I wasn’t in CM HouseKapil … MAHMOOD NEXT PAK ENVOY TO INDIA ... met Tahir Khan ... scam where he is named as an accused. The apex court directed the

RAJNATH: INSTIL FEARAMONG MAOISTSNew Delhi: Buffeted by a stringof deadly attacks on securityforces engaged in anti-Naxaloperations, Home MinisterRajnath Singh on Mondaypitched for an aggressivestrategy to quell Maoist rebelswhich should instill “fear” inthem. He asked the Statesaffected by Maoist violence to“take ownership” of theoperations launched against theLeft extremists, while insistingon effective steps to “choke”their finances.

ARMY DESTROYS PAK BUNKER WITH MISSILES New Delhi: A widely-circulatedvideo on social media on Mondayshows a Pakistani bunker alongthe LoC, the de facto border inKashmir, being destroyed by ananti-tank guided missile fired bythe Indian Army.

SOHAIL MAHMOOD NEXTPAK ENVOY TO INDIA Islamabad: Career diplomatSohail Mahmood will succeedAbdul Basit as next Pakistan’snew High Commissioner to Indiaand is set to take charge at theend of this month, PakistanForeign Office sources said.

CBI GRILLS HOODA IN LAND ALLOTMENT SCAMNew Delhi: The CBI on Mondayquestioned former Haryana ChiefMinister Bhupinder Singh Hoodafor six hours in connection withthe alleged irregularities inallotment of 14 industrial plots inPanchkula.

CAPSULE

RAHIBA R PARVEEN nNEW DELHI

Delhi Minister and seniorAam Aadmi Party (AAP)

leader Satyendar Jain onMonday categorically rejectedsacked Minister Kapil Mishra’sallegation of Chief MinisterKejriwal taking `2 crore in cash from the former, saying the ousted Minister has lost his “mental balance” and is making baselessallegations.

“There is a limit to lying. Iwasn’t even present at CM’s res-idence on Friday and I canprove it in many ways. He(Mishra) has lost mental bal-ance and making baseless alle-gations. Show us papers orproof if the allegations aretrue,” Jain said.

Kejriwal also broke hissilence over corruption chargeslevelled by Mishra. “Truth willprevail and its beginning will be made in the SpecialAssembly Session on Tuesday,”he tweeted.

Meanwhile, the AAP sus-pended Mishra from primarymembership of party.

The decision was taken atAAP’s Political AffairsCommittee (PAC) after a meet-ing at Chief Minister Kejriwal’sresidence.

Defending Kejriwal, Jainsaid, “He (Mishra) is makingcorruption allegation againstArvind Kejriwal, perhaps one

of the most honest politicians,we know of.

He is accusing Kejriwal ofindulging in corruption,whose honesty has attractedthousands of workers to joinhim.

“If he (Mishra) has proof, he should show the doc-uments. He should go to anti-graft bodies, why is he going to the media? This is justan attempt to distract andthreaten.”

Mishra, who was sum-marily removed from the post

of Water Minister on Saturdaynight, had on Sunday accusedKejriwal of taking `2 crore incash from Jain. “I saw with myown eyes Jain giving `2 croreto Kejriwal at his residence,” hehad said.

Mishra has also allegedthat Kejriwal had delayed theprobe into a `400 crore tanker scam, and submitteddocuments to the Anti-Corruption Branch (ACB) toback his claim.

Earlier in the day, the AAPalleged that “a big conspiracywas hatched against it by theBharatiya Janata Party (BJP).”through Mishra and saidKejriwal would not resign overthe “baseless allegations”.

In a Press conference atparty headquarters, AAP lead-ers Sanjay Singh, Ashutoshand party spokesperson DilipPandey called Mishra’s allega-tions “baseless” saying that he did it “out of despera-tion” after being removed fromthe Cabinet.

Continued on Page 7

RAJESH KUMAR n NEW DELHI

Those travelling in theMetro will have to shell out

more from Wednesday asBoard of Directors of DelhiMetro Rail Corporation(DMRC) on Monday approvedthe increase in fares. The min-imum fare will go up from `8to `10 while the maximum farefrom `30 to `50. This arrange-ment will be in place untilSeptember as another hike infares will come into effectfrom October when the max-imum fare will go up to `60.

As per the recommenda-tions of the fourth fare fixationcommittee headed Justice(Retired) ML Mehta, there willbe a total six fare slabs as againstthe existing 15 fare slabs. Thenew slabs are: up to 2 km — ̀ 10;2 to 5 km — `15; 5 to 12 km —`20; 12 to 21 km — `30; 21 to32 km — `40, and for journeysof over 32 km — `50. The faresof Airport Express Line have notchanged.

“The fare revision wouldbe implemented in two phas-es. The first phase will beimplemented with effect fromMay 10 and the second phasefrom October 1,” said DelhiMetro Chief SpokespersonAnuj Dayal and Director

(Finance) KK Saberwal.In the second phase,

the fare structure would be`10 (0-2 km), `20 (2-5km); `30 (5-12 km); `40(12-21km); `50 (21-32km)and `60 for 32km and above. On Sundays and national hol-idays, the maximum fare wouldbe `40.

“The fare revision has beenlong overdue and we have been

demand-ing it on

account ofincrease in the

cost of inputs suchas the cost of energy and the

cost of repair and mainte-nance. There are increasingoperational costs like salariesand Dearness Allowances ofemployees. Since constitutionof the third fare fixation com-

mittee, there has been increasein the rate of industrialDearness Allowance by 95.5per cent (from 16.90 per centto 112.40 per cent), rate ofCentral DA by 103 per cent(from 22 per cent to 125 percent) and average increase inthe rate of minimum wages by156.2 per cent” said thespokesperson.

Continued on Page 7

RAHIBA R PARVEEN nNEW DELHI

Sacked Delhi Water Ministerand suspended AAP

leader Kapil Mishra continuedhis tirade against ChiefMinister Arvind Kejriwal.

He alleged on Monday thatHealth Minister Satyendar Jainhad told him about a ̀ 50 croreland deal and `7 crore Chhatarpur farmhouse dealfor Kejriwal’s deceased brother-in-law.

“I am naming the relativefinally since the AAP leaderswanted to know. These dealswere asked to be settled by Jainfor his (Kejriwal’s) brother-in-law and are in the name ofBhansals,” he said.

Also, he alleged that PublicWorks Department’s (PWD)settled a fake bill of `10 crore for Kejriwal’sbrother-in-law. Mishra termedAAP’s allegation that he was intouch with the BJP as baseless.

“I will not join the BJP. Ifthere is anyone who openly andfiercely criticised the BJP over

Kashmir, Pathankot and cor-ruption in civic bodies, it is me.I challenge AAP leaders,including Sanjay Singh, toprove with evidence that I wasin touch with any person fromthe BJP. I challenge the AAP tomake public the files pertain-ing to decisions they havetaken in the last two years. I

will never leave the AAP. Anyone who points the fingerat Kejriwal and other AAPleaders is accused of being a BJP agent,” Mishra told themedia on Monday.

Mishra accused the AAP of“massive corruption” in PunjabAssembly elections.

Continued on Page 7

Sacked Ministeralleges PWD settleda bill of `10 crore for CM’s relative

PNS n NEW DELHI

Offering a breather to mid-dle class homebuyers in

the country, including salariedclass, India’s largest public sec-tor lender State Bank of India(SBI) on Monday announced asteep reduction in home loaninterest rates, a move that willgive impetus to affordablehousing in the country.

The bank will now chargesalaried borrowers 8.35 per cent,reduced by 25 basis points (bps)or 0.25 per cent per annum onhome loans up to `30 lakh asagainst existing 8.60 per cent.For loans above `30 lakh bankwill be charged at 8.50 per cent,down by 10 bps.

With thisreduction, theSBI’s offering isthe lowest inthe homeloan marketand the newrate will beeffective fromTuesday. Themove comes at a

time when Government ismaking all-out efforts to fulfilPrime Minister NarendraModi’s dream of providing“Housing for All” by 2022.

“We have seen a steep hikein the home loan enquiriesrecently and reduction in rateswill further help millions ofhomebuyers realise theirdreams of owning a home oftheir own. With this offer,individuals can apply for homeloans through multiple chan-nels which are available them.Also, the bank offers bouquetof home loan products cateringto different sections of thesociety,” said Rajnish Kumar,Managing Director forNational Banking in the Group.

However, the bank said inits statement that eligible homeloan customers can also avail ofan interest subsidy of `2.67lakh under the Pradhan Mantri

Awas Yojana scheme. “Asfor male borrowers, the

limited period offer isvalid till July 31 andthe new rate for thesalaried will be

lower by 20 bps at8.40 per cent,” itsaid.

Continuedon Page 7

PNS n NEW DELHI

The Indian woman, whotook refuge in the Indian

High Commission inIslamabad last week, gave astatement before Pakistanimagistrate that she was forcedinto marriageby a Pakistannational andwanted toreturn India.

T w e n t y -year-old Uzma,who hails fromNew Delhi, hadmet Tahir Khanin Malaysia where they report-edly fell in love and decided toget married. Uzma later trav-elled to Pakistan and got mar-ried to Tahir. However, shelater came to know that Tahirwas already a married manwith four children. Since Uzma

was on a visit visa to Pakistan,she had to obtain a different visafor her stay in that country orwhich Tahir took her to theIndian High Commission inIslamabad on Friday. Afterreaching the Indian HC, Uzmarefused to step out and insisted

being sent back toIndia immediately.

“The youngIndian woman,who had soughtshelter in theIndian HighCommission inIslamabad on May5, 2017, recorded

her statement in the Court ofJudicial Magistrate First Classin Islamabad on Monday as perlocal legal requirement,” saidMinistry of External Affairsspokesperson Gopal Baglay on Monday.

Also See Page 13

Tehran: Iran has threatenedto hit inside Pakistan if terrorattacks on Iran continued. Thethreat has come in the wake ofa border attack that killed 10Iranian guards.

Iranian State TV is quotingthe Army’s chief-of-staff, GenMohammad Hossein Bagheri,as saying on Monday thatIranian soldiers will attack“terrorists wherever they are,”suggesting they could crossinto Pakistan to target terror-ists there.

The Sunni militant groupJaish al-Adl claimed the Aprilassault. Bagheri says thatPakistan to go after terrorists’hideouts on its soil, but if thereare “continued attacks, the ter-rorists’ safe havens will be targeted and crushed, wherev-er they are.”

The porous Iran-Pakistanfrontier has long been used bydrug smugglers and Sunni ter-rorists, both of whom occa-sionally clash with Iraniansecurity forces. AP

ABRAHAM THOMAS nNEW DELHI

In a big blow to RJD chief andformer Bihar Chief Minister

Lalu Prasad, the SupremeCourt on Monday directedhim to face separate trial in allcases related to the fodderscam where he is named as an accused.

The apex court directed thetrial court to expeditiouslyconclude trial in all the casesagainst Lalu and other accusedpersons, including formerBihar Minister JagannathMishra and former bureaucratSajal Chakravarty, preferablywithin nine months.

Lalu faces trial in six casesrelating to the fodder scamcases. He is already convicted inone that relates to illegal with-drawal of funds from ChaibasaTreasury between April 1, 1994and January 31, 1995 to the tuneof `37.70 crore.

In 2013, the JharkhandHigh Court had quashed the

chargesheet against Lalu inanother fodder case relating toillegal withdrawal fromDeogarh treasury to the tune of`85 lakh. Two hundred andfifty vouchers and 17 fakeallotment letters were preparedin this case relating to theperiod from 1991 to 1994.There are 38 accused personsand one of them was Lalu. The

CBI had appealed in the SCagainst that HC judgement.

The HC had held that allcases against the accused aroseout of a single conspiracy andtwo trials for the same offencewill amount to double jeopardyprohibited under Article 20(2)of Constitution and Section 300of Criminal Procedure Code.

Continued on Page 7

SC unleashes fodder ghoston Lalu with separate trialsCourt says Jharkhand HC erred in quashing chargesheet against RJD chief

SBI makes Modi’shome-for-all dreammore affordable

m Lalu faces trial in six cases relating to thefodder scam cases

m Ex-Bihar CM is already convicted in onethat relates to illegal withdrawal of fundsfrom Chaibasa Treasury between April 1,1994 and January 31, 1995 to the tune of`37.70 crore

m The CBI has failed to live up to its reputation. In theinstant case, lethargy on its part

m SC slams CBI for “lethargy” in filing appeal against Lalu

France will fight against terrorism: Macron

Forced to marry Pak national at gunpoint, says Indian woman

Will hit insidePak if terrorattacks go on,warns Iran

Metro rides to cost lot more from now

Deal was for Kejriwal’s

brother-in-law: Mishra

Up to 25 bps cut in

loan interest; focus

on women borrowers

Current French President Francois Hollande stands alongside French President-elect Emmanuel Macron, left, during a ceremony to mark Victory Day in Paris on Monday (RELATED REPORTS ON P12) AP

FROM WEDNESDAY, MAXIMUM FARE TO RISE

FROM `30 TO `50; FROM OCT 1, IT WILL BE `60

I wasn’t in CM House

that day: Satyendar

NEW RATEo The new slabs are: up to 2 km — `10; 2 to 5 km — `15; 5 to

12 km — `20; 12 to 21 km — `30; 21 to 32 km — `40, andfor journeys of over 32 km — `50. The fares of AirportExpress Line have not changed

o In the second phase, the fare structure would be `10 (0-2km), `20 (2-5 km); `30 (5-12 km); `40 (12-21km); `50 (21-32km) and `60 for 32km and above. On Sundays and nationalholidays, the maximum fare would be `40

Kapil Mishrasuspendedfrom AAP;Kejriwalsays truthwill prevail

AAP leaders Sanjay Singh, Ashutosh, and Dilip Pandeyat a Press conference in New Delhi on Monday PTI

AAP MLA Kapil Mishra comes out after submitting a reportagainst Delhi CM Kejriwal and Health Minister SatyendarJain to ACB in New Delhi on Monday Pioneer photo

Satyendar Jain Arvind Kejriwal

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PNS n LUCKNOW

Chief Minister YogiAdityanath said on

Monday that UP governmentwould make adequate arrange-ments under a special strategyin Naxal-infested areas.

Speaking at a meeting ofChief Ministers of Naxal-infest-ed states at Vigyan Bhawan inNew Delhi on Monday,Adityanath said his govern-ment would provide all coop-eration, including exchange ofintelligence inputs and spruc-ing up of security parapherna-lia, to the Union government.

Primarily two districts inUP — Chandauli andSonebhadra — are infestedwith Naxalism, largely becausebeing adjacent to the problem-hit states of Chhattisgarh andJharkhand.

Yogi said in these areas,projects and schemes forimprovement in power supply,construction of roads, improve-ment in public distributionsystem, healthcare and educa-tion services, solution of waterproblem and creation of jobswould be rolled out effectively.

The Chief Minister saidthat efforts were being made totake care of the importantneeds of the police force, toequip them with the latestweaponry and improve com-munication systems, andexpressed the desire for moresupport from the Centre in this

direction. He also pointed out that

the Naxal problem not onlyaffected some states but alsowas bane for the developmentand economic progress of thecountry.

The Chief Minister advo-cated better coordinationamong affected states, a newstrategy, assimilation of tech-nology and joining of hands touproot this menace. He alsounderlined the need for mod-ernisation and for upgradingtechnology and communica-tion methods to take on thescourge in the present times.

Yogi assured the UnionHome Minister and others pre-sent in the meeting that the UPgovernment was committed totackling the menace ofNaxalism and would leave nostone unturned to adhere to theguidelines and instructions ofthe Union government in thisregards.

PNS n LUCKNOW

Accusing Samajwadi Partypatron Mulayam Singh

Yadav of playing into the handsof Bharatiya Janata Party,Congress on Monday reactedsharply to the allegations of theformer Chief Minister of UPthat it was responsible for therout of the SP in the stateAssembly polls

The Congress said the SPpatron’s words and actions donot match and that he hadalways drifted away whenattempts to form a joint frontagainst “communal” forceswere made.

“Who broke the coalitionof like-minded secular forces inBihar? It was Mulayam SinghYadav. There is a clear differ-ence in his words and action,”Congress MLC Deepak Singhsaid on Monday, adding thatMulayam always used his partyto divide secular votes just toensure victory of BJP.

“How Mulayam SinghYadavji always played into BJP’shand is evident from severalexamples and the most glaringof them is SP’s contesting inGujarat when the party has nobase there,” Congress MLCDeepak Singh pointed out,while dumping the SP patri-arch’s charge against theCongress.

The Congress leader saidthat even in recent Assemblyelections in UP, it wasMulayam Singh Yadav whocreated hurdle before his then

Chief Minister son AkhileshYadav, who wanted to defeatBJP by forging a grand alliancealong with the Congress.

“If SP witnessed the humil-iating defeat in recent elections,it was not due to Congress as thereason is evident to even a lay-man how the Yadav family feudfor power created confusionand the entire SP cadre gotdemoralised,” Singh said, addingthat the SP patron, instead ofresolving the family feud, wastrying to shift the focus from thefamily to Congress.

“Mulayam’s allegations aredevoid of any substance and aresimply baseless,” he added.

On Sunday, MulayamSingh Yadav had said inMainpuri that “alliance withCongress is responsible for thepresent poor state of the party”.

Yadav said he had advisedAkhilesh Yadav for not goingahead with the alliance but hewent ahead with it. He had alsoalleged that the Congress hadleft no stone unturned to ruinhis life and had lodged falsecases against him.

Meanwhile, accusing theSP patron of “disrespecting theoverwhelming mandate” of thevoters of UP, the BJP urged himto do serious introspectionand soul searching.

“The way Mulayam wasvirtually thrown out of the SPby his son Akhilesh Yadav...given his current state of mind,his statements are not surpris-ing,” UP BJP spokespersonManish Shukla said.

PNS n LUCKNOW

While senior IPS officerAmitabh Thakur has

demanded that the IPSAssociation take up the issue ofMLA Radha Mohan DasAgarwal’s misbehaviour with atrainee woman IPS officer inGorakhpur, the incident hastriggered a war of words in thesocial media.

The woman IPS officer,Charu Nigam, reacted on herFacebook page without makingany comment on the legislator,but Agarwal blamed the officerfor ignoring the plight ofwomen and alleged that shewept to grab sympathy.

Charu Nigam, through herFB account, thanked peoplewho supported her for Sunday’sincident. “My training hasn’ttaught me to be weak. I just didnot expect that my SP (City)Ganesh Saha Sir would out-rightly reject the irrational

argument and talk about myinjury. Before sir came, I wasthe senior-most police officerthere but when sir came andstood by the force, I got emo-tional,” she wrote.

“Media has taken a standbecause everyone saw bothincidents and which shows thepositive intent of media inGorakhpur. I am thankful tothem for having shown thetruth with least manipulation,”Charu said in her post.

Further, she said, “I believethat good gets good. And that’swhy I have got the support ofthe media. Please stay calm! Iam fine and slightly hurt.Nothing to be agitated about.”

However, MLA fromGorakhpur Sadar, RadhaMohan Das Agarwal, wenthammer and tongs at the PressClub in Gorakhpur onMonday, alleging that thepolice opened two liquor shopsand when people objected,

they cane-charged even preg-nant and old women.

“What happened to thelady officer when the pregnantwoman and old women werecrying during the police action.Why did she did not take cog-nisance?” Agarwal said whileclaiming that the police hadtaken money to reopen theliquor shops.

An eminent paediatricianof Gorakhpur, Agarwal said hewould sit on a dharna in frontof Mahatma Gandhi’s statue atTown Hall on May 10 to protestthe police atrocity.

Criticising the officer ofgrabbing sympathy of being awoman, the BJP MLA saidthat her act was condemnableas she misused her power tobeat up poor women.

As per reports, the localshad put up a road block toprotest running of countryliquor shop in Chiruwadal areaof Gorakhpur on Sunday. On

being informed, Circle Officerof Gorakhnath, Charu Nigam,rushed to the spot and tried toexecute orders of DGP SulkhanSingh to clear the highwayblockade. In the process, somewomen protesters tried to man-handled her after which copsused force to disperse them.

The cops also detainedhalf-a-dozen women in thisregard.

The situation took an uglyturn after the local MLAreached there. In the presenceof senior officers, Agarwalscolded Charu Nigam andforced the cops to release thedetained women. The youngofficer broke down while herseniors bowed down to theMLA, assuring him of probingthe charges made by him.

The MLA later denied thecharge of abusing the officerand claimed that she took lawin her hand and assaulted apregnant lady and an eight-

year-old boy. He demandedaction against the officer for her‘inhuman’ act.

Meanwhile, IPS officerAmitabh Thakur has written aletter to UP IPS Associationchief Praveen Singh askinghim to immediately convene ameeting to discuss theGorakhpur incident.

Thakur said that if theAssociation did not take prop-er steps after Saharanpur andGorakhpur incidents, it mighthave adverse long-term impactand possibility of recurrence ofsuch incidents will grow.

The IG stressed that if IPSofficers were not able to savetheir own dignity and do nottake strong action, it will sendwrong signal in society. The IPSAssociation should hence meetto pass definite proposals,including asking field officersto take strong action and bringthe facts to the notice of high-er officials, he stated.

PNS n LUCKNOW

After a clash betweenThakurs and Dalits in

Saharanpur that left a youthdead and several familieshomeless after their huts weretorched, another clash tookplace in Etah on Monday overinstallation of Dr BRAmbedkar’s statue.

Fortunately, the policereached on time but it trans-formed the face-off between twocaste groups to a clash betweenDalits and the men in khaki.

The two sides fought apitched battle for over an hourresulting in injuries to over adozen people, including fivepolicemen.

Later senior officialsrushed to the spot with addi-tional force and chased awaythe troublemakers. Two per-sons were arrested by the policelater in the afternoon.

As per reports, members ofa Dalit community reachedBhudnagariya hamlet ofSarkauli area to install a statueof Dr BR Ambedkar onMonday morning. Soon mem-bers of an upper caste also con-verged on the site and protest-ed the move. Since the Dalitshad not taken permission forinstallation of Ambedkar’s stat-ue, the cops too reached thespot and dittoed the objectionby the upper caste members.

The situation took an uglyturn when the cops tried to forcethe Dalits to disperse and start-

ed removing Dr Ambedkar’sstatue from the site.

This incensed the Dalitcommunity members and theystarted targeting the policewith missiles, injuring CircleOfficer and ADM of Jalesaralong with five cops.

To defuse the situation,the police cane-charged the agi-tated mob, causing injuries toseveral persons.

The injured were shifted toa hospital and a heavy policeforce was deployed to avert anyfurther clash.

SSP Sathyarth Anil Pankajsaid the situation was tense butunder control. He said thestatue was handed over to acommunity while two personswere arrested for the violence.

“Additional force has beendeployed in the village eventhough peace is prevailingthere amid tense situation,” heclaimed.

Meanshile, some farmersfrom Haryana allegedly set fireto crops of growers in UttarPradesh following a clashbetween them over a land dis-pute in Mawi village of Shamlidistrict. The incident tookplace on Sunday, two daysafter eight persons were injuredin a clash over Haryana farm-ers trying to encroach upon apiece of land belonging to UPfarmers on the banks of theYamuna river. In view of thetension in the area, PAC hadbeen deployed on the Haryana-Uttar Pradesh border.

Lucknow (PNS): UP Assembly SpeakerHriday Narayan Dikshit is organising a work-shop on May 15 to apprise the legislators of theGoods and Services Tax Act.

The UP GST Bill is likely to be introducedin the first session of UP Assembly commenc-ing from May 15 for consideration and passage.Parliament has already passed the CentralGoods and Services Tax Bill, 2017, theIntegrated Goods and Services Tax Bill, 2017,the Union Territory Goods and Services TaxBill, 2017, and the Goods and Services Tax(Compensation to States) Bill, 2017 during thelast Budget session in March this year.

GST, the single biggest tax reform in India

since Independence that subsumes all indirecttaxes levied by the Centre and states, will comeinto force from July 1. Before this deadline, allthe 29 state Assemblies of the India have to passthe State GST Bill. So far 10 Assemblies havepassed their respective State GST Bills.

Members of both the Houses of UP legis-lature have been invited to participate in theworkshop for understanding the nitty-gritty ofthe comprehensive tax reform legislation.

Dikshit said the workshop would give com-prehensive information to all legislators so thatthey could participate in the debate in both theHouses when the State GST Bill was introducedfor consideration and passage.

PNS n LUCKNOW

UP Expressway IndustrialDevelopment Authority

(UPEIDA) has asked the dis-trict magistrates of four dis-tricts to expedite the process ofland acquisition forPoorvanchal Expressway link-ing Lucknow with Ballia.

The expressway will linkBallia in east UP with nation-al capital Delhi.

UPEIDA Chief ExecutiveOfficer Avinish Kumar Awasthion Monday reviewed theprogress of land acquisition forthe project in nine districts.Against the required 4,724hectares of land, only 1,827hectare land has been pur-chased by the district authori-ties from farmers. The available

land is 36.67 per cent of theland required for the project.

The CEO directed the dis-trict magistrates of Lucknow,Ghazipur, Azamgarh andBarabanki to speed up theprocess of purchasing landfrom farmers and to ensureavailability of the land in thenext two months.

Awasthi said that therequired funds had been madeavailable to the DMs for pay-ment of compensation of landto the owners. He said the DMshad been asked to ensure thatthe purchase of land and pay-ment of compensation wasdone in a transparent manner.

“The payment of compen-sation be credited into thebank accounts of the land own-ers,” he said.

PNS n LUCKNOW

Targeting the YogiAdityanath and Narendra

Modi governments over lawand order issue, SamajwadiParty president Akhilesh Yadavsaid that after making tallclaims during the Assemblypolls on improving the situa-tion, the Bharatiya Janata Partyhad failed to deliver.

“The BJP is ruling at boththe Centre and UP. I wouldlike to know why the law andorder situation in the state isunder so much stress. There isa spate in heinous crimes andincidents of BJP leaders andtheir kin misbehaving andclashing with the police acrossUP,” Akhilesh said in Kanpurwhere he had gone to attend amarriage function on Monday.

“The Yogi governmentowes an explanation to thepeople as to why BJP leadersare pressuring the police andadministration officials in dis-tricts. In one district, the localMLA publicly humiliated ayoung woman probationer IPSofficer. Similar incidents havehappened in Agra,Saharanpur, Shahjahanpur andother districts. The presentregime has failed to controllaw and order and it seems tobe in a helpless situation,” theformer Chief Ministercharged.

However, Akhilesh refused

to reply to a volley of questionson the statements of his fatherMulayam Singh Yadav anduncle Shivpal Singh Yadav. Healso refused to comment onbrother Prateek’s wife AparnaYadav’s suggestion that heshould step down from the postof SP president.

On Sunday, MulayamSingh Yadav had said that it wasthe biggest mistake of his life toanoint Akhilesh as ChiefMinister of UP. He had alsocriticised his son for forging analliance with Congress despitehis opposition.

Meanwhile, sources in theSamajwadi Party said that theprocess of weeding out sup-porters of Shivpal Yadav fromthe party would continue andmore heads were likely to roll.

On Sunday, Akhilesh hadexpelled five Shivpal loyalists,including two former spokes-men of the party.

With the power struggle inSP first family reaching a deci-sive turn, the sources said thatthe party chief had decided tobe ruthless in dealing withdissenters and more leaderswere likely to be expelled incoming days.

Akhilesh wants to com-plete the clean-up operation inthe party before commence-ment of urban local bodiespolls, the notification for whichis likely to be issued by the endof this month.

PNS n LUCKNOW

Aday after MulayamSingh Yadav admittedthat it was the biggest

mistake of his life to anointAkhilesh Yadav as the ChiefMinister of the state, theSamajwadi Party patron’syounger daughter-in-lawAparna Yadav asked Akhileshto step down from the post ofparty president.

Aparna had unsuccessful-ly contested the recentAssembly poll from LucknowCantonment constituency. Inrecent days, Aparna has heapedpraises on the Yogi Adityanathgovernment.

“Akhilesh bhaiyya is knownfor honouring his words. So farhe has delivered whatever hehas said. Hence, he shouldstep down from the post of SPpresident and hand over theparty reins to Netaji(Mulayam),” said AparnaYadav.

Akhilesh had taken overthe post of SP national presi-dent from his father MulayamSingh Yadav on January 1 thisyear. He had, however,promised to reinstate his father

to the top post after threemonths, which has not hap-pened till date.

“The Yogi government isnot a one-man show. In hisparty and government, all deci-sions are taken after due con-sultations. In regional parties,one person issues a diktat andeverybody is required to com-ply with it. The regional partiesare like Hitler’s units,” Aparnasaid at a programme inLucknow on Monday.

“Yogi Adityanathji is a self-made person. He was elected toParliament at a young age of 26

years and has been elected tothe Lok Sabha for five termssince then. Now he is the ChiefMinister and we all shouldrespect him. The Yogi govern-ment is doing well. So far, theCM has not given any oppor-tunity to opposition parties tocriticise his government,”Aparna said.

Mulayam’s ‘chhoti bahu’ isalso not on the same page withAkhilesh on the issues of anti-Romeo squad and electronicvoting machine (EVM) tam-pering. She defended the Yogigovernment’s decision to dealwith the menace of eve-teasingand harassment of women inpublic places.

“Instead of criticising themove, everybody should look atit in a more positive way. Romeois a cult character of English lit-erature but ruffians and loafersare often referred to as “roadsideRomeo”. This squad hasimmensely benefited collegeand school girls and workingwomen. The Yogi governmenthas also acted against erringpolicemen following com-plaints,” Aparna Yadav argued.

The young leader alsorejected repeated allegations ofAkhilesh Yadav of EVMs being

tampered with during the elec-tions leading to the worst-everpoll debacle for SamajwadiParty.

“No such thing like tam-pering with the EVMs hap-pened during the Assemblyelections. The same machineswere used in the 2007Assembly polls and then theBahujan Samaj Party was votedto power. Later in 2012 polls,the EVMs were used and SPstormed to power. Hence thetampering charge holds littleground. We need to revisitour political and electoral strat-egy and do honest introspec-tion to find out the causes ofSP’s defeat,” Aparna main-tained.

The SP patron’s youngerdaughter-in-law described theinquiry ordered by Yogi gov-ernment into several projectsimplemented during Akhileshregime as a “routine process”.

“In 2012, when the SP wasvoted to power, it had orderedprobe into construction of sev-eral parks and memorials andinstallation of statues of Daliticons by the BSP government.It is a routine process and ithappens in all states and at theCentre,” Aparna pointed out.

Printed and Published by Vijay Prakash Singh for and on behalf of CMYK Printech Ltd., 4th Floor, Sahara Shopping Centre, Faizabad Road, Lucknow-226016 and Printed at Tin Tin Printech Pvt Ltd., C-33 Amausi Industrial Area, Nadarganj, Lucknow. Tel: (0522) 2438656 / 9336266608.

Editor: Chandan Mitra. Resident Editor: Vijay Prakash Singh. RNI No. 2016/57. Lucknow Telephones: EPABX: 4036600 Fax: 2345582. Allahabad Office: (95532) 2420818, 2421018, 3290460. Kanpur Office: (95512) 2304006, 2304416. Varanasi Office: (95542) 2414294, 2414295. Delhi

Office: Link House, II Floor, 3 Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg, New Delhi 110 002. Tel: (011) 23755271-274, 41509074.

Notice is hereby given by the undersigned for andon behalf of LIC Housing Finance Ltd. Area Office,Shahnazaf Road, Lucknow pursuant to Circular No.422/Annexure-E of LIC HFL that the Original Sale deed dated15.04.2005 executed by Gomti Adarsh Sehkari Samiti Ltd.in favour of Smt. Anubha Awasthi W/o-Capt. Desh DeepakAwasthi The said sale deed is registered in the office ofSub Registrar BKT Lucknow in Book No. I, Volume 1026on pages 289/302 at S.No. 1523 and Second Original Saledeed dated 11.08.2010 executed by Smt. Anubha Awasthiin favour of Smt. Vineeta Singh W/o-Devendra Pratap SinghThe said sale deed is registered in the office of SubRegistrar BKT Lucknow in Book No. I, Volume 3305 onpages 165/182 at S.No. 7979 in respect to Plot NO.9 and10 Khasra No.168 area 232.342 sq.mtr. situated atSaidpur Jageer, Pargana-Lucknow Tehsil-BKT and Distt.-Lucknow has been lost by its present owner Vandana DeviThat Vandana Devi W/o- Sher Bahadur has applied forhousing loan for which has proposed the said property tobe mortgaged by depositing Original sale deeds dated15.04.2005, 11.08.2010 with LIC HFL and as such any per-son claiming to be the said property covered by the saiddocuments may file claim before me within 15 days fromthe date of publication of notice failing which it will be pre-sumed that the property in question is free from any encum-brance and any claim in respect thereof against the appli-cant as mortgagee shall be void and ineffective after thelapse of 15 days of publication of the notice.

Mahendra Mohan Mishra, Advocate Krishna Tower, Chamber: No. 8, Near CMO Office

Kaiserbagh, Lucknow, Mob: 9415426914, 9559985554

NOTICE

Aparna asks Akhilesh to

step down as SP chief

‘Yogi government is doing well’

Discuss Gorakhpur incident: Amitabh to UP IPS Assn

Dalits clash with cops

over installation of

Ambedkar’s statue

CM assures adequatearrangements inNaxal-infested areas

Akhilesh hits out atYogi, Modi govtsover law, order

DMs of four dists asked to

speed up land acquisition

MSY playing into

BJP hands: Cong

Speaker organising workshop on GST

Poorvanchal Expressway

Mathura priests

not pleased with

CM’s order

Mathura: A group ofHindu priests here are notpleased with Chief MinisterYogi Adityanath’s latest order totake action against touts andfake “pandas”, saying that thiswill bring misery to the wholecommunity.

