16
W ith the commencement of the Amarnath Yatra being just a week away, the security agencies have height- ened vigil as intelligence inputs have suggested presence of 290 terrorists, including 34 Pakistani nationals exclusively trained by Pakistan Army for targeting security forces, in the Kashmir Valley. These ter- rorists could carry out attacks during the Amarnath Yatra, starting from July 1, the agen- cies have warned. As many as 130 terrorists are of Lashkar-e-Tayyeba (LeT), 103 of Hizbul Mujahideen (HM) and 34 of Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) besides two of Islamic State Jammu & Kashmir and five of Al Badr. In addition, three terrorists owing allegiance to al-Qaeda Kashmir also known as Ansar Ghazwatul Hind, whose chief Zakir Musa was recently killed by the security forces in an encounter, are also said to be active in the region. Out of the 130 LeT terror- ists, 79 are Pakistani nationals and of the 103 Hizbul terrorists in the Valley seven are Pakistanis and remaining are locals. Out of the 34 JeM ter- rorists, 21 are Pak nationals and remaining 13 locals. Following the inputs, the security grid in the Valley is being strengthened after con- tinuous review and monitoring of the situation in Jammu & Kashmir in order to avoid any untoward incident during the pilgrimage to the cave shrine. Nearly 115 terrorists have been killed by the security forces in Jammu & Kashmir as against a total of 254 last year. Over 70 security forces per- sonnel have been killed so far this year including 45 casual- ties in the Pulwama attack in February in which the CRPF convoy was targeted besides 19 of the Army. Last year, the Army alone suffered casualties of 61 personnel. According to the inputs, most number of terrorists liq- uidated in encounters belong to the JeM whose chief Masood Azhar was designated as a global terrorist by the United Nations earlier this year under the al Qaeda Sanctions List. Turn to Page 6 A fter human skeleton remains were found strewn near a garbage dump close to the post-mortem section of the Sri Krishna Medical College Hospital (SKMCH) on Saturday in Bihar’s Muzaffarpur, where 108 chil- dren have died due to Acute Encephalitis Syndrome and over 100 children are still being treated, an investigation was ordered, officials said. SKMCH Superintendent Dr Sunil Kumar Shahi told the media that he had ordered an internal inquiry after parts of deformed human bones and broken skull were found by some people behind the hos- pital premises. Meanwhile, as news chan- nels beamed the horrific images, the district adminis- tration swung into action and Sub Divisional Magistrate (East) Kundan Kumar and Superintendent of Police (City) Neeraj Kumar rushed to the spot. “We will not like to com- ment on this episode until we conduct a thorough inquiry”, the SP (City) said. Locals said with disgust that improper disposal of dead bodies has been a long-stand- ing problem in the area and stray dogs can be often seen pouncing upon half-burnt corpses. The SKMCH is in news for the death of more than 100 brain fever-afflicted children since June 1. A 42-year-old private tutor allegedly killed his wife Archana and their two- month-old daughter, five-year- old son and seven-year-old daughter by slitting their throats in the early hours of Saturday in South Delhi’s Mehrauli at their residence, police said. The accused Upendra Shukla, who hails from a village in Bihar’s Champaran and used to give private tuition classes of chemistry, has been arrested. Shukla gave his wife, five- year-old son Raunak and two minor daughters, Ranya (7) and two-month-old daughter, a sedative and later killed them while they were sleeping. Some wrappers of medicines were also recovered from the house. Two handwritten notes in Hindi and English in which Shukla confessed to killing his wife and children were recov- ered from the room. He, how- ever, did not give any reason for it, said the officer, adding that Shukla is suspected to be suf- fering from depression. Turn to Page 6 A mid rising geopolitical ten- sions between the US and Iran, India’s aviation regulator DGCA on Saturday said Indian airlines have decided to avoid the “affected part of the Iranian airspace” and reroute their flight “suitably”. On Friday, the American aviation regulator, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), issued a Notice to Airmen (NOTM) prohibiting US-registered aircraft from operating “in the overwater area of the Tehran Flight Information Region until fur- ther notice, due to heightened military activities and increased political tensions”. “All Indian operators in consultation with DGCA have decided to avoid the affected part of Iranian Airspace to ensure safe travel for the passengers. They will re- route flights suitably,” the DGCA (Directorate General of Civil Aviation) tweeted on Saturday. After the DGCA’s deci- sion, Air India’s Chairman and Managing Director Ashwani Lohani said,”No substantial effect on Air India flights. Details being worked out for rerouting on incoming flights.” As the majority of Pakistani airspace has remained closed for Indian airlines since the Balakot strike on February 26, the decision to avoid affected Iranian airspace on Saturday is going to further disturb the routes of their international flights towards middle-eastern and European countries, and the US. Post Balakot strike, Air India had to re-route, merge or suspend many of its interna- tional flights that connect India with European and American cities. On Thursday, Iran shot down a US military drone in its airspace, following which the FAA had warned that there is a possibility that commercial aircraft can be mistakenly tar- geted in Iranian airspace. Consequently, major air- lines around the world have already rerouted their aircraft. For example, Etihad Airways said Saturday that it has “suspended operations through Iranian airspace over the Straits of Hormuz and the Gulf of Oman, and will use alternative flight paths on a number of routes to and from Abu Dhabi until further notice”. United Airlines has decid- ed to stop Mumbai-Newark flight till September 1. In a statement, US-based United Airlines said,”Given current events in the Middle East and the continued closure of Pakistani airspace, we have decided to suspend our service between India (Mumbai and Delhi) and Newark until September 1.” Pakistan closed its airspace after Indian Air Force con- ducted air strikes on terrorist camps in Balakot in Pakistan on February 26. Since then, it has opened only two air routes that pass over through south- ern Pakistan and Gujarat. P olice on Saturday resorted to lathicharge injuring at least five people at Bhatpara in North 24 Parganas which once again witnessed street fights moments after a three-member BJP national delegation visiting the area left, sources said adding, one person had sus- tained head injuries. Even as the ruling Trinamool Congress leaders blamed the BJP for stoking vio- lence, Arjun Singh, the BJP MP from Barackpore under which Bhatpara is an Assembly segment, said police resorted to an unprovoked lathicharge adding the locals would continue their protests till the administration took measures to rein in the TMC hooligans. Accusing the BJP of “fish- ing in troubled waters”, State Minister and senior TMC leader Partho Chatterjee won- dered whether there was a need for the BJP delegation to visit the area. At least six people have died in one month. Out of them at least two persons died in police firing last week. The BJP’s fact-finding del- egation that on Friday visited the area said they had definite evidence to show that police had opened fire killing two per- sons and injuring the rest. “We have found shells of bullets used in Insas rifle,” said SS Ahluwalia a member of the delegation. “Police said they fired in the air but how did the bullets hit the victims on ground. Were the people flying in the sky?” he asked. The delegation, led by Ahluwalia and comprising Vishnu Dayal Ram and Satya Pal Singh, met the family of deceased persons and locals. The team was likely to submit a report on the situation to Home Minister Amit Shah, party sources said. P akistan has set a host of terms and conditions for the operationalisation of the Kartarpur corridor and opposed India’s proposals to make it open throughout the year to facilitate travel to one of the holiest pilgrimage sites of the Sikhs, officials said on Saturday. Islamabad has either put conditions or opposed all pro- posals moved by New Delhi and said that only 700 pilgrimages can have ‘darshan’ of the Gurdwara Darbar Sahib, Kartarpur, the final resting place of Guru Nanak Dev. Pakistan said pilgrims would be allowed to visit Kartarpur only under a special permit regime and on charging a fee against India’s proposal for visa-free and no-fee travel, a government official said. India has proposed that besides Indian nationals, Overseas Indian Card (OIC) holders should be allowed to go for the pilgrimage. But Pakistan said that only Indian citizens would be allowed. India sug- gested that the corridor should be allowed for use seven days a week and 365 days in a year but Pakistan said it would be allowed only on “visiting days”. New Delhi said 5,000 vis- itors should be allowed every day but Islamabad said not more than 700 pilgrims would be allowed, the official said. Pakistan has not responded to India’s proposal to allow 10,000 visitors on special days. India said individual or people in groups should be allowed but Pakistan said only groups of at least 15 people would be allowed. Pakistan did not agree to India’s proposal to construct a bridge over the Ravi river and also did not respond to India’s proposal to allow travelers to visit Kartarpur Sahib on foot. Despite Pakistan’s “non- cooperation”, construction work on the Kartarpur Sahib corridor was going on in full swing and on schedule for completing the project well before November 12, 2019, the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak Dev, another offi- cial said. The work on the pas- senger terminal building (PTB) is going on at a brisk pace and in parallel with work on the four-lane highway connecting the zero point and the state-of- the-art PTB from the existing highway.

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With the commencementof the Amarnath Yatra

being just a week away, thesecurity agencies have height-ened vigil as intelligence inputshave suggested presence of 290terrorists, including 34Pakistani nationals exclusivelytrained by Pakistan Army fortargeting security forces, inthe Kashmir Valley. These ter-rorists could carry out attacksduring the Amarnath Yatra,starting from July 1, the agen-cies have warned.

As many as 130 terroristsare of Lashkar-e-Tayyeba(LeT), 103 of HizbulMujahideen (HM) and 34 ofJaish-e-Mohammad (JeM)besides two of Islamic StateJammu & Kashmir and five ofAl Badr.

In addition, three terroristsowing allegiance to al-QaedaKashmir also known as AnsarGhazwatul Hind, whose chiefZakir Musa was recently killedby the security forces in anencounter, are also said to beactive in the region.

Out of the 130 LeT terror-ists, 79 are Pakistani nationalsand of the 103 Hizbul terroristsin the Valley seven arePakistanis and remaining are

locals. Out of the 34 JeM ter-rorists, 21 are Pak nationals andremaining 13 locals.

Following the inputs, thesecurity grid in the Valley isbeing strengthened after con-tinuous review and monitoringof the situation in Jammu &Kashmir in order to avoid anyuntoward incident during thepilgrimage to the cave shrine.

Nearly 115 terrorists havebeen killed by the securityforces in Jammu & Kashmir asagainst a total of 254 last year.Over 70 security forces per-sonnel have been killed so farthis year including 45 casual-ties in the Pulwama attack inFebruary in which the CRPFconvoy was targeted besides 19of the Army. Last year, the

Army alone suffered casualtiesof 61 personnel.

According to the inputs,most number of terrorists liq-uidated in encounters belong tothe JeM whose chief MasoodAzhar was designated as aglobal terrorist by the UnitedNations earlier this year underthe al Qaeda Sanctions List.

Turn to Page 6

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After human skeletonremains were found strewn

near a garbage dump close tothe post-mortem section ofthe Sri Krishna Medical CollegeHospital (SKMCH) onSaturday in Bihar’sMuzaffarpur, where 108 chil-dren have died due to AcuteEncephalitis Syndrome andover 100 children are still beingtreated, an investigation wasordered, officials said.

SKMCH SuperintendentDr Sunil Kumar Shahi told themedia that he had ordered aninternal inquiry after parts ofdeformed human bones andbroken skull were found bysome people behind the hos-pital premises.

Meanwhile, as news chan-

nels beamed the horrificimages, the district adminis-tration swung into action andSub Divisional Magistrate(East) Kundan Kumar andSuperintendent of Police (City)Neeraj Kumar rushed to thespot. “We will not like to com-ment on this episode until weconduct a thorough inquiry”,the SP (City) said.

Locals said with disgustthat improper disposal of deadbodies has been a long-stand-ing problem in the area andstray dogs can be often seenpouncing upon half-burntcorpses.

The SKMCH is in news forthe death of more than 100brain fever-afflicted childrensince June 1.

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A42-year-old private tutorallegedly killed his wife

Archana and their two-month-old daughter, five-year-old son and seven-year-olddaughter by slitting theirthroats in the early hours ofSaturday in South Delhi’sMehrauli at their residence,police said.

The accused UpendraShukla, who hails from a villagein Bihar’s Champaran and usedto give private tuition classes ofchemistry, has been arrested.

Shukla gave his wife, five-

year-old son Raunak and twominor daughters, Ranya (7)and two-month-old daughter,a sedative and later killed themwhile they were sleeping. Some wrappers of medicineswere also recovered from thehouse.

Two handwritten notes inHindi and English in whichShukla confessed to killing hiswife and children were recov-ered from the room. He, how-ever, did not give any reason forit, said the officer, adding thatShukla is suspected to be suf-fering from depression.

Turn to Page 6

���� �� ����� �� ����� ���� �"� � �������� � ���)� ������"�# �������� ���������� ��*������������ ��������������&����+ ����� ��������&������ �'(

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Amid rising geopolitical ten-sions between the US and

Iran, India’s aviation regulatorDGCA on Saturday said Indianairlines have decided to avoidthe “affected part of the Iranianairspace” and reroute theirflight “suitably”.

On Friday, the Americanaviation regulator, the FederalAviation Administration(FAA), issued a Notice toAirmen (NOTM) prohibitingUS-registered aircraft fromoperating “in the overwaterarea of the Tehran FlightInformation Region until fur-ther notice, due to heightenedmilitary activities and increasedpolitical tensions”.

“All Indian operators inconsultation with DGCA havedecided to avoid the affectedpart of Iranian Airspace toensure safe travel for the passengers. They will re-route flights suitably,” theDGCA (Directorate General ofCivil Aviation) tweeted onSaturday.

After the DGCA’s deci-sion, Air India’s Chairman andManaging Director AshwaniLohani said,”No substantialeffect on Air India flights.Details being worked out forrerouting on incoming flights.”

As the majority ofPakistani airspace hasremained closed for Indianairlines since the Balakot strikeon February 26, the decision toavoid affected Iranian airspaceon Saturday is going to furtherdisturb the routes of theirinternational flights towardsmiddle-eastern and Europeancountries, and the US.

Post Balakot strike, AirIndia had to re-route, merge orsuspend many of its interna-tional flights that connect Indiawith European and Americancities.

On Thursday, Iran shotdown a US military drone in itsairspace, following which theFAA had warned that there isa possibility that commercialaircraft can be mistakenly tar-geted in Iranian airspace.

Consequently, major air-

lines around the world havealready rerouted their aircraft.

For example, EtihadAirways said Saturday that ithas “suspended operationsthrough Iranian airspace overthe Straits of Hormuz and theGulf of Oman, and will usealternative flight paths on anumber of routes to and fromAbu Dhabi until furthernotice”.

United Airlines has decid-ed to stop Mumbai-Newarkflight till September 1.

In a statement, US-basedUnited Airlines said,”Givencurrent events in the MiddleEast and the continued closureof Pakistani airspace, we havedecided to suspend our servicebetween India (Mumbai andDelhi) and Newark untilSeptember 1.”

Pakistan closed its airspaceafter Indian Air Force con-ducted air strikes on terroristcamps in Balakot in Pakistanon February 26. Since then, ithas opened only two air routesthat pass over through south-ern Pakistan and Gujarat.

����� �������� +60+�!�

Police on Saturday resortedto lathicharge injuring at

least five people at Bhatpara inNorth 24 Parganas which onceagain witnessed street fightsmoments after a three-memberBJP national delegation visitingthe area left, sources saidadding, one person had sus-tained head injuries.

Even as the rulingTrinamool Congress leadersblamed the BJP for stoking vio-lence, Arjun Singh, the BJP MPfrom Barackpore under whichBhatpara is an Assembly segment, said police resorted to an unprovokedlathicharge adding the localswould continue their proteststill the administration tookmeasures to rein in the TMChooligans.

Accusing the BJP of “fish-ing in troubled waters”, StateMinister and senior TMCleader Partho Chatterjee won-dered whether there was a

need for the BJP delegation tovisit the area.

At least six people havedied in one month. Out ofthem at least two persons diedin police firing last week.

The BJP’s fact-finding del-egation that on Friday visitedthe area said they had definiteevidence to show that policehad opened fire killing two per-sons and injuring the rest.

“We have found shells of bullets used in Insasrifle,” said SS Ahluwalia amember of the delegation.“Police said they fired in the airbut how did the bullets hit thevictims on ground. Were thepeople flying in the sky?” heasked.

The delegation, led byAhluwalia and comprisingVishnu Dayal Ram and SatyaPal Singh, met the family ofdeceased persons and locals.The team was likely to submita report on the situation toHome Minister Amit Shah,party sources said.

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Pakistan has set a host ofterms and conditions for the

operationalisation of theKartarpur corridor and opposedIndia’s proposals to make itopen throughout the year tofacilitate travel to one of theholiest pilgrimage sites of theSikhs, officials said on Saturday.

Islamabad has either putconditions or opposed all pro-posals moved by New Delhi andsaid that only 700 pilgrimagescan have ‘darshan’ of theGurdwara Darbar Sahib,Kartarpur, the final resting placeof Guru Nanak Dev. Pakistansaid pilgrims would be allowedto visit Kartarpur only under aspecial permit regime and oncharging a fee against India’sproposal for visa-free and no-feetravel, a government officialsaid. India has proposed thatbesides Indian nationals,Overseas Indian Card (OIC)holders should be allowed to gofor the pilgrimage. But Pakistan

said that only Indian citizenswould be allowed. India sug-gested that the corridor shouldbe allowed for use seven days aweek and 365 days in a year butPakistan said it would beallowed only on “visiting days”.

New Delhi said 5,000 vis-itors should be allowed everyday but Islamabad said notmore than 700 pilgrims wouldbe allowed, the official said.

Pakistan has not responded toIndia’s proposal to allow 10,000visitors on special days. Indiasaid individual or people ingroups should be allowed butPakistan said only groups of atleast 15 people would beallowed. Pakistan did not agreeto India’s proposal to constructa bridge over the Ravi river andalso did not respond to India’sproposal to allow travelers tovisit Kartarpur Sahib on foot.

Despite Pakistan’s “non-cooperation”, constructionwork on the Kartarpur Sahibcorridor was going on in fullswing and on schedule forcompleting the project wellbefore November 12, 2019, the550th birth anniversary ofGuru Nanak Dev, another offi-cial said. The work on the pas-senger terminal building (PTB)is going on at a brisk pace andin parallel with work on thefour-lane highway connectingthe zero point and the state-of-the-art PTB from the existinghighway.

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Bharatiya Janata Party’s senior leader andformer Chief Minister of Madhya

Pradesh, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, said theparty would now concentrate on strength-ening the organisation in states where itwas not in power.

“We have to strengthen the BJP inthose states where the party is not inpower,” said Chouhan, who is BJP nation-al vice-president, while addressing a pressconference here on Saturday.

He said a fresh membership drivewould be launched in Uttar Pradesh fromJuly 6 to August end and it would coverover 1.69 lakh polling booths in the state.

Chouhan said across the countrythere were 10 lakh polling booths and themembership drive would run across thecountry covering each booth. He said theBJP had chalked out a three-pronged strat-egy for the success of the membershipdrive.

Chouhan said from July 1 to July 5,meetings of the organisational leaderswould be held in each district. He said themembers would be enrolled throughmissed call and later physical verificationwould be done of each call.

The BJP national vice-president saidfrom the organisational point of view, Uttar

Pradesh had been divided in 95 districtswhereas the actual number of districts inthe state was 75. He said the BJP had decid-ed to make four-member core teams forevery Assembly constituency where by-elections are to be held and the MPs, min-isters and legislators of these constituen-cies would be given responsibility ofensuring the party’s victory

After reducing Samajwadi Party andBahujan Samaj Party to virtual non-play-

ers in state as well as in national politics,the BJP in Uttar Pradesh is now planningto strike at the social vote base of these twoparties. At a meeting to discuss the party’smembership drive beginning July 6, thecadre was asked to focus on enrolling Jatavsand Yadavs as members.

BJP vice-president JPS Rathore, whois in-charge of the party’s membershipdrive in UP, said that the BJP would nowfocus on bringing Jatavs and Yadavs intoits fold. The party had lost seats in west-ern UP mainly because Jatavs did not sup-port it even though other Dalit sub-castesdid.

Party leaders have been asked to stopthe movement of Yadav votes towardsShivpal Singh Yadav’s PragatisheelSamajwadi Party Lohia (PSPL). The BJPfeels that Yadavs and Jatavs did not acceptthe SP-BSP alliance with ‘open heart’ andthe BJP can use this disappointment tomake inroads in the two vote banks.

The party strategists feel that if the BJPsucceeds in making inroads into the Jatavand Yadav vote banks, it will have no prob-lems in winning all 11 Assembly seats inthe upcoming by-elections.

“If the alliance had percolated downto the grassroots level, the results of UttarPradesh would have been different,” saida party leader.

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Defence Minister RajnathSingh said on Saturday

that the defence industrial cor-ridor in Uttar Pradesh wouldbe extended to Lucknow.

He said around 272 prod-ucts and equipment would bemanufactured in the units to beset up in the defence industri-al corridor.

The corridor was primar-ily announced for theBundelkhand region and Agra.

Addressing a meeting ofparty leaders and cadre inLucknow, Singh, who is visit-ing his constituency afterbecoming the DefenceMinister, said the BharatiyaJanata Party’s thumping victo-

ry in Uttar Pradesh in therecent Lok Sabha elections wasvery significant as the party’svote share increased despite thecoming together of caste-basedparties — Samajwadi Party,Bahujan Samaj Party andRashtriya Lok Dal.

“BJP’s big victory in thenational elections shows theparty’s vote share increased inUP despite the SP-BSP alliancein the state. After SP-BSPalliance in UP, some seniorleaders were thinking that we(BJP) will only get 10-15 seatsand not 72. But even after stay-ing in power for five years,there was no anti-incumbency.On the contrary, there waspro-incumbency and BJP’s voteshare increased,” he said.

Talking about NarendraModi’s vision, he said PrimeMinister Narendra Modi want-ed to fulfil the basic necessitiesof people. “For this, the gov-ernment has already initiatedseveral mega projects,” he said.

The Defence Ministerpraised the country’s soldiers.“Our soldiers carried out surgi-cal strike and then the air strikein Balakot. It sent out a messageto the world that India is a strongcountry, not a weak one,” he said.

Singh said the One RankOne Pension scheme wouldsoon be revised to benefit ex-Servicemen. The DefenceMinister said he had spoken tothe Prime Minister on thisissue and a decision would betaken soon.

Rajnath Singh retained hisLucknow Lok Sabha seat bydefeating his nearest rival,Poonam Sinha of SamajwadiParty by over 3.4 lakh votes.

Lucknow (PNS): Seven per-sons, including a 7-year-oldboy, were killed in three separatemishaps during the past 24hours.

Four youths, including twobrothers, were killed and onecritically injured when their carfell in the Grara river afterbreaking the railing of a bridgein Chowk Kotwali police stationarea on national highway 24 inShahjahanpur on Saturday.

Police said five youths fromGonda were going to Haridwarin a car and the driver lost con-trol over the wheel near the turnleading to Bareilly inShahjahanpur city.

The car first hit an electricpole and then plunged into theriver after breaking the railing ofthe bridge. The injured youth,Sriprakash, was rushed to thetrauma centre in Shahjahanpur.

The deceased were identi-fied as Umesh (27), Durgesh(28), Neeraj (25) and Vikas(27). They died on the spot.

The youths were going toHaridwar from where theyplanned to go to Kedarnath andBadrinath.

In a separate incidentreported from Kaushambi, a 7-year-old boy was killed and hisbrother injured when a vehiclehit them while they were play-ing at the roadside.

Police said the accidentoccurred on Friday evening inPuramufti area of the district.

The brothers, Sudhakar (5)and Diwakar (7), were rushed toa hospital where the doctors pro-nounced Diwakar dead. Policeare trying to arrest the driverwho managed to flee the spotwith his vehicle.

In Barabanki, two men werekilled after their tractor-trolleyfell in a canal near Sadhemau vil-lage in Fatehpur tehsil, policesaid Saturday.

Sudhir Yadav (24) andIndresh (35) drowned after thetractor-trolley fell in the canal onFriday. Villagers found the trac-tor-trolley following which theyinformed the police about it. Theincident is being probed, policesaid.

Lucknow (PNS): Main accused in the UttarPradesh Bar Council chairperson DarveshYadav’s murder case, Manish Sharma, suc-cumbed to his injuries at a hospital inGurugram on Saturday.

Darvesh Yadav was shot dead allegedly byManish Sharma inside a lawyer’s chamber onthe Agra civil court premises in the new UP BarCouncil president was felicitated by the lawyerson June 12. After firing five bullets onDarvesh Yadav, Manish Sharma had shot him-self in the head with the same weapon. He wasrushed to Gurugram for treatment on June 13and succumbed to his injury at 13:30 pm onSaturday afternoon, sources confirmed. He was

on ventilator.Darvesh Yadav, a native of Etah, was very

close to Manish Sharma but after some differ-ences they separated.

The family of Darvesh Yadav hadapproached the Supreme Court demanding aCBI probe into her murder and the apex courtis likely to hear the plea on June 25.

Darvesh Yadav was elected joint presidentof the UP Bar Association along withHarishanker Singh of Varanasi when bothreceived the same number of votes. As perarrangement, Darvesh Yadav was to be the pres-ident for the first six months and thereafterHarishanker would have taken the charge.

�� �� 0�'+�6,

Union minister and LokSabha member from

Amethi, Smriti Irani attackedCongress president RahulGandhi, saying the voters hadtaught a lesson to the naamdarand had elected a kaamdar.

The Union ministeraccompanied by Goa ChiefMinister Pramod Sawant wasin Amethi on Saturday.

“Did anyone ever thinkthat a woman from a commonfamily could defeat a big per-sonality? I am grateful thatAmethi made a revolutionwhen the people here went tovote for Bharatiya Janata Partyin a big way in all the booths,”she said and added, “Now thepeople of Amethi had got ridof a person who got elected butnever turned his face towardsthe people.”

