PNS n VIJAYAWADA

Playing the roles of both thegood cop and the bad cop, JanaSena chief Pawan Kalyan onThursday praised and criti-cised Chief Minister YSJaganmohan Reddy in thesame breath.

The Jana Sena chief notonly advised Jagan to rethinkon his decision to have threecapitals for the state, but alsocome to the rescue of thefarmers of Amaravati, evenwhile praising the ChiefMinister for his handling of theCoronavirus pandemic.

Commenting on the allegedatrocities against Dalits in AP,Pawan said that series of eventsagainst a community weredisheartening. “It’s quite dis-tressing that these incidents aretaking at a time a leader from

the community is the stateHome Minister. The Jagangovernment has failed to pro-tect the weaker sections,” theactor-politician said. “Thefarmers of Amaravati have mycomplete support,” he said.

Pawan Kalyan also foundfault with formerchief minister NChandrababuNaidu fora c q u i r i n g33,000 acres ofl a n d .

“Naidu should have listened toModi on the capital where thePM asked to build a capital likeGandhinagar in 2,000 to 3,000acres,” he said.

“While I welcome the num-ber of tests being carried out bythe AP goverment, the pan-demic should have been han-dled better. Unfortunately, thefacilities and infrastructure forCovid patients in AP is notgood,” the Jana Sena chiefsaid.

Pawan Kalyan said that hewas on Chaturmasa deek-

sha where he eats onlyone meal a day andsleeps on the floor. Hesaid that this deekshawill continue throughKarthika Masam andhe was doing it forthe wellbeing ofhumanity.

{

PNS n VIJAYAWADA

A staggering 7,998 freshCovid-19 cases and 61 casu-alties were added in a day inAndhra Pradesh on Thursday,taking the death toll to 884,according to the latest bul-letin.

Andhra Pradesh alsorecorded the second highestnumber of Covid-19 cases inIndia, next only toMaharashtra.

East Godavari is now theCovid hotspot of the state asthe contagion has beenspreading at a rapid pace overthe past week in particular.The district has recorded thehighest number of cases andcrossed the 10,000 mark(10,038), out of the total72,711 positive cases report-ed till July 23 in the state.

East Godavari also saw 14Covid-19 deaths, the singlelargest number in a district ina day so far.

In the last 24 hours, 5,428Covid-19 patients were dis-charged from hospitals afterthey got cured, the bulletinsaid.

According to East Godavaridistrict Collector MuralidharReddy the surge in the districtwas expected around August25, but the cases surged ear-lier than surmised. He advisedpeople not to panic, butinstead be aware and followCovid-19 guidelines.

Officials said that increasedtesting has led to detection ofmore cases. The district isnow conducting about 5,000to 6,000 Covid-19 tests againstthe earlier 1,500 to 2,000samples a day. The privatehospitals have also startedoffering Covid-19 treatment.

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VIJAYAWADA DELHI LUCKNOW BHOPAL RAIPUR CHANDIGARH

BHUBANESWAR RANCHIDEHRADUN HYDERABAD

5

Monetisation by RBI has a cost: Rajan

8

Need of hour tojointly bear Covidburden: HP CM

4

UK welcomes effortsby India, China to de-escalate tensionin Ladakh

Current Weather ConditionsUpdated July 23, 2020 5:00 PM

ALMANAC

TODAY

Month & Paksham:

Shravana & Shukla Paksha

Panchangam

Tithi : Chaturthi: 02:33 pm

Nakshatram: Purva Phalguni:

04:02 pm

Time to Avoid: (Bad time to start

any important work)

Rahukalam: 10:46 am – 12:22 pm

Yamagandam: 03:35 pm – 05:11 pm

Varjyam: 10:43 pm – 12:12 am

Gulika: 07:33 am - 09:09 am

Good Time: (to start any important work)

Amritakalam: 10:05 am – 11:35 am

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WEATHERFFoorreeccaasstt:: CloudyTemp: 28/25Humidity: 92%Sunrise: 05.53 amSunset: 06.52 pm

Order issued for permanentcommission of women officers PNS n NEW DELHI

The Ministry of Defence hasissued an order for grant ofPermanent Commission towomen officers in the Army

In a landmark judgement, theapex court in February had direct-ed that all serving women officersrecruited under the Short ServiceCommission (SSC) scheme willhave to be considered forPermanent Commission.

PNS n AYODHYA

The proposed Ram temple inAyodhya will now be bigger andtaller in size. According toNikhil Sompura, an architectand son of C. Sompura, chiefarchitect of the temple, "Theearlier design was prepared in1988. Over 30 years havepassed... the footfall is likely toincrease. People are also veryenthusiastic about visiting thetemple. So, we thought its sizeshould be increased. As per therevised design, the height of thetemple has been increased from141-feet to 161-feet."

Sompura said that two man-daps have also been added tothe design and all pillars and thestones that were carved based

on the earlier design will still beused. Only two new 'mandaps'have been added.

The original design that wasprepared in 1988, mentioned itsheight as 141 feet which hasbeen raised to 161 foot tall.

The construction will beginafter a grand ground-breakingceremony on August 5 and forthis, invitations have also beensent to the Prime Minister'sOffice and other VIPs.

SpiceJet lifts1,500 Indianstudents fromKyrgyzstan PNS n NEW DELHI

SpiceJet on Thursday saidit will operate nine charterflights in association withbollywood actor SonuSood to repatriate over1,500 Indian students fromKyrgyzstan during the nexttwo months.

"SpiceJet operated thefirst charter flight fromBishkek (capital ofKyrgyzstan) to bring back135 students to theirhometown of Varanasitoday," the airline said in apress release.

State records 7,998 cases,61 casualties in 24 hoursl With over 10,000 infections, E Godavari now Covid hotbed in AP

Krishna Das gains inreshuffle of portfoliosPNS n VISAKHAPATNAM

The Andhra Pradesh Cabinetunderwent a minor reshuffle onThursday, after portfolios wereallocated to newly sworn-inministers Chelluboina SrinivasaVenugopala Krishna and DrSidiri Appalaraju.

Dharmana Krishna Das, whoearlier was Roads and Buildingsminister, was promoted asDeputy Chief Minister and allo-cated the Revenue, Registrationsand Stamps portfolio.

The Roads and Buildingsdepartment, which was earlierhandled by Krishna Das was

allocated to Shankar Narayana.Sidiri Appalaraju was allocat-

ed Animal Husbandry, DairyDevelopment and Fisheriesdepartment. The BC WelfareDepartment, which was earlierhandled by Shankar Narayana,was allocated to ChelluboyinaSrinivasa Venugopala Krishna.

Pilli Subhash Chandra Bose,who was the Minister ofRevenue, and MopideviVenkataramana, who was theMinister of Fisheries, AnimalHusbandry and Marketing, hadrecently resigned from theirposts after being elected to theRS.

Groom tests positive hours before marriagePNS n EAST GODAVARI

While it’s said that marriages aremade in heaven, nowadays, itappears that the time they aresolemnised is dependent onCoronavirus.

Playing havoc with his mar-riage plans, a 28- year-oldyouth tested positive for Covid-19 hours before his wedding athis hometown Kothapeta vil-lage in East Godavari district ofAndhra Pradesh.

The youth was supposed to

tie knot with his girlfriendfrom Villakaru village of EastGodavari district, but the

Coronavirus-induced lock-down forced them to wait forat least three months.

Finally, when they decided tobrave the virus and get marriedthis weekend, the pandemicmade its presence felt, onceagain. On Tuesday evening, thegroom complained of feverand headache and he under-went the Covid-19 test thenext day. When the familymembers of the groom weremaking all the arrangements forthe marriage, officials from the

medical and health officials onThursday stepped into thegroom's home and confirmedhis worst fears, that he has test-ed positive. Brushing aside hisprotes, they the groom to aquarantine centre atBommuluru.

The medical and health offi-cials are suspecting that theyouth, along with his familymembers went toRajahmundry for shopping andhe might have contracted thevirus there.

PNS nWASHINGTON

The Andhra Pradesh HighCourt, which has been hearinga batch of petitions opposingthe trifurcation of the statecapital, on Thursday admittedyet another petition whichargued that the location of thecapital city of the state comesunder the purview of theCentre.

Admitting the petition, theHigh Court sent notices to theCentral and State governments,directing them to file a counteraffidavit in this regard andadjourned the case to August 6for further hearing.

It observed that when a sit-uation is developing, there can’t

be piecemeal hearing and thatall the matters have to be takenup together.

The pagination of the courtbundle is not complete and thatthey will be adjourning the mat-ter by one week for the registryto paginate and the matters tobe heard on August 6 for thecompletion, the bench hearingthe petition said.

Humaningenuity willfind solutionto Covid: Guv

Amid rising Coronaviruscases, Governor

Biswabhusan Harichandanon Thursday said humaningenuity and capability ofinnovation and adaptationwould soon create a solutionto the Covid-19 pandemicmankind was now facing.

In a televised address to thepeople of the state on comple-tion of one year in office ofGovernor, Harichandannoted that the country waswitnessing a spurt in Covid-19 cases in spite of the bestefforts by the administra-tion.

It was a worldwide phe-nomenon that even coun-tries with advanced medicaland public health facilitieswere finding it difficult tocope with.

The Governor said boththe state and the Central gov-ernments were doing theirbest to contain the spread ofthe virus and providing treat-ment facilities to those infect-ed by the virus.

"The only mantra throughwhich the battle againstCovid-19 can be won appearsto be following the principleof 4Ts - Tracing, Tracking,Testing and Treating," heremarked. He advised peopleto remain at home as far aspossible and follow the guide-lines issued by the healthexperts as prevention wasthe best way to defeat thevirus.

Man tests positive, wifedenied entry into her homePNS n EAST GODAVARI

In yet another incident ofsocial boycott fearing theCovid spread, residentsof Alcot Gardensin Rajahmundrylocked thehouse of aw o m a nhealth work-er, andA u x i l i a r yN u r s i n gM i d w i f e r y(ANM) and pre-vented her fromentering her own home afterher husband tested positivefor Covid-19.

According to reports,Kalyani, working as ANM atnear Kadiyapulanka (SriGurulanka) area in EastGodavari district and she hasbeen staying in a rentedhouse in Rajahmundry.

Kalyani’s husband testedpositive for the Covid-19and he was referred to homequarantine. However, heopted to convalesce at the

Bommuru quarantine centrein East Godavari district.

Meanwhile, Y Rajeev,owner of the house, did not

allow Kalyani into thehome claiming that

she would spreadthe virus.Though shetested negativefor the virus,the houseowner didn’t

allow her tostay in the rent-

ed house.With this she went

to her own house at AlcotGardens. But the locals therelocked her house from out-side forcing the health work-er and her relative to spendthe night outside of herhouse while it was raining.

Though she dialled 100(police) and others, no onecame forward to rescue her.

A video of Kalyani urgingthe people to show human-ity went viral on social mediaplatforms.

Shankaracharya objects to‘Bhoomi Pujan Mahurat'

The Jyotishpeethadheeshwar and Dwarka

Shardapithadheeshwar,J a g a d g u r uShankaracharyaS w a m iSwaroopanandSaraswati hasquestioned the"muhurat" ofAugust 5 for layingthe foundation stone ofthe Ram temple.

The Shankaracharya saidgenerally good work is initi-

ated in the "Uttam Kaal" sec-tion of the Hindu calendar.

"The August 5 date falls inthe Dakshinayan

Bhadrapada monthof the Hindu calen-dar. August 5 is thesecond date ofKrishna Paksha. In

the scriptures, thebeginning of the con-

struction of the home/tem-ple in the Bhadrapada monthis prohibited," he said.

Ayodhya temple to get bigger, taller, more magnificent

HC notice to Centre,AP on 3-capital plea

Rethink 3-capital decision,Pawan Kalyan advises Jagan

FAKE NEWS: AMITABH BACHCHANDENIES REPORTS OF TESTING NEGATIVE

DOCTOR HELD FOR RAPE BID ONCORONA PATIENT IN UTTAR PRADESH

Agovernment doctor at Aligarh's Deen Dayal hospital was arrested onWednesday on charges of molesting and attempting to rape a 25-

year-old woman, who was recuperating in the isolation ward after beingtested positive for coronavirus. According to reports, Doctor TufailAhmad, 30, was booked and later arrested from a hotel where he hadquarantined himself after completing hisduty in the isolation ward. The victim saidin her complaint that Tufail visited thewomen's ward on Tuesday night andallegedly touched the private parts of thepatient on the pretext of examining her.

AFRICAN-ORIGIN SIDDI TRIBAL ELATEDON BECOMING K'TAKA LAWMAKER

GOVT MAKES E-INVOICING OF GST COMPULSORY FROM OCTOBER 1

Shantharam Budna Siddi, a 55-year-old African-origin Siddi tribal, iselated on being nominated as a Karnataka Legislative Council (MLC)

member by Governor Vajubhai Vala. Siddi is among 5 personsnominated on Wednesday to the upper house to fill vacancies causedafter the term of the incumbents lapsed in the 75-memberlegislative council. The four others are former ministers A.H.Vishwanath and C.P. Yogeeshwar, academician Talwar Sabannaand BJP women's wing president Bharathi Shetty. "I amgrateful to the state government for giving our community avoice in the legislature and an opportunity to make lawsfor the benefit of all," said Siddi.

Megastar Amitabh Bachchan on Thursday dismissed reports that hehas tested negative for coronavirus and called the piece of news "an

incorrigible lie". The 77-year-old actor, who along with actor-sonAbhishek, was admitted to the isolation ward of NanavatiHospital here on July 11, was quick to rubbish stories thatstarted swirling on social media. "This news is incorrect,irresponsible, fake and an incorrigible lie!" wrote Amitabhon Twitter, tagging a video clip from a TV news channel.The reports emerged as the Bollywood veteran andAbhishek, 44, neared the completion of their 14-day quarantine period at the city hospital.

The government proposes to roll out compulsory e-invoicing of GST fromOctober 1, but has decided to raise the threshold to exempt smaller

entities from this compliance, an official said on Thursday. Accordingly, e-invoicing will be mandatory only for businesses with turnover of Rs 500crore or more. Those, on the other side of the threshold, will be exemptedfrom the compliance burden, for the time being. The threshold formandatory e-invoicing -- a step to improve taxcompliance — was earlier planned to be kept atRs 100 crore. But, the changes are now beingmade on the recommendations of an empoweredpanel of the GST Council.

3 3

3

3 3 3

33

total casas in East Godavari

active cases

recovered

cases

10,038

6,786

3,156total

deaths

96

Printed and published by B Krishna Prasad for and on behalf of CMYK Printech Ltd., Printed at Sree Seshasai Enterprises, D.No. New 3-88, Old 3-22, Chandra Theatre, Gosala, Penamaluru Mandal, Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh - 521 151, Resident Editor: B Krishna Prasad, AIR SURCHARGE of Rs 2.00.

Although every possible care and caution has been taken to avoid errors or omissions, this publication is being sold on the condition and understanding that information given in this publication is merely for reference and must not be taken as having authority of or binding in any way on the writers, editors, publishers, and printers and sellers who do not owe any responsibility for anydamage or loss to any person, a purchaser of this publication or not for the result of any action taken on the basis of this work. All disputes are subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of competent court and forums in Delhi/New Delhi only. Readers are advised and requested to verify and seek appropriate advice to satisfy themselves about the veracity of any kind of advertisement beforeresponding to any contents published in this newspaper. The printer, publisher, editor and any employee of the Pioneer Group's will not be held responsible for any kind of claim made by the advertisers of the products & services and shall not be made responsible for any kind of loss, consequences and further product-related damages on such advertisements.

VIJAYAWADA | FRIDAY | JULY 24, 2020 vijayawada 02

EGG RATES

` 52,200 (10 gm)

830

GOLD

` 62,000 (1kg)

` 3,050

HYDERABAD 340

VIJAYAWADA 376

VISAKHAPATNAM 400

RREETTAAIILL PPRRIICCEE `44..0000

SILVER

VIJAYAWADABULLION RATES

`//110000

CHICKEN RATES

Dressed/With Skin `177

Without Skin `201

Broiler at Farm `122

`//KKGG

(IN VIJAYAWADA)

REGULAR PATIENT FLOW DIPS

PNS n VISAKHAPATNAM

Most of the private hospitals,which were reluctant to sparebeds for Covid treatment, arenow changing their plans witha sharp decline in the flow ofpatients due to the pandemic.

Some hospitals, which acouple of months ago, hadless than 10 beds for treatingCovid-19 patients, are dedicat-ing an entire building, or sev-eral wings of their facilities tosuch cases. Officials of thehospitals said the change instand was prompted by a real-isation that they would now getonly a few patients with otherailments.

Earlier, the government hasasked private hospitals toincrease the number of beds.The hospitals were also askedto set up more satellite units forasymptomatic Covid patients,or those with mild symptoms.Officials of a number of privateseveral hospitals said they wereearlier reluctant to add beds forCovid treatment because theywere apprehensive that otherpatients would be scared away.

“Before Covid-19 struck, 60per cent of the indoor patientswould have planned admis-sions, coming through the out-patient department. The restwere emergency admissions.Now, there are barely anyplanned admissions,”Subramanyam, PRO of CareHospital in Ram Nagar, said.

“The hospital is trying toincrease 50 more beds dedicat-

ed to Covid treatment follow-ing the government’s request.”

Earlier in the week, DistrictCollector V Vinay Chand vis-ited Visakha Institute ofMedical Sciences (VIMS) andreviewed the situation withthe health officials. Keeping therising number of Coronaviruscases, he instructed officialsconcerned to make necessaryarrangements to improve thebed strength from 548 to 750and facilitate oxygen beds. Atthe CSR block, Vinay Chandinstructed officials to keepready 300 beds for occupation.

The special officer forCovid-19 of north CoastalAndhra Dr PV Sudhakar, said:“As cases are increasing, we willkeep more private hospitals onstandby. They should get readyto handle Covid-19 cases safe-ly.” Apart from free-of-costtreatment at designated Covidhospitals, health officials arealso planning to demarcate

hospitals for various strata ofsociety.

“There are some patients,who do not mind spendingmoney but insist on having asingle-occupancy cabin withtelevision and privacy. Forthem, corporate hospitals canbe roped in,” Dr Sudhakarinformed.

The district administrationis negotiating with a number ofprivate hospitals and, ifrequired, will either take overthe hospitals, or a few wings toaccommodate more patients. Ifthe government takes over thehospitals, the treatment isgoing to be free, as it comesunder the Arogyasri scheme.As of now only one, or two pri-vate hospitals have beenapproved by the governmentfor treatment in the district.

“Earlier, hospitals wereapprehensive about losing non-Covid patients. But over thepast few months, mostly Covid

patients are coming to getadmitted. So, hospitals areincreasing the number of bedsfor Covid treatment to remainviable, said Front Office man-ager of Pradhama Hospital.

“A large number of patientsdiagnosed with Covid are actu-ally patients, who came forother ailments. Such patientscome back for their proceduresafter recovering from Covidafter two weeks or so.Moreover, a few non-Covidpatients are not turning up forfear of contracting the virus,”said Venkatesh, manager-Critical Care Unit of SevenHills Hospital.

TDP to adopt rapesurvivor, Dalit minor girll Party will adopt and give education for the victim: NaiduPNS n VIJAYAWADA

The Telugu Desam Party(TDP) has announced Rs 2lakh financial assistance for theDalit minor girl, who fell vic-tim to kidnap and gang-rape inRajahmundry.

TDP National President andformer Chief Minister NChandrababu Naidu haspromised to adopt the 16-year-old girl and give her goodeducation on behalf of theparty. The TDP fact-findingcommittee consisting of for-mer ministers and MLAs hasreturned after a visit to thetown and submitted its report

to the party chief. The commit-tee called on the girl's familyand expressed its solidarity.

