has re-commended reservationfor girl students in IITs toaddress the issue of slumpin the number of femalestudents entering thepres-tigious institutes.The committee is learnt

to have suggested creatingup to 20 per cent supernu-merary seats for girls outof the total number ofseats.

The recommendation ofthe committee will betaken up in the meeting ofthe joint admission board(JAB) for a final decision,whichwill decidewhetherthe reservation will comein efect from this year orfrom 2018.Concernedby the slump

in number of girl studentsentering IITs, the JAB hasset up a panel under the

chairmanship of professorTimothyGonsalves to findways to rectify the situ-ation in the institutes.The number of seats for

male candidates will notbe afected and this willhelp IITs achieve the 1 lakhtarget by 2020. Also, onlycandidates who havealready qualified in JEE—Advanced will be con-sidered. - PTI

Panel recommends quotafor girl students in IITs

BERHAMPUR: Ignorance ofthe law has put a youngman in a fix after he triedto secretly dispose of thebody of his girlfriendwhocommitted suicide at herhome in Berhampur aftermaking a video call to himshowing her suicidepreparations.

Half-burnt body

On Saturday, the policeseized the half-burntbody of the woman,identified as PramilaPradhan (29), from nearGandala under thePurushottampur policestation in Ganjam district.Her boyfriend, Pintu

Padhi, with the help of anautorickshaw driver, hadtransported the bodyfrom Berhampur tocremate it withoutinforming the police.Pintu was rounded up bythe police from the spotand interrogated.During interrogation,

Pintu said late on January13 night, he received avideo call on his mobilephone from Pramila. Inthe call, she informed himabout her plan to commitsuicide and had alsoshown how shewasmaking preparations.A panicked Pintu did

not call up the policeabout the video call andthe suicide attempt ofPramila.Pintu is not well

educated and earns hisliving bymarketing friedsnacks prepared by hisfamily. Pramila was aprofessional dancer andmember of a dance group.According to sources,

the twowere in a live-inrelationship and Pramilawas living at a rented

house in Berhampur.For some reason, their

relationship turned sourand Pramila had decidedto take the drastic step.Around 3 a.m., Pintu

had reached Pramila’srented house, where heallegedly found herhanging from a plasticrope.He had phoned up the

familymembers ofPramila living outside theState, but theywere not inposition to immediatelyreach Berhampur.He booked an

autorickshaw to secretlydispose of the body. Herbodywas taken to thecremation ground on thebanks of the Rushikulyariver near Gandala.While he was burning

the body, the police gotinformation, reached thespot and seized thecorpse.Till now Pintu has not

been arrested as evidencehints at ignorance andpanic.

Man detained for trying todispose ofwoman’s bodySTAFF REPORTER Accused claims the

woman informed

him about her plan

to commit suicide

and he panicked

MANDI: The bodies of two NIT-Hamirpur students, who had gonemissing on January 6, have beenbrought down to the SundernagarCivil Hospital from the ShikariDevi peak here, an oicial said onSunday. The bodies of NIT stu-dents Akshya Kumar, a resident ofSujanpurTihra, andNavneet Rana,a resident Barmana, were broughtto the hospital on Saturday even-ing, SDM (Sundernagar) RajeevKumar said. -PTI

Bodies of NITstudents handedover to families

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SOUTH

CHITTOOR: The cattle festivalnear Kuppam town endedin a tragedy on Sunday withtwo panicked bulls dyingafter a railway enginestruck them, and a dozenrevellers sufering injuriesin the ‘Pasuvula Panduga’or jallikattu.

Although the festivaldoes not strictly match theTamil Nadu version, itdraws a large crowd to theGudupalle mandalheadquarters near Kuppamtown.

A large group of revellersgathered at Gudupallealong with cattle for thebull race, including youthand farmers from neigh-bouring Tamil Nadu vil-lages like Natrampalle andPachur.

As per the game rules,the frenzied bulls, whichwere said to have been sub-jected to intoxication, werereleased into the open to be

tamed by participants. Theorganisers had three cat-egories of prizes for ‘con-trolling’ the animals withinthe stipulated time and setboundary lines.

The villagers of Nu-lukunta Kothapalle weredeclared to have won thefirst prize of ₨4,000.

A dozen youth were re-portedly injured, with

some who had visible injur-ies getting treatment at thelocal hospital, and thosewith bruises simply walk-ing away.

Panicked bulls

Around 4 p.m., two bullsthat were chased by theparticipants crossed thevillage boundary limits andraced to the nearby railway

track. Though people ranafter the animals to stopthem, the bulls were fatallyhit by a train engine whichwas crossing the Jolar-pettai-Bengaluru section.

A bull attacked an SUVused by a batch of Com-munity Police Oicers, in-juring one of the volunteerswho had come to help withthe arrangements.

A dozen youthsuffer injuries inthe cattle fest

2 bulls die in A.P. jallikattu

STAFF REPORTER

FEELING BULLISH: Bulls that took up the gauntlet thrown by revellers during ‘PasuvulaPanduga’ at Rangampet near Tirupati on Sunday. — PHOTO: K.V. POORNACHANDRA KUMAR

TUMAKURU: A 32-year-old men-tally challenged woman wasallegedly raped by an assist-ant sub-inspector of police(ASI) in a moving vehicle inTumakuru on Saturdaynight.

According to the police,the woman had picked aquarrel with her familymembers and left home at 7p.m. She was spotted around11 p.m. by Umesh, 57, attachedto the Tumakuru rural sta-tion. He was on his policemotorcycle along with aHome Guard.

When they noticed thewoman, Umesh reportedlyasked the Home Guard totake the motorcycle and con-tinue night rounds. He calledone of his contacts and askedhim to bring a car. After it ar-rived, Umesh asked the wo-man to get into the SUV,promising to drop her home.He allegedly raped her as thevehicle was being drivenaround the city by a driver.Around 3.30 a.m., he droppedher home. The victim’smother has filed a complaint.

ASI held oncharge of raping womanSTAFF REPORTER

VIJAYAWADA: The life of 26-year-old Raja Vemula,brother of Rohith Vemula,has changed after his broth-er’s untimely death. The postgraduate from PuducherryUniversity is now driving agoods autorickshawbetween Guntur and Tenalito earn livelihood and meetadditional expenses.

On a mission

“Many people ofered me ajob, including Delhi ChiefMinister Arvind Kejriwal.But if I take up the job frompoliticians, I will be forced totoe the line with them, whichmy brother hated. Now that Iam on a mission to seekjustice and also spearhead-ing a movement, I will try fora job later,” he said.

Mr. Raja said the need formoney increased as he andhis mother were involved inhectic travelling addressingrallies and meetings all overthe country on the unfortu-nate incident (of his broth-er’s death). “I am not findingit diicult to work as a driver.

I need to stay close to mymother and help her,” heclarified.

(Rohith, a Ph.D student atthe University of Hyderabadcommitted suicide on Janu-ary 17, 2016 after controver-sies over his Dalit activismon campus.)

Mr. Raja, who did M.Sc inApplied Geology, wanted tobecome a scientist and he iskeen on pursuing his dream.“My brother’s death came asa bolt from the blue. It willtake some time to regainsemblance.”

He said apart from Aam

Aadmi Party, one more polit-ical party came forward tohelp but he rejected the ofer.“No, I do not want to tell thename of the party,” he said.

“Before [being] Dalits, weare Indians. The governmentshould realise it. We wantequal treatment. We are notfighting for fame, money orpower,” he said.

‘Long-drawn struggle’

Mr. Raja said the strugglewas a long-drawn one and itwas something which couldnot be achieved in a giventime frame.

“Right now, we are ofer-ing support to AmbedkarStudents’ Association whichwill be established in all 13districts of Andhra Pradeshand it will empower Dalitsabout their rights andresponsibilities.”

J.R. SHRIDHARAN

A file picture of Raja Vemula

Raja Vemula, an aspiring scientist, turns auto driver Brother Rohith’sdeath changed his life, but he iskeen on chasing his dream

ONGOLE: Alluru village inPrakasam district camealive as scores of bulls ex-hibited their strength dur-ing a cart race organised inview of Makara Sankranti inthe land of Ongole bulls.

The revellers had a galatime, cheering the ‘amateurbulls’ brought by the proudfarmers for the ‘YadlabandiRaadhadi’ contest whichbrought to limelight the in-digenous culture of southcoastal Andhra.

Only those bulls, whichwere being engaged in farmoperations on a regularbasis, were allowed to pullthe two-wheeled carts.

The pair of bulls ownedby P. Nagamanasa fromRajupalem won the firstprize of ₨5,000, followed bythe ones owned by M.Ramamurthy of Padarsi.The second prize moneywas ₨4,000. The pair of bullsowned by P. Sivakumarfrom Rajupalem finishedthird to win a purse of₨3,000 and the ones ownedby Y. Subba Rao ofKothapatnam got ₨2,000.

Village Revenue OicerP. Polaiah and Festival Or-ganising Committee pres-ident U.M. Subba Rao gaveaway the prizes.

The purpose of the eventwas to rekindle interest innatural farming.

SPECIAL CORRESONDENT

In Prakasam district, it’sa ‘show of strength’

YADGIR: While jallikattu inTamil Nadu remains underheavy scrutiny, anotherprohibited tradition sur-faced in Yadgir in northKarnataka on Saturday.

As many devoteesgathered to watch the pro-cession of the deity Mail-aralingeshwar, at least fourlive sheep were thrownfrom the hills on to themoving palanquin as part ofthe local tradition. Threepersons were arrested inthis connection.

The tradition involves abelief among the shepherdcommunity that sacrificingone sheep from their flock

by hurling it from greatheights at the deity wouldprotect the entire flock. Itwas practised despite thepresence of over 400 policepersonnel as well as oi-cials of the district adminis-tration, which had bannedthe tradition nearly fouryears ago.

Apart from monitoringthe check-posts, the policehad, for the first time, de-ployed a drone camera inthe hilly area. While theAnimal Husbandry Depart-ment seized 850 sheep andgoats at various check-posts, some managed tosmuggle the animals duringthe procession to carry outthe outlawed tradition.

Sheep hurled from hillat Yadgir temple ritual RAVIKUMAR NARABOLI

KOZHIKODE: Writer-activistKamal C. Chavara has al-leged that he was attacked bya man claiming to be a SanghParivar member at Kun-namangalam here on Sunday.

The incident took place ata bar at Karanthur, where,the writer said, the attackerapproached him asking if hewas the same ‘Kamalsi,’ whohad burnt his book publiclyon Saturday.

When he said yes, the at-tacker is alleged to have ab-used him verbally and thenslapped and pushed him.The writer was admitted tothe Government GeneralHospital in Kozhikode.

Mr. Chavara told The

Hindu that the attackerclaimed that he worshippedHanuman every day and thathe was from Wayanad. “Heslapped me and pushed meseveral times on the chest.He seemed quite drunk. I in-formed the police and didnot leave the bar for twohours as the man hadthreatened to attack again if Ileft the place”, he said. The

attacker had expressed angerat the burning of a copy of hisnovel ‘SmashanangaludeNote Pusthakam’ here.

The Kunnamangalam po-lice, who took the attackerinto custody, described theincident as a drunken brawl.They had not received anycomplaint and no case wasregistered.

Repeated threats

On way to hospital, Mr.Chavara said he had been re-ceiving several threats fromSangh Parivar outfits ever

since he was arrested on asedition charge almost amonth ago. “I was a strongcritic of the CommunistParty a while ago. Whateveris happening is not just partyvendetta. I feel they havejoined hands with the SanghParivar,” he said.

On December 17, thewriter was arrested on asedition charge based on acomplaint filed in Kollamdistrict. The complaintclaimed that he insulted theNational Flag in a Facebookpost. He was later releasedbut the case is pending incourt. “I still do not knowwho filed that case. The po-lice initially claimed thatthey had suo motu registeredthe case, but later changedthe version. I am yet to get acopy of the FIR,” he said.

On Saturday, Mr. Chavaraburnt a copy of his book, aquote from which was thereason for the sedition case,at the Kidson Corner in thecity. The book was displayedfor ‘public homage’ before itwas burnt in protest against‘continuing police harass-ment’.

Kerala writer ‘attacked’ dayafter he set fire to his bookSTAFF REPORTER

Kamal C. Chavara burning acopy of his book in Kozhikode.— PHOTO: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

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KALIKAPUR (BANKURA): At leastfour persons died after an il-legal coal mine collapsed inthe Mejhia block of WestBengal’s Bankura district onThursday night. Several arereportedly missing.

According to local people,almost three acres of the il-legal coal mine in Kalikapurvillage, adjacent toJharkhand, collapsed.

Rescue work is yet to start,villagers at the desolate min-ing site told The Hindu, asthe mine is an illegal one.

Even as district police oi-cials claimed that “no suchincident occurred,” villagerssaid that on Thursday,“nearly 60 workers” were in-

side the mine when it col-lapsed. “Four bodies were re-covered from the spot, butthat does not indicate the ex-tent of tragedy. We thinknearly 50 people weretrapped and have died in theincident,” a resident ofKalikapur alleged.

Eerie calm

Local Trinamool Congress(TMC) MLA Swapan Bouri,however, confirmed that hehad been “informed” aboutthe incident and the death ofthe workers. Superintendentof Police of Bankura,Sukhendu Hira, howeversaid the police “found noth-ing at the spot.”

There was an eerie calm atKalikapur with villagers hes-

itant to talk to outsiders. OnSunday afternoon, when TheHindu visited the place,most of the locals refusedspeak about the accident andthose who spoke refused to

share their names fearing re-percussions from the coalmafia. They also said it wasnot possible to visit the mineas the mafia were not allow-ing journalists or villagersnear the Bashulithan mine.

One villager said that thecoal mafia pay “an occa-sional amount” to the villa-gers “to keep mum” aboutthe mining, which is mostlyillegal.

“Despite being well awarethat the mine has collapsed,villagers did not try to rescuethe workers trapped insidethe mine. The bodies wererecovered by the familymembers of some of theworkers from Birbhum,” alocal resident said. They alsosaid that the villagers get

paid by the coal mafia to stayaway from such mines.

“If anyone refuses to dothe coal mafia’s bidding theyare threatened with murder,”said a resident of the neigh-bouring village ofArdhogram.

According to local rightsactivists, there are nearly “50illegal coal mines” inKalikapur and adjoiningareas. “These mines are runby the mafia-police-Trin-amool Congress (TMC)nexus.

A similar incident tookplace about a year backwhere three to four peopledied. But no action wastaken,” said an activist, whospoke under the condition ofanonymity.

Rescue operations are yet to commence though almost 50 persons are reported missing

4 die in West Bengal mine collapseSOUMYADAS

Family members of a minerwho died in the tragedy.— PHOTO: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

PATNA: When the Patna dis-trict administration learnt ofthe boat capsize in the Gangaon Saturday evening, the oi-cials called up first RajendraSahni even before the Na-tional Disaster ResponseForce (NDRF) or, the SDRF.

In his early fifties, Mr.Sahni has been a diver of thedistrict administration forseveral years and has res-cued over 100 people fromdrowning till date. Hailingfrom the fishermen com-munity, he and his team notonly saved many lives butalso retrieved 16-17 bodiesfrom the river.

“As soon as I got the phonecall, I along with my teamrushed to the spot at San-dalpur diara and started therescue operation...it waspitch dark and the weatherbone chilling but we jumpedinto the river and rescuedfive or six people,” Mr. Sahnitold The Hindu.

Later, he and 12 membersof his team dived down to theriver bed to retrieve bodies.It was not easy to spot thebodies in the deep waters ofthe Ganga.

“I used the hook fisher-men use to catch fish to loc-ate the bodies…we fished outabout 16-17 bodies,” he said.

Asked how the tragedycould have happened, Mr.Sahni said: “The boat whichhas a capacity of 20-25people had a load of 60…itwas bound to capsize.Moreover, it was old.” He andhis team had lifted the boatfrom the river bed.

Later the teams of NDRFand SDRF joined the rescueoperation.

“I’ll keep saving people aslong as I’m alive…saving liveshas become my religion,” Mr.Sahni said.

“If he had not been therethe death toll would havebeen much higher. Even thebodies would not have beenretrieved so fast,” said BinitKumar, an eyewitness.

Babloo Sahni and Rohit

Sahni, members of Mr.Sahni’s team said “it washeart-rending to see the bod-ies of children stuck up in-side the boat.”

“Every year such festivalsare being organised in river-ine areas by the governmentbut no proper arrangementsare made for the safety of thepeople,” said Mr. Sahni.

Tanvir, Himanshu, Chottuand Ravi Kumar were localyouths who too jumped intothe river and saved somelives.

“Had the administrationmade even five per cent ofthe arrangements done forthe just-concluded PrakashParv, no life would have beenlost,” said Mr. Ravi Kumar.

AMARNATH TEWARY

EXTRAORDINARY CHARACTER: Rajendra Sahni has been a diver forthe district administration for several years. He has rescuedover 100 people from drowning till date. — PHOTO: RANJEET KUMAR

Saving lives has becomemy religion, says diver

Dream run

BREATHTAKING SIGHT: A bird’s eye view of the Bandra-Worli Sea Link during the Mumbai marathon on Sunday. — PHOTO: PTI

NEW DELHI: The price of petrolwas hiked by 42 paise a litreon Sunday night, the fourthincrease in six weeks. Theprice of diesel was raised by₨1.03 a litre, the second hikein a fortnight.

The increase in rates, ef-fective from midnight onSunday, excludes Statelevies. Hence the actual hikewill be higher, the oil com-panies announced.

After including VAT, thehike in Delhi comes to 53paise for petrol and ₨1.20 alitre for diesel.

Petrol in the national cap-ital will cost ₨71.13 a litre asagainst ₨70.60 currently.Similarly, a litre of diesel willbe priced at ₨59.02 as op-posed to ₨57.82 currently.

Indian Oil CorporationLtd., Bharat Petroleum Cor-poration Limited andHindustan Petroleum Cor-poration Limited revise rateson first and 16th of everymonth based on average in-ternational price in the pre-vious fortnight. — PTI

Petrol price upby 42 paise,diesel by ₨1.03 PATNA: The ruling party

Janata Dal (United)cancelled its all-partyMakar Sankranti feaston Sunday following theboat tragedy in which 24people lost their lives.

“Following the boatmishap, the JD(U) tookthe decision to cancel thelunch hosted for allpolitical parties on theoccasion of the MakarSankranti…it has nothingto do with any politicalparty raising objectionsto it,” said State JD(U)president BasisthaNarayan Singh.

Earlier, the decision toinvite the opposition BJP

to the lunch hadtriggered unease amongalliance partners,specifically the Congress.

“Earlier on November24 the Chief Minister hadcancelled the annualreport card releasefunction after the railaccident in Kanpur inwhich several peoplefrom Bihar were killed,”said a senior JD(U)leader Shyam Rajak.

Some State Congressleaders, preferringanonymity though, toldThe Hindu on Sundaythat “inviting BJP to thelunch on MakarSankranti was nothingbut a ploy to put pressureon us.”

JD(U) calls of event AMANATH TEWARY

KOLKATA: Six pilgrims, all eld-erly women, died during amad rush to board a vessel atKachuberia on their wayhome from the GangasagarMela, Sundarban AfairsMinister Manturam Pakhirasaid on Sunday.

More than a million de-votees gathered at the KapilMuni’s Ashram in Gangas-agar in the Sundarbans areaon Sunday.

The tragedy occurred asthey got impatient due to thelong queue at a jetty andtried to outdo one another inboarding the vessel. Some ofthem fell on the jetty andwere later taken to a health-care centre.

Expressing his condol-ences, Prime Minister Nar-endra Modi sanctioned exgratia payment of ₨2 lakh forthe next of kin of the de-ceased and ₨50,000 for thoseinjured.

Search by divers

A search has beenlaunched by naval divers tofind anybody who mighthave fallen into the riverduring the rush.

Mr. Pakhira told PTI thatthe six women died after

falling ill during thescramble.

A few people fell uncon-scious while several took illduring the incident, he said.All were taken to a nearbytemporary healthcare centrewhere the six died.

“These women were veryold. Most of them wereabove 75 and were veryweak. They died a naturaldeath. Doctors said theydied of heart attack,” Mr.Pakhira said. “The rush wasbecause there would be novessel for about eight hoursdue to low tide,” he said.

State Ministers SubrataMukherjee and Arup Biswasdenied there was anystampede.

After the initial reports,Prime Minister NarendraModi had tweeted:“Saddened by the loss oflives caused by a stampedein West Bengal. My thoughtsare with the families of thedeceased.”

(With PTI inputs)

Six pilgrims dieduring rush at jetty

The dead were allelderly women ontheir way home fromGangasagar Mela inthe Sundarbans


KOLKATA: West Bengal BJPvice-president JoyprakashMajumdar was remanded inpolice custody for three dayson Sunday, a day after he wasarrested by the BidhannagarCity Police on charges offraud and cheating.

Mr. Majumdar has termedthe charges “baseless andpart of a conspiracy to ma-lign him.”

The key complainant,Arup Ratan Roy, claimed thatthe complaints, which weremade about six months ago,are genuine. As the convenerof a platform, Chhatra-Sikshak Sangram Commit-tee, which filed a complaintagainst Mr Majumdar, Mr.Roy said the BJP leader hadcollected ₨7.20 lakh from ap-plicants of Teacher’s Eligibil-ity Test (TET) and School

Service Commission (SSC).Mr. Majumdar had allegedlytaken the money promising“legal action” against theState government for notprocessing TET or SSC’scandidate list.

‘Promises not kept’

“He told the students thathe would take the Govern-ment to the court and raised₨7.20 lakh in two instal-ments,” Mr. Roy said. He isalso alleged to have prom-ised the applicants jobs. Butneither the promise was keptnor the money was returned,Mr. Roy charged.

On Saturday, Mr. Majum-dar was interrogated foreight hours and eventuallytaken into custody. He wascharged under sections re-lated to criminal breach oftrust, cheating and criminalconspiracy.


West Bengal BJP leadersent to police custody

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EDITORIAL

CARTOONSCAPE

The boat disaster in the Ganga on MakarSankranti day that killed at least 24people is another reminder that safety inpublic transport remains a low priority

for governments. As with road accidents, mishapsin the inland waterways and lakes take a terrible tollof lives regularly, with no efective administrativeresponse. In the Ganga Diara tragedy near Patna, alarge number of people had apparently crammedthemselves into a small vessel for a free ride afterwitnessing a kite festival. The relief ofered to thekin of the dead and injured both by the Centre andthe Bihar government should not, however, ob-scure the fact that the loss of life was entirely theresult of oicial failures. This was obviously theresult of serious neglect of safety norms for whichaccountability must be fixed. It is essential that a ju-dicial commission be constituted to inquire into theincident, to determine whether the laws on trans-port using inland waterways are being implemen-ted and to issue directions for the future. The coun-try boat involved appears not to have used itsengine at the time of the accident, but the absenceof safety training for operators is painfully evident.

The Centre, which talks of a paradigm shift infreight and passenger transport using inland water-ways, should respond to the shameful national re-cord on boat safety by firmly implementing exist-ing laws and introducing new measures along withthe States. Just last year it expanded the NationalWaterways programme and notified severalstretches of rivers and canals for a new deal for in-land water transport. Under the amendments to thecolonial-era Inland Vessels Act made in 2007 —which is to be further modernised — it is incum-bent on the States to apply some provisions of theMotor Vehicles Act to accidents, compensationand insurance against third-party risks for poweredboats. Just as in the case of motor vehicles, registra-tion of inland vessels other than small personalnon-powered craft must be made mandatory. Thiswill help enforce construction standards, subsidyfor transport boats, passenger insurance and acci-dent compensation. In the latest tragedy, the prob-lem also appears to have been inadequate supply,which forced people to pack themselves into theavailable boats. If this is true, the Bihar governmentmust own full responsibility and prevent a recur-rence. The heart-rending spectacle of children andtheir kin perishing on what should have been a dayof celebration must stir the conscience of govern-ments whose duty it is to provide safe and adequatepublic transport, and one at which they fail badly.

Drowned by state failure

Few would have picked Gujarat to win theRanji Trophy when the domestic seasonbegan. It is not one of Indian cricket’s tradi-tional powerhouses, and underdog stories

seldom sustain themselves over the course of along, sapping tournament. When Parthiv Patel’sside made the final, the popular perception wasthat it had gone as far as it could go. For, the titleround, on paper, appeared the most unequal of con-tests: in one corner, Mumbai, a 41-time champion,and in the other, Gujarat, here for the first timesince 1951. But Gujarat has paid history little heedover the last few seasons; indeed, there has been aconcerted efort since Parthiv took over, to breakfrom the past. The results have followed. Gujaratwon its maiden national title, the Syed Mushtaq AliTrophy (Twenty20), in 2012-13 and regained it in2014-15. It then claimed its first domestic 50-overtitle, the Vijay Hazare Trophy, last season. Thesebreakthroughs helped fill the side with the beliefthat the Ranji Trophy, although significantly morediicult to win, was not an unrealistic ambition. It isthis conviction that proved the diference on atense final day as Gujarat pulled of the highestchase (313 for five) in a Ranji final, consigningMumbai to only its fifth runner-up finish.