Irani and the Goa ChiefMinister also met the familymembers of late former grampradhan Surendra Singh of

Baraulia village who was shotdead recently. Surendra Singhwas a close aide of Smriti Iraniin Amethi and had worked forher in the recent Lok Sabhaelection.

Pramod Sawant said, “I hadcome to work in Amethi in 2014too as a worker. I had workedwith Surendra Singh for 20-22days, I knew him very well.”

“We are saddened at thedeath of Singh. He was a devot-ed party worker and the partystands with his family,” Sawanttold reporters after meeting thefamily.

Smriti Irani accompanied bythe Goa Chief Minister is on atwo-day visit to Amethi. Thetwo leaders also met people atthe village adopted by late GoaChief Minister ManoharParrikar.

Parrikar had adopted thesevillages under the NationalDemocratic Alliance govern-ment’s ‘Village AdoptionProgramme’.

“Manohar Parrikar had

adopted this village. If the UPgovernment wants, we willwork on education, health,roads, water and other prob-lems in this village in his(Parrikar’s) memory,” the GoaChief Minister said.

During her Amethi visit,Smriti Irani played a goodSamaritan and took an ailingwoman to hospital in her con-voy ambulance on Saturday.She directed the officials to takethe woman to the district hos-pital. The woman’s relativesalso boarded the ambulance.

Earlier on May 25, SmritiIrani had visited the con-stituency after the murder ofher aide Surendra Singh inBaraulia village of the district.

Later, Smriti Irani inaugu-rated and laid foundation stonesof several development andwelfare schemes. Deputy ChiefMinister Keshav Prasad Mauryaand Minister of State and min-ister in-charge of Amethi dis-trict, Mohsin Raza, were alsopresent on the occasion.

�� �� 0�'+�6,

Chief Minister YogiAdityanath on Saturdaywarned health officials

that negligence in health ser-vices would not be toleratedand those found careless wouldbe punished.

Yogi asked the health offi-cials to ensure the presence ofdoctors and nursing staff andavailability of medicines, bedsand necessary medical equip-ment in primary and commu-nity health centres, and districthospitals.

Taking a serious note of thedeath of a patient due to non-availability of ambulance inGola tehsil of Gorakhpur, Yogidirected the chief medical offi-cer concerned to take stringentaction against the guilty so thatsuch incidents were not repeat-ed in future.

He directed the officials tominimise the ambulance ser-vice response time so that theyreached the patient in theshortest possible time. “If anypatient dies because of ambu-lance not being able to pick upthe patient, stern action will betaken against the official con-cerned,” the Chief Ministerwarned.

Yogi Adityanath held areview meeting with healthofficials of Gorakhpur andBasti commissionerates at BabaRaghavdas Medical College inGorakhpur on Saturday.

He asked the officials toensure 100 per cent success inthe Communicable DiseaseControl Campaign from July 1to July 31. He also directed theofficials to ensure cleanlinessand availability of clean drink-ing water in hospitals.

The Chief Minister saidthat all health centres shouldhave a proper system to preventspread of viruses because thesick person first approached thenearest health centre.

Yogi said awareness pro-gramme should be taken up asa campaign and there should beno hindrance in making thecommunicable disease controlcampaign Dastak Abhiyan asuccess. This programme willbe monitored continuously.

The Chief Minister saidthat during a meeting inLucknow, directives had beenissued to BSAs and DIOS of alldistricts regarding communi-cable disease control campaignand they should meet all prin-cipals in advance so that thecampaign could be made suc-cessful.

The Chief Minister furthersaid that 12 departments hadbeen included in theCommunicable DiseaseControl Campaign and theHealth department had beenmade it nodal department.

All these departments willwork in coordination with eachother.

Yogi also said that the staff,

nurses, medical officers shouldbe trained in all the PICUs andmini-PICUs. He said everygram panchayat had been givenfund and the the CMO shouldreview its use every month. Healso stressed on fogging andantilarval spray and regularremoval of garbage to controlmosquitoes.

The Chief Minister askedthe health officials to remainalert vis-a-vis encephalitis andif a patient suffering from itcomes from Bihar, Nepal or anyother place outside UP, he/shebe treated with diligence.”There should be no negligencein treatment of such patients,”he stressed.

Yogi directed the Health

department officials to inspectCHCs, PHCs and district hos-pitals and remove all short-comings they find during theinspection and take actionagainst the careless employees.

Yogi also stressed on clean-liness on BRD Medical Collegecampus and said all personnelresponsible for it would beheld accountable. He saideveryone should be sensitivetowards the patients and nopatient should die in theabsence of treatment and med-ication. He also asked officialsto complete the construction ofthe buildings under the med-ical college within time whilegiving special emphasis on thequality of work.

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'����,����������������������Lucknow {PNS}: The body of a

woman from Delhi was found hanging inShamli district, following which policebooked her husband for abatement to sui-cide, officials said Saturday.

The incident happened on Friday inKandhla town of the district, where her in-laws’ house is.

Police said Mallika Begum, who wasin her 40s, allegedly committed suicide dueto some problems in her family and a casewas filed against her husband, NafeesAhmad, following a complaint by herbrother.

Her brother, Savaiz, alleged in thecomplaint that her sister was beingharassed by her husband, police said.

Nafees and Mallika were married for22 years, they said. Further investigationsin the case are underway.

A 21-year-old woman was also foundmurdered on Saturday at Tawli village ofMuzaffarnagar district.

According to Circle Officer VijayPratap Singh, the throat-slit body ofShabina was found outside the village.

A case of murder was registeredagainst unidentified persons. The motive

behind the killing was not yet ascertained,the CO said.

The body was sent for post-mortem.Meanwhile, the Mathura police foiled

an attempt to loot an ATM early onSaturday, an officer said.

The suspected robbers fled after apolice response vehicle (PRV) came to theATM of the Union Bank of India inKrishna Vihar Colony, Circle OfficerRakesh Kumar said. CCTV footageshowed, that the incident had taken placearound 1 am. The fingerprints have beentaken and a search is on.

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Muzaffarnagar: Twoalleged liquor smugglers werearrested in Shamli district and20 cartons of alcohol worthover �1.5 lakhs were seizedfrom them. The two men,Bhim Singh and Krishan Malik,used to allegedly smuggleliquor from Haryana to UP.They were arrested on Fridayafter their car was interceptedon Karnal-Meerut Highwaynear Titoli check-post in thedistrict, police said.

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The woman, identified asUrmila of Maharajganj,

alleged that her teacher and oneof his aides duped her of Rs 1.6lakh in the name of facilitatinga job on Saturday.

The crime took place in2015 and the woman lodged thecase after the accused refused topay back the money. Reportssaid Urmila did post-graduationin Social Works from a collegeon IIM Road in Jankipuram in2014-15. She came in contactwith Anand Kumar Shukla whowas a teacher at the college. “Iwas looking for a job so Isought help from Shukla who

told me that he could facilitatea job of a ticket collector in rail-ways and asked me to pay thecash. I discussed the same withmy parents and then we decid-ed to pay the cash. Shukla toldme that I had to pay the moneyin the bank account of hisfriend Rajeev who in fact knewrailway officials in the recruit-ment job,” she alleged.

Urmila claimed that she,along with Shukla, went tomeet Rajeev at the latter’s officein Purania locality underMadiaon police station whereshe paid Rs 70,000 as advanceand later paid Rs 90,000 inRajeev’s bank account. Police areinvestigating the case.

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Exposing Lucknow police’sclaim about intensive

patrolling in the city, unidentifiedmiscreants burgled the house ofa businessman in Indira Nagarand decamped with cash andjewellery on Friday.

Palash Bhargava of BuddhVihar colony of Indira Nagarinformed the police on Saturdaythat he had gone to see hismaternal uncle who lives inGomti Nagar on Thursday andtook a night halt there. “When Ireturned home on Friday night,I found the main gate of houselying flung open. I entered the

house and found the doors ofrooms were also lying open andarticles strewn across the floor,”Bhargava told police.

He said the miscreants rum-maged through the entire thehouse and decamped with cashand jewellery worth several lakh.

Bhargava said his parentswere in New Delhi at present andthe house was locked from out-side. “I got late at my maternaluncle house and so took a nighthalt there. I live in a gated colonyso I had little idea that my housewould be burgled,” he told police.

Police said a case was regis-tered in this connection. “Sub-inspector Viresh Kumar had

been assigned the task to probethe case. The police are scanningthe CCTV footages to reach tothieves,” the police spokesmansaid. He added Bhargava ran awater plant selling bottled water.

Theft at Bhargava’s house incolony made residents apprehen-sive of safety of their houses.They also criticised the police forfailing to check theft incidentstaking place in a huge numberthese days.

They said:” Police officialsused to claim that policemenremain present at different placeswhile conducting helmet/vehicle-checking almost all the time.How then the thieves made a way

and burgled the house?” Meanwhile, the Madiaon

police nabbed two suspects oftheft cases on Saturday andclaimed that they had committedseveral thefts in the past in thetrans-Gomti area. Those arrest-ed were identified as VishalKumar of Bahraich and Surendraof Sant Kabir Nagar. Policeclaimed to have recovered a hugequantity of stolen utensils andsaid the goods belonged to differ-ent incidents of theft. “Both wereloitering near Tadikhana locali-ty on Friday night and so theywere rounded up and interrogat-ed. They owned up their crime,”the police said.

Lucknow (PNS): A watchmanof a factory manufacturing electricpoles died after he suffered electricshock on Saturday morning inKakori. His son lodged a case ofcausing death due to negligenceagainst the factory owner.

The deceased was identified asChhotelal of Kakori and worked atthe factory owned by SaurabhSaxena of Thakurganj. Chhotelalwas found dead on the factorypremises when he was switching onthe fan and suffered the shock. Hewas rushed to a hospital where hewas declared “brought dead”. Thefactory workers informed deceased’sson Shrawan who held Saurabh tobe responsible for the untimelydeath of his father. “The current car-rying wire at the factory was in ashabby state and my father died dueto this only,” he said.

After the news of death reachedthe deceased’s village, a huge num-ber of residents assembled at thescene and staged a protest. Theydemanded compensation to thefamily of the deceased and registra-

tion of a case against the factoryowner. Meanwhile, to avenge theinsult, two youths stormed thehouse of their rival and threatenedto kill him in Chowk on Fridaynight. Not only this, the miscreantsopened fire on victim’s motherwhen she intervened. She was luckythat she was not hurt in the incident.Police registered a case and arrest-ed one of the attackers on Saturday.

The accused arrested wasidentified as Zeeshan of Kakoriwhile his aide was identified asIkhlaq, also of Kakori. The com-plainant, identified as MehrunNisa of Imambara locality, saidZeeshan and Ikhlaq had enmitywith her son and had a dispute fivedays back. “On Saturday night,both the attackers barged into myhouse while searching for my son.They were abusing him and threat-ening him with dire consequence.I confronted them at which theyfired at me. But I ducked and wassaved,” she stated in the complaint.Police worked on the case andarrested Zeeshan.

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Aclass IV employee of JalNigam was trapped in the

fire which broke out at hishouse under mysterious cir-cumstances in Hazratganj onSaturday evening. He was suc-cessfully rescued and wasadmitted to Civil Hospital.Police said he suffered minorburns and set the room afirein drunken state.

Hazratganj SHORadharaman Singh said thepolice were informed of thefire incident at the house in JalNigam colony located in BaluAddah locality around 6.15pm. “When we reached thescene, we found the room on

the first floor of the buildingon fire and the man, identifiedas Amit Verma, trapped inside.The doors were bolted frominside. We gained an access tothe room through balconyand saved Amit,” he said. Theofficer added that Amit didnot suffer burns. “The rightside of the shirt which Amitwas donning was singed,” heclaimed. The inspector saidAmit was lying in a corner andwas in a drunken state. “He setafire his room in an inebriat-ed state but we are yet to findout the reason,” the inspectorsaid. The residents said Amitwas unhappy with his family.“He returned home in adrunken state and bolted the

doors. A little later, we noticedsmokes emanating from theroom followed by screams ofAmit. We dialled the policecontrol room and a teamreached the scene,” they said.They said Amit suffered minorburns in the incident.

The incident drew atten-tion of commuters passingvia the embankment road(near Parag Dairy) and resi-dents who assembled in ahuge number to the scene.Most of them remained rivet-ed to the scene until the oper-ation was over. Following theassembly of mob, the traffic onthe road came to a standstillcausing a jam-like situation inthe locality.

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Central Institute forSubtropical Horticulture

(CISH) would soon establish amango museum, directorShailendra Rajan said at theMango Fest. He said nearly 230mango varieties would be dis-played at the museum.

“The museum will havefibre-glass models of the man-goes and the same are beingprepared in Kolkata. The aimis to ensure that people fromfar-off places and around theglobe may come and see thevarieties prevalent in UttarPradesh since the state isknown for mangoes. This isour endeavour to boost eco-tourism,” he added.

The institute has displayed

over 300 varieties of mangoesand there are a number ofhybrids of different names,shapes and sizes of red, yellow,purple and green. He said thatthe demand for coloured vari-eties had increased. “Thesecoloured variety hybrids aredeveloped because of the com-bination and blends of antho-cynins. The peels contain moreantioxidants as compared topulp but unfortunately, thepeel is not consumed,” hepointed out.

The CISH director saidthey were trying to find theglycemic index of mangoes inorder to name the varietieswhich could be eaten by dia-betics. He added that CISH,with the help of the depart-ment of Biotechnology, New

Delhi, was developing anational mango databasewhich would have data relatedto the available varieties ben-eficial for farmers, students andresearchers. “We have made anexclusive website which has thedatabase of all the varieties inIndia, all the nurseries, andmango technologies fromacross the globe. We have pro-vided information about morethan 500 phytochemicalsfound in mangoes,” he said.

The weekly mango agroadvisory covers informationlike weather forecasts, manage-ment of mango diseases &pests, weed control, use ofmanures & fertilisers, inter-cropping etc which are avail-able online at the nationalmango database.

������� � #���� 0�'+�6,

Mango Fest was inaugu-rated on Saturday byMinister for Forest and

Horticulture Dara SinghChauhan at Indira GandhiPratishthan on Saturday.Chauhan said the need of thehour was to increase mangoes forexport so that farmers’ incomecould e increased. He said it wasalso important to focus onorganic farming.

“There are huge varieties ofmangoes in the state, includingDussehri, Langda, Chausa, Gorjitand Lakhnaua Safeda amongothers which vary in colours andshapes. There are scores oforchards in Lucknow,Saharanpur, Meerut,Moradabad, Varanasi, Ayodhyaand Prayagraj and through theMango Fest, the government isattempting to increase the qual-ity in mango production andexport,” the minister said.

There is a mango called‘Modi’ named after PrimeMinister Narendra Modi at theMango Fest and it is beingexhibited by Aam UtpadakBaghbani Samiti. There is arange of other interesting namesincluding ‘Husnara’, ‘Alif Laila’,‘Kala Pahad’, ‘Nazuk Badan’,‘Sindoor’, ‘Angoor Dana’,‘Bombay Yellow’, ‘Tomy Atkins’,‘Nawab Pasand’, ‘Makhan’,‘Lambori’ and ‘Jamun’ amongothers. CISH director ShailendraRajan said that a whole bookcould be written on why themangoes had been given these

interesting names. “There areprimarily three reasons. Theseare named after the seasons inwhich they grow, because ofcolours, and to appease others,”he said.

Giving examples, he said that‘Kala Pahad’ was named sobecause it was huge in size andblack in colour. “Similarly,‘Husnara’ has been named sobecause it is pretty and red incolour. Names of prominent per-sonalities are given to mangoes toappeasing them. Take for exam-ple ‘Nawab Pasand’ and ‘ImamPasand’ which have been giventhese names because these people

relished these varieties,” he said,adding that ‘Angoordana’ wasnames so because of its grape-likeappearance.

‘Dedhsera’, which weighsover one-and-a-half kg; ‘Karela’,which looks like a bitter gourd;and ‘Chitli’ with white patchesare the rarest of rare mango vari-eties. Mohammed Saad Farooqisaid he was taking part in theexhibition for the first time. Hehad 30 varieties at his orchardwhich could be called rarest ofthe rare, he added.

“I have an orchard inLeherpur, Sitapur. ThisDedhsera weighs over one-and-

a-half kg and hence this name as‘ser’ is more than a kg. However,it’s not among the best in termsof taste. The main problemwith this mango is that it doesnot ripen on the tree and as soonas it starts growing, it falls off andbreaks. We have to pluck thembut we don’t sell but simply dis-tribute these mangoes,” he said.

He said he had two treesproducing Dedhsera in hisorchard and one which wasdying was more than 80-year-old. These are humongous treesthat occupy a lot of space,” headded. “Earlier, it used to be avery big orchard, more than

1,000 bighas. The family gotdivided and the share that I gotis a small piece of land which hasover 149 trees and 30 varietiesare the ones which are very rare,”he explained.

There is also a variety called‘Karela’ as it has a rough surfaceand looks like bitter gourd whenraw. Another variety called‘Chitli’ which has white patch-es on the surface. “A hybrid, itcomes from the variety called‘Chitlikhas’, and the patches arelike the ones on Dalmatian dogbreed. The patches exist becausethose areas of the skin do nothave chlorophyll,” he added.

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The southwest monsoonarrived in eastern parts of

the state on Saturday and isexpected to reach the statecapital on Sunday. OnSaturday, Lucknow recordedthe maximum temperature at37.6 degree Celsius, while theminimum temperature was27 degree Celsius.

Light rains and cloudsmade the weather pleasant inthe city on Saturday morning.MeT director JP Gupta saidthe weather was pleasant inLucknow because of thearrival of monsoon in thestate. There would be fre-quent rains now, he added.

The forecast for Lucknowis partly cloudy sky with rainsand thunderstorm likely insome areas. The maximumand minimum temperaturesare expected to be around 36degree Celsius and 26 degreeCelsius respectively.

Rain and thunderstormare likely at many places overeastern UP and at a few placesover western UP. There iswarning for heavy rainfall atisolated places over east UP.Thunderstorm, accompaniedby gusty winds (30-40 kmph)and lightening, is expected atisolated places over easternUP. In the state, Aligarh wasthe hottest at 41.6 degreeCelsius.

Lucknow (PNS):Secretary, Union Ministry ofHousing and Urban Affairs,and chairman of LucknowMetro Rail CorporationLimited (LMRC) DurgaShankar Mishra reviewed theoperational 23-km stretch ofNorth-South corridor andworking of the various depart-ments. During his first ride, hediscussed at length the safetyfeatures inside the trains andstations, signaling and otheroperational aspects.

Following the ride andstation visits, he held a meet-ing at the administrative build-ing of LMRC with managingdirector Kumar Keshav andother senior officials. Mishraexpressed happiness over theincreasing ridership and saidhe was confident that the fig-ures would get even better afterthe re-opening of schools.

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A team of 66 students fromCity Montessori School per-formed yoga on InternationalDay of Yoga at the UnitedNations Organization head-quarters in New York. SecretaryGeneral, UNO, AntonioGuterras was also present onthe occasion. The CMS stu-dents were commended forthis effort. Before departing forthe event, the team had metDefence Minister RajnathSingh in New Delhi and soughthis blessings.

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la- 11491½ ubZ ffnYyh] ccq/kokj] eebZ 11] 22019@oS'kk[k 111] 11941No. 1491½ NEW DELHI, WEDNESDAY, MAY 1, 2019/VAISAKHA 11, 1941

MINISTRY OF ROAD TRANSPORT AND HIGHWAYS NOTIFICATION

New Delhi, the30thApril,2019S.O. 1676(E).--Whereas by the notification of the Government of India in the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways,

Department of Road Transport and Highways Number S.O. 3799 (E), Dated 01 August 2018, published in the Gazette ofIndia, Extraordinary, Part II, Section 3, Sub-section (ii) issued under sub-section (1) of section 3A of the National HighwayAct, 1956 (48 of 1956) (hereinafter referred to as the said Act), the Central Government declared its intention to acquire theland specified in the Schedule annexed to the said notification for building (Widening/Two-laning, etc.), maintenance, man-agement and operation from Km. 450.000 to Km. 486.775 on National Highway No. 76E (Tikari to Mirzapur) in the districtof MIRZAPUR in the state of UTTAR PRADESH.

And whereas the substance of the said notification has been published in “Dainik Jagran" and "The Times Of India" bothdated 15.08.2018; under sub-section (3) of section 3A of the said Act;

And whereas objections have been received and the same have been considered and disallowed by the competent Authority; And whereas, in pursuance of sub-section (1) of section 3D of the said Act, the competent authority has submitted its report

to the Central Government;Now, therefore, upon receipt of the said report of the competent authority and in exercise of the powers conferred by the

sub-section (1) of section 3D of the said Act, the Central Government hereby declares that the land specified in the said Scheduleshould be acquired for the aforesaid purpose;

And further, in pursuance of sub-section (2) of section 3D of the said Act, the Central Government hereby declares thaton publication of this notification in the Official Gazette, the land specified in the said Schedule shall vest absolutely in theCentral Government, free from all encumbrances.

SCHEDULE Brief description of the land to be acquired, with or without structure, falling within the (Tikari to Mirzapur) section of

NH76E in the stretch of land from Km. 450.000 to Km. 486.775 in the District of MIRZAPUR in the state of UTTAR PRADESH.State: UTTAR PRADESH District: MIRZAPURSr. Survy Type of Land Nature of Land Area in Nameof the Land Owner/InterstedNo. Number Hectare Person

Party Survey No.:1 2 3 4 5 6

Taluk:SadarVillage : Gopalpur

1 240 Private Agriculture/Non 0.004 Harishankar S/o Ayodhya Singh Agriculture 240

2 240 Private Agriculture/Non 0.152 Sapna Singh D/o Ramshiromani SinghAgriculture 240

3 240 Private Agriculture/Non 0.004 Santosh kumar Singh S/o Shamsher Agriculture Bahadur Singh

240 4 241 Private Agriculture 0.0742 Rakesh Kumar S/o Chhangur Singh

241 5 241 Private Agriculture 0.0743 Chandresh Kumar S/o Chhangur Singh

2416 241 Private Agriculture 0.0743 Manoj Kumar S/o Chhangur Singh

241 7 241 Private Agriculture 0.0742 Gaytri Devi W/o Chhangur Singh

241 8 241 Private Agriculture 0.297 Lalji S/o Shivdarshan

241 9 242 Private Agriculture 0.0039 Rakesh Kumar S/o Chhangur Singh

242 10 242 Private Agriculture 0.0039 Chandresh Kumar S/o Chhangur Singh

242 11 242 Private Agriculture 0.0039 Manoj Kumar S/o Chhangur Singh

24212 242 Private Agriculture 0.0038 Gaytri Devi W/o Chhangur Singh

242 13 242 Private Agriculture 0.0155 Lalji S/o Shivdarshan

24214 242 Private Agriculture 0.0078 Subedar S/o Ayodhya

24215 242 Private Agriculture 0.0077 Harishankar S/o Ayodhya Singh

242 16 242 Private Agriculture 0.0155 Rajkumaree W/o Late Jagtmba

24217 260 Private Agriculture 0.0712 Subedar S/o Ayodhya

260 18 260 Private Agriculture 0.0713 Harishankar S/o Ayodhya Singh

260 19 260 Private Agriculture 0.1425 Rajkumaree W/o Late Jagtmba

260 20 261/1 Private Agriculture 0.0091 Jai Singh S/o Subedar Singh

261/121 261/1 Private Agriculture 0.0091 Rajan Singh S/o Subedar Singh

261/122 261/1 Private Agriculture 0.0183 Rajkumarec W/o Late Jagtimba

261/123 261/1 Private Agriculture 0.0092 Subedar S/o Ayodhya

261/1 24 261/1 Private Agriculture 0.0273 Harishankar S/o Ayodhya Singh

261/1 25 261/2 Private Agriculture 0.0115 Rakesh Kumar S/o Chhangur Singh

261/2 26 261/2 Private Agriculture 0.0115 Chandresh Kumar S/o Chhangur Singh

261/227 261/2 Private Agriculture 0.0115 Manoj Kumar S/o Chhangur Singh

261/2 28 261/2 Private Agriculture 0.0115 Gaytri Devi W/o Chhangur Singh

261/2 29 261/2 Private Agriculture 9.046 Lalji S/o Shivdarshan

261/2 30 262/2 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0175 Satynarayan Singh urf Manager Singh

Agriculture S/o Kashee Singh262/2

31 262/2 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0058 Mahendra Vikram Singh urf Munna Agriculture Singh S/o Sheetla urf Bundela Singh

262/2 32 262/2 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0058 Manvendra Vikram Singh urf Mangal

Agriculture Singh S/o Sheetla urf Bundela Singh 262/2

33 262/2 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0059 Madhvendra Vikram Singh urf Lakhan Agriculture S/o Sheetla urf Bundela Singh

262/234 262/2 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0044 Tribhuwan Singh S/o Matasaran

Agriculture 262/2 35 262/2 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0044 Gareeb Singh S/o Matasaran

Agriculture 262/2 36 262/2 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0263 Abhiman Singh S/o Tara Singh

Agriculture 262/2 37 262/2 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0262 Avdhesh Singh S/o Tara Singh

Agriculture 262/2 38 262/2 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0087 Ramakwal Singh S/o Kallu

Agriculture 262/2 39 263 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0387 Satynarayan Singh urf Manager Singh

" Agriculture S/o Kashee Singh 263

40 263 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0129 Mahendra Vikram Singh urf Munna Agriculture Singh S/o Sheetla urf Bundela Singh

263 41 263 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0129 Manvendra Vikram Singh urf Mangal

Agriculture Singh S/o Sheetla urf Bundela Singh 263

42 263 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0129 Madhvendra Vikram Singh urf Lakhan S/o Agriculture Sheetla urf Bundela Singh

263 43 263 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0096 Tribhuwan Singh S/o Matasaran