Naidu was moved when theleaders narrated to him aboutthe deteriorated condition of

the innocent girl. He immedi-ately announced the Rs 2 lakhcash assistance. As the girl hasstudied up to Class X, the TDPchief announced that theirparty would take care of herfuture education. There was astrong need to instill confi-dence in the girl.

Naidu asked the party lead-ers to agitate against suchatrocities and assure the vic-tims that the TDP would standlike a rock of support to themin their hour of need. Societyhas a responsibility to mouldthe hapless girl into a dutifulcitizen, who would carry onher fight against such injustice.

PNS n HYDERABAD

Health Minister Eatala Rajenderhas directed the authorities tofocus on equipping isolationcentres in all districts.

During a video conferencewith superintendents of hospi-tals and staff of the TelanganaVaidya Vidhana Parishad,Eatala asked officials to recruitor engage requisite personnel,including sanitation staff,patient care providers, lab tech-nicians, and nursing staff for theisolation centers.

Referring to the standards ofcare, the Minister said, “We arein talks with researchers aroundthe world to provide advancedtreatment information fromtime to time. Experts say thateven if the vaccine comes, itwould not be of much use; 99%of people do not need medica-

tions like Remdisivir or be puton ventilator. Timely use of anti-inflammatory drugs can savelives.”

The Minister said that DietContractors would be paidarrears shortly. Necessary san-itation staff, patient careproviders, lab technicians and

nursing staff would be hiredshortly. Oxygen cylinders wouldbe sent to all hospitals fromHyderabad, he said.

Reasoning that many peoplewere dying more "due to fear ofcorona" than from the compli-cations caused by the virus , theMinister called for redoubled

efforts to quickly detect coron-avirus and prevent deaths. Mostpeople don’t even know thatthey were infected by the virus.“I will be available to you 24hours a day, let's all work withthe same spirit,� he observed.

Eatala asked the authorities ofevery government hospital toensure that generator facility isavailable, along with stocks ofdiesel to run the machines. Hegave these instructions in thewake of sudden shutdown ofpower supply in GandhiHospital at about 5:35 pm,which was restored at 5:56 pm.According to superintendent DrRaja Rao, “Our generatorsstarted functioning by 5:42pm(within 7 minutes of powershutdown). There’s no issue& no problem occurred in theEmergency & ICU areas andother patient care areas.

TS to focus on isolation centres in districts

Private hospitals to cashin on Covid-19 treatment

l Some hospitals, which acouple of months ago, hadless than 10 beds for treatingCovid-19 patients, arededicating an entire building,or several wings of theirfacilities to such cases.Officials of the hospitals saidthe change in stand wasprompted by a realisation thatthey would now get only a fewpatients with other ailments

l “Before Covid-19 struck, 60per cent of the indoor patientswould have plannedadmissions, coming throughthe outpatient department. Therest were emergencyadmissions. Now, there arebarely any plannedadmissions,” Subramanyam,PRO of Care Hospital in RamNagar, said.

Admission criteria for NITs & CFTIs relaxedPNS n HYDERABAD

After IIT, Central Seat AllocationBoard (CSAB) also relaxednorms for admissions intoNational Institute of Technology(NITs) and Centrally FundedTechnical Institutions (CFTIs)on Thursday.

NITs will admit undergradu-ate students based on their per-formance in Joint EntranceExam-Mains (JEE-Mains) andwill discount the Class XIIBoard examination marks inselection process, the HumanResource DevelopmentMinistry has announced.

"Due to prevailing circum-stances, the Central Seat

Allocation Board (CSAB) hasdecided to relax the eligibilitycriterion for admissions to NITsand other centrally funded tech-

nical institutions," Union HRDMinister Ramesh PokhriyalNishank tweeted.

"JEE Main 2020 qualified

candidates will now only needto obtain a passing certificate inClass XII examination irrespec-tive of the marks obtained," hefurther stated. As per the norms,a candidate had to secure a min-imum of 75% marks in Class XIIBoard exams, or rank amongthe top 20 percentile in theirqualifying examinations, to getthe admission, along with theperformance in JEE-Mains.

Earlier, Indian Institutes ofTechnology (IITs) alsoannounced that they will admitthe students based on their per-formance in JEE-Advanced. Themarks in Class XII Board exam-inations will not be necessary foradmission into IITs this year.

Covid-19 suspect jumps offhospital building in HyderabadPNS n HYDERABAD

A 75-year-old man, suspected tobe infected with Coronavirus,committed suicide by jumpingoff hospital building at SrinagarColony here on Thursday. Thedeceased was identified as RNagender, a retired employee ofAir India. He was residing inAmeerpet, along with his wifeand two sons.

According to police,Nagender had shown symp-toms of the virus and had goneto Nikhil Hospital at Srinagar

Colony on Thursday. After awhile, he went to the terrace ofthe building and jumped from

it. He suffered critical injuriesafter he landed on the treesbelow. The hospital staff imme-diately took him inside and puthim under emergency treat-ment. Nagendra later suc-cumbed to the injuries. TheBanjara Hills police registered acase and took up investigation.

Preliminary investigationrevealed that Nagender wasalso suffering from lung ailmentand he was scared of contract-ing the virus. Afraid that he wasaffected, he took the extremestep, said the police.

PNS n HYDERABAD

Maddela Sabeera aliasRekha, a television actress,committed suicide at herresidence in Vidyanagar inHyderabad on Thursday.

According to police,Sabeera, a native of Gunturdistrict , moved toHyderabad pursuing herdream to act in movies.

"She had acted in a coupleof television serials but afterthat there were no offers.Then she returned toGuntur and got married.However, differences arosebetween the couple afterthe birth of a girl child, dueto which they got separated.A couple of years later, shegot married to oneChaitanya and shifted toHyderabad and has beenliving at Vidyanagar," saidthe police.

Chaitanya was into realestate business and sheresumed her career in thetelevision industry. Sheworked as an anchor in tele-vision. Gradually, offersbegan declining and herhusband’s real estate busi-ness, too, ran into losses dueto which she reportedlyplunged into depression.

On Wednesday, she wentto take a bath but did notcome out from the bath-room even after a long time.Her husband went lookingfor her. Finding the bath-room door closed, he calledher but there was noresponse. Immediately, healerted the police whorushed to the spot and foundher dead in the bathroom.

TV actor fromGuntur endslife in Hyd

Kidnappedson ofbeggarrescuedPNS n VISAKHAPATNAM

Ganesh, the two-year-oldson of a beggar, who wasallegedly kidnapped onJuly 21, was traced fromPhool Bagh Colony ofVizianagaram onThursday. The policearrested the three personsin this connection. Theaccused have been identi-fied as Patan Salman Khan,Sk Subhani and BandaruRoshan Raja. All three arefriends and residents ofPhool Bagh Colony.According to police, theaunt of Roshan Raja, whois childless wanted to adopta child. On July 21, all thethree had come toVisakhapatnam in an auto-rickshaw and they noticedGanesh living with his par-ents, who are beggars, onthe roadside.

They waited till all thethree slept, and seizingthe opportunity late in thenight, they kidnappedGanesh and took him toVizianagaram. Based on acomplaint filed by Srinu,father of Ganesh, policelaunched a search opera-tion. Based on CCTVfootage, the police identi-fied the registration num-ber of the auto-rickshawand traced the accused.

PNS n CHENNAI

Andhra Pradesh with near-ly 8,000 COVID-19 casestopped southern states indaily numbers for the sec-ond day on Thursday asTamil Nadu, Karnataka andKerala also reported recordsingle day tallies with theaggregate of the four breach-ing the 20,000 mark.

Tamil Nadu breached the6,000 mark, Karnataka shotpast 5,000 cases andKerala saw 1,000plus infectionsfor the secondday as the pan-demic situationin the southernregion contin-ued to remaingrim.

The t iny UnionTerr itor y ofPuducherry recorded 123fresh cases, taking its tally to2,421.

The four states and theUT registered a total of20,701 cases on Thursday.

The high case-loads in Kerala

and Tamil Naducame months after

the former announcedon May 8 it had flat-

tened the curve while thelatter earlier seemed to be oncourse for achieving a sim-ilar feat before two clustersplayed spoilsport and start-ed pushing TN's cases northin quick pace.

AP tops with 8K freshCovid cases in S India

Tamil Nadu

breached the 6,000

mark, Karnataka

shot past 5,000

cases and Kerala

saw 1,000 plus

infections for the

second day as the

pandemic situation

in the southern

region continued

to remain grim

Amazon toset up 10 newfulfillmentcentres PNS n HYDERABAD

Amazon India on Thursdayannounced the expansion ofits fulfillment network inIndia, with 10 newFulfillment Centres (FC) andexpansion of seven existingbuildings. These new FCswill be set up in Hyderabad,Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru,Patna, Lucknow, Kolkata,Chennai, Ludhiana andAhmedabad.

With this expansion,Amazon.in will have morethan 60 FCs in 15 States, witha total storage capacity of over32 million cubic feet. Thenew FCs include the spe-cialised network of FCs forlarge appliances and furniturecategory and Receive Centres.All new fulfillment centreswill be operational beforethe festive season, enablingcustomers to stay safe athome and have what theyneed delivered at theirdoorstep

As per the press statement,Akhil Saxena, VP, CustomerFulfilment Operations,APAC, MENA & LATAM,Amazon India. Said, “Theincrease in storage capacity isin line with our long-termcommitment to invest inIndia and we are delighted tohelp Indian customers geteverything they need, whilekeeping our customers andour workforce safe. With theexpanded network of morethan 60 fulfilment centres, welook forward to creatingthousands of job opportuni-ties with competitive pay.”

IANS n NEW YORK

A new drug being developed inIsrael could be the answer totreating the main cause of Type2 Diabetes, insulin resistance.

According to ConcenterBioPharma co-founder andCSO Prof. Mottie (Mordechai)Chevion, “the unique property”of the drug, called Zygosid-50“is that it cancels out insulinresistance.

“It’s an anti-diabetes drug,” hetold The Jerusalem Post duringan interview on Thursday after-noon.“With Zygosid-50, we areproposing the use of the newdrug and are developing it intoan oral pill, as a monotherapydrug, to treat diabetics and pre-

vent in pre-diabetic patients,”Chevion said. Asked about howZygosid-50 works, he said that

it “almost completely reducesinsulin resistance and normal-izes all diabetes-associated

parameters to the normal range.“If you take care of the

insulin resistance, you takecare of the symptoms,” he said.

He stressed that they havenot found any adverse sideeffects during their testing.

“What we found aboutZygosid-50 allows us to go intoclinical trials,” he said, explain-ing that the US Food and Drug

Administration has approvedclinical trials, after supplemen-tary TOX studies, based on evi-dence from earlier testing inanimal models for Type 2Diabetes.

“It was proven as ‘safe’,”Chevion told the Post. “Wefound that it restores the nor-mal insulin sensitivity, itrestores blood glucose levels, it

also normalizes the glucosetolerance test,” which measuresthe body’s response to sugar,“and suppressed systemicinflammation, which is a com-ponent of diabetes.”

Chevion added that on amolecular level, “Zygosid-50...forces an intra-cellularexchange to take place,” whereit removes what’s called “freeiron” in cells and replaces it withzinc.

“It captures the ‘free’ iron inthe cell and it releases the sameamount of zinc into the cell - itfeeds them with zinc,” he said,adding that zinc deficiency hasoften been found in those suf-fering from diabetes.

He made it clear that zinc is

needed for certain pathways indiabetes-related processes inthe body. Chevion found thatZygosid-50 is effective in fight-ing topical inflammation on theskin and that even under con-tinuous use there were no neg-ative side effects.

Asked about BioPharma,Chevion said that it was set upin 2019 as a subsidiary toSilkim Pharma, which is aholding company for the intel-lectual properties of the inven-tors patents.

In December, Chevion wonfirst place at the 17th AnnualWorld Congress on InsulinResistance, Diabetes andCardiovascular Diseases for hiswork on Zygosid-50.

ISRAELI DOCTORS DEVELOP ‘ANTI-DIABETES DRUG'“It’s an anti-diabetes drug,” he told The

Jerusalem Post during an interview on Thursday

afternoon.“With Zygosid-50, we are proposing the

use of the new drug and are developing it into an

oral pill, as a monotherapy drug, to treat diabetics

and prevent in pre-diabetic patients,” Chevion said

VIJAYAWADA | FRIDAY | JULY 24, 2020 vijayawada 03

Cold storage units to beset up in each mandalPNS n AMARAVATI

In a bid to strengthening agri-culture infrastructure, ChiefMinister YS JaganmohanReddy on Thursday directedthe officials to establish coldstorage units in each mandaland also to build advancedwarehouses in each RythuBharosa Kendra (RBK).

He also wanted proposals tostrengthen the agriculturalmarketing sector with an infu-sion of Rs 4,000 crore. Duringa review meeting with Ministerfor o Agriculture K Kannababuand marketing officials, hedirected them to set up coldstorage units at the mandal-level for the convenience offarmers to sell their produce.

He said all the RBKs aswarehouses would be equippedwith grading and sortingmachinery with a budget of Rs350 crore. Other necessaryinstruments like weighing bal-ances, calipers and lab wears

are to be procured with Rs 92.2crore.

He wanted a software bedeveloped that will connect thecultivation details to RBKs,which will be directed to thecentral server. Soon afterreceiving the information,marketing officials shall inter-vene and take up the crop pur-

chase ensuring minimum sup-port price was paid to theircrops, he said.

Discussing the sale of crops, heasked officials to ensure that 30%of the sales take place throughlocal markets and JanathaBazaars and also asked the mar-keting department to intervenewith the remaining 70%.

n YSRCP govt to spend Rs4,000 crore for agri infra,marketing

n All RBKs as warehouseswould be equipped withgrading and sortingmachinery with a budgetof Rs 350 crore. Othernecessary instrumentslike weighing balances,calipers and lab wearsare to be procured withRs 92.2 crore.

n The CM wanted asoftware be developedthat will connect thecultivation details toRBKs, which will bedirected to the centralserver. Soon afterreceiving the information,officials shall interveneand take up the croppurchase ensuringminimum support price

TDP complains toNHRC on Dalit ‘tonsure’PNS n AMARAVATI

TDP leader Varla Ramaiah onThursday complained to theNational Human RightsCommittee (NHRC) againstthe YSRCP leaders and policefor beating up and tonsuringa Dalit youth in East Godavaridistrict. He wanted the NHRCto take cognizance ofunchecked atrocities beingcommitted against Dalits inthe State.

In a letter to the NHRCChairman, Ramaiah urged forstringent action against theperpetrators of atrocities onDalits. He accused theJaganmohan Reddy govern-ment of running an anti-Dalit'Jungle Raj' in the State eversince it came to power inJune, 2019. There is overalldeterioration in the law andorder situation and there hasbeen a spate of attacks alsoagainst Backward Classes(BCs), women and other vul-nerable sections of society, hepointed out.

Recalling the latest attack onDalit youth, Ramaiah told theNHRC Chairman that the rul-ing YSRCP leaders wereinvolved in illegal quarryingand transportation of sand inan indiscriminate fashion. Inthis backdrop, on July 18, thisyear, a truck illegally trans-porting sand hit one Vijayunder Sitanagaram police sta-tion limits in East Godavaridistrict. Then, IndugumilliVara Prasad stopped the truckwhile helping Vijay to get up.At this juncture, local YSRCPMLA's follower KavalaKrishnamurthy came to thelocation and got furious at

Vara Prasad. Krishnamurthyrashly opened his car door thatinjured Vara Prasad.Krishnamurthy had alsoscolded Vara Prasad in thename of his caste.

Ramaiah said that theYSRCP leader gathered around40 of his henchmen andattacked Vara Prasad and hisfriends, Sandeep, Anil andAkhil. Then, Krishnamurthylodged a complaint withSitanagaram police stationagainst Vara Prasad, Sandeep,Anil and Akhil on July 19.Accordingly, police registeredan FIR under Cr. No. 256/2020under IPC 324, 354, 341, 427,506 r/w Section 34.Krishnamurthy even exertedpressure on police to open arowdy sheet against all the four.

Ramaiah deplored that onJuly 20, the Sitanagaram policearrested Vara Prasad, Sandeep,Anil and Akhil. At the policestation, all the four were bru-tally beaten up with lathisticks, belts and boots. Morehumiliatingly, Dalit youth VaraPrasad’s head was tonsured asa part of ill-treating them.Tonsuring the head of a Dalitforcefully is a punishablecrime under SC/ST (PoA)

Act. Even when Vara Prasad’smother visited the police sta-tion, she was scolded and illtreated and sent away. OnJuly 21, all the four werereleased and were undergoingtreatment at their respectivehomes, while the DeputySuperintendent of Police(DSP) advised Vara Prasad notto go to hospital as there area lot of COVID cases.

Ramaiah said seeing thevisible injuries on VaraPrasad’s body, former MLAPendurthy Venkatesh and for-mer MP Harsha Kumaradmitted him to a hospital. Inthis regard, the NHRC shouldintervene and initiate sternaction against the culprits as asection of police are in con-nivance with the YSRCP lead-ers, he alleged.

n In a letter to the NHRCChairman, Ramaiahurged for stringent actionagainst the perpetratorsof atrocities on Dalits. Heaccused the JaganmohanReddy government ofrunning an anti-Dalit'Jungle Raj' in the Stateever since it came topower in June, 2019

n There is overalldeterioration in the lawand order situation andthere has been a spateof attacks also againstBackward Classes (BCs),women and othervulnerable sections ofsociety, Ramaiah pointedout

India’s growth rate may dip to 6% to 9%: Subramanian SwamyPNS n HYDERABAD

Country’s growth rate mayplunge to six to nine per centduring the current financialyear due to COVID-19 pan-demic and may bounce backnext fiscal if correct policieswere worked out, BJP leader andRajya Sabha MP SubramanianSwamy said on Thursday.

"Economy has collapsed inthe last four to five years. Whathas happened is that theCOVID-19 pandemic hassharpened the decline. Nowyou will find between six to nineper cent negative growth by theend of this financial year,"Swamy said.

He took part in a virtualmeeting organised by Indo-American Chamber ofCommerce, Telangana Stateand Andhra Pradesh branches.How will it turn around? Thecapacity for production is there.The very question is you shouldbe able to make it profitable toproduce and we should ensurethat the workmen were requiredin the factories, in the fields.

“They are all empowered togo back to their work. Once thathappens I would say that in2021-22 (next fiscal) we will riseto seven per cent growth rate ifyou follow the right policy. Notthe same policies of the last fiveyears," he said.

Swamy said he wrote lettersto Prime Minister NarendraModi on several occasions in

the past pointing out the incip-ient economic slowdown. "Ihave written a letter to the PMabout four days ago explainingwhat the situation will look likeby the end of this year. I wrotea letter in 2015 that the growthrate will start declining... Everyyear we have been declining," headded.

The BJP leader opined thatonly Rs 1.5 lakh crore of the Rs20 lakh crore stimulus packageannounced by the Centre for therevival of the declining econo-my due to prolonged lock-down, does not directly createdemand which is necessary atthis juncture.

Noting that country has ahuge labour potential, he saidit should be used properlylike the Japanese did to grow.Asked whether India can wina war, if it comes, againstChina, Swamy said if India canfight for one month, then it can

defeat the neighbouring coun-try. "If India has the stamina tofight for one month you defeatChina," he said.

Lauding the efforts of Indiantroops in defending theirmotherland, he said the neigh-bouring country was defeatedtwice in the past. Howeverpeople are not aware as ourcountry did not publicise it inorder avoid provoking theCommunist regime.