The community hasstressed that following thisorder, the police and adminis-trative action would bring thewhole priest community underthe lens and hence cause a lotof distress.

The Chief Minister, duringhis maiden visit to Agra onSunday, had ordered authoritiesto take action against “lapkas”(touts) and “pandas” (purohits)as they were a source of nui-sance to international as well asdomestic tourists. The commu-nity has demanded its imme-diate withdrawal of the order. PTI


PIONEER NEWS SERVICE n LUCKNOW

Officials of the TurtleSurvival Alliance, which is

conducting a survey of theGomti river in collaborationwith with the Forest depart-ment, have spotted the rarepeacock soft-shell turtle(Nilssonia hurum).

Shailendra Singh fromTSA told The Pioneer onMonday that they had discov-ered Nilssonia hurum, a rareturtle which had not beensighted in Gomti till now.

“The turtle monitoringsurvey was initiated in Aprilthis year by TSA and UPWildlife department, and wefound a new species of turtlefrom the Gomti river,” Singhsaid. The survey was conduct-ed earlier in 2003.

“This species was notfound in the surveys of 1993and 2003. Occurrence of thisspecies increases the total num-ber of species in the Gomtiriver to eight and the researchteam thinks there is strong pos-sibility of occurrence of anoth-er species called spotted pondturtle Geochelamys hamitonii,”he said. He said that the mon-

itoring exercise was done in2003 and 2004 which includedboat surveys from Pilibhit toSultanpur coupled with amark-recapture studies toascertain population structureand growth of Batagurid turtlesfrom the river.

“The study confirmed localextinction of three stripedroofed turtles called Batagurdhongoka and disappearanceof females of crowned river tur-tle Hardella thurjii from theselected stretches and popula-tions, which were found in1993 surveys led by DhruvjyotiBasu,” Singh said

Pointing out that the

occurrence of new speciesmade the conservation of riverfurther strategic for aquaticwildlife as entire stretch of theriver is unprotected.

“It may be noted that onlyseven species of turtles arefound in Chambal and 12species in Ganga. Turtles areimportant indicators of riverhealth and keep aquatic sys-tems clean. The survey hasbeen expanded to monitor fishdensities and diversity to pre-dict habitat qualities. The finalresults will be released by year-end by Principal ChiefConservator of Forests (UP) DrRupak De,” he added.


Dacoity was committed atthe house of real estate

businessman Chaman LalDiwakar in Gomti Nagar lateSunday night. The miscreantstook away Rs 4 lakh in cash andjewellery worth Rs 20 lakh.

Diwakar lives at 1\38, VivekKhand, along with his wifeSunita, three daughters Komal,Kajal and Priya and son Piyush.Six armed miscreants wearingmasks managed to reach thehouse by scaling the wallaround 2.30 am. Diwakar and

his wife were sleeping in thefront room while their son anddaughters were sleeping in sep-arate rooms located adjacent tothe front one.

On entering the house,they barged into the front roomand after holding Sunita at thepistol-point, they demandedkeys of almirah. Diwakar wasthrashed when he tried to resistthem. At the same time, two ofthe miscreants entered theroom where Piyush and his sis-ters were sleeping. They tied thearms and legs of all occupantsin the room with a plastic rope

and sealed their mouths sothat they could not raise analarm. Diwakar sustainedinjuries on his head, neck andchest. They opened the almirahwith the keys and made off withcash and valuables. They hadstayed in the house more thanan hour. They left the housefrom the main entrance. Piyushwas able to free himself around4.30 am and dialled 100 fromthe landline phone. The helpfrom Dial 100 came within 15minutes. Diwakar lodged anFIR at the Gomti Nagar policestation around 10 am.


The Special Task Force(STF) on Monday arrest-ed the mastermind who

supplied remote-controlledchips to petrol pump owners todupe customers.

Senior Superintendent ofPolice, STF, Amit Pathak saidthat Ajay Chaurasia was arrest-ed from Para area on Monday.

“He used to supply chips inseveral cities in the state and ona large-scale,” Additional SP,STF, Arvind Chaturvedi said.“Four chips, some pulsar cards,a circuit, one petrol-dispensingmachine have been recoveredfrom Chaurasia,” Chaturvediclaimed. He disclosed thatChaurasia was arrested on thebasis of details provided JauharAbbas, who was arrested earli-er in Muzaffarnagar.

When interrogated,Chaurasia said that the devicewhich he had designed wouldrelease 8 per cent less volumethan required but it woulddisplay the quantity which thecustomer had demanded. Headded that most of the gadgetsused in designing the chipswere thrown in Sai river inBanthra immediately after thescam was exposed.

He added that he was anemployee of the companyengaged in the maintenance ofthe petrol and diesel pumps. He

said that he had undergonetraining in maintaining thepumps from the institute man-aged by L&T firm in Mumbaiin 1999. He came to knowabout the device in 2000. Healso disclosed that L&T firmhad given a job to him with aposting in Gorakhpur aftercompleting the training but hisservices were terminated ondisciplinary ground.

SSP Pathak said that theinformation furnished by Rajuwould help the STF to reach thegang in Mumbai soon.

The UP STF on April 27

had raided seven petrol pumpswhich it claimed were usingremote control linked elec-tronic chips to cheat customersby dispensing less fuel.

The device, according toSTF officials, helped themmake on an average up to Rs 14lakh per month. The chip costaround Rs 3,000 and reducedthe output by nearly five to tenper cent, police officials said.

The remote control wouldset the limit and if a customersought one litre petrol, hewould end up getting 940 ml orless, they claimed.


Jagan Nath Yadav, a 40-year-old com-pounder, was shot dead while his younger

brother Shobh Nathsustained injuries in aclash with members ofthe rival group nearBidhauli village fallingunder Gosainganjpolice station on lateSunday night.

The police said thatJagan Nath, a residentof Tehravi village, lefthis house along withhis brother on a motor-cycle at 8.30 pm onSunday for Bidhaulivillage to attend a marriage function.Incidentally, the members of the rival groupwere there as they were also invited in thefunction. They were identified as VimalYadav, Manoj, Alok, Dori Lal and Pappu.Sources said that the marriage was solem-nised in a peaceful atmosphere and they wasno sign of any tension. They had drinks anddinner to-gather.

The tension started after the functionwas over at 12.30 am when they left for theirrespectively houses. Dori Lal, uncle of theVimal Yadav, ridiculed the brothers leadingto an exchange of hot words followed by vio-lence. Source said that the brothers were notcarrying any weapons with them while mem-bers of the rival group were well armed.

One of them shot at Jagan Nath in whichhe was seriously injured while Shobh Nathsustained injuries. After the incident, theyescaped away leaving the brothers alone. Theelder brother died on the spot while theyounger brother was rushed to nearby pri-mary health centre around 3 am.

Senior Superintendent of Police DeepakKumar said the motive for the murder wasrivalry in village politics.


Sanjay Kedia, husband ofMonica Singh,was arrested

in Allahabad on Mondaymorning. He was brought tothe state capital by road.Sources said that Monica’sfather SS Singh, who is a pla-toon commander, lodged anFIR at Krishna Nagar policestation on Sunday morningalleging his son-in-law hadplotted a conspiracy to elimi-nate her daughter. On the basisof the FIR, a team was sent topick him for interrogation.

Sanjay is a Deoria-basedbusinessman but he had left theplace before the shooting inci-dent and took shelter atAllahabad. The incident wasreported onthe premisesof Sky Hiltonhotel onS a t u r d a ynight inw h i c hMonica wass e r i o u s l yinjured. Thepolice pickedhim forinterrogationin the morn-ing. Duringthe interrogation, he did notadmit his involvement in thecrime. Kedia is being broughton transit remand and will befurther interrogated to findout shooters hired to eliminateher. The SSP said that soon thecase would be worked out andculprits would be arrested.


Lucknow Metro RailCorporation has laid the

first pier cap for the elevatedsection between KD SinghBabu Stadium andMunshipulia. Its officials saidthat the pier cap was erectedon Sunday near the BhootnathChauraha between Indiranagarand RS Mishra Nagar Metrostations.

“LMRC will be erecting 26pier caps on Metro pillarsbetween these two Metro sta-tions,” said the official.

It may be pointed out herethat as per the detailed projectreport (DPR) of the LucknowMetro its alignment afterHazratganj takes the followingcourse. It takes a sharp rightturn to fit in the KD SinghBabu Stadium Station. Thisstation will be accessible for thetraffic from High Court, MGRoad etc. The alignment hasbeen planned while maintain-ing a safe distance from theprotected monuments likeSaadat Ali Khan’s tomb,Murshid Zadi's tomb, VictoriaMemorial etc. After the KDSingh Babu Stadium Station thealignment takes a right turnand crosses the Gomti river andthen follows the centre of theUniversity Road till theVishwavidyalaya Station. TheIT College Station has beenproposed in the centre of theroad. The Isabella ThoburnCollege is located before this

station. The alignment followsthe centreline of the FaizabadRoad NH-28 before the start ofthe flyover (Indira Flyover)and maintains a safe distancefrom there.

The alignment again meetsthe centreline of the NH-28(Faizabad Road) and continuesto follow the curves along itscentreline and then reachesthe next proposed station atBadshahnagar. It then crossesthe nala location and takes aright turn to again meet theNH-28 (Faizabad Road). Thenext station, Lekhraj Market,has been proposed in the cen-tre of the road with the entryand exit points on the serviceroads of the market. After theLekhraj Market the alignmentcontinues to follow the roadcentreline and the next stationis proposed at Ram SagarMishra Nagar.

Further the alignment con-

tinues along the Faizabad Roadand the Indiranagar Stationand has been proposed at a dis-tance of 300 metres from theHAL’s main entrance. There arecommercial buildings on bothsides of this station. After theIndiranagar Station the align-ment takes a sharp turntowards Munshipulia along-side the Polytechnic flyover. Atthis station a junction arrange-ment has been suggested forintegration with the proposedMRTS link to the Gomtinagararea. It then continues alongthe centreline of the road andalong Indiranagar to reach thelast station, Munshipulia. Thealignment has been extendedfrom the centreline of the sta-tion to maintain a safe andproper reversal distance.Further the road heads towardsthe Kukrail Reserve Forest andvery congested built-up area ofIndiranagar and Munshipulia.


Central Institute forSubtropical Horticulture

has developed genetic resourcedatabase and information sys-tem to manage both genomic,phenotypic and crop infor-mation to support extensiveinformation on perennial fruitcrops like mango. This wasstated CISH directorShailendra Rajan on Monday.

“Considering the impor-tance of mango, the project on“Development of nationaldatabase on mango” was fund-ed by DBT in a network modeinvolving 10 research institutesof India, namely, CISH,Lucknow, IIHR, Bengaluru,TNAU, Coimbatore, HARP,Ranchi, BCKVV, West Bengal,FRS, Sangareddy, RFRS,Vengurle, CHES,Bhubaneswar, AES, Paria andICAR Research Complex,Meghalaya.

The database was devel-oped in MySQL (mysql, 2007)on a Linux platform and isbeing updated regularly.

“The database containsthree major components- phe-notypic data of the plant andfruits, the details of the fruitand the characteristic features,which can be used in decidingthe economic importance ofthe accessions, molecular dataincludes curated moleculardata from NCBI, USA, andaccession characterisationinformation, published infor-mation and links includingresearch papers, reports, pro-ceedings, journals, authors onmango,” Rajan pointed out.

The interface of the data-base is Hypertext Pre-proces-sor (PHP, 2007), a widely usedgeneral purpose scripting lan-guage that is especially suitedfor web development. It isused for searching the datasetto create dynamic content thatinteracts with database. Server-enabled script is used for key-word search such as accessionnumber, local name, overallquality, use and period ofmaturity.

He said that different partsof mangoes like leaves, pani-

cles, flowers, twigs, stems,bark, wood, root, fruits, andseed kernels were used formaking various products likesweet dishes, glues, dyes, per-fumes and others.

“Phytochemicals found inthese mango parts have variousmedicinal properties viz., anti-tumor, anti–HIV, anti-diabet-ic, anti–inflammatory,anti–oxidative, immuno–mod-ulatory, cardioprotactive, bac-tericidal, broncholytic, secre-tolytic, and also anti-cancer asit inhibits the growth of thehuman gastric cancer cells.

These parts are still beingused by tribals and ethnicpopulations for medication.Scanning of literature revealedthat there is no database yetdeveloped on chemicals foundin mangoes. It is difficult forthe researchers to get informa-tion on said compounds at oneplace in a searchable format.Hence, for providing suchinformation a chemical data-base MChemDB has beendeveloped at ICAR-CISH,Lucknow,” he said.

Man who supplied chips

to petrol pumps arrested

Lucknow (PNS): In con-tinuation of the crackdownagainst rigging in fuel dispens-ing machines, the districtadministration conductedraids at two petrol pumps inTransportnagar on Mondaymorning. According to thedistrict administration offi-cials, inspections were con-ducted by the two teams didnot reveal any tampering withthe fuel dispensing machines.

It may be noted thatinspections are being carriedout on almost daily basis bythe district administrationteams after the STF unearthedtampering with the petrolpump machines some daysback. The raids were con-ducted at Sri Filling Centreand Transportnagar FuelCentre. Sri Filling Centre haseight dispensing units andnone was found rigged.Transportnagar Fuel Centrehas five dispensing units andtampering was detected innone. The team re-stampedtwo dispensing units at apetrol pump in Sadar. The twomachines, out of four, were notfound tampered with when a raid was conductedthere on May 1.

2 more petrol

pumps raided

Cash, jewellery lootedfrom bizman’s house

Shooting incident:

Woman’s husband

held in Allahabad

LMRC lays first pier cap

for elevated section

Compounder shot

dead by rivals

Rare turtle species spotted CISH develops database,

info system for mango


Minister for Technical and MedicalEducation Ashutosh Tandon

launched a student service app onMonday at a programme organised byAbdul Kalam Technical University(AKTU). The app has been preparedby the technical team of AKTU underthe guidance of Vice-ChancellorVinay Kumar Pathak. Through thisapp, students in the institutes affiliat-ed to AKTU can apply for migration,transcripts, provisional degree certifi-cates, duplicate degree certificates,duplicate marksheets and also lodge

their grievances. The AKTU officialssaid all the students who had to theirrespective colleges to collect these cer-tificates, they could now get themfrom their homes. While speaking on

the occasion, Tandon said the increas-ing digitisation efforts by AKTUwere appreciable and similar effortswould be made in medical institutesacross the state.

The AKTU Vice-Chancellor saidthat the app was meant to connect stu-dents of the technical universitythrough e-way. The programme,streamed live on Youtube, witnessedthe presence of AKTU faculty mem-bers. The minister also inauguratedthree community centres of BIET(Jhansi) — Dr APJ Kalam and MajorDhyan Chand hostels and guesthouse.

Tech univ launches student service app

A tree lying uprooted by a dust storm which hit the city on Monday night. Met director JP Gupta said the storm was caused by local heating. ForTuesday, the weatherman predicted partly cloudy skies with possibilities of thunderstorm accompanied by squalls in isolated parts of the state. Lucknowhad earlier witnessed a massive duststorm on May 3 which caused a lot of damage. Pioneer

SSP Deepak Kumar ad other police officers at the house stormed by dacoits Pioneer


U.P. RAJYA VIDYUTUTPADAN NIGAMLIMITED OBRATHERMAL POWERSTATION, OBRA-

SONEBHADRA CORRIGEN-DUM Tender No. T-1/FPD/BTPS/2017-18 floated byExecutive Engineer, FPD, BTPS,Obra for the work of Cleaning ofFuel Oil Pump House, its con-necting area & unloading of OilTank Wagons of Obra ThermalProject, Obra scheduled to beopened on 06.05.2017 (Part-I) &08.05.2017 (Part-II) is hereby re-extended and shall now beopened on 17.05.2017 (Part-I) &18.05.2017 (Part-II) respective-ly. Complete tender shall beaccepted in the Office ofExecutive Engineer, FPD, BTPS,Obra upto 13.00 Hours of17.05.2017. All other terms andconditions of the tender shallremain unchanged. ExecutiveEngineer FPD, BTPS, OBRANo. 162 Date 6.5.2017 SAVEELECTRICITY IN THEINTREST OF NATION

Office of the Cantonment Board64, Subhash Chandra Bose Marg, Cantt Kanpur -208004

NOTICE INVITING TENDERDated : 8.5.17

Online tender for the financial year of 2017-18 through two bid system are invited from expe-rienced supplier and / or registered contractor of Cantt. Board Kanpur through the Governmente-procurement portal http://eprocure.gov.in/epro cure/app by the Cantonment Board Kanpur.

Sl. NIT NO. Name of work Estimated cost No. of tender 1 CBK/SK/K-220/1 Supply of Garden Instrument & Material Rs. 50,00,000/-

2 CBK/SK/K-220/2 Supply of Sanitary Instrument & Material Rs. 1,25,00,000/-

3 CBK/SK/K-220/3 Supply of Oil & Battery Rs. 20,00,000/-

S.NO. ACTIVITY DATE TIME 1 Date of publication of e-tender 09- 05-2017 1000 hrs.

2 Last date of submission of online bids (Technical 24-05-2017 1500 hrs. as well as financial) on e-tender portal

3 Opening of technical bid (cover 1) 25-05-2017 1600 hrs .

4 Opening of Financial bid (cover 2) Tenderers qualified in technical bid will be intimated separately

The CEO/Board reserves the right to increase/decrease the estimated cost of supply and toaccept or reject any or all the tenders without assigning reasons thereof.

Further details may be obtained from www.eprocure.gov.in/eprocure/app. For any clarifi-cation contact Cantonment Board Kanpur office on any working day during office hours. Tenderswill be accepted via online mode only.

(Harendra Singh) Chief Executive Officer,

Cantonment Board, Kanpur

NATIONAL AWARDSonakshi Pandey of

Modern Academy (Lucknow)is amongst the 15 nationalwinners for the ‘My City MyHeritage’ competition organ-ised by INTACH. Fifteennational winners and 100regional winners were select-ed from among 12,000 entries.Sonakshi had written onchikankari. The national win-ners will be felicitated inDelhi together with interest-

ing site visits to make thisexperience a special one forthem.

“The students will be vis-iting national museum,Mehrauli Archaeological Parkand various other culturaland natural landmarks likeThe Energy Research (TERI)Research Centre in Delhi aswell as interact with experts ofArchaeological Survey ofIndia, INTACH Delhi chapter,renowned conservationists,

historians and heritageexperts of Delhi etc,” VipulVarshney said.

AKBAR-E-AZAMA play titled ‘Akbar-e

Azam’ was staged at SangeetNatak Akademi by UttarPradesh Artists Associationon Monday. The play waswritten by SN Lal and direct-ed by Baba Khan and YusufKhan. Akbar was played byUdaiveer Singh, Jahangir byAli Khan, Noor Jehan byUma Singh, Jodhabai by SoniSingh, Arjuman by TanyaSuri, Abul Fazal Faizi byHafeez Khan, Maan Singh byAnimesh Srivastava, VeerSingh by Tushar Bajpai, ZafarBeg by Rahul Mishra.

ALLAHABAD BANKUsha Ananthasubramanian

took over as executive officer(MD & CEO)of AllahabadBank on May 6.Earlier, she wasthe MD andCEO of PunjabNational Bank.She had joined

banking industry as specialistofficer in Bank of Baroda inFebruary 1982.


The UP govt’s State TobaccoControl Cell, Hope Initiative,

Family Planning Association ofIndia (FPA India) and Vote ForHealth Campaign, Asha Parivar,organised an interactive sessionas countdown to the World NoTobacco Day which will beobserved on May 31. SatishTripathi, State Consultant, UPgovt’s State Tobacco ControlCell, informed the students ofSpringdale College that tobac-co use is a leading preventable


For those city denizens whoare interested in learning

how to catch a live snake theWildlife Institute at the ONGCCentre of Lucknow Universityis offering it as a course witha live demonstration. Thecoordinator of the WildlifeInstitute, Amita Kannaujia,while talking to ‘The Pioneer’said that the course aimed athelping the people identify thenon-poisonous and poisonoussnakes so that the reptileswere not unnecessarily killed.The course will be introducedfrom this academic sessiononwards.

She said that among thevarious new programmeswhich had been launched bythe Lucknow University therewere several courses whichwould interest the generalpublic. She said that the course

was their brainchild and theyhad consulted the courses ofseveral universities both with-in the country and abroad todesign it. “We had also offeredthe course because we feltthat when the people see asnake they should not kill itand instead try and rescue itand release it. There has beenan increase in the cases ofsnakebite in the recent past,”she said.

She said that the con-struction activities hadincreased in the city with theMetro work and several otherdevelopment works takingplace which bring these rep-tiles out from their hidingplaces. “A number of snakeswere found in the JaneshwarMishra Park recently and theseare likely to be found in theareas where there is a lot ofdigging. So many pythonshave been found lately in the

city which have been killed,”she added. While impartingtraining the students will begiven a live demonstration atthe Lucknow Zoo. Pointingout that the man-animal con-flict was one of the major areasof concern, she said that therescue operation courseswould keep evolving in thecoming years. “We are placingfocus on the snake and theghariyal rescue operations forthis year and gradually we willkeep changing the profile,”she added.

She said, “The main aim isto highlight importance ofwildlife and involve the pub-lic in the protection of thespecies and subspecies of wildanimals and plants which area part of the earth. Here wewill also include mass publicawareness and support fornature conservation activitiesthrough campaigns and sev-

eral forms of formal and non-formal education. Researchskills need to be built foreffective wildlife conserva-tion,” she added.

Wildlife Science focuses onthe biology and managementof wild animals, includingtheir ecology and conservation.As a wildlife scientist one willstudy native and exotic birds,mammals, reptiles andamphibians in natural or sim-ulated environments, their bio-diversity and human-wildlifeinteractions. This measuregives the ability to implementand evaluate wildlife manage-ment programmes for captiveand free-ranging wildlife. Onewill thus develop a strong sci-entific knowledge of wildlifeanatomy and physiology,breeding, reproduction, nutri-tion, health, husbandry, ecol-ogy, welfare and behaviour,”said Kannaujia.


Deputy registrar, RamManohar Lohia National

Law University, Lucknow,Sanjay Diwakar, said here onMonday that a total of 2,800candidates would be appearingfor the CLAT-2017 examina-tions at nine centres inLucknow. The CLAT-2017examinations for admissions to18 National Law Universitieswould be held on May 14 bythe Chanakya National LawUniversity, Patna, he said. Hesaid that the V-C of RMLNLUwas the coordinator for 10cities which include eight citiesin Uttar Pradesh and two inUttarakhand. These includeVaranasi, Agra, Lucknow,Gorakhpur, Allahabad and oth-ers.

Sanjay said that a total of9,500 students would beappearing for the examina-tions from the UP-UttarakhandZone. “The examination will beonline and will be held in oneshift. The students appearingfor the examinations hadincreased over the past fewyears.”

On being asked what kindof preparations had been madeto ensure that there were noglitches in the online examina-tions, he said, “If there is anyproblem in the computer thenthe time at which it hadoccurred is recorded and whenthe candidate concerned sits onthe other computer he or shegets the same time which wasleft to complete the examina-tion,” he added. Common LawAdmission Test (CLAT) is anon-statutory body created

under a Memorandum ofUnderstanding (MoU) for theconvenience of the studentsseeking admission to variousNational Law Universities inthe country.

An entrance test is con-ducted to provide a list of can-didates on the basis of ‘merit-cum-preference’ to eachUniversity for admission totheir Undergraduate (UG) orPost-graduate (PG) pro-grammes, as per the eligibility,reservation and other criterialaid down under the respectivestatutes of the participatinguniversities. The Common LawAdmission Test (CLAT) is anall-India common entranceexamination, conducted onrotational basis by 18 NationalLaw Universities (NLUs) foradmissions to their UG and PGdegree programmes.

The 18 participating NLUsin the order of their year ofestablishment are as follows:National Law School of IndiaUniversity (NLSIU),Bengaluru, National Academyof Legal Study and Research(NALSAR), University of Law,Hyderabad, National LawInstitute University (NLIU),Bhopal, West Bengal NationalUniversity of Juridical Sciences(NUJS), Kolkata, National LawUniversity (NLU), Jodhpur,Hidayatullah National LawUniversity (HNLU), Raipur,Gujarat National LawUniversity (GNLU),Gandhinagar, Dr RamManohar Lohia National LawUniversity (RMLNLU),Lucknow, Rajiv GandhiNational University of Law(RGNUL), Punjab, Chanakya

National Law University(CNLU), Patna, NationalUniversity of Advanced LegalStudies (NUALS), Kochi,National Law University,Odisha (NLUO), Cuttack,National University of Studyand Research in Law (NUSRL),Ranchi, National LawUniversity and JudicialAcademy (NLUJA), Assam,Damodaram SanjivayyaNational Law University(DSNLU), Visakhapatnam,Tamil Nadu National LawSchool (TNNLS),Tiruchirappalli, MaharashtraNational Law University(MNLU), Mumbai, andMaharashtra National LawUniversity (MNLU), Nagpur.

In some of the participat-ing Law Universities seats areavailable for NRIs, NRI-spon-sored and foreign nationals.There is no minimum cut-offscore prescribed. Candidatureof every candidate will be con-sidered in their respective cat-egory in order of merit.Theprescribed fee for the exams isas follows: For General, OBC,SAP and other category candi-dates it is Rs 4000 and forSC/ST category candidates it isRs 3,500. The counselling fee isthe payment (Rs 50, 000) madeto the CLAT office by a candi-date to show his/her commit-ment in taking admission inany of the participatingNLU(s). The counselling fee isnot a separate fee. It is theadjustable advance paid to theCLAT office which subsequent-ly gets adjusted at the time ofadmission from the fee payableto the respective University bya candidate.


Union Minister for HumanResource Development

Prakash Javadekar said thatquality education was essentialfor all-round development ofstudents. Addressing a gather-ing of CMS teachers at school’sGomti Nagar (Campus II)auditorium, Javadekar said:“Education mainly aims atmoulding students into goodhuman beings and it is onlypossible if all children receivequality education completewith values.”

Javadekar was the chiefguest at the teachers’ confer-ence organised on ‘New modelof education for 21st century’on Monday. The Union min-ister said the accountability ofboth government and privateschool teachers should befixed and learning outcomesmust be visible. “Childrenmust be able to show learning

outcomes of the classes theyare in. Teachers'’ training isalso necessary,” he added.

Earlier, Javadekar formal-ly inaugurated the conferencewhile Dy CM Dinesh Sharmapresided over the function.State Minister for BasicEducation (independent

charge) Anupama Jaiswal,State Minister for Basic,Secondary, Higher,Professional and MedicalEducation Sandeep Singh, andBJP national spokespersonSudhanshu Trivedi were thespecial guests of honour on theoccasion.

‘Quality education essential’

cause of death.“It kills nearly 10 lakh

people every year in the coun-try. The Government of Indiahas enacted the Cigarette andOther Tobacco Products Act(COPTA) in 2003 to curb themenace of tobacco. Salientfeatures of COPTA include aban on the sale of tobaccowithin a radius of 100 yardsfrom all educational institu-tions, prohibits sale of tobac-co products to or by minorsand a ban on smoking at pub-lic places,” he said. UttarPradesh bears the highest eco-nomic burden of tobacco-related diseases in India (28 pc)thus strengthening the imple-mentation of comprehensivetobacco control measures is apublic health imperative for thestate,” Rahul Dwivedi addedfurther.

“The theme of the WorldNo Tobacco Day-2017 is‘tobacco – a threat to develop-ment’ to remind the govern-ment and all of us as citizensto take strong action to end thegame of tobacco and improvedevelopment of our state andnation,” said Rahul Dwivedi,Director of Vote For HealthCampaign, Asha Parivar, at aninteractive session with the stu-dents of Daffodils College inIndiranagar. “We appeal toNITI Aayog to strengthentobacco control in the state sothat all development pro-grammes can have heightenedoutcomes,” said Rahul

Dwivedi.Jaideep Dhondiyal,

Manager, Hope Initiative, saidthat the tobacco epidemic wasa threat to social, economicand environmental develop-ment. “Tobacco industry mis-leads the young people to fallin the trap of this harmful sub-stance. There are 5,500 youthswho initiate tobacco use everyday in India. We need todenormalise the social accep-tance of tobacco use to eradi-cate its consumption. Thisrequires greater awareness inthe masses with support fromall sectors such as education,health, media, panchayati raj,public transport and civil soci-ety.”

Mitashree Ghosh fromFPA India highlighted thatwomen were also taking uptobacco products, particularlythe smokeless form of tobaccoin rural areas which take agreat economic toll, includingdeath and disabilities. This isthe right time to take strongaction and increase publicawareness about the detri-mental effects of tobacco con-sumption. This event was apart of a series of awarenessprogrammes being organisedin the lead up to World NoTobacco Day-2017 by HopeInitiative, Family PlanningAssociation of India (FPAIndia) and Vote For Healthcampaign, Asha Parivar.

Tobacco use poses a gravehealth and economic burdenon the country as well as thestate. According to a reportreleased by the Ministry ofHealth and Family Welfare in2014, the total economic costattributable to tobacco usefrom all diseases in India in theyear 2011 for persons aged 35-69 amounted to Rs 1,04,500crore, including direct andindirect medical costs. Tobaccoconsumption is a major riskfactor for four non-communi-cable diseases (NCDs)- cardio-vascular diseases, cancers,chronic respiratory diseasesand diabetes, which attribute to80 per cent of all NCDs-relat-ed deaths in India.

‘Tobacco use leading cause of death’

CITYBRIEFS

An interactive session was held as countdown to the World No Tobacco Day which will be observed on May 31

2,800 candidates to

appear in CLAT-2017

Children having fun with cartoon characters Gattu-Battu at Childline Academy inMall Avenue on Monday Pioneer

Varsity offers course to catch live snake

Lucknow (PNS): GovernorRam Naik released the LPS coffee-table book titled ‘EducationalInheritance’ on Monday. The bookcovers progress of the school show-casing its productivity and successsaga along with its globally-placedstudents. The programme startedwith the lighting of the lamp byNaik, Lucknow University Vice-Chancellor SP Singh and others.The Governor praised the bookand said: “Life is an endless jour-ney. Think of the country. Yourcontribution is always required.Learning never ceases to be. Keepon being learned, keep on beinginnovative, keep on being progressive.”

Governor releasescoffee-table book

Union Minister for Human Resource Development Prakash Javadekar and DeputyDM Dinesh Sharma at the CMS programme on Monday Pioneer

CMS students giving a cultural performance Pioneer

nation 05LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9, 2017

ARMY, NAVY, IAF SET TOGET ENHANCED PAY New Delhi: The Army, Navy andIndian Air Force personnel are allset to get enhanced pay as perthe recommendations of the 7thPay Commission from the currentmonth. The Government had lastweek the enhanced their paypackage after the Union Cabinetaccepted certain demands of thethe three services includingrestoring an earlier system ofdisbursing disability pension. Thethree services issued generalinstructions separately todisburse the revised pay as wellas the arrears in May’s salary.

BRAHMA KUMARIS HOLDMASS RAJ-YOGA SESSIONNew Delhi: Six weeks before theInternational Yoga Day on June21, the Brahma Kumarisorganisation held a massive massraj-yoga session in the nationalCapital where over 3000 raj-yogaenthusiasts converged andundertook several steps of yogicstretching exercises, creativecontemplation and silentmeditation for world peace andwell being.

INSHORT

PNS n NEW DELHI

The Centre has asked theChief Ministers to review

the preparedness to deal withany adversity in case of sub-nor-mal monsoon, even though theMeteorological Department hasforecast normal rains this year.

Union AgricultureMinister Radha Mohan Singhhas written a letter to all theChief Ministers of the Statesand Union Territories to reviewtheir preparedness to handleany weather-related contin-gency, if any, in advance, so thatthe possible adverse impact ofsub-par rainfall on farmerscan be mitigated. An updatedforecast will be issued next

month. The Met Department(IMD) has projected normalsouthwest monsoon in its firststage forecast for 2017.

Officials said that the Statesand Union Territories havebeen asked to review the pre-paredness of each district in

line with the DistrictAgricultural ContingencyPlans. States have also been toldto check progress made inrolling out schemes under theDistrict Irrigation Plans of thePradhan Mantri Krishi SinchaiYojana, progress of water con-

servation/recharge/harvestingrelated works under MNREGAand water-shed management.

They have also been told tosee if Drought ManagementCentres been set up and activatedat the State headquarter andarrangements for the monitoringof drought. States have been toldto monitor progress made in therestoration of irrigation infra-structure like desiltation ofcanals, repair, energisation oftube-wells and replacement,repair of faulty pumps, repair oftransformers/power lines.

That apart, they have beentold to keep a tab on progressmade in the repair of hand-pumps/drinking water pro-jects. States have been informed

that they can earmark 25 percent of funds under centrally-sponsored schemes as flexi-funds which, inter-alia, couldbe used for mitigation of nat-ural calamities.

In addition, expanding thecoverage of the Pradhan MantriFasal Bima Yojana will enablefarmers to minimise risks asso-ciated with loss of productionin the event of a disaster, theofficials added.