Agriculture 263 44 263 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0097 Gareeb Singh S/o Matasaran

Agriculture 263 45 263 Private Agriculture/Non 0.058 Abhiman Singh S/o Tara Singh

Agriculture 263 46 263 Private Agriculture/Non 0.058 Avdhesh Singh S/o Tara Singh

Agriculture 263 47 263 Private Agruculture/Non 0.0193 Ramakwal Singh S/o Kallu

Agriculture 26348 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0417 Satynarayan Singh urf Manager Singh

Agriculture S/o Kashee Singh 264

49 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0139 Mahendra Vikram Singh urf Agriculture Munna Singh S/o Sheetla urf

Bundela Singh 264

50 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0139 Manvendra Vikram Singh urfAgriculture Mangal SinghS/o Sheetla urf

BundelaSingh264

51 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0139 Madhvendra Vikram Singh urf Lakhan Agriculture S/o Sheetla urf Bundela Singh

264 52 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0104 Tribhuwan Singh S/o Matasaran

Agriculture 264 53 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0104 Gareeb Singh S/o Matasaran

Agriculture 264 54 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0104 KalluSingh S/o Teju Singh

Agriculture 264 55 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0405 Abhiman Singh S/o Tara Singh

Agriculture 264 56 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0405 Avdhesh Singh S/o Tara Singh

Agriculture 264 57 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0145 Basanti Devi W/o Basantlal

Agriculture 264 58 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0055 Ramashankar Sahni S/o

Agriculture Ghuranprasad Sehni264

59 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0055 Manishankar Sahni S/o Agriculture Ghuranprasad Sahni

264 60 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.011 Soubhagywati Devi W/o

Agriculture Ratan Kumar Gupta264

61 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0075 Gopal Nath S/o Kewlaprasad Agriculture 264

62 264 Private Agriculture/Non 0.0104 Ramakwal Singh S/o Kallu Agriculture 264

63 265 Private Agriculture 0.0007 Satynarayan Singh urf Manager Singh S/o Kashee Singh

265 64 265 Private Agriculture 0.0003 Mahendra Vikram Singh urf Munna

Singh S/o Sheetla urf Bundcla Singh 265

65 265 Private Agriculture 0.0002 Manvendra Vikram Singh urf MangalSingh S/o Sheetla urf Bundela Singh

26566 265 Private Agriculture 0.0002 Madhvendra Vikram Singh urf Lakhan S/o

Sheetla urf Bundela Singh 265

67 265 Private Agriculture 0.0002 Tribhuwan Singh S/o Matasaran 265

68 265 Private Agriculture 0.0001 Gareeb Singh S/o Matasaran 265

69 265 Private Agriculture 0.001 Abhiman Singh S/o Tara Singh 265

70 265 Private Agriculture 0.001 Avdhesh Singh S/o Tara Singh 265

71 265 Private Agriculture 0.0003 Ramakwal Singh S/o Kallu 265

72 268 Government Non Agriculture 0.0264 Gramsabha (Trench/Ditch) 268

73 269 Private Agriculture 0.0076 Kamla Shankar S/o Ramchandra 269

74 269 Private Agriculture 0.0076 Kailashnath Bramhdev Slo Lalbahadur269

75 269 Private Agriculture 0.0038 Amar Krishan S/o Matadyal 269

76 269 Private Agriculture 0.0038 Ramashre S/o Bhuneshwar 269

77 269 Private Agriculture 0.0013 Rameshwaree Devi W/o Ramujagir 269

78 269 Private Agriculture 0.0013 Shantee Devi W/o Lalman 269

79 269 Private Agriculture 0.0012 Susheela Devi W/o Dayashankar 269

80 269 Private Agriculture 0.0019 Rajdhar S/o Ramjee 269

81 269 Private Agriculture 0.0019 Sheshdhar S/o Ramjee 269

82 270 Private Agriculture 0.0144 Bholanath S/o Bechu 270

TOTAL 1.9282

[F. No. NH-12014/18/2016/UP/NH-II/3A/3D]RAJESH GUPTA, Dy. Secy.

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Jammu: Lauding border resi-dents for providing support totroops and maintaining vigil intheir areas, Army chief GeneralBipin Rawat said on Saturdaythat the forces were fully pre-pared for emerging securitychallenges.

"I am fully satisfied with theoperational preparedness oftroops to meet all security chal-lenges,” the Army chief saidduring his visit to the Akhnoorsector here.

On Friday, the Army chiefhad visited troops on the Lineof Control (LoC) in Rajouri dis-trict and assured material andmoral support to all soldiers forenhancing operational capa-bilities.

He also reviewed the secu-rity situation in the state andexhorted all ranks to remainvigilant to counter nefariousdesigns of the enemy and anti-national elements.

On the second day of his

tour, General Rawat, accompa-nied by General OfficerC o m m a n d i n g - i n - c h i e f ,Northern Command,Lieutenant General RanbirSingh, visited troops in theAkhnoor sector and was briefedand updated by General OfficerCommanding, White KnightCorps, Lt Gen Paramjit Singhand commanders on ground, adefence spokesman said.

He said General Rawatreviewed the preparations torespond to ceasefire violationsby Pakistani forces, counter

infiltration grid and preparationto deal with provocations byenemy on the LoC and theInternational Border (IB).

The Army chief was alsobriefed on infusion of technol-ogy with operational techniquesand integration of force multi-pliers, which has increasedcapabilities manifold, thespokesman said.

He said the Army chief alsointeracted with the soldiersand commended them for self-less devotion and high standardof professionalism.

He was appreciative of thesynergy between Jammu andKashmir Police, civil adminis-tration, Border Security Forceand the Army, the spokesmansaid.

He said General Rawatconveyed his appreciation to thecitizens living along the borderfor providing all support to thetroops and maintaining vigil intheir areas. PTI

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Thiruvananthapuram: Facingheat over the rape allegationsagainst his elder son, CPI(M)State secretary KodiyeriBalakrishnan on Saturdaysought to distance the party andhimself from the case.

Looking visibly uncomfort-able as he faced a barrage ofquestions from the media per-sonnel, Balakrishnan said hisson Binoy was an adult andresponsible for hisactions,adding that he need notexpect any protection from himor from the party.

This is the first timeKodiyeri was reacting on thecharges of rape and cheatingagainst his son, raised by a for-mer bar dancer of Mumbai.

"Neither my party CPI(M)nor I will protect Binoy. He is anadult. He stays as a separate fam-ily and is responsible for hisactions," Kodiyeri said.

The complainant, a 33-year-old woman from Mumbai, hadalleged that Binoy had raped herpromising marriage and she

had an eight-year-old son fromthe relationship.

Mumbai Police has regis-tered a case against Binoy, whois said to be abscounding.

Balakrishnan, who wasundergoing ayurvedic treat-ment,today attended the CPI(M)state secretariat at the AKGCentre here and also met ChiefMinister Pinarayi Vijayan inthe morning.

Speculations were rife sincethis morning that Kodiyeriwould put in his papers.

Surprising the media, theveteran leader called for a pressmeet this evening and made itclear his son would fight the caselegally and neither he nor theparty would back him.

He also said the party wouldnot shoulder the responsiblity ofthe misdemeanours commit-ted by the family members ofparty workers. "This is a lessonto every party member thatCPI(M) will not take responsi-bility in case any family mem-ber commits any offence,"

Balakrishanan said.The allegations need to be

probed to bring out the truth, hesaid, adding Binoy would haveto prove his innocence.

The CPI(M)'s stand on theissue had earlier been made clearby its General Secretary SitaramYechury, who had stated that theparty will not interfere in thematter as it was an issue relatedto an individual and not to theparty, he said. Denying mediareports that he had offered tostep down from the party lead-ership, Balakrishnan said "if Ihad done any wrong, the partywill decide and take the action".

Claiming that he got toknow about the case only afterMumbai police registered anFIR, he rejected media reportsthat the woman and her familyhad contacted him. "No onespoke to me in this regard.All thereports that I or my family hadcontacted her (complainant) areallegations that have been men-tioned in the complaint. Let thecourt decide," he said. PTI

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Mumbai: MaharashtraMinister Girish Mahajan'scomment that the next ChiefMinister is expected to befrom the BJP drew a sharpresponse from Shiv Sena chiefUddhav Thackeray onSaturday.

The alliance between thetwo parties was forged after heheld discussions with BJP chiefAmit Shah and chief ministerDevendra Fadnavis (before theLok Sabha polls), Thackeraysaid.

"We formed the allianceafter BJP's national presidentAmit Shah, chief ministerFadnavis and I reached amutual understanding. No oneelse should poke his nose intothe issue of who will be thenext chief minister," Thackeraywas quoted as saying in a Senastatement.

The two saffron parties,

partners in the ruling coalition,decided to continue thealliance for the Assembly polls(due in October) as well whenthey decided on seat- sharingformula for the recent LokSabha elections.

Speaking to reporters,Mahajan, senior BJP leaderand state Water ResourcesMinister, had said everyoneexpected that the next chiefminister should be from hisparty.

Thackeray said there wereseveral burning issues beforethe state which needed to bedealt with.

"There are problems ofpoor farmers who voted us topower. But instead of address-ing their woes, the question ofwho will become the chiefminister has assumed signifi-cance for some people," theSena chief said. PTI

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Srinagar: Jammu & KashmirGovernor Satya Pal Malik saidon Saturday the situation in theValley had vastly improved overthe past year and the HurriyatConference was willing to enterinto a dialogue with theGovernment.

"The Hurriyat Conferencewas not willing to talk. RamVilas Paswan was standing attheir door (in 2016), but theywere not ready to talk, Maliksaid at a funtion here. "Today,they are ready for talks and wantto hold dialogue. There is achange in everyone."

Malik said the situation inKashmir had improved eversince he took over as theGovernor last August, addingthat recruitment of militants hadalmost stopped and stone-pelt-ing incidents on Fridays hadended.

"I feel good that the tem-perature (of the situation) hascome down significantly sincethe day I arrived here," he said.

"We do not feel good whena youth is killed, we want tobring him back. There is a lot ofthought being given as to whatkind of scheme is needed tobring them back," Malik said."But when someone opens fire,the security forces will fire back.

They would not present a bou-quet of flowers."

The Governor hinted that itwas not easy to assess the situ-ation of Kashmir while sittingelsewhere in the country even ifone had served or lived in thevalley for some time.

"When I visit Delhi, thereare so many people who claimto be Kashmir hand. I ask themwhen were you in Kashmir.They say 15 years ago," he said."Kashmir changes in 15 days,you do not know anything. Ifyou want to know Kashmir, livethere and see it."

Malik said when he came tothe state he decided not to lis-ten only to intelligence people.

"I am in touch with around200 people and from them Ihave come to know about theproblems. The diseases havebeen diagnosed, the diseases areplenty but these can be cured.The narrative can be changed,the prerequisite is that the inten-tions are good and sincere onboth sides," he added. PTI

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Varanasi (UP): Newly elected BahujanSamaj Party (BSP) MP Atul Rai, who hasbeen accused of rape, surrendered in acourt here on Saturday.

The judicial magistrate (first)remanded Rai in 14-day judicial custody.

An FIR was registered against Rai onMay 1 on a complaint by a college stu-dent who had alleged that he took herhome on the pretext of meeting his wifebut sexually assaulted her.

Rai, who has denied the rape allega-tions, had been on the run since the lodg-ing of the FIR.

The parliamentarian from the Ghosiconstituency in Uttar Pradesh was declaredabsconder by the local court.The SupremeCourt had on May 27 refused to grant Raiprotection from arrest in the rape casewhile noting that 16 other criminal caseswere pending against him. PTI

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Rajnandgaon: Union MinisterGiriraj Singh said on Saturdaythat those opposing the tripletalaq legislation were doinginjustice to the Muslim women.

The Union governmentFriday introduced the freshMuslim Women (Protection ofRights on Marriage) Bill 2019which criminalises the practiseof triple talaq.

"Those who are opposingthe bill to ban triple talaq in thename of Muslims and religionare doing injustice to our sisters(the Muslim women)," the BJPleader said.

"I want to ask whether lawshave not been been enacted tocheck social evil among theHindus like child-marriage and

the custom of `sati' (burning ofwindow on husband's funeralpyre)," the Union Minister forAnimal Husbandry said.

He was speaking atRajnandgaon in Chhattisgarhafter attending inaugural sessionof a workshop related to his min-istry.

"Those who are opposing it(the bill) have a vested politicalinterest," he said when askedabout the Congress' opposition.

He also advocated simulta-neous elections. "...No year pass-es when there is no election.Frequent elections to panchay-at bodies, municipal bodies,assemblies or Parliament affectthe continuity of developmentprograms," he said. PTI

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Chennai: As Tamil Nadu reels under theworst water crisis, the ruling AIADMK onSaturday performed 'yagna' in templesacross the State, while the Opposition DMKstaged "empty pot" demonstrations, urgingthe Government to take steps to address theissue.

Senior AIADMK leader and FisheriesMinister D Jayakumar took part in a 'yagna'at a Shiva temple here and planted saplingsin the premises of the shrine.

He told reporters that performing yag-nas was "an expression of faith", hoping thatthe Almighty will answer their prayers forrain.

DMK leader and former city mayor MaSubramanian, who led an agitation here, hitout at the AIADMK, saying executing planswith rationale alone could help address the

situation. "Conducting such rituals have noutility," he told PTI.

Municipal Administration Minister S PVelumani took part in a 'yagna' atPatteeswaram temple in Coimbatore district.

As Velumani took part in prayers, hun-dreds of DMK cadres staged a protest, seek-ing the Minister's resignation for his "failure"to create necessary infrastructure for watersupply. Talking to reporters later, he said themove to bring water from Jolarpet in Velloredistrict to Chennai would not affect the wateravailability there.

Former Lok Sabha deputy speaker MThambidurai took part in a prayer inanother city temple. Education Minister KA Sengottaiyan participated in a puja atPachamalai Murugan temple in Erode dis-trict. PTI

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Palanpur: A SpecialInvestigation Team (SIT) wasformed on Saturday to probethe alleged murders of fourmembers of a family inGujarat’s Banaskantha district,police said.

While police suspected thatKarsanji Patel (55), a debt-ridden farm labourer, hadkilled his wife and three chil-dren with an axe beforeattempting suicide in Kudavillage in Lakhani taluka of thedistrict on Friday, the villagershave disputed this version.

They claimed that somemoney lenders might havekilled the family members ofPatel. "A five-member SIT hasbeen formed to investigate thegruesome murders after vil-

lagers held a sit-in and refusedto receive the bodies from acommunity health centre untilthe murderers are arrested,"said IG, Border range,Dharmendrasinh Vaghela.

The villagers relented andaccepted the bodies after theSIT was set up.

A large number of vil-lagers gathered outside thecommunity health centre inLakhani and even called for abandh, arguing that Patel wasnot behind the killings.

Police had Friday said thatPatel, who is currently hospi-talised with head injuries, hadaxed his wife Anandiben (50),their two sons, Ukaji (22) andSuresh (13), and daughterBhavna (22). PTI

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Tiruchirappalli (TN): A seniorDMK leader on Saturday askedparty chief M K Stalin not totake on board key ally Congressfor the local body polls, expect-ed to be held shortly andinstead go it alone.

KN Nehru, a former StateMinister and DMK's districtsecretary, addressing a protestdemonstration here, said tallclaims were being made byCongress leaders on gettingmaximum number of seatsfrom DMK for the local bodypolls.

"A Congress functionaryhas claimed to get 35 wards insouth Chennai. Another wants50 seats elsewhere. If this istheir mindset, what will be leftfor DMK workers?

"Where will we go? Shouldwe stand on the road?"he asked.

Hence "I am telling ourpresident; to be of proper useto the people, it will be betterfor us to face the local bodyelections alone."

The Tiruchirapalli districtparty stalwart asked how longcould the party be "palanquinbearers".."we are carrying them(Congress) on our shoulders."

He, however, made it clearthat this was his own view andnot that of the party and added

that he would abide by anydecision of the DMK chief.

In the same breath, he saidif the party top brass wantedthem to continue to prop upCongress, they would do so.

Delving into the Congress-DMK ties in the past, Nehrurecalled that some from thenational party used to criticisethem and the party-led gov-ernment even when they wereallies.

Considering "coalitiondharma," the party worked forA Chellakumar and made himwin from Krishnagiri LokSabha seat though he had spo-ken against the party in theAssembly in the past, he said.

Later, Nehru told reportersthat he had only expressed histhoughts after seeing newsreports of Congress func-tionaries demanding morenumber of seats.

Apparently disapprovingof such demands, he said suchassertions one after other byleaders may strain ties betweenthe two parties.

Asked if his remark was atactic to contest in more num-ber of seats, he said: "for surewe will fight in more numberof seats in the local body elec-tions." PTI

Gorakhpur (UP): Accusingprevious SP and BSPGovernments of having an"apathetic" attitude towardsfarmers, Uttar Pradesh ChiefMinister Yogi Adityanath saidhis Government had accordedtop priority to them, givingrecord sugarcane dues afterassuming office.

"During the SP, BSPregimes, the attitude of theGovernment was apatheticand farmers could barely get�900 per quintal for wheat butour Government is giving�1,860 per quintal,” an officialrelease quoting him said.

"For the first time after theIndependence, over �70,000crore outstanding paymentwas made to sugarcane farm-ers," he claimed.

The Chief Minister allegedthat the previous SPGovernment had "ruined" themilk production while hisgovernment had been makingefforts to promote the dairyindustry and its products.

"Over 14 dairies will bestarted soon in the state.Arrangements are being madeto purchase milk from farm-ers so that more of them couldget into the dairy industry," hesaid at an innovative farmers'meet, organised by MadanMohan Malviya University ofTechnology here under theaegis of the CII and the UPAgriculture Department.

The CM said in the pastfive years, under the leadershipof Prime Minister NarendraModi, several welfare schemesfor farmers had been intro-

duced."�6,000 is being given to

all farmers annually underthe Kisan Sammaan NidhiScheme so that they do nothave to ask for help from any-one. Farmers have also beenpaid 1.5 times of the cost ofproduce in my regime," hesaid.

Talking about the initia-tives taken by the StateGovernment, Adityanath said,"Around 40 lakh farmers havebeen trained and providedknowledge of creative farmingthrough Uttar PradeshFarmers' School."

The Chief Minister saidPipraich and Munderwa sugarmills had been started forsugarcane farmers of easternUP.

Pipraich sugar mill willhave a crushing capacity of50,000 quintals per day. It willproduce fine sugar, ethanoland electricity.

"The Bansagar project waspending since 1977-78. Tokenmoney was given every yearbut to no use. Within one yearof our Government, the pro-ject was completed. With thehelp of the Bansagar project,arrangements have been madeto irrigate 1.5 lakh hectares,"he said.

For increasing the incomeof farmers, the chief ministersaid, "Along with agriculture,farmers will also have toengage themselves in animalhusbandry, dairy industry,horticulture, vegetable pro-duction, poultry, fisheries andduck farming." PTI

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Mumbai: The EnforcementDirectorate has told the BombayHigh Court that it was ready toprovide an air ambulance tobring diamantaire MehulChoksi, a key accused in themulti-crore Punjab NationalBank scam, to India.

Choksi, currently based inthe Caribbean nation ofAntigua, recently told the highcourt that he left India for med-ical treatment and not to avoidprosecution in the case. He saidhe would return to India as soonas he is medically fit to travel.

In a counter affidavit filedbefore the court on Friday, theEnforcement Directorate (ED)said Choksi's submissionappeared to be "facades beingerected merely to mislead thecourt".

"The ED conducts investi-gations in a very fair and pro-fessional manner. It may beappreciated that taking ahumanitarian approach, theyare ready to provide an expertmedical team along with airambulance to bring Choksi fromAntigua to India under propermedical supervision," the probeagency said.

The agency added that bestmedical services were available

in India and, if required, wouldbe provided to Choksi on hisreturn.

The agency also brought tothe court's attention the dis-charge summary of the hospitalin New York, where he had suc-cessfully undergone surgery inFebruary 2008, which allowedthe diamantaire to return towork within three to five days.

"As such it is not clear whatis preventing him from travellingnow, after 16-17 months fromthe date of undergoing the saidprocedure," the ED said.

The EnforcementDirectorate, which moved aspecial PMLA court here to getChoksi declared a fugitive eco-nomic offender, has accusedthe jeweller of fleeing the coun-try to avoid arrest.

Choksi and his nephewNirav Modi, who is currently ina London jail, are wanted by theED and the CBI for allegedlydefrauding the Punjab NationalBank (PNB) to the tune of�13,400 crore. PTI

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Mumbai: The MaharashtraChief Minister's Relief Fundhas disbursed �553.92 crore to56,318 needy people for medicalrequirements since 2014, whenthe Devendra Fadnavis govern-ment took over.

The figure for the last 10months alone is �106 crore dis-bursed to 10,582 people, a seniorofficial said.

In a statement issuedSaturday, Fadnavis said, "TheState Government offers finan-cial help to patients throughAyushman Bharat and MahatmaJyotiba Phule Jan Arogya Yojana.But those who cannot availthese two schemes usually gethelp from chief minister's relieffund."

Fadnavis said total amountdisbursed between 2009-14,when a Congress-NCPGovernment was in power, was�40.56 crore to 16,000 needypeople.

"Our Government dis-bursed monetary help to notonly more people, but alsoraised the amount of financial

help from �25,000 initially to Rsone lakh and further to �3lakh," he said.

When contacted, a seniorofficial working in the chief min-ister's office said there was nodearth of money in the CMRFto help needy people.

"The present Governmenthas incorporated a few more cat-egories to the financial assistancescheme. Apart from heart surg-eries and cancer, help can also beavailed for liver, heart and bonemarrow transplants," the officialsaid.

On Friday, Mission Muskan,a joint initiative of the RotaryInternational and Chief MinisterMedical Assistance Cell organ-ised a fund-raiser at the BombayStock Exchange, after which acheque of �3 crore was handedover for the CMRF to AmrutaFadnavis, the CM's wife.

Suresh Chokhani, MissionMuskan chairperson, said apartfrom the �3 crore that washanded over, another �7 crorewill soon be deposited in theCMRF. PTI

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The CBI has registered agraft case against unknown

officials of Indian Air Force(IAF), defence ministry and thefugitive arms dealer SanjayBhandari in connection withthe alleged corruption in the�2,895-crore deal in 2009 foracquisition of 75 Pilatus basictrainer aircraft.

After lodging the case, theagency also carried out search-es at the residence and office ofBhandari, who is alleged to beassociated to Robert Vadra,the brother in-law of Congresspresident Rahul Gandhi.

The role of some seniorIAF officials and those from thedefence ministry is under scan-ner, sources said.

“We have also bookedunidentified officials of theIndian Air Force, defenceMinistry and Switzerland-based Pilatus Aircraft Limitedin the case,” said an agency offi-cial.

Bhandari is wanted inIndia for alleged breach of for-eign exchange rules and paying

kickbacks to secure defencedeals. He was booked by theEnforcement Directorate (ED)in 2016 based on complaints ofhis alleged role in dubiousdefence and land deals fromincome tax department andDelhi police.

Bhandari is also beingprobed in Vadra’s allegedLondon properties case.

The agency had registereda Preliminary Enquiry into the�2,895 defence deal three yearsback and was converted into aRegular Case (FIR) and the FIRafter a prima facie case of cor-ruption against the accused wasmade out during the enquiry.

Pilatus Aircraft Ltd., theSwiss company, was one of thebidders for the contract foracquiring trainer aircraft float-ed in 2009, officials said.

The agency has allegedthat the Swiss company hadentered into a criminal con-spiracy with Bhandari andBimal Sareen, both directors of

Offset India Solutions PrivateLimited, and dishonestly andfraudulently signed a ServiceProvider Agreement withBhandari in June 2010, whichwas in violation of the DefenceProcurement Procedure, 2008.It was allegedly done to get thecontract for supply of 75 basicTrainer Aircraft to the IndianAir Force.

Pilatus bagged the con-tract on May 24, 2012 for�2895.63 crore.

“It is suspected that theSwiss company paid huge com-mission to Bhandari and partof which was allegedly paid toinfluence the officials of theIAF and the MoD associatedwith the procurement,” accord-ing to the FIR.

There is a strong suspicionthat the huge cash amountwas part of the commissionamounts paid by PilatusAircrafts Limited to Bhandarito obtain the contract, theagency has alleged in its FIR.

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The BJP on Saturday termedas a “complete lie” and

“biased against the Modi-Government” the InternationalReligious Freedom Report thatalleged mob attack againstminorities and that some seniorofficials of the ruling BJP madeinflammatory speeches againstthe minority communities.

The US state department’s2018 International ReligiousFreedom Report shows clearbias against the Narendra ModiGovernment and the BJP, theparty said asserting that itsleaders had strongly deploredviolence against minorities andweaker sections of society.

The report, released onJune 21, alleged that somesenior leaders of the BJP “madeinflammatory speeches againstminority communities”.

“Mob attacks by violentextremist Hindu groups againstminority communities, espe-cially Muslims, continuedthroughout the year amidrumors that victims had trad-ed or killed cows for beef,” thereport said.

In an official statement,

BJP media head and RajyaSabha MP Anil Baluni said“The basic presumption in thisreport that there is some granddesign behind anti-minorityviolence is simply false. On thecontrary, in most of such cases,these instances are carried outas a result of local disputes andby (people with) criminalmindsets.”

Whenever needed, PMModi and other BJP leadershave strongly deplored vio-lence against minorities andweaker sections of the society,he added.

Baluni said India has deep-rooted democratic institutions,including fiercely independentand pro-active judiciary, which

is quite capable of handlingsuch disputes and punish theguilty.

Unfortunately, this fact iscompletely ignored in this report, he said, adding thatthe Bharatiya Janata Partyunder the leadership of Modibelieves in “Sabka Saath, SabkaVikas” (With all, developmentfor all).