"Our people performedextremely well although 20unfortunate soldiers lost theirlives," he maintained. Heclaimed that encouraging com-panies such as Walmart intothe country may affect millionsof domestic retailers.

He suggested that India, aspart of bilateral trade, shouldexert pressure on the US toagree to import Indian agri-cultural produce into thatcountry.

Chalk out plan on KGedu at Anganwadis:CM’s fiat to officialsPNS n VISAKHAPATNAM

Setting up of a proper kinder-garten education system andproviding good nutrition tothe children at Anganwadicentres were discussed in areview meeting chaired byChief Minister JaganmohanReddy at his residence cumcamp office at Tadepalli onThursday.

The Chief Ministerreviewed the progress of activ-ities under ‘Nadu-Nedu’ (Thenand Now) scheme inAnganwadi centres and ‘YSRSampoorna Poshana’ (YSRComplete Nutrition) pro-gramme. He directed theauthorities to provide post-delivery financial assistance ofRs 5,000 to women under‘Aarogya Aasara’ (HealthSupport).

“Think about how toimplement the pre-primaryeducation and plan within7–10 days. The education ofchildren at this age should belinked to Class I,” the CM said,adding that the textbooks havealready been changed as partof the curriculum reforms,hence, education authoritiesshould hold a meeting anddecide on the curriculum.

To impart learning skills tochildren in Anganwadi cen-tres, all necessary tools, televi-

sions and special books shouldbe made available to them, hesaid. The Chief Minister alsostressed on the need to ensuresame quality of food across allAnganwadi centres.

Some Anganwadi centresare being run from rentedpremises. The government isworking on the constructionof new buildings and the cre-ation of infrastructure in exist-ing buildings. The ChiefMinister has clarified that thefood served under YSR's holis-tic nutrition should be of goodquality. The quality of food inAnganwadi should be thesame everywhere, for whichstandard operation procedureshould be followed.

SpiceJet lifts1,500 Indianstudents fromKyrgyzstan

Continued from Page 1

Scheduled international pas-senger flights continue toremain suspended in Indiasince March 23 due to the coro-navirus pandemic."SpiceJet...will operate ninecharter flights to evacuate over1,500 Indian students strand-ed in Kyrgyzstan for over twomonths. This special repatria-tion mission...has been under-taken by SpiceJet in associationwith film actor Sonu Sood," thepress release noted. The low-cost carrier has operated over400 charter flights to repatriatearound 65,000 Indians fromcountries like Oman, Qatar, SriLanka, Lebanon and SaudiArabia. Till now, more than1.24 million people have beeninfected and around 29,600people have died due to coro-navirus in India. Scheduleddomestic passenger flightsresumed in India on May 25after a gap of two months dueto the coronavirus-triggeredlockdown.

n Noting that country has ahuge labour potential, hesaid it should be usedproperly like the Japanesedid to grow. Asked whetherIndia can win a war, if itcomes, against China, Swamysaid if India can fight for onemonth, then it can defeat theneighbouring country. "IfIndia has the stamina to fightfor one month you defeatChina," he said

n Lauding the efforts ofIndian troops indefending theirmotherland, he saidthe neighbouringcountry was defeatedtwice in the past.However people arenot aware as ourcountry did notpublicise it in orderavoid provoking thecommunist regime

n The Chief Ministerreviewed the progress ofactivities under ‘Nadu-Nedu’ (Then and Now)scheme in Anganwadicentres and ‘YSRSampoorna Poshana’(YSR Complete Nutrition)programme. He directedthe authorities toprovide post-deliveryfinancial assistance of Rs5,000 to women under‘Aarogya Aasara’ (HealthSupport)

Ayodhya temple to get bigger,taller, more magnificent

Continued from Page 1

The construction oftemple will take around3.5 years, Sompura said.

"As soon as the groundbreaking ceremony or the'bhumi pujan' is done, theconstruction work willbegin. The team of Larsen& Toubro, along withmachinery and materials,have reached the spot andthe work on foundationwill start right away. It willtake 3 to 3.5 years for thecompletion of the work,"Sompura said.

Three-day long Vedicrituals will be held aheadof the grand ground --breaking ceremony, whichwill revolve around theinstallation of a 40 kg sil-ver brick as the foundation

stone.The rituals will begin on

August 3 with a 'GauriGanesh' Puja , and will befollowed by 'Ramracha'on August 4 in which the'Ram Naam' will be recit-ed without a break.

The entire ceremonywill be telecast live so thatall devotees can watch itfrom their homes.

Sources said that onlyabout 50 persons will beallowed at the event. Therestriction on the numberof persons has beenimposed due to the pan-demic. Shri RamJanmabhoomi TeerthaKshetra sources said thatmassive CCTV screenswill be put up acrossAyodhya so the devoteescan watch the programme.

Shankaracharyaobjects to...

Continued from Page 1

He said that according to VishnuDharma Shastra, the launch in theBhadrapada month is the cause ofdestruction. The 'Daivagna BallabhGranth' states that the home, made inBhadrapada, brings poverty. Vastu Pradeepalso says the same. Shankracharya said thataccording to Vastu Rajaballabh, the begin-ning of Bhadrapada gives zero fruit. He saidthat it is also not right to consider it as aus-picious due to "Abhijit Muhurta". "Abhijitis prohibited on Wednesday in the mar-riage of Muhurta Chintamani. Till theCancer is in the Sun, the foundation stonecan be done only in the month of Shravanand not in Bhadrapada," saidShankracharya.

HC notices to govt ...

Continued from Page 1

One of the counsel arguedthat there is a writ petition filedfor construction of permanentHigh Court in Amaravati andthat may be taken up. Thebench refused, observing thatif the state succeeds in the liti-gation, then the location of theHigh Court could be shiftedand therefore there can’t be anyadjudication of the said writpetition at this juncture.

The Advocate General,appearing for the state, inter-vened at this juncture andinformed the court that thecounter-affidavit filed in thematter discloses that peopleholding positions of power tolocate the capital at Amaravati,hinted at a minimal expendi-ture of Rs 1.5 lakh-crore. Thebench remarked that they arenot adjudicating the matter andthat there will be no apprehen-sion regarding the same. TheA-G further argued that in themeantime the Governor maygrant assent to the Bills whichwould become law, to whichthe court observed that thosesituations could also be takencare of, during the course ofhearing of the writ petitions.

State records 7,998 cases,61 casualties in 24 hours

Continued from Page 1

Till date, 37,555 patients hadrecovered and been dischargedfrom hospitals while the statenow had 34,272 active cases, itadded. Guntur district recorded1,184 and Anantapur 1,016 newcases in the last 24 hours, accord-ing to the bulletin.

Guntur and Kurnool districtsreported seven Covid-19 deathseach, Krishna and Srikakulam sixeach, Visakhapatnam andVizianagaram five each duringthis period.

The state claimed to haveconducted a record 58,052 sam-ple tests in 24 hours, including25,618 rapid antigen tests, result-ing in 7,998 positives.

Overall, 14,93,879 tests werecompleted in the state so far at therate of 27,975 per million popu-lation even as the infection pos-itivity rate climbed further up to

4.87 per cent.The recovery rate, however,

showed an improvement to 51.65per cent after 11,922 patients weredischarged from hospitals in thelast two days.

Groom testspositive...

Continued from Page 1

The unfortunate turn ofevents meant that the weddingwas postponed, again, andseveral of the family membersof the groom have been askedto observe home quarantine.The officials said over 30 to 40people have attended the mar-riage preparations in thegroom's house and they wouldundergo Covid-19 tests.

Order issued for permanent...Continued from Page 1

Army Spokesperson ColAman Anand said the govern-ment order paved the way forempowering of women officersto shoulder "larger roles" in theArmy.

"The order specifies grant ofpermanent commission toShort Service Commissioned(SSC) women officers in all 10streams of the Indian Army,"he said.

Col Anand said the 10streams where permanentcommission of women officersare being made availableinclude army air defence, sig-nals, engineers, army aviation,electronics and mechanicalengineers, army service corpsand intelligence corps

At present, the Army offerspermanent commission towomen officers in two branch-es — judge advocate general(JAG) and education

"Their selection board willbe scheduled as soon as allaffected SSC women officersexercise their option and com-plete requisite documenta-tion," the Army spokespersonsaid.

Under SSC, women offi-cers are initially taken for aperiod of five years, which isextendable up to 14 years.Permanent commissioning willallow them to serve till the ageof retirement

The Army recruits womenofficers under SSC for streamslike air defence, engineering,signals and services and theycan serve up to a maximum of14 years

Last year, the defence min-istry had taken an in-principledecision to allow permanentcommissioning of women instreams like signals, engineer-ing, army aviation, army airdefence and electronics and

mechanicalIt was decided that the SSC

women officers will be consid-ered for grant of permanentcommission based on theavailability of vacancies andsubject to willingness, suitabil-ity, performance, medical fit-ness and competitive merit ofthe aspirants

The three services haveallowed permanent recruit-ment of women in selectstreams including medical,education, legal, signals, logis-tics and engineering

The women officers recruit-ed through the SSC in the IAFhave the option of seeking per-manent commission in allstreams except the flyingbranch

The Navy has allowed per-manent commission of womenin a host of departments suchas logistics, naval designing, airtraffic control, engineeringand legal.

Krishna Dasgains inreshuffle ofportfolios

Continued from Page 1

During the transition, theportfolios were managed byChief Minister YSJaganmohan Reddy.Ramachandrapuram MLAVenugopala Krishna andPalasa MLA Appalaraju weresworn in as ministers onWednesday. Bose andMopidevi Venkataramanaalso took oath as Rajya SabhaMembers the same day.

PNS n VISAKHAPATNAM

Top leaders of the bannedCPI (Maoists) escaped duringan exchange of fire that tookplace in VisakhapatnamAgency on Wednesday.

Additional SP (operations)based at Narsipatnam Satishsaid Central Committee leaderRK, Aruna and Chalapathi,along with 30 membersDalam, were present in theforests of Peda Bayulu to

conduct meetings with theAdivasis of the area in connec-tion with the Martyr’s Weekthat will be observed by theextremists group from July28.

“There was blood at theencounter site and at leastthree to four members mighthave sustained injuries. Asthey were in good numbers,Maoists might have takenthem, along with them. We willknow the casualties in anoth-

er three to four days,’’ the ASPsaid.

Meanwhile, tension pre-vailed in Munchingput andPeda Bayulu area following theencounter. Youths were seen ingrip of fear arrests and ques-tioning by the Special ArmedForces. Barricades have beenput up at important points andthe armed police are making arandom check. Heavy rains,on the other hand, disruptedpolice combing operation.

Top Maoist leader RK escapesafter exchange of fire in Agency

No auction forBalapur Ganeshladdu this yearPNS n HYDERABAD

The Coronavirus has cast itsshadow on the BalapurGanesh festival celebrations,the second biggest inHyderabad after theKhairatabad Ganesh festivalcelebrations.

For the first time in over 25years, the Balapur GaneshUtsav Committee inHyderabad will not auctionthe 21-kg laddu prasad thisyear.

The committee at its meet-ing held here on Thursday,decided to make the celebra-tions this time a low-keyaffair this year because of thepandemic.

Further, the committeedecided to limit the height ofthe Ganesh idol this year tomere six feet as against 21-feet last year.

NAVEEN KUMAR

n HYDERABAD

Those facing withdrawal symp-toms post lockdown announce-ment have now completely quitsmoking. Though many wereplanning to quit, they were unableto due to easy access. However,staying at home has compelledthem to control the urge and quitsmoking altogether.

In many families, people wouldnot smoke at home out of a senseof respect for their elders orbecause of the absence of socialcues of parties and post-lunch tea

breaks with colleagues."I have been trying to quit

smoking for quite some time now.It was always one of those stop andstart affairs. What the lockdowndid to me is to bring things intoperspective, a moment of quietreflection in the middle of a pan-demic, on how much I prioritisemy health. I had never spent somuch time at home. It gave meenough time to think: if not now,then when?" says Rajesh Sahoo, atechie from Cognizant. Moreover,data from the Zoe CovidSymptom Tracker app suggestedsmokers were 14 per cent more

likely than non-smokers to devel-op the three 'classic' symptoms ofCoronavirus infection - fever,persistent cough and shortness ofbreath. An official release from

WHO said, "The available evi-dence suggests that smoking isassociated with increased severi-ty of disease and death in hospi-talised Covid-19 patients."

"It is not the normal 9-to-5 jobin the creative industry; youalways have to be ideating. Aftercrazy meetings and brainstorm-ing, you could leave all of it asidefor a little while, to have a smoke,"said Nithin Raj, a copywriterfrom an advertisement agency.

Psychiatrist Dr VenkateshBabu, who consults for FortisHospital, has been speaking withpeople online who have been

looking to quit during lockdown.For the first week, the questionswere mostly around dealing withwithdrawal symptoms and sourc-ing nicotine patches. Eight weeksdown the line, a couple of themtell him they have not relapsed.

"The reason you quit is veryimportant. If it is just because cig-arettes are not available at thispoint of time, or there is a com-pulsion to be at home, it is nevergoing to last. But if they weremeaning to quit before this, andsee the lockdown as an opportu-nity, then giving up will be easi-er," he says.

Smokers quit in highest numbers during Covid

VIJAYAWADA | FRIDAY | JULY 24, 2020 nation 04

SHORT READS

Cong to launch agitationagainst ‘dismal' law andorder in UP: Lallu

BALLIA (UP): The Congresswill launch an agitation acrossUttar Pradesh over the "dismal"law and order situation andissues facing the commonpeople, the party's state unitpresident Ajay Kumar Lallu saidThursday. The Congress ischalking out a strategy for theagitation, he said, alleging thatYogi Adityanath-led BJPgovernment has proved to be afailure on the law and orderfront. Talking to reporters here,Lallu alleged that loot, murder,dacoity and rape have becomethe new identity of UttarPradesh. Targeting the chiefminister, the Congress leadersaid his claims regardingstrengthening embankmentsand flood relief measures haveturned out to be lies. Lallu saidhe visited Turtipaar andMujhena villages of Ballia onThursday and found that noflood relief works have beenundertaken there.

Protests in UP hospitalover power outage,unhyegenic conditions

Over 10K litres ofillicit liquor seized inUP in 3 days

LUCKNOW: The Uttar PradeshExcise department has lodged401 cases and seized 10,169litres of illicit liquor in the lastthree days during a special driveconducted in the state, a seniorofficial said on Thursday.Twenty-three people werearrested and sent to jail for theiralleged involvement in illegalliquor sale while 10 vehiclesseized in this connection, ExciseCommissioner P Guruprasadsaid in a statement issued here."A special enforcement drive isbeing conducted against themanufacture, smuggling andsale of illegal liquor by theExcise department. During thelast three days, a total of 401cases have been registeredacross all over the state inwhich 10,169 litres illegal liquorhas been recovered," he said.

MUZAFFARNAGAR: Patients ata COVID hospital in Jhinjhanatown of Shamli district staged aprotest when a senior officialwas inspecting the facility overcomplaints of power outageand unhyegenic livingconditions. A video hadsurfaced on social media inwhich patients at the facilitywere seen raising thecomplaints, following whichSubdivisional Magistrate ManiArora was conducting aninspection on Wednesday. Assoon as the official reached thecentre, the patients startedprotesting which caused aruckus. District MagistrateJasjit Kaur said an explanationhad been sought from theHealth department over theissues raised and warned ofstrict action against thosefound responsible.

Sri Lankan port workers protestagainst proposed deal with Indian COLOMBO

Wearing black arm bands, theworkers of the strategicColombo Port have restartedtheir protest against a proposeddeal with India to develop adeep-sea container terminal ofthe country's largest andbusiest port.

The workers ended theirprotest on July 3 following ameeting with Prime MinisterMahinda Rajapaksa, a day afterthey had threatened to go onan indefinite strike if the gov-ernment allowed a foreigncountry to develop the EasternContainer Terminal (ECT).

The previous Sirisena gov-ernment signed a "memoran-dum of cooperation" (MOC)with India and Japan for a tri-partite effort to develop theECT which is located just nextto the USD 500 millionChinese-run ColomboInternational ContainerTerminal (CICT).

Although the MOC wascompleted last year, a formalagreement for the terminal'sdevelopment is yet to be signedand the trade unions are press-ing the government to aban-don the MOC and develop theterminal as a 100 per cent SriLankan venture.

The workers, who launchedthe 'Black Week' protest onWednesday, alleged that gov-ernment had reneged on the

pledge to make the ECT oper-ational as a Sri Lankan venture.

"The government must saywho is pressuring them on this.If it is India, then we will saythat port's future will be in dan-ger," Shamal Sumanaratne, atrade union leader toldreporters.

The port workers have ropedin influential Buddhist monkElle Gunawansa to join them.The monk blessed the protes-

tors and issued a warning tothe government. "We will givethis government more time, ifthey don't want to do the rightthing, we will take to thestreets," Gunawansa said.

Prasanna Kalutharage,another trade union leader,said the port workers wouldensure 50 million rupees to theTreasury every month throughECT's operation as a 100 percent Sri Lankan venture.

Need of hour to jointly bearCovid burden: HP CMPNS n SHIMLA

Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakuron Thursday hit out at theopposition Congress for criticis-ing the Himachal Pradesh gov-ernment over the recent hike inbus fares and for allowingtourists to the hill state duringthe COVID-19 pandemic.

Thakur said it is the need ofthe hour to jointly bear the bur-den of handling COVID-19and several other states, includ-ing Punjab, have also hiked thebus fare. The chief minister wasaddressing BJP workers of theDoon assembly segment in theShimla parliamentary con-stituency online from his officialresidence here.

He is in self-quarantine sinceWednesday afternoon after adeputy secretary in his officetested positive for coronavirus.

Though Thakur, his wife DrSadhana Thakur and their twodaughters tested negative around9 pm on Wednesday, they will

remain quarantined for a weekand tested again, Additional CS(Health) R D Dhiman said.

The opposition Congress,Centre of Indian Trade Unions(CITU) and the RSS-affiliatedAkhil Bharatiya VidyarthiParishad (ABVP) had onTuesday demanded an immedi-ate rollback of the 25 per centhike in bus fares in HP. The stategovernment decided to increasethe bus fare by 25 per cent. It alsodecided to hike minimum busfare for the first three kilometresfrom Rs 5 to Rs 7 in view of thefund crunch due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Industry backs Karnatakagovt's ‘jobs-for-locals’ push PNS n BENGALURU

Industry has backed Karnatakagovernment's "jobs-for-locals"push saying the state has talentwith required skills and thebusiness has a responsibility tobe a good citizen in every placethey go to.

According to the new indus-trial policy approved onThursday by the government,"all new industrial projectsshall create maximum possibledirect employment opportuni-ties with a minimum employ-ment of 70 per cent toKannadigas on an overall basisand 100 per cent in case ofGroup D employees."

Welcoming the governmentdecision to give preference tolocal youth, Chairman ofFICCI, Karnataka StateCouncil, K Ullas Kamath saidthe State has abundant talentwith required skill sets.

"Karnataka has the best ofeducation institutions and alsoskill development ITIs. Localyouth needs encouragement in

their own State. This can beachieved over a period oftime," Kamath said.

The government, he said,has to focus on imparting skillpost education so that they canget into industry after complet-ing the training.

"Here, public-private part-nership with industry will bedesirable."

Terming it as a "good poli-cy," information technologyindustry veteran T VMohandas Pai said in everyState industries should createmaximum employment forlocals.

"This practice of getting

cheaper contract labour fromoutside for Group D jobsshould stop," Pai, a formerChief Financial Officer of ITmajor Infosys Ltd, said.