Parthiv led by example right through, saving hisfinest for the tournament’s most important mo-ment. His 143 in the fourth innings against Mumbaiwas a remarkable exhibition of grace under fire. Hehas also played a significant role behind the scenesin Gujarat’s revolution, establishing an honest,transparent culture within the team. The respons-ibility for the final decision still rests with the man-agement, but everyone is encouraged to speak up.Several domestic sides across India are plagued bycricketers looking after their interests first andtherefore pulling in diferent directions. Gujarat, byall accounts, has been successful in addressing thisproblem. The team has also ensured that a talentedgeneration which played junior cricket togetherwas ofered all the support and patience it neededto make the transition to the next level. OpenerPriyank Panchal provided the batting spine, top-ping the Ranji table with 1310 runs, while fast-bowler Jasprit Bumrah and left-arm spinner AxarPatel changed the dynamic of the side, adding a cut-ting edge to the bowling. Gujarat was also not waryof looking outside the State for solutions. Experi-enced Uttar Pradesh left-armer R.P. Singh wassigned to both fill in when Bumrah was away on na-tional duty and mentor the seam-attack. As Parthivsaid after the final, Gujarat had a long-term planand the structure to implement it. This was a tri-umph born from a big dream, and kept alive by apainstaking attention to detail.

The Gujarat cricket model

One of the most banal tropes of Hollywoodblockbuster trailers is about one man pittedagainst an all-powerful enemy, and ulti-mately prevailing. The figure of the loneranger battling on with his back to the wall isa popular figure of American pop culture.How ironic, then, that this very figure seemsto have become the bane of the country’srighteous political establishment.

So one man, holed up in the embassy of atiny Latin American nation, a man who hasn’tseen much sunlight in four years, who is un-der round-the-clock surveillance, and is sub-ject to arbitrary denial of Internet access, hasmanaged to swing the presidential electionof the most powerful country in the world ina direction it ought not to have gone. Or so weare told by influential sections of the Westernpress.

From revolutionary to villain

The past week or so has seen a spate of art-icles on the so-called unravelling of JulianAssange, the editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks.They suggest that Hillary Clinton lost theU.S. presidential election because of him.Backing this logic is the allegation thatWikiLeaks served as a conduit for dissemin-ating documents obtained by hackers work-ing for Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The leaked emails and documents of theDemocratic National Committee (DNC)published by WikiLeaks were damagingenough to spark the resignation of top Demo-cratic Party oicials, including the DNCchair and the communications director.These leaks, the argument goes, ruined Ms.Clinton’s electoral prospects, thereby pavingthe way for Donald Trump’s triumph.

The Democrats have been saying sinceJuly 2016 that their servers were attacked byRussian hackers. Last week, the U.S. intelli-gence community (USIC) oicially con-firmed the allegation. Kremlin has dismissedthe USIC’s charges as “unfounded”. WhilePresident-elect Donald Trump seemed to ac-knowledge that Russia may have been in-volved in the cyber-attacks, he has main-tained that it had no impact on the elections.Mr. Assange has denied that he got the leaks

from Russia, and claims that his source wasnot a state party. In such a scenario, what onebelieves boils down to who one believes,which, in turn, depends on one’s political orideological allegiances — the quintessential“post-truth” situation.

However, the extraordinary spectacle oferstwhile liberal hero Assange and currentliberal nightmare Trump on the same side ofthe American political divide, with each ap-pearing to endorse the other’s claim that Rus-sia had nothing to do with the DNC leaks, hadone immediate outcome: it prompted theAmerican liberal elite to question Mr. As-sange’s motives, and cast him as the villainwho collaborated with Mr. Putin to interferein the U.S. elections and ensure a Trump vic-tory. For them, the USIC’s oicial statementsare proof of Mr. Assange’s culpability, attest-ing to his metamorphosis from idealistic cy-ber-revolutionary to opportunisticcharlatan.

It must, no doubt, be tempting, and ratherconvenient, for Democrat supporters to pinthe responsibility for Ms. Clinton’s defeat onanyone but the Democrats themselves. Butthere are several problems with thisnarrative.

Flaws in the ‘trial’

For starters, both the declassified report ofthe USIC and the “Russian dossier” leaked al-legedly by a private firm make claims of Mr.Putin’s involvement in the DNC hackswithout presenting supporting evidence.The excerpts from the latter, published bysome media outlets, were unverified quotesby anonymous spies. None of the claims hasbeen independently authenticated by a me-dia outlet. And no reason has been given whyreports of Western intelligence agenciesshould carry more credibility than the deni-als of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

Second, are Mr. Assange’s motives or cred-ibility the issue here? If we assume that theyare, then we cannot avoid subjecting his ac-cusers — the American press and intelli-gence agencies — to the same test.

In the 10 years of its existence, WikiLeakshas published more than 10 million classifieddocuments. Till date, there is not a single in-stance where its material has been found tobe false or inauthentic. On the other hand, sit-ting in judgment on Mr. Assange today arethe same media outlets and the same intelli-gence community that sold to the publicwhat is arguably the most egregious lie in thehistory of journalism — about weapons ofmass destruction in Iraq— which helped jus-tify a needless, destructive war that con-sumed tens of thousands of civilian lives, dis-membered a country, and hatched severalterrorist organisations.

Perhaps it is because the authenticity ofthe DNC leaks is beyond question, and theircontent raises diicult questions about theDemocratic Party establishment — ques-tions easier avoided -- that the response hasturned ad hominem, focussing on Mr. As-sange instead.

It may or may not be true that Mr. Assangeworked with Russia to publish the DNC leakswith the aim of ensuring a Clinton defeat. Letus assume that he did. Does it then constitutean act of villainy or moral trespass?

One could respond, as Mr. Assange has,with two arguments. First, that American in-terference in the democratic processes of

other countries is well documented. There-fore, it is not tenable to hold that other na-tions do not have the right to pay back in kind.

Second, Mr. Assange believes that it is hismoral responsibility to do whatever he can toprevent a Clinton victory. He has said manytimes that Ms. Clinton is a warmonger, thather victory would lead to greater Americanmilitary involvement outside its borders, andthereby impose greater misery on the peopleof the world.

Liberal commentators have dismissed hisstatements as his “Clinton obsession” and thedelusional ranting of a paranoid eccentric.And yet, a recent report in The Guardiancites U.S. Defence Department data to the ef-fect that in 2016 alone, the Obama adminis-tration dropped 26,171 bombs, or threebombs an hour. In this context, it is hardly im-moral for anyone to want to deploy his re-sources to steer America’s presidentialchoice toward a candidate who he thinksmight be less of a military interventionist.From this viewpoint, which Mr. Assange ap-pears to hold, undermining the Clinton cam-paign by sharing secret information that is ofpublic interest constitutes a perfectly legit-imate enterprise. Interestingly, Dean Baquet,the executive editor of The New York Timeshas acknowledged that the internal DNCemails published by WikiLeaks were news-worthy, and it is quite likely that mainstreampublications would have published them hadthey got hold of them first.

It was about new information

What Mr. Assange did — the act for whichhe is undergoing trial-by-media — was tosupply relevant but new information aboutan electoral candidate so that the Americanvoter could make an informed choice. Onecould argue that he did what the mainstreammedia was supposed to do but wasn’t doingenough of.

In the event, it was the American voterwho made the final choice, a choice that mayor may not have been influenced by the ma-terial published by Mr. Assange. At any rate,thanks to the leaks, it was a choice made withmore information than less. No one who be-lieves in the accountability of politicalparties should have a problem with that.Therefore, to blame Mr. Trump’s victory onMr. Assange or, for that matter, on Russia, notonly amounts to a refusal on the part of theDemocrats to take responsibility for the de-feat, it is also an insult to the American publicthat has delivered a mandate from the limitedchoices it was given.

If Mr. Assange must be criticised, it mustbe for not giving enough bang for the buck, asit were, for his whistle-blowers. He ought tobe doing more to ensure that his data trovesare systematically analysed and organised ina user-friendly format, with the significantbits sifted out from the routine ones. But thebulk of the data on WikiLeaks’ servers con-tinues to be inaccessible to the public even asthey remain in the public domain. Second, heis yet to match the scale of his U.S.-centricleaks with similar disclosures on its geopolit-ical rivals such as Russia or China.

However, to blame him for Ms. Clinton’sdefeat, or to brand him a Trump supporter, isto wilfully disregard his track record. Mr. As-sange’s politics has been clear from the dayhe founded WikiLeaks, and it hasn’t changedsince. He believes that the biggest threats todemocracy and freedom are the twin phe-nomena of mass surveillance for the power-less and secrecy for the powerful. He hasmade a career out of reversing this paradigm:transparency for the powerful and anonym-ity for the dissenting citizen. His personalmotive for publishing the DNC leaks,whatever it may be, is evidently not one thatis inconsistent with his stated mission ofmaking secrecy a losing proposition for gov-erning elites.

[email protected]

Julian Assange: Scapegoat or villain?To blame Donald Trump’s victory on Julian Assange or, for that matter, on Russia, not only amounts to arefusal by the Democrats to take responsibility for Hillary’s defeat but is also an insult to the U.S. electorate

If Assange must be criticised, it is

for not giving enough bang for the

buck for his whistle-blowers. He

must ensure that his data troves

are systematically organised

G. SAMPATH

Calendar controversy

Have those who defend or opposethe incident of the image ofMahatma Gandhi being replacedwith that of Narendra Modi in theKVIC calendar and diary doneanything to promote the use ofkhadi? Many leaders have doneprecious little to fulfil Gandhiji’sdreams. Incidents of farmer andweaver deaths, and violencetowards animals in the name oftradition are some few examples.The best way to pay real tribute tothe father of the nation would be toimplement his policies with heartand soul (“Modi mocked forimitating Gandhi’s pose”, Jan.14).

K. Manasa Saanvi,Hyderabad

The replacement of the image is inbad taste. The Mahatma and thecharkha (spinning wheel) areinseparable. He had made it aweapon against colonial rule andforeign goods. He brought in a newdimension of self-respect andself-suiciency with that simpletool. His simple and symbolic act iswhat boosted the image of khadi. Ifthe Prime Minister wants toemulate him, he can promoteindigenous goods and the spirit ofinclusive growth in his deeds.

Dr. D.V.G. Sankara Rao,Nellimarla, Vizianagaram, Andhra Pradesh

Bullfighting debate

The letters published for and

against the ban on jallikattu make,at best, interesting reading. Theanti-ban brigade vouches for thefact that this “rural sport”symbolises grit, determination, willpower and what have you, and evenswears by photographic evidence.The upholders of the ban arequestioning the valour involved andclaim that there is little diferencebetween taming and torture. Whileone party describes the whole afairas nothing but a friendly race, theopposite camp projects it as a goryfight aimed at maiming the haplessanimal. Whatever be the merits ofthe case, the stark reality is that theanimal has literally no “say” in thematter.

R. Rajaraman,Bengaluru

Jallikattu is a dangerous sportwhere bulls are kicked, punchedand dragged to the ground. Theyare deliberately disoriented withintoxicants and have tortureinflicted on them. Such acts are a flagrant violation ofthe Prevention of Cruelty toAnimals Act, 1960. Local partieswhich have been batting for thissport under the excuse of cultureand tradition have only been doingso with the ulterior motive ofcashing in on votes. If our ruralyouth wish to display their valourthey can always join the army ratherthan take part in a foolhardy sportsuch as jallikattu.

R. Sivakumar,Chennai

The contention that the bull is“embraced” by a tamer for 30seconds or 15 feet, whichever islonger and hence there is no crueltyinvolved, is a fallacious argument.The way a tamer “embraces” a bullin order to tame it, i.e. holding itstail and horns and clinging to itsbody, itself is an act of cruelty.Further who is going to monitor,and how, that the taming is only for30 seconds or 15 feet? What action isproposed if it is beyond that? Incase of untoward incidents tohumans or bulls in the process, whowould be held responsible?

B. Harish,Mangaluru

The fact is that most people who areagainst jallikattu do not seem tomind enjoying steak for dinner orhave beef as a protein source.Article 51A(g) of the Constitutionalso asks citizens to have“compassion for living creatures”. Iflove for animals is indubitable andsuch people respect the law somuch, why are they not voicingtheir opinion to close slaughterhouses? There are 37 pure cattle breeds inIndia. Unless we engage with thetraditional livestock keepers andsupport them, we will lose thesebreeds to commercial dairies andallow slaughterhouses to dominatethe show.The intricate connect can be seenbetween these events and farmingstud bulls. The ones that win injallikattu are most preferred by

farmers. The calves from such bullsare in demand as they will be usedas draught animals in transport andfarming.

Jayendra,Madurai

Budget before polls

Once a notification about anelection comes into force, it is theconvention that the courts do notinterfere and all the decisionsrelating to the conduct of theelection and what comes within theambit and definition of the modelcode of conduct rests with theElection Commission (“So what’sthe big deal about advancing theBudget, asks SC”, Jan.14). There isindeed a big deal in the advancingof the Union Budget given theannouncement to elections to fiveStates. It was a deliberate ploy,thought out well in advance. Whilethe model code of conduct cantechnically be confined to the Stateswhere elections are going to beheld, the efects of budgetaryconcessions are pan-Indian incharacter. Examples are waiver ofagriculture loans and enhancementof IT limits. It is a puerile argument that nothingwould be announced relating tothose States which are electionbound. Moreover the BJP, when inopposition, took the same stand aswhat the Opposition is demandingnow.

V.N. Gopal,Chennai

Food quality

BSF jawan Tej Bahadur Yadav’svideo clip is a wake-up call to thetop brass in all our defenceestablishments. The daily rationallowance of ₨95 is peanuts to saythe least. The Comptroller andAuditor General has also pulled upthe Indian Army over the dismalquality of food that was beingserved to troops. When viewedagainst this backdrop, Yadav hasdone nothing wrong and it is timefor the government to clean uparmy kitchens, both literally andfiguratively.

M. Somasekhar Prasad,Badvel, Andhra Pradesh

Zoo tales

To one who has become cynical anddisillusioned with the daily dose ofthe social and economic unrestwhich has become a part of ourdaily life, the article on the hyenacub, Ayush, came as a refreshingindication that things are not sodismal after all (‘Ground Zero’ –“The hyena has the last laugh”,Jan.14). There are still areas to behappy and optimistic about. Thevigil the zoo authorities kept toensure that Ayush bounced back isthe story of animal conservation atits best. Highlighting this unsungefort in animal conservation anddevoting a page to this topic showsthat The Hindu cares.

S. Rajaram,Chennai

LETTERS TO THE EDITORLetters emailed to [email protected] must carry the full postal address and the full name or the name with initials.

581

CMYK

ND-ND

PERSPECTIVE | 11THE HINDU MONDAY, JANUARY 16, 2017

NOIDA/DELHI

U.S. team urgesJohnson to allocatemore grain to India

The three-man Congressionalteam which visited India inDecember is understood to haveurged President Johnson toallocate to India another 1.7million tonnes of grain (inaddition to the 900,000 tonnesallocated on December 22). Thegroup wanted to make sure thatIndia would thus have adequatefood supplies not only during thecrucial period of the Indianelections but also until the end ofJune. The 900,000 tonnessanctioned in December wouldlast until the middle of March.

At the rate of 700,000 tonnes amonth, India would need another2.5 million tonnes for the periodfrom mid-March to the end ofJune. With the United Statesproviding 1.7 million tonnes ofthis, it was apparently theCongressional team’s hope thatthe balance of 800,000 tonneswould be provided or paid for byother rich countries.

India steadilyreplacing militaryequipment

The Chief of the Army Staf,Gen. P.P. Kumaramangalam,yesterday [January 14] asked theArmy personnel to look after theirequipment well. He said it was

heartening to note that most ofthe equipment came fromindigenous production.

There was no significantexpansion of the Army at presentand new equipment was steadilycoming in to replace the old out-of-date equipment which had tobe retained out of necessityduring 1962.

Addressing the Army Dayparade here [New Delhi], he saidthey could serve the nation byconserving food and equipmentwhich cost the nation money. TheGeneral assured those personnelwho came from drought-strickenareas that everything was beingdone to ensure that adequate foodwas available to their families,who lived there.

Satellite positioned in space

A new Early Bird-typecommunications satellite hasbeen stationed over the PacificOcean, and is expected to beready for commercial use in abouttwo weeks’ time.

Jubilant oicials of theCommunications SatelliteCorporation (Com-sat)announced late last night [January14] that the satellite namedIntelvsat-two had beensuccessfully positioned insynchronous equatorial orbit nearthe international dateline and “allon-board communicationssystems appear to be functioningproperly.”

(dated January 16, 1967)

FROM THE ARCHIVES

Aidan White, director of the Ethical Journalism Net-work, has been at the forefront for nearly three decadesin establishing the ground rules for handling sources.“Good journalism is only ever as good as our sources ofinformation,” he wrote. “Most of those sources are per-sonal, many are oicial, and some will be anonymouswhistle-blowers. Together they provide reporters withthe lifeblood of their trade — reliable, accurate andtruthful information.” My own yardstick to evaluate

sources is based on three key issues: accuracy, fairness and public interestin reporting.

The time, however, has come to go beyond conventional wisdom. Till re-cently, a reporter could neatly demarcate oicial information from the gov-ernment from other additional information. The rules about sources applyfor only the latter as the former is assumed to be a factual statement put outin the public domain by the state apparatus. But what happens if theprimary source, the government, puts out contradicting facts?

Confusion over editions

A number of readers asked us to clarify a contradiction that had crept inwith regard to the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) in Bengaluru — whether itwas the 14th or the 15th edition of the meet as given in the front-page story,“Note ban critics revere black money: PM”, and in the Editorial page mainarticle, “Revisiting a passage from India” (Jan. 9, 2017), respectively. In ourCorrections and Clarifications column onJan. 11, 2017, we said that it was the 15th PBD.From where, then, did the reporter get the in-formation that this was the 14th PBD? The of-ficial flyer issued by the Government of Indiasaid that it was the 14th edition and the re-porter reported it.

The website of the Ministry of External Af-fairs, which conducts the PBD, listed 14 earlier PBDs held between 2003 and2016. It also had the keynote address by External Afairs Minister SushmaSwaraj delivered on January 10, 2016 to mark the 14th edition. The an-nouncements in various Indian embassies across the world called the latestedition in Bengaluru the 15th PBD. The websites of the Indian embassies inItaly, Portugal and Senegal sought nomination for Pravasi Bharatiya Sam-man Awards that would be conferred during the 15th edition of the PBDconvention to be held on 7-9 January, 2017 in Bengaluru. What was lost inthis number debate was the fact that the Government of India decided tohave a diferent format for the PBD — the event would be held in diferentStates every two years and a smaller event would be held in Delhi every al-ternate year. Last year, despite earlier reports to the contrary, a PBD was in-deed held in Delhi, albeit on a much smaller scale, in which the British Em-ployment Minister, Priti Patel, was the chief guest.

Events that led to demonetisation

There were queries asking us to give the correct sequence of events thatled to the November 8 announcement of demonetisation. Readers wantedto know why the column “Fifty days later” (Jan 12, 2017) contradicted anearlier report, “Demonetisation is in national interest, govt. says in RajyaSabha” (November 16, 2016). The November report was about what PowerMinister Piyush Goyal, as a member of the treasury bench, spoke on thefloor of the House. He said that it was the Reserve Bank of India that gavethe proposal to the government and when the proposal came before theCabinet, it was approved.

The January column was the reconstruction of the sequence of eventsthat emerged from a few replies to RTIs, and the Parliamentary StandingCommittee on Finance. Three key facts in that column are: the RBI receiveda letter from the government on November 7, 2016 that advised the CentralBank to withdraw the legal tender of ₨500 and ₨1,000 notes in circulation;despite working with a depleted strength of just three out of 10 independentmembers due to vacancies, the RBI Board met the next day and gave its con-sent to convert more than 80 per cent of the cash into paper; and the RBIhad received no reference, call for views, or information from the govern-ment on demonetisation prior to November 7.

There is no contradiction in the newspaper. It reported Mr. Goyal’sspeech in Parliament, in which he clearly said that it was the RBI that runsthe monetary policy and it was the RBI’s board that took the decision to de-monetise ₨500 and ₨1,000 notes. The report was given prominence becausethe speech was made in the presence of Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.Journalists report parliamentary proceedings.

The twin acts of fact-checking and contextualising an issue follow policypronouncements and their rationale by the government. The durationbetween the government’s pronouncement and an informed critique of thesame depends partly on the levels of transparency of the state apparatusand partly on the journalists’ ability to access facts, figures, the sequence ofevents and the details of internal discussions within the government. I donot see journalistic lapses in these two cases. The state apparatus cannotabdicate its responsibility of providing the correct picture. One can under-stand the need for secrecy to take a colossal decision like demonetisation.But once the deed is done, the onus to explain both the rationale and themodus operandi of the decision lies with the government.

[email protected]

What happens ifthe primary source,the government,puts outcontradicting facts?

FROM THE READERS’ EDITOR

About 20km outside of Meerut, in thesleepy town of Sardhana, lies one of In-dia’s most spectacular churches, the Ba-silica of Our Lady of Graces. The Cath-olic church, completed in 1822, was builtby Begum Samru, a nautch girl born aMuslim who improbably rose to becomea feared military commander who ruledover a small principality for over 50years. The Begum is said to have ruled inan even-handed manner, distributingher largesse to Protestants, Catholics,Hindus, and Muslims alike, with a par-ticular interest in educational causes.

But nothing of the harmonious co-ex-istence of religions that once character-ised Sardhana is left, as the area has suc-cumbed to manufactured “ancienthatred” between Hindus and Muslims.Communal riots last occurred in Sard-hana in June 2004, and the 2013 com-munal riots in nearby Muzafarnagar,which claimed the lives of more than 60people (the majority of whom wereMuslim), looms large.

Politics in Upper Doab

Sardhana is part of the Upper Doabregion of Uttar Pradesh (U.P.), which in-cludes the districts of Baghpat, Buland-shahr, Gautam Budh Nagar, Ghaziabad,Hapur, Meerut, Muzafarnagar, Saharan-pur, and Shamli. Doab literally meanstwo rivers, and this region, nestledbetween the Yamuna and the Ganga, isas fertile agriculturally as it is politically,yielding leaders like Mayawati and anextraordinarily complex party dynamic.

Upper Doab has 44 assembly con-stituencies (ACs) out of a total of 403electable ACs in U.P. In the 2012 U.P. As-sembly election, the votes in this regionsplit among five parties: Mayawati’sBahujan Samaj Party (BSP) won 17 seats,the currently ruling Samajwadi Party(SP) won 10, the Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) won 9, Congress 5, and theRashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), a largely Jatparty led by Ajit Singh that was in alli-ance with Congress, won 3 seats.

Like the rest of U.P., Upper Doab wasswept up in the Modi wave in the 2014national election, with the BJP display-ing an extraordinary consolidation ofvotes. The BJP won every parliamentaryconstituency (PC) in the region, and itwon 42 out of the 44 AC segments (theother 2 went to Congress in Saharan-pur). There is some evidence that theBJP benefitted from religious polarisa-tion in the region in 2014. The BJP polledan average of 51 per cent in Upper Doaband 43 per cent across U.P. in 2014. Fur-thermore, BJP’s Sanjeev Kumar Balyanpolled over 56 per cent of the votes ineach AC segment in the PC of Muzaf-farnagar, winning each area handily. In2012, the BJP had won just one of theACs in Muzafarnagar, Sardhana.

Religious polarisation taps into anemotional response from the voter andcan be driven by hearsay and rumour. Ata tea stall in Purqazi, the shop ownertells us about an incident in whichMuslim men were bathing naked in thelocal canal, from which they were eve-teasing women. He personally led agroup of men to the nearby Muslim vil-lage to “address the situation”. He viewshis support for the BJP as a way of keep-ing the bade log (decision-makers) inBSP and SP, who only seek to appeaseMuslims, at bay. Of course, we are un-able to verify anything. The story isstrikingly similar to the catalyst for the2013 Muzafarnagar riots. These sorts ofclaims dot many of our conversations,and it soon becomes clear that itwouldn’t take much to start a seriousconflagration around here like in 2013.

Back in a village around Sardhana, agroup of young men from the Thakurcommunity is all praise for Chief Minis-ter Akhilesh Yadav. We are chatting nextto a newly built, smooth village road thatis credited to Mr. Yadav. But these youngmen are all voting for the BJP. One ofthem complains, “When four Muslimsdie, 15 lakhs get deposited in their ac-count. When Hindus die, no one evenasks about us.” This is obviously unsub-stantiated. As Britain and the U.S. arenow learning, identity politics can be anefective foil for appeals based on eco-nomic development. But the two types

of appeals are diferent. While voterscan hold politicians promising develop-ment accountable by demanding visibleevidence, identity politics can persist onrumour and polarisation alone.