“Mega schemes launchedand effectively implemented bythe Modi government havebenefited all the castes, reli-gions and regions equally. BJPis indeed proud of its record inuplifting living standards of allpoor, underprivileged sectionsof the society, irrespective oftheir faith and gender,” he said

in the statement. Indian people have recent-

ly reaffirmed their confidenceon the development agenda ofthe BJP-led NDA alliance bygiving Modi a massive mandatein the parliamentary election,he said.

The report alleged mobattacks by violent extremistHindu groups against theminority communities, partic-ularly Muslims, continued inIndia in 2018, amid rumoursthat victims had traded orkilled cows for beef, an officialUS report said Friday.

The State Department in itsannual 2018 InternationalReligious Freedom Reportalleged that some senior offi-cials of the ruling BJP madeinflammatory speeches againstthe minority communities.

According to some NGOs,the authorities often protectedperpetrators from prosecution,it said.

The report said that as ofNovember, there were 18 suchattacks, and eight people killedduring the year.

On June 22, two UttarPradesh police officers werecharged with culpable homi-

cide after a Muslim cattle trad-er died of injuries sustainedwhile being questioned inpolice custody, the report said.

Mandated by the Congress,the State Department in itsvoluminous report gives itsassessment of the status ofreligious freedom in almost allthe countries and territories ofthe world.

Releasing the report at theFoggy Bottom headquarters ofthe State Department,Secretary of State MikePompeo said the report waslike a report card which trackscountries to see how well theyhave respected this funda-mental human right.

In the India section, theState Department said thatthere were reports by non-governmental organizationsthat the Government some-times failed to act on mobattacks on religious minorities,marginalised communities andcritics of the government.

The State Department saidthat the central and state gov-ernments and members ofpolitical parties took steps thataffected Muslim practices andinstitutions.

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Prime Minister NarendraModi on Saturday congrat-

ulated the winners of the PrimeMinister’s Award forOutstanding Contribution forPromotion and Developmentof Yoga, 2019.

“We are immensely proudof their rich work to ensuremore people embrace Yogaand our planet becomes health-

ier,” he tweeted.Modi posted the congrat-

ulatory message on Twitter inSpanish, French, Arabic,Russian, Japanese and English.

Founded in 1980, the JapanYoga Niketan has popularisedyoga across Japan. It runs manyyoga training institutes andcourses. They have been able todraw people from all sectionsof Japanese society, Modi said.

Founded by Swami

Satyananda Saraswati, the BiharSchool of Yoga, Munger hasbeen actively working for over50 years.

“They merge ancient wis-

dom with modern trends withan aim to improve fitness.Their yoga programmes andpublications are widely popu-lar,” the PM said.

Modi also referred toAntonietta Rozzi, who belongsto Italy and has been practisingYoga for over four decades. Shefounded the Sarva YogaInternational and popularisedYoga across Europe.

“We are proud of dedicat-

ed individuals like her,” hetweeted. The prime ministersaid Swami Rajarshi Muni,who hails from Gujarat’sLimbdi, has made remarkableefforts to spread yoga. Mostnotably, he founded the LIFEMission and is associated withLakulish Yoga University thatmentors students, he said.

“His commitment to socialservice is also outstanding,”Modi said.

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The Centre has disbursed�12,305 crore so far to ben-

eficiaries under the PradhanMantri Kisan Samman Nidhi(PM-KISAN) scheme that aimsto boost farmers income byproviding them �6,000 per yearin three equal instalments.

“Recently, the governmenthas initiated the PM-KISANprogramme effective fromFebruary 1 to enable farmers totake care of expenses related toagriculture and allied activitiesas well as domestic needs,”Agriculture Minister NarendraSingh Tomar said in a writtenreply to the Rajya Sabha.

The scheme provides a pay-ment of �6,000 per year in threeequal instalments of �2,000 tobeneficiaries.

Recently, the Centre decid-ed to extend the benefit of thisscheme to all 14.5 crore farmers,irrespective of the size of theirlandholding, costing �87,217.50crore annually to the exchequer.

Giving an update on dis-bursement, Tomar, in a reply toa separate query, said, “Till date,the first installment to3,29,52,568 beneficiaries andthe second installment to2,85,73,889 beneficiaries havebeen credited directly to thebank accounts of farmers’ fam-ilies under the PM-KISAN

scheme.”The Government has dis-

bursed �6,590.51 crore for thefirst installment and �5,714.77crore for the second tranche, thedata showed.

“PM-KISAN is a continu-ous and ongoing scheme, in which the financial benefits aretransferred to the bank accounts of the identified ben-eficiaries as and when theircorrect and verified data isuploaded by the concernedStates/UTs on PM-KiSAN webportal,” the minister said. Thedata uploaded by the States/UTsundergoes multi-level verifica-tion and validation by variousagencies, including banks, and

then the amount is transferredto beneficiaries’ accounts. “Inthis process several times, therejected data is returned to theState/UT governments for cor-rection.

Though this result in delayin release of benefits to the iden-tified beneficiaries, it is essentialso as to ensure that the benefitreaches the correct beneficiary,”Tomar said.

The minister informed thatthe Government has decidedbeneficiaries would be eligible toget the payment commencingfrom the four-monthly period inwhich their names are uploadedin portal and also subsequentinstallments.

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After dillydallying formonths, the Rajasthan

Government has finally agreedto implement the central flag-ship health protection scheme,Ayushman Bharat - PradhanMantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY) in the State.

Soon, AB-PMJAY will beintegrated with Rajasthan’sexisting state health scheme,BhamashahSwasthya BimaYojana (BSBY), said Dr InduBhushan, CEO AB-PMJAY andNational Health Authority.

He said, “The NHA hasbeen constantly working close-ly with the RajasthanGovernment in findingapproaches to seamlessly inte-grate BSBY with AB-PMJAY.We are happy that the StateGovernment too will be thepart of the central scheme. Wehave assured all possible sup-port including technical andpolicy-related assistance, toRajasthan.”

Currently, Rajasthan is pro-viding benefits to 97 Lakh

families under the BSBYscheme, and many of the eligi-ble families under AB-PMJAYare already covered underBSBY. All eligible familiesunder BSBY and AB-PMJAYwill be made eligible to availhealth benefits up to �5 Lakhper year under the scheme.

As far as the technology-related aspects are concerned inrolling-out the scheme,Rajasthan will continue thecurrent software implementa-tion, and systemic API basedintegration with solution suiteof NHA for benefits to bedelivered through AB-PMJAY

is envisaged to be done.As a part of package map-

ping, Rajasthan will run apackage mapping exercise toensure all packages specifiedunder PM-JAY are mappedwith the packages in BSBY.However, similar to any staterunning AB-PMJAY, Rajasthanhas complete flexibility toexpand beyond the AB-PMJAYpackages.

Last week, Union HealthMinister Harsh Vardhan hadwritten to the Chief Ministersof Delhi, Odisha, Telanganaand West Bengal, urging themto join the AB-PMJAY.

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In the absence of proper diag-nostic facilities in the country,

particularly in remote areas,nearly 80 per cent of personswith haemophilia (PwH), a seri-ous blood disorder remain undi-agnosed. According to an esti-mate, there are nearly two lakhPwH in India, the highest in theworld.

Haemophilia is a lifelongbleeding disorder that preventsblood from clotting. Delay indiagnosis or treatment can befatal to the persons with thegenetic condition. Also, therepeated bleeding into joints,bones muscles may lead to syn-ovitis, arthritis and permanentjoint deformities.

The Health Ministry tooadmits that a lot is yet to be donein the sector, particularly ondiagnostic front which in fact isa first step toward ensuring bet-ter treatment and managementof the disease.

“There is a need for a net-work of diagnostic centres across

the country that can help first ofall in diagnosis and later makepeople aware about the serious-ness of the health disorder.There are disparities in diagno-sis also,” admitted VinitaSrivastava, national consultant,Blood cell from the Ministry.

She was speaking at anevent “Initiative on HemophiliaCare V- A sensitization programand the way forward, IHC-V”organised here by theHemophilia Foundation of India(HFI), the umbrella body forregistration of the patient withthe disorder.

SS Roy choudhury, CEO,HFI, said, “Almost one person inevery ten thousand is hemo-philic. By this record, there aremore than one 1,33,000 personswith Haemophilia in India.Unfortunately, due to lack ofadequate infrastructure, we havebeen able to identify only 22,000such PwHs so far.

“Also, those who have beenidentified, are not getting ade-quate treatment and medicinesthat are required for proper

care, as per the World Federationof Hemophilia. “

Vikash Goel, President(HFI) felt that the identificationand diagnosis of the remainingsufferers can only be possible ifthere are enough trained hemo-philia doctors and testing facil-ities.

According to doctors, causeof haemophilia is the inabilityof the body to produce theanti-hemophilic factor (AHF) inthe required quantity. There isno known cure for this disorder.

Dr Nita Radhakrishnan,assistant professor at Noida-based Super Speciality PediatricHospital Doctors said, thoughthe government has doneenough under the NationalHealth Mission for haemophil-ia, proper diagnostic centreshave not come up in remotebelts of the country.

Also, though, worldwidethere has been increasingemphasis on providingProphylaxis treatment whereinintravenous injection of factorconcentrate is given to the per-

sons with haemophilia on reg-ular basis in order to preventanticipated bleeding, India hasjust made a beginning. TheMinistry has recently started apilot project at two hospitals inNoida in Uttar Pradesh andChennai in Tamil Nadu where-in children are being taught howto administer factors at theirhome itself on regular basis.

Dr Nita Radhakrishnan saidthat if children get timely factorinjections that would preventthem from life threateningbleedings as well as ensure theirquality life. The treatment pre-vents bleeding and joint destruc-tion, helping children withhaemophilia be more active,attend school, go for outdoorgames and above all, follow aroutine life which every childwants to live.

“Though prophylaxis is acostly treatment, its cost-effec-tive in the long-term because iteliminates the high cost associ-ated with subsequent manage-ment of damaged joints andimproves quality of life,” she said.

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The hay stack of a BJP work-er inside the premises of his

house was set on fire in Nadiadistrict of West Bengal byTMC workers, a charge the rul-ing party denied.

China Mondal, whose husband Sambhu is a BJPactivist, lodged a complaint with the Taherpurpolice station saying someTrinamool Congress workersset the hay stack afire in the weehours of Saturday for politicalreasons.

In her FIR, China said herson, an e-rickshaw driver, was entering their house in Maniktala village around 1am when he found four per-sons who are known TMCworkers fleeing from theirpremises.

The fire was noticed thevery next moment and localpeople and a fire tender dousedto blaze.

She alleged that they mightalso have a plan to set theirhouse on fire.

Local people said the firecould have spread to otherhouses.

Sambhu Mandal allegedthat he was earlier threatenedby the TMC workers that hewould be driven out from thevillage for supporting the BJP.

Local TMC leaders said theparty was not involved with theincident.

Police said an investigationwas on.

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Maharashtra ChiefMinister Devendra

Fadnavis will undertake a‘rath yatra’ (a tour in a specialvehicle) across Maharashtra tocampaign for Assembly polls,the BJP said Saturday.

The state polls are due inOctober.

The decision was taken atthe meeting of the state BJPexecutive here.

Revenue minister andsenior party leaderChandrakant Pati l saidFadnavis’ campaign tour willstart in August and the datewill be announced later.

“During the rath yatra,our slogans will be ‘Fir EkBaar Shivshahi Sarkaar’ (Onceagain saffron alliance gov-ernment) and ‘Abki Baar 220Ke Paar’ (This Time 220-plus),” Patil said.

Another party leader saidFadnavis will try to cover all288 Assembly constituenciesduring the tour, highlightingthe achievements of his gov-ernment.

Fadnavis, who addressed the meeting, saiddecisiveness was his party’sstrength.

“We are here for politics of performance! Decisiveness is our strength, we are not for populist measures, butworking hard on actual delivery system. And only bythis we are able to gain confi-dence of people,” he tweetedlater.

“We need to move for-ward with this direction &with more sustained efforts,”he added.

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“At the time of the killings,the accused’s mother-in-lawwas at their house in Mehrauliwhich has two rooms. WhenShukla did not open the door ofhis room on Saturday morning,she informed the neighbourswho broke it open and foundhim lying unconscious next tothe bodies. They then called upthe police,” said the seniorpolice official.

“A police control room(PCR) was received regardingthe incident at around 7 AM.Acting on the call, anEmergency Response Vehicle(ERV) rushed to the spot. Onspot, Upendra had locked thedoor from inside where othervictims were also lying in poolof blood. Police team broke thegate and found Upendra sittingnext to the victims. They wereall rushed to nearby hospitalwhere Upendra’s wife and threechildren were declared broughtdead by the doctors,” said thesenior police official.

“Initial investigation, it wasrevealed that Shukla’s wife

Archana was a diabetes patientand he was not a financiallysound person. A quarrel mighthave erupted between the cou-ple recently on this issue due towhich he became depressedand killed them. Police teamsare investigating the exact causeof his depression, which he isclaiming,” said police officialprivy to investigation.

“Shukla was found insidehis room with a cut on his handand the investigation will revealthat whether he tried to commitsuicide after killing them or hegot injured during the incident,”he said. According to sources,Shukla had tried to kill his wifeand three children on Thursdaynight also but could not executehis plan. “On the interveningnight of Friday and Saturday, hegave them sedatory substanceand later killed them after slit-ting their throats. Some wrap-pers of medicines were alsorecovered from the house,” saidthe sources. According to neigh-bours, the mother-in-law ofUpendra Shukla saw himthrough the window of theroom lying on the floor faintedalong with others.

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From Page 1The JeM has suffered casu-

alties to the tune of 36 so far thisyear. The Pulwama attack hadtriggered the aerial strikes on theterror training facility of the JeMat Balakot in Pakistan. The Jaishhad claimed responsibility forthe February 14 Pulwama attackat the CRPF convoy. In the wakeof the continuing action againstthe ultras by the security forces,the JeM is particularly facingshortage of cadres and the latestISI-Pak army gameplan is totrigger a major unrest by carry-ing out a major attack in theValley. As a tactical ploy, the JeMhas also sought to shift its baseto Jammu to evade action fromthe security forces. In Jammuregion, the outfit is seeking tocreate a communal situation bytargeting the BJP/RSS leadersand influential personalitiesfrom the Hindu/Sikh commu-nities, according to Intelligenceassessments.

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Tehran warned Washingtonon Saturday that any attack

would see its interests across theMiddle East go up in flames afterUS President Donald Trumpsaid he called off a strike at the11th hour.

The aborted US militaryaction was to have been inresponse to Iran’s downing of aUS reconnaissance drone, whichhas seen tensions between thetwo countries soar after a seriesof attacks on oil tankers the UShas blamed on Iran.

“Firing one bullet towardsIran will set fire to the interestsof America and its allies” in theregion, armed forces generalstaff spokesman BrigadierGeneral Abolfazl Shekarchi toldthe Tasnim news agency.

“If the enemy -- especiallyAmerica and its allies in theregion -- make the militarymistake of shooting the powderkeg on which America’s interestslie, the region will be set on fire,”Shekarchi warned.

President Donald Trumpsaid Friday that the UnitedStates was “cocked & loaded” tostrike Iran but pulled back at the

last minute as it would not havebeen a “proportionate” responseto Tehran’s shooting down of anunmanned drone.

Under pressure to respondto the high-stakes incident nearthe strategic Strait of Hormuz,Trump said the US was preparedto hit “3 different sites” Thursdaynight but that he scrapped thestrikes “10 minutes” before theywere to have been launched.

“I asked, how many will die.150 people, sir, was the answerfrom a General,” the presidenttweeted, saying he concluded itwould not have been “propor-tionate to shooting down anunmanned drone.”

According to excerpts of aninterview with NBC’s “Meet thePress” conducted Friday morn-ing at the White House, Trumpsaid he had not given finalapproval to strikes against Iran,and that no planes were in theair. “But they would have beenpretty soon. And things wouldhave happened to a point whereyou wouldn’t turn back or could-n’t turn back,” he said.

He added that he did notwant war with Iran, but if it cameto pass, there would be “obliter-ation like you’ve never seen

before.” The US president hadstruck a combative tone in ini-tial comments Thursday aboutthe downing of the Global Hawksurveillance aircraft, but as thepre-dawn incident whipped upfears of open conflict, Trumpmoved to dial back tensions.

Tehran insists that the droneviolated its airspace -- somethingWashington denies -- but wasprepared to accept on Friday thatit might have done so by acci-dent.The drone could haveentered Iran’s airspace over a mis-take by “a general or some oper-ators,” the commander of theRevolutionary Guards’ aero-space arm, Brigadier GeneralAmir Ali Hajizadeh told statenews agency IRNA on Saturday.

“Nonetheless, this was an actof trampling international avia-tion laws by a spy aircraft, whichmet our natural response,”Hajizadeh added.

The foreign ministry said ithad summoned the charge d’af-faires of the United ArabEmirates, from where the USdrone launched, to protestagainst its decision to “put itsinstallations at the disposal offoreign forces for aggression”against Iran.

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Security measures wereincreased at one of Iraq’s

largest air bases that housesAmerican trainers followingan attack last week, a top Iraqiair force commander saidSaturday.

U.S. Military said opera-tions at the base were going onas usual and there were cur-rently no plans to evacuate per-sonnel.

The stepped-up Iraqi secu-rity measures at Balad air base,just north of the capital,Baghdad, come amid sharplyrising tensions in the MiddleEast between the United Statesand Iran.

The current regional crisisis rooted in the U.S.Withdrawal last year from the2015 nuclear deal betweenTehran and world powers.Washington subsequently re-imposed sanctions on Iran,sending its economy intofreefall and cutting deeply intoits oil exports.

Gen. Falah Fares told TheAssociated Press by telephonethat the measures include anight-time curfew, boosting

security inside and near thebase as well as surveillance ofnearby areas.

He said these measuresare being carried out in coor-dination with the US.

“All unnecessary move-ments have been reduced,”Fares said, adding that thecurfew now lasts from sunsetuntil sunrise. He said thechange was made after Baladair base, home to a squadron ofIraqi F-16 fighter jets, was hitwith three mortar shells lastweek without inflicting casu-alties. The curfew had previ-ously been from midnight tosunrise, he said.

Col. Kevin Walker, US AirForces Central CommandDirector of Force Protection,denied in a statement laterSaturday reports that USForces are evacuating contrac-tors or any other personnelfrom Balad air base.

“Operations at Balad AirBase are continuing as normal.Claims that personnel are beingevacuated are categoricallyfalse,” Walker said.

“There are no plans at thistime to evacuate any personnelfrom Balad.”

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The frontrunner in the raceto be the next British Prime

Minister, Boris Johnson, wasdealing with the wrong kind ofheadlines on Saturday as aloud and noisy bust-up with hisgirlfriend in London wasreported to the police.

Johnson, who is going headto head with UK foreign sec-retary Jeremy Hunt in theConservative Party leadershiprace to replace Theresa May atDowning Street, was recordedby neighbours during whatseemed like a screaming matchwith partner Carrie Symondsin south-east London onFriday.

“The caller was concernedfor the welfare of a femaleneighbour. Police attended andspoke to all occupants of theaddress, who were all safe andwell,” a Metropolitan Policespokesperson said.

“There were no offences orconcerns apparent to the offi-cers and there was no cause forpolice action,” the spokesper-son added.

‘The Guardian’ reportedthat a neighbour had told thenewspaper they heard a womanscreaming followed by “slam-

ming and banging” during thealleged altercation. In arecording made by the neigh-bour from their own flat,Johnson was reportedly heardrefusing to leave the flat andtelling the woman to “get off ”his laptop before there was aloud crashing noise.

Symonds is allegedly heardsaying the Tory MP had ruineda sofa with red wine: “You justdon’t care for anything becauseyou’re spoilt.

You have no care formoney or anything.”

Johnson’s spokesperson hasrefused to comment on thereports but it will lead tointense scrutiny over the for-mer Cabinet minister’s colour-ful private life. His affair withSymonds, a communicationschief for the Tory party, hadbeen exposed last year result-ing in his Indian-origin wifeMarina Wheeler filing fordivorce.

Wheeler, a human rightslawyer, is the daughter of for-mer BBC journalist CharlesWheeler and his second wifeDip Singh.

During his time as theMayor of London from 2008-2016, Johnson had often madereferences to his wife’s Indian

roots to categorise himself asthe “son-in-law of India”.

The couple are now in theprocess of splitting up after 25years of marriage and fourchildren, with 29-year-oldSymonds expected to joinJohnson, 55, at Downing Streetif he wins the Tory leadershipbattle.

She was in the audienceduring Johnson’s leadership campaign launchon June 12 and has been cred-ited in the media with smarten-ing up the leadership hopeful’slook.

Johnson continues to bethe bookmakers’ favourite tosucceed Theresa May asConservative leader and theUK’s next Prime Minister, afterholding on to a clear lead inseveral rounds of early votingby Conservative MPs.

He now faces the wider160,000-strong Tory member-ship in hustings to convincethem of his credentials overJeremy Hunt.

Members of theConservative Party will receivetheir postal ballot papersbetween July 6 and 8, with thenew leader expected to beannounced in the week begin-ning July 22.

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Nine people died in a fierycrash of a small airplane

used in a sky dive operation, offi-cials in Hawaii said. T h e r ewere no survivors after the twinengine King Air plane crashedFriday night near DillinghamAirfield, on Oahu’s North Shore,Hawaii Department ofTransportation spokesman TimSakahara said.

“Upon arrival, we saw theplane fully engulfed in fire,”Honolulu Fire Chief ManuelNeves told reporters on thescene. “The first crews onscene extinguished the fire.”

Neves said the crashedoccurred near the perimeterfencing of the small airport.

“They’re quite a ways awayfrom the runway,” he said.

The plane was used in a skydive operation, and Neves saidsome family members of those

on board waited at the airportfor the plane to return.

The debris field was rela-tively small, about 50 feet (15meters) by 50 feet (15 meters),he said.

“In my 40 years as a fire-fighter here in Hawaii, this is themost tragic aircraft incidentwhat we’ve had,” he toldreporters at the scene, about anhour’s drive north of Honolulu.

Crews with HonoluluEmergency Services said itassisted with death pronounce-ments of the nine after receivingthe call at 6:26 pm local time,agency spokeswoman ShayneEnright said. Names, ages andgenders of the deceased have notbeen released. Neves said manydetails are still not known aboutthe flight. But he says witnesseshave said the plane was inboundto the airport when the crashoccurred but that has not beenconfirmed.

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At least seven people diedSaturday when an under-

construction building ownedby a Chinese company col-lapsed at a Cambodian beachresort, officials said, as rescuersscoured the giant rubble heap forsurvivors.

The building went downbefore sunrise in the casino-resort town Sihanoukville insouthwestern Cambodia, arapidly developing touristhotspot awash with Chineseinvestments.

Four people have beenarrested in connection with theaccident, including the Chinesebuilding owner, the head of theconstruction firm and the con-tractor. A Cambodian landown-er has also been held at provin-cial headquarter for questioning.

The seven-storey buildingwas almost 80 per cent completewhen it crashed down earlySaturday, the deadliest suchaccident in recent years inCambodia.

“Now the death toll fromthe building collapse is seven,”Sihanoukville city police chiefThul Phorsda said, after officialsearlier pinned the number ofdead at three.

At least 21 people werereported injured -- several crit-ically -- and at least three of thedead were Cambodian, includ-ing two workers and a transla-tor.

Rescue workers in hard hatspulled people from a mountainof concrete, wood and twistedmetal. Medical workers attend-ed to a shirtless injured man asconcerned crowds built uparound the site, while scores ofsoldiers and police joined thesearch for survivors.

“Teams continue to searchfor more victims,” a provincialofficial statement said, addingthat an investigation into theaccident had been launched.

There was no confirmationof precisely how many peoplewere at the building at the timeof the collapse, though earlierofficials said 30 people were

feared trapped.Around 50 workers would

normally have been on the siteat the time, Preah Sihanouk gov-ernor Yun Min said.

The building belonged to aChinese national who rented theland from a Cambodian owner.The construction firm and con-tractor were both Chinese-owned as well.

Sihanoukville was once asleepy fishing community beforebeing claimed first by Westernbackpackers, and then wealthyRussians. Chinese investmenthas flooded in in recent years,spurring a construction boom ina resort town known for its casi-nos which pull in mainlandtourists.

There are around 50Chinese-owned casinos anddozens of hotel complexes underconstruction.

Between 2016 and 2018, $1billion was invested by ChineseGovernment and private busi-nesses in the Preah Sihanoukprovince, according to officialstatistics.

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Malaysia on Saturday saidthe perpetrators of vio-

lence against Myanmar’sRohingya minority must “bebrought to justice”, in sharpcomments delivered at a nor-mally tame regional summit.

Myanmar does not recog-nise the Rohingya as citizens,instead officially labelling them“Bengalis”, short-hand for ille-gal immigrants from neigh-bouring Bangladesh.

A military crackdown in2017 drove more than 740,000Rohingya into Bangladesh, car-rying accounts of rape, masskillings and the razing of vil-lages.

UN investigators havecalled for Myanmar’s top gen-erals to be tried for genocide.

But Myanmar’s army andde facto leader Aung San SuuKyi have defended the action as

necessary to f lush outRohingya militants fromRakhine state.

In talks Saturday withSoutheast Asian counterparts,Malaysia’s Foreign MinisterSaifuddin Bin Abdullah calledfor the “perpetrators of theRohingya issue to be broughtto justice”, his ministry said inTweet.

He also said repatriation ofthe minority from the fetid,overcrowded refugee camps ofBangladesh “must include thecitizenship of the Rohingya.” Malaysia, a Muslim countrywhich hosts a large Rohingyarefugee population, is one ofthe few members of theAssociation of Southeast AsianNations (ASEAN) to speak upfor the minority.