"However, for highly skilledjobs, there should be no suchrestriction as it will impedeefficiency with the caveat thatjobs are given on a fair andequal opportunity basis forlocals."

SJTA plans to preserveLord Jagannath's chariotsPNS n BHUBANESWAR

Contrary to the usual practiceof dismantling the three gigan-tic chariots after the annual RathYatra, the Shree JagannathTemple Administration (SJTA)is contemplating to preservethem this year.

The chariots were used byLord Balabdara, DeviSubhadra and Lord Jagannathfor the annual 9-day sojournto Shree Gundicha Templefrom the Sri Mandir, the12th-century main shrine.

A discussion in this regardwas held with servitors and car-penters who constructed thethree wooden chariots within arecord time during the pandem-ic, said the Chief Administratorof SJTA Krishan Kumar.

Sources said that the SJTA iscontemplating to preseve thechariots as this year's Rath Yatratook place amidst the COVID-19 pandemic and in the absenceof devotees. "We have set up atechnical committee to guidethe administration on how topreserve the chariots and keep

the wooden structures safe frominsects," he said.

Every year the chariots aredismantled after the Rath Yatrafestival and the wood is used inthe temple kitchen. But this year,the SJTA is planning to conservethe three chariots at the muse-um being constructed atJagannath Ballav, the Lords gar-den. The SJTA chief administra-tor said a directive has alreadybeen issued to shift the chariotsto the premises of JagannathBallav.

Lord Jagannaths chariotcalled 'Nandighosh', is the tallestone of 45-feet high with 16

wheels, while Lord Balabhadra's'Taladhwaja' is 44-feet high with14 wheels. Their sister DeviSubhadra's chariot'Darpadalana' is 43-feet highand has 12 wheels.

The SJTA had earlier decid-ed to document this years RathYatra in view of its massivearrangements made amidst thepandemic and COVID-19scare. For the first time in liv-ing memory, the Rath Yatra ofLord Jagannath and the returnjourney was held in the pilgrimtown under curfew and in theabsence of devotees as per theSupreme Court guidelines.

Pvt schools stop online classesafter govt's ‘no fee' orderPNS n AHMEDABAD

Private schools in Gujarat havesuspended online classes for anindefinite period fromThursday, after a state govern-ment order said they should notcollect fees from students untilthe schools reopen.

In a notification issued lastweek, the Gujarat governmentdirected self-financed schools inthe state not to collect tuitionfees from students as long asthey remain shut in the wake ofthe COVID-19 pandemic.

It also asked these schoolsnot to hike fees for the acade-mic year 2020-21.

Unhappy with the move, aunion of representing nearly15,000 self-financed schools inGujarat decided to put on holdonline classes, an alternativearrangement started earlier thismonth for students.

Majority of these schoolsinformed the parents throughSMS on Wednesday night that

there will not be any onlineclasses for their wards fromThursday. Self-financed SchoolManagement Association'sspokesperson Dipak Rajyaguruon Thursday said almost all theself-financed schools in thestate refrained from impartingonline education.

"If the government believesonline education is not real edu-cation, then there is no mean-ing of imparting such unrealeducation to our students.Online education will remainsuspended until the govern-ment withdraws that notifica-tion," Rajyaguru said in a state-ment.

PNS n BEIJING

China successfully launched itsfirst Mars probe on Thursday,aiming to complete orbiting,landing and roving in a singlemission, taking an ambitiousstep towards planetary explo-ration of the solar system.

A Long March-5 rocket,China's largest and mostpowerful launch vehicle, car-rying the spacecraft with amass of about five tonnes,soared into the sky from theWenchang Spacecraft LaunchSite on the coast of southernChina's island province ofHainan, the official Xinhuanews agency reported.

About 36 minutes after thelaunch, the spacecraft, includ-ing an orbiter and a rover, wassent into the Earth-Mars trans-fer orbit, embarking on analmost seven-month journeyto the red planet, according tothe China National SpaceAdministration (CNSA).

The Chinese Mars probenamed Tianwen 1 or Quest forHeavenly Truth 1, will fulfilthree scientific objectives:orbiting the red planet forcomprehensive observation,landing on Martian soil and

sending a rover to roam thelanding site. It will conduct sci-entific investigations into theplanet's soil, geological struc-ture, environment, atmosphereand water, media reports said.

It should arrive in orbitaround the red planet inFebruary.

The Long March 5 rocketwill transport the robotic probeto the Earth-Mars transfer tra-jectory before the spacecraftbegins its self-propelled flighttoward Mars' gravity field.

According to ChinaAerospace Science andTechnology Corp, a State-owned space conglomerate,

the probe will travel for aboutseven months before it reach-es Mars, which at the farthestpoint of its orbit is about 400million kilometres from Earthand 55 million kilometres atthe nearest point.

It said the probe consists ofthree parts - the orbiter, the lan-der and the rover -and they willseparate in Mars orbit. Theorbiter will remain in the orbit forscientific operations and to relaysignals while the lander-rovercombination makes anautonomous descent and landing.

The rover has six wheels andfour solar panels and carries sixscientific instruments. It

weighs over 200 kilogrammesand will work for about threemonths on the planet, thedesigners said.

China aims to catch up withIndia, the US, Russia and theEuropean Union to reach thered planet.

"The triple-task expeditionof Tianwen-1 marks anothermilestone in China's aerospacescience and technology devel-opment, as well as a fresh dar-ing adventure in the country'slong march of outer spaceexploration following its lunarprogram and the endeavour tobuild a space station," thestate-run media commented.

China launches first Mars mission

Maha: Leaders pay tributes toTilak on his birth anniversaryPNS n MUMBAI

Leaders cutting across partylines, including MaharashtraChief Minister UddhavThackeray and his deputy AjitPawar, paid tributes to freedomfighter Bal Gangadhar Tilak onhis birth anniversary onThursday.

Tilak was born on July 23,1856 at Chikhali village inRatnagiri district. He died inAugust 1920 in Mumbai.

"Tributes to Lokmanya BalGangadhar Tilak who hadbugled 'swarajya (self-rule) ismy birth right and I shall haveit'," the Chief Minister's Office(CMO) tweeted.

Thackeray praised Tilak fortaking on the British regimewith his intelligence andintense journalism, and notedthat the freedom fighter wasjailed for it many a times.

"We can see the dream of aprosperous and strong nation

because of his sacrifice anddedication. Tributes to histhoughts and memories," thechief minister wrote.

Taking to Twitter, stateDeputy Chief Minister AjitPawar said, "Tributes toLokmanya Bal GangadharTilak who had roared 'swara-jya is my birth right and I shallhave it'. Let's resolve to convertthe 'swarajya' he talked aboutinto 'surajya' (good rule), as wepay respects to him."

State PWD Minister andCongress leader Ashok Chavanhailed Tilak for firmly raisingthe demand for self-rulethrough his speeches and writ-ings.

Water Resources Ministerand state NCP chief Jayant Patilalso tweeted saying, "Humbletributes to Lokmanya BalGangadhar Tilak who wasdescribed as the 'Father of IndianUnrest', was a great freedomfighter, litterateur, journalist."

Trump points atrace protests,bar-goers forsurge in casesn WASHINGTON

President Donald Trump iscasting wide blame for anationwide surge in coron-avirus cases, pointing to racialjustice protests, travelers fromMexico and young bar-goers.

Holding his second briefingon the virus in as many daysafter a three-month hiatus,Trump sought on Wednesdayto explain the rise in confirmedcases across the nation's South,Southwest and West.

Trump says cases amongyoung Americans first startedto rise “shortly after demonstra-tions.” He says the protests fol-lowing the death of GeorgeFloyd “presumably triggered abroader relaxation of mitigationefforts nationwide.” He also saysa “substantial increase in trav-el” around Memorial Day andsummer vacations was also adriver of new cases.

Further, he says, “Youngpeople closely congregating atbars and probably other places,maybe beaches,” likely also ledto new cases.

PNS n PITHORAGARH

Fifty-three families of Dhapa vil-lage, around 30 km north ofMunsiyari town in this district ofUttarakhand, were evacuated tosafety after a huge ditch startedto develop in the middle of thevillage, following torrential rainsover the past few days.

"The families have been shift-ed as a precautionary measure tonearby safe locations like angan-wadi centres, primary schoolsand government buildings,where they are being taken careof by the district supply officerand revenue officials,"Pithoragarh District MagistrateV K Jogdande said.

With heavy fatalities caused bya cloudburst recently in Gaila

Pattharkot and Tanga villages ofthe district, the administration isleaving nothing to chance.

Scared villagers began to leavethe village even before the districtadministration swung intoaction, fearing imminent land-slides and gradual widening ofthe ditch.

Meanwhile, a zila panchayatrepresentative from the area

said all families of Dhapa villageshould be shifted out perma-nently and relocated.

"The village is witnessing con-tinuous landslides from the hillssince July 16. We have request-ed the state government to shiftthe village to a safer place perma-nently," Member of PithoragarhZila Panchayat Jagat SinghMartolia said.

Ditch in Uttarakhand village due totorrential rains; over 50 families evacuated

PNS n RAIPUR

The Chhattisgarh governmenthas urged Union HomeMinister Amit Shah to increasethe Centre's share under thepolice modernisation schemefor the state for effective anti-Naxal operations and forenhancing resources ofA thedepartment, an official said onThursday.

Chhattisgarh Home MinisterTamradhwaj Sahu made thisdemand in a letter to Shah writ-ten on Wednesday.

In the letter, Sahu expressedconcern over the gradual reduc-tion in the funds allocated to thestate under the modernisationof state police forces (MPF)scheme by the Centre despite

the fact that Chhattisgarh hasbeen fighting against the LeftWing Extremism (LWE) for thelast several years, the public rela-tions department official said.

"In 2013-14, the allocationapproved for the state under thescheme was approximately Rs56 crore, which came downover the years and in 2019-20,it was not even Rs 20 crore," theminister said in the letter.

The main objective of thescheme is to identify and fulfilthe necessary shortcomings inthe police administration and itsoperation, he said.

Out of the 28 districts in thestate, 14 are Naxal- affected, ofwhich eight are the worst-hit.The state government has takenseveral measures for tackling themenace and increased thestrength of the force as well aspolice stations, he said.

Presently, around 45Battalions of the CentralArmed Police Forces (CAPFs)are deployed in the state. Whenthe state came into existence,there were only 22,520 policepersonnel, whose number hasnow increased to 75,678, Sahursaid.

The Long March 5rocket willtransport therobotic probe tothe Earth-Marstransfer trajectorybefore thespacecraft beginsits self-propelledflight towardMars' gravity field

"Karnataka hasthe best ofeducationinstitutions andalso skilldevelopment ITIs.Local youthneeds encourage-ment in their ownState. This canbe achieved overa period of time,"Kamath said

Chhattisgarh urges Centre to hike fundallocation for police scheme

PNS n NEW DELHI

A Delhi-based private labora-tory has claimed that it hasbeen selected as the central labfor human clinical trials ofCovaxin, India's indigenousCOVID-19 vaccine candidate."We are extremely privileged toannounce that Dr. Dangs Lab,New Delhi has been providedthe opportunity to serve thenation by being selected as thecentral lab for the HumanClinical trials of Covaxin;India's indigenous COVID-19vaccine being developed andmanufactured by BharatBiotech in collaboration withthe Indian Council of MedicalResearch (ICMR) - NationalInstitute of Virology (NIV)," itsaid in a statement.

Dr Dangs will becentral lab forCovaxin dtrials

The workers, wholaunched the‘Black Week'protest on Wednes-day, alleged thatgovernment hadreneged on thepledge to make theECT operational asa Sri Lankanventure

VIJAYAWADA | FRIDAY | JULY 24, 2020 nation 05

SHORT READS

MP: Journalist diesafter being shot overold rivalryNIWARI: A 35-year-oldjournalist working for aGwalior-based daily died after agroup of persons allegedly shothim and attacked him withsticks over an old rivalry inMadhya Pradesh's Niwaridistrict, police said onThursday. The incident tookplace near Putri Khera village inSendri police station limits onWednesday evening. Thevictim, Sunil Tiwari, and hisbrother were heading towardsthe village on a motorcyclewhen seven persons, includingthree identified as AwdheshTiwari, Narendra Tiwari and AnilTiwari, intercepted the duo,sub-divisional officer of policeBalram Singh Parihar said. Theaccused allegedly attacked thevictim with sticks and shot him,he said. The journalist's brothersomehow managed to escapefrom the spot to reach thevillage to get help, while theattackers fled leaving the victimgrievously injured, he said.

Upset about actor'sdeath, minor girl killsself in C'garhDURG: Upset about the death ofactor Sushant Singh Rajput, a13-year-old girl allegedlycommitted suicide inChhattisgarh's Durg district,police said on Thursday. TheClass 7 student was foundhanging from the ceiling of herhome in sector-7 of Bhilai townon Wednesday evening, saidTrinath Tirpathi, station houseofficer of Bhilai Nagar policestation. "A suicide note wasrecovered from the scene, inwhich the girl has stated thatshe was taking the extreme stepas she was upset about thedeath of actor Sushant SinghRajput," he said. According tothe girl's father, his daughterwas a fan of the actor and keptwatching his videos and films,the official said. The victimalways looked for news relatedto the Chhichhore actor, whowas found hanging in hisMumbai home on June 14, theSHO said quoting the girl'sfather. Incidentally, the girl waswatching the movie Chhichhoreon Wednesday evening, whenher father stepped out to fetchthe rest of the family from hergrandparents' place at RailwayColony in Durg, he said. On itsreturn, the family found that thegirl hanging from the ceiling,the official said.

Pak Armyshells fowardareas alongLoC in PoonchPNS n JAMMU

The Pakistan Army onThursday opened fire andshelled forward areas alongthe LoC in Jammu andKashmir's Poonch district,officials said.

The Indian Army effective-ly retaliated. "At about 1100hours, Pak Army initiatedunprovoked ceasefire viola-tion by firing with smallarms & shelling with mortarsalong the LoC in Qasba sec-tor of Poonch district", adefence spokesman said. Thisis the third day that Pakistaniforces have violated the cease-fire along the LoC.

UK welcomes efforts by India, Chinato de-escalate tension in LadakhPNS n NEW DELHI

The UK on Thursday welcomedefforts by India and China to de-escalate tension along the Line ofActual Control (LAC) in easternLadakh.

British High CommissionerSir Philip Barton also expressedconcern over Chinese action inHong Kong as well as cases ofhuman rights abuses againstUyghur Muslims in Xinjiang.

The UK, he said, is aware ofthe challenges presented by"some Chinese actions" and hasbeen working with its closeallies like the US to deal withthem. "I would like to say that theprogress we have seen in man-aging the tensions and the com-mitment the two special repre-

sentatives made on boundaryquestion on July 5 to disengageand de-escalate is welcome," thenewly-appointed envoy said dur-ing an online media briefing.

He said the Chinese actions inHong Kong as well as along the

LAC are "concerning".The British envoy also talked

about the "tragic loss of lives" ofIndian soldiers along the LACand hoped that both sides wouldbe able to achieve de-escalationof tensions through talks.

DRDO establishes Covid-19testing facility in LehPNS n NEW DELHI

The DRDO has established aCOVID-19 testing facility atthe Defence Institute of HighAltitude Research (DIHAR) inLeh to augment the existingcapacity for identification ofcoronavirus cases in the unionterritory of Ladakh, accordingto an official statement.

The testing facility, whichwas inaugurated by LadakhLieutenant Governor R KMathur on Wednesday, iscapable of screening 50 sam-ples per day, said the statementby the Defence Ministry.

"The facility can also beutilised for training manpow-er for COVID-19 testing andwill be of great help to address

future bio-threats and carryingout R&D (research and devel-opment) activities pertinent toagro-animals diseases," theministry noted.

In Ladakh, the virus has

infected 1,206 people andkilled two people, as per dataon the Union health min-istry's website. There are 186active COVID-19 cases inLadakh as of now, it stated.

PNS n CHENNAI

Eighty-four security and fire ser-vices personnel deployedin Raj Bhavan have test-ed positive forCOVID-19 but noneof them came intocontact with GovernorBanwarilal Purohit orsenior officials, the gov-ernment said here on Thursday.

As few men posted at RajBhavan showed symptoms, test-ing was done for 147 personneland 84 of them, comprising

security and fire service staffers,were found positive for coron-avirus, a Raj Bhavan release said.

"All these persons werefurther investigatedand now have beenquarantined by thehealth department.All these persons

were working on theouter side of Raj Bhavan

like the main gate and not inthe main building," the releasesaid, adding none of themcame into contact with gover-nor Purohit or senior officials.

84 TN Raj Bhavan stafftest positive for Covid-19

Northeast has potential to becomeIndia's growth engine: PM ModiPNS n NEW DELHI

The northeast has the potentialto become India's growthengine, Prime MinisterNarendra Modi said onThursday, noting that peace isnow being established in theentire region.

He made these remarks atthe foundation stone layingceremony of the Manipurwater supply project via videolink.

While blockades havebecome a part of history inManipur, the era of decades ofviolence in Assam has ceased.

In Tripura and Mizoramtoo, youth have abandonedthe path of violence and theBru-Reang refugees are nowmoving towards a better life, hesaid in his address.

The prime minister notedthat the government is makingconstant efforts to improveconnectivity in the northeastregion, be its highways, layingof rail tracks or upgradation ofairports.

The foundation stone layingprogramme, the prime minis-ter said, is an example of thefact that even during the crisistriggered by the novel coron-avirus, the country has notstopped working.

Till the time a vaccine isdeveloped, we have to vigor-ously fight against coronavirusand the development worksshould also be carried for-ward with full force, he said.

Referring to the "aatma nirb-har Bharat abhiyan" (self-reliant India campaign), theprime minister said now clus-

ters are being developed forvalue addition and marketingin local products. In theseclusters, all the facilities will begiven to agro startups andother industries.

He said the northeast has thepotential to replace India'sbamboo import with local pro-duction.

There is a huge demand forincense sticks in the country,but for this, India importsbamboo worth crores ofrupees, he lamented.

A lot of work, Modi point-ed out, is being done to changethis situation.

He said a huge investment isbeing made under the NationalBamboo Mission. This willbenefit the youth of the north-east, and the startups here.

Many institutes are now

being set up for health, educa-tion, skill development andstartups.

With the formation of sportsuniversity and world class sta-dia, Manipur is becoming amajor hub for the country'ssports talent, he observed.

Speaking on the water sup-ply project, the prime ministersaid it is a big day for lakhs ofpeople of Manipur, includingImphal, as it will reduce thewater problems faced by them.

He said women will especial-ly benefit as they won't have totravel for kilometers to fetchclean water. The project hasbeen designed keeping in mindneeds of the next 20-22 yearsand lakhs of people will getaccess to clean drinking water,while thousands will getemployment, he said.

An externally funded pro-ject, the Manipur water supplyproject was designed to providefreshwater household tap con-nections (FHTCs) to remain-ing households in GreaterImphal planning area, and for

1,731 rural habitations cover-ing 2,80,756 households in all16 districts of Manipur.

The project outlay is Rs3054.58 crore, with a loancomponent funded by the NewDevelopment Bank.

SC allows Raj HC topass orders on plea ofPilot, 18 MLAs

DIRECTIONS SUBJECT TO ITS VERDICT PNS n NEW DELHI

The Supreme Court Thursdayallowed the Rajasthan HighCourt to pronounce order onplea of 19 dissident CongressMLAs, including sacked deputyCM Sachin Pilot, against theAssembly Speaker's notice forinitiating disqualification pro-ceedings against them, but saidthat it would be subject to theoutcome of the petition beforethe top court.