Sincere and strategic voters

But the BJP certainly doesn’t seem aspopular here as it did in 2014. Just a fewminutes from the young Thakur men,we chance upon a group of men from theJatav community conversing next to aBSP oice. Most of them had supportedthe BJP in 2014, and speak positively ofMr. Yadav’s work, but will all vote for theBSP this time. They feel that the cross-caste coalition promoted by the BJP is asham, and say they’ve learned their les-sons. One of them tells us, “In U.P., votesare based on biradri, and people are ex-pected to vote for their biradri.” Al-though we did sense less enthusiasm forthe BSP as compared to elections past.

Political scientists make a distinctionbetween “sincere” and “strategic”voters. A sincere voter is one who has anemotional connection to a politicalparty, irrespective of the competitive-ness of the party. A voter who selects aparty purely based on a religious orcaste-based connection to the party is asincere one, although calling suchvoters “sincere” in this context mayseem like a bad joke.

Strategic voters are those who don’twant to waste their votes on candidateswho have no chance of winning, so theyvote for the preferred candidate amongthe top two competitive candidates. Forinstance, the BSP’s supposed coalitionof Dalits and upper caste Hindus in elec-tions past seems at least partially a func-tion of upper caste Hindus strategicallyvoting for BSP against SP. In a world in

which most people are strategic voters,one expects only two competitiveparties to be there in an AC and a region.The history of multiple parties and com-petitive candidates within an AC in Up-per Doab suggests a fair amount of iden-tity-based voting in most elections.

In the next village, we chat with aMuslim village elder and his associatesover a cup of tea and biscuits, wherethey lay out an explicitly strategic ra-tionale for voting. Given the religiouspolarisation here, the elder was clear:“The job of Muslims is to defeat the BJP.We will vote for whoever has a betterchance of winning.” An associate addedan implicit endorsement of the SP: “Forus, a BSP vote is only to defeat the BJP.They do no work.” A particular fear cen-ters around SP splitting between Mu-layam Singh Yadav and Akhilesh Yadav,as this would split sincere Muslimvoters and create complicated calcula-tions for strategic Muslim voters, espe-cially vis-a-vis the BSP (which is fieldinga large number of Muslim candidates).

Upper Doab displays the complex re-lationship between religious polarisa-tion and voting behavior, but there isstill some time until the voters go to thepolling booth. Ultimately, unlike manyother regions in U.P., we observe veryfew voters who remain uncertain abouttheir vote choice (or strategy). This sug-gests that the parties will fine-tune theirappeals according to the identity-basedarithmetic discussed in detail above,and the election here is likely to turn onthe party that plays the numbers theright way.

Neelanjan Sircar and Bhanu Joshi are affiliated with

the Centre for Policy Research (CPR) in Delhi. Ashish

Ranjan, also with CPR, contributed to this article.

The identity-based numbers game In U.P.’s Upper Doab, there is a complex relationship between religious polarisation and voting behaviour

Voters can hold politiciansaccountable by demandingevidence, but identity politicscan persist on rumour andpolarisation alone

RESOLUTE: “Few voters are uncertain about their vote choice in Upper Doab.” Farmers in Baghpat district. PHOTO: SHIV KUMAR PUSHPAKAR

NEELANJAN

SIRCAR

BHANU

JOSHI

Technology has permeated every nookand corner of our lives. It is even chan-ging the way people smoke, whether forthe better or worse is yet to be determ-ined. Electronic nicotine delivery sys-tems (ENDS), the most common proto-type of which are e-cigarettes, are thenew-age formula for people trying toquit smoking. However, they present asimultaneous promise and threat in theworld of tobacco control. Although theyare projected as ‘tobacco cessation’products by various sellers, includingtobacco giants themselves, the lack ofconcrete evidence in support of thisclaim coupled with the absence of anyregulatory approval for their use makethem a serious public health threat. Thisis especially the case when one con-siders the increasing import of e-cigar-ettes into the country. Market researchalso projects the compound annualgrowth rate of the Indian e-cigarette in-dustry at 63.38 per cent in the period2013-2018 (Research and Markets Re-port on E-cigarette Market in India2014-2018).

Danger without warning

As e-cigarettes contain nicotine andnot tobacco, they do not fall within theambit of the Cigarettes and Other To-bacco Products (Prohibition of Advert-isement and Regulation of Trade andCommerce, Production, Supply and Dis-tribution) Act, 2003 (COTPA), whichmandates stringent health warnings onthe packaging and advertisements of to-bacco products. Most e-commerce web-sites sell e-cigarettes as therapeuticproducts which enable people to quitsmoking. We went through 26 promin-ent and easily accessible e-commercewebsites that sell e-cigarettes to studywhether these products were sold with

appropriate health warnings. The res-ults of the survey are not heartening.

Of the websites, 50 per cent have nohealth warnings on the consumption ofe-cigarettes despite the fact that theseproducts contain nicotine. Eight addi-tional websites, which comprise 30 percent of the dataset, display warnings inan inaccessible manner. These websitescarry health warnings stating the addict-ive properties of nicotine and other illefects of e-cigarettes (including thewarning that e-cigarettes are not meantfor non-smokers) but do not displaythem as a part of the description of theproduct. Instead, these warnings are dis-played at the bottom of the web page orclubbed with the section on terms andconditions, unlikely to be noticed by aregular buyer. In one case, the healthwarning was incorrect, stating that“nicotine does not pose major health is-sues even at a higher volume of con-sumption.” Other dangers posed by e-ci-garettes, which do not feature in thehealth warnings, are the possibilities ofthe product exploding (incidents havebeen reported globally) and accidentalconsumption of the liquid inside the e-

cigarette, which leads to death.The current unregulated sale of e-ci-

garettes is dangerous for a country likeIndia where the number of smokers ison the decline (WHO Global Report,2015) as it increases the possibility of e-cigarettes becoming a gateway forsmoking by inducing nicotine addictionand perpetuating smoking by making itmore attractive, thereby encouragingpersons to become users of tobacco aswell as e-cigarettes. In the absence ofclearer evidence on the efect of e-cigar-ettes on tobacco cessation, it is imperat-ive that their sale be accompanied by ac-curate health warnings. This isespecially relevant in India, where datain the Global Adult Tobacco Survey2009-2010 suggests that tobacco controllaws, particularly the pictorial healthwarnings and advertisements, man-

dated under COTPA, have been highlyefective in increasing awareness of thehealth risks of tobacco (smoking as wellas non-smoking). More than 70 per centof persons surveyed noticed healthwarnings on cigarettes, while approxim-ately a quarter thought of quitting onseeing this warning. The efectivenessof such warnings in ultimately reducingtobacco consumption has also been con-firmed by the WHO.

The way forward

The Indian government has beenslow to respond. Since the first declara-tion of its intention to ban e-cigarettescontaining nicotine in 2014, only Maha-rashtra, Kerala, Karnataka and Punjabhave implemented the ban. The Stategovernments are adopting diferentroutes: Punjab has classified nicotine asa poison, while Maharashtra treats it asan unapproved drug. Lack of a uniformapproach in dealing with this publichealth problem will not only jeopardisethe health of the people, but will also en-able the sellers of such products slipthrough the holes. The unaccountabledelay in taking an action in this regard isa reflection of the apathy of the govern-ments towards a serious and potentialpublic health problem.

In this light, it is recommended thatfirst, the Indian government impose ap-propriate restrictions on the sale and ad-vertisement, online and otherwise, of e-cigarettes, including proper healthwarnings, in order to plug the existingregulatory vacuum. This should be donewith immediate efect, and simultan-eously the government should also com-mission independent scientific researchon the benefits and risks posed by theseproducts in the Indian context. On thebasis of this research, it may then makean informed decision regarding theirregulation as tobacco imitationproducts or as therapeutic products.

Shreya Garg, Research Fellow at the Vidhi Centre forLegal Policy.

In the absence of clear evidence on the efect of e-cigarettes on tobacco de-addiction, the sale of theseproducts must be accompanied by accurate health warnings

WARNING: “The current unregulated sale of e-cigarettes is dangerous for a countrylike India where the number of smokers is on the decline.” PHOTO: WIKIPEDIA

SHREYAGARG

Pictorial health warnings andadvertisements have beenhighly effective in increasingawareness of the health risksof tobacco

Smoking e-cigarettes is injurious to health

A.S.

PANNEERSELVAN

When the primary source is a problem

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“Amazon must tenderunconditional apology.They must withdraw allproducts insulting our na-tional flag immediately,”Ms. Swaraj declared on so-cial media elaborating thatAmazon’s employeeswould be denied visas if thedoormats bearing the In-dian flag were not with-drawn.

Subsequently, the MEAhad confirmed to TheHindu that the doormatshad been withdrawn. How-ever, other items like flip-

flops bearing religiousimageries continued todraw attention promptingthe MEA to act. “As a fol-low-up to the matter re-garding the sale ofdoormats with the Indianflag on Amazon, our am-bassador in Washingtonhas been instructed to con-vey to Amazon that whileproviding a platform forthird party vendors, theyshould respect Indian sens-itivities and sentiments,”MEA spokesperson VikasSwarup said.

Behave or face action,oicial tells Amazon

FROM PAGE ONE

The police crackdownadded to the tense situationin Bahrain which has wit-nessed sectarian unrest fol-lowing the hanging of a fewleading detainees. Sunday’sprotest is the first since In-dian workers faced starva-tion due to non-payment ofsalaries in Saudi Arabia andKuwait in July 2016, whichprompted External AfairsMinister Sushma Swaraj todeclare remedial measures.

Though reports of unrestamong Indian workers inBahrain have been circulat-

ing in various social mediafor sometime, Sunday’s vi-olence is a clear indicationof the seriousness of thesituation. The disturbancein Bahrain is significant asit came less than a weekafter India celebrated thePravasi Bharatiya Divashonouring the Indiansabroad.

Minister of State for Ex-ternal Afairs V.K. Singh’svisit to Bahrain coincidedwith the Pongal celebrationamong expat workers in theArab country.

Indian worker dies inBahrain crackdown

Mr. Pargat Singh and Mr.Sidhu’s wife, Dr. NavjotKaur Sidhu, joined the Con-gress earlier on November28 of last year but the ex-cricketer could not imme-diately follow suit becauseof certain professionalcommitments.

Meanwhile, DeputyChief Minister SukhbirSingh Badal of the Akali Dallashed out at Mr. Sidhu, ask-ing him to come clean andtell ‘’Punjabis’’ why he wastrying to fool them into vot-

ing for the Congress 20days before the Assemblyelections, after having beenmissing from Punjab forover seven months.

“Mr. Sidhu had earlierclaimed while leaving theBJP that the Akalis did notlet him enter Punjab..Nowplease tell the people whatstopped you from enteringPunjab? It’s obvious yourcommercial interests inMumbai were more im-portant to you than thepeople of Punjab,” he said.

Sidhu begins hisCongress innings

NEW DELHI: The radio is an in-evitable part of the ordinaryIndian’s life. From broadcast-ing crop updates for farmersto soothing jingles to tideover the morning blues andlive traic alerts for thehassled commuter, the radiohas been an inseparablefriend for many.

Now, if the Supreme Courthas its way, private FM radiostations will have an essen-tial role to play in the world’soldest democracy — dissem-ination of news. They willhave to exercise the right toinform with fairness andwithout prejudice and theright to counter and questionthe government’s version ofnews.

On Friday, a Bench ofChief Justice of India J.S.Khehar and Justice D.Y.Chandrachud picked upfrom a plethora of pendingpublic interest litigation pe-titions a 2013 one filed byCommon Cause for a judicialdeclaration to end the mono-

poly of the Prasar BharatiCorporation, which ownsand operates All India Radio,over news broadcasting andcurrent afairs programmes.

The Bench asked whythere should be a continuingprohibition on FM radio sta-tions and community radiosfrom airing their own newsand current afairs on a parwith private TV channelsand the print media.

Government control

The court asked why thegovernment wanted to con-trol news on radio, whichcovers almost the entire pop-ulation, even the ruralmasses, as per oicial estim-ates. The government’s pro-hibition, Common Cause ar-gued, was in clear violationof the Supreme Court’s land-mark verdict in 1995 in theMinistry of Information &Broadcasting vs Cricket As-sociation of Bengal. Theapex court then held that“airwaves are public prop-erty to be used to promotepublic good and expressing a

plurality of views, opinionsand ideas”.

“Policy Guidelines and ofthe Grant of PermissionAgreements framed by thegovernment which prohibitprivate FM radio stations andcommunity radio stationsfrom broadcasting their ownnews and current afairs pro-grammes are clearly violat-ive of the fundamental rightof freedom of speech and ex-pression as guaranteed un-der Article 19 (1) (a) of the

Constitution. It is submittedthat the right to freedom ofspeech and expression alsoincludes the right to inform-ation, which encompassesdiverse interpretations ofnews and current afairs,”civil rights advocatesPrashant Bhushan andKamini Jaiswal submittedbefore the Bench in thepresent case.

Gag orders

The court, in turn, direc-

ted the government to ex-plain, in four weeks, theseries of orders systematic-ally passed between 2008and 2013 to gag private radiofrom airing their own newsand current afairsbroadcasts.

On November 28, 2008,the Telecom Regulatory Au-thority of India recommen-ded that for private FM radiobroadcasting Phase III, FMbroadcasters “may only bepermitted to broadcast news,taking content from AIR,Doordarshan, authorised TVnews channels, United Newsof India, Press Trust of Indiaand any other authorisednews agency without anysubstantive change in thecontent”.

On July 25, 2011, a minorchange was made underPhase III policy guidelinesfor FM to allow broadcast ofFM radio news bulletins ofAIR without any addition ormodification.

During the third NationalCommunity Radio Sam-melan on February 10, 2013,

the Union Information andBroadcasting Ministry saidthat community radio sta-tions would not be allowedto broadcast news for sometime to come. As a stopgapmeasure, they could be per-mitted to re-transmit uned-ited AIR news.

The policy document onradio was probably the onlyone in which the governmentdid not stop at regulatorycompliance, but attemptedto prescribe what kinds ofprogramming should bebroadcast, Common Causesubmitted.

The NGO argued that noother democratic countryhad similar curbs.

“None of the USA’s 14,000-plus radio stations, the2,000-odd stations in Spainor the 1,000-plus stationseach in Italy, France, Greeceand Australia are barredfrom airing news and cul-tural afairs. In fact, manystations are solely newschannels, including special-ised ones for community ra-dio,” the petition argued.

KRISHNADAS RAJAGOPAL

‘NO NEWS’ IS BAD NEWS: Private FM stations are now not allowedto broadcast their own bulletins.— PHOTO: SATISH H.

Why can’t FM stations broadcast news, asks SC

NEW DELHI: Even as the Elec-tion Commission is yet totake a call on which of thewarring Samajwadi Partyfactions gets the ‘cycle’ sym-bol of the party, the stageseems set for an alliancebetween the Congress andAkhilesh Yadav in Uttar Pra-desh.

Sources say the announce-ment could happen any timearound January 17, the dateon which the filing of nomin-ations for the first phase ofpolls begins.

“We are waiting for theElection Commission’s de-cision, which should comeby the time the filing of nom-inations begins. We are in thefinal stages of stitching an al-liance with Akhilesh Yadavand the announcementcould come as early as the17th,” said a Congress leader,adding it may not matter

which way the EC rulinggoes.

A leader close to Mr. Yadavalso confirmed to The Hinduthat the alliance was almostdone and an announcementcould happen within days.

While there was no clarityon the seat-sharing arrange-ment to be put in place,sources in the Congress saidthe party was looking at up-

wards of 100 seats out of theState’s 403.

Speculation was also rifethat the Akhilesh factionwithin the SP would partwith more than 100 seats, butthe Congress and Ajit Singh’sRashtriya Lok Dal wouldhave to share these as per amutually shared formula inwhich the RLD would claimits share in the western dis-

tricts with a sizeable pres-ence of the Jat community.

Jat shift

The Jats, traditionally withthe RLD because of the leg-acy of Chaudhary CharanSingh, had voted for the BJPin large numbers in the 2014Lok Sabha polls.

“An alliance between theCongress and SP willstrengthen both but we don’tknow whether it can be awinnable combination,” saidJNU academic and Uttar Pra-desh observer BadriNarayan. Dr. Narayan saidthat an SP weakened by in-fighting was in the best in-terest of Mayawati’s BSP, asmore Muslims would veertowards it to stop a resurgentBJP from coming to power inthe State.

Meanwhile, MulayamSingh and brother ShivpalSingh announced their ownlist for Uttarakhand.

Cong., Akhilesh to reach dealSP faction will part with 100 seats to be shared by the party and the RLD

VIKAS PATHAK

Akhilesh Yadav

Bhamre said a Directorate ofIndian Army Veterans wasset up at Delhi Cantonmentand the process of establish-ing a veteran vertical in eacharea and sub-area level hasalready begun.

“Those who serve the na-tion deserve its gratitude,” heobserved.

He said the governmenthas implemented the onerank, one pension (OROP)scheme.

As on December 27, 2016,of the 20,72,457 ex-service-men eligible for OROP, thefirst instalment of ₨3,994.49crore has been disbursed to19,69,385 veterans, while thesecond instalment of₨2,290.72 crore has been dis-bursed to 5,54,849 veterans.

NEW DELHI: Subhash Bhamre,Minister of State for De-fence, has appealed to ex-servicemen to utilise “oicialforums” to seek redress oftheir grievances, even as heassured them that the gov-ernment was sensitive totheir concerns and “all pos-sible steps are being taken tomitigate their grievances”.

“Our Prime Minister andDefence Minister are sensit-ive towards all your ques-tions. We will try to addressyour grievances but unfortu-nately some elements aremaking wrong statementsregarding defence afairs andcreating a myth, which is notright,” Dr. Bhamre said at theinaugural session of the firstArmed Forces Veterans’ Dayon Saturday.

Last year the governmentdeclared January 14 Veter-ans’ Day.

Talking of the measuresbeing taken for veterans, Dr.

Veterans’ pleas willbe heard: BhamreSPECIAL CORRESPONDENT Says some elements

are making wrongstatements regardingdefence affairs andcreating a myth

BHUBANESWAR: A gas agencyowned by the brother ofUnion Petroleum MinisterDharmendra Pradhan wasamong the fuel outletssearched in Odisha on Sat-urday following allegationsof black-marketing, adultera-tion and short-changing con-sumers by selling less fuelthan what they had paid for.

The anti-corruption wingof the State Vigilance De-partment searched outlets inKoraput, Nawarangpur, Puri,Bhubaneswar, Berhampur,Balsore, Sambalpur, Bargarh,Angul and Cuttack, a state-ment said.

The gas agency owned byMr. Pradhan’s brother at Tal-cher in Angul district wasamong those searched.While Mr. Pradhan was notimmediately available forcomment, BJP State generalsecretary PrithvirajHarichandan alleged that themove was an example of mis-use of vigilance by the BJDgovernment.

The Vigilance oicerswere assisted by oicers ofthe Civil Supplies and theLegal Metrology depart-ments, the statement said.Certain irregularities weredetected in some places, thestatement said.

Stock anomalies

While some filling sta-tions showed a shortage orexcess stocks, some werefound to be delivering lessvolume of fuel to customers,the statement said, adding

that at a service station atPuri, calibration of theequipment was found de-fective. Forty gas cylinderswere found missing in a gasgodown. An inquiry foundthat the cylinders were soldto a man in Talcher withoutany document, the statementsaid.

During the course of thesurprise check, samples ofpetrol and diesel were col-lected and sealed, in thepresence of proprietors,managers or salesmen of thefilling stations, for test to de-tect adulteration.

The searches revealed thatmany filling stations did notpossess explosive licences,required under the ExplosiveAct and Rules. The ChiefController of Explosives isbeing moved to take actionagainst such stations, it said.Steps are also being taken totake action against default-ing filling stations and theirproprietors for violation ofthe provisions of the Essen-tial Commodities Act. —PTI

Samples were taken fromfuel stations across Odisha.—PHOTO: NAGARA GOPAL

Raid on gas agency ofOil Minister’s brother

CHANDIGARH: Former HaryanaChief Minister BhupinderSingh Hooda on Sunday saidthat Haryana Health Minis-ter Anil Vij’s remarks thatMahatma Gandhi’s imagedid not help Khadi andcaused currency devaluationreflected the “bankrupt stateof mind” of the leader andthe party.

“Those who cannot hon-our our freedom fighters,what else can be expectedfrom such people ... Ma-hatma Gandhi’s ideology isnot limited to India butacross the world. BJP leaderscan make attempts to re-move Gandhiji’s photo-graphs but Gandhi has al-ways lived in the soul ofIndia,” said Mr. Hooda.

Mr. Hooda said: “Khadiand Gandhi are synonymous.No one can either deny thisfact or separate Gandhi fromKhadi.”

BJP Minister Mr. Vij hadon Saturday said that it was

good that Gandhiji’s imagehas been replaced with thatof Prime Minister NarendraModi in the calendar and di-ary of Khadi and Village In-dustries Commission(KVIC) as Modi is a betterbrand. He also said that

Gandhiji’s image should beremoved gradually from thecurrency notes too.

Facing backlash, Mr Vij,later, withdrew his remarks,saying he didn’t wish to hurtanyone’s sentiments. “Mystatement was given in my

personal capacity. I am with-drawing it,” he tweeted.

Haryana Chief MinisterManohar Lal Khattar hadalso distanced himself fromMr. Vij’s statement, sayingthe party does not endorsehis statement.

Vij retracts remarks on Gandhiji SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

ON THE CALENDAR: Youth Congress activists stage a protest in Kolkata on Sunday against the useof Narendra Modi's photo in place of Mahatma Gandhi’s in a Khadi calendar. —PHOTO: PTI

CHANDIGARH: Former PunjabChief Minister Surjit SinghBarnala, who died on Sat-urday, was cremated at hisnative village Barnala withfull state honours on Sunday.

His son and ex-MLAGaganjit Singh, and grand-son Samarpratap Singh litthe pyre.

People from all walks oflife came to pay their last re-spects to the leader.

Barnala, who served aschief minister from 1985 to1987, died at the age of 91 afterhe was admitted to the Post-Graduate Institute of Med-ical Education and Research(PGIMER), Chandigarh.

President’s condolences

President Pranab Mukher-

jee condoled the demise ofBarnala. In a message to hiswife, Surjit Kaur Barnala, thePresident said, “I am sad to

learn about the passing awayof your husband, Surjit SinghBarnala, a colleague andfriend for long.”

Former Punjab CM crematedwith full state honoursSPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

Punjab Governor V.P. Singh Badnore paying last respects toformer CM Surjit Singh Barnala in Chandigarh. — PHOTO: PTI

NEW DELHI: In the wake of re-ported protests by employ-ees of the Reserve Bank of In-dia (RBI) over allegedgovernment interference,senior Congress leader andformer Finance Minister P.Chidambaram sought toknow whether a joint secret-ary was now running thecentral bank.

“Is a Joint Secretary run-ning RBI? Employees Unionprotests government inter-ference. Bravo!” Mr. Chidam-baram tweeted.

This happened after someRBI employees wrote to itsGovernor Urjit Patel aboutgovernment interference,particularly about the ap-pointment of an oicial tocoordinate currency

management.Mr. Chidambaram also re-

ferred to the statement of ex-RBI Governor Y.V. Reddythat he would have have ad-vised the governmentagainst demonetisation and

proceeded on sick leave if hishand were to be forced.

Against demonetisation

“Ex-RBI Governor Reddywould have advised againstdemonetisation. If over-ruled, he would haveresigned. Bravo!” the formerFinance Minister tweeted.He added that even the RSS-ailiated workers’ union, theBharatiya Mazdoor Singh,had expressed reservationsover demonetisation.

Mr. Chidambaramtweeted: “Adding to thevoices against demonetisa-tion are ex-RBI GovernorReddy and BMS. Welcome!BMS supported demonetisa-tion. Now it has discoveredcash shortages, job loss, re-trenchment, farmers’distress.”

Is a joint secretary runningRBI, asks Chidambaram SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

P. Chidambaram

LUCKNOW: The Lok Dal on Sundayoffered its symbol and nationalpresident’s post to SamajwadiParty patriarch Mulayam Singh incase the SP symbol ‘cycle’ wereto be frozen by the ElectionCommission. “I offer Lok Dal’ssymbol and national presidentpost to netaji,” Lok Dal presidentSunil Singh said. — PTI

Lok Dal ofer to Mulayam

“The BSF jawan hasspoken the absolute truth…I have an apprehension thatthe enquiry into his com-plaint will go against him …I do not wish that some-thing wrong should happenwith this fellow [Yadav],”Naik Bhagat said in hisvideo, speaking in Hindi.

Talking of similar condi-tions in the Army, NaikBhagat said the jawans onlyget a part of their entitledrations.

“We are being given onlyup to 40 per cent of themenu allotted to us. Don’tknow where the rest of therations goes. Not only I butevery jawan wants to ex-press these sentiments butdoes not know where tospeak, no one knows,” hesays.

Endorsing Lance NaikSingh’s statement on thesahayak system, NaikBhagat said: “More thanhalf of the Army is involved

only in walking dogs, par-ticularly those of the of-ficers…Jawans going onleave are not given a vehicleto drop them of from theunits. But a lieutenant, ma-jor or other senior oicersare not only given a car topick them up or drop thembut also a buddy to carrytheir luggage. Why is thisdiscrimination withjawans?” Nk Bhagatquestioned.