The Union AgricultureMinister also hoped that allnecessary and advance steps arebeing taken by the StateGovernments in the interest ofthe farmers. It is estimated thatnearly 50 per cent of farm landis rain fed in the country.

PNS n NEW DELHI

After 10 years, India has beenunanimously elected as the pres-

ident of the UN-Habitat, an organ ofthe United Nations Organisation(UNO) that promotes socially andenvironmentally sustainable humansettlements across the world. TheUN-Habitat reports to the UnitedNations General Assembly.

Minister of Housing and UrbanPoverty Alleviation M VenkaiahNaidu will preside over the deliber-ations of the Governing Council ofUN-Habitat for the next two years.Prime Minister Narendra Modi in atweet congratulated Naidu on beingelected as the President of theGoverning Council of UN Habitat inNairobi on Monday. Prime Minister

further said, “I am sure you will giveyour best and contribute towards cre-ation of futuristic cities.”

Since the UN-Habitat came intobeing in 1978, it is only the third timethat India has been elected to leadthis important organisation after2007 and 1988. Naidu will chair thefour-day meeting of the 58 memberGoverning Council of UN-Habitat inNairobi, Kenya.

Addressing the GoverningCouncil of UN-Habitat, Naidu elab-orated on the integrated, inclusive andsustainable urban developmentmodel of India through various newmissions like Atal Mission forRejuvenation and UrbanTransformation (AMRUT), SmartCity Mission, Swachh Bharat Missionand Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana.

DEEPAK KUMAR JHA nCHENAB (SRINAGAR)

India will not only be thehome to the world’s tallest

rail bridge over River Chenabby next year but in order tomake it a real global touristattraction, the area adjoiningthe 359-metre steel bridgeacross the Pir Panjal range willhave facilities like bungeejumping, water sports andtrekking besides a host ofrestaurants.

The `1,200-crore bridge,35 metres higher than theimposing Eiffel Tower, is part ofthe 325-km Udhampur-SrinagarRail Corridor which wasdeclared a national project afterit became economically unvi-

able. In two years time, theIndian Railways along withJammu & Kashmir Tourismhopes to start generating rev-enue through the commercialactivities around the steel bridge.

The 467-metre main steelarch span is being designed andforged at units in nearbyPunjab and as far as Nagpurand being transported in bits.

The engineering marvel,coming up in the most daunt-ing geology of the world andmore challenging than Andesin South America and Alps inEurope, is an attempt to boosttourism. It has increasedemployment opportunities inthe Valley State.

Construction of the 1.315-km-long bridge, with the

expertise of Konkan RailwayCorporation Limited (KRCL)and design consultants fromGermany and Finland, is in fullswing over the river.

“Realising its scenic beau-ty and tourism potential, wehad invited the State tourismdepartment which was excitedto do some activities besideshaving food courts and restau-rants situated on the hillocks.There will be sight-seeingpoints, trekking routes, bungeejumping among others in thesedifficult terrains,” KRCLChairman and ManagingDirector (CMD) Sanjay Guptatold The Pioneer.

The rail bridge will havetwo halts at both ends to caterto the demands of tourists aswell as locals, who find liveli-hood in the construction activ-ities of railways.

The Northern Railwayshad to first construct 22 km ofaccess roads to these sites nearKauri village, which has veryscattered population just likeany hilly region. Footpaths and

cycle trails will be providedadjacent to the single linetracks.

“More than 500 peoplefrom these areas have receivedemployment. I am glad to sayearlier we faced skilled handslike welders, fitters etc but nowwe are getting them from thisregion only,” said a site officer.

Since the area is in a highseismic zone and also near theIndo-Pak border, Railways inconsultation with the DRDOhas designed the bridge towithstand any kind of majorblast including 40TNT used byterrorists. There will be sensorson the bridge to check thewind velocity and as soon asthe wind speed exceeds 90kmph, the signal on the trackwill turn red preventing trainmovement.

The mammoth bridgewould consume about 24,000tonnes of steel with 63 mm-thick special blast-proof steel.With a life span of 120 years,the mega steel structure will bepainted with a special corro-

sion-resistant paint which lastsfor 15 years. Amongst the hostof safety measures are aerialsecurity, online monitoringand warning systems to protectpassengers and rolling stocks incritical conditions.

Northern Railway ChiefEngineer BS Tomar said whilethe schedule for completion ofthe bridge is by March 2019,the engineers are hopeful ofcompleting it by the end ofDecember 2018. The bridge isthe crucial link to the 111-kmstretch between Katra andBanihal which is part of theUdhampur-Srinagar-Baramullasection of the Kashmir Railwayproject.

“While Udhampur to Katrawas commissioned in July2014, Qazigund to Baramullawas commissioned in October2009 and Banihal to Qazigundin June 2013. The only missinglink in this entire Kashmir raillink is the Katra to Banihalstretch and Chenab Rail Bridgeis part of it. Once completed,Kashmir will be connected

directly to any part of India.The link is slated to be com-missioned in March 2021,” said

Ministry of Railways DirectorGeneral (Information) AnilSaxena.

World’s tallest rail bridge over Chenab getting ready

To have facilities like bungeejumping, water sports, trekkingfor global tourist attraction

PIONEER NEWS SERVICE nNEW DELHI

Aggression is the newmantra of the Centre,

States and security forces totake on the Maoist challenge.An aggressive anti-Naxal oper-ation will go hand-in-handwith infrastructural develop-ment projects in Maoist-hitareas, the Centre and 10extremism-affected Statesdecided on Monday.

“We have to bring aggres-sion in our policy, there shouldbe aggression in our thinking,aggression in our strategy,aggression in the deploymentof security forces, aggression inoperations, aggression in ring-ing development, aggression inroad construction.

“We will have to be cau-tious that extremely defensivedeployment may result inreduction of operational offen-sive,” Union Home MinisterRajnath Singh said in his inau-gural address to a conclave ofChief Ministers and top officersof the Maoist-hit States, a fort-night after 25 CRPF personnelwere massacred by Naxalites inChhattisgarh’s Sukma district.

Hence, more forces will bedeployed in the Maoist hotbeds and more helicopters willbe provided to the States.

Alongside aggressive oper-ations, road constructionworks, setting up of telecom-munication, power and railwayfacilities in the remote areaswill be expedited. Singhstressed for befitting strate-gies during the security oper-ations and enhanced intelli-gence in tackling the Maoists.

Economic resources, hesaid, play an important role inany war — only when moneyis available is it possible to buy,eat, drink and possess ammu-nition and weapons.“Therefore, choking the finan-cial resources of the left wingextremists is the most basicmantra in this fight,” he said.

Maoist rebels are known toextort money from contractorsengaged in almost all develop-ment projects being executed inareas they hold sway whichthey call “levy”. Declaring an allout war, Singh stressed on“unity of purpose” and spoke ofa unified coordination andcommand to counter left wingextremists (LWE). Along with

strategic command, unifiedcommand was required at theoperational and tactical level —besides intelligence sharingwhich was equally important,he said.

Referring to the enormityof the problem, Singh said asmany as 12,000 citizens had losttheir lives in Maoist violenceover the last two decades. Ofthese, 2,700 were jawans ofsecurity forces and 9,300 wereinnocent common people.There were no shortcuts to suc-cess, he said, underscoring theneed for short-term, medium-term and long-term policies atdifferent levels.

“There is need to find asolution to this problem and thestrategy is available and encom-passed in the word ‘SAMAD-HAN’. It means S-SmartLeadership, A-AggressiveStrategy, M-Motivation andTraining, A-Actionable

Intelligence, D-DashboardBased KPIs (Key PerformanceIndicators) and KRAs (KeyResult Areas), H-HarnessingTechnology, A-Action plan foreach Theatr, N-No access toFinancing.”

Referring to the 9/11 terror

attack, he said the US had takenon the challenge to ensure thatthere was no repeat. The 9/11Commission stated that theincident was not failure ofintelligence but the failure ofimagination, he said.

“Therefore, the SAMAD-HAN, which we have discussedtoday has inbuilt potential forimagination. We have to workon imaginative thinking onthe whole situation so that we

can out-think and out-manoeuvre Left-wing extrem-ists,” he said.

“In order to free India fromthe influence of Left-wingextremists that encourage vio-lence and killing, it is necessarythat we all should think and workin this direction. I believe thatefforts to suppress democracythrough the influence of the gunwill never succeed,” he said.

The Chief Ministers ofBihar, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh,Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh andJharkhand attended the meeting,while West Bengal, AndhraPradesh, Telangana and MadhyaPradesh were represented byHome Ministers and senior offi-cers. District magistrates andsuperintendents of police of 35worst-hit Naxal-affected dis-tricts along with heads of para-military forces and intelligenceagencies also attended the high-level security meet.

Detailing the deliberationsabout the meeting, HomeSecretary Rajiv Mehrishi saidUnion Ministers of Roads,Power, Railways and Telecom —Nitin Gadkari, Piyush Goyal,Suresh Prabhu and Manoj Sinharespectively also held discus-sions with the Chief Ministersfor the speedy implementationof infrastructure. Most of thestates urged for speedy imple-mentation of telecom andpower projects in the remoteareas for the development.

However, Home Secretarywas tightlipped on the deci-sions taken in the meetingabout the operations. But hesaid there was a discussion onstopping the illegal money flowin the Maoist affected areas.“Demonetisation has chokedthe funds to Naxals and thedesperation is now to snatchthe arms etc,” he said withoutdetailing further.

To battle Naxals, HM calls for SAMADHAN

Centre, 10 extremism-affectedStates decide to take on Maoists

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh with Chief Ministers of various States at a meeting to review the strategy and security issues in dealing with Left wing extremism, atVigyan Bhawan in New Delhi on Monday PTI

SUKMAATTACKAFTERMATH

PNS n NEW DELHI

Days after several CRPFpersonnel were killed in

Sukma, a Shashtra Seema Bal(SSB) constable Kailash Dahreon Monday sustained splinterinjuries in an IED attack by theMaoists in Barrebeda area ofChhattisgarh while he was ona patrolling duty to providesecurity to the newly-con-structed railway line.

SSB PRO Deepak Singhsaid that the patrolling teamwas led by AssistantCommandant Vivek Ojhawhen the incident happenedand at around 11.30 am an IEDwas initiated by suspectedMaoists on the patrolling party.He said the security team wasgoing to clear the railway trackfor working party of Rail VikasNigam Limited (RVNL).

“We were able to evacuatethe SSB constable for spe-cialised treatment immediate-ly and is being administered thebest treatment available at theAntagarh hospital. He is out of

danger now.,” Singh added. For the purpose of securi-

ty cover to railway tracks, twoBattalions of SSB have beendeployed in the Balod andKanker district of Chhattisgarh.The purpose of deployment isto guard and give protection forconstruction of 95-km-longDalli Rajhara to Rowghat rail-way line. It is a joint venture ofIndian Railways, State Govtand SAIL. The area is a Maoiststronghold. Since SSB’sdeployment from May 2014, 17km stretch of railway line hasbeen built and commissionedbetween Dalli Rajhara toGudum.

“The area has been identi-fied as having huge reserves ofiron ore and the constructionof the railway line will facilitatetransportation of Rowghat oreto Bhilai. Most of area coversunder forests. Deforestationand acquisition clearance is bighurdle apart from area beingMaoist hot beds,” said SSBDirector General (DG)Archana Ramasundaram.

SSB CONSTABLE INJUREDIN IED ATTACK IN C’GARH

PNS n NEW DELHI

The Supreme Court onMonday issued notice to

the Centre on a PIL seeking anend to the inhuman practice offemale circumcision prevailingamong a community of ShiaMuslims in India, the DawoodiBohras.

The PIL by a Delhi-basedlawyer, Sunita Tiwari, allegedthat the inhuman practiceinvolved mutilation of femalegenitals of young Bohra girlsabove five years of age whichwas a serious violation ofwoman’s fundamental rights.

The Bench headed byChief Justice JS Khehar termedthe issue to be “extremely sen-sitive” as it sought responsefrom the Centre and States likeMaharashtra, Gujarat,Rajasthan and Delhi, whereDawoodi Bohra communitypredominantly reside.

The PIL argued by formerAdditional Solicitor General(ASG) Rakesh K Khanna

sought a complete ban on thispractice commonly known as‘khatna’ or “female genitalmutilation” (FGM). Such actought to be classified as a cog-nisable, non-bailable offence,for which it sought directions.

The petition referred tointernational conventions ofthe United Nations, to whichIndia is a signatory underwhich such practices violate theright of women and childrenunder the UN Convention onthe Rights of the Child and UNUniversal Declaration ofHuman Rights. The practice isinhuman and violates genderequality and rights of a womanover her own body as themutilation causes “permanentdisfiguration to the body of agirl child.”

The petition further point-ed out that 27 countries havepassed a law banning such cus-tom including the countries inAfrica from where it originat-ed. Sadly, India has remained anexception, it stated.

SC issues notice toCentre on practice offemale circumcision

PNS n NEW DELHI

The Supreme Court onMonday put the Centre,

State Governments and majortiger reserves across the coun-try on notice to respondwhether the StandardOperating Procedure (SOP) todeal with emergency situa-tions arising out of man-animalconflicts in and around natur-al forests and reserves are beingfollowed.

The issue assumed signifi-cance as the PIL filed by lawyerAbir Phukan pointed out anincident in Uttarakhand wherea tranquilised tiger when soughtto be removed by an earthmovergot crushed under it and died.

A Bench headed by ChiefJustice JS Khehar said that itwill examine whether the SOPis being adopted by Stateswhile issuing notice to theMinistry of Environment andForests and 17 other States. The

PIL argued by advocate GopalShankaranaraynan stated thatSOP was violated to the hilt asvisible from the Uttarakhandincident where an earthmoveris never used to remove a tran-quilized tiger. The incidentoccurred at Belpadao region ofTerai West forest division inUttarakhand near CorbettTiger Reserve.

The petition said that theincident reaffirmed the fact that“the unregulated activities ofminers and quarry owners atplaces in and around forests areenough to cause significantharm to wildlife.” The fact thatan earthmover was present inthe restricted forest zone wasevidence to this effect, it added.The plea sought directions toensure an incident of this kinddoes not recur, by setting up apanel to look into the causes ofconcern which were con-tributing by conflicts betweenhuman beings and animals.

SC poser to Govts on

procedures in dealing

with wild animals

Prepare contingency plans for monsoon, States told

PTI n NEW DELHI

Five senior IAS officers work-ing in the Central

Government have been sent toUttar Pradesh which is facingshortage of senior bureaucrats.

The move comes followinga request to the Centre by thestate government seeking ser-vices of some senior officers ofUP cadre.

The AppointmentsCommittee of the Cabinet(ACC), headed by PrimeMinister Narendra Modi, hasapproved repatriation of five

bureaucrats including seniorIAS officer Alok Kumar, at pre-sent Joint Secretary in TextilesMinistry, to their cadre state ofUttar Pradesh, an order issuedby Department of Personneland Training (DoPT) said.

Besides him, Sanjay RBhoosreddy, Prashant Trivediand Shashi Prakash Goyal (allfrom 1989 batch) have alsobeen repatriated to UP, it said.

Bhoosreddy is at presentChief Vigilance Officer inMMTC Ltd. Trivedi and Goyalare working as Joint Secretariesin Ministry of Consumer

Affairs, Food and PublicDistribution, and Ministry ofHuman ResourceDevelopment, respectively.

Anurag Srivastava, a 1992-batch IAS officer, has also beensent to Uttar Pradesh. He willbe relieved by the end of June,2017 after the InternationalYoga Day event, it said.

June 21 has been declaredas International Yoga Day.

Srivastava is Joint Secretaryin AYUSH Ministry. Thesesenior officers are likely to getimportant posts in the State, asenior DoPT official said.

Centre sends five senior

IAS officers to UP

India unanimously electedas president of UN-Habitat

PTI n NEW DELHI

The CBI on Monday questioned former HaryanaChief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda in con-

nection with alleged irregularities in the allotmentof 14 industrial plots at Panchkula, by the HaryanaUrban Development Authority.

Hooda, who was the de facto chairman ofHUDA, was examined by the agency for the first timesince it registered the case against him, an IAS offi-cer and two other HUDA officials last year.

“Yes, he is being examined,” CBI spokespersonRK Gaur said, when asked about the development.

The agency had recently also examined UPSCmember and the then Principal Secretary to the ChiefMinister Chattar Singh in connection with case.

It is alleged that the orders for the allotment wereissued from the Chief Minister’s office.

Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar had inDecember 2015 ordered that the State VigilanceBureau to register an FIR in the case and the the mat-ter then be reffered to the CBI.

Panchkula land allotmentscam: CBI grills Hooda

The mammoth bridge would consume about 24,000tonnes of steel with 63 mm-thick special blast-proofsteel. With a life span of 120 years, the mega steelstructure will be painted with a special corrosion-resistant paint which lasts for 15 years. Amongst the host of safety measures are aerial security, online monitoring and warning systems to protectpassengers and rolling stocks in critical conditions

LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9, 2017 nation 06

SAUGAR SENGUPTA n KOLKATA

The Bharatiya Janata Partyon Monday demanded a

NIA-investigation into theAusgram bomb blast thatoccurred on Sunday eveningkilling at least five people andleaving quite a few injured.

There was a need for theNational Investigation Agencyto take up the matter as theState-run Crime InvestigationDepartment will not be able toprobe the matter impartially,State BJP president Dilip Ghoshsaid.

“The way terrorists, smug-

glers and anti-social elementsare being harboured in Bengalone doubts whether the State-run CID will be able to conductan impartial probe into the mat-ter. Hence we want the NIA toinvestigate it,” Ghosh saidreminding that “this is no ordi-nary blast.”

The ferocity of the explo-sion was that an entire con-crete structure was blown intosmithereens. The blastoccurred at Pichkuri Dhal vil-lage in Ausgram Block ofBurdwan East district. Thoughthe local Trinamool CongressMLA Abhedananda Thandar

blamed “CPI(M) goons whohurled a bag full of bombsinside the party office” localssaid a huge stock-pile ofbombs went off in the eveningblowing the roof of the con-crete structure off and pullingdown the walls.

District Superintendant ofPolice Kunal Agarwalremained tight-lipped afterthe Trinamool Congress’ pro-duced its official version blam-ing the opposition outfits,though other officials said onconditions of anonymity thatbomb disposal squad had beensent to the area.

Demanding an NIA-probedistrict BJP president SandipNandi said “our experience inthe Khagragarh blast showshow terror activities weregoing on under the nose ofthe State Government” andinside the house of a localTrinamool Congress leader.

Subsequently, the Statepolice tried to suppress factsin the Khagragarh blast tillthe NIA was sent in andexposed the larger conspira-cy that was hatched from thisplace and Simulia Madarsa,he said. NIA arrested about adozen terrorists with Jamatul

Mujahideen Bangladesh(JMB) links in theKhagragarh case.

A team of State BJP lead-ers led by Locket Chatterjeewere likely to visit the spot onTuesday, party sources said.

Meanwhile in a separateincident a blast ripped off ahouse at Charu Market inSouth Kolkata. Though thepolice would not tell anythingfor certain sources said theblast could have occurredafter gas cylinders stockpiledin it went off. The buildingwas used for illegally refillinggas cylinders, sources added.

BJP demands NIA probe into Ausgram blast

KUMAR CHELLAPPAN n CHENNAI

Even as the two factions ofthe ruling AIADMK are

fighting it out each other as partof their plan of mutual annihi-lation, the opposition DMK isgearing up to capture power inTamil Nadu. In what is seen asa prelude to the formation of aGrand Alliance in the State, theDMK has decided to celebratewith gaiety the 94th birthday ofparty president MKarunanidhi.

Karunanidhi, who hasbeen confined to the bedroomof his Gopalapuram residencein Chennai due to age-relatedproblems would make his firstpublic appearance of 2017 onJune 3 at the YMCA Groundsin the city to receive birthdaygreetings from his fans andparty cadre, according to R SBharati, MP and organisingsecretary of the DMK.

Party sources said allprominent national leadersincluding Congress presidentSonia Gandhi, her son andparty vice-president RahulGandhi, chef ministers of Biharand Orissa (Nitish Kumar andNaveen Patnaik respectively)would fly down to Chennai togreet Kalaignar (asKarunanidhi is addressed bythe cadre).

The year 2017 also marksthe 60th anniversary ofKarunanidhi as MLA. He wasfirst elected to the Tamil Naduassembly in 1957 and sincethen has won all assemblyelections he had contested. Agalaxy of opposition party lead-ers from all national, regionaland caste parties barring theBJP and Shiv Sena are expect-ed to land in Chennai on June3 to congratulate and wishgood health to the DMK chiefwho was also a five-time ChiefMinister of the State. Leaders ofthe CPI(M), the CPI and otherLefts parties too would join thebirthday pageant to make itknown that they would alignwith the DMK in future elec-tions.

The DMK has intensifiedits efforts to cobble up aRainbow Alliance similar to theone it formed to face the 2004Lok Sabha election in whichthe party-led front swept all the39 seats in the State. The onlydifference this time is that theDMDK (led by Vijayakanth),the PMK and the MDMK maynot figure in the front as allthese parties have made itknown that they would nothave any kind of alliance withthe DMK.

The last fortnight saw partyworking president M K Stalin

upping the ante against the BJPwith allegations of impositionof Hindi over non-Hindispeaking States. He chargedthat the move by the Ministryof Surface Transport to writethe place names in Hindi alongthe National Highways passingthrough the State was a proofof the hidden agenda of theBJP-led Government at theCentre. Stalin has been warn-ing the Centre that he wouldlaunch an anti-Hindi agita-tion all over Tamil Nadu sim-ilar to the one witnessed by thecountry in the 1960s.

But H Raja, national sec-retary of the BJP , called Stalin’sbluff and said that the DMKleader’s advisors had failed tocounsel their leader proper-ly.”What the NHAI is doingnow with regard to the milestones in the NationalHighways is nothing but imple-menting a policy decision takenby the UPA Government in2006.The decision to have milestones painted with names inthree languages (Hindi, Englishand regional languages) wastaken by T R Baalu, the thenUnion Minister of SurfaceTransport representing theDMK,” said Raja while speak-ing to journalists at Chennai onMonday.

DMK hopes Karuna’s 94th

b’day may turn party fortune

Rajput Karni Sena president Sukhdev Singh Gogamedi arrives at Ahmedabad airport on Monday. Gogamedi protested againstSanjay Leela Bhansali's movie Padmavati and beat up the filmmaker during the shooting in Rajasthan PTI

World Heritage site Mahabodhi Temple illuminated for Budh Poornima celebrations in Bodhgaya on Monday PTI

OMER FAROOQ n HYDERABAD

For the people reeling underthe scorching summer heat

and dry weather in Telanganaand Andhra Pradesh finallythere is some news to cheer.Many parts of Andhra Pradeshand Telangana are likely toreceive isolated rainfall and wit-ness thunder storm activityunder the spell of a trough.

Cyclone Warning Center atVisakhapatanam as well as theprivate weather forecasterSkymet have said that a troughwas formed from Central UttarPradesh through MadhyaPradesh, VidarbhainMaharashtra, Telangana to inte-

rior Karnataka.The thunderstorm as well as

the isolated rains over the nexttwo to four days is likely to bringthe temperature downs in boththe Telugu States.

CWC at Visakhapatanamsaid that, many parts of AndhraPradesh were already receivinggood rain for the last two daysand the activity will continue foranother 48 hours. Highest rainfall of 5 cms was recorded atNellimerla in Vizianagaram dis-trict in 24 hours till Sundaymorning. Visakhapatanam andVizianagaram cities also record-ed 3 cms each. In Anantapur dis-trict, one of the worst hit by thedry spell, Penugonda recorded

3 cms of rains while Lepakshitown recorded 2 cms of rains.

Weather office said thatunder the influence of thetrough, rain is likely to contin-ue till May 10 and the temper-atures may start rising again afterthat.

Hyderabad where mercurywas 4 to 5 degrees above normalfor most part of April, the tem-perature has dipped slightly andit was 38%, a slightly below thenormal.

According to SkymetHyderabad and its surroundingswere likely to experience thun-der storm and thunder showerover the next 48 hours bring-ing relief from the heat.

Rain likely to bring reliefin Telangana, Andhra

KHURSHEED WANI n SRINAGAR

While Chief MinisterMehbooba Mufti talked

about hope for return of peaceand tranquility in Kashmir, asenior police official onMonday said that 200 militants,majority of them locals, wereactive in Kashmir. The daymarked the re-opening of high-est Government offices in sum-mer capital Srinagar after bien-nial shifting from Jammu, evenas clashes between securityforces and student protesterserupted at several places.

Talking to reporters on there-opening of Civil Secretariat,Mehbooba Mufti stressed oncollective and heedful efforts byevery section of the society toget J&K out of the difficulttimes and the looming uncer-tainties. She said this is not thefirst time that people of theState have seen tough times butin the past too they have bravedchallenges and come out res-olutely. “I remember 1996when it was difficult to evenconduct a public meeting. Butpeople have come out of thatand would also pass throughthe present times withresilience,” she said andappealed for collective and vig-ilant efforts by every section ofthe society in this regard.

Terming youth as an assetand a promise for a better

future, the Chief Minister saidthe youth of the State havemade us proud in all fields theywent and competed. “Be itstudies, sports or competitiveexams, our youth have per-formed so well to hold ourheads high”, she said and askedthem to exhibit their potentialin any corner of the country.“Jammu & Kashmir is a jewelin the crown of India and ouryouth have the whole canvas ofthe country available to displaytheir talent in whatever fieldthey take the plunge”, she saidand added that education is amovement which leads a soci-ety from darkness towardslight. Mehbooba Mufti

appealed media to play a con-structive role in minimising thedivide between sections of thesociety and act as a guide anda beacon to show the right pathto the Government and thepeople whenever they deflectfrom their objective.

However, a senior policeofficer offered a glimpse to theactual ground situation in theValley. At a press conference,Inspector General of Police(Kashmir range) Javed Gillanisaid that 200 militants wereactive in Kashmir and majori-ty among them were locals. Hesaid the number is roughly thesame that existed last yearwhen around 95 locals joined

the militant ranks.He said amongst 200, as

many as 110 militants are localsand others are foreigners. Hesaid militants have launched apsychological warfare byuploading videos. “It is a psy-chological warfare that they(militants) are trying to indulgein,” he said justifying theauthorities’ move to block var-ious software applications andsocial networking sites.

He said the ban has beenimposed for a month and itwould be assessed as to how itcan be effective at the groundlevel. Gilani said the anti-insurgency operations werecontinuing in the Valley onday-to-day basis albeit withfocus on following standardoperating procedures.

Meanwhile, clashesbetween students and securityforces were reported from var-ious places in the Valley.

The clashes erupted inZainakote area of Srinagar afterarmy men reportedly fired inair to disperse students whohad blocked traffic on Srinagar-Baramulla highway.

The students from localHigher Secondary Schooljoined by local youth clashedwith police to protest againstthe student arrests, in Newaarea of south Kashmir’sPulwama district.

Reports said the students of

Higher Secondary SchoolQalamabad in Langate area offrontier district of northKashmir’s Kupwara staged aprotest against the use of forceson agitating students acrossKashmir since past three weeks.

Hundreds of vehicles werestranded on Magam Beerwahroad in central Kashmir’sBudgam district after studentsof different private schoolsheld a protest demonstrationand blocked the road atAripanthan point against thedetention of a 6th class student.

They demanded the releaseof their detained schoolmateSahil Ahmad. He had beendetained last Thursday duringa nocturnal raid and detainedin place of his elder brother.Pertinently, tensions betweenstudents and forces have esca-lated since April 15, whenpolice raided the DegreeCollege in Pulwama, about 30kilometers (20 miles) south ofSrinagar. Hundreds of studentsprotested and clashes left atleast 50 students injured.

On April 17, anotherround of student protests (bothboys & girls) across the valleyleft more than 100 students andan unknown number of policeofficers injured. Authoritiesresponded by closing colleges,universities and some highschools for a week, but theprotests continued unabated.

Video shows Army destroying

Pak bunkers along LoC

PM's brother threatens rationshops’ stir over commission

CM calls for collective efforts to

get J&K out of difficult times

Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti arrives to inspect the guard of honour at the CivilSecretariat complex on the first day after bi-annual Darbar move, in Srinagar onMonday PTI

Devotees pulling the temple car as a part of the Chithirai festival of MeenakshiAmman Temple in Madurai on Monday PTI

PNS n GANDHINAGAR

Prahalad Modi, elder brother of Prime Minister Narendra Modiand president of Gujarat State Fair Price Shop & Kerosene

Licence Holders’ Association on Monday warned the StateGovernment that ration shop keepers would go on an indefinitestrike from May 28 in support of their demand for higher com-missions.

“We are also thinking of resigning en masse and launching anon-violent protest on Gandhian path,” Prahlad Modi said in a let-ter addressed to Principal Secretary, Food, Civil Supplies andConsumer Affairs, Gujarat. The copy of the letter has also beenmarked to Gujarat Chief Minister, his deputy and Chief Secretary.When asked for how long would they continue their stir he said,“If they (Gujarat Government) do not listen then for life.”

Gujarat roughly has about 1.2 crore ration card holder regis-tered with Gujarat Government. These include beneficiaries underBPL and Antyoday schemes. Of the total, 65 lakh cardholders comeunder the purview of National Food Securities Act, while 55 lakhhave been declared void. These beneficiaries are served by around900 fair shops across the State.

“The state has been seeking suggestions to help increase oper-ating commission for fair price shop owners but it is their duty tosee how the commission can be improved,” Prahlad said in the let-ter. “Through this letter we seek to inform the government thatafter 20 days, the fair price shop owners and kerosene dealers wouldstay away from distributing goods under PDS system and theresponsibility of situation arising out of that of the StateGovernment.”

MOHIT KANDHARI n JAMMU

Sending Army authorities ina tizzy, dramatic visuals

showing Indian Army destroy-ing Pakistani post along theLine of Control (LoC) onMonday hit the TV channelscreens amid loud clamour forgiving “befitting” reply to the“barbaric” act of mutilation ofbodies of Indian soldiers by theBorder Action Team (BAT) ofPakistan Army.

Several TV channels wentballistic making “unsubstanti-ated” claims that the videowas “purportedly” shot whileIndian Army retaliated toavenge mutilation of bodies ofjawans after May 1 attack in theKrishna Ghati sector ofPoonch. Senior Army officersposted in the Northern com-mand headquarters swiftlydenied leaking of the video,claiming it has not beenreleased by the Indian Army.

The Army officersdemanding anonymity, how-ever, failed to give satisfactoryreplies how such exclusivevideos found their way in the

public domain. When asked whether any

enquiry has been initiated totrack down the source of leakthe Army officers shied awayfrom commenting on record.

The Army officers at leastdenied claims made by TVchannels that the video wasshot in the Krishna Ghati sec-tor of Poonch after May 1strike by the Pakistan BATteam.

“I cannot comment on thevideo, which has not beenreleased by the Indian Army,”a senior officer posted in themedia cell of Udhampur-basedNorthern command head-quarters told The Pioneer.

Interestingly, 1.41 minutelong video clip was in circula-tion since Sunday evening butit went viral early Mondaymorning when some TV chan-nels started broadcasting it.

Initially, an attempt wasmade to hard sell the video topacify the angry masses seek-ing “firm” response from theIndian Army but as the dayprogressed question markswere raised about the timing

and the location of the videoshot from inside the bunker ofthe Indian Army.

Army officers posted inJammu and Nagrota also raisedquestion marks over the timingof the video claiming thejawans of the Indian Armywere eagerly waiting their turnto avenge mutilation of theircolleagues.

“The video in circulationmay have been shot before theBAT of Pak Army mutilated thebodies of our soldiers,” Armyauthorities claimed

In the video, the soldierspresent in the bunker can beheard relaying real time infor-mation to their superior offi-cers how the shells were hittingthe target and destroying thePakistani post.

On ground zero, the IndianArmy is yet to take strongaction against the Pakistanarmys ‘despicable’ act.

Since May 1, the Army offi-cers have been brainstormingand reviewing their prepared-ness to plan their “appropriate”retribution to avenge mutila-tion of Indian soldiers.

nation 07LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9, 2017

Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia pays floral tributes to Martyrs of famous Harding Bomb case Master Amir Chand, BhaiBal Mukund and Master Awadh Behari in a function organised on MAMC Campus on Monday in New Delhi Pioneer photo

STAFF REPORTER n NEW DELHI

The Delhi Congress onMonday wrote to

Lieutenant-Governor AnilBaijal and demanded prosecu-tion of Delhi Chief MinisterArvind Kejriwal and hisMinisters on the basis of theShunglu committee report. Theparty has also decided toapproach the Court after gettingprior sanction from the L-G.

“We demand the sanctionto prosecute Kejriwal and hisMinisters under the Preventionof Corruption Act, based onthe Shunglu committee report,”Delhi Pradesh CongressCommittee (DPCC) presidentAjay Maken said.

He said the L-G has thepower to sanction the prose-cution but the L-G and theCentral Government had nottaken any action on the reporteven after more than seventhmonths of its submission.

“If Baijal failed to accordsanction for prosecution, itwill be then clear that the both(Centre and Baijal) are helpingKejriwal to get out from thiscrisis,” he added. Maken alsosaid the Congress will launcha signature campaign in Delhifrom Tuesday and hand over 10lakh signatures to Kejriwal asa referendum on the AAP.