Rajasthan Assembly SpeakerCP Joshi however failed to getany interim relief on his pleaalleging that the high courtcannot interdict the disqualifi-cation proceedings undertakenby him under 10th schedule ofthe Constitution.

A bench of Justices ArunMishra, B R Gavai and KrsihnaMurari said Joshi's plea raisesimportant questions andrequires prolonged hearing.

We are not restraining theHigh Court from passing theorder but it will be subject to theoutcome of the petition (ofSpeaker) before the SupremeCourt, the bench said, while fix-ing the plea for hearing on July27.

Voice of dissent in democra-cy cannot be shut down , thebench observed.

We are trying to find outwhether this process (disquali-fication) was permissible ornot," it said, while questioningJoshi on the reasons for initiat-ing disqualification proceed-ings against the 19 dissidentCongress MLAs.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal,appearing for Joshi, listed thereasons for starting the dis-qualification proceedings, sayingthat these MLAs did not attendparty meetings and conspired todestabilise their own govern-ment.

The bench said: This is not asimple matter and these MLAsare elected representatives."

Responding to a query of thebench, Sibal said, These MLAshad gone to Haryana, stayed ata hotel and gave TV bites thatthey want floor test." He said theissue as to whether the disqual-ification process is permissibleor not cannot be taken note ofby the court at this stage. Ourgrievance is purely constitu-tional and there cannot be anyorder till decision is taken by thespeaker."

COVID-19 Conducting exams in varsities in MCQsformat not feasible alternative, say academicians

Sense of despairamong Congressworkers, saysKuldeep BishnoiPNS n NEW DELHI

Haryana Congress leaderKuldeep Bishnoi on Thursdaysaid there is a sense of despairamong party workers overthe treatment meted out toyoung leaders likeJyotiraditya Scindia andSachin Pilot, and also urgedthe leadership to promotemass leaders in every state inthe war against the BJP.

Taking on the old guard, heasked the Congress leader-ship to give other responsibil-ities to those who have beenoccupying high positions for35 years and have never con-tested elections.

Bishnoi, who is son of for-mer Haryana chief ministerBhajan Lal, triggered specu-lation when he posted a pic-ture of himself with Scindiaand Pilot on Twitter.

"Many congratulations@JM_Scindia. A welldeserved one," he said alongwith the picture, on a daywhen Scindia took oath asRajya Sabha member of theBJP. He also congratulated for-mer Congress leader PriyankaChaturvedi, who also tookoath as a Shiv Sena memberof Rajya Sabha on Wednesday."Sincere congratulations@priyankac19 on your hard-earned success. Best wishes fora bright future."

PNS n NEW DELHI

Conducting exams in universi-ties in Multiple ChoiceQuestions (MCQs) format inview of COVID-19 pandemic isnot a feasible alternative as itcannot test students' analyticalskills and students pursuingsubjects like literature will be ata disadvantage, academicianshave pointed out.

The concerns by academi-cians come against the backdropof the Delhi High Court askingthe University GrantsCommission (UGC) to clarify iffinal year examinations of theuniversities be conducted basedon MCQs, open choices, assign-ments and presentations, insteadof long form exams.

The UGC officials, however,maintained that over 6,000 uni-versities in the country havealready conducted exams forfinal year students or are plan-

ning to conduct them.Earlier this month, the UGC

in its revised guidelines direct-ed the higher education institu-tions that final year examina-tions be conducted inSeptember 2020, instead of July2020, as per its guidelinesannounced in April.

Punjab, Maharashtra, Odisha,Tamil Nadu, West Bengal andDelhi have announced reserva-

tions against the plan, citing theCOVID-19 situation.

Rajesh Jha, a political scienceprofessor and executive councilmember of DU, said, "Our stu-dents are not prepared for a newformat of exams. They havebeen taught to analyse thingsand will be caught unpreparedfor any new format. All of a sud-den you cannot impose a sys-tem. You need to test it before

implementing it. Coronavirustime cannot be used for exper-imentation."

Pankaj Garg, a professor atRajdhani College, said, "Theformat of exams decide how stu-dents are taught. For MCQs andeven for open book exams, thestudents have to be taught in acertain way but in DelhiUniversity, students have notbeen taught in a way that they

can take exams in such a for-mat".

"Plus problems are multiply-ing-- coronavirus cases are onthe rise and students in Assamand Bihar are also facing issuesdue to floods. Internet connec-tivity is already an issue and theflood situation has complicatedthe connectivity situation, soeven if the MCQ format examshappen they will happen in anonline format which will not befeasible for students," he said.

Saikat Ghosh, an Englishprofessor at the Shri Guru TeghBahadur Khalsa College andAcademic Council member,said, "The way the subjects andthe syllabus have been designed,we teach those subjects even atthe undergraduate level in a fairamount of detail and we encour-age students to show analyticalskills. Analytical skills cannot betested through the MCQ format,which favours information"

NE's prosperity alwayspriority of Modi govt: Shah

Union Home MinisterAmit Shah on Thursdaycongratulated Prime

Minister Narendra Modi for theManipur water supply projectand said the development andprosperity of the Northeast hasalways been the priority of hisgovernment.

Shah said the project, whosefoundation stone was laid byPrime Minister Narendra Modion Thursday, will provide safedrinking water to more than 2.8lakh households and also gen-erate huge employment oppor-tunities in Manipur.

"Development and prosper-ity of North Eastern region hasalways been the top priority ofModi govt. In his continuedefforts, PM @narendramodi jitoday laid the foundation stoneof Manipur Water Supply pro-ject worth ?3,054 crores. I con-gratulate PM for this unprece-dented project," Shah tweeted.

He said the project is yetanother manifestation of theprime minister's resolve towards'Har Ghar Jal' (water in everyhome) and a prosperous

Northeast. The foundationstone of the project was laid byModi via video link.

An externally funded project,the Manipur water supply pro-ject was designed to providefreshwater household tap con-nections (FHTCs) to remaininghouseholds in Greater Imphalplanning area, and for 1,731rural habitations covering2,80,756 households in all 16districts of Manipur.

The project outlay is Rs3054.58 crore, with a loan com-ponent funded by the NewDevelopment Bank.

The prime minister noted that thegovernment is making constant effortsto improve connectivity in the north-east region, be its highways, laying ofrail tracks or upgradation of airports

PNS n BENGALURU

Alleging large-scale corruptionin COVID management inKarnataka to the tune of at leastRs 2,000 crore, former chiefminister Siddaramaiah onThursday demanded a judicialinquiry by a sitting High Courtjudge.

The government, however,dismissed the charges saying noirregularities have taken place.

"The total money spent onCOVID management is Rs4,167 crore whereas state Health

Minister B Sriramulu says onlyRs 324 crore has beenspent.Equipment and materialswere purchased double or triple

the existing cost. At least Rs2,000 crore has been pocketedby the ministers and officials,"Siddaramaiah. who is the leaderof opposition in the state assem-bly, told reporters. He demand-ed a judicial inquiry by a sittingjudge of the high court.

Releasing some documents tothe media to substantiate hisallegations, the former chiefminister claimed that the healthdepartment spent Rs 700 crore"some of the amount has beenspent and some is in thepipeline."

Siddaramaiah demands probe intoirregularities in Covid management

The UGC officials,however, maintainedthat over 6,000universities in thecountry havealready conductedexams for final yearstudents or areplanning to conductthem

Green card waitlist foran Indian more than195 yrs: US SenatorPNS n WASHINGTON

The backlog for an Indiannational to get permanent res-idency or Green Card is morethan 195 years, a topRepublican senator has said,urging his Senate colleagues tocome out with a legislativeresolution to address this prob-lem. A Green Card, knownofficially as a PermanentResident Card, is a documentissued to immigrants to the USas evidence that the bearer hasbeen granted the privilege ofresiding permanently.

Senator Mike Lee said onWednesday that the currentGreen Card policy did nothingfor the child of an immigrantwhose dead parent's GreenCard application was ultimate-ly denied because his or her jobwas no longer available.

"Someone from India enter-ing the backlog today wouldhave to wait 195 years to receivean EB-3 green card. Even if wegive their children this limbostatus, none of them will havea prayer of becoming a US cit-izen," Mr Lee said on theSenator floor.

In fiscal year 2019, Indian

nationals received 9,008 cate-gory 1 (EB1), 2,908 category 2(EB2), and 5,083 category 3(EB3) Green Cards. EB1-3 aredifferent categories of employ-ment-based Green Cards.

Lee, the senator from Utah,was speaking on the legislationmoved by Senator Dick Durbinthat seeks to protect immigrantworkers and their childrenwho are stuck in the green cardbacklog.

"Green cards are critical inthe lives of so many who arehere on temporary work visas.The backlog puts families atrisk of losing their immigrationstatus as they wait year afterweary year to finally make itthrough this green card back-log," Mr Durbin said.

"Our bipartisan agreementwould add critical protectionsthat were not in the original billfor immigrant workers andtheir immediate family mem-bers who are stuck in the back-log. They would be able toswitch jobs and travel withoutlosing immigration status. Andchildren of immigrant workerswould be protected from agingout so they will not face depor-tation," he said.

The British Airways’announcement that it isgoing to retire its fleet ofBoeing 747s from commer-cial passenger services hit

many aviation fans pretty hard. I haveprobably flown more passenger milesin the British Airways’ 747 aircraft thanon any other airline. In the past fewmonths, two other iconic operators ofthe Boeing 747, Australian airlineQantas and Dutch airline KLM, alsoannounced that they flew their lastjumbo flights. In the last couple of years— thanks to the emergence of morepoint-to-point flying, higher frequen-cy and the sheer efficiency of moderntwin-jet aircraft like the Boeing 787 andAirbus A350 — more and more 747sare being retired across the world.

Air India withdrew the jumboflight’s operations a couple of years agobut has been using it for some Haj andUmmah-related duties. Most otherAmerican, Asian and European oper-ators have retired the plane from ser-vice. However, there are exceptions likeAir China, Lufthansa and Korean Air,which operate the newer 747-8 variant,and a couple of other airlines such asThai Airways that operates the older747-400. In fact, my last 747 flight wasunexpectedly on the Thai Airways fromNew Delhi to Bangkok and back lastyear in October.

The global aviation industry is ina meltdown after the Wuhan virus laidwaste to the global economy. Global avi-ation was a primary vector in the spreadof the virus and many nations sealedtheir land borders. Others like Indiabanned all flight operations though lim-ited repatriation flights are still beingcarried out.

Many airlines have read the writ-ing on the wall and they understand thateven if a solution, such as a vaccine tothis accursed pestilence is found, traf-fic will not recover for months, may beeven years. The Boeing 747 is too largean aircraft for reduced traffic. Thismeans higher operating costs. As forAirbus A380, airlines are quickly retir-ing these aircraft, too. Air France, theairline of the nation where the A380 isput together, just retired all of itsAirbus A380 fleet, the youngest beinga decade-old. Airlines will tell you thatit is cheaper to fly two Boeing 787Dreamliners than a single 747 orAirbus A380.

While cargo variants of the 747 arestill flying in great numbers, boththose built at the Boeing factory outsideSeattle, Washington, and those planesconverted from passenger operations tofreight, have halted operations. After all,the 747 was initially conceived as a cargoplane and the iconic “hump” on the air-

craft was there to allow the noseto be lifted up for the cargo to beloaded. Cargo operations withthe 747 are likely to continue formany, many years because thereis no direct replacement for it. Infact, most international air cargooperators still follow a “hub andspoke” model for cargo travellingbetween major airports.

The last convoy carryingfuselage and wing sections of theA380 has reached the finalassembly line in Toulouse and theaircraft will be completed in acouple of months. Even then, thesingle largest operator of theA380 aircraft, the Dubai-basedEmirates Airline, is retiring itsoldest twin-deck behemoths. Butit is ironic that the Boeing 747,which undertook its maidenflight in 1969, would have signif-icantly outlived the Airbus A380,a plane built with typicalEuropean arrogance to one-upthe US. The A380 is undoubted-ly an amazing engineering andtechnological achievement unlikethe Boeing plane, but is anunmitigated commercial disaster.

The Airbus A380 line willclose soon as the last nine planesare prepared for delivery. In the15 years since the factory openedits doors, a mere 251 enteredcommercial service. Boeing isexpected to close its 747 lines in2022, with 16 aircraft (all cargovariants) remaining to be deliv-ered. Around 1,558 planes havealready been delivered since1970. And while the currentoptions such as the 747-8 have lit-

tle in common with the earliestmodel —100 and 200 variants —just one look, and you know thatit is 747. I think (I do not believethat I am alone here) this is thesingle most important reason thatthe 747 is seared into our mem-ories; it looked unique when itwas first flown and it still doeswith the hump at the front andits sharply swept wings.

There was an aesthetic beau-ty in the 747, which the A380simply does not have. The latteris functional but not pretty. Truthbe told, I rarely got to fly in 747sof late, the move to withdraw itfrom service across the worldhaving begun in the early 2010s.Of course, those two flights toThailand were a pleasant sur-prise, a couple of British Airwaysflights across the “pond” stuck ina middle seat less enjoyable. ButI did experience that ultimate joyof an aviation fan. I have flownon the upper deck of a 747, whichis one of the single most funthings one can do.

The last time I did that wason a British Airways evening ser-vice from Chicago O’Hare toLondon Heathrow. As far as mymemory goes, I think I just sleptthroughout that flight. I neverknew it was going to be the lasttime. Even as global air travelboomed during the past decade,a lot of that was due to the riseof low-cost airlines, hopping andskipping around the world withtheir gigantic fleets of AirbusA320 and Boeing 737 aircraft.

While it will be interesting to

see what happens to these air-lines, even Indian ones, in theaftermath of the Chinese conta-gion, international air travel, too,has changed. In no small part,thanks to the emergence of morepoint-to-point flying and ultra-long-haul flights.

A decade ago, a non-stopflight to and fro from India to theUS was just about possible witha load of penalties. Today’sBoeing 777 and 787s and Airbus’A350 can make the crossingwith a full load in just 16 hours.Imagine travelling from NewDelhi to San Francisco in the1970s and 1980s when the 747had just begun service. An AirIndia or Pan American 747would have taken you to NewYork’s JFK after stopping at leasttwo-three times. You would haveto change planes at JFK and thenmake the cross-country hopacross the US, may be withanother stop or two. Travel timewith stop-overs may have beenaround two days.

Before the pandemic started,both Air India and UnitedAirlines had non-stop servicesbetween the two cities, 15 hoursfrom take-off to touchdown.Sure, that might seem like a lotof time without any “fresh air” butthere was no need to walk bleary-eyed with screaming childrenacross a strange airport, dealingwith security and waiting forhours through weather delaysand the risk of lost baggage,thanks to the multiple connec-tions. But without the Boeing

747, none of this would have hap-pened. The 747 made large-scale international commercialtravel viable; it democratisedtravel in a way that was previous-ly unimaginable. It is because ofthe Boeing 747 that there was ahuge wave of migration of engi-neers and doctors out of India inthe 1970s and 1980s.

The 747 made flying afford-able; it made global airportsimprove their facilities, jetbridgesthat connect planes to the termi-nal became a standard feature atairports as did massive automat-ed baggage handling. Airportsbuilt bigger runways and largerinfrastructure to cater to themasses that a single jumbo jetbrought in. The 747 changed air-craft design; the high-bypassturbofan engines developed forit transformed aviation. It led tothe development of the trijetsDouglas DC-10 and Lockheed L-1011 Tristar by rival companies.

It is the development of thehigh bypass turbofan, which lit-erally sips fuel compared to olderengines, that led to the creationof all modern planes such as theBoeing 777, which has the largestengine in commercial service.The 747 was the “Queen” and theworld of aviation comprised itssubjects. Even though fewer andfewer 747s remain in the skiesferrying passengers, the legacy ofthe Boeing 747 is one that willcontinue for a long time tocome.

(The writer is ManagingEditor, The Pioneer)

In 1953, newly independent and democratic Indiaplaced a large order for fighter jets. The contractdidn’t go to the British. Instead, India ordered 70

Dassault Ouragan aircraft from France and a strangelove affair developed between Indian fighter jocks andFrench jets. Over 140 Ouragans served the Indian AirForce (IAF) before they were replaced by DassaultMystere IV aircraft of which India operated over 100.The latter distinguished itself admirably in the 1965war with our unfriendly western neighbour. While Indiadid not operate the legendary Dassault Mirage III andMirage 5, which acquitted themselves with distinc-

tion over the skies of the Sinai peninsula during the two Arab-Israeli conflicts, we didorder a small number of the Mirage 2000 aircraft. It quickly became a frontline fighterfor us and played a critical role during the Kargil war. It even delivered the weaponrythat destroyed a terrorist hideout in Balakot early last year. And now, India will startreceiving the next generation of French fighting prowess, the Rafale.

The Rafale is a dramatic step up for the IAF. With its supreme weaponry and elec-tronic warfare capabilities, it is far superior to anything that either of the troublesometwosome on India’s eastern and western border have. It is an expensive plane and aninitial planned order for 126 aircraft has been peeled back to 36. It is but certain thata follow-up order will be placed soon. However, India would do well to remember theacquisition problems it has faced in the past. With the Mirage 2000 and the Boeing C-17 Globemaster, a heavy lift logistics aircraft, India dithered with making its follow-uporders. Both aircraft had seen their production lines close and India was left twiddlingits thumbs. We cannot afford to vacillate like this with acquisitions again as the previ-ous UPA administration hesitated for years over military hardware acquisition. As a result,it left gaping holes in India’s security apparatus, which are only being patched up today.The Rafale is a great new addition to the IAF and will give India an edge both in weaponsdelivery and air-to-air combat. But they cannot come fast enough. However, India mustnot give in to knee-jerk reactions. Instead, we must plan out a thorough acquisitionstrategy with more domestic manufacturing, which will not only help the local econo-my but also develop India’s military-industrial potential. The events of the past few monthshave taught us that we cannot trust the Chinese, particularly its President. We have tobe prepared for the worst. The Rafales will help.

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot may havebeen a tad too offensive in seeking the court’sintervention to deter his one-time deputy Sachin

Pilot from challenging the disqualification notice sentto him and his loyalist MLAs under the anti-defec-tion law. But the Supreme Court firmly underlined whatdemocracy is, the kind Gehlot has been claiming todefend, and what constitutional processes are.“Assume a leader has lost the faith of persons. Whileremaining in the party, they cannot be disqualified.Then this will become a tool and no one can raisetheir voice. The voice of dissent in a democracy can-

not be suppressed like this,” said Justice AK Mishra as the top court refused to stopa High Court verdict on a petition by 19 rebel Congress MLAs, challenging their dis-qualification notices. Clearly, the court laid down the thin line between the democraticright to dissent, that is healthy for building participatory dialogue and one which deservesa listen, and an ego-driven revolt. And it went with Pilot’s defence that the notices werean attempt to curb “freedom of speech.” For the last few days, the Pilot camp has beenchallenging the showcause saying the House was not in session and they hadn’t doneor said anything to indicate they were parting ways with the Congress. Both Gehlotand Pilot camps have been seeking refuge in the interpretation of clause 2(1)(a) of the10th Schedule of the Constitution. Going by the several Supreme Court judgments inthe matter, it could be said that any anti-party activity was tantamount to voluntarilygiving up the membership of the party. Gehlot has been building evidence of Pilot’sbreakaway moves since, like parading MLAs claiming bribery offers and releasing allegedtapes of senior BJP leaders coaxing rebels, to justify this argument. But Team Pilot arguesthat the clause cannot be overstretched to disallow the right to express one’s opinion.Rajasthan Speaker CP Joshi, who served the notices last week, had argued that therebels cannot petition the High Court before he took action. And that as a constitution-al authority, he had the right to do so even when the House was not in session as therebels had skipped two meetings of the legislature party. In fact, anticipating an adverseverdict, Joshi moved the Supreme Court even before the High Court could declare itsruling on the Pilot camp’s plea. The Supreme Court even took note of this impatienceto latch on to power. The court asked, “It is the matter of just one day. Why can’t youwait?” And reminding the Speaker of his constitutional role, the judges asked why he,as a neutral person, should approach the court at all in a pre-emptive manner or appearpartisan? The Supreme Court can anyway hear appeals against High Court rulings butwhy did the Speaker assume that the latter would be favourable to the rebels? Thispresumptive tactic might just impact all the other moves of Gehlot. So far, in a bid tosave his Government, he has been aggressively taking on the BJP for another versionof “Operation Lotus” and poaching a discontented and maladjusted Pilot. He even wroteto Prime Minister Narendra Modi, alleging the BJP’s attempts to dislodge his Government,naming Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat and making Modi himself complic-it in the goings-on in his party. But his adventurism on the rule of law has betrayed thematurity and astuteness with which he acted before the BJP could move in, herdinglegislators, furnishing numbers to the Governor and gathering evidence against Pilot.Getting the Speaker to defend the disqualification notices has clearly backfired and exposedhis anxieties. Gehlot claims he has 106 MLAs on his side, still a narrow lead in a 200-member Assembly. If the High Court disqualifies Pilot and his 18 MLAs, the majoritymark of 101 will come down and Gehlot will be safely home. If not, the rebel MLAscan vote against his Government and narrow the margins.