Army chief warns ofcrackdown

Bipin Rawat

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CHANDIGARH: With PunjabCongress president Am-arinder Singh saying he isready to contest againstChief Minister ParkashSingh Badal in the Lambi As-sembly constituency, the lat-ter says it is a “smart ploy” ofCongress vice-presidentRahul Gandhi to get rid ofCaptain (Retd) Singh.

Mr. Badal said here onSunday that opponents ofAkali Dal were trying tosettle their intra-party rival-ries by pushing their rivalsinto Akali strongholds.

“Earlier, we saw howArvind Kejriwal smartlymanoeuvred BhagwantMann and other major AAPleaders into Akali strong-holds.. Now Rahul Gandhiseems to have followed thatpattern with Capt. Singh,” hesaid.

Roll of the dice

“The move reminds of thelast dice throw by a losinggambler in which he stakes

even the honour of his housein order to reclaim his losses.But we all know what hap-pens to such desperate gam-

blers,” he said. Mr. Badal,however, said that as a goodhost, he would welcomeCapt. Singh with open arms

and would enjoy his pres-ence.

“But I hope he goes backwith his security deposit in-

tact,” he said. Capt. Singh had earlier

said that he was willing tofight the upcoming As-

sembly elections from Lambi— the constituency fromwhere Mr. Badal too is in theelectoral fray.

“I want to fight the ChiefMinister on his home turf ofLambi with an aim to defeatall the top Akali leaders whowere responsible for des-troying the State,” Capt.Singh told presspersons inAmritsar.

Request to high command

The Congress leader saidhe had requested the Con-gress high command to allowhim to fight the Assemblypolls from Lambi so that hecould free Punjab from thevicious and destructive ruleof the “Badals”.

“I will fight from bothLambi and Patiala, if permit-ted by the Congress highcommand,” he said.

Capt. Singh said that oncein power, his governmentwould open a probe into allAkali scams and punishevery person found guilty ofany criminal deed, especiallydrug trade.

Lambi will be Amarinder’s Waterloo: BadalSays Rahul has set a trap for the State Congress chief by letting him contest in the Chief Minister’s constituency


FACE OFF: Punjab Congress president Captain Amarinder Singh at an election campaign for party candidate Gurpreet SinghKangar from Rampur Phula, in Bathinda on Sunday. — PHOTO: PTI

NEW DELHI: Home Minister Ra-jnath Singh held a meetingon Sunday to assess the se-curity situation in poll-bound Manipur, hit by aneconomic blockade for morethan 70 days.

The Home Ministry hadearlier written a letter to theElection Commission of In-dia (ECI) regarding the “on-going tension and grave lawand order situation” and re-quested it to defer the elec-tion in the State in view ofshortage of security forces.

The EC rejected the Min-istry’s plea and announcedelection in the State in twophases on March 4 and 8.

Sunday’s security reviewmeeting at the residence ofMr. Singh was attended byFinance Minister Arun Jait-ley, Defence Minister Mano-har Parrikar, Army ChiefGeneral Bipin Rawat, HomeSecretary Rajiv Mehrishi, IBchief Rajiv Jain, Naga peacetalks interlocutor R.N. Raviand Joint Secretary Saty-endra Garg. Attorney Gen-

eral Mulkul Rohatgi was alsopresent.

The Home Ministry hadinformed the EC about theavailability of 87,000 Centralpolice forces for electionduty in all the five poll-bound States of Punjab, UttarPradesh, Goa, Uttarakhandand Manipur. Around 17,500Central forces are alreadydeployed in Manipur, ex-cluding the forces ear-marked for election.

The Centre had earlierpulled up the Congress-ledManipur government for notending the blockade of thenational highway by Nagagroups.

Mr. Rajnath Singh had senta letter to Chief MinisterOkram Ibobi Singh askinghim to “discharge the consti-tutional obligations with ut-most promptness” as “main-taining law and order andessential supplies is theState’s responsibility”.

Manipur is reeling underthe blockade called by theUnited Naga Council toprotest the creation of sevennew districts.

Rajnath reviewsManipur situation SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

LUCKNOW: The Left parties onSunday announced its list ofcandidates for 105 Assemblyseats in Uttar Pradesh.

Six Left parties, includingthe CPI and the CPI[M] havealready decided to contest140 of 403 seats in the As-sembly elections togetherand in today’s list, a max-imum of 58 candidates havebeen fielded by the CPI and18 by the CPM, a party re-lease issued here said.

The CPI-ML has put upcandidates on 17, All IndiaForward Bloc on seven andSUCI(C) on five seats, the re-lease said, adding the namesof 35 remaining candidateswill be announced soon.

As per the release, six

Communist parties haveformed an alliance against allthe communist and capitalistforces to contest the As-sembly polls in the State.

Slams Centre’s policies

It added that the anti-people policies of the BJPgovernment at the Centrehad an adverse impact on thepeople in Uttar Pradesh.

The government’s move ofdemonetisation leading tocash crunch has troubled thecommon man, and benefitedthe corporates.

Criticising the State gov-ernment, the release saidthat the policies adoptedhave afected farmers, la-bourers and the poor. —PTI

Left announces listof candidates in U.P.

IMPHAL: Union HRD MinisterPrakash Javadekar arrived inImphal on Sunday morningto prepare the list of BJP can-didates for the ensuing As-sembly polls scheduled forMarch.

BJP spokesperson N. Birentold The Hindu said that Mr.Javadekar will submit the listof candidates to party presid-ent Amit Shah and the finallist is expected by January20. Several ticket aspirantsrushed to the party oicewhere Mr. Javadekar helddiscussions with the Stateparty president, electionpanel convener ThounaojamChaoba and others.

The BJP leaders have theirtask cut out with an averageof five aspirants for each ofthe 60 constituencies. Thethreat of a revolt by those leftout is very real. While insome constituencies, ticketaspirants have publiclypledged to support the partycandidate, some aspirantssaid that if they are deniedtickets they would considerjoining other parties or con-test as Independents.

Javadekar inImphal forelection talksIBOYAIMA LAITHANGBAM

DEHRADUN: In the run-up tothe Uttarakhand Assemblyelections, dynastic politicswill be at the forefrontwith leaders from theCongress and the BJPseeking party ticket fortheir children to carryforward their legacy.

Chief Minister HarishRawat, BJP leader BhuvanChandra Khanduri, VijayBahuguna among othersare seeking ticket for theirfamily members for theFebruary 15 State Assemblypolls.

The leaders are trying toget ticket for their childreneven as Prime MinisterNarendra Modi hadexhorted people of thepoll-bound States to shundynastic politics and votefor development.

Interestingly, StateCongress chief KishoreUpadhyay, who has a keyrole in the distribution ofparty ticket, faces a big testas he himself has beenadvocating shunningdynastic politics. Mr.

Rawat wants to field histwo sons, Virendra andAnand, daughter Anupamaand his wife Renuka, in theelections.

According to Congresssources, Virendra andAnand will be trying theirluck from Assemblysegments in Kumaonregion while Anupama andher mother could contestfrom Haridwar district, aGarhwal division of theState.

Mr. Rawat himself mightcontest from twoAssembly seats. His otherrelatives, Karan Mehra,Rajya Sabha MP MahendraSingh Mehra are alsoaspiring for party ticket.

Apart from them, Mr.Rawat’s loyalists, includingSpeaker Govind SinghKunjwal, former MLA

from Sult Ranjit SinghRawat, Lalit Farsvaan fromKapkot, Harish Dhamifrom Dharchula andAlmonda’s Manoj Tiwariare vying for party ticket.

State Finance MinisterIndira Hridayesh andIrrigation Minister YashpalArya also want to fieldtheir sons in the elections.

The BJP, which claims itis against dynastic politics,is planning to field RituBhushan, daughter offormer Chief MinisterBhuvan ChandraKhanduri, fromKarnaprayag.

Vijay Bahugunaapparently has also askedticket for his son Saket orSourav to take on theelectoral battle fromSitarganj.

BJP’s Satpal Maharaj hasprojected himself fromChaubattakhal while hiswife and former ForestMinister Amrita Rawat hassought ticket from theRamnagar Assembly seat.— PTI

Campaign waits as leaderscanvass for children

Dynastic politics in full play in BJP,Congress as race for ticket hots up in Uttarakhand

NEW DELHI: The Election Com-mission has issued an orderbarring chief ministers, min-isters and political ap-pointees in the five poll-bound States from hearingappeals filed by people be-fore statutory bodies till theelection process was over astheir decisions could influ-ence voters.

In a communication sentto Chief Secretaries andChief Electoral oicers of Ut-

tar Pradesh, Uttarakhand,Manipur, Goa and Punjab,the Commission said that asper its information, chiefministers, ministers andpolitically appointed oice-bearers of statutory bodiescontinue to hear appeals

filed by persons under vari-ous laws prevailing in thefive States even after theModel Code of Conductcame into force on January 4.

It said the hearings bypoliticians “may have director indirect influence onvoters and may also disturbthe level-playing field” dur-ing the elections.

“All such hearings of stat-utory bodies should be de-ferred till the conclusion ofpoll in all constituencies inyour State. If any such hear-

ing is required to be held incompliance with the man-datory provisions of law/anycourt order, such hearing inlieu of chief minister/minis-ters or politically appointedoice-bearers of statutorybodies, should be held by aSecretary-level oicer nom-inated by the Chief Secret-ary,” the Commission hassaid.

The poll body has alsoasked the five States to sendtheir compliance report byTuesday.

Stay on hearing public appeals till pollsSPECIAL CORRESPONDENT EC order bars CMs,

ministers and politicalappointees fromhearing appeals in 5 poll-bound States

Day in the State capital, ur-ging her party workers tocome to the aid of the poor, illand the needy on the day.While she was in power, sheused the day to announcemajor welfare schemes.

Ballot lesson for BJP

And her return to powerwas a key aspect of her hour-long address here. By defeat-ing the BJP in U.P. and form-ing a “full majority” govern-ment, the BSP would delivera big blow to the NarendraModi government at theCentre, which would thennot dare to take “anti-people” and “immature” de-cisions such as demonetisa-tion, she said.

Ms. Mayawati said thatthough there were no public

LUCKNOW: Only the BahujanSamaj Party can stop theBharatiya Janata Party in Ut-tar Pradesh, its supremoMayawati asserted onSunday. Neither a unitedSamajwadi Party nor an SP-Congress alliance stand anychance and voting for eitherof these parties would helpthe BJP, she cautionedvoters.

Dismissing the prospectsof an SP-Congress allianceunder the leadership of ChiefMinister Akhilesh Yadav, Ms.Mayawati asked voters tochoose between the “taintedface” of the Yadav scion andthe “clean face” of her party,the BSP. Ms. Mayawati’sstatement comes at a timewhen the Congress and SP,along with the RLD, are closeto clinching an alliance in theState even as the SP is torn inan internal battle over itssymbol — cycle.

“People of the State needto decide whether they wantas CM a tainted face underwhom Muzafarnagar, Dadri,Mathura and Bulandshar in-cidents happened or theclean face of the BSP, whichwould check all communaland goonda elements,” theDalit leader said here, ad-dressing the media on her 61st

birthday. Mr. Yadav, however, has

many times publicly claimedthat an SP-Congress alliancewould fetch more than 300 ofthe 403 seats in U.P.

Like previous years, Ms.Mayawati celebrated herbirthday as a Jan KalyankariDiwas or People’s Welfare

protests or expression of an-ger by those afected by de-monetisation, the peoplewould teach the BJP a lessonthrough the ballot. The BJPshould prepare to face theconsequences, she said.

While she continued totarget the Modi governmentfor its failure to fulfil pollpromises and ushering inache din, Ms. Mayawati onceagain predicted that a split inthe “base vote” of the SP, theYadavs, would rule it out ofcontention and voting for it

would amount to helping theBJP. Though she termed theSP fight as being betweenAkhilesh Yadav and his uncleShivpal Yadav, she curiouslydid not mention MulayamSingh, even as the battlebetween him and his son forthe party ownership is nowin the public domain.

Many times in recentmonths, Ms. Mayawati hadalleged that the Yadav in-fighting was a ploy by Mr.Mulayam Singh to promotethe image of his son as a mar-tyr-hero and shed his anti-in-cumbency disadvantage bytransferring it to Mr. Shivpal.

She dismissed the SP as aparty belonging to “one fam-ily, one caste and one re-gion”.

Cautions U.P. people

The BSP chief also saidthat the Opposition wasmaking eforts to ensure thather party was restricted to itscore votebank, and cau-tioned the people of U.P. tonot fall for the conspiracy.

Questioning the timing ofthe BJP’s allegations againsther family members andtheir wealth, she asked whydid the BJP, which has beenin power for two-and-a-halfyears, not take any stepsearlier.

In a lighter moment, as herlong speech touched thehour mark, Ms. Mayawatilooked at the packed houseof journalists at the BSP’sMall Avenue oice here andsaid: “Just five-ten moreminutes. I know you havebeen listening for a longtime...but it’s me who is hav-ing to do the talking.”

Only BSP can stop BJP: MayawatiOMAR RASHID

BSP supremo Mayawati releases a book A Travelogue of myStruggle-ridden Life and BSP Movement on her 61st birthdayin Lucknow on Sunday. — PHOTO: PTI

Asks voters tochoose between the“tainted face” of theYadav scion and herparty’s “clean face”

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COLOMBO: The Tamil NationalAlliance (TNA) will not be apart of the ongoingConstitution-making processif more devolution is notconsidered, a senior partyleader has said.

“We have a mandate fromthe people for a federalConstitution with the mergerof North and East to resolvethe National question.Discussions are under waywith the government on howbest to come to an

agreement. We cannotaccept the 13th Amendmentas a comprehensive powersharing mechanism,” saidsenior TNA memberDharmalingam Siddharthan.

“If the Governmentabandoned the idea of findinga solution for the nationalquestion, we won’t be part ofthe Constitution-makingprocess and we would becompelled to leave it,” hewas quoted as saying by TheSunday Times. — PTI

‘TNA will quit process if no devolution’

KARACHI: China has handedover two ships to thePakistan Navy to safeguardthe strategic Gwadar portand trade routes under the$46 billion China-PakistanEconomic Corridor, a move

likely to raise alarm in India.China handed over the

two ships to the PakistanNavy on Saturday jointsecurity along the sea routeof the China-PakistanEconomic Corridor (CPEC),Dawn News reported.

The ships — named aftertwo rivers Hingol and Basolnear Gwadar — werereceived by Commander ofthe Pakistan Fleet ViceAdmiral Arifullah Hussaini.

— PTI

Pak. gets 2 ships for Gwadar security

LONDON: Members of theHouse of Lords are pushingfor the government to re-move international studentsfrom migration figures, in abid to prevent students fromremaining a political footballused by the government tohelp meet net migration tar-gets. The move could helphalt the decline in Indian stu-dents as a result of tighteninggovernment policy both onvisas and educational insti-tutions. It will also help toward of negative percep-tions about Britain’s open-ness to foreign students.

The move comes in theform of an amendment to thecontroversial Higher Educa-tion and Research Bill —currently going through theHouse of Lords.

According to an amend-ment proposed by cross-bencher and former diplo-mat Lord Hannay ofChiswick, and due to be dis-cussed in the next couple ofweeks at the “committee”stage of the bill, the govern-ment has a “duty to encour-age international students toattend higher education es-tablishments covered by thisAct.”

Cross-party support

The amendment has re-ceived cross-party support:with Conservative LordChris Patten, Liberal De-mcorat Baroness SusanGarden and Labour Baron-ess Janet Royall also puttingtheir name to it.

The amendment “shall en-sure that no student, eitherundergraduate or postgradu-ate, who has received an oferto study at such a higher edu-cation establishment shall betreated for public policy pur-poses as an economic mi-grant to the U.K., for the dur-ation of their studies at suchan establishment.”

The four peers have alsointroduced two otheramendments requiring the

government to not introducefurther immigration con-trols on foreign students andacademics, from when theAct is passed.

The issue of whether ornot students — who onlyreside in the U.K. temporar-ily — should be included inmigration figures has beenthe subject of heated debateboth in Parliament and in themedia.

“Now we have this Bill go-ing through which providesan opportunity not just tohave a debate but to havesome decisions — which iswhy we put these amend-ments forward,” Lord Han-nay told The Hindu. “Theyare not designed to roll backthe measures already put inplace but to prevent any ad-ditional ones,” he said.

An important signal

Removing students fromthe numbers would send a“hugely important signal.There is great concern thatthe government wants to re-duce the number of studentsto hit migration targets,” saidcross-bench peer Lord

Karan Bilimoria, who hasbeen one of the most vocalcritics of government im-migration policy in theLords.

While there is no cap onthe number of internationalstudents, there is concernthat toughening up of rulesconcerning student visaswould help the governmentmeet its stated goals of redu-cing immigration.

The debate happens in thecontext of a sharp decline inIndian students in the U.K.According to figures pub-lished by Higher EducationStatistics Agency earlier thisweek, the number of Indianstudents fell to 16,745 in theyear 2015-2016 from 29,900 in2011-2012. By contrastChinese student numbersrose from over 78,000 to over91,000.

A number of members of

the House of Lords have ex-pressed concern about thedirection of governmentpolicy on internationalstudents.

Modi’s remarks

“Our Prime Minister’s re-cent visit to India demon-strates that our desire totrade will receive a frosty re-ception if we maintain ourattitude on student visas. Toparaphrase India’s PM Modi,‘You want our trade but notour children’,” BaronessWarwick of Underclife toldpeers during the samedebate.

Lord Hannay says he is op-timistic about support for hisamendments in the House ofLords, and believes theystand a fair chance of makingit through the House of Com-mons — where the Bill willreturn following the thirdreading in the House ofLords.

“I hope it will help turn thepage on this very unhappyperiod in our history wherepeople thought we were avery closed and unwelcom-ing nation,” he added.

Amendment to bill proposes excluding students from the category of economic migrants to U.K.

Peers propose ‘student-friendly’ moveVIDYA RAM

ATTRACTING INDIAN STUDENTS: The move could help halt the decline in the number of Indianstudents as a result of tightening government policy. Picture shows representatives from U.K.universities at an educational fair in Hyderabad. — FILE PHOTO

The number of Indianstudents in U.K. fellto 16,745 in the year2015-2016 from29,900 in 2011-2012

LONDON: Prime Minister TheresaMay will use a major speech onBrexit next week to call onBritons to reject the acrimony oflast year’s referendum and unitearound the vision of a Britainmore open to the world, heroffice said on Sunday.

Ms. May intends to kick off theformal process of negotiating theterms of Britain’s exit from theEuropean Union (EU) by the endof March, but has given littleaway about what deal she will beseeking, frustrating someinvestors, businesses andlawmakers.

She is due to make a speech inLondon on Tuesday before anaudience including foreigndiplomats as well as Britain’s ownBrexit negotiating team and othersenior officials, Ms. May’sDowning Street office said in astatement. — Reuters

PM May to callfor national unityin major speech

LONDON: Muslim job-seekers inthe U.K. are disadvantaged, theBritish government hasacknowledged, after Muslimswere found to be facingsignificant pay gaps comparedwith those who identify as‘Christians’.

The Government EqualitiesOffice (GEO) has published itsresponse to last year’s hard-hitting report by the women andequalities select committee onemployment opportunities forMuslims, The Evening Standardreported.

The GEO accepted that a “lackof comprehensive data” ishindering progress in gettingmore Muslim people into highereducation, which in turn has animpact on their chances ofemployment. — PTI

‘Muslim job-seekers aredisadvantaged’

NEW YORK: U.S. President-electDonald Trump tore into civilrights legend John Lewis onSaturday for questioning thelegitimacy of the his WhiteHouse victory, intensifying afeud with the black congress-man days before the nationalholiday honouring MartinLuther King Jr.

Mr. Trump tweeted thatMr. Lewis (Democrat-Geor-gia) “should spend moretime on fixing and helpinghis district, which is in hor-rible shape and falling apart[not to mention crime infes-ted] rather than falsely com-plaining about the electionresults.” He added: “All talk,talk, talk — no action or res-ults. Sad!”

16-term congressman

Mr. Lewis, among the mostrevered leaders of the civilrights movement, sufered askull fracture during themarch in Selma, Alabama,more than a half-century agoand has devoted his life topromoting equal rights forAfrican-Americans.

Mr. Lewis, a 16-term con-gressman, said on Friday thathe would not attend Mr.Trump’s swearing-in cere-mony at the Capitol next Fri-day. It would mark the firsttime he had skipped an in-auguration since joiningCongress three decades ago.

“You know, I believe in for-giveness. I believe in tryingto work with people. It willbe hard. It’s going to be verydiicult. I don’t see this Pres-ident-elect as a legitimatePresident,” Mr. Lewis said inan interview with NBC’s“Meet the Press” set to airSunday.

“I think the Russians parti-cipated in helping this manget elected. And they helpeddestroy the candidacy of Hil-lary Clinton,” Mr. Lewis said.

Rep. Ted Lieu, (Democrat-California) said he too wouldskip Mr. Trump’sinauguration.

The Democratic Party ofGeorgia called on Mr. Trumpto apologise to Mr. Lewis and

the people of his district. On Twitter, Mr. Lewis

earned support from Demo-cratic colleagues — and afew Republicans. “Ahead of#MLKDay2017, let us re-member that many havetried to silence @repjohn-lewis over the years. All havefailed,” said House Demo-cratic minority leader NancyPelosi. “Rep. John Lewis wasbeaten, bloodied & arrested40+ times marching for civilrights,” wrote Senator ChrisCoons of Delaware. “He is atrue American hero and rep-resents the best of us.”

Without directly denoun-cing Mr. Trump’s comments,Republican Senator BenSasse of Nebraska linked to aphoto of Mr. Lewis at a civilrights march, with the mes-sage, “John Lewis and his

‘talk’ have changed theworld.”

On Saturday, some 2,000demonstrators, the majorityof them black, marchedalong the National Mall —the grassy esplanade that ishome to major museums andmonuments — to the parknear the Martin Luther KingMemorial. — AP, AFP

BATTLE FOR EQUALITY: John Lewis (far right) with Martin LutherKing, Jr. leading a march in 1965 from Selma to Montgomeryto protest restrictive voting rights. — PHOTOS: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS, NYT

Protests following Trump’sTwitter tirade against icon

DUBAI: Bahrain on Sunday ex-ecuted three Shia Muslimmen convicted of killing threepolicemen in a 2014 bomb at-tack, the first such executionin over two decades, drawingcondemnation from foreignoicials.

Activists in Bahrain reactedwith rage to the move, callingit a “black day” for the GulfArab kingdom and postingimages of protesters clashingwith police on social media.

The executions came lessthan a week after the coun-try’s highest court confirmedthe punishment against Ab-bas al-Samea (27), SamiMushaima (42) and Ali al-Singace (21), found guilty ofkilling one Emirati and twoBahraini police oicers.

Such executions are ex-tremely rare in the small GulfArab island. The last similarcase involving a Shia Bahrainioccurred in 1996. — Reuters

Bahrain executes3 Shias, drawscondemnation

CA MAU (VIETNAM): Viet Congveteran Vo Ban Tam remem-bers the first time he crossedpaths with John Kerry on thebanks on the Bay Hap river, aday that ended in bloodshed.

Almost a half-centurylater, the now 70-year-oldMekong Delta shrimp farmerlocked eyes with the U.S.Secretary of State on Sat-urday and they warmlygrasped hands in mutual re-spect. Mr. Kerry returned tothe Vietnam waterway at theend of a visit to the Com-munist nation, less than aweek before he was to leaveoice, searching for the spotwhere he won a Silver Starfor bravery as a young U.S.Navy lieutenant.

Guerilla warfare

On February 28, 1969, asthe skipper of Swift BoatPCF-94, Mr. Kerry waspatrolling when Vo BanTam’s unit launched anambush.

The plan, the Vietnamese

guerilla told his former ad-versary on Saturday, was touse rifle and grenade fire tolure the heavily-armedAmerican craft into range ofa shoulder-held rocketlauncher.

This tactic had paid of for

the Viet Cong in the past buton this day Mr. Kerry made adramatic decision, deliber-ately beaching his boat thenstorming ashore to pursuethe operator.

Grabbing an M-16 rifle thethen 26-year-old chased

down the guerilla and shothim dead, saving his crewfrom a counter-attack.

Vo Ban Tam rememberedthe dead man, 24-year-old BaThanh, as a respected mem-ber of the Viet Cong’s mainforce in Ca Mau province,trained to use the prizedlauncher.

Mr. Kerry had never be-fore learned the name of theman he shot. During his un-successful 2004 WhiteHouse campaign, opponentstarnished his war record byclaiming he killed a teenager.

But U.S. oicials preparingfor Mr. Kerry’s visit trackeddown Vo Ban Tam and his ac-count confirmed Mr. Kerry’smemory that his slain ad-versary was an adult.