In a letter to the L-G,Maken said, “After pursuing thesaid (committee) report, Irequested the Commissioner ofPolice, Delhi to register anFIR under various sections ofthe Prevention of CorruptionAct against Kejriwal and carryout necessary investigation.”

“Since, despite passage ofmore than three weeks no actionwas taken against the accusedpersons, hence, on May 7, Iagain moved a representationbefore the ACB, along with acopy to the Joint Commissionerof Police, ACB,” he said.


Having taken a serious viewof the recent gas spill at

the Tughlaqabad containerdepot which led to the hospi-talisation of over 450 school-children, the National GreenTribunal (NGT) on Mondaysought the responses of theCentre and the DelhiGovernment.

“We have gone through thenewspaper reports...Someemergency mechanism wasrequired to check further envi-ronment degradation,” a Benchheaded by NGT chairpersonSwatanter Kumar said whiledirecting Central PollutionControl Board and Delhi

Pollution Control Committee(DPCC) to conduct jointinspection and submit a statusreport on the entire incident.

The green panel issuednotices to the Ministry ofEnvironment and Forest, DelhiGovernment, Railway Boardand DPCC and asked them tofile their replies within a week.

It also issued a show causenotice to the ContainerCorporation of India (CON-COR) on why environment

compensation should not beimposed on its Tughlaqabaddepot and why should it not beshifted to some other place.

Also, the tribunal appoint-ed advocate IG Kapila as ami-cus curiae and posted the casefor hearing on May 15.

The order came after advo-cates Sanjay Upadhyay andSalik Shafique mentioned thematter, which the tribunaltook note of on its own.

At least 450 girl students of

the Rani Jhansi School andGovernment Girls’ SeniorSecondary School, run by thecity administration, had to behospitalised on Saturday aftertoxic fumes spread due to thechemical leakage.

Most of the students, whocomplained of irritation in theeyes and breathlessness, weredischarged after a few hoursbut a few had to be kept underobservation in ICUs.

Earlier, in a separate mat-ter, the NGT had issued noticeto CONCOR on a plea filed bywarehousing expert AjayKhera claiming that non-Delhibound operations currentlybeing carried out at InlandContainer Depot atTughlakabad (ICD/TK) wascontributing to the alarminglevel of air pollution in the cityand hence should be shifted tosome other location outsidethe Capital.

NEW DELHI: Senior BJP leaderSubramanian Swamy on Mondaywrote to L-G Anil Baijal for delayin taking decision on sanction forprosecution against CM ArvindKejriwal and Deputy CM ManishSisodia for accepting `2 crorefrom sales tax defaulter SKNAssociates. Swami’s statementcame after the allegation madeby Kapil Mishra who was sackedas the Water Minister on May 6and Maken had on Monday alsodemanded the resignation ofKejriwal, claiming the AAP had“lost its anti-corruption plank”.

Swamy, in his petition hasalso provided relevant docu-ments regarding the SKNAssociates which was caughtfor donating four cheques of ̀ 50lakhs to the AAP. SR


The Anti-Corruption Branch(ACB) on Monday said it

will record sacked DelhiMinister Kapil Mishra’s detailedstatement after he alleged thatChief Minister Arvind Kejriwalhad influenced the probe intoa `400 crore tanker scam.

Mishra visited the ACBoffice this morning and sharedevidence related to the tankerscam that dates back to SheilaDikshit’s tenure as ChiefMinister.

“Mishra has said that hewants to record a detailedstatement and we will givehim time. We will record hisdetailed statement,” ACB chiefMukesh Kumar Meena said.

Mishra has sought time forrecording his statement andonce it is recorded, action will be

taken as per law, Meena added.Mishra has alleged that the

investigation into the tankerscam was repeatedly delayed andinfluenced by Kejriwal and “histwo men”. While Mishra claimedthat he has shared “all the evi-dence”, Meena didn’t divulge thedetails and maintained that histeam is in touch with the AamAadmi Party (AAP) legislator.

It may be noted thatDikshit was “examined” by theACB officials in August 2016,in connection with her allegedinvolvement in the tanker scambesides being handed over a setof 18 written questions.

“She (Dikshit) has alreadybeen examined. There aremany documents that are beinganalysed. Most of the state-ments have been recorded andafter recording Mishra’s state-ment, we will decide the future

course,” Meena added.Till some time back,

Mishra had been accusing theBJP of shielding Dikshit in thecase and Monday he allegedthat the AAP Governmenttried to shield her.

“I told the officials howKejriwal deliberately delayedthe report and how publicmoney was misused,” he alleged.

“Also, I told them howKejriwal, along with his twomen, affected the tanker scamprobe. The Government alsotried to shield Dikshit time andagain. The ACB will call meagain for a detailed investiga-tion,” he told reporters after themeeting with ACB officials.

Meena, however, said theyhaven’t received any complaintin connection with Mishra’sallegations of Kejriwal taking`2 crore from Health MinisterSatyender Jain.

The Kejriwal-led AAPGovernment had in June 2015constituted a fact-finding com-mittee to go into alleged irreg-ularities in procuring some385 stainless steel water tankersby the DJB.

ACB to record Kapil

Mishra’s statement

Meena says they haven’t receivedany complaint in connection withMishra’s allegations of Kejriwaltaking `2 crore bribe from Jain

TUGHLAQABAD GAS LEAK

Asks them to

file their replies

within a week

Green panel issues notices to Centre, Delhi Govt

Swamy wantsKejriwal, Sisodiaprosecuted,writes to L-G

Writes to L-G; party toapproach the Courtafter getting priorsanction from Baijal

Prosecute CM,his Ministers:Congress

SC UNLEASHES...Dealing with the CBI’s

appeal challenging this orderthat virtually would lead to clo-sure of all other cases againstLalu and other accused, theapex bench of Justices ArunMishra and Amitava Roy said,“Offences are different at dif-ferent places, by differentaccused persons. As and whena separate offence is commit-ted, it becomes punishable andthe substantive charge whichhas to be taken is that of theoffence under the Prevention ofCorruption Act etc… Eachdefalcation would constitute anindependent offence. Thus itcannot be said to be a case ofdouble jeopardy at all.”

Setting aside the HC order,the Bench noted that the samejudge took a different viewwhen it came to another fod-der scam accused RK Rana,against whom separate trials insix cases were allowed by rely-ing on various SC decisions.

His appeal was also dis-missed by the Supreme Court.The Bench said, “We are con-strained to observe that thesame learned Judge had takena different view in Dr RKRana’s case on the basis of samefacts, and same question of lawin the same cases. Judicial dis-cipline requires that such a bla-tant contradiction in such animportant matter should havebeen avoided.”

Urging courts to exerciseconsistency in passing orders ofa similar nature, the Bench heldthe HC judgment to be palpa-bly illegal and faulty. It said,“Judge has ignored large num-ber of binding decisions of thisCourt while giving impermis-sible benefit to the accused per-sons and delayed the case forseveral years. Interference hadbeen made at the advancedstage of the case which waswholly unwarranted anduncalled for…Such inconsis-tent decision-making ought tohave been avoided at all costsso as to ensure credibility of thesystem.” Although, Lalu’slawyers senior advocates RamJethmalani and Surendra Singhattacked the conduct of CBI inapproaching the apex courtafter a long and unexplaineddelay of over 157 and 222days, the Bench condoned thedelay, saying, “ The CBI hasfailed to live up to its reputa-tion. In the instant case, lethar-gy on its part is intolerable. Ifthe CBI fails to act timely, peo-ples’ faith will be shaken in itseffectiveness.”

The Court asked theDirector CBI to decide and fix

responsibility on the concernedofficer for causing delay anddirected the agency to follow itsManual and devise methodol-ogy to avoid delay. AlthoughSolicitor General Ranjit Kumarblamed the delay on bureau-cratic lethargy as files remainedpending for clearance, theBench expressed “surprise” onthe CBI’s handling of such a“sensitive” case.

It said, “The Director, CBIcannot escape the responsibil-ity for delay in such cases to betermed as deliberate one, whichis intolerable. Being the head ofthe institution it was theresponsibility of the Director,CBI to ensure that appealswere filed within limitation.”

I WASN’T...Hitting out at Mishra, who

submitted documents to theAnti-Corruption Branch(ACB) to back his claim thatKejriwal had delayed the probeinto a Rs 400 crore tankerscam, Singh said Mishra hadhimself written to a letter to theACB in September last year,saying that under pressure, theanti-graft body was trying toimplicate the Chief Minister inthe water tanker scam.

The AAP leaders alsoshowed a copy of the letterwritten by Mishra to the ACBin September 2016 saying theagency was trying to targetKejriwal in the alleged watertanker scam by coming “underpressure” from the Centre andeven when his name was notmentioned anywhere in theevidence. Singh accusedMishra of speaking the BJP’slanguage. “A game of exploita-tion is being played against theAAP. The BJP is hatching aconspiracy against the AAPthrough Mishra,” Singh said.

Singh claimed that Mishrawas stating what the BJP hadbeen repeatedly trying to allegein connection with the watertanker scam. “Mishra’s allega-tions are laughable. Why isn’the telling us the time and dateof visiting Kejriwal’s house? Heis implying that Kejriwal him-self invited him to be a witnessof him taking a bribe fromSatyendar Jain. He is alsoclaiming of an alleged landdeal, if so, why isn’t he reveal-ing it? I want to ask him ifKejriwal had called him upbefore accepting the ‘bribe’,” hesaid

Asserting that AAP cannever compromise with cor-ruption, Singh said, “The BJP

and the Congress are treatingMishra as Harishchandra...Heis the same person who hadcalled Modi an ‘ISI agent’.”

He said that there weremore serious issues like ter-rorism and the recent Sukmaattack on the Indian Army butinstead of resolving them theBJP was only “focusing oneradicating the AAP.”

METRO RIDES...The Delhi Metro’s fares

were last revised in November2009 when the minimum farewas revised to Rs 8 from Rs 6while the maximum fare to Rs30 from Rs 22. The DMRC hasreportedly suffered a net loss ofRs 708.5 crore in 2015-16.

The existing policy ofallowing a discount of 10 percent on smart cards use wouldbe continued. To avoid over-crowding during peak hours,passengers using the smartcard will get additional 10 percent discount during off-peakhours from Monday toSaturday. This means passen-gers may avail 20 per cent dis-count on the smart card whiletravelling during the off-peaktime. The value of tourist cardfor one day and three-dayvalidity shall be Rs 200 and Rs500 respectively including thesecurity deposit of Rs 50.According to officials, thepower bill accounts for almost40 per cent of the Metro oper-ating cost. Besides, Metro hasto pay installments of the Rs30,000-crore loan taken fromJapan InternationalCooperation Agency (JICA),the Japanese company whichfinanced the project, officialssaid.

Around 35 lakh Delhiitestake the Metro ride every dayto reach their destinations andthis figure is expected to touch50 lakh per day after comple-tion of the third phase of theMetro line. The third phase ofMetro projects has alreadymissed the deadline.

The Ministry of UrbanDevelopment had constitutedthe fourth fare fixation com-mittee headed by Justice(Retired) ML Mehta on May27, 2016. The committee sub-mitted its report in Septemberlast year. The committee mem-bers had also visited HongKong to study the formula ofHong Kong metro’s automaticfare adjustment mechanism.Officials in UrbanDevelopment Ministry say thatDelhi Metro had sought to

double the fares.

SBI MAKES...Encouraging women,

Kumar, however, said that the25 bps reduction is applicableto new women borrowers whoare salaried, while for the non-salaried women borrowers, thereduction is 20 bps. “Similarly,a male salaried borrower canget a new loan at 8.40 per cent,20 bps lower than the prevail-ing rate, and a non-salariedmale borrower can avail of aloan at 15 bps lower than thecurrent rate,” he added. Witharound 26 per cent marketshare, the largest lender is alsothe biggest player in the homeloan market, and even at theexisting 8.60 per cent it offersthe lowest rate as of now. Onthe other hand, second-largestprivate player HDFC offersloans at 8.65 per cent to womenfor loans up to Rs 75 lakh and8.7 per cent for others in thesame space, while the mini-mum rate being offered bylargest private lender ICICIBank. “The new offer may notpush up its market share sig-nificantly as 45 per cent of itsRs 2.23 trillion home loanbook, is already under the Rs30 lakh bracket and the rest ofthe credit industry is also veryaggressive,” Kumar said.

DEAL WAS FOR...He said the AAP was

involved in corruption whiledistributing tickets in Punjaband supplied liquor.

On Sunday, Mishra hadaccused Kejriwal of corruptionof Rs 2 crore from his confidantand Transport MinisterSatyender Jain. However, Jainrefuted the allegations.

Earlier, the ex-Minister wasquizzed by the Anti-Corruption Branch in thealleged tanker scam that datesback to Congress ChiefMinister Sheila Dikshit’s tenure.“I told the ACB officials howChief Minister Arvind Kejriwaldeliberately delayed the reportand how public money wasmisused. “

He tweeted, “Met ACBofficials and gave informationon “Role of Arvind Kejriwal Jiand two of his close associatesin Tanker Scam (sic)”. “Nextwill go to CBI to file a case onillegal cash deal.”

The tanker scam relates toalleged irregularities in thehiring of private tankers to sup-ply water.

Calling Jain Raja

Harishchander by giving cleanchits to yourself on his socialnetworking profile, Mishra said“let the issue be probed first.”

“So Satyendra Jain is givingclean chit to Arvind Kejriwal jiand Arvind Kejriwal ji givingclean chit to Satyendra Jain.Simply wow !!!,” Mishra latertweeted.

He also alleged AAP leaderSanjay Singh was involved inlobbying for overseas fundingof the party.

He also claimed that sincehe has made accusationsagainst Kejriwal, he has beenreceiving death threats fromthose who are close to the chiefminister. Slamming the CM,Mishra said Kejriwal does notwant to resign. “Kejriwal’sweakness is his chair. He doesnot want to leave his chair. Iwant to ask Kejriwal if he willresign the day when Jain is sentto jail in a corruption case,” hesaid. “There are four to fivepersons in the AAP’s PoliticalAffairs Committee (PAC) whoare indulging in corruption. Ihave got to know that PAC willthrow me out of the party inthe evening. I will not acceptthe decision of PAC whichtakes the same in a closedroom. The AAP is not the partyof four to five persons and it isthe people’s party and peoplewill decide who should remainin AAP,” Mishra said.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

PNS n NEW DELHI

Fresh twist has emerged in theSunanda Pushkar’s death

case which showed the deathscene might have been tamperedto mislead the investigation.

A private news channel onMonday aired tapes of a con-versation to claim thatSunanda’s body might havebeen moved from room num-ber 307 to 345 of Leela hotel.

It also tried to give theimpression that Sunanda’s hus-band and Congress leaderShashi Tharoor has tried tosuppress the truth about hiswife’s death.

Sunanda (51) was founddead in room of a five-star hotelLeela situated in south Delhi onthe night of January 17, 2014.Reacting to the expose, Tharoortermed the reports as “misrep-resentations and outright lies”.

“Exasperating farrago ofdistortions, misrepresentationsand outright lies being broad-cast by an unprincipled show-man masquerading as a jour-nalist,” Tharoor said in aFacebook post. “I am angeredthat someone would exploit ahuman tragedy for personalgain and TRPs. I challenge himto prove his false claims in acourt of law,” he said.

Kolkata: Giving a fresh twist tohis three and a half month stand-off with the Supreme Court,Calcutta High Court Justice CSKarnan on Monday “sentenced”Chief Justice of India JagdishSingh Khehar and seven otherapex court judges to five year rig-orous imprisonment.

Justice Karnan, who is fac-ing contempt charges fordegrading the judiciary andmaking allegations of corrup-tion against several SupremeCourt judges, held the eightjudges guilty of harassing a“Dalit Judge” (Justice Karnan),with a “common intention”.

The 12-page “order” said theaccused have “committed” anoffence “punishable under theSC/ST Atrocities Act of 1989 andamended Act of 2015”.

However, the SupremeCourt has already restrainedJustice Karnan from discharg-

ing any judicial and adminis-trative functions and directedall authorities and tribunals notto take cognisance of any “pur-ported” order passed by him. The other judges named inthe “order” are Justice DipakMisra, Justice J Chelameswar,Justice Ranjan Gogoi, JusticeMadan B Lokur, Justice PinakiChandra Ghose, Justice KurianJoseph and Justice R Banumathi.

Now Justice Karnan ‘sentences’ CJI, 7 SC judges to 5-year jail

Fresh twistemerges inSunanda’smurder case

While seven of the judgeswere members of the benchthat initiated suo motu con-tempt proceedings againstJustice Karnan, JusticeBanumathi along with theChief Justice Khehar hadrestrained him from discharg-ing any judicial and adminis-trative functions. IANS

Exasperating farrago

of distortions,

misrepresentations

and outright lies

being broadcast by

an unprincipled

showman

masquerading as a

journalist

— SHASHI THAROOR

Some weeks ago, ChiefJustice of India JS Kheharurged all parties to theAyodhya dispute to worktowards an amicable settle-

ment and even offered his goodoffices to moderate an out-of-courtsettlement. Describing the issue asa matter that concerned “senti-ments and religion”, the ChiefJustice asked all parties to “give abit, take a bit… make an effort tosort it out”. In his view the courtshould come into the picture onlyif such a settlement is not possible.

Given the sensitivity of theissue, it would indeed be ideal forall parties to move away from thecourt room and resolve the issueamicably via negotiations as sug-gested by the Chief Justice.However, many things have hap-pened both within and outside thecourts during the life of this longand seemingly intractable dispute,which are indeed non-negotiable.One such is the sovereign commit-ment made by the Government ofIndia in the Supreme Court inSeptember 1994, that if it wasestablished that a Hindu temple orreligious structure existed beforethe Babri Masjid, it would handover the site to the Hindus.

A five-judge Bench of theSupreme Court delivered its judge-ment in the Faruqui case (MIsmail Faruqui and Others VsUnion of India and Others) inOctober 1994. While doing so, itsimultaneously disposed off thePresidential Reference that hadbeen made the previous yearunder Article 143(1) of theConstitution. In that reference thePresident asked the court the fol-lowing question: “Whether aHindu temple or any Hindu reli-gious structure existed prior to theconstruction of the RamJanmabhoomi-Babri Masjid(including the premises of theinner and outer courtyards ofsuch structure) in the area onwhich the structure stood?” Thecourt declined to answer thisquestion. It said the questionposed by the President was “super-fluous and unnecessary and doesnot require to be answered”.

In the Faruqui case, the con-stitutional validity of Acquisitionof Certain Areas at Ayodhya Act,1993, was challenged. The courtupheld the Act but declaredSection 4(3) of the Act, which pro-vided for abatement of all pendingsuits and legal proceedings pertain-ing to the disputed structure, to beinvalid. This resulted in the revivalof all pending suits and legal pro-ceedings before the AllahabadHigh Court.

The Presidential Referencesaid a dispute has arisen whethera Hindu temple or a Hindu reli-gious structure existed prior toconstruction of the masjid and thatthe Government proposed to set-tle the said dispute “after obtain-ing the opinion of the SupremeCourt of India”. Those represent-ing Muslim interests said the ref-erence was purely academic andserved no constitutional purpose.

The Supreme Court asked theSolicitor General to respond tothese arguments. The SolicitorGeneral made a written state-ment on behalf of the Governmentof India on September 14, 1994, inresponse to the court’s query. Hespoke of the significance of thePresidential Reference and saidthat the Government would treatthe court’s opinion on the questionof fact raised in the reference as“final and binding”. Further, theGovernment was confident thatthe opinion of the Supreme Court“will have a salutary effect on theattitudes of the communities andthey will no longer take conflict-ing positions on the factual issuesettled by the Supreme Court”.

More significantly, the Solicitor

General told the court that ifefforts at a negotiated settlement donot succeed, the Government wascommitted to enforce the solutionin the light of the Supreme Court’sopinion and consistent with it. TheGovernment’s action in this regardwill be even handed in respect ofboth communities. “If the questionreferred is answered in the affirma-tive, namely, that a Hindutemple/structure did exist prior tothe construction of the demolishedstructure, Government action willbe in support of the wishes of theHindu community.

If, on the other hand, thequestion is answered in the neg-ative, namely, that no such Hindutemple/structure existed at the rel-evant time, then Governmentaction will be in support of thewishes of the MuslimCommunity.” The SolicitorGeneral’s statement formed a partof the record and was taken intoaccount by the court.

The Narasimha RaoGovernment gave this commit-ment because Muslim leadershad told the Government thatthey would voluntarily hand overthe site to the Hindus if the exis-

tence of a temple below the Babristructure was established. TheWhite Paper put out by the RaoGovernment after the demolitionof the masjid had incorporatedthis fact. Since everything seemedto revolve around the answer tothis question, this became the cen-tral issue in the negotiationsbetween the Vishwa HinduParishad and the All India BabriMasjid Action Committee. TheGovernment felt that everythingwould fall in place, once this piv-otal question was answered.Hence the Presidential Reference.

However, while the SupremeCourt declined to answer thequestion, the Allahabad HighCourt ordered the ArchaeologicalSurvey of India (ASI) to excavatethe site and tell the court whethera Hindu temple or religious struc-ture existed below the destroyedmasjid. The ASI conducted exten-sive archaeological investigationsat the site and submitted a compre-hensive report to the AllahabadHigh Court. It said: “Viewing intotality and taking into account thearchaeological evidence of a mas-sive structure just below the disput-ed structure and evidence of con-tinuity in structural phases fromthe tenth century onwards up tothe construction of the disputedstructure along with the yield ofstone and decorated bricks as wellas mutilated sculpture of divinecouple… are indicative of theremains which are distinctive fea-tures found associated with thetemples of North India.”

In other words, the ASI’s exca-vations and findings have conclu-sively answered the question raisedin the Presidential Reference.Further, following this overwhelm-ing evidence, all the three judgeson the Lucknow Bench of theAllahabad High Court whichheard the Ayodhya case, relied onthe ASI’s report and concluded thata Hindu temple existed below thedisputed structure.

The Government’s solemnassurance before the SupremeCourt, the overwhelming archae-ological and scientific evidencepresented before the AllahabadHigh Court on the existence of atemple below the disputed struc-ture and the opinion of all the threejudges of that court are all factswhich just cannot be wished away.They will have to be central to aneventual settlement, but as ChiefJustice of India JS Kehar has sug-gested, a negotiated out-of-courtsettlement will be ideal.

(The writer is Chairman,Prasar Bharati. Views expressedhere are personal)T

he Supreme Court on Monday dashed the hopes of Lalu Prasad when it ruledthat the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leader would stand separate trials in fourcases relating to the fodder scam. With this, Lalu Prasad's short period of

relief — less than three years — comes to an end. The Jharkhand High Courthad in 2014 ruled that no conspiracy charges were made out against the RJDsupremo who has already been convicted in one related case, debarred fromcontesting elections, and is out on bail. With the apex court setting aside theHigh Court order, troubles for Lalu Prasad are bound to multiply in the comingmonths, since the Supreme Court has directed the trial court to complete its pro-ceedings in the next nine months. A separate trial for each of the offences effec-tively means that the RJD leader has no respite even if he, for argument's sake,secures relief in one of the cases; the other three will linger to haunt him. Butthe more worrying factor for him is that the CBI will not be any longer able todrag its feet and strengthen its arguments more for the sake of formality thanwith the belief that it needs to nail the accused. The apex court has pulled up

the CBI for showing laxity in challeng-ing the High Court's verdict, observ-ing that it ought to have deputed a per-son specifically for the issue. It's truethat the CBI, for whatever reason, hadshown less enthusiasm than neededin bringing Lalu Prasad to justice.There is no reason for it to cling onto its old ways.

The Supreme Court's order comesat a most inopportune time for theRJD leader. He is already on the back-foot as a result of the public exposureof his taped conversation with Biharconvict and Siwan strongman,Mohammad Shahabuddin. If the audiotapes are to be believed, the two wereheard discussing governance matters,with Lalu Prasad acceding to the con-vict's demands. Equally shocking is

that Shahabuddin was calling from jail (how did he get access to a phone?) andthat Lalu Prasad had no hesitation in entertaining his call during which, amongother things, the shifting of a Superintendent of Police was discussed. Lalu Prasad'slinks with the muscleman-politician are old and have been a matter of publicknowledge. But the audio tapes revealed the RJD leader was functioning overthe head of the State's Chief Minister who apparently had not been in the know.The twin developments — the apex court's directive for the conduct of sepa-rate trials and the secret tapes — are bound to impact the coalition regime inBihar, in which the RJD and Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal (United)are partners. Will these strengthen Nitish Kumar's hands vis-à-vis Lalu Prasad?Will the unease that already exists between the two partners now magnify andlead to a political realignment? These are early days for an answer. What is cer-tain is that Lalu Prasad cannot breathe easy. His legal battle has just got morecomplicated and his prospects of contesting polls are as dim as before.

Reeling from the Brexit shocker and US President Donald Trump's aggres-sion, the European Union (EU) has reason to cheer with the election of mid-dle-of-path Emmanuel Macron as the new French President. The EU was

terrified over the prospect of far-right Marine Le Pen winning the presidentialcontest and succeeding François Hollande. Le Pen's strong views on globalisa-tion, cross-border trade, immigration etc are well known, and the EU memberssaw them as damaging to the prospect of the Union's unity. On the other hand,Macron had been an international banker, a champion of the free market —although some suspect him of Left-leanings, which is not accurate since he isa favourite whipping of the Left too — and a strong votary of the EU. He hadserved as the Economy Minister in Hollande's Cabinet and is generally well-regard-ed, if considered somewhat dull. Throughout his campaign, his supporters wavedthe French as well the EU flags, and this pleased the EU members no end. It'sthus not surprising that there has been gushing praise from the West over theFrench electorate's choice. It must be admitted that Macron is the right personto continue with France strong ties with the EU and that Le Pen's arrival wouldhave led to disruption — even if for a while and not to the alarmist extent it had

been generally projected. The electionresult indicates that the people inFrance are not prepared as yet to takea chance with Le Pen's belligerentdomestic and international politics,although many may have been sym-pathetic to the larger issues she hasraised. Le Pen has had considerablesupport among the working class andshe has over the years worked on theirsocio-economic disenchantment.Added to this was her trenchantnationalism, which too appealed tosections of the populace. Put togeth-er, these, however, failed to give hervictory. To an extent, Macron's some-what diluted position on the way todeal with the EU and internal securi-ty implications, helped; he hadexpressed a demand that the European

Union deploy some 5,000 European border guards on the bloc's passport-freetravel zones.

Le Pen's loss — and the earlier defeat of Austria's leader Norbert Hofer, whowas widely expected to win — does not mean the end of the far-Right's dreamof electoral successes this year. The Netherlands has a strong leader of this polit-ical thought waiting to spread his wings, Geert Wilders. It’s possible that he mayachieve what other far-Right leaders elsewhere in Europe could not. Then thereis the looming figure of Nigel Paul Farage in the UK (he believes Le Pen’s momentis only a few years away). In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel is having sleep-less nights because of rising pressure from the Right parties and their leaders.Therefore, there is no running away from the rise of the far-Right anymore. TheRightists (not to be confused with the kind in the Indian context) in Europe arenot going to fade away; in fact, they believe they have only now begun cominginto their own. Centrist and Left-leaning leaders in Europe cannot take thingsfor granted as before. One mistake from them, and the Le Pens and the Hoferswill bounce right back. It's both a challenge and an opportunity.

French prefer a Centrist

Macron and not Le Pen, at least not for now

opinion 08LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9, 2017

Archaeology holds keyto Ayodhya resolutionThe ASI's excavations and findings have conclusively answered the question raised in the PresidentialReference. The Allahabad High Court relied on the report and concluded that a Hindu temple existed

Harrowing times for Lalu

RJD supremo caught in tape, fodder shockers

Limited glory

Sir — Dravida MunnetraKazhagam (DMK) president MKarunanidhi definitely needs tobe celebrated for his gloriousfeats not only in Tamil Nadu butalso in Indian politics. That he hasnot lost any of the Assemblyelections contested by him is def-initely a great record and anadditional feather in his alreadydecorated cap.

Moreover, the unmatched wis-dom and intelligence he possess-es, combined with his unparalleledadministrative acumen, has madehim become a statesman par excel-lence. Further, he is known for hisfriendship with all tall leaders ofthe country, irrespective of theirpolitical affiliations. The onlyexception was J Jayalalithaa.

This being the case, it is unfor-tunate that the DMK is invitingonly the Opposition leaders, par-ticularly those who are opposed tothe BJP for the diamond jubileecelebrations of this doyen’s entryinto the Assembly slated for June3 which synchronizes with his 94thbirth day. The party is thus deny-ing a grander and much betteraccolade which the DMK patriarchrichly deserves.

Shalini GeraldChennai

Delayed execution

Sir — This refers to the editori-al, “ Bold, welcome verdict” (May6). Indeed, the apex court hasgiven a historic verdict. TheNirbhaya episode was one of therarest, which saw the entire coun-try united. Off course, Nirbhaya’sparents can now take a sigh ofrelief after the apex court’s judge-ment. Their five year ordeal willcome to an end.

Most importantly, this judge-ment will set the right example andrepose people’s faith in the judicia-ry. Though the juvenile, who wasequally involved in this rape case,got away with minimal punish-ment, but it is commendable thatthis case forced our Governmentto amend the juvenile justice Bill.This will now ensure that juveniles,who are involved in heinous crimelike these, get similar punishmentas that of adults.

It is also time that the`1,000-crore Nirbhaya fund isutilised effectively for the better-ment of safety of women in oursociety. There is a lot that needsto be done still. But one thing wemust not forget is the fact thatthis execution will not takeplace immediately.

Bal Govind Noida

Harsh punishment

Sir — This refers to the editorial,“ Bold, welcome verdict” (May 6).That Nirbhaya’s case was ‘rarest ofrare’ was once again made clear bythe lurid details of the crimerestated by the apex court. Still,there must be some space for adifferent point of view on punish-ment. To say that life sentencecould have met the end of justiceis not to downplay the horror ofthe crime. There is little evidencethat death penalty deters any bet-ter than life sentence.

The opposition to capitalpunishment comes from strongmoral convictions. The aboli-tionist cause is premised on thebelief in the intrinsic worth ofhuman life. Civilization dictatesthat justice must be tempered withmercy. It must be reformative andnot retributive.Taking life by any-one, even by the state is bereft ofhumanity. The existence of thedeath penalty on the statute bookshows our place in the civilisationladder. It is time the gallows wasshifted from prison premises tothe museum, its rightful place.

G David MiltonMaruthancode

www.dailypioneer.com

p a p e r w i t h p a s s i o n

A SURYA PRAKASH

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Victory of French

President-elect

Macron is a symbol-

ic victory against

protectionist moves

and is a vote of con-

fidence in EU.

Japanese PM

—Shinzo Abe

I am sure that attempts to

stall development and

throttle democracy at

gunpoint (by Maoists) will

not succeed.

Union Minister

—Rajnath Singh

Criminal elements in

saffron brigades are

targeting poor

Hindus in the name

of cow protection in

Uttar Pradesh, now

ruled by BJP.

BSP leader

—Mayawati

GIVEN THESENSITIVITY OF THEAYODHYA ISSUE, ITWOULD BE IDEAL

FOR ALL PARTIES TOMOVE AWAY FROMTHE COURT ROOMAND RESOLVE THE

ISSUE AMICABLY VIA

NEGOTIATIONS ASSUGGESTED BY THE

CHIEF JUSTICE OF INDIA

SOUNDBITE

Kapil’s exposé, a blow to

Kejriwal’s moral image

This refers the report, “Kapil Mishra drops a bombshell” (May 8). This lat-est episode marks the lowest point in Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal'spolitical career; he came into prominence during Anna Hazare's anti-cor-

ruption campaign. Delhi voters must be deeply regretting their overwhelmingsupport to a former Indian Revenue Service officer who had formed a newpolitical outfit, promising moon if his party was voted to power.

After an outstanding result in the 2015 Assembly poll, Kejriwal started day-dreaming. The Chief Minister's office in a Union Territory appeared too small;he eyed Prime Minister Narendra Modi's seat. Neglecting Delhi, he foughtAssembly elections in Punjab and Goa. Unfortunately, he lost badly. His nexttarget is Gujarat and other States where polls were due. It is not clear whetherKejriwal has learnt right lessons and decided to concentrate on Delhi to pro-vide model governance before trying elsewhere. Kapil Mishra's revelation hasdealt a death blow to Kejriwal's image as a moral, corruption-free leader.

M RatanVia email

Send your feedback to: [email protected]

ABHIJITBHATTACHARYYA

GWYNNE DYER

Apart from US PresidentDonald Trump’s needfor a dramatic foreign

policy initiative, is there anygood reason why we are hav-ing a crisis over North Korea’snuclear weapons testing now?

If the Pyongyang regime isreally planning an under-ground nuclear test soon, asWashington alleges, it will bethe sixth bomb test it has car-ried out, not the first. Thathardly qualifies as a new devel-opment that requires urgentaction. The same goes for itsballistic missile tests, whichhave been ongoing for manyyears. Nothing new is going onin North Korea.

In South Korea, on theother hand, things may beabout to change a lot. The can-didate predicted to win thepresidency in today’s election,Moon Jae-in, favours a muchsofter policy towards NorthKorea. He has even promised

to re-open industrial andtourist projects in North thatwere financed by South Koreaunder the last Democratic(centre-Left) Government.

A decade ago, whenMoon’s Democratic Party wasstill in power in Seoul, he waschief of staff to President RohMoo-hyun and the so-calledSunshine Policy of reconcilia-tion with North Korea was theorder of the day. The goal wasto create commercial, financialand personal ties between thetwo Koreas, and to that endSouth Korea sent aid andinvestment to the North.