As Gehlot continues to prepare a back-up plan and publicly deride Pilot, it wouldhave been better if he had accommodated him as shrewdly and continued his chiefministership. Now, it looks like he is the one impatient instead of Pilot. The youngerCongressman and once an acolyte of the Gandhi scions cannot look back either as hehas waded deep into the contest. He is drawing political sustenance from the grass-roots where he has worked for the last six years or so. The Gujjars of three States —Rajasthan, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh — has amassed behind him just like they didfor his father Rajesh Pilot. This means a sizeable votebank that could make Pilot attrac-tive to the BJP. The fact that he changed his plea in the High Court and made the Centrea party to it is some indication that he will gravitate to the other polarity. That’s the sadpart, the assumption that Congress’ breakaways, most of them talented with fresh ideas,will do better in the BJP than in the party that they had volunteered for. The example ofHimanta Biswa Sarma in the Northeast shows that the BJP is consolidating with ex-Congress talent. Old Congresswallahs may say the young are pesky and impatient butthe crossovers have meant that the Congress has lost Goa, Manipur, Uttarakhand,Arunachal, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka. Is Gehlot’s ego turf worth it?

This round to Pilot

Some succour

Sir — This refers to the editor-ial, “A glimmer of hope” (July22). The news that early stageclinical trials of the OxfordUniversity COVID-19 vaccinehave proved that it is safe andinduces an immune responsegives the world hope at a timewhen we are facing one of thedeadliest pandemics in history.

Though more tests have tobe done before it is made avail-able for the public, there is hopefor mankind even as the pan-demic has already claimed morethan six lakh lives and infectedmillions of people around theglobe. Many other nations,including India, are also on thepath of developing a vaccine.There is something to rejoice asthe Serum Institute of India, oneof the premium immunobiolog-ical drugs manufacturers of thecountry, has entered into a man-ufacturing partnership withAstraZeneca once the vaccinetrial is successful.

The human trials will bedone in August and a con-firmed analysis will be possibleby October/November, accord-ing to the firm. If everything

goes well, the vaccine will beready by December. Let us hopethis vaccine and others, that arealso being tested, put an end tothe mental and physical miseryof the people.

M Pradyu Kannur

Futile exercise

Sir — This refers to the article,“Leave Lutyens alone” (July 21)by Yashovardhan Azad. Thewriter is right to raise alarm overthe Government’s plan to

restructure the Lutyens’ zone. Parts of this area have main-

tained a distinctive architectur-al heritage and urban character.The razing of buildings from theRashtrapati Bhawan to IndiaGate will rob the Lutyens area ofits beauty.

Instead of getting a facelift,the large open spaces may get obliterated. Many beautiful build-ings in the Lutyens’ zone addgrace and charm to the city. Onefinds it difficult to understand asto why such a restructuring isrequired at places which arebrimming with charm and beau-ty. The Government shouldinstead focus its energy on rede-veloping and beautifying the oldcity of Delhi and also perking upthe economy.

Devendra KhuranaBhopal

Adapt to changes

Sir — The pandemic has led toseveral changes. But the judicialsystem has found it difficult toadapt to changing times. Infact, the pandemic has onlymade matters worse for ourcourts. Piled up cases, outdatedlaws, lengthy legal proceedingsand the lack of legal reforms aresome of the things that demandimmediate attention.

Rati JainVia email

P A P E R W I T H P A S S I O N

www.dailypioneer.comfacebook.com/dailypioneer | @TheDailyPioneer | instagram.com/dailypioneer/

op nionVIJAYAWADA | FRIDAY | JULY 24, 2020

06

Farewell, my Queen

KUSHAN MITRA

The Boeing 747 is being withdrawn from passenger service. It changed aircraft

design, made flying affordable and pushed airports to improve their facilities

PM Modi is 100 per centfocussed on building hisimage. India’s captured institu-tions are busy doing this task.One man’s image is not a sub-stitute for a national vision.

Congress leader—Rahul Gandhi

There’s the knowing smile. Notbecause I know things forsure...but mostly because I amat peace with the idea of notknowing...what’s important willreveal itself at the right time...

Actor—Sushmita Sen

The Trump administrationhas maintained close contactand tremendous cooperationwith India on the latest Chinese borderaggression.

US Ambassador to India—Ken Juster

S O U N D B I T E

L E T T E R S T O TT H E E D I T O R

Oxford vaccine promising but let’s be real

This refers to the editorial, “A glimmer of hope” (July22). With 15 million cases and six lakh deaths glob-ally, biomedical companies are under tremendous

pressure to deliver a safe and effective vaccine forCoronavirus. While the outbreak is peaking by the day,a silver lining on the horizon is also flashing. A new vac-cine development technology — RNA vaccine, alsoknown as mRNA — is emerging as the front-runner toalleviate mankind’s COVID-19-inflicted miseries. Thethree leading vaccines by Oxford — AstraZeneca, Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna — are mRNA based and arealso in the final phase of trials. The technology, capa-ble of faster rollout at affordable prices, is versatile andpromising. It is known to produce safe and long-last-ing immune response in addition to better managementof a class of white blood cells called T-cells. White cells,as we all know, help the body get rid of infected cells.That two dozen of the 150 vaccinations are mRNA dri-ven is not surprising. All the three front-running vac-cines score high on “dual immune response” compris-ing antibodies and T-cells.

Though some euphoria is justified, yet we mustunderstand that vaccine development is a lengthy andpainful process. Even the vast amount of data from clin-

ical trials is unable to justify the hypothesis the biomed-ical community has set out to prove. The durability ofthe immune response system as also the longevity ofthe regenerated T-cells together are concern areas. Theuniversal safety of vaccines across age groups remainsworrisome as representation of the vulnerable groupsin the clinical trials is said to be limited. While the needfor a safe and effective vaccine is given, expediency can-not override quality. Being optimist is good but beingone with caution is better.

SK PrabhakarGurugram

Send yyour ffeedback tto:letterstopioneer@gmail.com

The Rafale arrivesIf you take racism and dis-crimination in the world, oneof the most important thingsis to teach your children his-tory as it should be and notthe sanitised version of it.

Former Sri Lanka captain —Kumar Sangakkara

SC says disqualification can’t be based on dissent, asks whySpeaker approached court when he should be neutral

India’s long tradition of French fighter jets continues. The game-changer aircraft will boost our capabilities

FDI through front door

ATTEMPTS ARE BEING MADE TO DESTABILISE ELECTED

GOVERNMENTS. I DON'T KNOW TO WHAT EXTENT YOU

ARE AWARE OF ALL THIS OR YOU ARE BEING MISLED.

—RAJASTHAN CHIEF MINISTER

ASHOK GEHLOT

IT IS CLEAR FROM THE LETTER OF THE CM TO THE PM

THAT HE HAS LOST THE CONFIDENCE OF HIS MLAS AND

HIS GOVERNMENT IS IN MINORITY.

—RAJASTHAN BJP CHIEF

SATISH POONIA

POINTCOUNTERPOINT

On April 22, the California-based US internetgiant, Facebook, announced its decision tobuy 9.99 per cent stake in Jio Platforms

Limited (JPL) paying more than 43,450 crore. JPLis a 100 per cent subsidiary of Reliance IndustriesLimited (RIL) and has in its fold a wide spectrumof businesses such as wireless broadband, homebroadband, enterprise broadband, narrowband,internet-of-things businesses, a bouquet of digitalapplications, e-commerce and so on.

This was followed by a flurry of investments withbig names such as General Atlantic, Silver Lake,Qualcomm, Intel, Vista, Google and so on, bring-ing in cumulative investment of over 1,00,000 crore,taking the total to 1,50,000 crore. In lieu of this cap-ital, they get aggregate shareholding of 30 per centor 5,000 crore for every one per cent, thus valuingthe company at a whopping `5,00,000 crore.

Even as foreign investors see value in every seg-ment of the business on this platform, at the centrestage is e-commerce, which is being powered byJioMart commerce platform — a unit of JPL. In fact,Facebook has come in primarily with an eye on tap-ping opportunities in this area and signed a com-prehensive agreement with JPL to exploit synergiesbetween the two conglomerates.

The duo intend to offer technology-enabledwherewithal to enable consumers access neighbour-hood stores and have products delivered at theirdoorsteps. About 30 million of these stores will beempowered to digitally transact with every customerin their neighbourhood (over 400 million-strongIndian database of WhatsApp — a 100 per cent sub-sidiary of Facebook — will come in handy).JioMoney — RIL’s payment platform — will be inte-grated into the JioMart venture to facilitate hassle-free seamless payment for transactions. The modeloperated by Reliance under JioMart is a combina-tion of online and offline retail. Apart from RelianceRetail Limited (RRL), which has thousands of retailstores spread all over India and gets hooked on tothe Jio platform, it will be serving tens of millionsof neighbourhood stores in a variety of ways viz. han-dling, procurement, storage, payment, deliveryand so on. Since all of this will be powered by a dig-ital eco-system, the model is a hybrid of online andoffline.

Two things are abundantly clear: RelianceIndustries is deeply entrenched in Indian retail —already through RRL and now increasing its foot-print exponentially through the Jio Platform. It isgetting a massive injection of Foreign DirectInvestment (FDI), with Facebook alone havingpumped `43,450 crore into JioMart. But this is outof sync with the extant policy in regard to FDI inretail. For the purpose of FDI, unlike the interna-tional practice where retail is treated as a singlehomogenous sector without any distinction, theIndian Government has divided retail into severalclasses. In India, we have Single-Brand Retail(SBR) and Multi-Brand Retail (MBR) and there aresub-categories within each. Here, we deal with MBRor retail — as it is known in common parlance.

Within MBR, there is the “physical” format oroffline, which takes two forms: The euphoricmom-and-pop stores, also nicknamed neighbour-hood stores, and organised retail. Then, we have theonline format, which has two sub-categories, themarketplace model and the inventory-based model.

In the physical format, as per a policy approvedby the then UPA dispensation in 2012, as much as51 per cent FDI is allowed but with a plethora of rid-ers such as 30 per cent local sourcing, minimuminvestment of $100 million and prior approval of theState where the retail shop is to be set up. In 2016-

17, an unprecedented 100 per cent FDI infood retail was allowed, subject to the for-eign retailer selling items which aresourced only from Indian farmers andprocessed locally. Besides, 25 per cent ofinvestment should be in agri-infrastruc-ture like irrigation, farm machinery/imple-ments and so on. In the online format, asper guidelines issued in early 2016, (PressNote 3) 100 per cent FDI is allowed underthe so-called marketplace model. Themarketplace is a platform where vendorssell their products to consumers even asits owner merely acts as a facilitator. Themarketplace owner provides servicessuch as booking orders, raising invoices,arranging delivery, accepting payments,handling rejections, warehousing and soon. But, s/he can’t hold inventory andundertake direct selling.

The permission for 100 per cent FDIin the marketplace is subject to two mainriders, that is “the entity cannot permitmore than 25 per cent of total sales on itsplatform from one vendor or its groupcompanies. Further, it can’t directly or indi-rectly influence the sale price.” Sans anyspecification as to “who the vendor is”, afirm linked to the marketplace (either itssubsidiary or a Joint Venture with anIndian company) is eligible.

Thus, contrary to the real intent of thepolicy, which disallowed the market-place owner from direct selling to individ-ual consumers, the fine print permittedthem to do so — albeit by its subsidiaryor JV. This is precisely what e-commercemajors such as Amazon andFlipkart/Walmart have been doing eventhough they came in as marketplace oper-ators. They are operating as direct sellers,controlling inventory, giving discounts andso on.

A clarification to Press Note 3 issuedon December 26, 2018 has not material-ly altered the position on ground zero. Itsays “the owner of the marketplace or itssubsidiary or its JV with Indian compa-

ny can’t have ownership of the seller.”Further, “a seller/firm on the platform can’tsource more than 25 per cent of its inven-tory from a firm connected with the lat-ter.” The marketplace owner can getaround both. First, by having less than 50per cent shareholding in the seller firm andargue, he has no control (albeit majority)over the latter and second through thewholesale arm continuing supplies to theseller but within the 25 per cent thresh-old.

The clarification has not deterred theirhold over Indian retail; they are dominantsellers themselves, giving little space to mil-lions of small vendors for whose benefitthis unique policy dispensation of the mar-ketplace was designed. Disingenuousbureaucrats allowed them to do so bycrafting policy architecture to suit them.

The small vendors, through theirumbrella organisations such as All IndiaOnline Vendors Association (AIOVA),Retailers Association of India (RAI),Delhi Vyapar Mahasangh (DVM) and soon, have petitioned judicial authorities atvarious levels seeking action againstAmazon/Flipkart for violation of FDInorms and indulging in unfair practicesbut have not got any relief. The sole rea-son is that the courts go by the fine printwhich suits these giants.

Unlike the marketplaces of foreign e-commerce majors, JioMart commerceplatform floated by RIL holds the poten-tial of giving a boost to the small vendors,but even this may not gel with the extantpolicy framework. Even as the mainthrust of the policy is on “complete pro-hibition of FDI in direct selling to indi-vidual consumers”, JioMart, which isdeeply entrenched in direct sales, hasreceived investment from Facebook — aforeign company.

Like Amazon et al, Reliance/Facebookmay get around by citing that foreignshareholding in the seller firm is less than50 per cent or a wholesaler linked to

JioMart owner Reliance/Facebook willkeep its supplies to the vendor within the25 per cent threshold. Or they may carveout a separate entity entirely for food retailwhere 100 per cent FDI is allowed. Thisway, the two would be able to demonstratethat they are not violating the rule book.But this is not the way to go.

Looking at what is happening onground zero, it is abundantly clear that theModi Government has no objection topermitting FDI in online retail and evenin offline retail (albeit without any riders)as amply demonstrated by the treatmentmeted out to Amazon/Flipkart earlier andnow to Facebook riding piggyback on RIL.If that be so, then why allow it to happenin a vague and convoluted manner? Whyshould the policy not be clear-cut andtransparent? Why should FDI not beallowed through the front door?

The Government should shun themarketplace model. It should allow 100per cent FDI in retail in both online andoffline without any riders (the special cat-egories such as 100 per cent FDI in foodretail should go). This will level the play-ing field for all, online vs offline, food retailvs non-food, marketplace vs inventory andso on and eliminate discretion of bureau-crats whose writ is all-pervasive when itcomes to grant of approvals.

It will help small traders by leading toall-round development of infrastructureand offering a wide range of choice forsourcing products. They can and will co-exist with big players — both foreign andIndian. It will be pro-consumer in thelong-run with many players catering totheir needs at competitive/affordableprice. Sans these policy changes, underbusiness as usual scenario, the consumerswill pay a heavy price in the medium tolong-term as Indian retail will be cartelisedby a few players viz. Amazon, Walmartand Facebook/RIL.

(The writer is a New Delhi-based pol-icy analyst)

The Govt must allow 100 per cent FDI in retail as this will level the playing field for all,eliminate discretion of bureaucrats whose writ is all-pervasive and help small traders

analysis 07F I R S T C O L U M N

India can exitfiscal tight spot

KUMARDEEP BANERJEE

For this to happen, GDP growth and theeconomy have to be treated and run like a

corporate house, hungry and lean

UTTAM GUPTA

LOOKING AT WHATIS HAPPENING ONGROUND ZERO, IT

IS ABUNDANTLYCLEAR THAT

THE MODIGOVERNMENT HASNO OBJECTION TO

PERMITTING FDI INONLINE RETAIL

AND EVEN INOFFLINE RETAIL

(ALBEIT WITHOUTANY RIDERS) AS

AMPLYDEMONSTRATED

BY THETREATMENT

METED OUT TOAMAZON/FLIPKARTEARLIER AND NOW

TO FACEBOOKRIDING PIGGYBACK

ON RIL. WHYSHOULD IT BEALLOWED TOHAPPEN IN A

VAGUE ANDCONVOLUTED

MANNER? WHYSHOULD THE

POLICY NOT BECLEAR-CUT ANDTRANSPARENT?

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and top Cabinet Ministers havespent the last fortnight talking to numerous stakeholders andpotential investors across the globe and at various fora, try-

ing to convince them that India has lifted the shutters and is readyfor business. Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister for Road Transport &Highways and MSMEs, has talked about potential opportunities forinvestors on the Delhi-Mumbai, Delhi- Meerut highway corridors,the linked and now commercially-available waterways and has goneon record to promise daily, weekly and monthly returns from invest-ments in India’s infrastructure. Similarly, Minister of Communications,Electronics and Information Technology Ravi Shankar Prasad hasannounced an ambitious production-linked incentive scheme forlarge-scale electronics manufacturing firms, with potential finan-cial incentives and sharp focus on high-value, globally-producedcomponents of mobile phones and air conditioners.

Modi himself, at multiple fora and one-on-one conversationswith top CEOs, has made a strong pitch for refuelling India withupgraded, long-term investments for a brighter future for enterpris-es and the global world order. Much of this effort has been madeto keep the money coming in for Finance Minister NirmalaSitharaman, who has been trying to find alternate sources of rev-enue during one of the biggest economic slowdowns India has seenin recent memory and to ensure that the State fulfils its commit-ment of providing basic amenities like food and medical care to alarge section of the population. These efforts are the need of thehour for India, which is faced with the dual challenges of a ragingpandemic and military/economic ambush from an aggressive neigh-bour, China. And there is still a large track left to be covered to becomea larger than $5 trillion economy in a very short period.

So, what can be done? To begin with, GDP growth and theeconomy have to be treated and run like a corporate house, hun-gry and lean. Some may argue that it could lead to overlooking thewelfare of a vast majority of the population. In a democracy, thiscould lead to uncomfortable questions in Parliament at a time whenelections in some States are around the corner. While I won’t com-ment on the latter part of the argument regarding the politics behindstalling growth projects, the fact remains that there are many enter-prises and cooperatives around the world where sustainable devel-opment of employees has gone hand in hand with healthy busi-ness growth.

To take an example, the Government has access to a vastamount of cash. It can very well enter into minority shareholdingor profit-sharing arrangements with private fund managers and sov-ereign wealth creators, who can be tasked with bringing in high-value returns in a relatively short span of time. Of course, the chal-lenge would be to put the perfect agreement papers in place, astoo tight controls on managerial capacity could lead to efficient fundmanagers losing interest. On the other hand, too less control andthe Government could be pulled up for corruption and collusionwith wrong parties.