The 10-member bloc nor-mally abides by a principle ofnon-interference in each other’sinternal affairs.

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Russia’s travel industry hitout Saturday at a decision

by the Kremlin to suspendflights to Georgia as a politi-cally motivated move that haslittle to do with safety concerns.

President Vladimir Putinsigned a decree banningRussian airlines from flying toGeorgia from July 8 late Fridayin response to anti-govern-ment rallies in the ex-Sovietneighbour.

The outbreak of protests was sparked by a par-liamentary address in Tbilisi bya Moscow lawmaker earlierthis week.

The Kremlin said the banwas to “ensure Russia’s nation-al security and protect Russiannationals from criminal andother unlawful activities” anda taskforce was being puttogether to oversee the returnof Russians from Georgia.

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Protesters in Hong Kongended their overnight siege

of police headquarters peace-fully Saturday, disappointedthat their demands for the ter-ritory’s leader to formally with-draw a contentious extraditionbill and police to apologize forheavy handed tactics have goneunmet.

By daybreak, police hadcleared the streets of barriers setup by protesters to snarl trafficin the Asian financial center,and only a few groups in themostly youthful crowdremained. Many slept outsidethe legislature.

Traffic was again smoothon a major thoroughfarethrough the government’s cen-tral complex as the protestmovement regrouped to con-sider next moves.

Police said nine female and

four male staffers were hospi-talized “with considerabledelay” during the blockade.The police statement did notsay whether they were injuredin clashes or had otherwisebecome unwell.

Around police headquar-ters, masked and helmeted pro-testers covered surveillancecameras with masking tapeand lashed barriers togetherwith nylon cable ties.

They threw eggs at thebuilding and drew graffiti onthe walls.

Protesters also “splashedoil” and targeted police officers’eyes with laser pointers, accord-ing to the police.

Hong Kong has beenrocked by major protests for thepast two weeks over legislativeproposals that many view aseroding the territory’s judicialindependence and, morebroadly, as a sign of Chinese

government efforts to chipaway at the city’s freedoms.

Hong Kong leader CarrieLam indefinitely suspendeddebate on the bills a week ago,making it likely they would die.But protesters are demanding

that she formally withdraw theproposed changes to the extra-dition laws, which would expandthe scope of criminal suspecttransfers to include mainlandChina, Taiwan and Macau.Some also want Lam to resign.

Legal and business groupsin Hong Kong oppose the leg-islation, saying critics of China’sruling Communist Party wouldbe at risk of torture and unfairtrials on the mainland and thatit further erode the “one coun-try, two systems” frameworkunder which Hong Kong hasbeen governed since the han-dover from British rule in 1997.

The peaceful ending toFriday’s protests drew a sigh ofrelief in the city of 7.4 millionpeople, after police unleashedtear gas and rubber bullets last week in violent clashesthat left dozens injured onboth sides.

Police were previously crit-icized for their use of force butthis time waited out the pro-testers. Police did issue a state-ment at 4:50 a.M. Condemningthem for blocking key streetsand seriously disrupting workat police headquarters.

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Nepalese nationals must havevisa if they are entering

India from Pakistan, China,Hong Kong and Macau, accord-ing to a notice issued by theNepalese Embassy in NewDelhi.

Similarly, Nepalese nation-als travelling to Gulf countries,including Saudi Arabia, Qatar,Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain andLebanon, are required to acquireNo Objection Certificate fromthe respective Nepalese Em-bassies, it said. To get the NOC,a traveller is required to submitan application to the respectiveembassy along with relevantdocuments, including employ-ment permit, the notice stated.

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Claiming that there was aserious threat to the life of

jailed former Pakistan primeminister Nawaz Sharif due tolack of medical care, his daugh-ter Maryam Nawaz on Saturdaysaid that her Pakistan MuslimLeague (N) party will not lethim become the “Morsi” ofPakistan.

Former Egyptian presidentMohamed Morsi, who tookover the realm in country’s firstfree elections in 2012 and wasousted a year later by the mili-tary, died on Monday afterfainting during a session incourt. However, a group ofBritish lawmakers and lawyers,who published a report inMarch 2018 into how Morsi was

being treated in custody, con-cluded that the former presi-dent, who had a history of ill-health including diabetes, liverand kidney disease, was notreceiving adequate medical care.

“We are not Egypt and wewill not allow Nawaz Sharif tobecome Morsi,” Maryam, vicepresident of PML (N), said.

She said that Sharif, 69, wasseriously ill and needed imme-diate medical care which wasnot being given to him in jail.

Alleging that there was aserious threat to Sharif ’s life,Maryam said that her fatherwas suffering from complicat-ed ailments and neededfocused treatment, includingsurgeries, and the treatmentmight go for a year.

She said that the treat-

ment is complicated and doc-tors in Pakistan are reluctant totreat the high-profile patient.

Maryam also claimed thather family was not informedabout Nawaz’s third heartattack that he suffered in AdialaJail last year, The ExpressTribune reported.

The three-time prime min-ister had in April sought theSupreme Court’s permission togo abroad for medical treat-ment. However, the permissionwas not granted.

He was given a six-weekinterim bail by the top court onMarch 26 to undergo medicaltreatment. He had filed a peti-tion on April 27 for permanentbail as he was suffering fromacute anxiety and depressionthat may lead to “sudden death”.

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Pyongyang’s relationshipwith Beijing is “invincible”

because the countries bothendured Japanese rule, NorthKorea said Saturday, the dayafter the Chinese President’shighly symbolic visit ended.

The commentary, in offi-cial North Korean newspaperRodong Sinmun, comes short-ly before the G20 summit inJapan where US PresidentDonald Trump will meet withChina’s Xi Jinping.

With Beijing andWashington at loggerheadsover trade, China is keen toremind Trump of its influence

with nuclear-armedPyongyang, while increasinglylooking to Japan -- a key USally in the region -- to serve asa hedge against growingAmerican protectionism.

Relations between Tokyo,Beijing, and both Koreas arestill heavily affected by Japan’sexpansionism in the first halfof the 20th century, withPyongyang’s state media criti-cising Japan on a near-dailybasis.

Saturday’s Rodong Sinmundedicated five pages to thesecond day of Xi’s visit toPyongyang, and carried a sep-arate editorial stating how the“sacred period of the anti-

Japanese struggle has becomethe foundation of the DPRK-China friendship”.

“DPRK-China relationshipis an invincible friendship thatfirmly combines military cama-raderie and trust,” it stated,using the abbreviation of NorthKorea’s official name.

Xi, in a rare opinion piecepenned for the newspaper ear-lier this week, also said citizensof the countries jointly opposeda “foreign invasion” and sup-ported each other in the pur-suit of socialism.

Like North Korea, Beijing’sCommunist authorities alsoregularly denounce Tokyo overhistorical issues.

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In a landmark ruling in march2018, the Supreme Court hadexplained at length that “weneed to understand thateuthanasia is basically an

intentional premature terminationof another person’s life either bydirect intervention (active euthana-sia) or by withholding life prolong-ing measures and resources (passiveeuthanasia) either at the express orimplied request of that person (vol-untary euthanasia) or in the absenceof such approval/consent (non-vol-untary euthanasia).

In other words, it had stated:That human beings have the rightto die with dignity, allowing aLiving Will. However, it has set outstrict guidelines that will governwhen and how it is permitted. In anation where relatives go to anylengths to save a patient’s life what-ever the cost, the fact that the apexcourt allowed Living Will wasremarkable.

More than a year later, a surveyasked citizens what living wellmeant to them during last days oftheir life. The survey conducted witha sample size of 2,400-plus showedthat 88 per cent wished for the inde-pendence to decide their line ofmedical treatment during the lastdays of their life rather than leavingit on their family. The survey alsoshowed that despite having strongopinions about their last moments,only 27 per cent are aware about theconcept of Living Will.

While the ‘living well’ factormay differ from person to person,most had a wish regarding how theywant to live the last few moments oftheir life. The Supreme Court’s ver-dict on Living Will, withdrawaland withdrawing of life supportbecomes an important factorenabling people to ‘live well’ in theirlast moments. What we now wish isto have simplified process laid downto help people execute their LivingWill.

Dr RK Mani, head of End of Life

Care in India Task Force, tells youthat the need for the survey was dueto the rise in the population of theaged and rise in non- communica-ble diseases.

“In a situation like this there willbe people who need to make theirwishes and values known. Maybenot consciously, but they feel theneed to make others know how theywant to spend their last days. Sincethe SC’s landmark judgement, wewanted to know how much thatjudgement had percolated,” Dr Manisays.

The lack of awareness aboutLiving Will is worrisome sincethere is a another survey that saysthat 83 per cent of people want todie at home — with their family.How does one decide and executeit? This rests with the Living Will.Even if the SC says that Living Willis valid, we are still struggling withcreating awareness, how to do it andhow to honour it.

“Another reason why there issuch low awareness is that manyconfuse Living Will with euthana-sia. But this is not the case. What isbeing debated is avoidance of excesstreatment when there is no benefit.People should be in control of howyou are being handled by recordingyour values and wishes,” Dr Manisays.

Dr Gaurav Thukral, COO,HCAH says that the worrying bur-den on the family and wanting a suf-fering free dignified end of life high-lights the maturity of the Indianpeople in dealing with a difficult sit-uation. “The values of putting needsof the family before your own wasevident as 96 per cent of senior cit-izens who thought Living Will to bea relevant concept. They see it as animportant way to reduce financialstress on their family while 93 percent of respondents in the 25-35years group found it relevant to putan end to suffering of patients onartificial life support,” Thukral says.

Living Will is a person’s right to

live with dignity and how a personwant to live his life. Active and pas-sive euthanasia are just mediums.Just like in passive euthanasia,Living Will kicks in when the per-son writes down in clear words thatunder these circumstances the willneeds to be executed. Any person ofsound mind can make a Living Will.He will appoint a person who willthen make a decision on behalf ofthe person who has made the willthat under unsalvable condition, hedoesn’t want to be put on ventilator.

This is the execution part of theLiving Will. “Then comes the hon-ouring part where the friend or fam-ily member needs to inform the hos-pital. But the problems occur in theexecution itself; honouring comeslater. Take an example. In the lastfive years, a lot has been done inorgan transplant and there are clearguidelines laid down when the per-

son is declared brain dead. The sameneeds to be done in Living Will likeit is in several western countries,”Thukral shares and tells you thatthere are several challenges that willcome while executing a Living Will.

First, we don’t talk of death tillthe person actually dies. We go withthe ethos that the soul never dies,only the body does. Nobody plansfor death in our country unlike theWest.

Second, lack of awareness existsdue to the stigma that is attached ifthe elderly are not taken to the hos-pital during the last days of their life.Statements like ‘they didn’t take careof the parents in their last momentand kept them at home’ are com-monplace. Then there is son versusthe daughter, where the son wouldbe more practical than the daugh-ter. All these social scenarios com-plicate the situation.

There is a reason why we don’twant to talk about death. DevduttPatanaik, physician-turned-mythol-ogist, says that the connectionbetween religion and death is thatreligion gives meaning to death andexplanations to what happens afterdeath. Science has no answers.

He tells you that the reason whywe are scared of death given that allour scriptures say that the only thingcertain in life is death is not basedon scriptures. “This fear is based onthe idea of secret — that we attractwhat we think about. If we thinkabout death, we will attract death.And the attachment to life is plainand simple. The same reason whyleaders don’t delegate or retire, andbehave like control freaks,” Patnaiksays.

Thukral says that even thoughthese are social complications, weforget the most important aspect

here.“We forget to factor in what the

person wants. Does he want to livehis last days where someone else hasto change diapers for him?,” Thukralasks and tells you that there are safe-guards to prevent foul play.

“Just one person can’t and does-n’t make the final decision. Like inbrain dead people, there is not onedoctor who takes the decision, it isa committee in tandem with thefamily members. Similar process canbe in place for Living Will,” Thukralsays.

Dr Mani says that the only mis-use can stem from taking a hastydecision in withholding and with-draw the treatment even thoughthere maybe cases — a rarity—where a forged document maybesubmitted for which there can besafeguards. But this doesn’t andshould not take away the right of theperson to live with dignity. Thequestion is how to go about it inpractice. It doesn’t have to be a legalsounding document since we havethe right to will even if not done infront of the magistrate.

Second, inherent to medicalpractice, there are protocols forsafeguards. It can’t be unilateral doneby one individual. There are stan-dard operating procedures whichneeds to be followed. From the legalside, there has to be a constitution-al right which is now there. But theproblem is in its implementation.Majority of the time, the decisionhas to be down within hours ormaybe days and not month. Thecourts’ procedures are not easy andnobody has the time — the familymembers or the doctors to go tocourt when their patient in on ven-tilator.

“Also, we can’t expect the legalluminaries nor the judges to under-stand the medical challenges on theground. It is the duty of the medicalprofessionals to educate them andadvocate them in the interest of thepatient otherwise the patient’s suf-

fering continues as does the finan-cial burden on the family. Therefore,an appeal has been made to theGovernment and appealing to SC torevisit the procedure for clarificationand modifications,” Dr Mani tellsyou.

Some of the modificationsinclude: To execute the Living Willyou need to get signature of firstclass judicial magistrate which thenneeds to be archived with the dis-trict court digitally and in a hardcopy. Many times, access to this canbe difficult. The option can be get-ting the Living Will notarised orsigned by two witnesses.

Second, in order to honour thewill there are three levels whichinvolves the hospital medical body,the district collector and the districtmagistrate. This is not feasible sinceend of life care is usually taken with-in a week.

People wanting to make a LivingWill need to keep some key pointsin mind. First, anyone can executeit whether one is anticipating trou-ble or not.

Second, if you have a serious ill-ness, there should be a discussionwith the treating team on the treat-ment and the limits and what hap-pens when the situation deterioratesor death occurs so that the familyand the patient can express theirapprehension and be prepared. Thiscan even involve candid discussionwith psychologists, counsellors andeven spiritual guides. When there isa holistic approach to what one cananticipate, one can take the rightdecision.

According to Dr Mani, theimportance of Living Will rests onthe premise that death is inevitable.“There was a time when it came nat-urally. Today, due to advancementin medicine death now is unnatur-al— hooked on to medical equip-ment. In such a situation onebecomes just another entity. Henceit is important to execute one,” DrMani says.

�What is the song about?It is a love ballad composed by

Gourov-Roshin. It has been shot in UttarPradesh — Lucknow. We had a good timeduring outdoor shooting. If we hadn’t hadfun, it would have been difficult to survivewith the temperatures touching 45°Celsius. It was so hot. But it was team work.We had fun in the studio as well. DanishSabri has penned the song and KookieGulati has shot the video. It has been pic-turised on Aparshakti and AkankshaRanjan. The good part is that people areloving it too.�Was there a reason why you chose toshoot in this heat?

It is a single. It can’t have a deadlineor be time bound. A single video can’t bepushed forward for long. There is only somuch that one can show in a music video.Luckily, I had only a day’s shoot. Thatworked for me. The idea to shoot — whenand where — rested with the producers.�Are there any clashes when you workwith other composers?

It rarely happens that I am called in fora project where the composer is different.There have only be a handful of suchinstances. With Gourov-Roshin, I havedone a few projects and hence we share agreat chemistry. Also, they are open towhatever changes that came to my mindwhile singing. There were no ego clashes.�How important is it to have a comfort

level with other artists?There will be a time when you sing for

a composer the first time. It would bestrange to turn down a project because youdon’t have that chemistry. But some-times, you come across people with whomyou love to work with. �Why did you choose to do this single?

Gourov-Roshin shared this projectwith me. The melody is simple. People love

simplicity. To begin with, I didn’t know ifit was film or non-film song. The song havebeen supported by Sony Music who areparticular with their project. This is greatfor a performer like me. This song is a life-time experience. �Direction, composing or playback.What do you prefer?

Composer, singer and a performer.This is how I would rate my preference.�You didn’t have a Godfather. Whatstruggle did you face?

My struggle was no different from thenext man who comes to Mumbai. I did-n’t have anything planned. I did what oth-ers do to make a mark in the industry. �Was singing your goal?

I knew that I would make music mycareer. If I had not come to Mumbai, Iwould have been a music teacher.�Advise to youngsters.

Have patience, be positive. Don’t losefocus that brought you to this industry.�Future projects.

I am working on Sadak 2, BatlaHouse and Malang. These are some of theprojects on cards.�What is your life’s mantra?

Dhairya, be calm. Don’t panic.�Did you feel that Aashiqui 2 wouldchange your career graph.

I knew it was a great break. But neverrealised that the song would receive suchrave reviews.

Comedy shows alwaysentertain and thereforepeople love to watch

them again and again. This iswhat makes it easy for the pro-ducers to experiment with thegenre.

The latest one in the his-tory of comedy shows is JijajiChhat Per Hain which went onair from January 2018. Theshow is now set for a twist —Elaichi (Hiba Nawab) is goingto secretly marry Pancham(Nikhal Khurana).

This twist, the makersopine with give the show a TRPboost. Nawab tells you that thetwist was a much needed one.“To get to know why we cameup with the twist in the show,audience have to watch it. Fornow, all I can say is that it wasmuch needed,” she tells you.

But she signed on the dot-ted line and said yes to theshow. Before signing the show,Nawab was sceptical whether itwill be able to attract the audi-ence.

“I was not sure thatwhether this show will be asgood as Bhabhi Ji Ghar ParHain. But then I decided to giveit a try and it has worked outwell till now. The show is pop-ular especially among the chil-dren. I was also unsure about

my character’s name — Elaichi.Now, when I get so much ofappreciation for the role, I feelhappy that my decision ofbeing a part of this show hasturned out well,” she explains.

Khurana says when he firstgot to know about his charac-ter, he was reminded of ShahRukh Khan’s character inChamatkar. “My first reaction

after getting to know aboutPancham was that it is similarto Shah Rukh Khan’s characterin Chamatkar. I was excited toplay this role. Ever since Istarted playing this role, I havebeen evolving as an artist,” hesays.

The show is a brainchild ofSanjay Kohli. He is also theman behind Bhaag Bakool

Bhaag, F.I.R and Bhabhi JiGhar Par Hain. Kohli believesin putting out shows that havethe potential the bring thefamily together. When he start-ed making shows on comedy,he was confident that his showswill tickle the funny bone.

“Making people laugh is achallenge but if done right itwill take you to heights. Myshows target housewives andchildren. They are the oneswho enjoy these shows themost. This is because most peo-ple are busy with work andreach home late. The only peo-ple who can enjoy such showsare women and children. Also,I make them in a mannerwhere this audience can relateto it. It needs creativity anduniqueness,” he tells you.

Kohli has always enjoyedmaking comedy shows becausehe feel it is his duty to makepeople laugh.

Both the shows — BhabhiJi Ghar Par Hain and JijajiChhat Per Hain have beendoing extremely wel.

Therefore, as of now Kohlihas no plans of coming up witha new rib-tickling show but hehas definitely something oncards. Is he stepping into thedigital space? We will have towait and watch.

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Based on the Teluguremake — Arjun Reddydirected by Sandeep

Vanga, Kabir Singh is theHindi remake by the samedirector. The good is thatthere are no major changes inthe storyline. This is also the

reason why it makes thisHindi version cringe worthy— this love story is dark,twisted and obessessive.

This alone is a reason forall the men (read boys) tolove Kabir Singh.Unfortunately, the crudity(chasing women because youhave an itch to scratch), thelanguage, the gestures, doingcrack, smoking like a chim-ney, drinking like there is notomorrow and chase thehouse help down the stairs

because she broke a glasswith the intentions of beatingher are only some of thethings that make you squirm.More so, if you are a womanand abhor a situation wherethey are objectified or aretreated as possession. Whilesome sense of belonging andthat someone cares gives yougoose bumps, Kabir Singh’sobsession borders on manic.His severe anger issues addsto the obsessiveness.

Also, no love should go

in a zone which gives theman the right to hit awoman. We have enough vio-lence against women in reallife. Vanga should have beenmore responsible even if theaim was to show realisticcontent and depcits theyoung to a T.

The sad part of thismovie is that even though thefilm shows the protagonist doall these things, there is noway that this will not godown well with the audience.

Arjun Reddy was a hit and sowill this one be.

Shahid Kapoor as KabirSingh delivers OTT perfor-mance. Kiara (Advani) in herrole as meek and mouse likelooks pretty. It is good to seeKamini Kaushal whose note-able works include NeechaNagar (1946) and Nadiya KePaar (1948). It is also good tosee Suresh Oberoi eventhough he does look a bithaggard.

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Alexis Sanchez put a miser-able club season with

Manchester United behind himas he sent Chile into the CopaAmerica quarter-finals with thewinning goal in Friday’s 2-1 winover Ecuador.

Jose Fuenzalida gave Chilean eighth-minute lead but EnnerValencia equalized for Ecuadorfrom the spot.

Sanchez bagged the winnerbut Chile finished with 10 menafter Gabriel Achilier’s red carda minute from time.

The 30-year-old Sanchezstarted only nine PremierLeague matches, scoring justonce, in an injury-interruptedseason for the Red Devils inwhich he struggled to make animpact when he did play.

But he scored for the secondgame running in Salvador asChile joined Colombia as the

only teams to qualify for theknock-out stages after their firsttwo games.

Chile top Group C with aperfect six points ahead of theirclash with Uruguay at Rio’siconic Maracana on Monday.

Ecuador are left staringelimination in the face after asecond straight defeat, knowingthey must beat Japan in BeloHorizonte on Monday to standany chance of progressing.

Chile began as they had leftoff in their 4-0 thrashing ofJapan last Monday, opening thescoring after just eight minutes.

Ecuador made a hash ofclearing a corner and Fuenzalidasent an angled volley from theedge of the area into the far bot-tom corner.

Ecuador brought the samemuscular approach to the gamethat had seen them reduced to10 men in their opener againstUruguay — a 4-0 loss.

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Drag-flicker Gurjit Kaur scoreda brace as India secured its

place in the final round of TokyoOlympic qualifiers by beating Chile4-2 in the semifinals of the women'sFIH Series Finals hockey tourna-ment here Saturday.

The top two teams from theongoing tournament have securedtheir berths in the FIH OlympicQualifiers to be held later this year.

Gurjit (22nd, 37th minutes)struck twice, while Navneet Kaur(31st) and skipper Rani Rampal(57th) were the other goal scorersfor India.

Carolina Garcia (18th) andManuela Urroz (43rd) scored thegoals for Chile at the HiroshimaHockey Stadium.

India will take on Japan in thesummit clash on Saturday.

The hosts beat Russia 3-1 inpenalty shoot-out in the othersemifinal after both the teams werelocked 1-1 at the end of regulation60 minutes.

World no. 9 India started thematch on the front foot as theymade six circle entries inside thefirst 15 minutes but to no avail.

Chile also made four circlepenetrations but failed to get a shoton target as the first quarter endedgoalless.

But the Indian team was in fora surprise three minutes into thesecond quarter when Carolinascored a field goal through a

counter-attack to seize the initiative.Stunned by the goal, the Indians

went on the offensive and drew par-ity four minutes later when Gurjit

converted a penalty corner as boththe teams went into the halfwaybreak locked 1-1.

A minute after the change of

ends, India took the lead throughstriker Navneet, who picked up theball from just outside the 25-yardcircle, ran into the striking circle

and slotted home with a powerfulshot.

Six minutes later, India extend-ed their lead through another penal-ty corner conversion by Gurjit.

Chile did not give up andearned two penalty corners in quicksuccession towards the dying stagesof the third quarter but they failedto capitalise on their chances.

In the 43rd minute, though, apoor clearance from the Indiandefence saw Chile regain possessionand Urroz reduced the marginfrom a Denise Krimerman's feed.

The fourth and final quarterwitnessed a good fight between thetwo teams till the 57th minutewhen Rani scored with a reverse hitafter receiving a pass from LilimaMinz.

After the match, India captainRani dedicated the win to teammateLalremsiami's father, who passedaway on Friday.

Rani lauded the young strikerfor showing great courage in theface of adversity by staying with theteam instead of returning homeafter listening about her father'sdeath.

"One of our team mateLalremsiami lost her father yester-day so this victory is dedicated toher father. Hope he rests in peace.She did really good and we are soproud of her. She was with the teamand didn't return home," Rani said.

"We are happy that we are in thefinal. This game is all about winningbut still we can do much better."

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Lewis Hamilton timed his best lapto perfection on Saturday when

he took pole position ahead of hisMercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottaswith a blistering late effort at theFrench Grand Prix.

The five-time world champion,who had struggled to match theFinn's pace in the previous twopractice sessions, reeled off a fastestlap in one minute and 28.319 sec-onds.

It was the 86th pole of hiscareer for Hamilton, who won lastyear's race from pole, and a record-increasing 63rd front-row lock-out

for Mercedes. Hamilton has taken60 of his poles with Mercedes.

It was a master-class from thedominant Silver Arrows team whiletheir rivals laboured in pursuit,with Monegasque Charles Leclerctaking third for Ferrari ahead ofMax Verstappen, fourth for RedBull.

British rookie Lando Norrisimpressed with a fine effort to takefifth ahead of his resurgent McLarenteam-mate Carlos Sainz and, sur-prisingly, a despondent SebastianVettel down in seventh in the secondFerrari after a gearbox issue duringQ3.

Daniel Ricciardo was eighth for

Renault ahead of Frenchman PierreGasly in the second Red Bull andAntonio Giovinazzi of Alfa Romeo.

"It's not an easy track," saidHamilton. "It's very technical andValtteri has been very quick allweekend. I've been chipping awayand the last two laps were the ones."

Bottas said: "I think Lewis hada really good lap. It's between super-close between us all weekend and it'sabout fine details."

A happy Leclerc said: "At theend, I am pretty happy with my lapand unfortunately it wasn't enough!A good start will be very importanttomorrow."