Mr. Kerry returned fromVietnam later in 1969. Des-pite holding Silver andBronze stars for valour andthree Purple Hearts for be-ing wounded in action, hebecame a prominent anti-war activist. — AFP

FACE-TO-FACE: John Kerry hakes hands with Vo Ban Tam, amember of the former Viet Cong who took part in the attackon Kerry’s Swift Boat on February 28, 1969. — PHOTO: AFP

Kerry visits his ex-Vietnam war foe

PARIS: Diplomats from 70countries gathered in Paris onSunday to try to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace eforts amidfears of a new escalation ifDonald Trump implements apledge to recognise Jerusalemas Israel’s capital.

Neither Israel nor thePalestinians are representedat the conference, which Is-raeli Prime Minister Ben-jamin Netanyahu has dis-missed as “rigged” against theJewish state.

‘Moving Israeli embassy’

Opening the meeting,French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said the interna-tional community wanted to“forcefully reiterate that thetwo-state solution is the onlysolution possible” to theseven-decade-old conflict.

In a TV interview later, Mr.Ayrault warned that movingthe U.S. embassy from Tel

Aviv to Jerusalem would have“extremely serious con-sequences” and predicted Mr.Trump would find it im-possible to do so.

“When you are President ofthe United States, you cannottake such a stubborn and such

a unilateral view on this issue.You have to try to create theconditions for peace,” he toldFrance 3 TV.

Both Mr. Netanyahu andPalestinian President Mah-mud Abbas have been invitedto meet with President Fran-cois Hollande to discuss theconclusions of the Paris talks.Mr. Abbas, who has backedthe meeting, is expected totravel to Paris in the comingweeks but Mr. Netanyahu re-jected the ofer, French diplo-mats said.

Three French Jewishgroups called for a protest onSunday outside the Israeliembassy in Paris to denouncethe conference.

The meeting is mainly sym-bolic, but comes at a crucialjuncture for West Asia, fivedays before Mr. Trump, whohas vowed unstinting supportfor Israel, is sworn in as U.S.President. — AFP

Paris hosts symbolic peacemeet amid protests from Israel

French President FrancoisHollande at the meet in Parison Sunday. — PHOTO: REUTERS

GALLE: The historic Dutch fortin Galle last week hosted ac-claimed writers, artistes andthinkers at one of the most-anticipated literary festivalsin the region.

The Galle Literary Festival2017, held this year fromJanuary 11 to 15, has since itslaunch in 2007 drawn a widerange of personalities to thecountry’s southern shores.

“We live as adults, but readas children,” observed SunilaGalappatti, author of A LongWatch, the memoir of Com-modore Ajith Boyagoda, thehighest-ranking military of-ficer held captive by theLTTE. “We want exact posi-tions as we read… and wearen’t ready to allow for thehuman spectrum that we en-counter in our real lives,” shesaid, on her attempt to bringout her protagonist’s voicewith its ambiguities intact.

Ms. Galappatti, after grap-pling with the complexity ofthe narrative, decided to be astoryteller and not a chron-icler of the conflict. “I real-ised that I was a subjectivere-teller of a subjective

story,” she said. She made aconscious efort to retain theCommodore’s “understated”voice that she heard in his ac-count over the six years sheworked on the book.

Earlier, a screening ofshort films by young SriLankans explored the sym-bolism of the armed forces inSinhala society, the searchfor the disappeared in theNorth, religious intoleranceand deprivation.

From the final years of theisland’s long war to the aspir-ations for healing after itended in 2009, the festivalhas seen a lot.

“There has been a change

for me after the governmentchanged [in 2015], in the wayI programme,” said ShyamSelvadurai, acclaimed authorand festival curator.

Under the previous re-gime, he “felt hell-bent andalso conscience-driven” toinclude sessions on the civilwar, trauma and reconcili-ation, he says. “I would actu-ally go out and create thesesessions, soliciting parti-cipants. Now I no longer feelthe active need to do so.”

He compared it to being awriter who is gay. When Mr.Selvadurai began his ownwriting, he felt the need toraise it in his books and be“out” in his sexual identity.

But now, given the “hugechanges” in acceptance, hefeels less inclined to do so inquite the same way.

For the moment, he seesno great shift in literaturesince the war ended. “This isbecause books and ideas takea long time to gestate. Thewriter needs the distance oftime to metaphor-ise an ex-perience. Eight years isn’t alot; and a lot has alsohappened in the eight years[since the war ended].”

Living as adults, reading as children at Galle Literary FestMEERA SRINIVASAN

GALLE: The state of free speech isfraught in India, with a massivemisuse of laws producing a“chilling effect” on the media, N.Ram, Chairman and Publisher ofThe Hindu group of publications,said here on Friday.

Speaking on ‘free speechdeficits’ at the Galle LiteraryFestival, he said that the countryhad shifted from being in anenviable position earlier in regardto freedom of expression to asituation where journalists andintellectuals felt demoralised andisolated. Mr. Ram said that theilliberal and unreasonableinterpretation of constitutionalprovisions and laws, the presenceof some laws in the statute books— notably, criminal defamation —and the visible increase inintolerance in society and polity,accompanied by the rise ofmajoritarian communalism andultra-nationalism, were reasons forthe fraught state of free speech.

Speaking on Sri Lanka, he saidthat though the country had a“chequered history” of freespeech, a sense of relaxation and

euphoria were apparent after theregime change in January 2015.

Drawing on a recent meetingwith the Leader of the OppositionR. Sampanthan, Mr. Ram said thesenior Tamil leader pointed to a“significant change” in thesituation, where the media arefreer now than in the past.

Commenting on Tamil Nadu —a State that is “notorious for itsmisuse of criminal defamation” —Mr. Ram said that often, the“process was the punishment”,

which deterred the media fromprobing cases of abuse of publicoffice for private gain. “It is aparadox that it is one of the mostprogressive and well-administeredStates in the country, which has ascientific system of politicalcorruption.”

The law of criminal defamation,he observed, is the “single biggestobstacle to free speech in India”, inaddition to what he termed as“malignant” aspects of the IndianPenal Code, such as sedition.

‘Visible rise in intolerance in India’

N. Ram, Chairman, Kasturi and Sons Limited, at the GalleLiterary Festival on January 13. — PHOTO: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT


Sunila Galappatti, author ofA Long Watch.

WASHINGTON: Donald Trump’sspokeswoman and the Kremlindenied on Sunday a report thathis first foreign trip after takingoffice would be a summit withRussian leader Vladimir Putin.

The Sunday Times in London,citing unnamed British officials itsaid had been informed of theplan, said Mr. Trump would seekto “reset” relations with theKremlin, naming Iceland the likelyvenue.

But Trump spokeswomanHope Hicks said the report was“completely false”.

Kremlin spokesman DmitryPeskov said on Sunday that “forthe moment there has been nodiscussion about a meeting”,according to the Russian newsagency RIA Novosti. Iceland saidit was not aware of such a planbut indicated willingness to hosta summit to help improverelations between Washingtonand Moscow. —AFP

Team Trump,Kremlin denyreports of meet

Congressman John Lewis

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Amazon India to create over 7,500 jobs

Amazon.in will create more than 7,500temporary jobs, mostly in logistics, for itsupcoming January 20-22 sale. — PTI

Hindustan Coca-Cola to invest ₨1,000 cr.

Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages, the bottlingarm of Coca-Cola in India, is setting up twogreenfield units at a cost of ₨1,000 crore. — PTI

Auto exports decline by 5% in 2016

India’s automobile exports fell 5% in 2016dragged down by lower sales of two and three-wheelers in various markets. — PTI

MUMBAI: In a bid to safeguardthe interests of the publicshareholders, the Securitiesand Exchange Board of India(SEBI) has tightened thenorms for merger of an unlis-ted company with a listedentity.

The board of the capitalmarket regulator, which metat Jaipur, decided that theholding of public sharehold-ers post the merger cannotbe less than 25%. Further, thewatchdog has stipulated asimilar threshold for institu-tional shareholders of theunlisted entity as well,post-merger.

“The objective is to havewider public shareholdingand to prevent very large un-listed company to get listedby merging with a very smallcompany,” according to aSEBI statement.

The regulator has also de-cided that an unlisted com-pany can be merged with alisted company only if thelatter is listed on a stock ex-change having nationwidetrading terminals.

To ensure larger say forthe public shareholders, the

regulator has also made theire-voting mandatory in caseswherein the stake of suchshareholders reduces bymore than 5% in the mergedentity.

“The regulations attemptto ensure the rights of thepublic shareholders are pro-tected and also get themgreater look-in on mergerswith unlisted subsidiaries,”said Sanjeev Krishan, Part-ner and Leader – Deals, PwCIndia.

Sumit Agrawal, Partner,

Suvan Law Advisors and aformer SEBI law oicer, saidthat the regulator was con-cerned because there havebeen instances where theroute of merger was used toget an indirect listing for anunlisted company.

“There was another cat-egory of misuse where underan arrangement; securitieswere being issued to pro-moter related persons only.There was an issue on elec-tronic voting requirement aswell. This amendment

would also take care of re-cent challenges in highcourts,” Mr. Agrawal said. Atleast two high courts hadfrowned upon SEBI’s juris-diction over scheme of ar-rangements in the recentpast.

Broker fees

Among other issues, theregulator also reduced thebroker fees by 25% from ₨20per crore of turnover to ₨15crore. This will result in re-duction of overall cost oftransactions and will benefitthe investors and promotethe development of securit-ies market, according to thestatement.

In order to help mutualfund investors take better in-formed decisions, SEBI hasdecided that fund houseswill have to include in theiradvertisements, the per-formance of the scheme interms of CAGR for the pastone year, three years and fiveyears and since inception.

Currently, the fund houseonly publishes the scheme’sreturns for as many twelvemonth periods as possiblefor the past three years.

The regulator has also al-

lowed mutual funds to investin hybrid instruments likeREITs and InvITs but haslaid down certain criteria onthe cap for such investments.

A mutual fund schemecannot invest more than 5%of its net asset value (NAV)in units of a single REITs/In-vITs issuer. Further, theoverall exposure of a schemein REITs/InvITs has beencapped at 10%.

However, such limits willnot be applicable for invest-ments in case of index fundor sector or industry specificscheme pertaining to REITsand InvITs.

‘Attracting investors’

“Allowing mutual funds toinvest in a new class of ‘al-ternative securities’ wouldhelp in attracting more num-ber of investors into REITsand InvITs. SEBI’s prefer-ence has been that retail in-vestors should investthrough mutual funds ratherthan directly. This is a wel-come move for fund manage-ment community and an in-direct route for smallinvestors to get exposure tothese securities,” Mr.Agrawal said.

SEBI aims to ensure wider public holding, prevent mergers of large unlisted firms with small ones

ASHISH RUKHAIYAR

Market regulator tightens merger norms

INVESTOR-FRIENDLY: E-voting is mandatory when public holdingdrops by more than 5% in the merged unit. — FILE PHOTO: REUTERS

KOLKATA: Bata India is eyeingTier III and Tier IV citiesthrough a franchise modelrather than opening newstores, according to RajeevGopalakrishnan, President,South Asia, Bata EmergingMarkets.

“Considering the fact thatretail business will grow rap-idly in Tier III and Tier IVmarkets over the next fiveyears, due to increasing dis-posable incomes and the factthat these markets arelargely unrepresented by or-ganised players, it was de-cided to enter new marketsthrough franchising insteadof opening own stores,” hesaid. “Most important pointin managing the franchiseebusiness is to ensure thatpartners grow consistentlywith brand and get decent re-turn on their investment.”

In 2015-16, Bata recast itsplans of opening 100 storesevery year and decided toconcentrate instead onachieving same-storegrowth. “We have been fol-lowing dual strategy of driv-ing same store-growth andopening new stores,” he saidin an email interview.

Bata currently has 64 fran-

chise stores and about 1,300retail stores. Bata has fivemanufacturing units and7,770 employees. It sells 50million footwear pairs annu-ally. Bata India is part of theSwitzerland-based Bata ShoeOrganisation.

Bata is evaluating new loc-ations and has currentlyidentified “100 potentialtrade areas that cover bothmalls and high street areas.Almost 40% come from cit-ies, while the remaining willcome from low tier cities andtowns where consumers arelooking for convenience,latest designs and diverse-range for various occasions.

“We plan to open stores fo-cussing on Bata, Hush Pup-pies, Footin thereby cateringto various segments,” Mr.Gopalakrishnan said.

INDRANIDUTTA

Bata has identified 100potential locations includingmalls and high-street areas.

Bata to choose franchisemodel for store expansion

NEW DELHI: The country’s GDPgrowth rate for the currentfinancial year is set to slow to6% on account of demonet-isation and is expected tomaintain the same rate forfive years, according to theCentre for Monitoring In-dian Economy (CMIE).

“Before the demonetisa-tion shock, the Indian eco-nomy was expected togradually accelerate its realGDP growth rate from 7.5%to over 8% per annum,” Ma-

hesh Vyas, Managing Dir-ector at CMIE wrote in anarticle. “We now expect thisgrowth trajectory to shiftdown to about 6% per annumfor the next five years. Theeconomy is unlikely toachieve a growth of 7% anytime during the coming fiveyears.”

The removal of 86% of thecurrency in circulation led toa sharp decline in privateconsumption expenditure,Mr.Vyas stated.

“The fall in retail inflationto 3.6% in November and the

fall in sales reported by sev-eral fast-moving consumergoods companies are earlyindications of the fall in con-sumption expenditure,” hewrote.

“The immediate impact ofdemonetisation was a sharpreduction in private final

consumption expenditure, acorresponding fall in retailprices of perishable com-modities, a substantive dislo-cation of labour and corres-ponding losses in wages andbreak-down of supply chainsin many parts,” he stated.

The dislocation of labour,due to workers having towaste productive time stand-ing in a line at banks, and fur-ther losing out on wages be-cause employers themselvesdid not have the cash to paythem, further dampenedconsumption expenditure.

“We expect this low de-mand to persist till threeconditions are met,” Mr.Vyas wrote.

“First, liquidity is fully re-stored; secondly, confidencein liquidity is fully restored;and thirdly, consumers areyanked out of their equilib-rium at lower levels of con-sumption of non-essentialcommodities.”

None of these conditions,he added, is likely to be ful-filled anytime soon since therestoration of full liquidity isestimated to take as long as

till September, and the pub-lic will take even longer to re-gain confidence in the gov-ernment and the ReserveBank of India.

Consumer spending hit

“As a result, we expect thehit on consumer spending tolast much longer than just afew quarters,” Mr. Vyaswrote.

“Private final consump-tion expenditure (PFCE)grew 7.5% in 2015-16. We hadexpected PFCE growth to ac-celerate to 7.8% in 2016-17

and then to over 8% goingforward. Now, we havescaled back the PFCE growthestimate to 5.5% for 2016-17and to 6.8 % per annum goingforward.”

Mr. Vyas further expectedthis downward trend in con-sumption expenditure todelay any revival in privatesector investment.

“We expect capital forma-tion to shrink by nearly 2% in2016-17 as against an earlierexpectation of a 2.3% in-crease in the same,” Mr. Vyaswrote.


Post-demonetisation, GDP to grow at 6% for next five years, says CMIEThe public will take along time to regainconfidence in thegovernment and theReserve Bank of India

NEW DELHI: The consent of allstakeholders, such as theCentre and businesses, isneeded to implement norms,right up to the municipallevel, against abuse of marketpower and other illegal prac-tices restricting free tradeand competition amongbusinesses, said Rajeev Kher,member, Competition Ap-pellate Tribunal.

Mr. Kher said technologyhad been contributing a lotto the evolution of competi-tion reforms. He was speak-ing at a discussion on “Polit-ics of Competition Reformsin India.”

If the spirit of innovation isnot thwarted, technology —which had been touching allwalks of life — can helpmainstream competition upto the municipal level, hesaid. The term ‘competitionpolicy’ refers to norms pre-venting restrictive tradepractices and abuse of mar-ket dominance.

Cartelisation

Even municipal institu-tions are grappling with theproblem of cartelisation andsuch anti-competitive prac-tices, Mr. Kher said.

Disturbing an existingconfiguration overnight canbecome a problem and thegovernments are usually re-luctant to take up multi-dis-ciplinary policy-making likein the field of competitionpolicy, he added.

“Competition is a pan-eco-nomic concept,” which cov-ers issues such as poverty re-duction and consumerwelfare.

“Therefore, you will needbuy-in from the most import-ant stakeholder, which is thegovernment, as well as otherstakeholders including theindustry to mainstreamcompetition.”

Govt., industrymust fight forfree trade jointly,says tribunalSPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

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BUSINESS

BOTTOMLINEglobal round-up

Moody’s pays $864 million to U.S.,states over pre-crisis ratingsMoody’s Corp has agreedto pay close to $864million to settle with U.S.federal and stateauthorities over its ratingsof risky mortgagesecurities in the run-up tothe 2008 financial crisis,the U.S. Department ofJustice said on Friday. Thecredit rating agencyreached the deal with the Justice Department, 21 states andthe District of Columbia, resolving allegations that the firmcontributed to the worst financial crisis since the GreatDepression, the department said in a statement. “Moody’sfailed to adhere to its own credit-rating standards and fellshort on its pledge of transparency in the run-up to the GreatRecession,” Principal Deputy Associate Attorney General BillBaer said in the statement. S&P Global’s Standard & Poor’sentered into a similar accord in 2015 paying out $1.375 billion.Standard and Poor’s is the world’s largest ratings firm,followed by Moody’s. Moody’s said it would pay $437.5 millionto the Justice Department, and the remaining would be splitamong the states and Washington, D.C. — Reuters

Start-up investors fret over risks of mass data collectionNearly every technologystart-up wants the samething: more data. But inthe rush to collect allmanner of informationabout customers, tensionsare rising in Silicon Valleyover whether suchpractices amount to aform of surveillance thatcustomers will ultimatelyfind invasive. Whether ordering an Uber, streaming music,shopping online or tracking a health condition, consumers aregiving an unprecedented amount of information totechnology companies. “The data that companies ... have onyou is significantly greater than you appreciate,” Mark Suster,managing partner at venture capital firm Upfront Ventures,said in an interview at a business conference in SantaBarbara, California, sponsored by CB Insights, a business datafirm. Collecting big data helps Airbnb, for instance, knowwhether its customers prefer to travel to the beach ormountains, and Uber knows popular drop-off locations andhow to price trips. — Reuters

U.S. retail sales boosted by autodemand; producer prices climb

U.S. retail sales rose inDecember amid strongdemand for automobilesand furniture, providingfurther evidence that theeconomy ended the fourthquarter with momentumand is poised for strongergrowth this year. Thestrengthening economy iscausing inflation to perk

up. Other data on Friday showed producer prices rising for asecond straight month in December, notching their biggestyear-on-year gain in just more than two years, and consumersstarting to anticipate paying more for goods and services.Rising domestic demand and inflation come ahead ofexpected fiscal stimulus from the incoming Trumpadministration. That would increase the likelihood of theFederal Reserve raising interest rates at least three times thisyear, economists said. “This is not the picture of an economythat requires the support of the central bank’s policymakers,”said Chris Rupkey, chief economist at MUFG Union Bank inNew York. “We expect Fed officials to keep with their promiseto raise rates two or three times this year.” — Reuters

It is that time of the year when ex-pectations about the Budget takecentre-stage. While there are

hopes and apprehensions on the ex-tent to which the Budget provisionswould revive investment and de-mand, questions abound on how theBudget can be inclusive in its ap-proach and delineate a roadmap forcreation of job opportunities. Be-sides, the Budget would have provi-sions to push up living standards ofthe common citizen. All this andmore is likely to be unveiled in theforthcoming Budget.

The Union Budget 2017-18 is beingannounced at a time when the eco-nomy is seeing a growth rate exceed-ing 7% during this fiscal. At the sametime, inflation is down and the cur-rent account deficit is under control.

Our monsoonshave beengood. As a res-ult, food-grainproduction isestimated torise to an all-time high of 135millon tonnesin the kharifseason. Sowingis also robustin the rabi sea-

son which in turn is expected to stim-ulate the rural economy and improvepurchasing power. And, the politicalconsensus to usher in the GST augerswell for future growth and inclusion.While demonetisation is expected toinhibit the GDP growth rate, this islikely to be a blip in the growth tra-jectory for a quarter or two as the un-derlying fundamentals are largelypositive.

Jobless growth

Despite the above, our economyhas been facing challenges on theemployment front with job oppor-tunities not commensurate with therate of growth. Every year, 10-12 mil-lion young people join the labourforce and 5 million people leave agri-culture to join the non-agriculturesectors. Thus, there exists a total de-mand of 15- 17 million new jobs per

annum. Hence, creating job oppor-tunities for the youth every year isone of the biggest challenges for theBudget. We look forward to a tool-kitof policies which would help im-prove employment intensity in theeconomy.

Employment growth could begiven a boost through investments inmanufacturing and infrastructure. Inthe infrastructure space, capital ex-penditure in key projects like roads,railways, power as well as agri-infra-structure like irrigation, cold storage,warehousing and public housing pro-jects in clusters would kick-start avirtuous cycle of employment-in-tensive growth.

Budget data reveals that capital ex-penditure is budgeted to increase by5% in FY17 after an increase of morethan 25% in FY16. It is imperative thatthis slowdown in public investmentsbe reversed in FY2018.

Renewed attention to manufactur-ing and the ‘Make-in-India’ initiat-ives could be a major driver ofgrowth and job-creation. The gov-ernment has been in favour of settingup manufacturing zones as well assector- and product-specificclusters. We look forward to theBudget to announce a few clusters es-

pecially in areas which generate em-ployment. Within manufacturing,the major employers are the MSMEsand hence it is necessary to nurturethem by providing incentives forgrowth. The Government’s initiativeon Start-Up India and Stand Up Indiaare some ways to enhance the com-petitiveness of new firms in theMSME domain, which in turn wouldcreate entrepreneurship and jobs.The Budget should encourage cre-ation of start-ups by removing theburden of State regulation andthereby reducing compliance costsand the tax burden of successfulstart-ups. A start-up could be definedas any firm less than 5 years old withno further qualification.

For providing quality jobs in exist-ing firms, the Government should ex-tend the policy framework providedfor textile and apparels to all sectors.

This provides for fixed-term em-ployment contracts to workers andstate support for employers’ provid-ent fund contributions in the firstyear. Specific reform policies shouldalso be contemplated in the Budgetfor top the ten job-creating sectorssuch as tourism, IT, healthcare, tex-tiles, and food processing, amongothers.

Technology is a major enabler forgrowth of business and innovation isbecoming critical to enhance manu-facturing productivity and employ-ment.

For promoting MSME innovation,a National Innovation Fund could becreated with a sizeable corpus of atleast ₨10,000 crore to provide seed-funding to industry for innovationand R&D projects. There is also aneed for a National Technologystrategy for the next 10 years withclear outcomes in critical sectorssuch as Defence, Aerospace, Elec-tronics, and Capital Goods. Such astrategic approach exists in Taiwanand South Korea.

Tax deduction

Tax deduction is available for em-ployment generation under section80JJAA of the Income Tax Act in re-spect of costs incurred on any em-ployee whose total emolument is lessthan or equal to ₨25,000 per month.This cap on salary is very low espe-cially in the case of the software in-dustry and should be suitably en-hanced, at least to ₨50,000.

Focusing on skilling and educationis imperative for employability andlong-term sustainability of growth.Tax deductions for investments inskill development, including provi-sion of opportunities for training inspecific skills, would encouragefirms to hire workers rather than gofor capital-intensive technologies.Skill training can be provided under aPPP framework and the governmentcould consider a weighted deductionof 150% on skill development initiat-ives of the private sector.

To provide a boost to skill develop-ment under the ‘Skill India’ initiative,a portion of MGNREGA expenditurecould be linked to skill developmentinitiatives for those workers who areinterested in undergoing a trainingcourse. With such incentives, Budget2017-18 would promote a paradigmchange towards employment-ori-ented growth and help realise thedream of a developed India.

The author is Director-General,Confederation of Indian Industry

‘We expect Budget to boost employment’Creating job opportunities for the youth every year is one of the biggest challenges for the Budget

CHANDRAJIT

BANERJEE

JOB MIRAGE: Every year, 10-12 million young people join the labour force and 5 million people leave agriculture to join non-agriculture sectors. — FILE PHOTO

“Japan- India relationship isblessed with the largest potentialfor development of any bilateral re-lationship anywhere in the world”

Speech by H.E. Shinzo Abe –Prime Minister of Japan at the Par-liament of the Republic of India,August 22, 2007

Japan and India have had a longtrade and economic relationshipstarting from the later part of the 19th

century. However, post World WarII and the establishment of diplo-matic relations, the imperatives ofthe cold war kept the relationsbetween the two countries at a sub-optimal level. In the late 1980s, withthe cold war fading, Japan-India re-lations again looked promising. It isworth noting that even during thecold war period, Japan’s OverseasDevelopment Assistance(ODA)was still active in India. The land-mark event which signalled the highpoint of the relationship in thatperiod was the joint venturebetween Maruti Udyog and SuzukiMotors in 1984 to produce smallcars in India. This article seeks tofind ways to rejuvenate the partner-ship between Indian and Japan toblossom into one of the most func-tional partnerships among nationstates in recent history.