Second, the Government can again, by strategic choice, pickup a bunch of real estate and infrastructure projects stalled acrossthe country due to lack of funds or slowing demand (even beforethe COVID-19 crisis began). The Government’s track record of tak-ing up construction has been much below market standards butit can make a fresh start by bringing world-class builders and infra-structure specialists on board. A leading example of bringing effi-ciency by smart partnering and teamwork is Delhi Metro, whereboth the Central and State Governments have an equal ownershipbut the money to build the 489-kilometre suburban railway networkhas come from Japan. The corporation thus formed runs with 10nominees from the State and Central Government and eight (includ-ing the Managing Director) full-time Directors. What it ensures isequal say for most stakeholders and also brings the necessarymomentum behind the wheels to tunnel through the toughest andmost congested lanes of Delhi.

In a similar approach, Smart City, a pet project of the Governmentthat is in tune with Digital India, can be broken into smaller self-sustaining, futuristic enterprises with an independent Board ofDirectors, equal nominees from the Union and State Government-concerned and a full time professional CEO (with a competitive salaryto begin with). This team of approximately 20 people will have thetask of converting an available chunk of land and its civic ameni-ties into a global, high-tech piece of excellence, while empoweredto raise funds for itself.

Modi has often been praised for his respect for the bureau-cracy and bringing in the right talent for implementing projects ona mission mode. If he and his talented team put their mind to con-verting Smart City projects into globally-marketed profitable ven-tures in a relatively short span of time, it could be a game chang-er. It could help the country to come out of the current economiccrisis and turn it into one of the biggest opportunities for the nation.

(The writer is a policy analyst)

Amid the pall of gloom cast byCOVID-19 and the oppressiveheat, India was earnestly look-

ing forward to the arrival of the mon-soon. The Indian MeteorologicalDepartment (IMD) had forecast sur-plus rainfall in various parts of thecountry and sure enough, metropo-lises such as Mumbai and Delhi havereceived a healthy share of showers.

Mumbai, for instance, received 26per cent more rainfall as compared tolast year, while Delhi received 70 mmof rain on July 19 alone, which is thehighest in the last five years. But nomatter how heartening the rains

might be, every passing year theybring in their wake the ever-growingproblem of urban flooding.

This has been experienced fordecades in India but sufficient atten-tion has not been given to specificefforts to deal with it. In the past, anystrategy on flood disaster managementlargely focussed on riverine floodsaffecting large extents of rural areas.Urban flooding is significantly differ-ent from rural flooding as urbanisa-tion leads to developed catchmentsand in the event of heavy/high inten-sity rainfall, there is higher run-off,which increases the flood peaks from1.8 to eight times and flood volumesup to six times. Consequently, flood-ing occurs very quickly due to fasterflow times, sometimes in a matter ofminutes.

The recent death of a mini-truckdriver after his vehicle got submergedunder the Minto Bridge after a spellof rain in Central Delhi underlines thegrowing threat of urban flooding.While most of the time urban Indiapatiently endures huge volumes of

flooding and the resultant trafficsnarls, when people start losing lives,it is time for the citizens and theauthorities to consider the problemseriously and deal with it effectively.

Though large cities like Mumbai,Delhi and Chennai go through urbanflooding annually, the recurrence ofthe problem suggests that no lessonsare learnt and no infrastructure is builtor improved to prevent it. Just a fewhours of hard rain in metropolitancities can present a very embarrassingspectacle as daily life is thrown out ofgear and the cities become unwitting

examples for the developed world tolearn from. Another concerningaspect is that urban flooding increas-es the chances of contagious diseaseslike typhoid, cholera, leptospirosis,hepatitis and even COVID-19 spread-ing far more easily. For instance,floodwaters in Assam spread discard-ed medical waste and used PPE fromhospitals and COVID-19 care centres,raising fears of infection among peo-ple in inundated areas.

One of the major reasons forurban waterlogging are the archaicsewer systems in our cities that areheavily choked with silt and garbage.Indian metros not only need regularcleaning of sewers and storm waterdrains, particularly before the onset ofthe rainy season, they also require anadvanced system that is based on thelatest technology and satellite data thatcan calculate the quantities of waterrun-off every monsoon and accord-ingly estimate the load factor on thesewerage and storm water system.

Another reason for flooding ofcities is excessive concretisation and

paved areas in the urban landscape.This has not only resulted in exacer-bating the heat island effect andcausing a sharp spike in ambient tem-peratures but preventing rainwaterabsorption into the ground andrecharging of the water table. This, too,increases the rainwater run-off,putting undue pressure on thedrainage network.

The efforts to prevent urbanflooding will be incomplete unless theground water absorption rate of rain-water as compared to the run-off rateis balanced. Another issue pertainingto urban flooding is the role played byillegal construction and how it isimpacting the storm water drainagesystem across India’s major cities. Asurban sprawls increase rapidly, unau-thorised construction and unplanneddigging by civic agencies are becom-ing two major issues that are furtherimpacting our already overburdeneddrainage systems adversely. Floodingwill continue to trouble urban citizensunless these impediments areaddressed and removed.

We often marvel at infrastructureplanning of ancient India, especiallythe drainage system of the Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa cultures that dateback to 2400 BC. Sadly we are unableto replicate the excellence and successof the bygone era in today’s time.Urban flooding is avoidable and inorder to ensure safety of lives andproperty, it is essential for theGovernment to rapidly develop strate-gies that draw from the best of theworld’s benchmarking practices inurban rainwater management. Weneed city-wise protocols that cater tothe typicality of the demographics andgeography and automatically kick inwhen the area receives a certainquantum of rainfall.

Traffic snarls, waterlogging andthe loss of lives due to urban flood-ing are a painful indication that amanageable issue has been allowed todeteriorate and get out of hand. It istime authorities around the countrywake up.

(The writer is an environmentaljournalist)

A flood of urban woes during the rainsTraffic snarls, waterlogging and the loss of lives show that a manageable issue has been allowed to deteriorate

KOTA SRIRAJ

VIJAYAWADA | FRIDAY | JULY 24, 2020

www.dailypioneer.com

F O R E I G N E Y E

In an age of tweets andelectronic messaging,handwritten letters are asfashionable as woodenspinning wheels.Incidentally, MK Gandhi’scollected writings and lettersspan 98 volumes. Suchletters provide historianswith a flashlight into thetimes in which they werewritten. Bereft of them,historians look at theirshoelaces for inspiration.

(Dawn editorial)

WE ARE NOTHINGWITHOUT HISTORY

VIJAYAWADA | FRIDAY | JULY 24, 2020 money 08

CAPSULE

Kia Motors expects Sonet topump new energy NEW DELHI: Kia Motors Indiaon Thursday said itsupcoming model Sonet, to belaunched during the festiveseason this year, will injectnew dynamism in the compactSUV segment in the country.The company, which is goingto unveil the sub-four meterSUV globally on August 7, hasreleased the first officialrendering of the newproduction-ready Sonet. Themodel, which is slated forlaunch during the upcomingfestive season, aims to setnew design benchmarks andinject a new dynamism in thecompact SUV segment, KiaMotors India said in astatement. "With the new KiaSonet, we had the ambition togive this compact SUV astrong and muscular characterfound only in much largervehicles,” he said.

Airbus workers on strike againstSpain layoffsMADRID: Airbus workers inthe European aircraftmanufacturer's eight plants inSpain are striking Thursdayagainst the consortium'sdecision to cut 1,600 jobsover the next few months.Battered by the coronaviruspandemic, Airbus announcedlast month that it musteliminate 15,000 jobs, or morethan 10% of its globalworkforce, to safeguard itsfuture and warned of morethin years ahead. The cuts aremostly in Europe and affect900 employees in Spain.They're in addition to 700layoffs out of 2,600 global jobcuts in the consortium'sdefense division. Workerschanted “Zero layoffs!” as theymarched from the Airbus plantin Getafe, to the local townhall,demanding more politicalinvolvement to revive theindustry and investments thatwill guarantee long-termemployment.

India's LPU studentbags Rs 1.3 cr PhDscholarship NEW DELHI: Punjab-basedLovely Professional University(LPU) said its post graduateagriculture student SumantBindal has bagged a fully-paidscholarship of Rs 1.3 crore topursue PhD in plant sciencesat Australian NationalUniversity. "This is perhaps thebiggest scholarship everbagged by an agriculturestudent from India. The PhDprogramme would commencein September 2020 at ANU,"Jalandhar-based LPU said in astatement. Bindal, a postgraduate in agri-genetics andplant breeding would be doingresearch on "Identification ofsignalling pathways activatedby resistant genes againstFusarium wilt in tomato," theprivate university said. Hisresearch would focus on howto make tomatoes completelyresistant to Fusarium wilt, aplant fungus that infectstomatoes worldwide, and hasreportedly caused up to 45 percent yield loss to tomato cropin India in the past, it added.

PNS n NEW DELHI

The government has so faridentified 20 sectors whereIndia can meet domesticdemand as well as become aglobal supplier, Commerceand Industry Minister PiyushGoyal said on Thursday.

He said industry body Ficciand other associations areworking with the governmentin this regard.

"We have identified first 12sectors and now 8 more, so wehave 20 sectors in which Ficciand other associations are verymuch part of our engagement,where we have identified sec-tors where India can not onlymeet own domestic needs butalso become globally compet-itive and become global leadersupplying to the world," he saidin a Ficci webinar.

These sectors include foodprocessing, organic farming,agro chemicals, electronics,industrial machinery, furni-

ture, leather, auto parts and tex-tiles, among others.

He also highlighted thatdespite having skilled carpen-ters and artisans, India contin-ues to import furniture.

"Can we not prepare India tobecome the factory of theworld for furniture, can we notbuild to scale at competitiveprices so that the world looksat India, to source from India,"he added.

Further talking about yoga,

the minister said yoga holdshuge potential for industryand young entrepreneurs as theworld is excited about it.

"But did India really grab theopportunity that the PrimeMinister (Narendra Modi)opened up for India. Did we setup 100,000 yoga centres allover the world, did any entre-preneur amongst you or star-tups thought in terms of thepossibilities that yoga offers byplanning to train maybe

100,000 or 500,000 yoga teach-ers who would find an oppor-tunity across the globe," Goyalnoted.

He said one has to take aperson in yoga room for foursessions only and for the fifthsession, the person will come"running and then for the restof his life, he would want to bea yoga participant, that is thepower of yoga".

Cure is not only about med-icine or about visiting hospitalor a doctor for treatment, thehuge possibilities of yoga as apreventive medication areknown to many but have notbeen captured as an opportu-nity.

"I do not know whether allof us have failed the nation andthe people of India, wheredespite the Prime Ministerwith his vision of opening updoor, opening up opportuni-ties, for all of us, (we) have notseized the moment," the min-ister asked.

PNS n MUMBAI

Private non-life insurerBharti AXA GeneralInsurance on Thursday saidit has received Rs 800 croreworth crop insurance man-date from Maharashtra andKarnataka governments toinsure farmers in both thestates under the PradhanMantri Fasal Bima Yojana(PMFBY).

The company has securedauthorisation for three yearsfrom both the state govern-ments to implement thePMFBY in six districts ofMaharashtra and three dis-tricts of Karnataka, a releasesaid.

“Apart from implementingcrop insurance for farmers inboth the states, we will alsocapitalise on innovative tech-nologies and digital capabil-ities for sharing relevantinformation about thePMFBY and ensure speedyand hassle-free claim assess-ments in the respective dis-tricts,” the company's CEOand MD Sanjeev Srinivasansaid.

‘Identified 20 sectors where Indiacan become global supplier’ PNS n BENGALURU

The Flipkart Group onThursday announced thelaunch of Flipkart Wholesale,a new digital marketplace, andthe acquisition of 100 per centinterest in Wal-Mart IndiaPrivate Limited, which oper-ates the Best Price cash-and-carry business.

Kiranas and MSMEs arecentral to India's retail ecosys-tem and Flipkart Wholesalewill focus on meeting theirneeds by providing small busi-nesses a wide selection at sig-nificant value, the companysaid in a statement.

"Whether in grocery, gener-al merchandise or fashion,these businesses will have one-stop access to an extensiveselection of products withattractive schemes and incen-tives, supplemented with data-driven recommendations forstock selection, deliveredthrough a fast and reliablenetwork to drive greater effi-ciencies and better margins," itsaid.

Best Price currently sup-ports more than 1.5 millionmembers, including kiranasand other MSMEs.

Top Indian brands, local

manufacturers and sellers havepartnered with FlipkartWholesale to ensure the avail-ability of an exhaustive rangeof products and merchandisefor kiranas and MSMEs, thestatement said.

Kalyan Krishnamurthy,Chief Executive Officer,Flipkart Group, said, "Theacquisition of Walmart Indiaadds a strong talent pool withdeep expertise in the wholesalebusiness that will strengthenour position to address theneeds of kiranas and MSMEsuniquely."

Flipkart Wholesale willlaunch its operations in August2020 and will pilot services for

the grocery and fashion cate-gories.

It will be headed by AdarshMenon, a veteran at Flipkart.

Sameer Aggarwal, ChiefExecutive Officer at WalmartIndia, will remain with thecompany to ensure a smoothtransition, after which time hewill move to another role with-in Walmart. With the acquisi-tion of the Walmart India busi-ness, its employees will join theFlipkart Group and the homeoffice teams will integrate overthe next year. The Best Pricebrand will continue to serve itsmembers via its omnichannelnetwork of 28 stores and e-commerce operations.

Flipkart Group to launch of Wholesale,acquires Walmart India biz

PNS n MUMBAI

Demand for essential com-modities surged after Unlock1.0 as their shipment volumewas nearly three times higherafter the relaxations as com-pared to the lockdown period,according to a report by e-com-merce logistics aggregatorShiprocket.

The shipment volume ofessential products was nearlythree times higher after therelaxation in lockdown fromUnlock 1.0 and over 40 percent of the overall shipmentvolume came from essentialcategories as compared to thelockdown period, said thereport.

There has been an increaseof 65 per cent in active shippers

in the direct-to-consumer(D2C) segment, it added.

During the lockdown, therewere supply disruptions, anddelivery services faced hugechallenges and were unable tomeet the demand or orders, itsaid.

The report is an analysis ofshipment trends in post-lock-

down India in the D2C sectorfor a period between May 18and June 30, with a sample sizeof over 26,000 sellers acrossthe country.

The report further said 60per cent of sellers felt that theblend of both offline and onlinewill continue to be preferreddemand channel.

Less than 2 per cent of sell-ers were not sure how the newnormal will look like for them,it added.

"The lockdown created amajor disruption in the supplychain, and the demand-to-supply ratio was not balancedwith the demand increasingexponentially. Our report wasbased on the patterns andtrends observed," Shiprocketco-founder and ChiefExecutive Officer Saahil Goelsaid.

He added that Unlock 1.0has paved the way for a newphase of logistics operations inIndia.

The government has easedrestrictions on several aspectsof logistics and e-commerceand Shiprocket looks forward

to continuing its services in theUnlock 1.0 without hindrancesin the supply chain and ship-ping, he noted.

"It's interesting to see anincreased demand for hyper-local services amid this pan-demic. We hope the situationimproves and the world returnsto normalcy soon," he added.

Further, Mumbai, Delhi andBengaluru clocked the highestnumber of pick-ups and deliv-eries which underlines pent-updemand in these cities duringthe lockdown, report added.

Also, sellers in these citieswere able to overcome chal-lenges more quickly in becom-ing operational, it added.

While Delhi leads the pick-up activities, Mumbai was thetop city in terms of delivery.

Essential item demand surges with Unlock 1.0

PNS n MUMBAI

Equity benchmark Sensexjumped 269 points onThursday, led by gains in indexheavyweight RelianceIndustries, ICICI Bank andKotak Bank amid hopes offresh government stimulus tosupport the economy.

The 30-share BSE Sensexended 268.95 points, or 0.71per cent, higher at 38,140.47.

Similarly, the NSE Niftyadvanced 82.85 points, or 0.74per cent, to close at 11,215.45.

Shares of Reliance Industriesclimbed around 3 per cent tohit a record closing high of Rs2,060.65.

SBI, ICICI Bank, TechMahindra, ITC and KotakBank were among the otherwinners. On the other hand,

Axis Bank, HUL, Infosys, TCSand L&T finished in the red.

According to NarendraSolanki, Head- Equity Research(Fundamental), Anand RathiShares, Indian markets startedoff on a positive note but withunderlying caution as its Asianpeers traded mixed as investorsremained concerned over US-China tensions. "During thenoon session markets strength-ened as domestic sentimentswere boosted after news ofIndia working on offering pro-duction-linked incentives forup to five sectors to boostdomestic manufacturing," hesaid. Some support also camewith the Chief EconomicAdviser's statement that thegovernment may announcemore fiscal measures to boostdemand, Solanki added.

Amazon joins handswith Acko to offer autoinsurance in IndiaPNS n NEW DELHI

Amazon Pay on Thursdaysaid it has tied up with AckoGeneral Insurance Ltd to offertwo- and four-wheeler insur-ance policies in India.

Amazon Pay, which is thepayments unit of AmazonIndia, will help customerspurchase insurance effortless-ly, and Amazon Prime mem-bers will get extra benefitsincluding additional discounts,a statement said.

Customers can buy autoinsurance from Amazon Paypage, Amazon app or mobilewebsite and they can get aquote for their car or bike'sinsurance by providing basicdetails, it said.

In this quick paperlessinsurance plan, customerscan get hassle-free claimswith zero paperwork, one-hour pick-up, and three-dayassured claim servicing andone-year repair warranty inselect cities.

Policyholers will also have

an option for instant cash set-tlements for low value claims,making it beneficial for cus-tomers.

Additionally, customers canselect from a list of add-onslike zero-depreciation andengine protection and theywill be able to pay for theinsurance using Amazon Paybalance, UPI, or cards, thestatement said.

PNS n SACRAMENTO (US)

California will spend an addi-tional USD 315 million onprotective masks through acontract with a Chinese man-ufacturer.

Governor Gavin Newsomannounced the deal withBYD on Wednesday as hetouted California's efforts toprocure masks for healthcare and other essential work-ers.

Newsom signed a USD 1billion contract with BYD inApril and the first masksbegan arriving last monthafter delays.

Newsom said Californiawill soon launch a competi-tive bidding process to try toget more masks at lowerprices.

But he also acknowledgedthe masks aren't always get-ting to workers that needthem and pledged a moreaggressive state response.

PNS n MUMBAI

Former RBI GovernorRaghuram Rajan on Thursdaysaid the central bank has beenexpanding its balance sheetand buying government debton the back of excess liquidi-ty amid the economic slow-down but cautioned that thiscomes at a cost and cannot bea lasting solution.

He said central banks inmany emerging markets areresorting to such strategiesand disagreed with votaries of

the "modern monetary theory"who support this, making itclear that there are no freelunches.

"The RBI has been expand-ing its balance sheet and it hasbeen buying government debt.But effectively, in that process,what it is doing is borrowingfrom the banks at the reverserepo rate and lending on to thegovernment," Rajan saidspeaking at a conferenceorganised by Singaporeanlender DBS Bank.

It can be noted that at pre-sent there is excess liquidity inthe system as people get morerisk averse and save more andthe demand for credit is slug-

gish. Banks are parking the

money with the RBI in thereverse repo window, earningvery less.

It can be noted that mon-etisation of the fiscal deficit isone of the suggestions putforth by a slew of economistsand analysts as a prescriptionto tackle the current environ-ment.