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Roger Federer's Wimbledonpreparations continue to

run smoothly after he reachedthe final of the ATP event inHalle for a 13th time with a 6-3, 6-3 win over Andy Murray'snew doubles partner Pierre-Hugues Herbert on Saturday.

World number 43 Herbert,28, struggled in his first-evermeeting with 20-time majorwinner Federer, who is chasinga record-extending tenth title inHalle this year.

The straight-sets victoryprovided welcome respite forFederer, who was forced tobattle through gruelling three-set encounters with Jo-WilfriedTsonga and Roberto BautistaAgut earlier in the week.

The 37-year-old Swiss willface David Goffin in the final,after the Belgian fought to vic-tory over rising Italian star

Matteo Berrettini earlier onSaturday.

Goffin, 28, who alsoknocked out home favouriteand world number fiveAlexander Zverev in the lasteight on Thursday, beatBerrettini 7-6 (7/4), 6-3 toreach his first ATP Tour finalsince 2017.

The Belgian proved onechallenge too many for in-form 23-year-old Berrettini,who has risen to 22 in the worldrankings this season andclaimed his second ATP title ofthe year in Stuttgart last week.

Goffin has lost seven of hiseight meetings with Federer inthe past, beating him in threesets at the 2017 ATP Finals in

London."We all know how good

Roger is on grass. He is incred-ible, but I will try to be ready tobeat him," said Goffin.

"Roger has had toughmatches this week againstTsonga and Bautista Agut, butas soon as he has had to play hisbest tennis, he has done so."

Meanwhile, Ashleigh Bartyis one win away from becom-ing the first Australian to becrowned women's world num-ber one in 43 years after reach-ing the final of the WTA eventin Birmingham. Barty beatBarbora Strycova 6-4, 6-4 in thesemi-finals to extend her win-ning streak to 11 consecutivematches.

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�/��� ���� ����� �Aryan Singh shocked top seed Tanishq Gupta in the second

round of the 14th Lucknow District Under- 25 Open ChessChampionship at Excellia School on Saturday. In other matches sec-ond seed Medhansh Saxena defeated Sanyam Srivastava while AdityaPant and Sameer Basu beat Aryan Duggal and Divyansh Pandeyrespectively.

���������������������/Charminar Club defeated Young Challenger by 24 runs to win

the 1st Gaurav Mehta Memorial Cricket Tournament at ChowkStadium on Saturday. Batting first, Charminar Club piled scored183 runs in 29 overs. In reply, Young Challengers were bunled outfor 159 runs in 29.1 overs.BRIEF SCORES:CC:183 (Mohit Kumar 65, Aaman 24, Aman 24; Utkarsh 26/2, Ajeet31/2, Prashant 47/2)YC: 159 (Rohit 77, Naman 22; Wahabul 27/2).

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Kane Williamson's latestWorld Cup batting master-class helped New Zealand

recover from a woeful start to posta total of 291-8 against the WestIndies on Saturday.

New Zealand were 7-2 insidethe first over after fast bowlerSheldon Cottrell removed openersMartin Guptill and Colin Munrofor golden ducks at Old Trafford.

But Williamson's career-best148 -- his second successive WorldCup hundred after a match-win-ning 106 not out against SouthAfrica at Edgbaston on Wednesday-- turned the tide.

The New Zealand captainreceived sound support from RossTaylor (69) during a third-wicketstand of 160.

However, Cottrell helped leavethe West Indies with a reachabletarget thanks to an impressive 4-56 in his maximum 10 overs,including the key wicket ofWilliamson.

He also held three catches andran out dangerman Colin deGrandhomme (16).

Taylor gave his innings awaywhen he could not clear Jason

Holder at mid-off after chipping acatch off Chris Gayle, to leave NewZealand 167-3 in the 31st over.

But Williamson carried on intypically calm fashion.

He went to his 13th one-dayinternational hundred with hiseighth four when he pulled a loosedelivery from fast bowler KemarRoach.

He then hoisted Cottrell leg-side for the only six of his innings.

Williamson surpassed his pre-vious best score in 137 ODIinnings -- 145 against South Africain Kimberley in 2013 -- before hefell skying Cottrell to wicket-keep-er Shai Hope.

In all, Williamson faced 154balls, including 14 fours and onesix.

He has now scored 373 runs,including two hundreds, in fourinnings this World Cup at anaverage of 186.5.

Earlier, West Indies made a

sensational start after Holder sentNew Zealand, the 2015 losingfinalists, into bat.

Cottrell was on target firstball with a delivery that thuddedinto the pads of Martin Guptill.

Umpire Ruchira Palliyagurugeinitially said "not out" but the WestIndies successfully reviewed the

decision, with replays showing theball would have hit leg stump.

Munro too fell first ball, beat-en completely by another yorkerthat smashed into his stumps.

For the second time in the overCottrell, still a serving member ofthe Jamaica Defence Force, greet-ed a wicket with his trademark mil-itary salute.

It was only the second occasionwhen both openers in a World Cupmatch had fallen for first-ballnoughts, with Sri Lanka's LahiruThirimanne and TillakaratneDilshan collecting golden ducksagainst Afghanistan in 2015.

Williamson and Taylor, howev-er, repaired the damage in style fora New Zealand side who have yetto lose at this World Cup.

The West Indies were seventhin the 10-team round-robin grouptable before the start of Saturday'smatches and struggling to qualifyfor the semi-finals.

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Sarfaraz Ahmed is adamantthat defeat to India last

time out won’t be playing onPakistan’s mind in the slight-est when they take on SouthAfrica at Lord’s.

Pakistan have won justone of their five matches at theWorld Cup 2019 — an impres-sive 14-run triumph over hostsEngland — but lost by 89 runsto their biggest rivals India atOld Trafford in their mostrecent match.

They will have had a weekto analyse that loss by the timethey take to the field inLondon on Sunday, wherethey will try to down a Proteasside who similarly only haveone victory to their name.

But skipper Sarfaraz insistshis team won’t be focusing onthe past and that the squad areconfident of bouncing back instyle at the home of cricket.

“Everything is fine afterthe India match,” he said. “Itwas tough for us but after thematch, we gave our playerstwo days’ rest. Then beforethree days, we were practisinghard.

“Psychologically there is apressure on you as a Pakistancaptain if you lose againstIndia in a World Cup match.

“People will think we arebeaten but it's not the first timewe have lost to them in aWorld Cup, so it’s fine. We allare OK and we are all are back-ing ourselves, so hopefully we

will bounce back.“Morale is still very high

for us. The tournament isnow open now, so we have achance and we are focussingmatch by match. Hopefully wecan start by beating SouthAfrica.”

The two sides contested ahighly-competitive ODI series

in South Africa back in Januarythat Pakistan eventually lost 3-2.

That has whetted theappetite for this Sunday's clash,although Sarfaraz believes it isfoolish to read too much intothose games six months on.

“If you talk about the SouthAfrica series, it’s different,”

added Sarfaraz. “A bilateralseries is a different type of pres-sure to a World Cup. We playedgood cricket but unfortunate-ly we didn't win the series. Weare very hopeful heading intothe game against South Africaand we will try for our best.”

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With both teams virtually out of thesemifinal race, South Africa andPakistan will be battling it out for

a consolation win in their World Cupmatch at the Lord’s here on Sunday.

Having mustered just three pointsfrom six games, South Africa are all butout of the tournament while Pakistanmight still sneak into the semifinals, pro-vided they win their remaining fourgames and other results go in their favour.

When Pakistan were pummelled byWest Indies in their tournament opener,many of their loyal fans drew parallel totheir triumphant campaign in 1992 whenthey scripted a sensational turnaround towin the title.

However, following Pakistan’s heavyloss against India on June 16, not manyof their supporters have any hopes leftfrom their struggling side. It is not a sur-prise that the fans have shown littlerestraint in their criticism of the SarfarazAhmed-led side and stories of faction-alism have surfaced from nowhere.

“It (severe criticism) is usual inPakistan cricket after the team performsbadly, isn’t it? The expectations arealways high,” said former captain ShahidAfridi during his chat with ShoaibAkhtar on the latter’s Youtube channel.

Mohammad Amir was the lonewarrior in the bowling departmentagainst India and their batting andfielding, too, was a big let down onceagain. Senior player Shoaib Malik, whohas not been among the runs so far, isnot expected to get another game in hislast competition before he retires fromODI cricket.

South Africa, too, have not learntfrom their mistakes in what has been adisappointing campaign.

They did have their moments in theprevious game against New Zealand butlet the Kane Williamson-led side off thehook and paid the price for it.

Head coach Ottis Gibson said theteam’s target in the remaining games isto play to its potential.

“We’ve still got three games to playand I’d like to think that we can at leastplay the way we know we can play,” saidGibson ahead of the game.

“The thing about the squad is thatthere are guys playing their last WorldCup and I’d like to think that they willleave the world stage having signed offon a strong note.

“And there are some youngsters here

that I’m sure will play in future WorldCups. So they too would like to leave astatement. That’s the way we’ve got tolook at it,” he added.

Leggie Imran Tahir and batsman JP Duminy will retire from ODIs after theconclusion of the team’s campaign here.

It will also be the first match at theLord’s in the World Cup and it remainsto be seen how the pitch will play.

F��� Pakistan: Sarfaraz Ahmed (captain),Fakhar Zaman, Imam ul Haq, BabarAzam, Haris Sohail, Hasan Ali, ShahdabKhan, Mohammed Hafeez, MohammedHasnain, Shaheen Shah Afridi, WahabRiaz, Mohammed Aamir, Shoaib Malik,Imad Wasim, Asif Ali.South Africa: Faf du Plessis (captain),Quinton de Kock (wk), Aiden Markram,Hashim Amla, JP Duminy, David Miller,Kagiso Rabada, Dwaine Pertorius, AndilePhehlukwayo, Tabraiz Shamshi, ImranTahir, Lungi Ngidi, Chris Morris, Rassievan der Dussen, Beuran Hendricks.

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�Have you guys started withpermutations?

We definitely never feel done and out.We’ve sort of tried to put a lot of focus backcompletely on to us going forward. It’s obvi-ously really important that we win theremaining three of our games, and if there’soutside chance of qualifying, that would beincredible.�Has it been difficult to lift the playersfor today’s match?

Naturally after the game, it was — itwas quite a tough one to swallow becauseobviously it was quite an important gamefor us leading to it and it was really close.It obviously went down to the wire andKane Williamson played incredible to gethis team going, something we can learnfrom. The mood, naturally it was a bitdown, but I think we’ve done a bit of oursulking and moping around. The energy inthe changing room is really good, and ithelped as the families arrived day beforeyeaterday. The guys are feeling slightly morerefreshed.�A lot of starts without anyone gettingthat big score. Has that been the differ-ence between success and failure?

It’s sort of the modern game. A start isalmost — it’s really important to get your-self in, because we’ve seen the knocks andthe magnitude of knocks that some of thetop players in the world are doing at theWorld Cup. They are really scoring bighundreds.�How important is it for you to get theruns and stamp your authority?

From a confidence perspective, it willbe quite important. It will be nice goinghome, whenever we go home, knowing thatwe have managed to put performancestogether at a World Cup. So it is importantfor us. Going forward, we are trying to notlook too much into the future in terms ofplayers retiring and things like that. It’ssomething that really is outside of our con-trol as players and as young players, espe-cially. If you look at guys like Kagi andLungi, they have actually done incrediblywell in their young career so far. So it’ssomething we are putting a bit of focus on.�How much of an inspiration SA mighthave taken from SL?

It was a great game of cricket, and it justproves that as soon as a team clicks on theday, any team at this World Cup can beatany other team. That’s why I say we reallykind of focus on ourselves because if we puttogether our best game of cricket, it shouldput us in a good position to hopefully wingames. It’s nice to see that a team like SriLanka with great players, and maybe havebeen struggling for form, as have we, havebeen able to overcome one of the favourites.�Can you put your finger on why you’restruggling to convert the starts?

It’s situations in the game whereas abatter, you and your partner might also bedeciding we are going to try to put pres-sure on this bowler and it doesn’t come off,execution let’s you down but the thinkingis right.�Which Pakistani bowlers do you feeldifficult for SA batsman?

We’ve played a recent series againstPakistan. Hafeez wasn’t part of that series,so that will be a new sort of challenge forsome of us who haven’t faced him. But asa whole, I think Pakistan have got a real-ly good bowling unit. Amir is back and inform, and obviously Ahmed has hadattack. It will be a nice challenge to facethem at lords, and as a whole, I think, yeah,their bowling lineup is one we definitelycan't take lightly.

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Wahab Riaz called onPakistan’s World Cup

strugglers to stick together asthey prepare to face SouthAfrica in a must-win game atLord’s today.

Pakistan have only threepoints from five games and tomake the semis they are like-ly to need to win their fourremaining games andimprove their net run-rate,while hoping other results gotheir way.

Pakistan pace-man Riazinsists his team-mates realisethe importance of the do-or-die game and he hopes dis-playing a united front againstSouth Africa will spark astrong performance.

“We have to lift our-selves,” Wahab told reporters.“We are each other’s strength.We are all good friends andknow that only 15 of us canlift the team which not evenour family members can do.”

Team management gave

Pakistan’s players time off tounwind and come backrefreshed after the Indiagame.

Riaz insisted his team-mates realise the mistakesthey have made so far and aredetermined to make amends.“Good teams are the oneswho realises their mistakes, sowe have discussed all thosemistakes and a two day break

has refreshed us,” he said.But the 33-year-old, who

took three wickets inPakistan’s shock win over pre-tournament favouritesEngland, admitted the bowl-ing unit needs to work hard-er.

“As a bowling unit we aretrying hard, We are all focusedto do well in the South Africamatch,” Riaz said.

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It’s not about the six pack, it’s aboutthe skill and Lasith Malinga

showed that in spades in Sri Lanka’swin over England.

He has done it so many timesfor Sri Lanka over the years but itwas great to see him at his best. Hewas on a mission with the new ball,taking two crucial early wicketswhich Sri Lanka needed to defenda total like 232.

Then when Joe Root looked likehe was playing one of those inningswhere he just takes the game awayfrom you, Dimuth Karunaratneturned to Mali and threw him theball. He told him that he needed himand Mali delivered. Big players per-form in big games and that is whathe did, removing Root and then Jos

Buttler who could have won thegame for England as well.

I was really impressed withDimuth’s captaincy, trusting hisplayers, bringing on the off-spinnerDhananjaya de Silva at an importanttime and getting rewarded for that.I hope this game will give Sri Lankaa lot of confidence in this ICC Men’sCricket World Cup. They have beat-en one of the best teams in theworld, and they need to believe inthemselves.

At times it feels like they have

played with a little bit of fear andhave not been able to really expressthemselves. This win should changethat. Even after they had batted, I feltthat it was a competitive totalbecause the wicket was fairly slow.

It was great to see AngeloMathews scoring some runs. He stillisn’t quite in top form and you couldtell that he really needed a score. Attimes I wanted him to be moreaggressive, but with wickets fallingaround him, he produced a greatinnings and was the rock of that bat-

ting line-up.A word also for Avishka

Fernando. His performance shouldgive Sri Lankan fans a lot of hope forthe future. With Dimuth andAngelo, this team has batsmen whocan build an innings but it is impor-tant to have the x-factor in there aswell and that is what Avishka pro-vides. I’ve been a fan of his for awhile now, and I thought he playedreally well after those two early wick-ets, taking some of the momentumaway from England.

It’s a great win for Sri Lanka, butalso for the World Cup and it opensthings up a little.

The top four so far have a lot ofmatches against each other comingup, so they will inevitably drop somepoints. You look at New Zealand,Australia and England who all haveto play each other which does makeit interesting. That leavesBangladesh, Sri Lanka and the WestIndies with a chance to close the gapif they can pick up a few more wins.

I’ve always been convinced thatSri Lanka step up their game atWorld Cups. They have the abilityand they have the skill. This gameshould give them the confidence.

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Lasith Malinga insisted he haddone nothing new despite being

hailed as a “legend” after starringin Sri Lanka’s stunning World Cupwin over England.

The veteran paceman tookfour for 43 as Sri Lanka, defendinga seemingly modest total of 232-9,beat England by 20 runs to open upthe race for a semi-final spot.

England, bidding to win theWorld Cup for the first time, wouldhave gone top of the 10-teamround-robin table with a victory atHeadingley.

But instead they suffered theirsecond defeat of the group phasefollowing an equally surprising14-run loss to Pakistan.

Malinga’s haul saw him becomejust the fourth bowler to take 50wickets at the World Cup afterGlenn McGrath, MuttiahMuralitharan and Wasim Akram.

And just as importantly for SriLanka on Friday, the 35-year-old,renowned for his unorthodox‘slingshot’ action, struck tellingblows.

Malinga, who briefly returnedhome earlier in the tournament fol-lowing the death of his mother-in-law, rocked England at the start oftheir chase when he had JonnyBairstow lbw for a golden duck.

England then saw Malingahave stand-in opener James Vincecaught at slip.

Malinga had the in-form JoeRoot caught behind down the leg-side for 57 on review and JosButtler fell lbw for 10 to a trade-

mark yorker.Ben Stokes tried to take the

game away from Sri Lanka — nowjust two points behind third-placed England — with a blister-ing unbeaten 82, only for wicketsto keep falling at the other end.

“We know how hard BenStokes hits it, he got two or threeboundaries but we just kept bowl-ing our stock ball,” said Malinga.

“We stuck to our basic plan —line and length, no loose balls andadd in some variations and bounc-ers.”

Sri Lanka captain DimuthKarunaratne praised Malinga andfellow veteran Angelo Mathews,whose painstaking 85 not outhelped them recover from a col-lapse to three for two.

“Lasith is a legend,” saidKarunaratne.

“He keeps doing what heknows, that’s the main thing, thebasic things. He did a really goodjob.

“It looked like a 300 wicket, wethought it was a good, flat wicket.But when we played it seamed inthe first few overs then it got slow-er and slower.”

As for Mathews, the skippersaid: “Angelo, in-form, he knowshow to play his role. He’s a goodfinisher and did a good job.”

Sri Lanka — who have nowbeaten England in four successiveWorld Cups — next play SouthAfrica in Durham a week onFriday and Malinga said: “Wewant to carry on the momentumand confidence into the othermatches.”

����� 0""#�

England say they won’t tone down theiraggressive instincts when they take on

Australia on Tuesday, despite a shock defeatto Sri Lanka exposing what former captainMichael Vaughan believes is the side’s “onedownfall”.

Next week’s hotly-anticipated clash atLord’s between the Ashes rivals took on anextra layer of intrigue on Friday as Englandslumped to their second defeat of the tour-nament after failing to chase down SriLanka’s modest total of 9-232 at Headingley.

England’s aggressive batting line-up hasmade them the No 1 ODI team in the world,but the likes of Vaughan have questionedtheir decision-making in pressure moments.

Moeen Ali was singled out at Headingleyafter he tried to hit back-to-back sixes andwas caught at long-off, with his dismissalsparking a match-changing collapse of 5-42.

“England have not played with anysmartness,” Vaughan told the BBC. “Thegame was won when Moeen Ali hit a six andhe tried to hit another. I hope we are not inan era where in the dressing you can't say‘that is not good enough’.”

“What this has proven is the one down-fall of this England side. We have all said thatif England play smart cricket then they willbe the team to beat. But they didn’t.”

England have comfortably scored fasterthan any other side in the world since theirearly exit from the 2015 World Cup, withtheir run-rate of 6.31 well above their near-est challenger Australia (5.78).

Missteps from Eoin Morgan's side havebeen few and far between in that period, buttheir ability to play a more restrained game

with the bat when conditions are againstthem has come into question before, mostnotably when Pakistan knocked them out ofthe Champions Trophy in 2017.

In the semi-final at Cardiff, England fold-ed for just 211 on a used pitch despite beingheavily favoured to win the tournament.

Warm London weather and a freshwicket at Lord's should, however, make forfavourable batting conditions come Tuesday'sclash with Australia.

Asked if his side’s belief in their aggres-sive strategy is as strong as ever, Morganreplied: “There is no reason why it should-n’t be. We are going to play competitivegames. We are not going to win every gamein this World Cup. We still need to go backto the process that's taken us to being astrong side in the world. I think the messageis quite simple — we need to do the basicsalong with the way that we play as well.”

The tournament hosts had been heavi-ly favoured to reach the semi-finals, but thatcould be in jeopardy if they slip up againstany of their final three group-stage oppo-nents — Australia, New Zealand and India,all of whom currently hold top-four spots.

England haven’t beaten any of thoseteams at a World Cup since the 1992 edition,but recent history may be a better guide tohow Morgan’s side will respond and itdoesn’t spell good news for the Aussies.

In their last 46 ODIs on their home turf,England have not lost two consecutivegames, a trend Morgan is well aware of.

"When we get beaten, we tend comeback quite strong," he said. "We tend toresort to (playing) aggressive, smart, posi-tive cricket.

"Let's hope that is the case on Tuesday."

����� 0""#��

Eoin Morgan admits Englandforgot about the basics of a run

chase in a shock defeat to Sri Lankabut has promised to bounce backagainst defending championsAustralia in their next game onTuesday.

England suffered a shocking20-run defeat at the hands of SriLanka here on Friday, failing tochase down what looked like a sub-par 232/9.

“You look at the basics of a runchase, partnerships are very impor-tant. We struggled to get enough ofthem, or one substantial one,going. We had a couple of individ-ual innings but that is not going tobe enough to win the game,”Morgan was quoted as saying byICC website.

Ben Stokes made an unbeaten82 and Joe Root 57 for the hosts,but the two ran out of partnerseven as Lasith Malinga led aremarkable fightback.

“Quite a few wickets wereturning points, simply in the factthat you have got guys coming inat six, who average 40, seven whoaverage 30, we bat all the waydown. So every single wicket isquite important because every sin-gle one could have salvaged apartnership that could win you thegame,” insisted Morgan.

With England scheduled to

face Australia at Lord's next week,Morgan has asked his teammatesto come back strongly.

“When we get beaten we tend

to come back quite strong, we tendto resort to aggressive, smart andpositive cricket so let's hope that’sthe case on Tuesday.

“The message is quite simple,we need to do the basics alongwith the way that we play as well.There is no reason why it should-

n’t be, we are going to play com-petitive games and are not goingto win every game in this WorldCup,” said Morgan.

“We need to go back to theprocess that has taken us to beinga strong side in the world,” headded.

A lowly Sri Lanka had onlyone win in the tournament com-ing into this clash and too againstAfghanistan, but Morgan insistedthey didn’t underestimate theiropponents.

“Mally (Malinga), he has beenaround for a long time, so bowl-ing like that is not a surprise at all.We are going to lose games in thegroup stages.

“We didn’t deserve to winthis game. There were a couple ofchallenges that presented them-selves with the wicket and we did-n’t overcome them,” said the skip-per.

England were without the ser-vices of injured Jason Roy at thetop of the order and their slowstart in the chase might havehampered their chances of win-ning, but Morgan begged to dif-fer.

“If you look at the games wehave played. We would love (Roy)in the side and he is a hugestrength at the top of the order butthat is not why we lost the gameor why we might have struggledon this wicket,” said Morgan.

����� 06�#6�

Glenn Maxwell, the man whoknows Adam Zampa as well as

any in the Australian camp, insiststhe leg-spinner can be a legitimatewicket-taking option at the businessend of the World Cup.

Back in the team to faceBangladesh after a two-gameabsence, Zampa returned figures of1-68 off nine overs and went for 30off his last 13 balls as MushfiqurRahim and Mahmudullah launcheda spirited late rear-guard at TrentBridge on Thursday.

But Maxwell stressed the num-bers failed to tell the full story.

“I thought today was the besthe’s bowled in a while,” the all-rounder said of Zampa, one of twospinners in Australia’s squad along-side Nathan Lyon.

At other times he’s bowled notas well but still taken wickets.That’s always been his challenge. I’mpretty close to him in the field aswell and talking to him and mak-ing sure he’s still doing his thing. Ithought today he did really well.

“Unfortunately, (there were a)couple of big hits off his good balls,which you expect as a spinner. Itcost him towards the end of hisspell. “It’s just the nature of leg-spinbowling in one-day cricket thatsome days your best ball goes forsix.” Zampa has five wickets for thetournament at an average of 47.20and an economy rate of morethan seven, though spinners havelargely found the going tough atvenues with modest boundariesand flat pitches.

Coach Justin Langer hasadmitted he has been taken abackby the triumph of pace over spinduring the tournament given theincreasing importance of slowbowlers in 50-over cricket since the2015 World Cup.

But as the British summer

progresses and pitches presumablyget drier, conditions could swing infavour of spinners.

“I thought he bowled beauti-fully today and if keeps putting theball in the right areas he's going tokeep getting wickets for us,”Maxwell said.

Maxwell played an importantrole in Zampa’s re-emergence as aforce in Australia’s bowling attackin the lead-in to the World Cup.

Having found himself down onconfidence during Australia’s five-game one-day tour of India inFebruary, it took some candidwords from his Melbourne Starscaptain to help put Zampa right.

“Bowling to someone like Virat(Kohli) and he’s hitting the ball inall areas — you definitely feel likeyou’re under pressure,” said Zampa.

“I didn’t feel like I was at mybest for the first three games. It wasMaxi who had a word to me andsaid, ‘good on you for gettingwickets, but you’re probably not atyour best. What have you changedfrom the Big Bash?’

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The 2019 cricket World Cuphas reached its halfway stage.

South Africa and Afghanistan arenow not in contention whereasthe West Indies, Sri Lanka,Pakistan and the peppyBangladesh side are all in the pre-carious position of having to winall their remaining matches.

The four sides that are strongcontenders to qualify are India,England, New Zealand andAustralia. The uncertainty nowfor these top teams is the orderin which they will qualify.