It’s impossible to saywhether that would eventual-ly have led to a less tense andmilitarised situation in theKorean peninsula, because inthe 2008 election the conserv-atives won and scrapped theSunshine Policy. The past nineyears under Right-wingGovernments have seen North-

South relations re-frozen andthe investments in North Koreaclosed down by Seoul.

In this week’s election,however, Moon Jae-in is far inthe lead, with the EurasiaGroup, the world’s largest polit-ical risk consultancy, givinghim an 80 per cent chance ofwinning the presidency. If hewins, he says he will reopeneconomic ties with NorthKorea in a policy his adviserscall Sunshine 2.0.

This runs directly con-trary to Trump’s policy of tight-ening economic sanctionsagainst the North and eventhreatening military action toforce Pyongyang to abandon itsnuclear weapons programme.So the question is: Has theTrump Administration pusheda military confrontation withNorth Korea to the top of itsforeign policy agenda in orderto pre-empt Moon Jae-in’s newSunshine policy?

Given the chaos that reignsin the Trump White House,this may not be the case. Itcould just be that Trump ismaking policy on the fly, andthat he neither knows norcares about the domestic pol-itics of South Korea. But somerecent US actions point to adeliberate attempt to get theconfrontation going beforeMoon takes office.

One clue could be the sud-den rush to deploy theTerminal High Altitude AreaDefense (THAAD) system inSouth Korea before the elec-tion. It’s a system designed tointercept short-and medium-range ballistic missiles of thesort that North Korea mightuse to deliver nuclear weaponson South Korea (and maybeJapan) if it ever managed tomake its nuclear weapons smallenough to fit on them.

A reasonable precaution,perhaps — but THAAD was

originally scheduled to beinstalled in South Koreabetween August and Octoberof this year. Then suddenly itarrived in the country inMarch, and was “operational”(at least in theory) by lastmonth. Moon will now havegreat difficulty in reversingthat decision, assuming that hebecomes President, and theNorth Koreans are predictablywaxing hysterical about it.

On the other hand, Trumpshocked the South Koreans byannouncing at the end of Aprilthat South Korea would have topay one billion dollar for theTHAAD system, despite an exist-ing agreement that the US wouldbear the cost. He also declaredthat he was going to renegotiatethe existing free trade agreementbetween the two countries.Which suggests that there is noclever plan, just the usual stum-bling around in the dark.

Whether the US is deliber-

ately manipulating events ornot, Moon Jae-in will be in adifficult situation if he becomesPresident. He quite rightlybelieves that there is no needfor a crisis this year to resolvea problem that has been sim-mering away (but never boilingover) for at least fifteen years,but unless he goes along withit he will find himself in a con-frontation with Donald Trump.

Could Moon win that kindof confrontation? He could if hehas strong support at home, andhis party already controls theSouth Korean Parliament. Publicopinion is harder to gauge, withthe electorate generally dividedmore or less evenly between ahard and a soft approach toNorth Korea. But they all agreethat they don’t want a war inwhich they would be the prima-ry victims, and Trump’s style canbe quite frightening.

(The writer is an independent journalist)

Whether the US is deliberately manipulating events in Korea or not, Moon Jae-in will be in a difficult situation if hebecomes President. Public opinion is divided. But all agree that they don’t want a war in which they would be the victims

More power to the judiciary

3rdeye 09LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9, 2017

I have told the Anti-Corruption Branch how Chief

Minister Arvind Kejriwal delayed probe into the

tanker scam and misused public money.

—Sacked AAP Minister

KAPIL MISHRA

Mishra is making baseless allegations

against the Chief Minister out of desperation

after being expelled.

—AAP leader

SANJAY SINGH

From the sector

of education to

civil services,

every fraternity

sees the

judiciary of

India with

revered eyes.

But the judiciary

needs to buckle

up and take

charge as the

frontrunner of

the system, as

it seems the

fault lines in

some strata are

far too deep to

resolve by

themselves

POINTCOUNTERPOINT

Unprecedented! Shocking!Amazing! Extraordinary!Dance of democracy!Fundamental right!Expression of thought,

belief, ideas and views”! Whateversemantics one may wish to use, itremains undefined, incomprehensible,incomplete, bizarre. Suffice it to statethat for the first time in independentIndia, an avoidable news on higher judi-ciary is hitting headlines for all wrongreasons. It is ‘judge versus judges’; a per-ceived tussle between single Benchand Division Bench. Almost daily?

In fact, after having registered as anAdvocate in the Supreme Court and theDelhi High Court, at the age of 63 plus,five years ago, and having appeared sev-eral times before both the Bench of thecourts, one is distraught, dismayed, dis-tressed. Seeing the most unheard of andunimaginable scenario of ‘My Lordversus My Lord’, notwithstanding theabsence of any litigant. There is no vakil(counsel) or vakalatnama. No vakil tofight for his ‘brief ’ against his ‘opponent’vakil. In the eyes of a common man,there are only dramatic personae, withor without petition, in the high templeof justice; hailing from two cities; fromcapital of the country and the capital ofa Province.

Frankly speaking, one had neverseen before in one’s two previous profes-sion such intense, pronounced andtransparent public difference of opinion,either as a college lecturer or as a civil ser-vant — leading to such ‘situation’. Somuch so that the entire legal fraternityappears confused and ‘dumb-ed’ intostunning silence. There are only whispersand wild rumours which are floating.

Of course, there could be ‘issues’, asone had seen ‘issues’ in the past too. Also,what stands out stark even today is thedeeply embedded fault lines and ‘deepdivide’ in the psyche and physical struc-ture of the civil service. Yet, both sectors(education and civil service) alwaysregarded the higher judiciary with awe,respect and deep reverence. They still do.And that makes one more fearful.

In fact, this fear emanates from thefact that the bureaucracy, which standsway below in the pecking order of pro-tocol of state hierarchy vis-à-vis higherjudiciary, has two distinct class/catego-ry. The ‘privileged’ and the ‘underpriv-ileged or non-privileged’. The ‘privileged’consists of one and only ‘superior’ ser-vice. The ‘underprivileged’ consists of atleast 15 ‘inferior’ services, constitutingthe majority. And the tussle for pay, pro-motion, prospect, perks, privileges,power, position and posting between the‘minority privileged’ and the (vast)‘majority underprivileged’ is a routineaffair which continues to eternity.

Governments have come and gone;but this single and focussed rivalry, jeal-ousy and undercutting exists in “as iswhere is basis”. And for all this, the high-est temple of justice has been the ulti-mate doctor and arbiter for ameliora-tion of grievances of the people of India.

Yet, petition, submission, hearing,natural justice, cause of action and anyamount of litigation or ‘out-of-court set-tlement’ continue unabated. The ‘greatdivide’ of bureaucracy could neither be

abolished nor reduced. Not as yet. Why?Because, the Indian bureaucracy tendsto be ‘power without responsibility’ inparticular segment and exactly theopposite, ‘responsibility without powerand punishment of possibility’, in anoth-er sector to this day.

Successive Pay Commissions, con-stituted to look into the over all scenario,ended up with sectarian verdict. Askedto comment whether ‘justice, fair play,equity’ have been done or not, ‘what isthat? How dare you?’ is likely to be theanswer; followed by a stern ‘cold’ glancewith contemptuous glare.

Things are not confined to civil ser-vices only. Even the ‘uniformed bureau-cracy’ feels and had felt aggrieved. On‘parity’ and ‘position’, under the sun ofthe state, murmur is audible.Resentment is visible. Issues are action-able. Higher judiciary is the hope. Butthe judiciary itself is in turmoil.

Who then will plead in ‘open housejudge versus judges?’ None. None as yet.The Constitution does not have any pro-vision pertaining to conflict resolutionbetween sitting judges of two courts of thehigher judiciary. Obviously, theConstituent Assembly, which sat fromDecember 1946 to November 1949, tomake the Constitution, could not have hadvisualised a ‘judge versus judges’ situation.

Thus, while Article 124 of theConstitution stipulated ‘establishment

and constitution of the Supreme Court’and vide Article 217 “appointment andconditions of the office of a judge of aHigh Court”, and empowered theParliament to “prescribe” the “numberof judges” and that “every Judge of theSupreme Court shall be appointed by thePresident by warrant under his hand andseal”, today, the situation, in light of,‘Supreme Court Advocates-on-RecordAssociation vs Union of India (2015) 6SCC 408’, is different. It is now the ‘col-legium’ which plays the seminal role per-taining to appointment of judges in theapex court, thereby multiplying theresponsibility and importance of its pro-fessional jurisdiction manifold.

In the midst of all this, however, ajudge of the Supreme Court cannot be“removed from his office except by anorder by the President after”... followingdue procedure “by each House ofParliament” vide Article 124(4) of theConstitution. In case of the removal ofHigh Court judge too, Article 124 (4) isapplicable. In short, therefore, whereasappointment of judges of higher judicia-ry is comparatively simple removal pro-cedure is far from easy.

In the light of this complicated sce-nario, what is the future outcome of thepresent ‘single Bench High Court judgeversus Division Bench Supreme Courtjudges?’ (Supreme Court does nothave the concept of single Bench as its

minimum composition stands at two-man Bench). To this author’s view, it isthe judiciary and the judiciary alonewhich can untie the knots vide SupremeCourt decision Minerva Mills LimitedvsUnion of India — “Judiciary is theinterpreter of the Constitution and tothe judiciary is assigned the delicatetask to determine what is the powerconferred on each branch of theGovernment...” Indeed, the judgementgives apex court the power.Nevertheless, today it is also time toemulate the doctrine of ‘harmoniousconstruction’ vide ‘VenkataramanaDevaru v. The State of Mysore, AIR 1958SC 255’ and other linked cases.

There is a striking similaritybetween the apex judiciary of India andthe British Parliament. Thus, even if awrong law is legislated, or error commit-ted by the British Parliament, no courtcan rectify the mistake as the BritishParliament itself, being supreme, canright the wrong. In India too, if anywrong has been committed by the apexcourt, the same top court only can makecourse correction. Is it not time to do so?Should not collective effort be made torestore self-respect, honour, credibilityand image of and above all, public con-fidence on the higher judiciary of India?

(The writer is a practising advocate atthe Delhi High Court and the SupremeCourt. Views are personal)

The Korean crisis: Why now? thinknowN

obody can say anything about

you. Whatsoever people say

is about themselves. But you

become very shaky, because you

are still clinging to a false centre.

That centre depends on others, so

you are always looking to what

people are saying about you. And

you are always following other

people, you are always trying to

satisfy them. You are always

trying to be respectable, you are

always trying to decorate your

ego. This is suicidal. Rather than

being disturbed by what others

say, you should start looking

inside yourself.

—Osho Rajneesh

Spiritual guru

Solar energy holds a

bright future in India

India is blessed with plenty of natural resources and isalso close to the equator. It must make efforts to tapthe sunlight and lead its people out of darkness

Like in British Parliament, in India too, if any wrong has been committed by the top court, the same court must course-correct. Is it nottime to do so? Should not collective efforts be made to restore the credibility and image of public confidence in the higher judiciary?MUDIT GARG

FIRSTCOLUMN

In India, nearly about 300 million people; 24 per cent of the totalpopulation are deprived of electricity and are compelled to livein the dark. Also, the per capita consumption is only 1,070 kWh

as against the global average of 3,026 kWh. Besides, coal-basedthermal power is the prime source of electricity in India, despitegruesome environmental problems. To address both these issues— power shortage and pollution — solar energy seems to be thesimplest solution foe both Governments and industries. PrimeMinister Narendra Modi’s International Solar Alliance (ISA) is a sig-nificant move in this direction that is also backed by World Bank'sone trillion dollar investment. The institution is also providing onebillion dollar to expand India's solar power capacity.

Curtailing cost: One of the latest studies by researchers fromthe Oxford University claimed that by 2027, the global share of solarenergy will reach up to 20 per cent; almost eight times higher thanits existing share, which is only 1.5 per cent. Improvements in tech-nology, gradual reduction in the manufacturing cost, and the grow-ing market of solar rooftops are the most favourable factors for thischanging scenario. Also, enhanced life of photovoltaic (PV) cells,along with unprecedented developments in turbine-based powerproduction have made it affordable not only for businesses but alsofor housing societies. To extend India's cumulative capacity from9.0GW to 100GW by 2022, there is an urgent need for strong col-laborations between Government and private enterprises. Alike roadand transport sector, formulation of Public Private Partnership mod-els can prove to be a strategic push to promote renewable and envi-ronment-friendly solar energy.

The challenges: Consistent power supply demands better stor-age which means an efficient loop of grids. But due to large-scaleurbanisation, availability of land in open environment is a costly affairfor private players. On the other hand, due to a small consumer base,the capacity factor of solar panels is quite low in comparison to con-ventional power stations. The same factor affects its transmissioncost which is still dearer than thermal power transmission. Little aware-ness of the benefits of solar energy among the masses is anotherconstraint in its growth and Small and Medium Enterprises with lowadvertising budgets cannot attain success in this direction.

Road to reform: To save the environment and to make electric-ity available even in the remotest areas of rural India, the Union aswell as State Governments should take adequate measures to pro-mote solar power. But the highly price sensitive customer of Indiawould not switch to solar power until and unless they receive it unin-terruptedly at a cheaper price. Therefore, simplification of regulato-ry norms and provision of financial incentives, such as tax exemp-tion would be a great initiative by the Government, if the decision-makers consider it for long-term prospects. Because such incentiveswill help private companies to reduce costs and increase productioncapacities. Notwithstanding, identifying the economically viable pro-jects to serve the priority customers should be the foremost task ofsolar companies before entering into a particular market/geography.In addition to these structural developments, emphasis should alsobe given to intensify operational machinery. Hence, solar companiesmust take immediate action in the adoption of latest technology tooptimise output of batteries, energy-storage integrators, rooftop pan-els, and solar grids.

India is blessed with an infinite number of natural resources andproximity to equator helps brighten its vast pieces of lands with sun-light. When almost one-fourth of the nation is stricken with darkness;a darkness that is responsible for the gloomy fate of people and busi-nesses in those regions, India should make substantial efforts to tapthat sunlight. The task is challenging, yet achievable and ifGovernments, solar companies, and technology firms cooperate witheach other, then in the next 15 to 20 years, solar power will emergeas the fuel of India's socio-economic development. But, for long-termsustainability of the sector, industrialists, policymakers, and researchorganisations should devise instruments to bring down the cost andmarket price of the solar power all across the country. On a brighternote, it wouldn't be wrong to say that clean, renewable, and sustain-able solar power is the future of ‘Incredible India’.

(The writer is director, operations of Vivaan Solar)

LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9, 2017 money 10

But once the health of the banksthemselves improve, we havealso announced that thegovernment will be willing tobring down its own equity in thebanks to 52 per cent and thatcan be used for banks’recapitalization

FINANCE MINISTER ARUN JAITLEY

We will get more opportunitiesbecause as the volumes increase

we have to look for newsegments and new products. So

maybe we may work onsomething in future

MSI EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR,

ENGINEERING, CV RAMANGOVT & CORP

FROM

BUZZ

{usp}

The Railway Minister, Suresh Prabhakar Prabhu on Monday laid the foundation stone for construction of a 26-km-long new broad gauge railway line from

Mukongselek in Assam to Pasighat in Arunachal Pradesh and announced commencement of surveys for 7 new broad gauge railway lines in Arunachal

Pradesh. He also flagged off a new Shatabdi Express (No. 12088/12087) between Naharlagun and Guwahati. Although the Minister was originally

scheduled to visit Naharlagun and address a public meeting there, he had to cancel his visit due to unforeseen circumstances and addressed the gathering

at Naharlagun through video link from NF Railway headquarters at Maligaon this morning. Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh Pema Khandu, Railway

Minister of State Rajen Gohain, Minister of State for Home Affairs, Kiren Rijiju were among the dignitaries present at Naharlagun railway station.

Union Minister of State (I/C) for Power, Coal and New Renewable Energy, Piyush Goyal releasing the ‘5th Annual Integrated Rating of State

Power Distribution Utilities’ for the FY’2015-16 in the presence of (L to R) Arun Kumar, Secretary (Mines), Dr AK Verma, Jt Secretary (Power),

Pradeep Kumar Pujari, Secretary (Power), Rajeev Kapoor, Secretary (MNRE), Rajeev Sharma, CMD, PFC and Dr PV Ramesh, CMD, REC.

NETRA INSTALLS INDIA’S HIGHEST TEMPERATURE DROP TUBE REACTOR ANDPHOTOGRAMMETRY SYSTEM OF SOLAR THERMAL LAB NETRA (NTPC Energy Technology Research Alliance) has installed India’s first of its kind, indigenously developed, high

temperature (designed for 1500 Deg C) Drop Tube Reactor (DTR) system recently. The DTR system is used for combustion

characterisation of coal/biomass and is used for designing Advanced Ultra Super critical Technology and reducing carbon

footprint from the fossil fuel plants. Photogrammetry System of Solar Thermal Lab has also been installed and commissioned

by DLR, Germany at NETRA under Indo-German R&D cooperation with the

German grant. System installed for the first time in the country to measure 3D

spatial coordinates of ‘point cloud’ of solar concentrators and help in

understanding its integrity. NTPC is fully aligned to the needs of adapting to

emerging technologies and upgrading the technologies through research and

development as a leading player in the World Energy Sector. It is particularly

sensitive to Research & Development and the paradigm shift which it can make.

NETRA set up in 2009 is the outcome of this vision. Climate change, waste

management, carbon capture and utilisation, new & renewable energy, efficiency

improvement and cost reduction are core areas of research at NETRA. It is also

providing scientific support to NTPC and other power utilities for improving availability, reliability and efficiency.

SAIL ARCHERY CADETS TO REPRESENT INDIA IN INTERNATIONAL MEETTwo cadets of SAIL Eklavya Archery Academy, Indrachand Swami and

Nomula Lavanya have been selected to represent India in the

International Archery Championship. After a tough competition

among 39 well-seeded archers from all over the country Indrachand

wrests the 3rd position and has been selected for the 4-member men

team in Modern Recurve category. The team will represent India in

the World Cup Stage-1, World Cup Stage-2 Archery Championship

going to held at Shanghai [China] from May 16-21 and Antalya

[Turkey] from June 6-11 this year respectively. In Modern Recurve

category for women, N Lavanya has been selected for the women

team to represent country in the World Cup stage-3 to be held at Salt

Lake City [USA] from June 20-25 this year. The selection competition

was tough as country’s 21 top ranking cadets were in fray. Both the cadets have been worked out on the basis of their

commendable performance in Selection Trial held at New Delhi during April 15-17. Along with Indrachand and Lavanya, two

more archers, Snehal Divaker and Kamal Kishore of SAIL Archery Academy took part in the selection trial. In 2016 Indrachand

won Gold Medal in ASIA Cup Stage -1 and Bronze Medal in Asia Cup Stage -2. N Lavanya also participated in World Cup Stage-

1 in March 2015. Their coach Rajendra Guiya and Kalapna Guiya toiled hard to hone their skill to the highest level.

The Governor of Meghalaya, Banwarilal Purohit visited the Assam Rifles Headquarters at Laitkor, Shillong on the last Sunday. Duringthe visit, the Governor paid homage to the martyrs at the War Memorial and visited the Assam Rifles Museum. He also addressed theOfficers, Junior Commissioned Officers and other ranks of Directorate General Assam Rifles at the Assam Rifles Rising Sun SportsComplex wherein he complimented Assam Rifles for its exceptional all round performance and for rendering yeoman service in themost challenging and inhospitable terrain of the North East. He exhorted them to continue the good work of maintaining peace andtranquility in the North East Region. The Governor also interacted with troops and enquired about their well being and nature of duty.

The ChiefMinister ofPuducherry, VNarayanasamy meeting theUnionMinister forMicro, Smalland MediumEnterprises,Kalraj Mishra,in New Delhion Monday.

Ex-President of GC UN habitat DrMichal Mlynar congratulates the newlyelected president of 26th GC, MVenkaiah Naidu on Monday at Nairobi,Kenya. India’s Union Minister MVNaidu said, “I’m indeed delighted to beelected as President of the GoverningCouncil of UN HABITAT. This is amatter of great pride for India as this isthe 3rd time that such responsibilityhas been bestowed upon us after 1988and 2007.” The member countries ofAsia Pacific group have nominatedIndia and the other groups of nationshave endorsed the same. India ischairing this 26th Session of theGoverning Council of UN HABITATwhich would focus on implementationof New Urban Agenda.

PTI n TOKYO

The Government will diluteits stake in state-run banks

to 52 per cent once the healthof the lenders improve and themoney will be used to injectcapital in them, FinanceMinister Arun Jaitley said onMonday.

He hoped for a resolutionto the burgeoning bad loanproblem following the gov-ernment empowering theReserve Bank of India (RBI) toorder lenders initiate insol-vency proceedings againstdefaulters and create commit-tees to advise banks on recov-ering non-performing loans.

“We already have a pro-gramme under which we havebeen supporting recapitalisa-tion of banks. Where morefunds are required from theGovernment, we will be quitewilling to look at that.

“But once the health of thebanks themselves improve, wehave also announced that thegovernment will be willing tobring down its own equity inthe banks to 52 per cent and

that can be used for banks’recapitalisation,” he said at aCII-Kotak investor roundtablehere.

This fiscal, the govern-ment has budgeted Rs 10,000crore of capital infusion inpublic sector banks.

The amount is lower than`25,000 crore set aside in theprevious budget but will beinsufficient to help state-runbanks raise about `80,000crore of equity capital that theywill require over the next twoyears to comply with the Basel

III norms and support creditgrowth.

Jaitley said the non-per-forming assets (NPA) problemis limited to “a certain set ofaccounts and these numeri-cally are not very large innumber but the quantums are

high and therefore, theyimpact the balance sheet ofbanks”.

“Now, we will wait for theresult over the next few monthsof what we decided (throughthe ordinance) and ensure thatunder the empowerment thatis being given to the RBI, thebanking industry itself goes infor resolution,” he said.

At a separate interactivesession on ‘India’s BusinessEnvironment: Reforms andOpportunities’ organised byCII, Indian Embassy and JapanChamber of Commerce, hesaid that with the new empow-erment of RBI, a resolution tothe stressed asset problem willbe reached.

“We were trying over thelast few years to address thisproblem and about three daysago, we have empowered thecentral bank to take certainprecipitative action in rela-tion to resolving the issue ofstressed asset itself.

I do hope, with this newsystem in place, resolution oflot of stressed asset in Indiawould take place,” he said.

Stake dilution in PSBs after their

health improves: Finance Minister

PTI n TOKYO

The Goods and ServicesTax (GST) is on schedule

for implementation from July1 and will not lead to any sig-nificant increase in prices ofgoods although cost of someservices may see a marginalhike, Finance Minister ArunJaitley said on Monday.

Hailed as the biggest taxreform since India’s indepen-dence, GST will replace anarray of central and statelevies with a national sales tax,thereby creating a single mar-ket and making it easier to dobusiness in the country.

Addressing CII-Kotakinvestors’ round table here,

Jaitley said that the GSTCouncil, headed by him andcomprising representatives ofall states, will in the next fewdays finalise the rates of tax fordifferent goods and servicesand the country is on track toroll out the simplified indirecttax regime from July 1.

“The current indirect taxstructure in India is fairlycomplicated...Those whotransacted in either goods orservices would have to dealwith multiple authorities.

“The whole country wasdivided into multiple markets.So a free movement of goodsand services was not possible.Now, the idea of GST was thatlet there be just one tax in the

country,” Jaitley said.He added that tax rates on

goods may go down margin-ally under the new indirect taxregime while services maysee some increase.

The GST Council, whichhad previously finalised afour- tier tax structure of 5, 12,18 and 28 per cent, is sched-uled to meet next week to putdifferent commodities andservices in the decided taxbrackets.

Demerit and luxury goodswill attract the peak tax rateplus a cess. Tax rate closed tothe existing incidence of totalcentral and state levies will bechosen as the slab for a goodor services.

GST scheduled for July 1 rollout: Jaitley

NEW DELHI: Armed withadditional legislative pow-ers, the RBI will soon startidentifying cases for resolu-tion of non-performing assetsin consultation with IBA fornecessary action, a seniorGovernment official said.

The Government willnot get into individual casesas it has already given autho-risation to the banking reg-ulator RBI to resolve NPAcases through the ordinancepassed last week, the financeministry official said.

“The cases which havealready been examined by thejoint lenders’ forum (JLF) buthave not reached logical con-clusion after that... Such caseswould be taken up by the RBIand the regulator can directbanks for resolution,” theofficial said.

The Indian Banks’Association (IBA) and thecorporate debt restructuringcell already have informationabout the NPA cases thathave not come to fruition.The central bank can seeksuch cases and pass directionto banks on specific ones, the

official said, adding that theordinance is expected tobreak logjam in accountsthat have gone through theJLF process, but not beenresolved.

Soon after the passage ofthe ordinance, the RBI lastweek made substantialchanges in the norms fordealing with stressed loansand warned banks that theywill be penalised for missingNPA resolution timeline.

The number of creditorsby value for consent for NPAresolution has been broughtdown to 60 per cent from theearlier 75 per cent.

At any point, the RBI canissue more guidelines tomake the process more effec-tive, the official said, addingthat haircut is a commercialdecision and will be taken by

banks.However, the official said

the oversight committee (OC)will be vetting the entireprocess of resolution so thatbanks get comfort as far asany future scrutiny is con-cerned.

The RBI may set up moresuch committees dependingon the requirement and couldpreclude any sector-specificOC, the official added.

NPAs, which have gonebeyond the Rs 8 lakh croremark, make the effectivenessof the resolution imperative,the official said.

Last week, the govern-ment empowered the RBI todirect banks to initiate insol-vency proceedings to recov-er bad loans.

Finance Minister ArunJaitley had said ordinancegives the Reserve Bank pow-ers to issue “directions to anybanking company or bankingcompanies to initiate insol-vency resolution process inrespect of a default under theprovisions of the Insolvencyand Bankruptcy Code (IBC),2016”. PTI

RBI to soon start pickingbad loan cases for action

PNS n NEW DELHI

In a bid to explore partnerships andtransparency in governance in the

State, global technology giant Oraclehas signed an Memorandum ofUnderstanding (MoU) with theGovernment of Jharkhand on Monday.The visiting CEO of OracleCorporation, Safra A Catz, said tech-nologies from Oracle are bound todrive digitisation in India, its secondlargest base after the US.

“The company employs close to40,000 people in India making it its sec-ond largest centre outside the US. Inour view, India is one of the greatestpossible opportunities right now,” saidCatz while signing a MoU with theJharkhand Government for jointlyexploring and identifying areas inwhich Oracle’s latest cloud based tech-nologies can be used to deliverimproved citizens services..

She hoped that the latest agreementwith the Jharkhand, and a similar onewith Maharashtra last year, wouldpave the way for alliances with otherStates. “The investment is unbounded.We have not bound the investments inany way. We have not put a cap on it,”Catz, who is on a three-day visit to India,said adding that Oracle will supportstart-ups in the State.

“We have initiated programmes in

this direction. We have recently start-ed State Data Centre which is very effec-tive and helpful in providing effectiveand responsible governance,” he said.

Jharkhand Chief MinisterRaghubar Das also said the State isramping up IT infrastructure. “We haveinitiated programmes in this direction.We have recently started State DataCentre which is very effective and help-ful in providing effective and respon-sible governance,” he said.

Das said that in line with PrimeMinister Narendra Modi’s digital Indiadrive, the State Government is under-taking continued efforts to bridge thegap between the Government and itscitizens through increased usage of IT.“We have targeted to make all theGovernment departments paperless bythe end of this year,” he said.

Jharkhand is now heading towardsMobile governance, he said, adding theState is aiming to provide various infor-mation and services on time to its cit-izens. “The Government of Jharkhandhas distributed 100,000 mobile phonesto women entrepreneurs,” he pointedout.

Das-led a high-level delegationcomprising state Chief SecretaryRajbala Verma, Principal Secretary toCM Sanjay Kumar, IT & e-Governance Secretary Sunil KumarBarnwal.

Oracle inks pact with Jharkhandfor clean governance, digitisation

NEW DELHI: Maruti SuzukiIndia (MSI) is preparing for abigger role in product devel-opment programme of parentSuzuki, buoyed by the successof Vitara Brezza in which itsengineers took the lead.

From beginning to workon minor changes on erst-while model Zen in 2000 to afull body change of small carAlto in 2008-09 and ultimate-ly being asked to develop avehicle on a given platform andan engine, MSI has beenenhancing capability of itsengineers.

The company is now look-ing to build further on theexperience of developing com-pact SUV Vitara Brezza,according to MSI ExecutiveDirector, Engineering, C VRaman.

“This has taken us one stephigher. Our engineers are ableto learn how to develop a fullmodel on a given platform, usethe Suzuki global developmentprocess, understand engineer-ing test standards, make ownjudgements and take deci-sions,” he told the news agency.

Today MSI engineers aredoing a lot of workshare withSuzuki, Raman said, whileadding, “we have to ensure thatthe engineers working in

Maruti and engineers workingin Suzuki are at par”.

However, he said it hasbeen a process of playing catchup as Suzuki MotorCorporation (SMC) engineersalso constantly upgrading theircapabilities working on newtechnologies.

When asked if there wouldbe a possibility for MSI to workon another project like theVitara Brezza, he said:“Definitely. We will get moreopportunities because as thevolumes increase we have tolook for new segments and newproducts. So maybe we maywork on something in future.”

He hastened however toadd that such a thing couldhappen only after 2020 as atpresent MSI engineers areoccupied preparing for BS-VIemission norms and safety reg-ulations that will come intoforce in the next few years.

Besides, the company isalso gearing up for new mod-els that are to be launched inthe next few years.

“We will be doing ourworkshare with Suzuki on BS-VI, where some of the modelsthey will do and for somemodels we may do the appli-cation development testing,”Raman said. PTI

Maruti prepares for biggerrole in Suzuki’s dev programme NEW DELHI: The Government

is looking to amend theNegotiable Instruments Act(NIA) in the upcoming mon-soon session in a push for less-cash economy, and a draft Billin this regard is being readied.

“We have worked outsomething. It will go forCabinet approval and we arehoping to introduce it in themonsoon session,” a seniorfinance ministry official said.

However, the official didnot share details.

Finance Minister ArunJaitley had made anannouncement to thiseffect in the Budget 2017-18 .

“As we move faster onthe path of digital transac-tions and cheque payments,we need to ensure the pay-ees of dishonoured chequesare able to realise the pay-ments. The government istherefore considering theoption of amending theNegotiable Instruments Actsuitably,” Jaitley had said.

In 2015, Parliamentpassed amendment to theNegotiable Instrument Act,providing for filing ofcheque bounce cases at theplace where a cheque is pre-sented for clearance and notthe place of issuance. PTI

PNS n NEW DELHI

In order to reach the accura-cy in mapping the level of

economic activities in the coun-try, the Government will releasethe new series of Index ofIndustrial Production (IIP) aswell as Wholesale Price Index(WPI) with 2011-12 as thebase year on Friday.

The IIP will give a broadoutlook on output of varioustypes of goods like basic, con-sumer and capital ones, whichhelps in gauging the economicprogress and investments in theeconomy. However, the month-ly WPI for April under the newseries will be released on May12 instead of May 15, theCommerce Ministry said in astatement.

The data for both theindices will be released at a jointpress meet for the revision ofbase year from 2004-05 to2011-12. It will be addressed bytop brass of both the ministries-- commerce and statistics.

A high-level panel hadfirmed up the methodology forthe IIP with new base year of2011-12. The change in baselinefor the IIP and WPI is expect-ed to bring in more accuracy inmapping the level of econom-

ic activity and calculating othernumbers like national accounts.

The Central StatisticsOffice (CSO) has alreadychanged the base year for thecountry’s national accounts,including the gross domesticproduct (GDP) and the grossvalue addition (GVA). Theretail inflation based on theConsumer Price Index (CPI) isalso calculated on the baseyear of 2011-12.

For long, economists andvarious think tanks have beenpitching for release of newtime series of WPI and IIP sothat GDP numbers can bebased on more accurate andrealistic data. The base year isrevised periodically to capturethe changes in the structure andcomposition of the industryover time due to technologicalchanges, economic reforms andconsumption pattern of thepeople.

New IIP, WPI series to be out on Friday

Govt likely to amend

NIA in monsoon session

money 11LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9, 2017

PTI n NEW DELHI

The Central Association ofPrivate Security Industry

(CAPSI) pressed forward itscase for retaining FDI limit at 49per cent in cash and ATMmanagement companies toringfence the domestic industry.

In a representation toFinance Minister Arun Jaitley,CAPSI, the body of cash man-agement service providers, saidservices rendered usingarmoured car, cash van andguards fall under the previewof the Private Security AgenciesRegulation Act, 2005 (PSARA)and hence, raising FDI beyond49 per cent would be in con-travention of law.

The representation comesin the wake of a proposal to

raise FDI limit to 100 per centin cash and ATM manage-ment companies as they aredeemed as a vital cog in push-ing financial inclusion.

There are nearly a dozencash management companiesin the country, including WriterSafeguard, SIS Securitas, CMS,Secure Value, Logicash, BrinksArya, Securitrans and ScientificSecurity Management Services.