’90s preferences

Despite having been an early in-vestor in India’s industrialisation,Japan in the early 1990s was focusedon trade and investment withChina. India’s nuclear tests in 1998again led to severe condemnationand harsh sanctions by Japan andthe relations moved to a low keel.However, despite this setback, therewas consensus amongst major Indiapolitical parties in support of robustrelations with Japan. The Vajpayee-led NDA government’s “look eastpolicy”, which was furthered by Dr.Manmohan Singh’s government,laid the foundations of a specialstrategic global partnership with Ja-pan at the turn of the century and inthe first few years of the new mil-lennium when the signs of a shift inglobal power balance in favour ofAsia became apparent. The currentNDA government’s focused efortsin this regard seem to stem fromawareness of the fact that the eco-nomic value created by way of tradeand investment between the twocountries is significantly lower thanthe potential. As per data from theJapan External Trade Organization(JETRO), Japan’s aggregate out-ward investment in China duringthe period 1996-2015 was $116 billionand in India was $24 billion. Chinahas received close to 5 times moreinvestment than India. Chart 1 cap-

tures the long-term trend. The stockof Japanese foreign direct invest-ment globally is $1.3 trillion. The an-nual outward flow of Japanese FDIis about $130 billion and the U.S.gets about $40 billion annually. In-dia should target at least $25 billionannually for the next 10 years.

FDI patterns

From a foreign direct investment(FDI) perspective, based on datafrom the Department of IndustrialPolicy and Promotion-India,between April 2000 and September2016, Japan ranked fourth with anaggregate investment of $24 billion.In comparison, China’s aggregateFDI in the same period was $1.6 bil-lion and that of South Korea was $2.1billion. The two-way trade (sum ofexports and imports) in 1994-1995between Japan and India was $4067million, between India and Chinawas $1015 million and between Indiaand South Korea was $961.9 million.By 2015-16, Japan-India two-waytrade had increased to $14,512 mil-lion (a cumulative annual growthrate of 6.3%), China-India two-waytrade had grown to $70,758 million(CAGR of 22.6%) and South Korea-India two-way trade had grown to

$16,587 million (CAGR of 14.6%).Chart 2 illustrates this with long-term data.

Challenges to partnership

There are three main challengeswhich have constrained the Japan-India partnership from achieving itsfull potential. First, India’s complexregulations, red tape, ad hoc natureof state-level interventions. Second,Japanese companies face consider-able logistics challenges and non-availability of uninterrupted powersupply constrains their manufac-turing plans in India. Third, whileIndia can emerge as a large marketfor Japanese infrastructure systemexports, there have been incredibledelays in the commencement of theprojects.

In order to facilitate investmentfrom Japan, the union governmenthas set up a Japan Plus committeewhich comprised four senior bur-eaucrats from the government andthree Japanese oicials chosen, oneeach from Japan’s Ministry of Eco-nomy, Trade and Industry (METI),Japan External Trade Organization(JETRO) and the Aichi perfectureto deal with all aspects of invest-ment mainly challenges faced by Ja-

panese companies post investment.Between FY15 and FY16, while FDIfrom Singapore and the U.S. havemore or less doubled, Japan’s FDIinto India has increased by only30%.

In fact, Japan International Co-operation Agency (JICA) has fun-ded the Tamil Nadu InvestmentPromotion Program for strengthen-ing policy framework and urbanand industry infrastructure to facil-itate foreign investment.

Japan is working on developing 12Industrial townships called JapanIndustrial Townships (JITs) whichwill operate like Little Japan with allthe infrastructure to support theoperations of Japanese companies.Still, the JITs face challenges fromaccess to ports, lack of uninterrup-ted power supply and poor level ofbenchmarking to global best stand-ards as applicable for industrialparks.

As per the JETRO Survey onBusiness Conditions of JapaneseCompanies in Asia and Oceania(2015), more than 70% of Japanesecompanies operating in India haveindicated that they will expand op-erations over the next one to twoyears. In comparison only 38.1% of

the Japanese companies operatingin China have indicated that theywill expand operations. Thesub-40% figure is a low since 1998.India can be one of the largest mar-kets for Japanese infrastructure sys-tems exports (one of the core com-ponents of Abenomics) intransport, water, energy and logist-ics. While there is the shining ex-ample of the Delhi Metro Rail, thedelays with Delhi Mumbai Indus-trial Corridor (DMIC), which wasset up in 2007, and the pace of theongoing feasibility studies of Chen-nai Mumbai Industrial Corridor(CBIC) are disappointing.

Tokyo Declaration metrics

The Tokyo Declaration ofNovember 2014 sets a target fordoubling Japan’s foreign direct in-vestment, the number of Japanesecompanies operating in India andan ambitious investment target ofJPY 3.5 trillion ($33.5 billion) withina five-year period. The doubling offoreign direct investment seems un-likely unless some dramatic revivalhappens.

The number of Japanese compan-ies in India in October 2014 was 1,156and by October 2015 it was 1,229, anincrease of 6%, much lower than theneeded growth to achieve the tar-get. The cumulative Overseas De-velopment Assistance disburse-ment by Japan (India is the largestrecipient of Japanese ODA) in 2014was JPY4.6 trillion and in FY 15-16only JPY 185.6 billion was disbursed.Given the under-performance on allthe benchmarks set up under theTokyo Declaration, timely interven-tion from the highest levels of bothgovernments can still ensure thatthe ambitious metrics can beachieved.

The Japan-India relationship is ata unique juncture as Asia is emer-ging as the powerhouse of theworld. The Japanese governmentmust play a more active role inbuilding India’s infrastructure,which will serve as a foundation forsustained economic growth. BothJapan and India must aspire for two-way trade of $100 billion, annual in-vestment by Japan in India of $25billion and at least 100 joint manu-facturing/research and develop-ment centres on a global scalewithin the next ten years.

Sivaprakasam Sivakumar is MD,Argonaut Global Capital, U.S. andHimadri Bhattacharya is SeniorAdvisor, RisKontroller Global

It’s time to say ‘Irasshaimase’ to JapanThe spirit of ‘welcome’ should aim to cut red tape, remove infrastructure challenges and avoid project delays in India

Between FY15 and FY16,while FDI from Singaporeand the U.S. close todoubled, Japan’s FDI intoIndia rose by only 30%

SIVAPRAKASAM SIVAKUMAR

HIMADRI BHATTACHARYA

The ongoing repercus-sions of the govern-ment’s decision todemonetise high-

value currency notes are be-ing felt in particular by cash-intensive sectors such as themicrofinance industry, ac-cording to microfinancecompany Satin Creditcare.

“It’s been a pretty toughtime (post demonetisation),”H.P. Singh, chairman andmanaging director of SatinCreditcare, said in an inter-view. “The cash supply posi-tion has been very bad in thenorthern states of Uttar Pra-desh, Punjab… in both ruraland urban areas. People saythere are no lines in Mumbaior in the south, but if you goto U.P., people are still onlygetting ₨500 per week.”

“The problem is allacross,” Mr. Singh added.“That has taken a toll on ourcollection eiciency. It usedto be 99.8%. Women as agender usually don’t default,and our instalments are verysmall. Now, we are closer to80-85% collectioneiciency.”

The reason for this is thatcash-intensive industriesacross the north of India arenow struggling to remainafloat.

“If you go to Agra, thenthey are in the business ofshoe uppers or shoe lowers,”Mr. Singh said. “Vendorshave not been able to pay be-cause there is no cash. You goto Bareilly and the zari work-ers have no work becausethere is no cash, andeverything over there runson cash. You go down toFirozabad, which is knownfor bangle-making, and thereis no work there.”

Joint liability model

Mr. Singh’s companyprimarily follows theGrameen model of lending,

or a joint liability groupmodel, where it lends togroups of about 15 rural wo-men, each of whom is collat-eral for the other women inthe group. Social and peerpressure ensures timelyrepayment.

However, various rules re-garding the withdrawal ofcash from banks post de-monetisation have even hitthe company’s ability to dis-burse loans to these womenentrepreneurs, according toMr. Singh.

‘Inaccessible ₨800 cr.’

“We can’t withdrawenough to loan out, since ourwithdrawal limit is ₨50,000,”he said. “For a company oursize, which disburses ₨300-400 crore every month, weare not able to withdraw therequired cash. So, we areonly doing disbursement ofthe cash collections that arebeing repaid to us. We haveabout ₨800 crore in our ac-counts waiting to be dis-bursed as loans, but we can’ttouch it!”

Mr. Singh said that themove towards digital pay-ments remains a distantdream, completely imprac-tical for the reality of thesituation in rural India at the

moment.“We live in the real world.

How will that poor, un-educated woman first get asmartphone, download theapp and then do digital bank-ing?” he said. “Most havebeen taught to even writetheir names by us, when allthey know is to put theirthumbprint!”

“And why would they doit?” Mr. Singh asked. “Theysay that they can’t get cashout from the banks for theirown consumption, so even ifI put the money in her ac-count through a cheque orthrough electronic transfer,she won’t be able to with-draw it.”

Regarding his businessand the industry, Mr. Singhsaid that this year would def-initely see poorer perform-ance due to demonetisation.“It depends on the level youare dealing in,” he said. “Weare more cash-intensive, sowe will be hit harder. Othersare less cash-intensive, sothey will be hit less.”

“But the point is that everycash transaction is not ablack transaction,” he added.“We have taken ourselvesbackwards by at least 2-3years,” according to Mr.Singh.

‘Have money, can’t lend!’TCA SHARAD RAGHAVAN

DIGITAL CHALLENGES: Not everyone can get a smartphone,download an app and engage in digital banking. — FILE PHOTO

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� ��

Career girlI just didn’t want to think about it until afterAustralia because Grand Slams mean a lot tome. It’s almost a little unreal right now because Ihaven’t taken it in. I'm being rather selfish — Serena Williams on her engagement

Upward curveWell, I got really mentally strong. I think I’m moreconsistent and much more mature in everything,you know, even off the court, on the court too.Everything is getting better now. — Kei Nishikori

Secret of successI have to be ready from the first round again. Iwill try to not put too much expectation andpressure on myself. I will try to do it like lastyear. That was the way I had my success. — Angelique Kerber

Telecast schedulePWL: Sony ESPN & ESPN HD, 7 p.m. Serie A: SonyESPN & ESPN HD, 1.30 a.m. (Tuesday). La Liga:Sony Six & Six HD, 1.30 a.m. (Tuesday). AustralianOpen: Sony Six & Six HD, 5.30 a.m. (Tuesday).NBA: Sony ESPN & ESPN HD, 7 a.m. (Tuesday).

PUNE: Not often does ViratKohli fail to see the team homeafter scoring a hundred in achase. Not often does a Kohlihundred in a chase get over-shadowed. Kedar Jadhav’s 65-ball hundred on his homeground did manage to putKohli’s exceptional efort inthe backdrop.

The cherry on the cake forabout 37,500 spectators, whothronged the MaharashtraCricket Association Stadium,was the fact that the lower-or-der ensured India crossed astif target of 351 without muchof a snag to take the lead in thethree-match ODI seriesagainst England.

When the diminutiveJadhav joined his India andRoyal Challengers Bangalorecaptain Virat Kohli in the

middle, India was in thedoldrums. Even getting closeto England’s total of 350 forseven, the visitor’s highest-ever in ODIs against India,looked diicult when M.S.Dhoni’s conscious walk downthe wicket to Jake Ball resultedin a top-edged pull to DavidWilley — who had earlierbowled the ball of the day tosneak through the gate of K.L.Rahul and uproot the middle-stump — at mid-wicket, Indiawas reduced to 63 for four inthe 12th over.

Kohli was in his element ashe has always been at thecrease but he needed to build apartnership to keep India inthe game. Not only did Jadhavgive Kohli the much-neededsupport but also took the pres-sure of his captain by hittingboundaries at will.

Ever since he pulled Ben

Stokes from outside the of-stump to mid-wicket fence ofthe second ball he faced,Jadhav looked to be in goodnick. In Stokes’s subsequentover, he first nudged him tothird-man fence before flick-ing the next ball wide of adiving Adil Rashid at mid-on.

That prompted Eoin Mor-gan to introduce spin butJadhav whisked a flipper in hisfirst over to the square-legfence before sending one overthe long-on fence in the leg-gie’s next over.

Hitting boundaries at willKohli, meanwhile, had raced

to his first fifty against Eng-land in a long time and was setto pace the chase to precision.The duo continued to keep thescoreboard flowing by gettinga boundary virtually everyover, not letting the required

rate ever climb over eight.When Kohli was eyeing his

27th hundred, Jadhav playedthe stroke of the day — an in-side-out lofted drive of a per-fect leg-break by Rashid thatsailed over the ropes. WhenJadhav joined Kohli in the clubof centurions, with a late-cutto third-man fence and re-gister India’s fifth-fastest hun-dred, the host required 90 runsof 14.1 overs.

With Jadhav starting tocramp, Kohli decided to up theante but failed to read a Stokesslower ball in the next over totop-edge an attempted pull toWilley at covers. In the nextover, Jadhav’s discomfort in-creased, so he opted to go aer-ial and cleared the boundaryof Ball twice in an over. How-ever, he eventually holed outin the deep in Ball’s next overto leave the tail with 60 runs to

get. Hardik Pandya then kept acool head in the company ofRavindra Jadeja and R. Ashwinto ensure India registered afamous win.

The target would not havebeen so stif had India’s deathbowling not allowed Stokes(62, 40b, 2x4, 5x6) to go ber-serk. The all-rounder capital-ised on a blistering start fromJason Roy (73) and a steadyhand from Joe Root (78).

England plundered 105 ofthe last eight overs to reach350. Even that was not enough.

Kohli-Jadhav combo delivers in a tall chaseCRICKET / Roy, Root and Stokes had powered England to 350, the team’s highest-ever score against India in ODIs

BLISTERING COUNTERATTACK: Kedar Jadhav and Virat Kohli, who joined forces at 63 for four, never let the scoring rate flag, and theircenturies in quick time ensured that the lower middle-order only had to hold its nerve to see India through. — PHOTOS: K.R. DEEPAK

Classic chases� 438-9: South Africa vsAustralia (434-4),Johannesburg, 2006

� 372-6: South Africa vsAustralia (371-6), Durban,2016

� 362-1: India vs Australia(359-5), Jaipur, 2013

� 356-7: India vs England(350-7), Pune, 2017

AMOL KARHADKAR

MELBOURNE: Australia called upuncapped Mitchell Swepsonto boost the spin contingentfor the upcoming India seriesto four, as Glenn Maxwell re-turned to the Test fold in the16-man squad.

The first Test begins inPune on February 23.

The squad: Steve Smith (capt.),David Warner, Ashton Agar, JacksonBird, Peter Handscomb, Josh Hazle-wood, Usman Khawaja, Nathan Lyon,Mitchell Marsh, Shaun Marsh, GlennMaxwell, Steve O’Keefe, MatthewRenshaw, Mitchell Starc, MitchellSwepson and Matthew Wade. —AFP

Four spinners inAustralia squad

MELBOURNE: Andy Murray setsout on Monday to end a recordrun of Australian Open finaldefeats as his great rival

NovakDjokovicvies to be-come thetourna-

ment’s greatest champion ofall time.

World No. 1 Murray is look-ing to avoid becoming the firstman in the post-1968 Open erato lose six Grand Slam finals atthe same major.

His coach Ivan Lendl lostfive finals at the US Open be-fore he broke through in NewYork in 1985.

Murray, who opens his cam-paign with a match againstUkraine’s Illya Marchenko onRod Laver Arena, says he’s in abetter position this time to fi-nally break through for hismaiden Australian Open.

Bhambri fails to make itYuki Bhambri stumbled at

the final hurdle of the qualifi-ers, losing his third and finalround match to ErnestoEscobedo 6-7(2), 6-2, 6-4 onSaturday. — AFP

HYDERABAD: Thenomination of formerIndia cricket captainMohammed Azharuddinfor the post of presidentin the Hyderabad CricketAssociation elections(scheduled for Jan. 17)was rejected on Saturday.

The returning oicerK. Rajeev Reddyinformed The Hindu thathe had to reject Azhar’snomination as the latterhad not given “asatisfactory explanationwhether the BCCI ban onhim in the wake of thematch-fixing scandalwas lifted or not and alsowhether he had enrolledhimself as a voter in theHCA”. — V.V.Subrahmanyam

Azhar’snominationrejected

Murray takes aimat Aussie Openjinx

PUNE: Virat Kohli, as expec-ted, singled out Kedar Jadhavfor praise after India staged aremarkable comeback to sealvictory in the series-openeragainst England.

“It was outstanding just tohave another guy who is will-ing to believe we can winfrom any situation was sucha boost for me as well,” saidKohli. “He knew exactly howto bat on this pitch. He put alot of pressure on the spin-ners... one of the best-calcu-lated innings I have seen.”

“I was glad I was out therewith him. He was dis-heartened versus New Zeal-and, when he could not get usacross the line in Delhi. I toldhim then there’s no pointthinking what you couldhave done and you wouldlearn how to close games outas you play more.” — SpecialCorrespondent

‘One of the bestinnings I’ve seen’

581

BENGALURU: Debutant Roby Nor-ales and C.K. Vineeth came ofthe bench to lead Bengaluru FC(BFC) to a nervy 2-0 victoryover Chennai City FC (CCFC)

in a Hero I-Leaguematch at theSreeKanteeravaStadium

here on Saturday.The Honduran forward

scored the opener in the 77thminute from a goal-mouthscramble after CCFC failed todeal with a BFC set-piece.

Vineeth’s strike to double thelead came two minutes later, ofaneat cut-back by Udanta Singhfrom the right.

The goals though were pre-ceded by a frustrating period

for the home team. It was re-peatedly thwarted by an oppon-ent for which caution seemed tobe the watch-word.

As early as in the fifth minute,Sunil Chhetri was denied fromclose range after some finecombination play from mid-fielder Lenny Rodrigues — whowas excellent on the day — Har-manjot Khabra and Udanta.

Daniel Lalhlimpuia thenforced Chennai goalkeeperKaranjit Singh — who was ad-judged the player of the match—into making two fine saves.

The closest Chennai camewas on the stroke of half-timewhen forward Marcos Viniciusmanaged to beat the ofside trap— a rarity otherwise — butflufed the chance by hittingwide.

K. Prashanth on the rightflank gave a decent account of

himself, going past defenderSena Ralte on multipleoccasions.

The second half was moresedate. Chhetri found himselfin space just outside the penaltyarea but his left-footer didn’teven hit the target.

Then Rodrigues found Robywith a delightful chip but thelatter’s first touch was foundwanting. It was not long beforehe made amends.

The results: On Sunday: AtVasco: Churchill Brothers 1 (BrandonFernandes 4) lost to Mumbai FC 2(Victorino Fernandes 34, KaranSawhney 90+2).

On Saturday: At Bengaluru:Bengaluru FC 2 (Roby Norales 77, Vin-eeth 79) bt Chennai City FC 0.

At Pune: DSK Shivajians 1(Gouramangi Singh 64) lost to EastBengal 2 (Wedson Anselme 13, WillisPlaza 80).

Roby, Vineeth star for BFCCome off the bench to help their side beat Chennai City

N. SUDARSHAN

THE BREAKTHROUGH: Roby Norales is gung-ho after scoring the opening goal for Bengaluru FCagainst Chennai City FC. — PHOTO: K. BHAGYA PRAKASH

CMYK

ND-ND

SPORT18 |THE HINDU MONDAY, JANUARY 16, 2017

NOIDA/DELHI

2 Fight and run into a fit ofshivering? (5)

3 Object to a pin up of European(7)

4 For example 3's spasm isimaginary (8)

5 Notoriously dangerous area butAdmiral Green's well-prepared(7,8)

18 About to consider retirement (7)

20 Copper ring used during climb tosupport (7)

21 Carbon mixed with yellow forboy's pencil (6)

24 Washrooms having "Gents"initially as symbols (5)

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

9 10

11 12

13 14 15

16

17 18 19 20

21

22 23 24

25 26

27 28

6 Pledge to keep working in court(6)

7 A Roman's replaced one whorows a boat (7)

8 Nurse losing heart duringproposed surgery (9)

14 Digression put reader off (9)

16 Recognised glove dead criminalcarried (8)

THE HINDU CROSSWORD 11905 (set by The Phantom)

F ACROSS

GDOWN

The search for God is an individual experience and findsfulfilment when He chooses to reveal His truth. Adevotee’s path to realisation is founded on the awarenessof one’s physical constraints and the perception of theundying self that yearns for God. If God is to beunderstood as formless, with no name, qualities, activities,etc., individual souls caught in the cycle of birth will neverbe able to even try to seek Him.

Out of His Sankalpa and His boundless compassion, Hethus transforms Himself into this universe and engages inthe acts of creation, protection, destruction, casting theveil of Maya, also known as Tirodana and granting grace.The ‘Linga’ and ‘Nataraja’ forms of Siva exemplify thistruth, pointed out Nallur Sa Saravanan in a discourse.

The cosmic dance of Siva as Nataraja has attracted manydevotees who are drawn by its symbolic impact. KaraikalAmmaiyar introduces the concept of Nataraja in the Bhakticult. She renounces her appearance and chooses to live inthe form of a mere skeleton. She undertakes a journey toKailasa to have darshan of Siva and wishes to become Hisservant and sing the glory of His feet. She prays to Sivathus: ‘Grant me undying bliss and devotion and alsofreedom from birth. If by chance I have to be born as aresult of my past karma, grant me the boon of alwayshaving you in my thoughts. Further grant me the boon bywhich I can behold your cosmic dance and sing your gloryeven as I serve your golden feet.’

She sees the cosmic dance of Siva in Thiruvalangadu andsings hymns in His praise. One has to seek God’s help todestroy the ego sense and pride inherent in each individualwhich is a hurdle to God-realisation.

Formlessness and Form

FAITH

Sudoku is a mind game and apuzzle that you solve withreasoning and logic. Fill in the grid with digits in such amanner that every row, everycolumn and every 3x3 boxaccommodates the digits 1 to 9,without repeating any.

TODAY'S SOLUTIONS

CAVIARBADMOUTH

RTOEOAR

GRAMMARNURSES

ULAMASA

DESIGNULTIMATE

ATDEAM

IDENTICALONSET

ECTAN

SPORTERADICATE

AECIMU

CRITERIAINSULT

TRANTHO

SURELYGSTRING

RAOLEOO

SENTENCED ANISH

VARIETY

SU | DO | KU

1 Sturgeon's roe are carried byVicar for seasoning (6)

5 Fight hard to control radicallymad criticism (8)

9 Radical part of periodicalreviewed by master's reading ofcorrect rules of language (7)

10 Takes care of new contractswhen purchase head leaves (6)

11 Plot to trap rebel soldiers duringretreat (6)

23 Hurt resulting in sprainsultimately (6)

25 Definitely rude when Europeanbutts in (6)

26 Girl's girdle covering bit of tinyinnerwear (1-6)

27 Punishment dramatized in"Scene ten" (8)

28 Pastry by man from Copenhagen(6)

12 Popular officer leading currentteam trained to be the best (8)

13 Duplicate papers a clientgenerated (9)

15 Making one's debut finally —that's a beginning (5)

17 Display class with poise (5)

19 To kill time (read basicallywhiling away time) (9)

22 Hack into intelligence networkwithout rules of judgment (8)

HYDERABAD: Chase Your Dreams,who is in good form, may complete ahat-trick in the Darley Arabian Mil-lion (1,200m), the chief event of theraces to be held here on Monday(Jan. 16).

1 MAKALU CUP (2,000m), 4-y-o & over, rated 26 to 50 (Cat. III),1-40 p.m: 1. Sonic (8) Sai Kumar 60,2. Monte Rosa (6) A. A. Vikrant 55.5,3. Pentagon (5) K. Sai Kiran 55, 4.Pretty Star (7) Ajeeth Kumar 55, 5.Own Battle (4) N. S. Rathore 54, 6.Rose Eternal (1) S. S. Tanwar 53.5, 7.Cannon Grey (3) Kiran Naidu 53and 8. Al Sadr (2) K. Mukesh Kumar52.1. Own Battle, 2. Pretty Star, 3.Al Sadr

2 NALOMA PLATE (1,200m)(Cat. II), maiden 3-y-o only(Terms), 2-10: 1. Creator (2) SurajNarredu 55, 2. Desert Moon (4)Srinath 55, 3. Friendly Gesture (9)G. Naresh 55, 4. Golden Hope (3)Kuldeep Singh 55, 5. Mega Million(8) A. A. Vikrant 55, 6. On The Fire(7) P. Trevor 55, 7. Sam The Brave(5) K. Mukesh Kumar 55, 8. Star-light (6) N. Rawal 55 and 9. Hope IsEternal (1) Akshay Kumar 53.5. 1. Desert Moon, 2. Creator, 3.On The Fire

3 ATTRACTRESS PLATE(2,000m), 4-y-o & over, rated 46 to70 (Cat. II), 2-45: 1. Rebellion (3) N.

Rawal 60, 2. Limitation (6) Aneel59, 3. Elysian (5) Suraj Narredu 57,4. Silvassa (1) Beuzelin 54.5, 5. Bril-liant (2) Akshay Kumar 53, 6. Cor-uba (4) A. S. Pawar 52.5 and 7.Penumatcha's Pride (7) Ajit Singh52.5. 1. Elysian, 2. Coruba, 3.Limitation

4 PLEASURE HUNT PLATE(1,100m), maiden 4-y-o & over,rated 26 to 50 (Cat. III), 3-15: 1. InCommand (8) Md. Ismail 60, 2.Secret Art (3) Srinath 58, 3. Moun-tain Of Light (6) P. Gaddam 57.5, 4.Shandaar (9) Kiran Naidu 57, 5.War Cry (1) Deepak Singh 57, 6.Ambitious Approach (5) AjitSingh 56.5, 7. Rohini (7) A. S.Pawar 56.5, 8. Magical Skill (2) An-eel 54.5 and 9. Top Sprint (4) B. R.Kumar 54. 1. Secret Art, 2. War Cry, 3.Mountain Of Light

5 MYSORE RACE CLUB CUP(1,400m), 4-y-o & over, rated 66 to90 (Cat. II), 3-45: 1. Numinous (9)Srinath 60, 2. O Ms Akilah (11) P.Trevor 56.5, 3. Ashwa Raftar (7)Suraj Narredu 56, 4. ExclusiveBeauty (4) Kiran Naidu 55.5, 5.Blossom (5) Md. Sameeruddin 55,6. Mangalyaan (3) Ajeeth Kumar55, 7. Kimono (6) N. S. Rathore53.5, 8. Vista (2) Akshay Kumar53.5, 9. Princess Hina (8) B. R. Ku-mar 52.5, 10. Red Express (10) K.