This is where once again theInternational Cricket Councilhas erred. The Indian PremierLeague's (IPL) format shouldhave been the correct format atthe knock-out stage.

The top two teams first playeach other and the loser, there-after, plays the winner of thethird and fourth place. The toptwo teams in the league stageneed to be given some sort ofrecognition for their effort andtherefore, should be given theopportunity for two attempts, ifthey lose against each other.

The present format of thetop team playing the 4th placeside and the 2nd and 3rd play-ing each other, therefore, makesthe qualifying positions quite

irrelevant. The only advantagederived from a team's higherplacing is if, in the semifinals andthe finals, the match gets washedout.

The World Cup has been adampener so far given the wet,rainy English conditions andthis is only likely to continue.Washed out matches or raineffected ones with theDuckworth and Lewis formulaas a decider is something all theteams are dreading. The exam-ple of it could be seen whenPakistan were chasing a formi-dable total against India. Theopening wicket partnershipbetween Babar Azam and FakharZaman at one stage, through theD&L calculations, could havehad Pakistan pip India, if theweather god had blessed them.

One does understand that itis quite impossible to replicatethe actual conditions throughmathematical calculations and sothe D&L becomes another of theuncertainty that competing sideshave to live with.

The major change from thepast is the behaviour of theplaying surface -- the pitch.English wickets were normallyfresh, a little moist at the start ofplay. This helped fast bowlersmove the ball off the wicket,which made batting that much

more difficult. These conditionswere even more pronouncedwhen there was rain and cloudycondition before the match.That's precisely why, a few of thecaptains opted to bowl first,hoping to take advantage of thedampness that normally pre-vailed when the wickets werecovered. Unfortunately for them,things have changed.

The modern covers have aheating system which keeps thewicket dry. Although, there isgrass on the wicket, the drynessbelow makes it beautiful forbatting. One does feel sorry for

the bowler, as after just 8 overs,the ball stops moving in the airand the grass ensures that it doesnot spin vigorously. The poorbowler is at the mercy of the bat-ter making a mistake ratherthan being able to expose the lackof his technique.

That is why centuries, bigscores and plenty of sixes havebeen in abundance. The techni-cally perfect batsmen are allhaving a ball, especially with thefield restrictions, with just fouroutside the circle for most partof the game and so hittingboundaries and rotating the

strike has become so much eas-ier for them.

The 50-over game hasbecome a total farce in favour ofthe batsmen. The use of two sep-arate balls from each end hasbrought the demise of the reverseswing and the slow and surebounce in the wickets, makes itdifficult for them to keep thebatsman in check. A trifle shortor pitched up ball is seen sailinginto the stand. The yorker andthe fast and slow bouncer havebecome the only weapon of thepacers. The finger spinners havebecome a liability, whereas, thewrist spinners are being playedcomfortably off the backfoot,even though in some cases thebatsmen have not read the deliv-ery well. The talented RashidKhan being slaughtered for wellover 100 runs in his nine overswas quite sad to watch. Withoutany help from the wicket, he wasat the mercy of every Englishbatsman.

The ICC has to address thisissue very seriously. It may begreat for spectators to see plen-ty of fours and sixes and for aver-age batsmen making a name forthemselves, but the records willhave no value if the competitionis not evenly matched.

The field restriction in thefirst 10 overs needs to go. This

was initiated to quicken thepace of the game and for thebatsmen to take up the challengewhen the ball was shiny and new.This too has become irrelevantas the present openers arebecoming smart and rather thansmashing the ball, cleverly placeit without taking unnecessaryrisks. They know in the nextpowerplay with only four field-ers outside the 30-yard circle,they will get enough gaps in thefield to keep their score cardmoving.

The modern bats are niceand woody. A mishit flies overthe fence and therefore, an addi-tional fielder, making it threeshould be allowed outside 30yards in the first ten overs. Thenext 15 overs should allow fourfielders and the last 15 overs, fiveoutside the ring.

The Kookaburra white ballis another area of concern. Thenew ball seems to lack move-ment after the initial overs andthe flat seam makes it difficult forbowlers to cut or spin the ball. Aball that is helpful to the bowlerswill be a better option than onethat gives no assistance to them.

There has to be a duelbetween the bat and the ball orelse it is gradually turning into aone-sided affair. A tale of manya batting records.

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Mohammed Shami’s last-over hattrick saved India

from a mighty scare after theymanaged to pip Afghanistan by11 runs to inch closer towardsWorld Cup semi-finals, as bril-liant death bowling compensat-ed for an inexplicable battingdisplay here on Saturday.

Shami (9.5-1-40-4), playinghis first match, not only success-fully defended 16 runs off thelast over but also dismissed thedangerous Mohammed Nabi(52 off 55 balls), Aftab Alam (0)and Mujeeb ur Rahman (0) offsuccessive deliveries to com-plete the rare feat.

Afghanistan were bowledout for 213 in pursuit of a man-ageable 225 run target which atone stage looked gettable afterthe Indian middle-orderflopped in their first World Cuptest.

It was superb death bowl-ing by Jasprit Bumrah (2/39 off10 overs) and Shami thatchanged the complexion of thegame. As much as Shamideserves the credit, Bumrahdeserves equal plaudits for giv-ing five runs in the penultimateover.

The pitch being a trickyone, a target of 225 against aquality bowling attack wasn’tgoing to be easy. There werepartnerships but there wasalways this belief thatAfghanistan batting won’t beable to sustain the pressure.

Bumrah was lethal as everand his two wickets in the 29thover literally tilted the gamebefore the minnows madeanother comeback. From a rel-atively comfortable 106 for 2, itbecame 106 for 4 withAfghanistan losing the momen-tum.

But Nabi (52) had otherideas as he tried his best but that‘exclusive 60 plus stand’ that ismandatory in these kind ofchases didn’t happen.

The Indian spinnersYuzvendra Chahal (2/36 in 10overs) and Kuldeep Yadav (0/39in 10 overs) were remarkablyconsistent with their lines asthey never really let the batsmenget away.

Earlier, skipper Virat Kohli(67 off 63 balls) again battedeffortlessly before Afghanistan’sIPL stars Mohammed Nabi (9-0-33-2), Mujeeb ur Rahman(10-1-26-1) and Rashid Khan(10-0-38-1) put brakes onIndia’s other star batsmen, keep-ing them under tight leash ona slow track that offered bothturn and bounce.

It was a glorious comebackby Afghanistan bowlers, asIndian batsmen played 152 dotballs (equivalent to 25.2 overs).This was after being hit for arecord 25 sixes by England inthe previous game.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni (28off 52 balls) and Kedar Jadhav(52 off 68 balls) were unable toaccelerate against the slowbowlers adding only 57 runs in14 overs during the middlephase.

Dhoni’s inability to rotatestrike during middle overs andKedar’s lack of game time wasevident as they could never real-

ly force the pace. Worse, theydidn’t even intend to take anyrisk against the three spinners.

While the odd ball washolding up and there was someturn available, at times, Kedarand Dhoni were even defend-ing fuller deliveries.

The intent was missing andsuddenly they were trying toplay out the overs bowled by

Mujeeb, easily the best of the lotwith 38 dot balls to his credit.

Dhoni was finally relievedfrom his miseries by Rashid asthe desperate former skippercame down the track and wasstumped. This was only the sec-ond time in his career and firsttime since 2011 that Dhoni wasstumped.

The amount of pressure

that the duo put on HardikPandya was evident as he wasforced to slog from ball one butfailed to deliver this time gettingout to pacer Aftab Alam.

Skipper Gulbadin Naib(2/51) also impressed with hisseam-up stuff dismissing Kedaroff the penultimate delivery ofthe innings.

Before this game, India lost

14 wickets in the three complet-ed games and none of the wick-ets went to the spinners.

It started with India’s in-form opener Rohit Sharmabeing beaten by a doosra fromMujeeb as he lunged forwardfor a defensive stroke.

KL Rahul despite scoring 30could never really get the mea-sure of Mujeeb, his Kings XIPunjab teammate.

The itch to outsmart Nabicost Rahul dearly as he tried areverse sweep only to findHazratullah Zazai at shortthird-man after a 57-run standwith Kohli.

Kohli never looked in trou-ble and hit one beautiful coverdrive off Rashid. Vijay Shankar(29 off 41 balls) nudged aroundand was steady during their 58-run stand before beingadjudged leg before by RahmatShah.

Kohli looked good foranother hundred but missedthree in three games, trying tocut Nabi with the turn.

Once Kohli was out, theIndian innings lost momentum.

INDIA: KL Rahul c HazratullahZazai b Nabi30, Rohit Sharmab Mujeeb 1, Kohli c Rahmat bNabi 67, Vijay Shankar lbw bRahmat 29, MS Dhoni st IkramAli Khil b Rashid Khan 28, KJadhav c (sub)Noor Ali Zadranb Naib 52, Hardik Pandya cIkram Khil b Aftab Alam 7,Mohammed Shami b Naib 1,Kuldeep Yadav not out 1, JaspritBumrah not out 1Extras (w 7) 7Total (8 wkts, 50 Overs) 224Fall of wickets: 7-1 (RohitSharma, 4.2), 64-2 (LokeshRahul, 14.2), 122-3 (VijayShankar, 26.1), 135-4 (ViratKohli, 30.3), 192-5 (MS Dhoni,44.3), 217-6 (Hardik Pandya,48.4), 222-7 (MohammedShami, 49.3), 223-8 (KedarJadhav, 49.5)Bowling Mujeeb Ur Rahman10-0-26-1, Aftab Alam7-1-54-1, Gulbadin Naib 9-0-51-2, MdNabi 9-0-33-2, Rashid Khan 10-0-38-1, Rahmat 5-0-22-1AFGHANISTAN: HazratullahZazai b Mohammed Shami 10,Gulbadin Naib c Shankar bPandya 27, Rahmat Shah cChahal b Bumrah 36, H Shahidic&b Bumrah 21, A Afghan bChahal 8, Mohammad Nabi cPandya b Mohammed Shami52, Najibullah Zadran c Chahalb Pandya 21, Rashid Khan stDhoni b Chahal 14, IkramAlikhil not out 7, Aftab Alamb Mohammed Shami 0, MujeebUr Rahman b Md Shami 0Extras: (B-4, LB-4, W-9) 17Total: (all out in 49.5 overs) 213 Fall of wickets: 1-20, 2-64, 3-106, 4-106, 5-130, 6-166, 7-190,8-213, 9-213 , 10-213 Bowling: Mohammad Shami9.5-1-40-4, Jasprit Bumrah 10-1-39-2, Yuzvendra Chahal 10-0-36-2, Hardik Pandya 10-1-51-2, Kuldeep Yadav 10-0-39-0.

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“The play’s the thing/Wherein I’ll catch theconscience of the king.” — Shakespeare

In the 60’s, while the flower childrenof the West were smoking up theirprivate infinities and seeking out anew world, and while popular cul-ture was poised to consume the

sanctum preserved for classics, RolandBarthe declared the ‘author’ dead. And

George Steiner pointedto the death of tragedy.But since history is nota single stream andeach nation is living itsown time, theatre inIndia was beingshaped by individualgenius and the defin-ing consciousness ofthree giants: In Hindi,Mohan Rakesh; in

Marathi, Vijay Tendulkar; and inKannada, Girish Karnad.

While Karnad went on to excel also asan actor, director, translator, and scholar, it is as a playwright — as one of these threegiants that define modern Indian plays —that one will remember him most. “You know, how I have been an actor, apublisher, a filmmaker. But in none ofthese fields have I felt quite as much athome as play writing,” the 1998 JnanpithAward winner once said (The Post-ColonialSpace: Writing the Self and the Nation).

For his language, he chose Kannada,the language of his childhood memories,and for his themes, he invoked thosechimeral tales and characters that comefrom and inform our myths, our history,and our dreams — plays like Yayati,Hayavadana, Naga-Mandala, Tughlak,Agni Mattu Male, and Taledanda.

In his use of mythology and history,he was unique and stands apart from hiscontemporaries, who employed otherstrategies to inform their plays. There area million factors that shape the aestheticsof an artist, but in case of Karnad, onecan safely trace it back to his early yearsin the quaint town of Sirsi, Karnataka,where he got to watch and enjoy the itin-erant Natak Mandalis that were commonto the region in early 20th century beforethe movies relegated them to the mar-gins. Karnad’s parents, Krishnabai neeMakikar and Dr Raghunath Karnad, adoctor in the Bombay Medical Services,were both ardent admirers of theatre andtook him along for regular performances,which fired the imagination of youngKarnad. He grew to love the Yakshaganatheatre, and the performances hewatched in his village. One sees thepower and the spectacle of these folkforms many years later, still strong, in thedramatic rhythms of his plays.

The rich women-centric themes, theawareness and consciousness of thewoman’s experience from Yayati toHayavadana and Naga-Mandala, may haveas much to do with his life, as with hisexposure to the Western canon.

Born in Matheran, Maharashtra, his

familywas by no

means a con-ventional one: Hismother was awidow with a son andhad to wait for fiveyears to marry the youngDoctor Karnad due tosocial pressures. Karnad’s teenage yearswere spent in Dharwar with two sistersand a niece, a household with a strongpresence of women figures.

Many years later, when Karnad was42, he married Saraswathi Ganapathy, amarriage formalised after 10 years ofbeing together. Evidently, modernity wasnot just an intellectual import, for him, itwas an experiential legacy.

��������� �While Kannada was Karnad’s childhoodlanguage, his language at school wasMarathi, and after graduating in Mathsand Statistics in 1958, he studiedPhilosophy, Politics, and Economics atMagdalene in Oxford, as a Rhodes scholarin 1960-63 (he was also the President ofthe Oxford Union during this time!).

Back in India, he had a longish stintwith the Oxford University Press until1970, after which he devoted himself tofull-time writing and a Chennai-basedtheatre group The Madras Players. Butagain in the late 80’s, Karnad lookedWest, and was a visiting Professor at theUniversity of Chicago, and a Fulbrightplaywright-in-residence.

These influences readied the groundsfor the playwright: A rooted, earthy earlylife, seeped with the beauty and thegrime of post-Independence India, and ayouthful 20’s in the midst of Oxford’svortex, wherein the best of Westernthought and art came to be studied anddiscussed. It is, therefore, not surpris-ing that though Karnad’s plays tellIndian tales, like the characters ofHayavadana, they bear a mixed incom-pleteness and posit conflicts, uncertainidentities and philosophical questionswith overlapping moral frameworks.

�/������ ��/Karnad’s use of Indian myths and historygave his plays the power of context — he did not have to tell the story beforetelling the story. But he did it in such away so as to draw fresh interpretations.This was not a new technique to India, where the Ramayana and theMahabharata have been mined by thegenius of playwrights many a time to tell a story relevant to the age.

The newness lay in his Aristotelianelegance of form, and the ability of hisplays to address complex political andsocial questions contemporary to the timethe plays were written. The psychologicaland philosophical conflicts of the play

dance in a symbolictelling in the more mythic

plays (like Hayavadana andNaga-Mandala) and in the con-flict internal to characters in hishistoric plays (like Tughlak andThe Dreams of Tipu Sultan).

His use of folktales, theatricalspectacle, song and fantastic plotsallowed him to pull off that

impossible balancing act of commentingon contemporary issues without soundingpropagandist or agenda-driven, of pro-voking thought without instructing, andof creating masterpieces that belong to adifferent age, speak to a different age, andyet remain relevant to all ages.

������/ Yayati, Karnad’s first play came out in1961. He was 23, in the flush of youth,Sartre and Oxford. “I was excited by thestory of Yayati. This exchange of agesbetween the father and the son, whichseemed to be terribly powerful and terriblymodern. At the same time, I was reading alot of Sartre and the Existentialist. Thisconsistent harping on responsibility, whichthe Existentialist indulge in, suddenlyseemed to link up with the story of Yayati,”said Karnad in The Post-Colonial Space:Writing the Self and the Nation.

The play is based on a story from theMahabharata, of King Yayati, who becauseof his infidelity, is cursed with perpetualold age by Shukracharya. Keen to enjoythe pleasures of youth, Yayati asks one ofhis sons to give him his youth in exchangefor the kingdom. The tale is seen throughthe eyes of that son’s (Puru’s) wife. Theplay was in Kannada (one that Karnad didnot translate into English himself), anastonishing achievement, and put himfirmly on the road to being the playwrightthat he became. How the Existentialist’semphasis on ‘responsibility’ morphed into‘dharma’ seen through the gaze of awoman is what myths are made of!

However, it was Tughlak in 1964,which really put Karnad on the nationalstage. Staged in the ancient Purana Qila inDelhi, directed by the legendary EbrahimAlkazi, and a young fiery Manohar Singhplaying the 14th-century KingMuhammad bin Tughlaq, this play tells atonce the story of a man before his time,impulsive, visionary, and tragic, and magi-cally becomes a metaphor for theNehruvian era of development and gover-nance. The figureheads may have changein the real world today, but the archetypaltale, built out of stuff that makes ushuman, still yields meaning contemporaryto us. Like any truly great play, it tran-scends its time, and has the ability toremain compelling and relevant.

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Girish Karnad is often calledthe Renaissance man, a man

of many parts, an intellectualwho defined the taste of an entiregeneration. But when the dustsettles, and time plays its part, hewill be fondly remembered in thelittle beautifully etched roles heessayed, both on television (thosewere Doordarshan days) and onthe bigger screen.

His role as father of littleSwami in Malgudi Days, in partic-ular, is unforgettable. A perfectfoil to Swami’s antics and adven-tures, Karnad played the part withsuch ease and effortlessness that itis etched forever in the minds ofpeople who grew up in the 80’s.He was at once stern yet sensitive,proud yet vulnerable, and thoughMico Chandru also essayed thepart later, it wasn’t quite the same.

Karnad also anchored for thescience programme, TurningPoint, and played dad inIndradhanush (India’s answer toTime Machine), yet this“Doordarshan fan” will alwaysremember him as Swami ke Papa.His involvement with cinema wasdeep, a natural extension to hislife in theatre. Here he acted,directed, wrote and collaboratedon every aspect of filmmaking,both in Kannada and Hindi. Hewon four Filmfare Awards, andwas conferred the Padma Shriand Padma Bhushan by theGovernment of India.

However, for non-Kannadaspeakers, his greatest contribu-tion to Hindi cinema arguablywould be the movie Utsavreleased in 1984. Adapted fromSudraka’s Sanskrit playMrichhkatikam, it starred Rekha,Anuradha Patel, Shashi Kapoor,Anant Nag, Amjad Khan, andintroduced Shekhar Suman.Karnad’s direction was impecca-

ble: It was probably the first timethat period drama based on aSanskrit play was made into amovie so truthfully, with all therich trappings of classical drama— the humour, the sensuality,and the sheer beauty of the plot.

Rekha never looked better.The art direction was fabulous,but the movie fizzled at the boxoffice and left Shashi Kapoor amuch poorer man. Both ShashiKapoor and Karnad were 20years too early. If one hasn’t seenit yet, one ought to; it’s a masterclass in filmmaking.

Another powerful movieKarnad directed and comeshighly recommended isGodhuli (1977). StarringNaseeruddin Shah, Om Puriand Kulbhushan Kharbanda, itis a movie that carries the dra-matic impact of a Theban play.Naseer is compelling, and themovie has one of the finest lastscenes in Indian cinema.

Karnad’s directorial debut inKannada films was withVamsha Vriksha (1971), whichhe co-directed with BV Karant,and for which they were award-ed the National Film Award forBest Direction. Some of hisother famous Kannada moviesinclude Tabbaliyu NeenadeMagane, Cheluvi, and Kaadu,though you may want to lookup the Kannada gangster movieAa Dinagalutoo.

His notable Hindi moviesinclude Manthan (1976) andSwami (1977), though he is bet-ter known to the millennial gen-eration for his roles in NageshKukunoor films like Iqbal(2005), Dor (2006), andAashayein (2010), besides playing roles in Yash Raj Films’ Ek Tha Tiger (2012) and Tiger Zinda Hai (2017).

Had Karnad never decided tospeak up as a public intellec-

tual, standing up for what hedeemed right, speaking up —sometimes, even out of turn —taking up cudgels for values likepluralism, had he just writtenwhat he did, that stupendousbody of work, it would have beenenough, his writing alone carriesthe strength of his convictions,and the power to question, tochallenge and to mobilise. Butgood enough was not enough forKarnad. He needed to stand evenwhere his plays would not go atgreat personal risk and speak up,every time. He spoke up for a plu-ralistic culture, for freedom ofexpression, never mincing hiswords when taking on what hesaw as fundamentalism; in recenttimes, becoming one of thestaunchest critics of Hindutva. Hespoke up against the demolitionof Babri Masjid in 1992, and hespoke up against the RSS andother organisations allied to theidea of Hindutva. He spoke upagainst the Idgah Maidan contro-versy in Hubli. He spoke up, tak-ing on the daunting Modi wave.

He was a name in the listthat included Dabholkar,Pansare, Kalburgi, and GauriLankesh. And at Gauri Lankesh’smemorial, silent, he still spokeup. It raised a storm, when hetook on VS Naipaul’s personalsimplistic view of history, callingout his “antipathy towardsIndian Muslims”, notwithstand-ing Sir Vidiadhar’s daunting lit-erary status, way back in 2012 atthe Tata Literary Festival.

He spoke up when SLBhyrappa criticised The Dreamsof Tipu Sultan, drawing attentionto the complexity of the character.Attempting to explain the differ-ence between history and historyretold as myth, he said referringto his earlier play Tughlak, “I don’thave an iota of interest in the his-torical Muhammad Tughlaq. Ihave no interest as to whether hewas good or evil, whether he waspro or anti-Hindu. I wished towrite an entertaining play, and inthe endeavour, wanted to choosea fairly complex character.” (inTipu Sultan: The Tyrant of Mysoreby Sandeep Balakrishna)

And he spoke up against nar-row linguistic chauvinism, eventhat of Kannada. Above thosewho appear to have succeeded inchanging the meaning of criticalterms of public discourse, where-in cultures turn civil, terms likeliberalism, urbanity, secular, hisname towers high, and his playsshall answer even as he goessilent, the picture of a genius,breathing in through an oxygenmask many languages, many cul-tures, with a placard that simplysays, “Urban Naxal”.

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����'�&���“Tragedy springs from outrage; it protests at the conditions of life. It carries in it the possibilities of disorder, for all tragic poets havesomething of the rebelliousness of Antigone.” — George Steiner

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In 1971 came Karnad’sHayavadana, probably his mostcomplex play. Based on a tale

from the Vetalpanchvimishika, andThomas Mann’s The TransposedHeads, which deals with the ques-tion of identity, incompleteness ofman, and the age-old dichotomy ofmind and matter, body and soul.The philosophical questions itaddresses are: What defines a manmost — his body or his mind? If theheads of two people were inter-changed, who would retain theidentity, the one with the head orthe one with the body?

In this play, Karnad employedthe form he had learned so manyyears back, as a child, watchingYakshagana folk theatre. This storyof the ‘horse-man’ with the humanvoice and a laugh that ends with aneigh, reminds one of the search forwhat is whole and human inJonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels.While some believe Hayavadana tobe the archetypal conflict betweenmind and body, it is a far more com-plex work — seeking the ‘complete-ness’ and ‘belongingness’ of manitself, and an inquiry into what cre-ates identity. A German version ofHayavadana directed by VijayaMehta was also staged as part ofDeutsches Nationaltheater, Weimar.

His play Naga-Mandala or Playwith Cobra, 1988, drew not onKarnad’s familiar classical sources,but upon an old story narrated tohim by another great, AKRamanujan. The play weavestogether two oral tales, one meta-

textual, about the nature of oraltales itself, while the other is a storyof a queen who fills the emptinessof her life by making up tales. TheKannada version won him theKarnataka Sahitya Academy Award,while his English translation of thesame was staged as a part of the cel-ebrations of the 30th anniversary ofGuthrie Theatre, Minneapolis.

He then went on to write AgniMattu Male (The Fire and the Rain),commissioned by the same theatre.

Karnad’s Taledanda (Death byBeheading, 1990) was an importantplay, especially in retrospect, dealingwith Veerashaivism, a 12th centuryreform movement, which was radi-cal and of contemporary relevance.It may well be a coincidence thatKarnad and his long-time friend,Lankesh, dwelled deep into thisLingayat reform movement, whichgrew deeply contentious, and fatal toKalburgi and Gauri Lankesh.

Karnad, as a playwright, usedthe language of myths and historyin a way modern India had neverseen, bringing to fore issues aboutwomen, children, and power; his craft deftly subverted meaningsof stories that had got fixed andappropriated it for a voice that we can comprehend and respond to. The architecture of his playsdraws strongly from Western structures, but the metaphors areIndian, and the archetypes, firmlyuniversal. They will last. GirishKarnad will not be forgotten.