It also suggested that thecash management logisticscompany is bound to obtainlicence under the PSARA Actbefore operating such busi-ness. “Further, the Ministry ofHome Affairs has clarified thatthere is no provision under thePSARA for hiring security ser-vices and providing it to a thirdparty on sub-contracting basis.

Any agency taking such actionis circumventing the provi-sions of the Act,” it stated.

The latest consolidated FDIpolicy, it said, also explains ‘pri-vate security’ and ‘armouredcar service’ will have the samemeaning as provided under thePSARA Act, 2005 for the FDIpurpose. Cash managementcompanies handle over `40,000crore of cash per day.

The government in 2015permitted 100 per cent FDIunder the automatic route forwhite-label ATM operationswith an aim to promote finan-cial inclusion.

White-label ATMs areowned and managed by privateoperators that charge the card-issuing bank a small fee for thetransactions.

Mumbai (PTI): The flagship Sensex wit-nessed a mild recovery on Monday while the Niftytook back the key 9,300 level on the back of unin-terrupted buying by domestic investors even astheir foreign counterparts looked the other way.After a strong opening, the BSE 30-share gaugereclaimed the 30,000-mark to hit a high of30,016.04, before closing at 29,926.15, up 67.35points, or 0.23 per cent.It had lost 267 points inthe previous session on Friday on global weak-ness due to a renewed slide in crude oil prices.

The 50-share Nifty retook the 9,300-mark,scaled a high of 9,338.70 before ending up 28.75

points, or 0.31 per cent, at 9,314.05.Banking stocks extended gains on the latest

empowerment of the RBI to tackle bad loans.ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, SBI, and HDFC Bankrose by up to 1.59 per cent. Shares of AmbujaCements and ACC surged 5.89 per cent and 3.43per cent, respectively, after both decided to explorethe merger option between them. Lupin surgedthe most by climbing 2.32 per cent, followed byBharti Airtel (1.91 per cent) ahead of its quarterlyearnings on Tuesday. Asian Paints, ONGC,Infosys, Sun Pharma, TCS, Hero MotoCorp alsoadvanced.

PTI n MUMBAI

Upping the ante in thehousing loan segment,the State Bank of India

on Monday steeply reduced itsaffordable home loan rates byup to 25 basis points, offeringa lower rate of 8.35 per cent tonew women borrowers.

With around 26 per centmarket share, the nation’slargest lender is also the biggestplayer in the home loan seg-ment. Even at the existing 8.60per cent, SBI offers the lowestrate.

HDFC, the second-largestplayer in the space, offers loansat 8.65 per cent to women forloans up to ̀ 75 lakh and 8.7 percent for others. Similar is theminimum rate being offered bythe largest private lender, ICICIBank.

As for male borrowers, thestate-owned bank said the lim-ited period offer was valid tillJuly 31 and the new rate for thesalaried would be lower by 20bps at 8.40 per cent.

One percentage point is100 basis points (bps).

Under the new govern-ment scheme, loans under ̀ 30lakh qualify for affordablehousing in which the borrow-er gets an interest subsidy of`2.67 lakh per annum.

SBI Managing Director for

national banking, RajnishKumar said the 25 bps reduc-tion was applicable to newwomen borrowers who weresalaried, while for the non-salaried women borrowers, thereduction was 20 bps.

Similarly, a male salariedborrower can get a new loan at8.40 per cent, 20 bps lower thanthe prevailing rate, and a non-salaried male borrower can availof a loan at 15 bps lower than thecurrent rate, Kumar said.

“This is a huge saving forthe borrower as the 25 bpsreduction translates into a sav-ing of `530 per month onEMI,” Kumar told PTI, addingthat the new rates would beeffective from Tuesday.

Explaining the reasonbehind the move, which makesits offering the lowest in theindustry, Kumar said the bankhad seen a hike in home loanenquiries of late and reductionin rates would further help mil-lions of buyers fulfil theirdream of owning a home.

Also, the bank expects thatthe new rates will attract thefence-sitting borrowers to go infor a loan now.

“This is a giant leap to givea fillip to the affordable hous-ing segment keeping the gov-ernment vision of providinghousing for all by 2022,” Kumarsaid.

“A lot of customers areundecided on a new home asrates of the market as well asfinance have been high for toolong. That should hopefullychange now,” Kumar added.

With a home loan book of`2.23 trillion, SBI leads thehome mortgage segment with25-26 per cent market share.

Kumar, however, said thenew offer may not push up itsmarket share significantly as 45per cent of its `2.23 trillionhome loan book was alreadyunder the ̀ 30 lakh bracket andthe rest of the credit industrywas also very aggressive.

SBI is also giving a specialoffer for construction financeto builders for affordable hous-ing projects. “This will give adual push both for constructionfinance and also for homefinance for affordable homes,but the bank did not quantifythe reduction,” he said.

Asked about the delin-quency levels in the home loansegment, he said the highestwas among the rural borrow-ers with a ticket size of under`4 lakh, but for other segments,he claimed that SBI has thelowest bad loans.

The SBI stock closed 0.91per cent higher at `298.65 onthe BSE on Monday as againsta 0.23 per cent rise of theSensex.

SBI cuts affordable home

loan rates by up to 0.25%

AIRTEL PARTNERS OLA FOR JOINT DIGITAL OFFERINGSNew Delhi: Telecom giant Bharti Airtel has partnered cab

aggregator Ola to offer a range of digital services to customers.Under the partnership, Airtel Payments Banks will integrate withOla app to allow consumers to pay for their rides. Similarly, OlaMoney (Ola’s mobile wallet) will be integrated as a digital pay-ment solution within MyAirtel App and Airtel’s website to enablerecharge/bill payment of Airtel prepaid mobile/DTH connections.Besides, Airtel retail points will assist customers looking to bookan Ola ride through kiosks at these locations. The telecom majorwill also facilitate migration of Ola devices to Airtel’s 4G net-work. Both partners will work to offer a range of value addedservices from Airtel’s stable to Ola customers over time, the com-panies said in a statement.

CANARA BANK POSTS `214 CR PROFIT FOR Q4New Delhi: Public sector lender Canara Bank on Monday

posted a profit of `214 crore for the March quarter of last fiscalas it managed to rein in non-performing assets. In comparison,the bank had registered a loss of `3,905 crore for the fourth quar-ter of the previous fiscal, 2015-16. Its total income during theJanuary-March quarter of 2016-17 rose to ̀ 12,889 crore, as against`12,116.14 crore in the same period a year ago, Canara Bank saidin a regulatory filing. Bank’s gross bad loans or non-perform-ing assets (NPAs) during the quarter under review rose marginallyto 9.63 per cent as against 9.4 per cent in the same year-ago peri-od. The gross NPAs, in terms of amount, were at `34,202 crore,up from `31,637.83 crore in the year-ago period. Net NPAs at6.33 per cent showed a slight decline as against 6.42 per cent ayear ago. For the entire financial year 2016-17, the bank posteda profit of `1,122 crore as against a loss of `2,812.82 in the pre-vious fiscal. The Canara Bank said the Board of Directors at itsmeeting held on Monday had recommended a 10 per cent div-idend for the year 2016-17.

WELSPUN CORP Q4 NET RISES FIVEFOLDNew Delhi: Welspun Corp Ltd (WCL), flagship company of

the Welspun Group, on Monday posted fivefold increase in con-solidated net profit at `68.59 crore for the quarter ended March31, 2017. The company had posted consolidated net profit of ̀ 13.06crore in the year-ago period, WCL said in a filing to BSE. The con-solidated income increased to ̀ 2,172.49 crore, from ̀ 1,976.05 crorein the corresponding quarter of FY’16. Welspun Corp is a one-stop service provider offering complete pipe solution with a capa-bility to manufacture line pipes ranging from half inch to 140 inch-es, along with specialized coating, double jointing and bending. PTI

QUICK TAKESRetain FDI limit at 49% in cashmanagement service: CAPSI

Sensex gets back on feet

Script Last Abs ChangeTraded Price Change %3MINDIA 11502.25 199.15 1.768KMILES 605.75 6.6 1.1AARTIIND 864.6 6.35 0.74ABAN 218.9 1.35 0.62ABB 1401.75 -10.55 -0.75ABBOTINDIA 4189.2 -79.65 -1.87ABFRL 163.75 -1.35 -0.82ABIRLANUVO 1708.2 0.75 0.04ACC 1714.4 59.1 3.57ADANIENT 114.5 1.15 1.01ADANIPORTS 342.3 -2.6 -0.75ADANIPOWER 30.9 0.9 3ADANITRANS 72.5 -0.5 -0.68ADVENZYMES 2032.75 -18.7 -0.91AEGISLOG 194.2 0.35 0.18AIAENG 1505.8 -27.1 -1.77AJANTPHARM 1580.15 -56.2 -3.43AKZOINDIA 1972.05 7 0.36ALBK 86.15 1.95 2.32ALKEM 1912.45 -18.6 -0.96ALLCARGO 184.1 4.05 2.25AMARAJABAT 881.55 7.85 0.9AMBUJACEM 260.8 14.5 5.89AMTEKAUTO 37.7 -0.25 -0.66ANDHRABANK 72.25 1 1.4APLAPOLLO 1486.45 -11.85 -0.79APLLTD 585.25 -7.9 -1.33APOLLOHOSP 1264.25 6.65 0.53APOLLOTYRE 240.55 -4.85 -1.98ARVIND 415 6.8 1.67ASAHIINDIA 232.95 5.8 2.55ASHOKA 208.15 -1.9 -0.9ASHOKLEY 83.35 0.2 0.24ASIANPAINT 1166.9 20.7 1.81ASTRAL 588.6 42.75 7.83ASTRAMICRO 134.6 4 3.06ASTRAZEN 988.1 40.45 4.27ATUL 2449.75 17.05 0.7AUROPHARMA 603.4 13.7 2.32AVANTI 903.85 18.45 2.08

AXISBANK 511.1 6.2 1.23BAJAJ-AUTO 2854.85 -35.3 -1.22BAJAJCORP 373.1 -2.6 -0.69BAJAJELEC 352.2 3.65 1.05BAJAJFINSV 4401.25 -2.8 -0.06BAJAJHIND 15.2 -0.3 -1.94BAJAJHLDNG 2070.1 -8.5 -0.41BAJFINANCE 1272.35 -1.45 -0.11BALKRISIND 1544.45 26.3 1.73BALMLAWRIE 232.55 0.75 0.32BALRAMCHIN 158.1 -0.1 -0.06BANKBARODA 188.95 1.6 0.85BANKINDIA 184.9 1.15 0.63BASF 1328.85 -44.45 -3.24BATAINDIA 572.55 0.95 0.17BAYERCROP 4672.1 86.4 1.88BBTC 878.75 -3.55 -0.4BEL 181.05 1.55 0.86BEML 1344.9 -13.9 -1.02BERGEPAINT 262.15 2.95 1.14BFUTILITIE 451.7 2.8 0.62BHARATFIN 774.5 -15.15 -1.92BHARATFORG 1100.4 2.3 0.21BHARTIARTL 351.25 6.6 1.91BHEL 175.75 3.2 1.85BIOCON 1054.6 17.1 1.65BIRLACORPN 764.65 -5.5 -0.71BLISSGVS 168.05 2.1 1.27BLUEDART 4679.2 -116.8 -2.44BLUESTARCO 695.65 15.55 2.29BOMDYEING 83.5 -0.9 -1.07BOSCHLTD 23433.35 168.05 0.72BPCL 716.1 -9.75 -1.34BRITANNIA 3525.85 3.35 0.1CADILAHC 466.45 0.45 0.1CANBK 395.85 1.3 0.33CANFINHOME 2840.2 9.6 0.34CAPF 752.7 3.6 0.48CAPPL 398.65 11.4 2.94CARBORUNIV 292.35 0.9 0.31CARERATING 1532.85 18.15 1.2CASTROLIND 441.95 6.3 1.45CCL 339.15 1.2 0.36CEATLTD 1669.9 5.95 0.36CENTRALBK 116.15 5.75 5.21CENTURYPLY 254.85 0.4 0.16

CENTURYTEX 1153.95 9.15 0.8CERA 2978.85 -37.8 -1.25CESC 979.9 38 4.03CGPOWER 76.55 -1.2 -1.54CHAMBLFERT 118.7 5.65 5CHENNPETRO 379.8 5.2 1.39CHOLAFIN 1087.75 -0.45 -0.04CIPLA 550.65 2.05 0.37COALINDIA 279 0.05 0.02COFFEEDAY 250.15 0.15 0.06COLPAL 987.55 -24.95 -2.46CONCOR 1183.9 -6.4 -0.54COROMANDEL 402 7.65 1.94CORPBANK 61.8 1.15 1.9COX&KINGS 220.9 1.8 0.82CRISIL 1891.8 5.05 0.27CROMPTON 234.65 7.8 3.44CUB 165.3 -1.55 -0.93CUMMINSIND 1047.45 16.15 1.57CYIENT 536.9 23.85 4.65DABUR 273.25 0.35 0.13DALMIABHA 2344.5 77.65 3.43DBCORP 383.3 7.65 2.04DBL 477.9 18.35 3.99DCBBANK 194.35 3.35 1.75DCMSHRIRAM 376.45 10.3 2.81DEEPAKFERT 265.15 0.85 0.32DELTACORP 161.2 1.65 1.03DEN 98 -0.2 -0.2DENABANK 47.25 0.75 1.61DHANUKA 889.05 0.25 0.03DHFL 441.55 9.5 2.2DISHMAN 308.2 -4.6 -1.47DISHTV 96.4 0.15 0.16DIVISLAB 627.55 1.25 0.2DLF 196.85 11.15 6DRREDDY 2601.25 -0.55 -0.02DYNAMATECH 2692.65 18.7 0.7ECLERX 1316.25 9.15 0.7EDELWEISS 176.7 7.2 4.25EICHERMOT 26910.3 1072.85 4.15EIDPARRY 328.1 2.15 0.66

EIHOTEL 131.95 -1.15 -0.86ELGIEQUIP 215.7 2.35 1.1EMAMILTD 1080.4 -4.6 -0.42ENDURANCE 796.85 2.85 0.36ENGINERSIN 167.95 2.35 1.42ENIL 785.75 -4.25 -0.54EQUITAS 160.95 0.9 0.56EROSMEDIA 229 11.15 5.12ESCORTS 602.4 10.05 1.7ESSELPRO 274.45 15.25 5.88EVEREADY 306.15 1.1 0.36EXIDEIND 239.5 -1.75 -0.73FAGBEARING 4683.25 -131 -2.72FCONSUMER 31.85 -0.4 -1.24FDC 190.45 0.65 0.34FEDERALBNK 118.25 1.85 1.59FINCABLES 525.45 2.75 0.53FINOLEXIND 562.45 -14.5 -2.51FORCEMOT 4384.45 -133.6 -2.96FORTIS 209.55 -1.05 -0.5FRETAIL 349.4 -2 -0.57FSL 38.75 -1.05 -2.64GAIL 418.15 -0.55 -0.13GATI 131.3 -4 -2.96GAYAPROJ 157.1 -0.6 -0.38GDL 248.9 -2.3 -0.92GEPIL 639.65 4.25 0.67GESHIP 414.35 -12.45 -2.92GET&D 341.15 6.7 2GHCL* 251.4 -2.5 -0.98GICHSGFIN 572.55 14.6 2.62GILLETTE 4809.2 400.65 9.09GLAXO 2439.45 -5.55 -0.23GLENMARK 852.35 6.1 0.72GMDCLTD 125.45 3.7 3.04GMRINFRA 16.75 0.55 3.4GNFC 307.35 -5.05 -1.62GODFRYPHLP 1179.3 -18.8 -1.57GODREJCP 1758.05 -7.95 -0.45GODREJIND 544.85 1.35 0.25GODREJPROP 533.45 4.5 0.85GPPL 157.9 1.5 0.96GRANULES 141.75 3.1 2.24GRASIM 1186.1 -3.4 -0.29GREAVESCOT 166.55 1.25 0.76GREENPLY 285.25 -2.55 -0.89

GRINDWELL 386.6 -3 -0.77GRUH 414.5 -6.15 -1.46GSFC 140.55 2.35 1.7GSKCONS 5175.75 11.4 0.22GSPL 174.45 -8.5 -4.65GUJFLUORO 748.25 -21.45 -2.79GUJGAS 794.65 3.15 0.4GULFOILLUB 771.65 8.25 1.08HATHWAY 40.55 0.8 2.01HATSUN 611.25 2.35 0.39HAVELLS 489.95 4.55 0.94HCC 42.95 0.2 0.47HCL-INSYS 53.7 -0.15 -0.28HCLTECH 839.45 11.85 1.43HDFC 1529.8 -16.7 -1.08HDFCBANK 1535.05 2.95 0.19HDIL 92.95 6.6 7.64HEIDELBERG 131.3 -0.8 -0.61HEROMOTOCO 3393.85 31.25 0.93HEXAWARE 249.8 11.2 4.69HFCL 14.55 0 0HIMATSEIDE 342.25 2.3 0.68HINDALCO 184.25 -1.4 -0.75HINDCOPPER 63.75 0.15 0.24HINDPETRO 529.55 4.3 0.82HINDUNILVR 955.25 1.4 0.15HINDZINC 247.85 -2.85 -1.14HMVL 286.6 1.9 0.67HONAUT 11215.8 -62.2 -0.55HSIL 348.05 10.1 2.99HTMEDIA 82.55 0.35 0.43IBREALEST 170.2 18.4 12.12IBULHSGFIN 1118.45 15 1.36ICICIBANK 303.3 4.75 1.59ICICIPRULI 409.9 17.3 4.41ICIL 203.8 2.5 1.24ICRA 4250.85 69.3 1.66IDBI 79.05 0.8 1.02IDEA 87.55 5.85 7.16IDFC 63.2 1.05 1.69IDFCBANK 65.15 0.25 0.39IFCI 32.35 0.15 0.47IGL 1018.15 -18.2 -1.76IIFL 492.7 1.45 0.3IL&FSTRANS 113.2 2.75 2.49INDHOTEL 128.6 0 0INDIACEM 210.15 2.7 1.3INDIANB 353.5 16.6 4.93INDIGO 1120.1 3.7 0.33INDOCO 224.6 -0.45 -0.2INDUSINDBK 1424.35 16.55 1.18INFIBEAM 1002.25 -36.35 -3.5INFRATEL 364.1 -2 -0.55INFY 945.45 13.95 1.5INGERRAND 891.25 7.3 0.83INOXLEISUR 282.85 5.15 1.85INOXWIND 203.05 5.7 2.89INTELLECT 128.15 -0.8 -0.62IOB 30.65 -0.25 -0.81IOC 428.35 -4.8 -1.11IPCALAB 541.9 4.05 0.75IRB 256.1 -0.15 -0.06ISGEC 6348.7 -43.95 -0.69ITC 272.95 -4.1 -1.48ITDCEM 187.5 1.75 0.94J&KBANK 82.9 0.75 0.91JAGRAN 193.9 0.75 0.39JAICORPLTD 87.55 0.85 0.98JBCHEPHARM 325.65 -3.8 -1.15JBFIND 281.75 3.9 1.4JCHAC 1750.65 -7.05 -0.4JETAIRWAYS 537.9 4.35 0.82JINDALPOLY 419.45 -0.5 -0.12JINDALSTEL 111.1 2.95 2.73JISLJALEQS 103.85 2.15 2.11

JKCEMENT 999.9 1.05 0.11JKIL 291.6 9 3.18JKLAKSHMI 489.3 2.1 0.43JKTYRE 176.7 0.15 0.08JMFINANCIL 118.7 0.6 0.51JPASSOCIAT 12.89 0.43 3.45JSWENERGY 66.9 2.6 4.04JSWSTEEL 191.3 1.5 0.79JUBILANT 759.25 -0.7 -0.09JUBLFOOD 1009.65 -19.45 -1.89JUSTDIAL 498.95 5.85 1.19JYOTHYLAB 371.8 -5.4 -1.43KAJARIACER 688.65 18.75 2.8KALPATPOWR 357.05 4.65 1.32KANSAINER 404.9 4.2 1.05KEC 218.3 6.75 3.19KESORAMIND 146.8 1.05 0.72KIRLOSENG 398.45 2.35 0.59KITEX 404.35 -3 -0.74KOTAKBANK 905.3 -1.7 -0.19KPIT 128.9 0.55 0.43KPRMILL 734.4 -1.3 -0.18KRBL 413.95 -6 -1.43KSCL 559.45 -3.65 -0.65KTKBANK 166.7 0.15 0.09KWALITY 148.55 -1.55 -1.03L&TFH 135.65 2.6 1.95LAKSHVILAS 181.35 2.6 1.45LALPATHLAB 958.9 0.65 0.07LAOPALA 555.3 0.5 0.09LAURUSLABS 560.4 3.55 0.64LAXMIMACH 4425.15 18.35 0.42LICHSGFIN 702.8 -18.05 -2.5LINDEINDIA 443.75 -3 -0.67LT 1708.65 -16.2 -0.94LTI 740.25 7 0.95LTTS 772.25 -0.8 -0.1LUPIN 1279.55 29.05 2.32M&M 1333.15 12.4 0.94M&MFIN 326.5 -1.5 -0.46MAGMA 117.7 -0.55 -0.47MAHABANK 35.95 0.5 1.41MAHINDCIE 246.25 3.1 1.27MAHLIFE 468 -8.7 -1.83MANAPPURAM 90.05 -0.6 -0.66MANPASAND 694.3 10.7 1.57MARICO 303 -2.2 -0.72MARKSANS 48.75 0.75 1.56MARUTI 6630.4 -17.75 -0.27MCLEODRUSS 189.9 4.95 2.68MCX 1111.25 -8.7 -0.78MFSL 628.95 11.55 1.87MGL 993.9 -0.4 -0.04MHRIL 448.15 6.85 1.55MINDAIND 491.1 10.05 2.09MINDTREE 502.7 6.8 1.37MJCO 362.5 0.7 0.19MMTC 65.15 0.4 0.62MOIL 327.6 4.2 1.3MONSANTO 2585.5 10.4 0.4MOTHERSUMI 406.75 11.55 2.92MOTILALOFS 933.5 -17.45 -1.84MPHASIS 584.75 24 4.28MRF 67586.35 -500 -0.73MRPL 135.35 8.55 6.74MTNL 24.15 0.25 1.05MUTHOOTFIN 394 2.8 0.72NATCOPHARM 907.8 6.25 0.69NATIONALUM 65.95 0.45 0.69NAUKRI 842.2 4.75 0.57NAVINFLUOR 3067.05 19.4 0.64NAVKARCORP 214.05 0 0NAVNETEDUL 170.75 3.05 1.82NBCC 198.95 1.95 0.99NBVENTURES 147.75 3.3 2.28

NCC 95.55 1.1 1.16NESTLEIND 6700.95 -21.5 -0.32NETWORK18 45.45 0.55 1.22NH 296.9 -13.05 -4.21NHPC 31.55 0.1 0.32NIITLTD 80.2 0.95 1.2NIITTECH 488.7 18.05 3.84NILKAMAL 2177.45 -9.2 -0.42NLCINDIA 102.15 -0.1 -0.1NMDC 124.35 -0.1 -0.08NOVARTIND 680.1 0.7 0.1NTPC 160.8 0.75 0.47OBEROIRLTY 396.1 -7 -1.74OFSS 3760.95 53.8 1.45OIL 324.3 1.7 0.53OMAXE 199.75 6.55 3.39ONGC 186.2 2.8 1.53ONMOBILE 83 0.35 0.42ORIENTBANK 176.55 1.9 1.09ORIENTCEM 166.5 6.05 3.77PAGEIND 14454.4 248.6 1.75PARAGMILK 248.9 9.35 3.9PCJEWELLER 445.35 16.3 3.8PEL 2498.85 -5.95 -0.24PERSISTENT 583.2 0.95 0.16PETRONET 425.35 -4.3 -1PFC 164.1 2.1 1.3PFIZER 1696.25 -28.25 -1.64PFS 47.4 2.15 4.75PGHH 7810.05 436.75 5.92PHOENIXLTD 408.8 7.75 1.93PIDILITIND 745.3 10.35 1.41PIIND 839.7 -6.75 -0.8PNB 176.05 1.4 0.8PNBHOUSING 1308.75 -14.9 -1.13PNCINFRA 156.9 -1.5 -0.95POLARIS 209.05 1.4 0.67POWERGRID 209.95 1.05 0.5PRAJIND 82.75 0.1 0.12PRESTIGE 253.95 9.55 3.91PRISMCEM 121.15 4.75 4.08PTC 102 2.5 2.51

PUNJLLOYD 23.35 0.8 3.55PVR 1550.05 28.3 1.86RADICO 121.15 0.3 0.25RAIN 108.8 -3.85 -3.42RAJESHEXPO 625.05 7.45 1.21RALLIS 237.25 0.4 0.17RAMCOCEM* 686.15 7.8 1.15RAMCOSYS 387.05 -2 -0.51RAYMOND 786.2 29.45 3.89RBLBANK 556.15 -4.6 -0.82RCF 90.65 4.35 5.04RCOM 32.45 1.25 4.01RDEL 65.05 1.15 1.8RECLTD 216.1 3.55 1.67REDINGTON 127.95 -0.2 -0.16RELAXO 485.1 1.95 0.4RELCAPITAL 661.2 9.05 1.39RELIANCE 1321.95 -6.65 -0.5RELIGARE 179.55 -4 -2.18RELINFRA 583.45 4.85 0.84RENUKA 14.2 -0.01 -0.07REPCOHOME 746.1 4.9 0.66ROLTA 59.7 0.25 0.42RPOWER 46.8 0.6 1.3RTNPOWER 8.35 -0.01 -0.12SADBHAV 328.05 4.7 1.45SAIL 60.45 0.55 0.92SANOFI 4157.5 -23.25 -0.56SBIN 298.65 2.7 0.91SCHNEIDER 147.85 3 2.07SCI 80.6 0.6 0.75SEQUENT 124.35 -0.85 -0.68SHARDACROP 517.45 7.45 1.46SHILPAMED 694.9 -3.25 -0.47SHK 312.7 1.55 0.5SHOPERSTOP 359.15 -17.3 -4.6SHREECEM 19408.1 140.3 0.73SHRIRAMCIT 2151.15 16.05 0.75SIEMENS 1355.65 0.35 0.03SINTEX 112.8 1.3 1.17SITINET 32.05 -0.2 -0.62SJVN 34.95 -0.1 -0.29SKFINDIA 1630.3 0.45 0.03SMLISUZU 1333.05 14.2 1.08SOBHA 411.4 3.6 0.88SOLARINDS 783.8 4.8 0.62

SONATSOFTW 162.6 0.95 0.59SOUTHBANK 25.7 0.25 0.98SPARC 314.95 -0.85 -0.27SPICEJET 121.2 3.7 3.15SREINFRA 109.9 6.6 6.39SRF 1741.45 -10.9 -0.62SRTRANSFIN 997.85 -3.2 -0.32STAR 1058.85 12.25 1.17STRTECH 156.15 2 1.3SUNDRMFAST 403.9 -0.8 -0.2SUNPHARMA 637.6 6.85 1.09SUNTECK 457.55 -6.85 -1.48SUNTV 855.75 3.8 0.45SUPREMEIND 1187.1 4.85 0.41SUVEN 187.9 -0.85 -0.45SUZLON 20.55 0.25 1.23SWANENERGY 146.95 -2.6 -1.74SYMPHONY 1449.85 30.15 2.12SYNDIBANK 91 3.6 4.12SYNGENE 467.9 -3.85 -0.82TAKE 135 1.3 0.97TATACHEM 632.4 -3.05 -0.48TATACOFFEE 132.9 3.25 2.51TATACOMM 653.8 13.05 2.04TATAELXSI 1529.45 -13.35 -0.87TATAGLOBAL 152.75 0.7 0.46TATAINVEST 669.55 3.25 0.49TATAMOTORS 423.25 3.5 0.83TATAMTRDVR 261.55 2.25 0.87TATAPOWER 82.85 -0.3 -0.36TATASPONGE 857.5 32.25 3.91TATASTEEL 432 -1 -0.23TCS 2341.9 21.95 0.95TECHM 421 7.95 1.92TECHNO 404.75 4 1TEXRAIL 98.2 1 1.03THERMAX 1023.35 14.7 1.46THOMASCOOK 207.3 2.1 1.02THYROCARE 717.6 10.05 1.42TIMKEN 729.25 4.35 0.6TITAN 483.7 -8.1 -1.65TNPL 291.9 0.6 0.21TORNTPHARM 1291 -3.45 -0.27

TORNTPOWER 223.75 5.55 2.54TRENT 254.9 -1.65 -0.64TRIDENT 90.9 4.2 4.84TRITURBINE 137.65 0.3 0.22TTKPRESTIG 6471.65 -28.5 -0.44TUBEINVEST 684.9 -12 -1.72TV18BRDCST 40.1 0.15 0.38TVSMOTOR 500.8 8.1 1.64TVSSRICHAK 4017.3 2.55 0.06TVTODAY 267.05 2.55 0.96TWL 122.1 1.6 1.33UBL 780.7 4.1 0.53UCOBANK 42.35 0.6 1.44UFLEX 368.7 7.15 1.98UJJIVAN 340.6 -5.95 -1.72ULTRACEMCO 4410.75 87.4 2.02UNICHEMLAB 266.3 -1.65 -0.62UNIONBANK 188 1.05 0.56UNITDSPR 1902.95 7.3 0.39UNITECH 5.68 0.09 1.61UPL 803.6 -3.2 -0.4VAKRANGEE 350.2 1.2 0.34VEDL 222.05 -1.3 -0.58VGUARD 208.05 3.65 1.79VIDEOIND 103.4 0.3 0.29VIJAYABANK 88.4 5.65 6.83VINATIORGA 861.45 16.1 1.9VIPIND 198.05 -3.5 -1.74VOLTAS 423.5 5.45 1.3VRLLOG 327.35 -0.45 -0.14VSTIND 3008.1 -42.35 -1.39VTL 1336.75 12.75 0.96WABAG 667.3 -7.2 -1.07WABCOINDIA 5868.05 -36.45 -0.62WELCORP 87.55 6.05 7.42WELSPUNIND 94.25 -0.8 -0.84WESTLIFE 237.2 0.75 0.32WHIRLPOOL 1193.3 2.2 0.18WIPRO 502.6 4.15 0.83WOCKPHARMA 677.8 -7.25 -1.06WONDERLA 381 -2.2 -0.57YAMNINV 23.6 0 0YESBANK 1614.95 6.25 0.39ZEEL 501.75 -5.5 -1.08ZENSARTECH 881.55 -1.8 -0.2ZYDUSWELL 870.35 5.2 0.6

NIFTY 50

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world 12LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9 , 2017

Macron wins 66.1% votes, Le Pen 33.9%

AFP n PARIS

Emmanuel Macron won 66.1 percent of the vote against 33.9 per cent

for far-right leader Marine Le Pen inFrance’s presidential election, finalresults from theinterior ministryshowed on Monday. Macron received atotal of 20,753,797 votes, comparedwith10,644,118 for Marine Le Pen, theministry announced the day after thelandmark election. The abstention rate

was 25.44 per cent, the highest since thepresidential election in 1969.

The interior ministry yesterdayreported a record numberof blank andinvalid ballots, accounting for nine percent of all registered voters, compared withtwo per cent in the first round.

Together with the abstention rate, thatmeans that one in three voters declinedto choose between the two candidates.Theabstention rate was 22.23 per cent for dur-ing thefirst round of the election on April

23, making it the first time since the 1969election that turnout was lower in thesec-ond round than in the first.

Casting a blank ballot - traditionallyused bydisgruntled French voters as aprotest vote - usuallyincreases in the sec-ond round.

But this year it quadrupled, thanksin part to anunprecedented situation ofneither the two mainstream left- lean-ing or right-leaning parties making it tothe run-off.

French President-elect Emmanuel Macron holds hands with his wife Brigitte during a victory celebration outside the Louvre museum in Paris France on Sunday.

World leaders congratulate Macron Washington/London/Beijing: World leaders on Mondaylargely hailed the thumpingvictor y of EmmanuelMacronin France’s presidentialelection, with the EU nations-breathing a sigh of relief anddescribing it a triumph forastrong and united Europe.

Independent centristMacron, 39, became France’syoungest-ever president aftercrushing the far-rightNational Front’s Marine LePen in the presidential runoffyesterday.

US President DonaldTrump congratulated Macronon his “big win” and said helooks forward to working withthe centrist leader, in anattempt to leave behindthetacit support he hadoffered to his main rivalMarine Le Pen ahead of thepolls.

British Prime MinisterTheresa May, who is current-ly negotiating Britain’s exitfrom the European Union,also congratulated Macron.

“I warmly congratulateEmmanuel Macron on hissuccess and I look forward toworking with him on a widerange of shared priorities,”she said.

“The leaders briefly dis-cussed Brexit and the PrimeMinister reiterated that theUK wants a strong partner-ship with a secure and pros-perous EU once we leave,” aDowning Street spokesper-

son said. Chinese President XiJinping congratulated Macron,saying China and Franceshared a “responsibil itytoward peace anddevelopmentin the world.”

“China stands ready towork with France to move thestrategic Sino-French part-nership to a higher level,” hesaid. Leaders of the 28-nationEuropean Union, from whichLe Pen said she wanted toremove France, were explicit-ly effusive in their congratu-lations. The EU nationsexpressed relief that Francehad proven not to be the nextdomino to fall after Britain’sBrexit vote.