Sai Kiran 52.5 and 11. KohinoorThunder (1) Kunal Bunde 52. 1. Ashwa Raftar, 2. O Ms Aki-lah, 3. Numinous

6 DARLEY ARABIAN MIL-LIION (1,200m), 3-y-o only(Terms), 4-20: 1. Autocratic (2) P.Trevor 56, 2. Chase Your Dreams(4) Srinath 56, 3. Turf Star (1) SurajNarredu 56 and 4. Kangra (3)Beuzelin 54.5. 1. Chase Your Dreams, 2.Kangra

7 NELSTON PLATE (1,100m),5-y-o & over, rated upto 30 (Cat.III), 4-55: 1. Golden Xanthus (11)Md. Sameeruddin 62, 2. WonderStar (8) A M Tograllu 62, 3. Amaz-ing Power (5) G. Naresh 61, 4. YesBaby (6) Kuldeep Singh 61, 5.Green Olive (13) A. A. Vikrant60.5, 6. Racing Ruler (4) KunalBunde 59.5, 7. Cruiser (7) K. SaiKiran 59, 8. Gochi (12) K. MukeshKumar 59, 9. Prep One (9) DeepakSingh 58.5, 10. Jamie (1) AkshayKumar 52, 11. Arracache (3) SaiKumar 51, 12. Kohinoor Love (2) N.Rawal 50.5 and 13. Royal Gold (10)Ajit Singh 50. 1. Amazing Power, 2. GoldenXanthus, 3. Wonder StarDay's best: ElysianDouble: Ashwa Raftar - ChaseYour DreamsJkt: 3, 4, 5, 6 & 7; Tr (i): 2, 3 & 4; (ii):5, 6 & 7; Tla: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 & 7.

RACING

Chase Your Dreams for feature

COLOMBO: Karunuday Singhoutplayed Kunal Anand 6-1,6-2 in the final of the AsianTour $5,000 tennis tourna-ment in Colombo on Sunday.

The results: Final: KarunudaySingh bt Kunal Anand 6-1, 6-2; Semi-finals: Karunuday Singh bt HeeraAshiq (Pak) 6-1, 6-1; Kunal Anand btSuraj Prabodh 1-0 retired.

Quarterfinals: Heera Ashiq btJatin Dahiya 6-1, 5-7, 7-6(2); Karu-nuday Singh bt DineshkanthanThangarajah (Sri) 6-2, 6-1; SurajPrabodh bt Aaditya Tewari 5-7, 7-6(5), 6-2; Kunal Anand bt Yasitha DeSilva (Sri) 6-4, 6-4.

Karunuday wins

RAMANATHAPURAM: DeepikaSoreng pumped in eight goalswhile Sangita Kumari scoredfive as Hockey Jharkhandthrashed Hockey Andhra Pra-desh 15-2 in the ‘A’ division ofthe seventh National sub-ju-nior hockey tournament forwomen on Sunday.

The results: ‘A’ division: HockeyJharkhand 15 (Deepika Soreng 8,Sangita Kumari 5, Salim Tete, PriyaDungdung) bt Hockey Andhra Pra-desh 2 (Bhavani Madugula, Roshitha,

Pulicharla); Hockey Odisha 3 (NehaLakra, Abinsimukti Surin, BimalBarwa) bt Hockey Unit of Tamil Nadu0; Hockey Gangpur Odisha 7 (Nam-rata Jasmine Bara 3, Jyoti Chhari 2,Manisha Oram, Sunita Xaxa) btHockey Maharashtra 1 (AkshataDhekale); Uttar Pradesh Hockey 5(Yogita Bora 2, Madhu Rai, SimranSingh, Mumtaz Khan) bt HockeyChandigarh 2 (Akshita Yadav, Sonu);SAI 2 (Akansjsha Shukla, Anjna Dung-dung) bt Hockey Patiala 1 (Suman Ku-mar). — Sports Reporter

HOCKEY

Deepika, Sangita shine

MUMBAI: Sergeant At Arms, riddenby A. Sandesh, claimed the Ramni-was Ramnarain Ruia Gold Cup, thefeature event of Sunday’s (Jan.15)evening races here. The winner isowned by Mr. & Mrs. K.N. Dhunjib-hoy and Mr. & Mrs. Z.K. Dhunjibhoyrep. Five Stars Shipping Co. Pvt. Ltd.& Mr. Vispi R. Patel. S.S. Attaollahitrains the winner.

1. YAWAR RASHIDTROPHY (1,400m), Cl. II, rated 60to 86: Celtic Prince (A. Gaikwad) 1,Artistic (Sandesh) 2, Star Council-lor (P.S. Chouhan) 3 and Korol (C.S.Jodha) 4. 2-1/2, 1, 3/4. 1m 25.18s. Rs.58 (w), 30 and 14 (p), SHP: Rs. 37, FP:Rs. 282, Q: Rs. 162, Tanala: Rs. 232and Rs. 88. Favourite: Star Council-lor. Owners: M/s. Juzer AbbasLokhandwala & Nirmal Singh.Trainer: S.Waheed.

2. RAMNIWAS RAM-NARAIN RUIA GOLD CUP(Gr.2) (2,000m), 4-y-o only:

Serjeant At Arms (Sandesh) 1,St. Andrews (Suraj Narredu) 2 andHighland Breeze (Trevor) 3. 5, 3-3/4.2m 4.44s. Rs. 12 (w), SHP: Rs. 14, FP:Rs. 10. Favourite: Sergeant At Arms.Owners: Mr. & Mrs. K.N. Dhunjib-hoy and Mr. & Mrs. Z.K. Dhunjibhoyrep. Five Stars Shipping Co. Pvt. Ltd.& Mr. Vispi R. Patel. Trainer: S.S.Attaolahi.

3. LACHMAN K. ADVANI &MAYA L ADVANI TROPHY(1,600m), Cl. IV, rated 20 to 46:Flashing Honour (Dashrath) 1,Sumaaq (C.S. Jodha) 2, Prince OfHeart (Neeraj) 3 and Othello (Par-mar) 4. 2-1/4, 2-3/4, Nose. 1m 39.69s.

Rs. 59 (w), 17, 27 and 35 (p), SHP: Rs.69, FP: Rs. 249, Q: Rs. 166, Tanala: Rs.1,896 and Rs. 2,437. Favourite: Oth-ello. Owners: M.A.M. RamaswamyChettiar Of Chettinad CharitableTrust. Trainer: Karthik G.

4. FORBES INDIA CUP(2,000m), Cl. III, rated 40 to 66:Frivolous (Sandesh) 1, Multiglory(Dashrath) 2, Uncle Scrooge (Tre-vor) 3 and Pugnacious (Neeraj) 4.2-3/4, 5-3/4, 5-1/2. 2m 3.56s. Rs. 25(w), 17 and 42 (p). SHP: Rs. 73, FP:Rs. 70, Q: Rs. 102, Tanala: Rs. 789 andRs. 105. Favourite: Sherlock. Own-ers: Mr. Jaydev M. Mody rep. J.M.Livestock Pvt. Ltd., M/s. Madhav G.Patankar, S.R. Marathe & Mr. Tan-may A. Agashe rep. Reward Farm-ing and Livestock Pvt. Ltd. Trainer:M. Narredu.

5. SIR H.M. MEHTATROPHY (1,200m), Cl. III, rated40 to 66: Alishas Pet (A. ImranKhan) 1, Benezeer (C.S. Jodha) andMagical Memory (Suraj Narredu) 2and Stardom Calling (Neeraj) 3. 1/2,dead heat, 1-1/4. 1m 11.67s. Rs. 45 (w),19, 20 and 25 (p), SHP: Rs. 41, FP: Rs.231, Q: Rs. 118, Tanala: Rs. 1,835. Fa-vourite: Maduro. Owners: M/s. Din-sha P. Shrof, Munchi P. Shrof, Mrs.Ayesha A. Hussain & Mr. AchuthanSiddharth. Trainer: Altaf Hussain.

6. RADHESHYAM JHUN-JHUNWALA MILLION(1,400m), 4-y-o & over: CriticsChoice (Sandesh) 1, Renee (Tre-vor) 2, Holy Smoke (Suraj Narredu)3 and Dancing Prances (A. ImranKhan) 4. 2, 2, 1. 1m 23.72s. Rs. 42 (w),21 and 29 (p), SHP: Rs. 47, FP: Rs. 182,

Q: Rs. 63, Tanala: Rs. 325 and Rs. 168.Favourite: Congressional. Owners:Mr. & Mrs. K.N. Dhunjibhoy andMr. & Mrs. Z.K. Dhunjibhoy rep.Five Stars Shipping Co. Pvt. Ltd.Trainer: Hosidar Daji.

7. FIGHT HUNGER FOUND-ATION TROPHY (1,200m),Maiden 3-y-o only:

Timeless (Trevor) 1, WindsorForest (Suraj Narredu) 2, La Magni-fique (Neeraj) 3 and Stunner (J.Chinoy) 4. Nose, 6, 3/4. 1m 12.05s.Rs. 74 (w), Rs. 16, 14 and 13 (p), SHP:Rs. 30, FP: Rs. 232, Q: Rs. 183, Tanala:Rs. 252 and Rs. 94. Favourite: LaMagnifique. Owner: Mr. RajeshMonga. Trainer: S.K. Sunderji.

8. MOHAMMED RASHEEDBEG & RAHAT BEG TROPHY(1,000m), Cl. IV, rated 20 to 46:Alpine Express (S. Amit) 1, GranParadiso (Parmar) 2, Adams Begin-ning (Parbat) 3 and Furiosa (C.S.Jodha) 4. Not run: Irish Boss. 1-3/4, 3,1-3/4. 59.74s. Rs. 46 (w), 20, 16 and 15(p). SHP: Rs. 38, FP: Rs. 134, Q: Rs. 75,Tanala: Rs. 636 and Rs. 185. Favour-ite: Gran Paradiso. Owners: Mr. AdiH. Shahiwalla, Ms. Pinaz A. Shahi-walla, M/s. Xerxes A. Shahiwalla,Faridoon N. Gamadia, Mrs. FarzinV. Gaekwad, Mr. Christopher John.Trainer: Vinesh.

Jackpot: (70 per cent): Rs. 39,498(five tkts.), (30 per cent): Rs. 1,459(five tkts.).

Treble: (i): Rs. 1,313 (seven tkts.),(ii): Rs. 2,826 (nine tkts.).

Super jackpot: (70 per cent): Rs.74,478 (one tkt.), (30 per cent): Rs.6,384 (five tkts.).

Sergeant At Arms wins main event

CHENNAI: The opening day of thetwo-day auction sale at the MadrasRace Club (MRC), that was revivedafter more than a quarter of acentury, saw a new record being sethere on Sunday.

A bay filly (Excellent Art-AmazingQueen) bred at the PoonawallaExhilaration Stud Private Limitedwas bought for a record prize of ₨20lakh by Chaduranga Kantharaj Urs, ascion of the Mysore royal family. Itis the highest-ever price paid for anequine at an Indian racing auctionsince Independence.

“I am happy to own the horsethat has made history and delightedto be in partnership with thePoonawalla Stud Farms,” adelighted Mr. Urs told The Hindu.

Mr. Zavaray Poonawalla, CMD,Poonawalla Exhilaration Stud

Private Limited, said “I am delightedthat history has been created andthough I am from Mumbai, I havealways had a close affinity with theMRC for 40 years or so. It is great toknow that a dream for the club hasbeen fulfilled during the first day ofa auction that has been resurrectedafter 25 years.”

The MRC chairman R.Ramakrishnan was thrilled withdevelopments that transpired on aneventful Sunday. “I am very happywith the response that we have gotfrom breeders as well as owners forthe auction that has been revivedafter such a long time.”

For the record, 32 horses wentunder the hammer for a total of₨1,56,05,000 and the average pricewas ₨4,87,656. The auctionconcludes on Monday.

History made at MRC auction

TOP OF THE CHART: The record-breaking bay filly, that wasbought for Rs. 20 lakh, snapped with its new ownerChaduranga Kantharaj Urs (right), R. Ramakrishnan,chairman of the Madras Race Club (left) and Zavaray S.Poonawalla of the Poonawalla Exhilaration Stud PrivateLimited. — PHOTO COURTESY: MADRAS RACE CLUB

NEW DELHI: Railways won theElite division while Delhiemerged Plate champion inthe senior women’s T20 cham-pionships.

All-round brilliance

Delhi rode on captainReema Malhotra’s all-roundbrilliance (31 not out, two for18) to edge Baroda by five runsin the Plate final at the VCAGround, Nagpur, on Sunday.

Mithali Raj (83 not out) setup Railways’s 72-run victoryover Madhya Pradesh at Ra-jkot on Friday for the Elitetitle.

Put in to bat, Delhi managedjust 115 for three wickets in thestipulated 20 overs.

Reema made an unbeaten 31in 29 balls and picked up twocrucial wickets in the middleto ensure victory for her team.

Her 58-run partnership withNeha Tanwar, who top-scoredwith 34, for the third wickethelped Delhi go past the 100-

run mark.In reply, Baroda managed a

decent scoring rate for the first15 overs, with all four of its top-order batters among runs.

However, none of the bot-tom five players scored a run,even as Tarannum Pathantried desperately to get someruns on board at the other endbefore being the last wicket tofall for a top-score of 30.

Baroda could only manage110 in its 20 overs for the loss ofeight wickets.

The scores: At Nagpur: Plate: Delhi 115 for

three in 20 overs (Neha Tanwar 34,Reema Malhotra 31 not out) bt Bar-oda 110 for eight in 20 overs (Taran-num Pathan 30, Babita Negi two for11, Reema Malhotra two for 18).

At Rajkot: Elite: Railways 168(Mithali Raj 83 not out,Thirushkamini 36, Nidhi Buley threefor 33) bt MP 96 (Ruchita Buley 38,Rajeshwari two for 13, SwagathikaRath two for 16). — SportsBureau

Railways, Delhi win

HAVING THE LAST LAUGH: The Delhi side which pipped Baroda byfive runs to win the Plate title.

NEW DELHI: Second seed MahakJain did her confidence aworld of good as she beat topseed Zeel Desai 7-6(6), 6-3 inthe girls final of the ITFgrade-2 junior tennis tourna-ment at the DLTA Complexhere on Saturday.

By beating an opponent towhom she had lost the final atthe same venue last year in thesame event, the small-built butstout-hearted Mahak emphas-ised the improvement she hadmade.

And that did her team, led bycoach Sajid Lodi, proud.

Commendable maturity

At 15, Mahak showed com-mendable maturity of tem-perament and the will to playeach point on merit, as shebounced back from beingdown 0-4 to record a memor-able triumph.

The first set was the key tothe contest of high intensityand Mahak survived a setpointin the tie-break to edge ahead.

After winning five games onthe trot from being 0-4, Mahakdid drop serve in the 11th game,after Zeel had held serve atlove, but broke back to forcethe tie-break.

Unlucky

Zeel was a bit unlucky as shegot an overrule in the thirdpoint on the ninth game in thefirst set, when she should havebeen ahead 30-15.

The point was replayed andshe eventually dropped serveas the match tended to slipaway from her firm grasp.

It had to be conceded thatthere were moments whenMahak was also not happywith some calls, but overall theumpire was quite sharp inmatching the fierce strokes of

the two players, both of whomwould be competing in theAustralian Open junior eventsoon in Melbourne.

In the second set, Mahakbroke serve in the fifth andseventh games, but failed toserve out the match in theeighth.

Zeel failed to convert threegamepoints in the ninth gameas Mahak forced the errors toclinch the contest in about twohours.

It was the second grade-2singles title for Mahak follow-ing the one in Japan. She hadwon the grade-3 title in Chand-igarh last week.

She had also finished run-ner-up in doubles with Yas-mina Karimjanova of Uzbek-istan.

The additional pointsshould help Mahak get closerto the top-50 from her currentcareer-best rank of 62.

The results (finals): Boys: Uisung Park (Kor) bt Len

Schouten (Ned) 3-6, 6-1, 6-0.Girls: Mahak Jain bt Zeel Desai 7-

6(6), 6-3.

TENNIS

Mahak caps a good run with titleSPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

� The first set was the keyto the contest of highintensity

� It was the second grade-2singles title for Mahakfollowing the one in Japan

NEW DELHI: Swimmers D. S.Srenethi of Tamil Nadu andGujarat’s Manna Patel domin-ated the under-14 and 17 cat-egories during the openingphase of the Khelo India Na-tional-level competitions hereon Sunday.

Organised by the Sports Au-thority of India under the aegisof the Sports Ministry, thecompetition has participantsfrom more than 25 states andUnion Territories.

The results (winners only):Cycling: Girls Under-14: T. Anjali

Devi (Man); Under-17: Joyshree Go-goi (Asm).

Boys: Under-14: Arshad (Del);Under-17: Esow (Andaman-Nico-bar).

Swimming: Girls: Under-14:50m freestyle: D.S. Srenethi (TN);50m backstroke: Shrungi Bandekar(Goa); 50m breaststroke: D.S.Srenethi (TN).

50m butterfly: Astha Choudhury(Del).

Under-17: 50m freestyle:Manna Patel (Guj); 50m back-stroke: Manna Patel (Guj).

50m breaststroke: B. Preethi(TN); 50m butterfly: AnubhutiBaruah (Del).

Boys: Under-14: 50m freestyle:Veer Khatkar (Del); 50m back-stroke: Tanmay Das (Del); 50mbreaststroke: S. Hiten Mittal (Kar);50m butterfly: R. Ameer Krishnan(TN).

Under-17: 50m freestyle: Kush-agra Rawat (Del); 50m backstroke:Soumyajit Saha (WB).

50m breaststroke: Varun Patel(Del); 50m butterfly: Anirudh H.M.(Kar).

4x50m freestyle mix relay: Un-der-14: Delhi; 4x50m freestyle mixrelay: Under-17: Tamil Nadu.

Srenethi, Mannarule the roost


MUMBAI: Africans dominatedthe elite category in men’s andwomen’s section at the 14thStandard Chartered MumbaiMarathon 2017. Tanzania’s Al-phonce Simbu, fifth-place fin-isher at the Rio Olympics,raced to victory in the men’ssection with a time of 2:09:32on a warm Sunday morning.Bornes Kitur of Kenya won thewomen’s event in 2:29:02. Bothwere richer by $42,000.

The results: Elite: Men: 1. Al-phonce Simbu (Tan) 2:09:32s, 2.Joshua Kipkorir (Ken) 2:09:50, 3.Eliud Barngetuny (Ken) 2:10:39; Indi-ans: Kheta Ram 2:19:51, BahadurSingh Dhoni 2:19:57, T.H. Sanjith2:21:19.

Women: 1. Bornes Kitur (Ken)2:29:02, 2. Chaltu Tafa (Eth) 2:33:03,3. Tigist Girma (Eth) 2:33:19. Indians:Jyoti Gawte 2:50:53, Shwamali Singh3:08:41, Jigmet Dolma 3:14:38.

Half marathon: Men: 1. G. Laksh-manan 1:05:05, 2. Sachin Patil1:06:22, 3. Deepak Kumbhar 1:06:28.Women: 1. Monika Athare 1:19:13, 2.Minakshi Patil 1:20:53, 3. AnuradhaSingh 1:25:20.

Simbu and Kiturrun to victory


NEW DELHI: The India under-17football team lost to Estoniau-18 2-1 in the ValentinGranatkin Memorial Cup atMoscow on Sunday.

India led 1-0 at the intervalafter Joysana’s 37th-minutestrike. Estonia equalised in the70th through Sorga and sealedthe match, thanks to Pihelgas’sgoal, in the 87th. — PTI

India u-17 WCteam loses

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CMYK

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SPORT | 19THE HINDU MONDAY, JANUARY 16, 2017

NOIDA/DELHI

INDORE: Parthiv Patel, the faceof Gujarat cricket for morethan a decade and a half,scored a precious 143 (196b,24x4) to lead his team to a

most memor-able maidenRanji Trophytriumph at theHolkar Sta-dium here onSaturday.

WhenParthiv depar-ted, after agutsy showingfor a little overfour and halfhours, his teamwas 13 runs

adrift of the winning post.Chirag Gandhi flashed his batfor consecutive boundariesof Shardul Thakur, wentdown on his knees andlooked skywards with sheerjoy even as the entire teamrushed in from the RahulDravid dressing room to cel-ebrate a fine victory.

Without doubt, all actionrevolved around Parthiv.Luck may have been withhim as he inside-edged shotshalf-a-dozen times and sur-vived a confident leg-beforeappeal on 120, the side 52runs away from the target of312.

The 31-year-old brought to

the fore all his experience toshow the way for a team thathe has now led to victories inall senior tournaments, in-cluding the Vijay Hazare (50overs) and Syed Mushtaq Ali(Twenty20) in the last fiveyears.

Gujarat resumed the final

day looking to knock of theremaining 265 runs requiredfor the win. Parthiv came tothe middle after Mumbai hadremoved Priyank Panchaland Bhargav Merai by themiddle of the 19th over withBalwinder Singh Sandhu Jr.and Abhishek Nayar striking.

The fall of the third wicketbrought together Gujarat’sbest pair and the fearlessManpreet Juneja sent a clearmessage that he was not go-ing to potter around.

He got into his groove andtook a heavy toll on Abhishekand Sandhu with a wide

range of shots. Parthiv sawluck smile on him and Mum-bai could hardly help it.

Often he hit the ball on the‘outside’, with the danger ofplaying on.

But the left-hander sur-vived with the ball going to-wards the fine-leg fence atleast six times before he hadreached his half-century.

But he also hit some lovelyshots rocking on to the backfoot, driving in front of thewicket and pulling the shortdeliveries to the boundary.

The two added 116 runs be-fore Juneja (54, 8x4) perishedto Akhil Herwadkar.

But, Mumbai’s fielders letthe team down with AdityaTare and Suryakumar Yadavputting down Rujul Bhatt on247 and 272.

Then, Herwadkar failed tolatch on to a diicult chanceand Bhatt, enjoying three‘lives’, remained unbeaten on27.

A true captain’s knockended when Parthiv top-edged Thakur.

He became the third cap-tain and wicketkeeper toscore a century in a RanjiTrophy final after Bombay’sMadhav Mantri and Punjab’sPankaj Dharmani.

The scores: Mumbai — 1st innings: 228.Gujarat — 1st innings: 338.Mumbai — 2nd innings: 411.

Gujarat — 2nd innings: SamitGohil c Tare b Nayar 21, Priyank Pan-chal c Yadav b Sandhu 34, BhagwanMerai b Sandhu 2, Parthiv Patel c & bThakur 143, Manpreet Juneja c Tare bHerwadkar 54, Rujul Bhatt (not out)27, Chirag Gandhi (not out) 11; Extras(lb-8, nb-3, w-5, pen-5): 21; Total (forfive wkts. in 89.5 overs): 313.

Fall of wickets: 1-47, 2-51,3-89,4-205, 5-299.

Mumbai bowling: ShardulThakur 22.5.4-90-1, B.S. Sandhu Jr.24-4-101-2, Vijay Gohil 15-4-46-0,Abhishek Nayar 15-4-31-1, VishalDabholkar 4-0-15-0, Akhil Her-wadkar 9-1-17-1.

Man-of-the-match: ParthivPatel

Gujarat won by five wkts. to liftthe Ranji Trophy.

Parthiv guides Gujarat to maiden Ranji titleThe skipper carves out a century as the Mumbai bowlers and fielders come up shortG. VISWANATH

HAIL THE HERO! Delighted team members hoist Gujarat captain Parthiv Patel after the left-handerplayed a valiant knock to help the team script history. — PHOTO: K. MURALI KUMAR

MELBOURNE: Pakistan’s stand-incaptain Mohammad Hafeezhit a fighting fifty to set up acomprehensive six-wicketvictory against Australia in thesecond One-Day Internationalon Sunday that levelled thefive-match series.