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Around a month ago, World Hypertension Day wasobserved. The notable piece of statistic was that four outof 10 adults worldwide have high blood pressure and only

around 50 per cent of them are aware of it. Some two decadesago, the number of adults estimated to be living with high bloodpressure was around 972 million. In the next five years, the num-ber is expected to grow to around 1.56 billion. Mindbogglingby any standards as a good 20 per cent of the population aroundthe globe will likely be suffering from hypertension. What isthe basis of coming to this conclusion is certainly a subject mat-ter of another research. Particularly because if we calculate thetotal number of people suffering from hypertension and otherglobal epidemics like diabetes, cancer, AIDS, depression etc,it may work out to be nearly the size of the entire populationof the world. Whether the whole world is sick or not is a wide-ly debatable issue, but given the business interest of the strongpharma lobby, there is certainly some room for scepticism. Moreso when huge investments in corporate hospitals are comingup and health/medical insurance companies are looking for anew and huge market. Then there is another question that needsto be answered: Whether these pieces of statistic are meant forcreating awareness or creating a market. If one has the patienceto sit in the out patients department of any senior physicianof a decent sized hospital and observe closely the kind of com-plaints the patients come with, hypochondriasis rather than anyserious malady would seem to be the major disease. In fact,many doctors are now actually confirming this. However, thisis not to discount the threat that lurks all over the world onaccount of changing lifestyles, which most diseases of the pre-sent times arise from. But we must take these warnings witha pinch of salt. Are they actually warnings or agonising statis-tics to awfulize the whole scenario by creating some kind of afear psychosis that benefits the pharma lobby more than thepotential patients? There is need to assess the whole situationscientifically and with an open mind and question such asser-tions. A case in point is the recent guidelines on identificationof diabetic patients and potential diabetics. While the measuresof diabetes are also changing and benchmarks are being low-ered, what is more interesting is the creation of new categories.So there is a range of measurements that tends to classify cat-egories of diabetic patients, starting from a stage called pre-diabetic. Often the predisposing factors are being highlightedas causative factors and this prompts many people to start tak-ing preventive medication, which may not be needed at all.Further, many people may actually develop some diseases outof fear. The big question that thus needs to be addressed iswhether the hypertension epidemic, that the world is likely towitness in the next five years, is due to medical conditions ormental conditions created by the onslaught of fear evokedthrough information that can make even a healthy individualanxious of his health condition. Tension, of course, is rising inthe world but it is more due to anxiety that is being systemat-ically ingrained in human minds. Health is everybody’s con-cern, but that should not make everybody sick.

�����)���������# ������#������ � ��5�"��� �5�������������� ���*����� �) �J�! �����* �� ��� �����������)J���K����J���

Everything changes in thismaterial world, some slow-ly and some fast; such is the

nature of this material world. Forexample, a human body changesvery slowly but a flower is just theopposite. And changes presentchallenges. Yes, this human bodyundergoes changes slowly but itsurely does. A child grows slow-ly but at every stage of his growththere are new challenges likeadmission in school, college etc.And each change requires impor-tant decision-making on the partof all concerned. Are we fullyequipped for making such deci-sions? The answer is no. Why?Because we can never have thefull facts because most of theimportant decisions involve thefuture, ie what will be the effecton the future due to the decisionmade. For example, what shouldbe the subject of specialisation fora student. One should knowwhat the student’s natural abili-ty is, what interests him, what isgood for his future, etc.

Who can tell for sure? Godcan because He is not only awareof everything about the presentbut He also knows the past and thefuture. We may know what tran-spired in the past but only whatleft deep impression on us. Rest weforget, which is not unnatural.Regarding the present, we areseverely limited in knowing thebig picture. We may know somepart but never the whole of it. Weare not equipped. This is the cos-mic design. And the future is

largely unknown except whatastrologers, palmists, etc indicateto us, and that may not be entire-ly accurate. It is also part of thecosmic design that we can seekhelp from God and He will oblige.

Personally, I seek God’s guid-ance and help all the time. I willcite some instances when Isought God’s help and it provedto be highly beneficial. Someclient owed us a lot of money and

we were unable to do anythingabout it. Someone suggestedgoing to court. This was a bigdecision, therefore, I prayed forguidance. The response camethat the present was not the righttime for such an action. Heindicated that such action atthat time was driven by greed —a door to hell. (16.21) We had topursue other avenues for the timebeing and be patient about it.

Subsequent events confirmedwhat my Lord had indicated.

One of my close relativesacted badly with me. I becamequite incensed. However, beingin the habit of seeking guidancefrom God, I prayed for guidance.My Lord indicated that if Iwanted to be happy, I shouldcontrol my anger. (5.23) I turnedmy relationship with this personinto a formal one where emo-

tions have no place. In anotherinstance, I received a suspiciousmessage on mobile. I meditatedon God and pat came theanswer, which was to block thenumber because lust should beshunned at all costs. (3.41)

Jealousy is not too far frommy thinking, but my Lord repeat-edly warns me of its conse-quence, ie birth in lower species.(16.19) I have been instructed toshut out such thoughts, and I amgetting into a habit of doing so.The last instance is somewhatunusual. My daughter misplacedan important document andthere was tension. I prayed andmy Lord indicated where thedocument was.

God is ever willing to helpbecause we in ourselves cannever be complete or totallyindependent; we need God’s help,Him being omnipotent, omni-scient and omnipresent. Aren’t wesmall souls and mostly helpless,and ill-informed? If we reallywish to avail of this readily avail-able facility, we can fortify our-selves with the knowledge of theBhagavad Gita. There is no otherqualification required. Wheneveranxious or fearful, pray to Godfor guidance and get perfectanswers or solutions. God willmost likely refer to a particularverse in the Gita. Anyone canapproach God and He willrespond in His own ways; we justhave to be receptive./��������������������"��� ����������* � ��� ������������K�0��*������J���

Krishna, through his teach-ings in the Gita as well as his addresses to thechief fighters in theMahabharata war, such as

Arjuna, Bhima, and Duryodhana,proved to be a great counsel on solv-ing present age day-to-day’s prob-lems. Krishna’s Karmayoga tendingto be an optimistic way to life provesa concrete living methodology of lifeto the present day man. As it providesfull instructions on his daily routinesuch as food, duties, thoughts, rela-tionships, responsibilities whetherpersonal or social. Accordingly, thetitle of Karma Shastra is also appliedto the Gita as a practical guide for aman of action and a mandate foraction. It is professed that throughthe practices of the Karma Yogaalone can one aspire all through per-fection in one’s life. Besides, Krishna’ssaga from the Mahabharata ,Puranas, and Gita teachings provideseveral hints to present day mankindtowards better management of worklife and other things.

The five essential factors of worklife management — efficiency, consis-tency, landing, controlling, and socialbonding — which Krishna discussesin the Gita are also well-delineated inthe narratives of the epicMahabharata, describing its 18-daywarfare in Kurukshetra, which illus-trates the unitive programme of the-ory and action, since life is held sim-ilar to the battlefield Kurukshetra. TheGita is the summary of all those fac-tors which serve as essentials for main-taining good work-life balance, andthe Mahabharata shows how thoseprinciples are applied in practice.

However, a gist of these princi-ples required for work-life balance isavailable in the opening chapter of theGita titled ‘Arjuna-Vishada Yoga’,which presents to us the behaviour-al crisis of the chief fighter in theMahabharata war, who has to man-age the impending warfare. Undersuch circumstances, Krishna’s dia-logue with Arjuna in the first chap-ter of Gita proves of great contin-gency for structuring managerialscience in the form of the essentials(aspects) required for smooth (run-ning of work-life balance) life. A per-son set on the path of life is just likeArjuna presented in such a positionand the context with which the Gitabegins the same day when the warwas about to start, also sounds thesame as a person starting his life.

Firstly, Krishna’s preaching ofYoga suggesting bonding of physical

and psychological faculties sounds aseffecting complete work life of pre-sent-day persons and making it har-monious and completely successful.As the Gita’s teachings provide scien-tific code of living, which guaranteessuccess all through in one’s life affairs.It is stated that by developing a bal-anced mindset through the control ofthe forces of attraction and repression,and being in harmony with the worldin the form of natural surroundingand fellow beings in all thoughts.

Krishna’s other teaching which isapplicable in this regard is that a per-son should have full faith and con-fidence in oneself, which will add topersonal strength and power andmake him win over all obstacles inlife with inner balance and calmness.

The Gita also suggests that a per-son’s life is divided on two fronts. Oneis limited to home where one has toperform one’s intrinsic individual

activities, while one’s workplace is thesecond home where one has tospend most of the day time for per-forming vocational duties, whichmay also be close to his intrinsicnature. Accordingly, a person shouldbracket both these activities (relatingto home and workplace) as a singleunit and treat both the premises asone’s operational field or karmakshetra, which is named Kurukshetrain the Gita, and treat both these withgreat value and importance, and notneglect either of the two and managehouse and office, ie life and work, inproper balance on equal levels.Further, the Gita’s suggestion that aperson has to be well-versed in hisprofessional sphere and should bewell-disciplined also sounds helpfulfor present-day people to managework life in a better manner.

Besides, the opening chapter ofthe Gita also provides many perspec-

tives on the work-life balance sepa-rately in the speeches of both Arjunand Duryodhana. Firstly, on themanagement of things like adminis-tration, organising events,Duryodhana’s words provide helpfulguidelines. These focus on the onemajor perspective of human life —affairs. Duryodhana is stated to havefirst made the survey of the army onboth sides and given his assessmentabout the same to his teacher Drona.He was apprehensive of the strengthof the opposite party, yet he impressedupon his preceptor Drona that he ismore skillful and better than the fight-ers in the opposition. Similarly, a per-son set on his life affairs should notbe led away by his weaknesses, ratherhe should be confident about his abil-ities to face the situation. Here,Duryodhana’s speech illustrates aperson’s faith in personal strength andalso his belief that he is loved and

respected everywhere by everyone insociety. His state of mind is also pos-itive as he looks upon his own armyas unconquerable by enemy. Whileaccording to him, the army of the ene-mies is conquerable.

The other prospective on life-work balancing technique can betraced in the words of Arjuna, whichhe addressed to Krishna after survey-ing from a distance the well-managedarmy of his opponent. Thus, it is evi-dent that both Arjuna andDuryodhana treat the same situationof life affairs in a completely differ-ent way. One treats the job in handor the current karma to be executedin association with his friends and rel-atives in opposition, while the othersees his action to be performed alongwith his friends and relatives only andnot as the enemies in opposition.

Here, Arjuna’s review of hiswork-life or karma led him to believethat it was in confrontation with hisfriends and relatives with whom hewas bound. Krishna’s advice toArjuna at this juncture helps suchtype of man who is perplexed withregard to the right and wrong actionunder certain circumstances.According to the Gita lessons, he hasto properly understand the complex-ities and the dynamics of karma oraction. Just like Arjuna, in one’s lifealso, sometimes personal karmabecomes easily involved with theaction of friends, relatives, as well asenemies. As a result, one’s work is eas-ily tarnished with the prejudices, bothconventional and personal.

According to Krishna, anotherguideline for managing work-life bal-ance is that “while involved in lifeaffairs of individual life, either voca-tional or social, one must be cautiousthat behind every action there is a willand behind every will there is a val-ued judgment”. It is also further stat-ed that the desire which supports one’saction arises out of mind, which is astore-house of thoughts and ideas,memories, and pairs of opposite feel-ings like love-hate, pleasure and pain,and that everything one feels anddesires is conceived in the mind only.Krishna, in the Gita, summed up hisguidance to present-day man onwork-life balance that one may man-age it by combining personal andsocial life and work together and dis-charge all these activities with excel-lence, keeping in mind that such activ-ities bring in a sense of togethernessand not that of exclusiveness.

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May 2019, on my visit toPrayagraj, a book accom-

panied me in Air India flightwherein I read this stirring dialogue:

“But today, for instance,Mr M’Choakumchild wasexplaining to us about NaturalProsperity,” said Sissy.

“National, I think it musthave been,” observed Louisa.

“Yes, it was. But isn’t it thesame?” she timidly asked.

“You had better say,National, as he said so,” returned Louisa.

“National Prosperity. Andhe said, Now, this schoolroom isa Nation. And in this nation,there are fifty millions of money.Isn’t this a prosperous nation, and ain’t you in a thriv-ing state?”

“What did you say?” askedLouisa.

“Miss Louisa, I said I did-n’t know. I thought I couldn’tknow whether it was a prosper-ous nation or not, and whetherI was in a thriving state or not,unless I knew who had got themoney, and whether any of itwas mine. But that had nothingto do with it. It was not in thefigures at all,” said Sissy, wipingher tears.

This dialogue, fromCharles Dickens novel: HardTimes, between Ms Louisa andSissy Jupe, a girl student notgiven to dictates of philosophyat her school that “nothing butfacts” matter, was not an ordi-nary dialogue, for Sissy wasonly a student generally notsupposed to be having nuancedwisdom to reflect on widerimplications of a mal-behavingeconomy but the visionaryauthor could fathom and put inSissy’s mouth the real distressof a girl student who knewmacro prosperity held no guar-antee for prosperity at microlevel. Equally important if notmore is, at her age, she alsoknew what was “National” wasobviously “Natural” too. Thusemerge these two importantlessons from aforementionedinteraction having tremendousrelevance for developmentalefforts underway in differentcountries.

Reading Dickens may ini-tiate readers into an emotion-al churning: a good way to pro-

ceed further but there is nogainsaying the fact that issuesinvolved in modern day life’svariedness when juxtaposedalong with complexity of socio-economic developmental mod-els render any analysis far toocomplicated. Let it be bela-bored further in terms of someof the principal concerns asexpressed in literature on wel-fare economics.

In the absence of refinedweapons in their armory, con-ventionally economists haveused a crude measure i.e. percapita income as indicative ofhuman welfare. Justified criti-cism asserts and with goodlogic that this single crudemeasure provided by per cap-ital income is inadequate andthe need to assess a number ofdistinct areas of human life indetermining how well peopleare doing can hardly be over-looked. Economists and poli-cy makers now are almostunanimous that we shouldinstead measure people’s capa-bilities, that is, whatever theyare able to do and that too ina variety of areas of life. Thathas been the seminal way ofegging on debate on factorsaffecting and consequentiallyimproving the quality of lifewith a view to making availableto policymakers options fortaking measures, includingcorrective ones, to promotehuman well-being and welfare.

When the prosperity of anation or the quality of life ofits inhabitants is talked about,how much money or let us say“goods” and “services” areavailable for a given number ofpeople (the dilemma Sissy con-fronts Louisa with) is not acomprehensively equipped toolto explain away national pros-perity. Larger questions involv-ing distribution of theseresources and more criticallywhat that distribution ofresources does to people’s liveslurk around. How people withthese resources conduct theirlives is what economists andphilosophers tend to look into.There are a lot of indices onehas to gauge like people’s lifeexpectancy, health care, med-ical services, education — andnot only about their availabil-ity, but about their nature and

more crucially their quality.Philosophers and econo-

mists have by and large reachedan uncompromising consensusthat the life a person leads canbe seen as a combination ofvarious doings and beings,which can be generically calledfunctionings. Some function-ings may be elementary matterslike being adequately fed, nour-ished and disease-free, whileothers may be more com-pounded, such as having self-esteem, preserving human dig-nity, taking part in the life ofthe community, and so on. Theterm “capability” of a personconnotes various alternativecombinations of functionings,any one of which (any combi-nation) a person can choose tohave. In this sense, the capa-bility of a person correspondsto the freedom that a personhas to lead one kind of life oranother. Capability is linkedclosely and is dependent upon“entitlement approach” whichemphasises a person’s actualcommand over bundle ofgoods and services and thatperson’s actual position in thesystem that operates throughset of rules regulating usage ofcommodities. For instance, inan economy overall ratio offood to population may be highbut there might be people orgroups not having sufficientcommand over food and thesepeople or groups might suffer.

Further, a basket of goodsand services may be veryappropriate for a young manbut the same will be disastrousfor an old man. Similarly, a bas-ket of goods and services for aman suffering from severe dia-betes may not be very appro-priate for a diabetes-free manof the same age. Or alterna-tively, goods suitable forextreme summer will not besuitable for severe winter.Climate too matters.

With an alarming numberof persons affected with psy-chiatric problems like schizo-phrenia, manic depressive psy-chosis and other severe and notso severe mental disorders,sooner or later appropriatepolicy strategies have to bethought out and in place toaddress their concerns: bothphysical and psychological.

Pertinent here is to recall JohnRawls’ “difference principle”which offers an explanation for“most deprived group of per-sons”. Deprivation is defined interms of availability of “primarygoods” which can be verydiverse in nature and this inturn necessitates constructionof an overall index of variousprimary goods. Rawlsian ver-sion is alleged to have beeninsensitive to persons withspecial needs: the disabled,sick and “mentally defective” asRawls called them. Policiesaimed at tackling poverty,hunger and deprivation must take care of people ofthese groups.

There are some importantissues in entitlement and capa-bilities approach. Since it isagreed that economic devel-opment’s overall target isexpansion of people’s “capabil-ities”, principal concern shouldfocus on what people can do inconsequence of having bene-fitted from enhanced capabil-ities. Second issue is to under-stand the process of econom-ic expansion and structuralchanges through which capa-bilities can be expanded. Whilegoods and services are valuable,they are not valuable in them-selves. Their value lies in whatthey can do for the people, orrather, what people can dowith these goods and services?Third, let us assume that thecapabilities of each person areuniquely related to total avail-ability of goods and services,then one can go ahead withfocusing on the total supply ofgoods and services. But thatassumption can never holdgood. We have the problem ofthe division of the total outputbetween families and individ-uals and in addition, we arefronted with the fact that theconversion of commoditiesinto capabilities varies enor-mously with a number of para-meters, e.g. sex, health, age,class background, education,social relations, etc.

For example let us take onegoal of SustainableDevelopment Goals launchedworldwide in 2015. In case ofgoal number 2: zero hungerwhich necessarily involves foodand nutrition, the nutrition of

people depends on the avail-ability of food per head in thecommunity, but distributionconsiderations too weigh heav-ily. Additional factors that needto be looked into are the per-son’s age and sex, a woman:whether pregnant or lactating,metabolic rates and body size,activity levels, medical condi-tions including presence orabsence of stomach parasites,climatic conditions, etc. Theproblem of distribution of foodwithin households is a seriousissue. Sex bias is an acceptedfact. There is no simple equa-tion between the capability ofa person to be well nourishedand availability of food. Unlessother related capabilities likeenjoying food, social inter-course, general happiness infamily, etc, are enhanced, nouseful conclusion can be drawn about well-being of ahuman being.

Prayagraj Experience:In Prayagraj, I asked a few

persons as to their views on fivebest indicators of developmentthey noticed during lasttwo/three years. Unanimously,they agreed on one: 24 hourselectricity supply everyday ascompared to 4 to 8 hours cutpreviously; two: 24 hours watersupply everyday as comparedto intermittent cuts/no suppliespreviously; three: about 90 percent congestion on almost allroads gone.

“Widening of almost allroads. We freely move on roadswe used to fear going twoyears back. Now cars can trav-el at 50 plus an hour and thatwas unthinkable previously,”said the taxi driver.

Four, neat and transparentadministration with no or verymeagre delays. “Responsiblebehaviour is the rule. Sense ofdiscipline prevails,” remarkedanother retired officer. But thefifth was the most importantthing which they commonlyshared, “Everyone is enjoyingthese changes. These are pub-lic goods and hence all personsirrespective of caste, religion,groups are entitled for thesefruits of development. The fas-cinating beauty of theseachievements is these are uni-formly available to all.”

One evening, I walkedRajapur road I used to go tofetch vegetables and other eat-ables during 1990-95 when Iwas posted at the thenAllahabad. I was for utmostsurprise. Road was really wide,clean, well-lighted and trafficwas highly disciplined. Pleasureaccompanied me as I moved onthat road. I thought “Yes, it isall inclusive growth. And thatwas what Sissy Jupe had in hermind when she disagreed withLouisa. We are amid timeswhen everyone is assured ofuniform benefits of develop-ment; benefits are not confinedto a few persons, groups ororganisations. No one needs toquarrel as did Sissy Jupe.”

Such a development hasmany invisible positive effects.Wide roads and less congestionleads to less and reduced stressand hypertension levels whichin turn contributes to generalhappiness, no or less alterca-tions on roads, no or lesseraccidents and so on so forth.24-hour availability of elec-tricity makes studies by stu-dents irritation free andrewarding. Time lost in look-ing at the clock waiting for cur-rent to come can have seriousimplications for students.Continuity of concentrationgoes and what they lose is sim-ply immeasurable.

Salman Rushdie’s THEGOLDEN HOUSE:Monologue of V Arsenyeva:

Let me end the article on aliterary note akin to the way itbegan. Charles Dickens criti-cally looked at iniquitousbehaviour of economy througha character Sissy Jupe. Rushdiehas Vasilisa Arsenyeva, aRussian girl with origins inSiberia, in mind. She now livesin New York and sometimes inFlorida. She intermittentlyreflects on issues like her ownpoverty, need and love. In hermonologue, she emphasises avital fact about “poverty of herorigin”. A time comes in a poorperson’s life when in place ofcursing his/her sufferance,he/she starts relishing it.Arsenyeva looks “with con-tempt” at those sympatheticwith her poverty. She admits,“Poverty is a disgusting condi-tion and to fail to emerge from

it is also disgusting. The past isa broken cardboard suitcasefull of photographs of things Ino longer wish to see.”

The question of food, thequestion of clothing, the ques-tion of warmth were all impor-tant questions for Arsenyevabut “there was never any ques-tion about a sufficiency ofdrink for her father.” But sheexcelled at all things she didand that moved her to Americaand she felt no need to thankanyone because she came toAmerica due to her solo efforts.Need causes love. To live hap-pily in a house, you must build“a solid house”.

Economists value capabil-ities and entitlements becausethese apart from paving theway towards freedom ofachieving happiness, also cre-ate plethora of correct, trans-parent and unbiased opportu-nities for the overall develop-ment of people. It is a questionof the command that peoplehave over their lives. It is allabout leading a life whichenables one to live up to whatArsenyeva’s monologue con-firms, “I am the general ofmyself and my body is the footsoldier that obeys what the gen-eral commands.”

Let us ponder over herexclamation and imagine theinner happiness that onceimpoverished and deprivedbut now capable Arsenyevahas achieved. Looking atPrayagraj experience, it is clearthat the society is steadilyheading towards times whenongoing developmental effortswill ultimately provide peoplewith what Paul Streeten calls,“the opportunity for a full life”.

(The author hails fromGorakhpur and is currentlyAdditional Deputy Comptrollerand Auditor General in office ofComptroller & Auditor Generalof India. He is a poet writing inEnglish with three poetry col-lections. His fourth bookSOLILOQUY OF A SMALLTOWN UNCIVIL SERVANT, asemi-autobiographical literarynon-fiction, has been publishedby Rupa Publications, NewDelhi in March 2019. The viewsexpressed in this article are hispersonal views.)

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All actions on our part are primarilyguided by cause-effect chain, theimplication of which gets

stretched on to the successive life afterdeath. We are thus born with Karmicimprints carried over from the past birth.These imprints are there in the form ofthought-seeds parked in our memorybank, which, given a congenial ground,come out in open. They set the terms ofhow our individual minds are primarilyoriented — desire trends, whims andfancies, prejudices and obsessions, habitsand attitudes. This way, every individualis born unique, each keen to passionatelypursue one’s individualistic aspirationalurges. That is subject to further add onas our impressionable minds get drawntowards tempting influences of the livingworld. No wonder, we all begin life withhigh hopes and ambitions, and in ouryouth, carrying the mindset as if nothingis unachievable. Accordingly, we set ourdream destination. Dreams are necessaryfor reaching heights one is capable of,since they serve as focus to reach anobjective. The paradox, however, is thatas we negotiate life in real terms, moreoften, we are to face challenges posedfrom within (habit tendencies) and

beyond. When things don’t move onexpected lines, we become subject tofrustrating experiences. Not everybody isable to take it kindly, particularly thosehaving a restive mind, marked withimpatience, intolerance, and a swagger-ing ego. The weaklings, in particular,come under acute pressure, often leadingto depression. If not attended promptly,it can take a serious turn, even demand-ing medical intervention.

The irony, however, is that in India,a large majority takes it lightly. Theybelieve that with time, as life progresses,we may come out of that hang, which ina large number of cases doesn’t happen.The worst is that they consciously avoidseeking an expert’s help, which, carry-ing the feeling that if it ever comes outin open, we may become socially out-caste. What we don’t realise is that ifleft unattended, our life itself may getderailed. In this respect, the Westernworld is much better, as they unhesitat-ingly seek immediate help.

The other day, someone worriedabout his child’s mind-state in futureterms came asking: “My child was hospi-talised by hostel authorities, when foundin a state of depression. Is there any

scope of its recurrence in future?”“Well, the seeds of negativity and

depression are very much in evidence inhis chart. Given a trigger, it could eruptagain. At this stage, though medication isnot required, regular counselling is calledfor. That may help him reorient thethought process in a way that he couldtake challenges in his stride,” I advisedhim. But he didn’t take it seriously. Theworry is that as Saturn catches up withnatal Moon early 2021, he once againbecomes susceptible to depression. But atthe end of the day, it is their call.

Let us have a look at his astrologicalpointers. Born with Aries lagna, heshould be impulsive, aggressive, impa-tient, intolerant, who would wish to liveon his own exclusive terms almost in ademanding mode. He may wish to be atthe head of things, never keen to play asecond fiddle to any. He may jump intoaction without applying proper fore-thought, which makes inviting adversi-ties more probable. He won’t ordinarilypay any attention to the advisories andcounsel offered by elders either, as theSun is ill-disposed off to Uranus. Thatmakes him eccentric, defiant, and habit-ually suspicious of elders’ intent. Hemay give a damn to commonsensicalwisdom and would rather prefer to pas-

sionately pursue his own line of think-ing, without any reality check.

Mind signifying Moon is conjunctSaturn, the planet of its nemesis, whichpoints to a negative mindset carrying theseeds of fear and insecurity. Such charac-ters usually keep their feelings sup-pressed within. Added to that is Moon’sconjunction with Rahu, as well as con-junction of Uranus and Neptune.Consequently, when things don’t moveon expected lines, he may fall into a neg-ative bind. He may keep mulling overthem beyond due, which when gravitatefurther, could set in depression. All themore, because intelligence signifyingMercury, the sub-lord of ailment signify-ing 6th cusp as well as 12th identifiedwith isolation, is opposed to Jupiter, the3rd cusp sub-lord. That, in the first place,accounts for his insensible reasoning andjudgment. And if that would not beenough, the linkage of 6th cusp with the3rd and 12th makes him susceptible toproblems of mind-genesis.

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