“Happy that the Frenchchose a European future.Together for a #Europe morestrong and more just,”Europe,” tweeted Jean-Claude

Juncker. The EuropeanCouncil President went evenfurther and said,“Congratulations toEmmanuelMacron, theFrench who chose freedom,equality and fraternity andsaid no to the tyranny of the‘fake news’”.

German Chancel lorAngela Merkel described hisvictory as “a victory for astrong and united Europe andfor French- German friend-ship.”

“He carries the hopes ofmillions of French people,and of many people inGermany and the whole ofEurope,” the German chan-cellor told a press conference.“Congratulations to@EmmanuelMacron, newpresident of #France. Let uswork in France and Spain for

a stable, prosperous and moreintegrated Europe,” Spain’sPrime Minister MarianoRajoy said in a tweet.

“This is a victory for theFrench people and forEuropean cooperation. Newopportunities will now openup for the proactive agendaneeded to strengthen the EU,including more jobs and fairworking conditions, a strongerclimate policy and a func-tioning asylum system inwhich everyone takes PrimeMinister Stefan Lofven.

Japanese Prime MinisterShinzo Abe said, “the victoryof President-elect Macron is asymbolic victory againstinward- looking and protec-tionist moves and shows avote of confidence in the EU”.

Canadian Prime MinisterJustin Trudeau telephonedEmmanuel Macron to con-gratulate him.

“I look forward to work-ing closely with President-elect Macron in the yearsahead as we work together ona progressive agenda to pro-mote international security,increase collaboration in sci-ence and technology, and cre-ate good, middle class jobs onboth sides of the Atlantic,” hesaid in a statement earlier.

Russ ian Pres identVladimir Put in askedMacron to bridge deep riftsbetween Moscow and Parisand work together to fightthe threat of terror.

Ceremonial troops prepare for a ceremony to mark Victory Day in Paris, France on Monday and French President-elect Emmanuel Macron, left, and outgoing President Francois Hollande, attend a ceremony to mark the end of World War II at the Arc de Triomphe and in last picture French President-elect Emmanuel Macron, second left, andoutgoing President Francois Hollande lay a wreath of flowers at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier during a ceremony to mark the end of World War II at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris o n Monday. AP

May talks Brexit withnew French PresidentLondon: Prime MinisterTheresa May told the FrenchPresident-elect, EmmanuelMacron, that she looks for-ward to work with him on arange of shared issues and reit-erated the UK’s desire to havea strong partnership with theEU after its exit from the eco-nomic bloc.

May had called Macron tocongratulate him on his elec-tion victory and the two lead-ers briefly talked about Brexitamongother bilateral issues,Downing Street said.

“The leaders briefly dis-cussed Brexit and the PrimeMinister reiterated that the UKwants a strong partnershipwith a secure and prosperousEU once we leave,” a DowningStreet spokesperson said.“The Prime Minister said thatshe looked forward to workingwith the new president on arange of shared issues, with theUK and France’s unique part-nership providing a strongfoundation for future cooper-ation.

“The Prime Minister andPresident-elect Macron lookedforward to meeting and hold-ing discussions at the upcom-ing NATO and G7 Summits,”the spokesperson added.

Centrist candidate Macrondecisively won the Frenchpresidential election yester-day, defeating far-right candi-date Marine Le Pen.

Macron, a former invest-ment banker and an econom-ic liberal, won by 66.06 percent to 33.94 per cent to

become the country’s youngestPresident at the age of 39.

He will also become thefirst president from outsidethetwo traditional main par-ties since the modern repub-lic’s foundation in 1958.Speaking soon after the resultsin Paris, he said that a newpage was being turned inFrench history. “I want it to bea page of hope and renewedtrust,” he said. B e f o r ethe phone call, Downing Streethad already issued a tri-umphant statement as the exitpolls forecast Macron’s\ win.

“The Prime Ministerwarmly congratulatesPresident-elect Macron on hiselection success. France is oneof our closest allies and welook forward to working withthe new President on a widerange of shared priorities,” astatement said.The FrenchPresident will be an importantally for the UK in its Brexitnegotiations with theEuropean Union as therearehopes that he will be a fairnegotiator.

Others from the UK whocongratulated Macron includ-ed former Prime MinisterTony Blair, to whom the newFrench President had beencompared during the cam-paign. “What is important isthat his election could be a realvictory for a more globalapproach to politics,” Blairtold French newspaper ‘LeMonde’. Scottish First MinisterNicola Sturgeon also expressedjoy at the French election

results. “Vive La France.Congratulations to newPresident, Emmanuel Macronon his decisive victory over thehard right,” she said onTwitter. The euro hit a six-month dollar high beforefalling back as markets react-ed to Macron’s victory inFrance’spresidential election.

The euro jumped to USD1.1024 at one point before slip-ping back to USD 1.098.Macron would beat anti-EUMarine Le Pen.

He was economy ministerunder Socialist PresidentFrancois Hollande, but hastried to define himself as nei-ther left nor right politically.

TRUMP SAYS LOOKS FORWARD

TO WORKING WITH MACRONPTI n WASHINGTON

US President DonaldTrump has congratulat-

ed Emmanuel Macron on his“big win” in theFrenchpresidential electionand said he looks forward toworking with him, down-playing the tacit support hehad offered to the centristleader’s main rival Marine LePen ahead of the polls.

“C ongratulat ions toEmmanuel Macron on his bigwin on Monday as the nextpresident of France. I lookvery much forward to work-ing with him!” Trump tweet-ed after the poll results camein.

The White House laterissued a statement congratu-lating the pro-EuropeanUnion Macron, who willbecome France’s youngest-ever leader at the age of 39.“We congratulate President-elect Macron and the peopleof France on their successfulpresidential election,” said

Press Secretar y SeanSpicer. “We look forward toworking with thenew presi-dent and continuing ourclose cooperation with theFrench government,” Spicersaid according to the state-ment.

Macron defeated the far-right leader Le Pen. Le Pen’sdecisive defeat, with an esti-mated 35 per centvotes, hasput Trump in a slightly trickyspot after he hadindicatedsupport for her ahead of thefirst round of thepolls.

Trump had tweeted that

Le Pen could benefit fromthe security fears in Franceover intermittent terroristattacks.

He had said a deadlyattack against a police officerin the Champs-Elysee inParis would have a “bigeffect” on the presidentialelection and praised Le Pen,calling her “the strongest onwhat has been going on inFrance.”

Though Trump neverendorsed Le Pen, in an inter-view to an American newsagency he did say that hethought the attack would“probably help” her.

His predecessor BarackObama had released a video

lastweek backing Macron.Yesterday, American law-makers also joined the WhiteHouse in congratulatingMacron, a former invest-ment banker whose win inthe French polls representedthe most significant responsefrom the liberals to the pop-ulist and nationalist wavethat brought Trump to powerin the November presidentialelection.

“The French people havechosen hope over fear, cho-sen to look forward ratherthan backward.

They have rejected thekind of divisive campaigning,assisted by fake news andRussian hacks, that propelledDonald Trump into office inour count ,” said HouseDemocratic Whip Steny HHoyer.“They have struck ablow for inclusive, tolerantdemocracy against the tide ofextremism and xenophobia.”Senator Ben Cardin, rankingmember of the S enateForeign Relat ionsCommittee, applauded theFrench people’s rejection ofisolationism and embrace ofa Europe - “whole, free, andatpeace.” The results, Cardinsaid, sent the “strongest pos-sible”message to RussianPresident Vladimir Putinthat his worldviewhas onceagain been re jec ted byEuropean voters.

“In spite of allegations ofRussian interference similarto that seen in our countrylast year, democratic institu-tions across France provedresilient,” he said.

Supporters of French independent centrist presidential candidate, EmmanuelMacron react outside the Louvre museum in Paris.

Thousands hail new Prez

at Paris victory rally

Paris: Thousands of flag-wavingsupporters gave EmmanuelMacron a rapturous welcome ashe strode into the courtyard of theLouvre museum to the strains ofthe European anthem after hisdecisive election victory. The glasspyramid in the world-famouscourtyard glowed golden as 39-year-old Macron made a solitarywalk yesterday toa stage in front,looking solemn. “Tonight, Francewon,” he cried to the crowds whoyelled with joy.Many of the mainlyyouthful supporters were wearingthe\t-shirt of Macron’s centristmovement En Marche (“On theMove”). Some supporters scaledlampposts to get a better view of

Macron, who was savouring athumping victory estimated ataround 65 to 35 percent over far-right rival Marine Le Pen. Aninstant street party had eruptedoutside the Louvreafter the resultswere announced. Cars honked as passengerswavedFrench flags, while the crowdschanted “PresidentMacron,President Macron!” from thepavements. Street vendorswheeled carts with sausages andcold drinks toward the crowds,with some vendors selling Frenchand EU flags. Shouts of joyerupted earlier as giant screens oneither side of the pyramid flashedup the result.

world 13LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9 , 2017

Priyanka teaches Bollywood’s

thumka to African children

Johannnesberg: Actress Priyanka Chopra taught Bollywooddance to African children during a visit here as UNICEF’sGoodwill Ambassador. The 34-year-old actress visitedJohannesburg and neighbouring Zimbabwe to help raiseawareness about violence against children in the continentas a part of the organisation’s campaign. Priyanka took toInstagram where she shared a video in which she is seenshaking a leg with the kids. “After they taught me theirdance moves, I showed them one of mine... it’s called the“thumka” #DanceParty #EndViolence #UNICEF #this-timeforafrica #SafePark,” wrote Priyanka. The kids tried tomatch their steps with her. Priyanka posted another videoin which she was seen bidding adieu to the children, whothen hugged the actressbefore they said their goodbyes.

GLGLOBEOBE

TROTTINGTROTTING

IS Afghanistan leader killed

AFP n KABUL

The head of Islamic StateinAfghanistan - believed to

be the mastermind behind sev-eral high-profile attacks includ-ing an assault on a military hos-pital that claimed at least 50lives - has been killed, US andAfghan officials said.

Abdul Hasib, whose groupis affiliated with IS in Iraq andSyria, was killed last month ina targeted raid by special forcesin the eastern province ofNangarhar, the presidentialpalace in Kabul said in a state-ment.

“He had ordered the attackon 400 bed hospital in Kabulthat resulted in the death andinjuries of a number of ourcountrymen, women,” it said.

“The Afghan governmentis committed to continuing itsoperations against Daesh andother terrorist groups untilthey are annihilated,” it added,using another name for IS,

which is also referred to as ISIS.NATO commander in

Afghanistan General JohnNicholson confirmed thekilling of Hasib and warnedthat “any ISIS member thatcomes to Afghanistan will meetthe same fate.”

First emerging in 2015,IS’s local affiliate in Afghanistan

overran large parts ofNangarhar and Kunarprovinces, near the Pakistanborder, but their part in theAfghan conflict had been large-ly overshadowed by the oper-ations against the Taliban.

The group has claimedresponsibility for a series ofbloody attacks, including an

audacious assault onAfghanistan’s largest militaryhospital in March, when gun-men dressed as doctorsstormed the heavily guardedfacility and threw grenadesinto crowded wards.

According to the USForces-Afghanistan, the local ISpresence peaked at between 2],500 to 3,000 but defectionsand recent battlefield losseshave reduced their number toa maximum of 800.

Last month, the USdropped its largest non-nuclearbomb on the jihadist group’shideouts in easternAfghanistan, triggering globalshockwaves.

The GBU-43/B MassiveOrdnance Air Blast, dubbedthe “Mother of All Bombs”,killed at least 95 jihadists,according to the Afghandefence ministry. After a steadydownsizing of US troop num-bers since 2011, US militarycommanders say they need to

strengthen the numbers onthe ground to better supportAfghan forces and help retaketerritory lost to the Taliban,which is considered a biggerthreat than IS.

The Pentagon will ask theWhite House next week tosend thousands more troops toAfghanistan to break a dead-locked fight with the Taliban,a senior official said Thursday.

The Pentagon will ask for3,000 to 5,000 more soldiers,mainly to advise and trainAfghan military and police,according to US media. UStroops in Afghanistan numberabout 8,400 today, and there areanother 5,000 from NATOallies, who also serve in anadvisory capacity.

Those numbers are a farcry from the US presence ofmorethan 100,000 six yearsago, and the Afghan militaryhas struggled to fill the voidamid an unrelenting Talibaninsurgency.

Gas leak kills 18 in ChinaPTI n BEIJING

Eighteen workers have beenkilled after a gas leak in a

coal mine in central China’sHunan Province, officials saidon Monday, the latest in aslew of mining accidents thatcontinue to plague the coal-richcountry.

As many as 55 people wereworking in the mining shaftwhen a gas leak took place atthe Jilinqiao colliery in

Huangfengqiao Township,Youxian County yesterday. Therescuers brought the remaining37 miners to safety and rushedthem to hospital, state-runXinhua news agency reported.

Investigators are still test-ing substances in the poisonousgas. Police have detained thoseresponsible for accident pend-ing investigation.

China, which is the world’slargest coal producer, maintainsthe highest fatality rates due oflax safety precautions.

China has witnessed manydeadly mine accidents, claim-

ing hundreds of lives annuallyeven as the country has tried toimprove standards by shuttingolder and smaller mines.

In March, 17 coal minerswere killed when a liftused tomove workers fell down a shaftin northeasternHeilongjiangprovince. Thirty-three peopledied in a gas explosion at a coalmine in the southwestern cityof Chongqing in October lastyear.

At least 38 people died intwo separate coal mine disas-

ters in China in December.China has acknowledged anincrease in deaths from majorcoal mine accidents as the gov-ernment presses its campaignto cut production overcapaci-ty in the industry.

In July, a top safety officialtold local media that a total of23,534 production accidentsclaimed 14,136 lives.Across allindustries tracked by StateAdministration of Work Safety(SAWS), 198 deaths occurredin 15 major accidents.

Indian woman says was forced tomarry Pakistani man at gunpointPTI n ISLAMABAD

A20-year-old Indianwoman, who approached

the Indian High Commissionhere with a request to repatri-ate her, today alleged that shewas forced to marry aPakistani citizen on gunpoint,marking a new turn in thecase.

Uzma filed a plea with anIslamabad court against herhusband Tahir Ali allegingthat she was being harassedand intimidated by him. Shealso recorded her statementbefore a magistrate.

Alleging that she wasforced to marry Ali on gun-point, she said: “My immigra-tion documents weresnatched”, Geo News reported.

Uzma said she does notwant to leave the Indian HighCommission premises till she

could safely travel back toIndia. According to reports,Uzma’s husband met her in theHigh Commission this morn-ing but he was not present inthe court.

The Pakistani HighCommission in New Delhisaid that the immigration doc-uments state that Uzmaobtained the visa under thevisit category.

Pakistani authorities havesaid that the Indian citizen didnot share her plans to marry

in Pakistan when she applied-for the visa and expressed herintent to visit her relatives inPakistan.

Uzma last weekapproached the Indian HighCommission here with arequest to repatriate her toIndia. But her husband, Ali,alleged that his wife had beendetained by the mission.

Pakistan Foreign Officespokesman Nafees Zakariayesterday said in a statementthat “the Indian HighCommission informed theMinistry of Foreign Affairsthat an Indian national, MsUzma, 20, had approachedthem .

Zakaria said that accord-ing to the Indian HighCommission, she claimed tohave married Ali and allegedthat she later came to knowthat he was already marriedand has four children.

Government sources in NewDelhi said the Indian womanhas sought the help of theIndian mission in Islamabadon May 5.

The High Commission isproviding necessary consularassistance to her and is intouch with the PakistanForeign Office on the matterand the girl’s family in India,said the sources.

Uzma and Ali reportedlymet in Malaysia and fell in loveafter which she travelled toPakistan on May 1 via theWagah border. Their ‘nikah’was solemnised on May 3.

But the situation changedwhen they visited the IndianHigh Commission on Friday.Uzma went inside the buildingof mission and did not return,according to her husband.

Ali has filed a case withlocal police that she wasdetained against her will.

1st evacuations from Damascus rebel districtAFP n DAMASCUS

Syrian rebels and their fam-ilies begin evacuating from

a district of the capitalDamascus for the first timetoday, bringing the govern-ment closer to recapturing allof the city.

The deal to evacuateBarzeh district mirrors similaragreements for opposition-held territory elsewhere in thecountry, allowing fighters safepassage in exchange for sur-render.

It comes days after thestart of a deal brokered byregime backers Russia and Iranand rebel supporter Turkey toput in place “de-escalationzones” where the governmentand opposition will halt hos-tilities.

“Armed men and some oftheir families have begun leav-ing Barzeh on 40 buses head-ing towards northern Syria,”state television said. It addedthat the evacuation would con-

tinue for five days, but thatrebel fighters who chose to staycould do so if they register withthe government.

The channel did not spec-ify how many people wereexpected to leave, but theSyrian Observatory for HumanRights monitor said up to 1,500people — mostly rebels —would leave Barzeh and head to

the northwest province of Idlib.The evacuation deal was

struck late Sunday night, anddozens of people had gatheredin Barzeh from the morning.

An AFP photographer sawrebel fighters carrying lightweapons looking on as childrenand women in brightly-coloured headscarves pulledshabby suitcases and duffel

bags.A source from the pro-

government National DefenceForces said rebel fighters wouldbe allowed to take their “per-sonal weapons” with them.

Negotiations were ongoingfor a similar deal in the districtof Qabun, in Damascus’snortheast, which forces loyal toPresident Bashar al-Assad havebeen shelling heavily for weeks.

Speaking at a press con-ference in the capital, ForeignMinister Walid Muallem con-firmed that the “reconciliationin Barzeh has begun.”

“We are working on Qabunand there is the Yarmuk camp,where talks are underway forthe evacuation of armedgroups,” he added.

Assad’s government con-trols all but six districts ofDamascus: Barzeh, Qabun,Jobar, Tishrin, Tadamun, andYarmuk camp. The evacua-tion is the first time that rebelsand their families have left adistrict of the capital.

Election rivals are violent extremists: RouhaniTehran (AFP): Iran’sPresident Hassan Rouhanilaunched a scathing attack onhis conservative electionrivals on Monday, sayingtheir era of “violence andextremism” was over.

“The people of Iran shallonce again announce thatthey don’t approve of thosewho only called for execu-tions and jail throughout thelast 38 years,” he told apacked stadium in the west-ern city of Hamedan, refer-ring to the Islamic revolutionof 1979.

“We’ve entered this elec-tion to tell those practicingviolence and extremism thatyour era is over.”Rouhanifaces a tough battle for re-election on May 19 as con-servative opponents attack

his failure to revive Iran’sstagnant economy. Analystssay his surprise victory in2013 was largely down to hispromise of improved civilliberties, and he has againmade this a dominant themeof his campaign this year.

“Your logic is prohibitionand nothing else. Our youngpeople have chosen the pathof freedom,” he told his oppo-nents. Rouhani raised an oldthreat, often levelled at hard-liners, that they want to seg-regate men and women onpublic footpaths.

“You don’t know them, Iknow them. They wanted tocreate segregated pavementsthe same way they issued adirective for sex segregationin their work place,” Rouhanisaid in a swipe against one ofhis main challengers, Tehranmayor Mohammad BagherGhalibaf, who reportedlytried to split the sexes in hiscity council offices.

The allegation was dis-missed by one of his oppo-nents.

“This ridiculous andrepetitive accusation fools noone,” said leading conserva-tive Alireza Zakani in a tweet.

“By contrast, the eco-nomic wall between this gov-ernment of money-makersand people’s empty plates isperfectly understood,” wroteZakani.

Rouhani’s governmenthas tamed rampant inflationbut failed to kick-start thewider economy despite anuclear deal with world pow-ers that ended many sanc-tions.

He has therefore pushedhis liberal credentials, attack-ing the security services forinterfering in people’slives,and posing with womenwearing loose and colourfulheadscarves that are still

opposed by hardliners despitebecoming commonplace inwealthier parts of Tehran.

He is due to address awomen’s rally on Tuesday.Rouhani also attacked thecontinued detention ofreformist politicians such asMir Hossein Mousavi, whohas been under house arrestsince 2011 for his part inprotests two years earlier.

“Why have you confinedto their houses our dear per-sonalities who were of serviceto this nation... who showedIran’s real image to the world?Under what law?” he asked.“We will go to the ballotboxes on 19 May to bringback our noble men to soci-ety,” he said, a lthoughRouhani made this promisein 2013 to no avail.

‘India overly interpreting

Beijing’s military buildup’

Beijing: India must not “exag-gerate” concerns on the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor or“overly interpret” Beijing’s mil-itary development, a state-runChinese daily said on Monday,days after the Indian Armychief suggested New Delhicarry out counter-encirclementof its “future adversaries”.

The article in GlobalTimes, a ruling CommunistParty publication, said Indiaworries that China was inten-tionally meddling in India-Pakistan disputes, “utilisingthe CPEC (which runs throughthe Pakistan-occupiedKashmir) to grant legitimacy toIslamabad’s control over thedisputed region.”

“India is viewing Beijingand Islamabad as potentialthreats and is suspicious ofBeijing’s One Belt and OneRoad initiative and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor(CPEC),” it said, adding that“India is exaggerating the sit-uation”.

“Beijing respects NewDelhi’s sovereignty concerns,and is willing to mediate inIndia-Pakistan disputes, on thecondition that it accords to thewishes of both India andPakistan,” it said. The remarks

in the Chinese daily came afterArmy chief Gen Bipin Rawatlast week said India must haveclose ties with Iran, Iraq andAfghanistan considering thesecurity matrix.

He said such a strategy willcreate a two-pronged dilemmafor Pakistan, and also helptackle issues with the other dif-ficult neighbour China, sug-gesting New Delhi should“carry out counter-encir-clement for our future adver-saries.”

Referring to his remarks,the article said China advocatespeaceful development and it“has and will never seek hege-mony in the region.” China’sdefence budget will rise byabout seven per cent this year,the lowest since 2010 andBeijing’s militarydevelopmentis “part of its national con-struction, and New Delhishould not overly interpret it,”it said.The Indian media sug-gests that China’s militaryexpenditure for 2017, about 1.3per cent of the GDP, is threetimes higher than that of India.“Frankly speaking, even if NewDelhi’s military spending isboosted to the same level, Indiastill lags behind its northernneighbour in its military capa-

bility. For instance, India’sdevelopment of aircraft carri-er is very slow despite its earlystart,” it said. China has onerefurbished aircraft carrier andrecently launched a homemadecarrier, which was expected totake a fewyears to opera-tionalise. A third carrier isreportedly under construction.

The official media againurged India to join the ambi-tion Chinese project to linkChina with Eurasia through theBelt and Road (B&R) initiativeamid concern here about NewDelhi’s apparent silence overparticipation in this week’sB&R summit.

At least 28 heads of stateand government, including theprime ministers of Pakistanand Sri Lanka, have confirmedtheir participation in the sum-mit Beijing is projecting as aglobal acceptance of the initia-tive.

The article said “instead ofbeing overly concerned aboutChina’s rise, New Delhi shouldconsider taking an early role inB&R initiative. China’s infra-structural initiative will notonly bring economic benefits,but also fulfil India’s ambitionto be an influential economicpower in the region.” PTI

Language may shape howwe perceive time: StudyPTI n LONDON

Language can influence the way in whichwe experience time, say scientists who

found that people estimate the duration ofevents differently depending on thelanguagethey use. For example, Swedish and Englishspeakers prefer to mark the duration of eventsby referring to physical distances - a shortbreak, a long wedding, etc. The passage oftime is perceived as distance travelled,researchers said.

However, Greek and Spanish speakerstend to mark time by referring to physicalquantities - a small break, a big wedding. Thepassage of time is perceived as growing vol-ume.

Bilinguals go back and forth betweentheir languages rapidly and often, uncon-sciously - a phenomenon called code- switch-ing. Researchers, including those fromLancaster University in the UK, askedSpanish-Swedish bilinguals to estimate howmuch time had passed while watching eithera line growing across a screen or a contain-er being filled.

At the same time, participants wereprompted with either the word ‘duracion’ (theSpanish word for duration) or ‘tid’ (theSwedish word for duration). Researchersfound that when watching containers fillingup and prompted by the Spanish promptword, bilinguals based their time estimatesof how full the containers were,perceivingtime as volume. They were unaffected by thelines growing on screens.

Conversely, when given the Swedishprompt word, bilinguals suddenly switched

their behaviour, with their time estimatesbecoming influenced by the distance the lineshad travelled, but not by how much the con-tainers had filled.

“By learning a new language, you sud-denly become attuned to perceptual dimen-sions that you were not aware of before,” saidPanos Athanasopoulos, professor at LancasterUniversity.

“The fact that bilinguals go between thesedifferent ways of estimating time effortless-ly and unconsciously fits in with a growingbody of evidence demonstrating the ease withwhich language can creep into our most basicsenses, including our emotions, our visualperception, and now it turns out, our senseof time,” Athanasopoulos said.

“It also shows that bilinguals are moreflexible thinkers and there is evidence to sug-gest that mentally going back and forthbetween different languages on a daily basisconfers advantages on the ability to learn andmulti-task, and even long term benefits formental well-being,” he said.

The study was published in the Journalof Experimental Psychology: General.

Obama urges Congress to show‘courage’ on health careBoston: Former PresidentBarack Obama, in his firstpublic comments about theongoing debate over his sig-nature health care plan, hasimplored members ofCongress to demonstratepolitical courage even if it goesagainst their party’s positions.

Obama briefly returned tothe spotlight as he acceptedthe annual John F KennedyProfile in Courage Award atJFK’s presidential library inBostonon Sunday.

The award is named for a1957 Pulitzer Prize-winningbook by Kennedy that profiledeight US senators who riskedtheir careers by taking prin-cipled though unpopular posi-

tions. In his approximately 30-

minute speech after acceptingthe award, Obama steeredclear of partisan attacks andnever mentioned his succes-sor, President Donald Trump,who has often criticised theprevious administration andhas worked to undo many ofObama’s initiatives, includ-ing the Affordable Care Act.

The former presidentrecalled members of Congresswho voted to pass the ACAduring his presidency, only tolose their seat in later elec-tions.

“They had a chance toinsure millions,” he said. “Butthis vote could also cost them

their seats, perhaps end theirpolitical careers.” Obamamade no direct reference toThursday’s House vote to dis-mantle much of the healthcare law, but noted that thedebate over the issue was con-tinuing. The House bill facesan uncertain future in theSenate, which is expected towrite itsown version of thelegislation.

“It is my fervent hopeand the hope of millions ...such courage is still possible,that today’s members ofCongress regardless of partyare willing to look at the factsand speak the truth, evenwhen it contradicts party posi-tions,” Obama said. AP

sport 14LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9, 2017

SOLID DAY FOR HERO MOTOSPORTSERFOUD (MOROCCO): Stage two of theAfriquia Merzouga rally proved to be yetanother impressive day for Hero MotoSportsTeam Rally with Joaquim Rodrigues and CSSantosh showing great temperament on ahot and tricky day to deliver a steady perfor-mance. Altogether 241 km of distance had tobe covered including the 53 km liaison sec-tion. Indian motor sport star C S Santosh,who finished the first stage in 16th position,rode solid through the second stage andgained a position to finish in Top 15. "Myfocus was to navigate well and not get lostbecause today's stage was quite complex. Allin all a very good day and I am looking for-ward to the upcoming stages," Santosh said.De Soultrait of Yamaha, who also finishedfirst in the first stage, won the second stagetoo.

BENGALURU & BAGAN START WITH WINCUTTACK: JSW Bengaluru FC defeatedShillong Lajong 3-2 in a tight encounter tomake a flying start to their campaign at the38th edition of the ongoing Hero FederationCup here on Monday. Strikes by UdantaSingh (35th minute), Eugeneson Lyngdoh(46th) and an own goal by skipperAibrolang Khongjee proved enough for theBlues to register their first win. In the othermatch, Defending Champions Mohun Baganbegan their title defence with a dominating4-0 win over DSK Shivajians in the ongoing38th Hero Fed Cup. A Balwant Singh brace(24th min, 71st) and a goal by Darryl Duffyheader (65th) and Jeje (90+ 2nd) provedenough for Sanjoy Sen's men to start theircampaign with a win.

JAYAWARDENE JOINS LANCASHIRELONDON: Sri Lankan batting great MahelaJayawardene will play for Lancashire in thisyear's T20 Blast competition, the Englishcounty announced on Monday. Jayawardene,39, has played in T20 leagues around theworld since retiring from international cricketin 2015 and has previously turned out inEngland for Sussex and Somerset. "I'm veryexcited about joining Lancashire Lightningfor the NatWest T20 Blast this summer,"Jayawardene said in a Lancashire pressrelease. "Lancashire is a huge county with afine history in the game. There is a younggroup of players at the club and I'm reallylooking forward to the opportunity to workingwith them." He will join up with Lancashire inJuly. "Mahela is a truly world-class batsmanwho scores runs all around the wicket," saidLancashire head coach Glen Chapple.

ROLLBALL LEAGUE TO BE LAUNCHEDJAMSHEDPUR: Following the success of IPL,ISL and IBL, a professional rollball league forboth men and women will begin in Mumbainext month, to give this discipline a profes-sional shape in the country. RollballFederation of India would launch "MahaRollball League" from June 3 at AndheriSports Complex, the Federation's vice-presi-dent Manoj Yadav said here on Monday. Indiahave won Rollball World Cup three times inthe men's section and twice in the women'ssection. In the league, Yadav said, eightteams in the men's section and six teams inthe women's section would vie for top hon-ours during the three-day event. Agencies

S I N G L E S

PTI n NEW DELHI

Defending champions India onMonday opted for the tried and test-ed in their Champions Trophy crick-

et squad with fit-again Rohit Sharma andMohammed Shami returning to the side.

Karnataka batsman Manish Pandeypipped young chinaman Kuldeep Yadav asthe 15th member of the touring party.

Rohit, who has recovered from athigh injury, made a comeback as selectorsgave due weightage to his round the yearperformance. Shami is making a comebackto the 50-over squad having last played anODI during 2015 World Cup semi-final.

Overall, the selection panel, headed byMSK Prasad, kept faith in the squad whichdefeated England in a home series earlierthis year.

India will play their opening match ofthe Champions Trophy, to be held inEngland, against arch-rivals Pakistan onJune 4. The event itself will get underwayon June 1.

Pandey has made it as an extra bats-man in the squad to be led by Virat Kohli.Prasad said the selectors seriously con-sidered Kuldeep Yadav too before he wasput on the standby list.

"We definitely considered the name ofKuldeep. He would have been a surprisepackage but whether we would haveplayed with two spinners is a question.Since Yuvraj (Singh) and Kedar (Jadhav)can bowl spin, he narrowly missed out,"Prasad explained.

Some of the other names that were dis-cussed seriously were keeper-batsmenRishabh Pant, Dinesh Karthik, ShardulThakur and Suresh Raina. Along withKuldeep, these four are also on the stand-by list.

Prasad made it clear that even thoughIPL is a premier domestic tournament, theperformance of players in the event can'tbe the sole criteria for selecting a squad fora 50-over tournament.

"We respect IPL but in the longer for-mat, we have to also consider the Englishconditions that we are playing in. Not justIPL but one needs to take into account theperformance of last one year also in sucha big tournament," Prasad said.

With no surprises in the team, Prasadsaid it was an easy team to pick as it hasshaped up well in the last four months.

"May be one place here and there. Butthis is the best side."

Veteran opener Gautam Gambhir,who has been performing well in the IPL,was not even discussed.

"As of now, we have picked ShikharDhawan and Rohit Sharma as openers andAjinkya Rahane is the back-up opener,"Prasad replied when asked about Gambhir.

Premier off-spinner RavichandranAshwin, who has skipped the IPL owing

to a sports hernia injury, has been includ-ed in the squad.

Explaining the decision, Prasad saidAshwin's injury was not that serious andhe merely required some rest.

"The injury was not serious. Thefranchise was magnanimous enough to lis-ten to our request to rest him. Rest is whatAshwin required as the last game that Indiaplayed, he was there. That shows he is fitand not like others who are getting reha-

bilitated after surgery," Prasad said.When asked if Ashwin's form in lim-

ited overs cricket, which has been dodgyfor some time, came up for discussionwhen Kuldeep's name croppedup:"Kuldeep's name was discussed becauseof his quality more than anything else."

Mahendra Singh Dhoni remainedIndia's first choice wicketkeeper.SQUAD: Virat Kohli (captain), ShikharDhawan, Rohit Sharma, Ajinkya Rahane,Yuvraj Singh, Mahendra Singh Dhoni(wk), Kedar Jadhav, Manish Pandey,Hardik Pandya, Ravichandran Ashwin,Ravindra Jadeja, Jasprit Bumrah, UmeshYadav, M Shami, Bhuvneshwar Kumar.STANDBY: Kuldeep Yadav, Rishabh Pant,Dinesh Karthik, Shardul Thakur, SureshRaina.ADMINISTRATIVE MANAGER: KapilMalhotra (Cricket Club of India).

‘MSD STILL INVALUABLE ASSET’Chairman of selectors MSK Prasad

dispelled any doubts about MahendraSingh Dhoni's future in internationalcricket, terming him the world's best wick-etkeeper right now.

The 35-year-old Dhoni's heir appar-ent in limited overs, a 19-year-old RishabhPant, has made a strong case for himselfbut he is being groomed as one for thefuture when the Jharkhand dasher decidesto call time on his career.

When asked if Dhoni's erratic battingform is a concern, Prasad's emphaticresponse made it clear that selectors stillhave faith in him.

"How many of us still believe that MSDis still the best wicketkeeper in the world?We all believe he is still the best wicket-keeper in the world. We are only talkingand focussing on his batting form," Prasadsaid.