It was the first win forPakistan against Australia inAustralia across all formatssince a win in an ODI at theWACA in Jan. 2005. Mo-hammad Amir was the mostsuccessful Pakistan bowlerwith three for 47. — Reuters

Hafeez stars inPakistan’s win

Australia: U. Khawaja c Sharjeel bJunaid 17, D. Warner c Rizwan b Jun-aid 16, S. Smith b Imad 60, M. Marsh cImad b Amir 0, T. Head c Rizwan bHasan 29, G. Maxwell b Imad 23, M.Wade b Malik 35, J. Faulkner c Asad bAmir 19, M. Starc run out 3, P. Cum-mins c Rizwan b Amir 0, J. Hazelwood(not out) 0; Extras (lb-7, w-11): 18;Total (in 48.2 overs): 220.

Fall of wickets: 1-31, 2-40, 3-41,4-86, 5-128, 6-193, 7-199, 8-207,9-212.

Pakistan bowling: Amir 9.2-0-47-3, Junaid 8-0-40-2, Imad 10-0-37-2, Hasan 7-0-29-1, Hafeez 10-0-45-0, Malik 4-0-15-1.

Pakistan: Sharjeel Khan c Wade bFaulkner 29, Mohd. Hafeez c Hazel-wood b Faulkner 72, B. Azam c Hazel-wood b Starc 34, A. Shafiq c Wade bStarc 13, S. Malik (not out) 42, U. Ak-mal (not out) 18; Extras (lb-6, w-7):13; Total (for four wkts. in 47.4 overs):221.

Fall of wickets: 1-68, 2-140, 3-142, 4-195.

Australia bowling: Starc 10-1-45-2, Hazelwood 10-2-32-0, Cum-mins 10-1-48-0, Faulkner 9-0-35-2,Head 2.4-0-23-0, Marsh 6-0-32-0.

Toss: AustraliaMan-of-the-match: Mohd.

Hafeez.Pakistan won by six wickets with

14 balls to spare.

SCOREBOARD

NEW DELHI: A fit-again Wriddhi-man Saha was on Saturdaynamed in the Rest of Indiasquad that will take on first-time Ranji Trophy championGujarat in the Irani Cup to beheld in Mumbai from January20 to 24. Cheteshwar Pujarawill lead the 15-man squad.

The squad:

Abhinav Mukund, Akhil Her-wadkar, Cheteshwar Pujara (capt.),Karun Nair, Manoj Tiwary, Wriddhi-man Saha, Kuldeep Yadav, ShahbazNadeem, Pankaj Singh, K. Vignesh,Siddarth Kaul, Shardul Thakur, Ak-shay Wakhare, Ishan Kishan, andPrashant Chopra. — PTI

Irani Cup: Pujarato lead RoI; Sahaset for return

JOHANNESBURG: Sri Lanka lost 16wickets in a day as SouthAfrica’s fast bowlers sent itcrashing to defeat by an in-nings and 118 runs in the thirdTest at the Wanderers Sta-dium on Saturday.

Sri Lanka was bowled outfor 131 and 177 as South Africa’sfour pacemen tore the battingapart handing the home side a3-0 series whitewash. — AFP

South Africasweeps series

South Africa — 1st innings:

426.Sri Lanka — 1st innings: D. Kar-

unaratne c de Kock b Philander 0, K.Silva c de Kock b Rabada 13, K.Mendis c Duminy b Rabada 41, D. deSilva c Bavuma b Philander 10, A.Mathews c de Kock b Rabada 19, D.Chandimal c de Kock b Philander 5,U. Tharanga c Elgar b Olivier 24, R.Herath c Cook b Olivier 8, S. Lakmal cRabada b Parnell 4, L. Kumara (notout) 1, N. Pradeep c and b Parnell 4,Extras (lb-2): 2; Total (in 45.4 overs)131.

Fall of wickets: 1-0, 2-47, 3-62,4-70, 5-90, 6-100, 7-108, 8-126,9-126.

South Africa bowling: Philander14-5-28-3, Parnell 10.4-2-38-2,Olivier 9-3-19-2, Rabada 12-3-44-3.

Sri Lanka — 2nd innings: D. Kar-unaratne b Rabada 50, K. Silva c deKock b Rabada 0, K. Mendis b Parnell24, D. de Silva c du Plessis b Olivier12, A. Mathews c du Plessis b Olivier10, D. Chandimal c Amla b Philander10, U. Tharanga c Duminy b Parnell26, R. Herath c Bavuma b Parnell 10,S. Lakmal c Philander b Parnell 31, L.Kumara c Cook b Olivier 0, N. Pra-deep (not out) 0, Extras (lb-2, nb-1,w-1): 4; Total (in 42.3 overs) 177.

Fall of wickets: 1-2, 2-39, 3-59,4-87, 5-108, 6-108, 7-134, 8-177,9-177.

South Africa bowling: Philander10-1-35-1, Rabada 12-3-50-2, Parnell10.3-1-51-4, Olivier 9-2-38-3, Duminy1-0-1-0.

Man-of-the-Match: J-P Duminy.Man-of-the-Series: Dean Elgar.South Africa won by an innings

and 118 runs.

SCOREBOARD

VADODARA: The GujaratCricket Association(GCA) has announced anincentive of ₨3 crore forthe team which won itsmaiden Ranji title onSaturday.

This will be inaddition to the ₨2 crorefrom the BCCI,according to GCA vice-president ParimalNathwani. — PTI

Bonanza forParthiv’s men

NEW DELHI: TanongsakSaensombonsuk came into thefinal of the Premier Badmin-ton League searching for hisfirst victory. As it was

destined,the WorldNo. 11 Thairalliedfrom beinga game

down against Ajay Jayaramand brought the Premier Bad-minton League title to Chen-nai Smashers.

It was a topsy-turvy finalwith Chennai taking a 3-0 leadafter its ‘trump’ mixed doublescombination and P.V. Sindhucame good.

Mumbai made it 3-3 by prov-ing superior in its ‘trump’men’s doubles and H. S. Pran-noy scoring his seventh vic-tory following a close battlewith P. Kashyap.

So, all depended on an of-form Saensombonsuk whohad lost both his previousmatches this season but held a3-0 head-to-head recordagainst Jayaram.

It was his confidence thatmade Chennai opt for him

ahead of Tommy Sugiarto inwhat turned out to be finalmatch of the title-clash.

Though Jayaram took thefirst game, Saensombonsukgave little away in the re-mainder of the 37-minutethriller and won 9-11, 11-7, 11-3.In fact,

Once Jayaram made it 3-3 inthe second game, Saensom-bonsuk broke away for a five-point lead and never trailedagain. In the decider, the Thairaced away with the final sixpoints to leave Jayaram and

Rockets shattered. Smasherswas left celebrating its 4-3victory.

The maiden title was worthRs. 3 crore for Smashers.Mumbai, runner-up for thesecond successive year, re-ceived Rs. 1.5 crore.

The title-triumph was aworthy reward for Sindhuwho tamed World No. 3 SungJi Hyun 11-8, 11-8 for the secondtime for a 6-1 individual recordin the competition.

In fact, Sindhu’s only losscame against World and

Olympic champion CarolinaMarin. For Gabrielle Adcock,the doubles specialist fromEngland, it was a second suc-cessive PBL title, since she waspart of last year’s winner DelhiAcers.

Gabrielle and her husbandChris, won five out of sixmatches after winning their‘trump’ match to give Smash-ers the lead in the final.

Chris, however, could notrepeat his winning magic inthe men’s doubles but contrib-uted hugely to the team’s suc-cess through consistency.

It was a pity that Prannoy’sunbeaten run in the PBL waspushed into the backgroundfollowing Saensombonsuk’scomeback victory in the decis-ive singles match.

The results:

Final: Chennai Smashers beatMumbai Rockets 4-3 [Chris Adcockand Gabrielle Adcock (T) bt Nipit-phon Puangpuapech and ZeibaNadiezda 11-9, 11-6; P. V. Sindhu btSung Ji Hyun 11-8, 11-8; Chris Adcockand Mads Pieler Kolding lost to YongDae Lee and Nipitphon Puang-puapech (T) 10-21, 6-11; P. Kashyaplost to H. S. Prannoy 4-11, 11-8, 11-8;T. Saensombonsuk bt Ajay Jayaram9-11, 11-7, 11-3].

Chennai Smashers emerges triumphantRAKESH RAO

SMASHING SUCCESS: Chennai Smashers team with the PBLtrophy on Saturday. — PHOTO: AP

SYDNEY: After 16 years on thecircuit, Luxembourg’s GillesMuller broke through for hisfirst career ATP World Tourtitle with a 7-6(5), 6-2 win overBritain’s Daniel Evans in theApia International final onSaturday.

Muller at 34 was thehighest-ranked player in thetop 50 without a tournamenttitle after losing in five finals,including two last season,both on grass in 's-Hertogen-bosch and Newport.

“What a night! I’ve waited along time for this,” saidMuller. “It just means somuch to me to win this tour-nament in front of my wifeand boys.”

The results (finals):

At Sydney: ATP Apia Interna-tional: Gilles Muller bt Daniel Evans7-6(5), 6-2.

At Hobart: WTA Hobart Inter-national: Elise Mertens bt MonicaNiculescu 6-3, 6-1.

At Auckland: ATP AucklandClassic: Jack Sock bt Joao Sousa6-3, 5-7, 6-3. — AFP

Muller’s wait ends

LOS ANGELES: Los Angeles Clip-pers avenged a Christmas Dayloss with a 113-97 rout of LosAngeles Lakers in Saturday’srematch at Staples Centerarena. In Chicago, ChicagoBulls snapped a three-gamelosing streak with a 107-99 winover New Orleans Pelicans.

The results: Saturday: Utah 114bt Orlando 107; Washington 109 btPhiladelphia 93; Phoenix 108 bt SanAntonio 105; Chicago 107 bt New Or-leans 99; LA Clippers 113 bt LA Lakers97.

Friday: Cleveland 120 bt Sacra-mento 108; Utah 110 bt Detroit 77;Orlando 115 bt Portland 109; Milwau-kee 116 bt Miami 108; Memphis 110bt Houston 105; Minnesota 96 bt Ok-lahoma City 86; Boston 103 bt At-lanta 101; Toronto 132 bt Brooklyn113; Philadelphia 102 bt Charlotte 93.— Agencies

Clippers on top in LA derby

WELLINGTON: New Zealandstormed back into the firstTest against Bangladesh herewith three quick wickets toback up a century by TomLatham and set the stage for anintriguing final day.

Bangladesh, seeking a firstwin over New Zealand, endedthe penultimate day with a 122-run lead on 66 for three butpossibly only six wickets inhand after opener Imrul Kayesretired hurt. — AFP

Kiwis strike back

Bangladesh — 1st innings:

Tamim Iqbal lbw b Boult 56, ImrulKayes c Boult b Southee 1, MominulHaque c Watling b Southee 64, Mah-mudullah c Watling b Wagner 26,Shakib Al Hasan b Watling 217,Mushfiqur Rahman c Watling b Boult159, Sabbir Rahman (not out) 54,Mehedi Hasan c Southee b Wagner0, Taskin Ahmed c Southee b Wag-ner 3, Kamrul Islam (not out) 6; Ex-tras (b-2, lb-6, nb-1) 9;

Total (for eight wkts. decl.) 595. Fall of wickets: 1-16, 2-60, 3-145,

4-160, 5-519, 6-536, 7-542, 8-566. New Zealand bowling: Boult 34-

5-131-2, Southee 34-5-158-2, deGrandhomme 20-2-65-0, Wagner44-8-151-4, Santner 17-2-62-0, Willi-amson 3-0-20-0.

New Zealand — 1st innings: J.Raval c Kayes b Kamrul 27, T. Lathamlbw b Shakib 177, K. Williamson cKayes b Taskin 53, R. Taylor c Mah-mudullah b Kamrul 40, H. Nicholls cMehedi b Shakib 53, C. de Grand-homme c Kayes b Subashis 14, B.

Watling c Kayes b Mahmudullah 49,M. Santner b Subashis 73, T. Southeelbw b Mahmudullah 1, N. Wagner cKayes b Kamrul 18, T. Boult (not out)4, Extras (b-10, lb-3, w-16, nb-1): 30;Total (in 148.2 overs) 539.

Fall of wickets: 1-54, 2-131, 3-205, 4-347, 5-366, 6-398, 7-471, 8-473, 9-504.

Bangladesh bowling: MehediHasan 37-5-116-0, Subashis Roy26.2-6-89-2, Taskin Ahmed 29-4-141-1, Kamrul Islam 26-4-87-3,Shakib Al Hasan 27-2-78-2, Mahmu-dullah 3-0-15-2.

Bangladesh — 2nd innings:

Tamim Iqbal b Santner 25, ImrulKayes retired hurt 24, MominulHaque (batting) 10, Mahmudullah cWatling b Wagner 5, Mehedi HasanMiraz run out 1, Shakib Al Hasan(batting) 0, Extras (nb-1): 1; Total (forthree wkts. in 18.3 overs) 66.

Fall of wickets: 1-50, 2-63, 3-66. New Zealand bowling: Boult 4-

0-21-0, Southee 3-1-12-0, Santner 6-0-19-1, Wagner 5.3-1-14-1.

SCOREBOARD

PUDUCHERRY: It was only fittingthat the two best teams tooktop honours at the 67th seniorNational basketball champi-onships here on Saturday.

Uttarakhand tamed a fight-ing Tamil Nadu 68-60 in themen’s final for its third crown,while Kerala bagged its secondtitle after 32 years with a 68-55victory over Telangana.

Though it was a team efortfrom Uttarakhand, it would beunwise not to mention Amrit-pal Singh’s display.

The 26-year-old, relativelyquiet till the third quarter,broke free in the fourth. Hescored half of his 34 points inthe second half to tilt thescales in Uttarakhand’sfavour.

Trailing 23-9 in the firstquarter, TN had its best mo-ments in the second withJeevanantham and Muinbekplaying a major role. Ut-tarakhand could collect justfive points to TN’s 15.

The turning point fromTN’s point of view was the exitof Jeevanantham after fivefouls. The 22-year-old, hailingfrom Dindigul, was outstand-ing in shooting and defensiverebounds, mostly in con-trolling a marauding Amritpal.

Amit Kumar Singh, Ut-tarakhand’s head coach, said:“we play together for majorpart of the season as the major-ity of us work in ONGC. Thekey [today] for us was not justAmritpal, but Murali Krishnaand Yadwinder [Singh] indefence.”

For Kerala, the triumph wassweeter as it had come after1984-85 and after havingplayed in six finals includinglast year.

Kerala started well like ithas always done in the tourna-ment. But slowly and steadily,Telangana raced ahead withwonderful passing and shoot-ing.

Aishwarya Natraj and R.

Ramya were the chief archi-tects in Telangana taking afive-point lead (19-14) in thefirst quarter.

There wasn’t much of achange in the second quarterthough Kerala was getting itsact together as its playersshowed more speed and alac-rity in rebounds.

Anjana, with her preciseshooting, reduced the margin

BASKETBALL

Uttarakhand overcomes tenacious Tamil Nadu; Kerala women triumph

LONG DROUGHT ENDS: Kerala women celebrate their first crownin more than three decades. — PHOTO: S.S. KUMAR

K. KEERTHIVASAN considerably for Kerala.The third quarter witnessed

a definite shift as the much-fit-ter Kerala players continuedto basket more than their op-ponent.

The results:

Men: Final: Uttarakhand 68 (Am-ritpal Singh 34) bt Tamil Nadu 60(Jeevanantham 12, Rikin Pethani 10,Muinbek 10).

Third place: Punjab 88 (Tal-winderjt Singh Sahi 21, Rajveer Singh18, Gurvinder Singh Gill 16, ArshpreetSingh Bhullar 14) bt Rajasthan 70(Vinod Kumar 22, Sharad Dadhich 18,Mohamad 13).

Women: Final: Kerala 68 (Jeena20, Roja Mol 10, Anjana 10) bt Telan-gana 55 (Ramya 15, Suganya 12).

Third place: Indian Railways 84(Navaneetha 21, Sruthi Menon 16,Madhu Kumar 15, Sitamani Tudu 11)bt Chhattisgarh 77 (PoonamChaturvedi 31, Sangeeta Kaur 13).

NEW DELHI: Diptayan Ghosh’seasier-than-expected victoryover Saptarshi Roy ensured anIndian stayed in contentionfor the title following the ninthand penultimate round of theDelhi International Openchess tournament here onSunday.

As things stand, Amonatovis trailed by Ghosh and Uzbekveteran Marat Dzhumaev at7.5 points. M. Karthikeyan,Mishra, N.R. Visakh andUkrainian Adam Tukhaev areon seven points.

The results (Indians unlessstated): Ninth round: FarrukhAmonatov (Tjk, 8) drew withSwayams Mishra (7); DiptayanGhosh (7.5) bt Saptarshi Roy (6.5);N.R. Visakh (7) drew with M.Karthikeyan (7); Niranjan Navalgund(6.5) lost to Marat Dzhumaev (Ukr,

7.5); M.R. Lalith Babu (6.5) drew withAndrei Deviatkin (Rus, 6.5); AdamTukhaev (Ukr, 7) bt S.L. Narayanan(6); Nguyen Huynh Minh Huy (Vie,6.5) drew with Vitaly Sivuk (Ukr, 6.5);Aradhya Garg (6) lost to KarenMovsziszian (Arm, 6.5); AlbertoDavid (Ita, 6) drew with AkashThakur (6); S. Ravi Teja (6) drew withAdam Horvath (Hun, 6).

Eighth round: Vitaly Sivuk (Ukr,6) lost to Farrukh Amonatov (Tjk,7.5); M. Karthikeyan (6.5) drew withDiptayan Ghosh (6.5); Marat Dzhu-maev (Uzb, 6.5) bt Alberto David (Ita,5.5); S.L. Naryanan (6) drew withNguyen Hynh Minh Huy (Vie, 6)Adam Horvath (Hun, 5.5) lost to Nir-anjan Navalgund (6.5); Saptarshi Roy(6.5) bt Attila Czebe (Hun, 5.5);Swayams Mishra (6.5) bt Niaz Mur-shed (Ban, 5.5); N.R. Visakh (6.5) btSahaj Grover (5.5); Rakesh KumarJena (5) lost to M.R. Lalith Babu (6);V.A.V. Rajesh (5) lost to AdamTukhaev (Ukr, 6).

CHESS

Ghosh scores over Roy RAKESH RAO

WIJK AAN ZEE (THE NETHERLANDS):

Aided by B. Adhiban’s twoblunders in succession, P. HariKrishna won with surprisingease to join World championMagnus Carlsen in the secondplace behind leader Pavel El-janov (two points) after tworounds of the prestigious TataSteel Masters chess tourna-ment here on Sunday.

The results: Second round: P. Hari Krishna

(1.5) bt B. Adhiban (0.5); Loek vanWely (Ned, 0.5) lost to Pavel Eljanov(Ukr, 2); Magnus Carlsen (Nor, 1.5) btRadoslaw Wojtaszek (Pol, 0.5);Levon Aronian (Arm, 1) drew withWei Yi (Chn, 1); Anish Giri (Ned, 1)drew with Wesley So (USA, 1); IanNepomniachtchi (Rus 1) drew withDmitry Andreikin (Rus, 1); RichardRapport (Hun, 0.5) drew with SergeyKarjakin (Rus, 1).

First round: Hari drew withAronian; Adhiban drew with Wely; Sodrew with Carlsen; Karjakin drewwith Giri; Andreikin drew with Yi;Wojtaszek drew with Nepomniatcht-chi; Eljanov bt Rapport. — SportsBureau

Hari beatsAdhiban

NEW DELHI: Sakshi Malik won herlast bout of the Pro WrestlingLeague to remain unbeaten asDelhi Sultans managed to endits disappointing campaignwith a 4-3 victory and avoid thewooden spoon against bottom-placed UP Dangal at the KDJadhav Indoor Stadium here onSunday.

With both sides not winninga single match and already outof contention for advancing tothe next round, it was a battlefor pride and Delhi managed toedge ahead. Sakshi proved herworth, winning by Fall in oneminute 39 seconds againstManisha in the 58kg while lead-ing 12-0.

Praveen Rana finally got avictory under his belt, over-powering Georgian TarielGaprindashvili 12-6 in the 74kg

while Mariya Stadnik over-whelmed Elitsa Yankova 11-1 inthe 48kg.

With the match tied on threebouts apiece, David Tlashadzethrew Amit Dhankar overheadfour a four-point take downand then managed to hold on tohis lead for a 8-6 win in the finalbout to help Delhi clinch the is-sue.

For UP, Babita used her ex-perience to edge past youngersister Sangeeta 6-4 in the battleof the Phogats in the 53kg.

The results: Delhi beat UP 4-3

[Women: 48kg: Mariya Stadnik btElissa Yankova 11-1; 53kg: Babitalost to Sangeeta 4-6; 58kg: SakshiMalik bt Manisha by Fall; Men: 57kg:

Erdenebat Bekhabar lost to Amit Ku-mar Dahiya 1-3; 65kg: Surjeet Gre-wal lost to Andrey Kviatkovski 0-16;70kg: David Tlashadze bt AmitDhankar 8-6; 74kg: Parveen Rana btTariel Gaprindashvili 12-6].

PRO WRESTLING LEAGUE

Sultans finish with a winUTHRA GANESAN

LIVERPOOL: Pep Guardiolasufered the largest league de-feat of his managerial career asManchester City slumped to a4-0 loss against Everton onSunday.

Romelu Lukaku and KevinMirallas put Everton in con-trol at Goodison Park beforeteenager Tom Davies scoredhis first goal for the club anddebutant Ademola Lookmancompleted the rout after com-ing on as an 89th-minutesubstitute.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic scoredan 84th-minute header asManchester United preventedLiverpool from recapturingsecond place in a 1-1 draw.

Paul Pogba stood to beUnited’s fall guy at Old Traf-ford after conceding a softfirst-half penalty for handball,which James Milner conver-

ted, only for Ibrahimovic tosave his blushes.

The results: EPL: On Sunday: Everton 4

(Lukaku 34, Mirallas 47, Davies 79,Lookman 90+4) bt Manchester City0. Manchester United 1 (Ibrahimovic84) drew with Liverpool 1 (Milner 27-pen). On Saturday: Burnley 1 (Bar-ton 78) bt Southampton 0; Hull 3(Hernandez 32, 50, Mings 62-og) btBournemouth 1 (Stanislas 3-pen);Leicester 0 lost to Chelsea 3 (Alonso6, 51, Pedro 71); Sunderland 1 (Defoe40) lost to Stoke 3 (Arnautovic 15,22, Crouch 34); Swansea 0 lost to Ar-senal 4 (Giroud 37, Cork 54-og,Naughton 67-og, Sanchez 73); Tot-tenham 4 (Kane 12, 77, 82, McAuley26-og) bt West Brom 0; Watford 0drew with Middlesbrough 0; WestHam 3 (Feghouli 68, Carroll 79, Lan-zini 86) bt Crystal Palace 0.

Serie A: On Sunday: Cagliari 4(Borriello 40, 60, Pedro 44, Farias

64-pen) bt Genoa 1 (Simeone 29).

Lazio 2 (Milinkovic-Savic 45+1,Immobile 68-pen) bt Atalanta 1(Petagna 21); Napoli 3 (Tonelli 47,Hamsik 49, Mertens) bt Pescara 1(Caprari 90+4-pen); Sampdoria 0drew with Empoli 0; Sassuolo 4(Matri 15, 66, Ragusa 24, Politano83) bt Palermo 1 (Quaison 9); Ud-inese 0 lost to Roma 1 (Nainggolan12).

On Saturday: Crotone 0 lost toBologna 1 (Dzemaili 51); Inter Milan 3(Icardi 69, Perisic 86, Eder 90+3) btChievo 1 (Pellissier 34).

La Liga: On Sunday: Valencia 2(Montoya 17, Mina 73) bt Espanyol 1(David Lopez 85); Celta Vigo 1(Radoja 89) bt Alaves 0. On Sat-urday: Leganes 0 drew with AthleticBilbao 0; Barcelona 5 (Suarez 14, 57,Messi 52, Arda Turan 58, Vidal 80) btLas Palmas 0; Atletico Madrid 1(Gaitan 8) bt Real Betis 0; DeportivoLa Coruna 0 drew with Villarreal 0.

EUROPEAN FOOTBALL LEAGUES

Everton thumps Man City

PUDUCHERRY: There will be two big In-ternational tournaments held in Indiathis year.

This was announced by K. Govinda-raj, president of Basketball Federationof India, after the annual general bodymeeting here on Saturday.

The FIBA Asia Cup for women will beconducted in July tentatively scheduled

in Bengaluru, while the FIBA u-16 girls’championship will be held in October-November in India, with the hosting citynot yet decided.

A National league has also beenplanned this year, which will be heldafter August, followed by a professionalleague by the end of the year. — Spe-cial Correspondent

‘Two big tournaments in India’

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