"He is an invaluable asset to the teamand his inputs in crunch situations, he hasgot one of the best brains. He is the bestperson to guide Virat," Prasad said aboutthe two- time World Champion skipper.

But he had words of encouragementfor Pant and made it clear that he is a "longterm solution". "We are completelyimpressed by how Rishabh Pant is playing.It's just combination because of which hemissed out. He is one cricketer we are look-ing at for our future. He is definitely a solu-tion for our future,” he said.

AP n MADRID

The Champions League semifinalsresume this week with Real Madrid

and Juventus looking to defend big first-leg victories and book their trip to thetitle game in Cardiff.

Madrid will carry a 3-0 advantagefrom the first leg when it visits Spanishrival Atletico Madrid to try to returnto the final for the third time in fourseasons.

Juventus will hold a 2-0 cushionfrom the first game when it hostsMonaco to try to make it to the finalfor the second time in three seasons.

Madrid won the title in 2014 and2016, both times against Atletico, whileJuventus lost the decider to Barcelonain 2015. The Italian club is seeking itsfirst Champions League title in morethan two decades.

Atletico and Monaco will need his-toric comebacks to keep alive theirhopes of winning Europe's top clubcompetition for the first time.

It could be a momentous week forJuventus.

Massimiliano Allegri's side has achance to return to the ChampionsLeague final and clinch an unprece-dented sixth Serie A title.

"First we have to recover some

energy and then we will focus onMonaco," Allegri said after Juventus' 1-1 draw against Torino, which still leftthe club in position to secure the titlewhen it visits second-place Roma fivedays after the game against Monaco.

"Passing the round is not a given,"he said. "Roma comes after."

Allegri had the luxury of restingseveral of his key players in the derbymatch and Juventus struggled at timesagainst Torino despite playing with a

numerical advantage for more than halfan hour. The Bianconeri needed a stop-page-time equalizer from substituteGonzalo Higuain as they missedextending their league record to 34 suc-cessive home wins.

Juventus will again look to Higuainto lead its attack on Tuesday againstMonaco, especially after the Argentinaforward ended his negative streak withboth goals in the first leg. Higuain had-n't previously scored in a Champions

League knockout match since 2013.Monaco needs just one more goal

to reach 150 for the season but at leasttwo to have a chance of reaching thefinal.

"We have to be confident againstJuventus, even though it's going to bevery difficult," coach Leonardo Jardimsaid. "We must keep playing goodfootball the way we know. If we scoreearly on, maybe that can change things."

Jardim will be hoping 18-year-oldstriker Kylian Mbappe and top scorerRadamel Falcao do better than in thefirst leg, when both missed goodchances to score against GianluigiBuffon.

In order to keep Mbappe as freshas possible for the return match, Jardimnamed him as a substitute away toNancy on Saturday, when Monacowon 3-0 for a club-record ninth straightleague win. Monaco moved closer tothe French title and reached 149 goalsin all competitions this season: Theideal confidence-booster before facingJuventus.

Mbappe only played 10 minuteslate on against Nancy, but still hadenough time to set up the third goal,while Falcao saved some valuable ener-gy for Tuesday by coming off about 15minutes from the end.

AP n MADRID

While Rafael Nadal continuesto thrive, Novak Djokovic

and Andy Murray are just tryingto get back in form.

The top-ranked Murray andthe second-ranked Djokovicarrive for the Madrid Openlooking to regain their confi-dence after lackluster starts totheir seasons, hoping to findtheir best game in time for theFrench Open later this month.

Nadal has won two straighttitles on clay, while Murray andDjokovic have struggled on thesurface so far.

For defending Madrid Openchampion Djokovic, the tourna-ment in Spain will also give hima chance to test his game afterparting ways with longtimecoach Marian Vajda last week.

"When you start losing morematches, you start questioningyour game, yourself, what you'redoing wrong so you can rectifythat and get better, turn the tablesaround," Djokovic said Sunday."I've been very fortunate to expe-

rience the upwards direction ofmy career ever since I've started.This is now a different directiona little bit. In the last six months,I haven't had too many of greatresults. That's why, you know, I'vefelt like I needed some changesand I needed to approach thingsmaybe a little bit differently."

"At the beginning of theclay season, it's always a bittrickier for me than the othersurfaces just because the move-ment isn't as natural on this sur-face for me as it is on the hardcourts and the grass courts,"Murray said.

AP n MADRID

Pro Kabaddi gets bigger andbetter with an increase in

the number of teams andmatches for the upcomingfifth season to be held in July.

More than 130 matcheswill be held in the new season,compared to the 60 from theseason 4. The newly renamedVivo Pro Kabaddi has eightteams — Delhi, Mumbai, PuneBengaluru, Kolkata,Hyderabad/ Visakhapatnam,Jaipur, and Patna — and willhave four more teams in theupcoming season, taking thetotal tally to 12 teams. However,the name or cities of the newteams are yet to be announced.

The announcement wasmade by the managing direc-tor of Star India Sanjay Guptahere on Monday with the pur-pose on increasing the geo-graphical representation of thetournament.

"In the fifth season of ProKabaddi League, we are goingto expand to new geographiesand bring new teams," SanjayGupta said. "We want fans

from different regions to bemore involved in the game.The number of matches willalso grow from 60 to morethan 130," he added.

As the emphasis is oninvolving regional fans more,Star has also focused onincreasing the number of lan-guages it is broadcasted in. Sofar it is telecasted in five lan-guages — Hindi, Telugu,Kannada and Marathi.

"We plan to add one moreregional language option forviewers in the new season. Likeany other sports, if the Kabaddimatches are broadcasted in

viewers' mother tongue, thedesire to follow the gameincreases. For instance, ratingof Kabaddi matches in Andhrawere close to that of cricketmatches in the region as view-ership increased due to telecastin Telugu," elaborated the man-aging director at an eventwhen Pro Kabaddi signed onVIVO as the title sponsor forfive years.

Also present at the cere-mony were Pro Kabaddi starsAnup Kumar and RahulChaudhari, along with formerAustralian cricketers Brett Leeand Matthew Hayden.

AP n MANCHESTER

Manchester United might finish the season withtwo trophies, a place in the Champions

League and a genuine sense that the club's old aurais slowly being restored.

Not a bad start to the Jose Mourinho era, manywill say. Still, there are some sights that would trou-ble even the most ardent of United fans.

First is the obvious one: the league standings.United is in fifth place — it could be sixth comeWednesday evening — with two weeks of the sea-son left, and the team is likely to finish outside thetop four for the third time in the past four years.

Another is a glance at the team's away recordagainst its biggest rivals. United hasn't scored a goalin five away matches against teams in the top sixthis season, including the loss to Chelsea in the FACup. Then, there are recent examples of Mourinho'scautious approach: Playing with 10 men behind theball for the entire second half in the Manchesterderby last month.

Or attacking midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryantaking over throw-in duties from Matteo Darmian

against Arsenal on Sunday so the left back couldreturn to the defensive line. Mkhitaryan, the play-er of the year in Germany last season with his flairand vision, virtually played as a wing back atEmirates Stadium, as did playmaker Juan Mata onthe right flank.

This was hardly the boldness that marked outUnited under Alex Ferguson.

Monday marked four years since Fergusonannounced his retirement after almost 27 years incharge at Old Trafford, and, after the forgettabletenures of David Moyes and Louis van Gaal, Unitedfinally has a manager of Ferguson's gravitas inMourinho.

Like Ferguson, Mourinho is a winner — cap-turing the League Cup in February and potential-ly the Europa League in two weeks is testament tothat — but will Mourinho ever recreate theswashbuckling sides of the Ferguson era?

After 25 games and nearly 200 days, United'slongest unbeaten run in a single season is over fol-lowing the 2-0 loss at Arsenal.

Rohit recalled to Indian squad

Fit-again Sharma & Shami returns, while Pant & Raina on standby for Champions Trophy squad

SOME OF THE OTHER NAMES THAT WEREDISCUSSED SERIOUSLY WERE KEEPER-

BATSMEN RISHABH PANT, DINESH KARTHIK,SHARDUL THAKUR AND SURESH RAINA. ALONG WITH KULDEEP, THESE FOUR ARE

ALSO ON THE STANDBY LIST

United give upon league ascaution backfires

Juve on verge of reaching UCL Final

Pro Kabaddi to have 4 new teams Djoker, Murray try toregain form in Madrid

MD, Star India, Sanjay Gupta (3rd from right) with former Australian players BrettLee (2nd right) and Matthew Hayden in New Delhi on Monday PTI

LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9, 2017

15

I'm very surprised. Definitelywasn't expecting something

like this— KKR’s Sunil Narine

on scoring the joint-fastestIPL fifty in 15 balls

4s

6s 577

boundarymeter

1283

CRUNCHGAMET O D A Y I N A C T I O N

QUOTEUNQUOTE

PTI n HYDERABAD

Putting up a dominant show, defend-ing champions Sunrisers

Hyderabad spanked table-toppersMumbai Indians by seven wickets inan IPL match to consolidate theirfourth position in the table, here onMonday night. Asked to bowl first,Hyderabad bowlers delivered in thecrucial match, restricting the rivals toa modest 138 for seven, which was builtaround skipper Rohit Sharma’s fight-ing 67-run knock off 45 balls.

Paceman Siddarth Kaul took threewickets while the Afghanistan spin duoof Rashid Khan (1/22) andMohammed Nabi (1/13) choked theMumbai batsmen with impeccable

line and length. Together they con-ceded only 35 runs in eight overs.

The total proved too small for thedefending champions as they over-hauled the target with 10 balls to spareas opener Shikhar Dhawan (62) led theway with an unbeaten half-century.

Hyderabad remained at fourthposition but now have 15 points, fivemore than closest rival Kings XIPunjab. One more win, taking theirtally to 17, will seal them a berth in thePlay-offs because even if Punjab wintheir remaining three matches they canget maximum to 16 points.

Hyderabad lost their captain DavidWarner (6) early when he was trappedby Mitchell McClenaghan but Dhawanand Moises Henriques (44) took the

match away from Mumbai with theirfiery knocks.

They added 91 runs for the secondwicket in 11 overs before JaspritBumrah dismissed the Australian inthe 13th over. In the previous overHenriques was dropped by HarbhajanSingh off his own bowling.

Mumbai boasted an impressiveMumbai attack but Dhawan andHenriques batted with determination.

Dhawan’s 62 came off 46 balls withsix boundaries, including two sixeswhile Henriques’ 44 came off 35 ballswith six fours.

Dhawan finished the match in thecompany of Vijay Shankar (15) aftercheap dismissal of Yuvraj Singh (9).

Earlier, the Mumbai Indians skip-

per added 60 runs for the fourth wick-et Hardik Pandya (15) but Hyderabadbowlers never allowed the rivals toscore freely with Siddarth Kaul (3/24)hurting them with an impressive three-wicket haul. The hosts kept theMumbai batsmen on a tight leash, giv-ing away only 36 runs in the Power-play overs and also got rid of big-hit-ting Lendl Simmons (1) and NitishRana.

Nabi, preferred over KaneWilliamson, struck with his fourth ball,clean bowling the West Indian whilepaceman Kaul scalped Rana (9).

Parthiv Patel (23) was dropped byVijay Shankar immediately after Rana’sdismissal but the southpaw could notcash in on and soon became the sec-

ond victim of Kaul to leave Mumbaireeling at 36 for three.

Hyderabad dried up the runs withthe table-toppers managing only 59runs at the half-way mark but Rohitand Pandya were still there.

Nabi completed his quota of oversin one go and conceded only 13 runs,playing his part in choking Mumbai.Warner smartly used all his fivebowlers. After opening the attack withBhuvneshwar he brought the pacemanback only in the 13th over.

Rohit and Pandya though kept thescoreboard ticking with singles andalso found odd boundary in between.They added 60 runs for the fourthwicket before Rashid separated themby dismissing Pandya.

PTI n MOHALI

Veteran South African player Hashim Amlafeels that the IPL has become a lot more

accommodating for 'orthodox' batsmen like himand says that one can score big runs in T20 for-mat with proper cricketing shots.

Kings XI Punjab opener Amla hit a brilliant104 off just 60 balls, which was studded with fivesixes and eight fours, though fora losing cause as his side lost toGujarat Lions by six wickets hereon Sunday.

As his wont, Amla, a Test-mould player, mostly stuck totraditional cricketing shots toscore the ton. This was hissecond century for KXIPthis season, the previousone being against MumbaiIndians.

When told that manythink T20 cricket is allabout hitting fours and sixesalmost every ball, Amla saidthe format forced every play-er to get a way out to "max-imise each ball".

"Everybody who playsT20 cricket has to find a wayof how to maximise eachball they faces. You willfind many examples ofbetter cricketers whohave been successful inT20 cricket withoutnecessarily looking agri-cultural, as they say.They have played goodcricketing shots and man-aged to get runs," Amlasaid at the post-matchpress conference.

The 34-year-old veteran of 104 Tests, whohas a triple ton to his credit, said every now andthen when a batsman, who is not known for lustyhitting, scores big in T20 cricket, such talks cropup. "So, I think over the ten years of IPL and T20cricket around the world, I know it comes upevery time someone who has got his runs whois not known or is not a massive six hitter. Butthis has been happening for many years now. Ithink guys are becoming a lot more accommo-dating for players like that," Amla said.

PTI n MOHALI

Their IPL play-off hopes severely dented,Kings XI Punjab captain Glenn Maxwell

termed the six- wicket defeat against GujaratLions today as "pretty devastating".

Maxwell put the blame of the defeat on theteam's horrendous fielding effort, saying thedropped catches hurt the team badly.

"Pretty devastating," Maxwell said after theloss.

"189 was enough, the bowlers and field-ers let us down. We dropped three crucialcatches. We haven't won a heap of games ina row. We've had to scrap. Unfortunately, we'lllose Hashim and David Miller now, and we'llhave to look deep in our reserves and

regroup," he added.Winning skipper Suresh Raina said

the win is a big morale booster for theyoungsters of the team what if theyhave already crashed out of the play-

off race."We had too many injuries (this

year). (But) still a good season for the young-sters," he said.

He lauded openers Dwayne Smith andIshan Kishan for setting the platform for thecomfortable win.

"Smithy (Smith) and Ishan gave us theplatform and later on me and DK (DineshKarthi) had a good partnership. I think it wasabout six-over partnerships.

"Sandy (Sandeep Sharma) and Mohit(Sharma) bowled brilliantly in between, butme and DK rotated the strike really well.When you're chasing 190, you need a goodstart, and that's what we've had in the last cou-ple of matches," he said.

Man-of-the-match, Smith, who struck awhirlwind 74 up the order, said overall he wasdisappointed with his performances this sea-son.

"(I's) still disappointed about my perfor-mances over the past games. I think my nat-ural game is like that, it was just about stay-ing out there as long as possible, and if I dothat we'll stay in front of the run rate," he said.

"I knew once I stay out there, runs willcome for sure. We're already out of the tour-nament, so we can't worry about that, we justneed to keep going on and look to damagesome other teams as well," Smith signed off.

IANS n BENGALURU

Royal Challengers Bangalore'sTravis Head admitted that it

has been the worst IndianPremier League (IPL) season forthe southern outfit after theysuffered their 10th loss in 13matches with a six-wicket defeatto Kolkata Knight Riders here onSunday.

RCB, who have reached thefinal three times since IPL'sinception in 2008, are rock-bot-tom in the points table with justtwo wins from 13 games and hav-ing mamaged five points.

"Result-wise, this is probablythe worst season. It is disap-pointing result," he said.

Head, who top-scored forthe hosts with an unbeaten 75made it clear that the side had agreat bonding.

"Nothing has changed off the

field since last season. We stillenjoy as an unit. But it hasn'tgelled well on the field. It happensin T20 cricket. You can't get backthe momentum back once things

go bad," he said.KKR's Chris Lynn, Head said,

has been the most powerful hit-ter this season. "He has a reputa-tion of being a big hitter in Big

Bash League too. In IPL, he's donethe same. He is an unbelievablehitter of the ball," he said, addingthat Lynn and Sunil Narine putthe pressure back on RCB in sixovers.

"They took advantage of thenew ball," he said.

Head said KKR took advan-tage of the new hard ball and tookthe game away from them in thefirst six overs.

"They just took advantage ofthe new hard ball. They had it inthe first six. They put pressureback on us," he pointed out.

KKR made the play-offs withthe win and will play Kings XIPunjab on Tuesday before endingleague engagements at the EdenGardens on May 13 againstMumbai Indians who are top ofthe table and have already qual-ified for the knockout stages ofthe competition.

PTI n MOHALI

Aplay-offs spot havingsealed after a resounding

victory in their previousmatch, Kolkata KnightRiders would aim for a top-two finish with a win whenthey take on an inconsistentKings XI Punjab in an IPLmatch here on Tuesday.

KKR bounced backfrom their back-to-backdefeats when they registeredan easy six-wicket win overRoyal Challengers Bangalorein Bengaluru on Sunday.

The Gautam Gambhir-led side are now at secondspot in the league table with16 points from 12 matcheswith the help of eight winsand they would look to con-solidate their position witha win over Kings XI, who suffered a six-wicket defeat toGujarat Lions on Sunday.

Chasing a modest 159 for victory on Sunday, KKRmade it easy, racing to 105 for no loss in just six overs, fora record IPL powerplay total. They achieved the target with29 balls to spare on the back of Sunil Narine's (54 off 17balls) record joint fastest IPL fifty — from 15 balls — andan equally aggressive knock from Chris Lynn (50 off 22balls).

Narine has come out as an opener in nine matches outof KKR's 12 so far and he has scored 194 runs.

Umesh Yadav, Chris Woakes and Narine will be themain bowlers on whom KKR will mainly bank upon withAnkit Rajpoot and Piyush Chawla also having the abilityto support them.

Glenn Maxwell-led KXIP, on the other hand, have aslender chance to make it to the play-offs as they have onlyfive wins from 11 matches and are placed at the fifth spotwith 10 points.

They now need to win all their remaining three match-es if they have to have any chance of making it to the knock-out stage.

KXIP's South African import Hashim Amla has beentheir main batsmen with 400-plus runs, which includes twocenturies — against Mumbai Indians and Gujarat Lions.

AFP n LONDON

England coach Trevor Baylissadmitted he faced some

difficult selection decisionsahead of next month'sChampions Trophy after thetournament hosts launchedtheir preparations with a 2-0series win at home to Ireland.

Test wicket-keeper JonnyBairstow, deployed as a spe-cialist batsman, made a blis-tering 72 not out as Englandbeat Ireland by 85 runs in thesecond one-day international atLord's on Sunday.

England were in danger offalling short of 300 untilBairstow, ably assisted byYorkshire colleague AdilRashid (39) led a charge thatsaw 61 runs scored in the finalfour overs of an eventual totalof 328 for six.

Sam Billings took thegloves in both Sunday's matchand England's seven-wicketwin over Ireland in Bristol onFriday in place of Jos Buttler,one of several England white-ball 'regulars' who missed theseries because of their IndianPremier League commitments.

But Buttler, along with all-rounders Ben Stokes and ChrisWoakes will be back from theIPL when England continue

their Champions Trophy build-up with a three-match cam-paign at home to South Africalater this month.

"We know there are stern-er tests coming up, with SouthAfrica in a couple of weeks'time and then the ChampionsTrophy coming up after that,but we have won well and wecan't do anything more thanthat," Bayliss told Sky Sports.

"I think there's probablynot a lot between the threekeepers but the amount ofruns Jonny scores, it'd be hardto leave him out," saidAustralian coach Bayliss.

"Every time we give him ago, he gets the job done for us."

Meanwhile Bairstow toldreporters: "I'm pleased with theway I'm striking the ball andmoving at the crease, and theby-product is the runs youscore." And he made it clear hewanted to get into theChampions Trophy team, withEngland bidding to win theirfirst major ODI tournament.

"It's something I've beentargeting -- I want to be a partof every England side goingforward," said Bairstow.

"We have a heck of a lot oftalent in the group, but if I putin the performances then whoknows?"

KKR seek top-2 finishin clash against KXIP

H’BAD CONSOLIDATE 4TH SPOT

SRH play like champions to dominate Mumbai Indians

S T A T P I C K

38GAUTAMGAMBHIR NEEDSJUST 38 RUNS TO

BECOME THE FIRSTBATSMAN FROM KOLKATAKNIGHT RIDERS TOCOMPLETE 3000 RUNS INIPL. THE KKR SKIPPERHAS SCORED 2962 RUNSIN 104 MATCHES SINCE2011 FAISEL FEATURES

Live on Sony Six

MOHALI

KXIP vs KKR

HEADTO

HEADM 20

KXIP 14

KKR 6TUESDAY | 8:00 PM

‘Everyone has tomaximise each ball’

‘Loss against Gujarat is devastating’

‘This has been our worst season’

Bairstow tough to

leave out: Bayliss

KOURTNEY KARDASHIAN thinksScott Disick disrespected her byflying another woman out to CostaRica during a family vacation.“Scott and I are living our own

lives, but we're herewith our kids. We'rehere to just be afamily and I don'tunderstand why he

would even thinkto invitesomebody. It'shurtful anddisrespectful,”she said.Kourtney, who isreported to bedating YounesBendjima, alsoruled out the

possibility ofrekindling her romance

with Disick. “I really don'tthink I could get backtogether with him. Mykids deserve someonewith more moralcharacteristics.”

The opening show of the AsianDesigner Week was presented byRinku Sobti. The designerbrought in a Global Age Ikat thatredefines the unparalleled beautyalong with the pure cottonweaves of Mangalagiri. GAUHAR KHAN, walked the rampfor Sobti. “Its pleasure to walk forRinku again, she is doing asplendid work to promote ourIndian crafts. Today when we arerunning after western fashion thiscollection has everything. It hasthe Indian touch along withwestern silhouette,” said Gauhar.

‘Nobodyshould playa characterto make itlikeable.You neverknow whichone will beliked by the

audience. As an actor,my job is tocommunicate thecharacter as thedirector thought of andput it down on paper.That's how I look at it.—RATNA PATHAKSHAH

Kourtney felt‘disrespected'

LUCKNOW | TUESDAY | MAY 9, 2017vivacity 16

Grammy Award winning singerJUSTIN BIEBER will be inconversation with celebratedfilmmaker Karan Johar on hisshow Koffee With Karan,says a source.Bieber is set to visit Indiafor the first time for his JioJustin Bieber PurposeTour. Koffee withKaran hascompleted fiveseasons. He will becelebrating seasonsix by unveiling itwith Bieber.“This will be the firsttime an internationalcelebrity of Bieber'scalibre will befeaturing in anIndian chat showformat. He willdefinitely do full justiceto this one-on-oneexchange if Bieberactually does decide toreserve a time slot forit in his busyschedule,” said asource.

Justin Bieber toappear on KWK

Momma.” “How middleclass!” “Aila!” If you

answered Sarabhai vs Sarabhaiin a blink, then you are a partof the legions of fans that isawaiting the second season ofthe show, with baited birth.While popular shows do havesecond seasons, what makesthis one exceptional is that it isback on air after a decade.

Though JD Majethia madeus laugh through his acting anddirection, it is perhaps as pro-ducer of the serial that he is bestknown for. He explains the rea-

son why it took time for theshow to come back on air. Hesays, “Coming back after adecade is not at all easy but themost challenging part was toget dates from entire cast asthey had their own commit-ments and schedules.Recreation is always a toughjob and to re-create the contentwhich people loved for somany years is very difficult asyou have to improve upon thestandards of previous season.”He was also heartened to seethat the entire cast performing

the same way that they did inthe first season.

Majethia is sure about onething – the Indian audience isfundamentalist. “Indian fansare fundamentalist. If theydon’t like you, you are gone. Butif they like you, they will neverforget you, which is what hap-pened with Sarabhai vsSarabhai. We always wanted tobring the show back but wewere scared if we will be ableto create the magic again.

Describing the inceptionof the iconic show, Majethia

recalls, “We started makingcomedies with Khichdi butdidn’t want to get stuck with aparticular image. We wanted totry something which would beabsolutely opposite of Khichdiand that’s how the storyline ofSarabhai vs Sarabhai took root.”

However, the surprisingpart was that initially the showwas a flop. It was only when itwas re telecast that it became ahit. And yes, the re-telecastcontinued for a good seven-eight years! If that is not a goodgauge of the kind of followingthe show commanded, what is?

The serial outlined thestory of the Sarabhais, a dys-functional upper-class family inMumbai with a middle-classdaughter-in-law, MonishaSarabhai. “What really clickedfor the show was that everycharacter brought in a differentkind of humour to the screen.Their acting was on point, andthe Indian audience instantlyconnected with the family.”

The new season by thelooks of the teaser, looks aspromising if not more from itsearlier season. The show willalso feature some new charac-ters. While the original cast ofRatna Pathak Shah, SatishShah, Sumeet Raghavan, RupaliGanguly and Rajesh Kumarremain, additions includeAishwarya Sakhuja andUrvashi Upadyay. “In order tospice up the sitcom, there willbe three additions to theSarabhai family which includeSahil and Monisha’s son, Sahil’ssister and our favourite poetRoshesh’s fiancé,” said Majethia.

However, Majethia doesnot want to have a long run forthis season, He said, “When wedid 70 episodes of season one,it stopped for a long time sothis time let’s not be greedy andenjoy the show in small bits.There will be more seasonsdepending on the responsefrom the audience.”

Sarabhai vs Sarabhai Take2 will be launched on digitalplatform. According to Majethia,“Digital medium is the strongestplatform today. Today 80 millionpeople have shifted to digitalplatform for comedy. Our showis starting from May 16 and willbe telecast every Tuesday. EveryFriday we also have a gig basedon each character of the Sarabhaifamily.”

The fans sure can’t waitany more.

Scene 1: On the sets of a popular real-ity show, a four-year-old asks asinger-judge, herself a product of a

talent hunt, to marry him. He is tryingto be all cutesy while the parents look onindulgently.

Scene 2: On another reality show afive-year-old gyrates to a popular itemnumber. Adequate doses of pelvic thrustsand suggestive gestures are a part of theperformance. Neither the audience, northe judges, not even the parents bat aneyelid.

Scene 3: Just after stupendous per-formance, the child narrates a sob storyof a tough life, where sometimes twomeals were hard to come by. There is nota single dry eye on the programme’s setas well as behind the TV set.

But what is the backstory? They areall being made to perform to a script tai-lormade to ratchet up TRPs. In theprocess they are setting the template fora mad competitive rush to TV showsbased on songs, dances and unusual acts,turning them into performing monkeyswho will fetch a commercial price earlyon, something that even a start-up can-not. And the success of one fuels theambitions of a hundred, leading to a spurtin coaching academies by ex-contestantswho are grooming hundreds for makingit to contest shortlists.

Reality shows on TV for children arenow overarching superhero stories at the

cost of innocence. On one, children canbe seen dancing to the latest number, onanother rendering a difficult raag and onanother whipping up a seven-coursemeal. Many see reality shows as a pass-port to fulfill Bollywood dreams. Butscratch the sparkly and glamorous sur-face of Indian Idol, Sa Re Ga Ma Pa LilChamps or Dance India Dance whichshowcase the talents of a child andinstances of sexist jokes, children madeto act older than their age and attemptsto swing the TRPs with sentimental sto-ries abound.

“As far as healthy competition is con-cerned, these platforms bring a child faceto face to his fears and audacities.However, in the long run, it seems toseverely damage the psyche of the chil-dren competing against each other. Abusiness to hoard money and major con-cern for TRPs, the children are objecti-fied in the most degrading way possible.Applying makeup, faking tears, inappro-priate comments at an age which requiresthem to be above the concerns of appear-ances,” said Seema Choudhary, child psy-chologist.

The smiling faces of the judges, thesexist jokes of the anchors and theapplause of the seated audience are allconsidered a part and parcel of the real-ity shows. It is also widely accepted thatthe child is not there to just sing anddance but to also act out a part. Not many

people realise that these reality shows arescripted and directed to suit the emotion-al range of the Indian audience.

Flirting with the female judges isanother given – with the child spoutinglines that have been memorised. He/sheis too young to know what it means actu-ally. Dig deeper and one also realises thatthings do not appear as they appearonscreen. He/she is asked to narrate anemotional story after his performanceand cry if need be. A child crying oversomething that happened in his/her past

is a sure shot selling point.Controversies with other chil-

dren on the show and viewingthem as their competitors isanother sure way to ensure that

TRPs hit the roof.Psychologists apprehend that this

will lead to disturbing behaviour intheir adulthood. A child psychologist,Tanushree Bhargava, said, “A child’smind is still in the developing phase andwhen you uproot a child from a pre-dictable lifestyle and place him/her in ahighly competitive environment, it is like-ly to result in the emotional instability inlater years.” She further added, “Exposureto such forced competition for fame ishazardous to the child’s attitude andbehaviour. This is actually the time tobefriend peers. But imposed stardom cutshim/her off from his/her ecosystem.”Parents need to be more careful about thelimits of their wards.

However, more than the channel orthe children and the judges, the onus restson the parents. For after all, it is nothingbut an attempt to make a quick buck ontheir part. In this rampant money-mak-ing, the parents at times forget that theirchild is human. They do not realise thatpushed to their limits and forced to com-pete against their peers can have a neg-ative impact on the child’s psyche.

The high expectations of the par-ents, and often a failure to fulfill themcan result in an inferiority complex, lowself-esteem and a sense of failure earlyin life. For children, it can be tough tojuggle reality TV shows with their nor-mal activities in daily routine. However,a creative content head of a kids realityshow requesting anonymity said, “Theseshows are an opportunity for the childto develop their personalities and talents.They are exposed to the camera and arebetter-equipped to handle the pressureof the spotlight. The child gets a senseof achievement and a boost of confi-

dence tostand up and per-

form on stage.” She alsodenies that there is a

danger of harming themental health of a child and

says that there are adequate safeguardsin place. She said, “We have counsellorsand psychologists on board who mon-itor the children. They have their ownschedules to follow, where they gettime to study and play as well.” She alsoassures that though there is competitionon these shows, it is only of the healthykind. And rather than stiff competition,the shows serve as an inspiration wherechildren after seeing other kids their ageperform are inspired to become likethem.

But what many people forget is thatthere is a thin line between healthy andforced competition. Pradeep Adwani’sInstitute for Performing Arts (PAIPA) isa south Delhi-based academy for train-ing talented children to sing and danceto help them get selected for reality shows.Rajiv believes that the spirit to participateand compete has improved thanks tothese shows. But he agrees that there arepitfalls too. He says, “Children havebecome competitive to a point where itcan no longer be called healthy. Morethan the children, their parents scavengeoff their children and compare them toothers. They push them to their limits andsometimes beyond that too.” Not surpris-ingly, this kind of behaviour leads to anunnecessary pressure on children whichmight lead to a vulnerable state of mind.

Educationist Umesh Pathak assertsthat the onus rests not just on the par-ents but on the channels as well. “Realityshows are made for masses. So the moralresponsibility of what is shown shouldbe of the producers of these shows. Theyshould promote talent rather than cheapnegative stuff because children follow-ing these shows have a misconceptionthat if they do such things they will alsobecome a reality show star.”

Till the time the channels, produc-ers of the programmes and parentsrealise this, it is only the children whowill bear the brunt of their parentalambitions.

The acclaimed textile revivalistand self taught fashion design-

er of signature handwoven sarees,Gaurang Shah, extends his uniquestyle to celebrate the art of dupattawith Dupatta Festival

Innovative draping styles havemade the dupatta move away fromits strong Indian roots to be a partof West-inspired contemporary sil-houettes.

A dupatta is one of the mostversatile garment that can be pairedand styled as per ones persona. Onecould go fusion, traditional, dress itup or dress it down. It is perfect foran office conference or a cocktailparty.

“Handwoven dupattas havebecome a staple in a woman’swardrobe. For a day out, at work ora casual look one can pair dupattaswith tops, kurtas, crop tops and playwith drapes to make it fusion,” saysShah.

“Handwoven dupattas havebecome a staple in a woman’swardrobe. A Maheshwari printeddupatta, a patan patola, a kota, khadijamdani, paithani, kanjeevaram,chikankari, parsigara, kalamkariare some of the handwoven dupat-tas that are in trend,” he added.

The designer feels that duppa-ta is perfect for any occasion.“Fora day out, at work or a casual look,one can pair dupattas with tops,kurtas, crop tops and play withdrapes to make it fusion,” he said.

Some of the range that Shah has

created for the festival are PatanPatola, Khadi Jamdani, Kota,Benarasi, Paithani, Kanjeevaramand Maheswari.

Photo: Pankaj Kumar

F R E E - F L O W I N G F A S H I O N

‘EXPOSURE TO SUCHFORCED COMPETITION

FOR FAME ISHAZARDOUS TO THE

CHILD'S ATTITUDE ANDBEHAVIOUR. THIS IS

ACTUALLY THE TIME TOBEFRIEND PEERS. BUTIMPOSED STARDOMCUTS HIM/HER OFF

FROM HIS/HERECOSYSTEM’

In the name of showcasing talented children, television programming hasyoung actors put on adult roles under the guise of cuteness, blurring theline between precocious and inappropriate. By SIDDHARTH CHOUDHARY

INNOCENCE

LOSTLOST

‘Indian audience is

fundamentalist’

It is this fanaticism that has brought back thebeloved Sarabhai Vs Sarabhai family to the screenafter 10 years. JD MAJETHIA, producer of theshow gets chatty with VAIBHAV RATRA

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