Rajan said there are limits tomonetisation and the processcan go long only for a limitedperiod of time.

Monetisation by RBI has a cost: Rajan

PNS n MUMBAI

The rupee pared its initialgains and settled on a flat noteat 74.75 against the US dollaron Thursday as escalating ten-sions between the US andChina weighed on investorsentiment.

At the interbank forex mar-ket, the domestic unit openedon a strong note at 74.65, buterased the gains and finallyclosed at 74.75, unchangedfrom its previous closing.

During the session, thedomestic unit witnessed anintra-day high of 74.52 and alow of 74.87 against the US

dollar.Forex traders said the uptick

in the rupee during the daywas supported by weak green-back, foreign fund inflowsand positive domestic equities,but rising tensions between theUS and China weighed oninvestor sentiment andrestricted the gains.

PNS n NEW DELHI

PNB Housing Finance onThursday reported 10 per centdecline in consolidated netprofit to Rs 257.2 crore in thefirst quarter ended June 30,mainly due to lower disburse-ment amid COVID-19 pan-demic. The housing financier,promoted by Punjab NationalBank, had reported net profitof Rs 284.5 crore in June quar-ter of 2019-20.

The company's net interestincome also slipped 22 per centto Rs 487.8 crore during April-June, as against Rs 625.5 crorein year-ago period, it said in aregulatory filing.

Total income during thequarter also fell to Rs 1,872.33crore from Rs 2,232.58 crore.

"During the quarter, theCOVID-19 pandemic had asignificant impact on the dis-bursements resulting in thelowest quarterly disbursements

in more than 24 quarters.However, with all our branch-es now operational, we are wit-nessing an increasing trend indisbursement on a month onmonth basis.

"The company has rolled outits business plan for the FY 20-21 and will continue to focuson the lower risk weightedretail assets, resulting in high-er percentage of retail book inthe total AUM," Neeraj Vyas,said.

PNS n NEW DELHI

Liquor firm Radico KhaitanLtd on Thursday reported a19.52 per cent decrease instandalone net profit at Rs44.07 crore for the first quar-ter ended June 30, 2020, dueto disruptions caused byCOVID-19.

The company had posted anet profit of Rs 54.76 crore inthe April-June quarter a yearago. Its total revenue from

operations declined 33.70 percent to Rs 1,774.65 crore dur-ing the quarter under reviewas against Rs 2,677.07 crore inthe corresponding quarter lastyear, Radico Khaitan said in aBSE filing.

The company said "becauseof lockdown, the volume forthe quarter ended June 30,2020, was impacted partially,as there were no sales duringthe period April 1, 2020, tillMay 04, 2020.

PNS n CANBERRA

Australia's response to thecoronavirus pandemictipped the government'sbudget 85.8 bi l l ionAustralian dollars (USD 61billion) into the red in thelast fiscal year and will cre-ate 184 billion dollars (USD131 billion) more debt in thecurrent year which would bethe nation's biggest deficitsince World War II, treasuryfigures showed on Thursday.

Treasurer JoshFr ydenberg revealedAustralia's crumbling eco-nomic outlook based onincreased governmentspending to stimulate toeconomy and declining taxrevenue.

The conservative govern-ment had forecast inDecember a 5 billion dollars(USD 3.6 billion) surplus inthe fiscal year that endedJune 30, 2020: the first sur-plus in 12 years.

Pandemic tocost Aus USD131 bn this yr

California innew deal withmask maker

Bharti AXAgets Rs 800 crcrop insurance

Customers canbuy autoinsurance fromAmazon Pay page,Amazon app ormobile websiteand they can get aquote for their caror bike insurance

Rupee settles flat at74.75 against US dollar

PNS n MUMBAI

Power demand is expected todecline by around 8 per cent incurrent fiscal due to the steepfall in demand from commer-cial and industrial segments onthe back of COVID-19 pan-demic-induced nationwidelockdown, Emkay GlobalFinancial Services said in areport.

According to the agency,the fall in demand is likely toresult in a 13.1 per cent year-on-year (YoY) decline in rev-enue of discoms (distribu-tion companies) to Rs 6.8lakh crore in FY2021.

The nationwide lockdownto contain the spread of thedeadly coronavirus duringthe first three months of thef iscal has s ignif icant ly

impacted economic activity,leading to 17 per cent fall inQ1FY21 power demand, itsaid.

"Our analysis reveals thatpower demand will decline 8per cent year on year in FY21on a steep fall in commericaland industr ial (C&I)demand," the agency said.

Further, the gap betweenaverage cost of supply andaverage revenue realised inFY21 is expected to increase

to Rs 0.95 per unit from Rs0.50 per unit in FY2020,translating to an under-recovery of Rs 1.12 lakhcrore. According to Emkay,discoms' overdue has reachedRs 1.17 lakh crore, which isclose to the peak level wit-nessed pre-UDAY.

"Discoms' financial stresshas been aggravated in thisperiod due to the fall inpower demand from thecommercial and industrialsegments and waiver of fixedcharges by many discoms tothe industrial segment.

"The overdue level is like-ly to remain high in FY21 dueto the expected rise in under-recovery and slow progress inthe Aatmanirbhar schemetoward loan disbursement," itsaid.

Radico Khaitan Q1 net falls19.52 pc to Rs 44.07 crore

Raghuram Rajan

PNB Housing Fin Q1 net profit falls 10pc to Rs 257 cr on lower disbursement

There hasbeen anincrease of 65per cent inactiveshippers in theD2C segment,according to areport

Power demand to decline 8 pc in FY21,discoms' revenue to fall 13.1 pc

Sensex surges 269 pts

A friend, brother,villain, comedian

— actorBrahmaji has

played it all inhis 25-year-longcareer in Telugucinema and hasbecome one of

the most sought-after character

artistes now. The55-year-old actor

speaks to K RAMYA

SREE aboutnepotism, thereason for not

succeeding as ahero, and more...

lthough wehave hundredsof characterartistes in theTelugu cinema,there are only a

few who gained the samelove and support that theaudience would give toprotagonists. One suchartiste is Brahmaji. Withhundreds of films to hiscredit, the actor is one ofthe most loved characterartistes in the TFI.

Speaking about hisentry to films, Brahmaji,who made his debut in theindustry in 1995 said, “Icame to Hyderabad after Ijoined a film institute here.Until then I was studyingin Eluru. My father whohappens to be a tahsildarhad many transfers, so myentire childhood had ustraveling from one place toanother.”

Brahmaji played severalcharacters, including neg-ative shades, but isn’t con-sidered a typical hero.Krishna Vamsi, a dearfriend of Brahmaji,launched him as a hero inhis film Sindhooram butthe film tanked at the boxoffice. When asked whyhe couldn’t succeed as ahero he said, “Only a feware lucky. I didn’t even

think of becoming a hero.Krishna Vamsi wanted tomake me a hero but it did-n’t work out. I didn’t takemy failure as a hero seri-ously. I’m happy as a char-acter artist and I’m lead-ing a comfortable life. Ifyou ask me, with presentcompetition amongheroes, the life of a char-acter artist is way betterthan that of a herobecause every Friday is awar. If a hero does onefilm in six months, we ascharacter artistes can doabout five to six films. Wehave more interactionwith the audience.”

Brahmaji who bringswith him over 25 years ofexperience in the filmindustry feels nepotismdoesn’t exist in the field ofart. “Many outsiders aredoing well in the industry,see for instance NaveenPolishetty, Nani, VijayDeverakonda and manymore. These people areextremely talented, hencethey are surviving thetough competition here.Entry for heroes comingwith a background mightbe easy but sustaininghere is difficult. For exam-ple, only one son amongthree sons coming with abackground in the indus-

try is doing well, the othertwo failed as actors. Thereis no nepotism here. Itssheer talent. You will growin the industry only if youhave talent. It is onlydemand and supply in theindustry and not nepo-tism. I will not agree ifyou say nepotism exists inthe industry,” the actoropines.

Things are a lot bettertoday, believes Brahmaji,when it comes to makinga comfortable space foryourself in the industry.“It is a lot easier for peo-ple to come to limelightnow, there are manymeans to showcase yourtalent. Back then, we hadto run from pillar to postfor opportunities. Today,people are making it bigby posting short films onyoutube, videos onTikTok, etc.,” he tells us.

The actor’s son toomade his debut with OPitta Kada. His sonworked for the IndianNavy before his debut inTelugu cinema. The Who’swho of Tollywood attend-ed the pre-release event ofO Pitta Kada because ofthe friendly relationshipthe actor maintains. “Myson felt he wasn’t able tospend enough time with

the family as he was in themarine for four months.He then decided to getinto films. He underwenttraining in acting. As trailand error, we first shot asmall portion of the filmand showed it to otherswhich later developed intoa full-fledged film afterwatching my son’s actingskills. I told my son to goback to his job if he does-n’t sustain here,” the actorconcludes.

‘NO NEPOTISM IN TOLLYWOOD, IT'S

DEMAND & SUPPLY’A

EEnnttrryy ffoorr hheerrooeess ccoommiinngg wwiitthh aabbaacckkggrroouunndd mmiigghhtt bbee eeaassyy bbuuttssuussttaaiinniinngg hheerree iiss ddiiffffiiccuulltt.. FFoorr eexxaammppllee,,oonnllyy oonnee ssoonn aammoonngg tthhrreeee ssoonnss ccoommiinnggwwiitthh aa bbaacckkggrroouunndd iinn tthhee iinndduussttrryy iiss ddooiinnggwweellll,, tthhee ootthheerr ttwwoo ffaaiilleedd aass aaccttoorrss.. TThheerreeiiss nnoo nneeppoottiissmm hheerree.. IIttss sshheeeerr ttaalleenntt.. YYoouuwwiillll ggrrooww iinn tthhee iinndduussttrryy oonnllyy iiff yyoouuhhaavvee ttaalleenntt.. IItt iiss oonnllyy ddeemmaanndd aannddssuuppppllyy iinn tthhee iinndduussttrryy aannddnnoott nneeppoottiissmm..

Are you interested

in a ‘RISHTA'?The new Netflix show Indian Matchmaking has everyone hooked to it, making itone of the top 3 shows being watched by Indians on Netflix. All about an Indian

matchmaker catering to the colourist, sexist and casteist demands of potentialbrides and grooms, and their parents, the show has fueled debates online and off

it, on the ugly side of arranged marriages in India. The Pioneer's SHIKHADUGGAL talks to women from the city across all ages and walks of life, to gauge

what they think of the show and what one can learn and unlearn from ito watch a show like IndianMatchmaking in 2020 candrive you nuts! The newweb series released on Net-flix last week and is receiv-ing mixed reviews. Indian

matchmaking showcases our cou-ntry’s obsession with criteria likeheight, caste, colour, etc. infusedwith Sima Aunty’s (the famousreal-life matchmaker fromMumbai) matchmaking tactics.

While some on the internet saythat the ‘show is simply holding amirror to the ugly society we area part of ’, many others argue thatthe show, instead, just whitewash-es the preconceived notions of anarranged marriage with mod-ernised ideas.

The families of the charactersin the show and Sima Tapariabelieve in the most atrociousideas of marriages, being prob-lematic at parts. The desire tohave a wife who performs allduties, works, and manageshousehold seems one-sided. Sheneeds to be accommodating, fun,and outgoing, all at the sametime! Yet in one of the characters,Aparna’s case, her determinednature, and confidence isn’tadmired but considered to benegative. Hypocrisy much?

Astrology in matchmaking isanother hype in the show. Theworld perhaps can’t depend onkundlis or the important decisionsby the elite on marriage cannot bebased on a nakshatra anymore but

the web show takes you back tothe olden times where Sima Tapa-ria consults a famous face readerfor her failed compatibility issues.

‘Hi, I am Sima Taparia fromMumbai. The girl should be flexi-ble, know how to compromiseand adjust’ — this phrase caughtthe attention of a post-graduatestudent of Mass Communicationfrom St. Josephs Degree College,who made her curious to knowwhy Sima Taparia is trending. “Ihappened to watch the trailer ofIndian Matchmaking and found ituncanny-cum-fun and decided tobinge-watch it. In the very firstepisode, the show managed toestablish a patriarchal and stereo-typical nature, wherein a match-maker is in pursuit of rich, succe-ssful, and good-looking matchesfrom abroad. Even to this day, inIndia, arranged marriages ask foradjustments, especially from uswomen. Mrs Sima is following thesame age-old tradition in theshow. The grooms are being emo-tionally manipulated by theirmothers. Pressure is being builtup after a certain age, with anurgent need to get married.Problems of sexism, ageism,casteism, and colourism continueto persist. All in all, the show isfull of sarcasm with a little bit ofcringe and I suggest our Indianparents grow out of such normsas Ankita Bansal’s father from theshow rightly does. He believes inher daughter’s fierce theories

about equality and that’sadmirable,” shares Prishita Motay.

The web series also acknowl-edges loneliness and that makesthe audiences not stop watchingit. This show is a hot mess, a fan-tasy that’s catering to the whiteaudiences with its exotic appeal ofdesi weddings. Some watcherswere mortified, embarrassed, sar-donic, confused, and some couldrelate to it. “Half an hour intoIndian Matchmaking and I fast-forwarded it. It’s a cesspool ofmatching kundlis. It’s all rooted incaste. I can just see it as a brand-ing stunt for Sima Taparia!Personally, our families didn’ttake such a path to get us hitched.It doesn’t seem like it’s about find-ing love but more about keepingsupremacy pure. The criteriaevery parent put forward leadsyou to body shaming — it’s justuncool! This road to getting mar-ried needs to be fixed instead ofbeing prosecuted as a Netflix spe-cial,” argues PradeepthiVissamsetti, a Teluguite and cityeditor for the famous blog on par-enting called Momspresso.

Pradeepthi also frowns at themarriage timelines discussed onthe show, but says it makes senseto some extent. She feels the pres-sure becomes stronger in ourtwenties to thirties and we keephearing that it’s time to settledown! “I second this ideologybecause I understand our lovedones have certain expectations

from us, but if it doesn’t work out,it leads to stress or disappoint-ment as seen with Nadia’s charac-ter — she wonders if the oppositeof loneliness is marriage, lacksself-confidence and is anticipatestoo much. Healthwise too, it’sbeneficial for a woman to getmarried before her thirties interms of her future pregnanciesbut she must be able to pursueher dreams even after gettingmarried,” she opines.

There are many issues aboutwhat women have to be like, forthem to be considered as wifematerial. Marriage is great but itmay not fix one’s insecurities, loveis hard work, and must flow fromboth ways, believe several youngwomen in the city. Everyonedeserves to have the best forthemselves when consideringmarriage, regardless of gender.With similar expectations comesPradhyuman who has been reject-ing women by just looking at theirphotos, to which Sima Aunty sug-gests he meet a life coach. A lifecoach from our own city says,“Arranged marriages are a veryintrinsic part of our culture andalso the iota of the web series. Ifound my match through a matri-monial advertisement too, in whymy biodata read: attractive andvivacious. As a life coach now, Ihave helped many young girls finda suitable groom, built their pro-jector image or stalked their socialmedia accounts and suggested

them to remove certain picturesthat don’t go well by their person-alities, because, let’s face it, thisnew age has no end to compar-isons. Fun fact — no matter howprogressive we become, a goodlooking man/woman will alwaysbe our first ordeal. We need a cor-dial shift to this approach. I per-sonally liked the matchmaker asshe’s quite passionate about herwork. The problem arises whenpeople don’t have an open mind.Episode four takes the characterPradyuman to a life coach whoasks him to introspect himselfwhich helped him become a lotless fickle-minded and fussy. Butwhy a life coach, you ask? It’sbecause the kids of this generationseem to be too picky and con-fused, they have multiple desires.It’s like they are on a shoppingspree! This takes us to anotherarea- when an individual rejectshis/her potential partner, it tendsto demean their morale and confi-dence, which we need to be care-ful about,” explains Priya Rajiv, atrained life coach. This graduatefrom the University of Oxford alsoloved the way Nadia Jagessar wasopen to change, passionately looksfor love the love of her, and is awoman of laughter.

So if you’ve binge-watchedSmriti Mundhra’s IndianMatchmaking, are you ready toevolve for the better, break stereo-types and dismiss plans for theideal bride/groom?

T

HHaallff aann hhoouurr iinnttoo IInnddiiaannMMaattcchhmmaakkiinngg aanndd II ffaasstt-

ffoorrwwaarrddeedd iitt.. IItt’’ss aa cceessssppoooollooff mmaattcchhiinngg kkuunnddlliiss.. IItt’’ss aallllrrooootteedd iinn ccaassttee.. PPeerrssoonnaallllyy,,

oouurr ffaammiilliieess ddiiddnn’’tt ttaakkeessuucchh aa ppaatthh ttoo ggeett uuss

hhiittcchheedd.. TThhee ccrriitteerriiaaeevveerryy ppaarreenntt ppuutt

ffoorrwwaarrdd lleeaaddss yyoouu ttoobbooddyy sshhaammiinngg —— iitt’’ss jjuusstt

uunnccooooll!! TThhiiss rrooaadd ttoo ggeettttiinnggmmaarrrriieedd nneeeeddss ttoo bbee ffiixxeedd

iinnsstteeaadd ooff bbeeiinngg pprroosseeccuutteeddaass aa NNeettfflliixx ssppeecciiaall..

PPRRAADDEEEEPPTTHHII VVIISSSSAAMMSSEETTTTIICITY EDITOR, MOMSPRESSO

AAss aa lliiffee ccooaacchh nnooww,, II hhaavveehheellppeedd mmaannyy yyoouunngg ggiirrllss ffiinnddaa ssuuiittaabbllee ggrroooomm,, bbuuiilltt tthheeiirrpprroojjeeccttoorr iimmaaggee oorr ssttaallkkeedd

tthheeiirr ssoocciiaall mmeeddiiaaaaccccoouunnttss aanndd ssuuggggeesstteedd

tthheemm ttoo rreemmoovvee cceerrttaaiinnppiiccttuurreess tthhaatt ddoonn’’tt ggoowweellll bbyy tthheeiirrppeerrssoonnaalliittiieess,, bbeeccaauussee,,

lleett’’ss ffaaccee iitt,, tthhiiss nneeww aaggee hhaassnnoo eenndd ttoo ccoommppaarriissoonnss.. IIppeerrssoonnaallllyy lliikkeedd tthheemmaattcchhmmaakkeerr aass sshhee’’ss qquuiitteeppaassssiioonnaattee aabboouutt hheerr wwoorrkk..

PPRRIIYYAA RRAAJJIIVV,, A TRAINED LIFE COACH

FridayJuly 24, 2020

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omposer HimeshReshammiya feels thatsingers should try andcompose their ownsongs because onlythen they will know

the soul of theirown

compo-sition.

“My songs have never been inthe conventional zone. They havealways been different and that iswhy I feel it’s almost impossiblefor someone else to performthem,” he said.

He feels the understanding ofthe nuances of a composer’s ver-sion is very rare.

“For example, Arijit (Singh) hasthe right kind of pick up sense, butnot everyone has that. I feeltoday’s singers should try andcompose their own songs becauseonly then they will know the soulof their own composition andthat’ll shine through and connectwith listeners,” he said.

The style of working was differ-ent a few year ago, he pointed out.

“Earlier, singers and composersused to get 8 to 10 hours to jamand rehearse with the musicians.They used to interact beforestarting any project, but nowa-days singers don’t get that muchtime. It is a sad reality thatcomposers today often justsend a tune to the singers over

WhatsApp and ask the singer todub the song themselves. So, theprocess doesn’t see the kind ofcoming together of talent, syner-gies and improvisations that usedto be a part of the previousprocess,” he explained.

Himesh recalled, “Back in theday, Alka Yagnik ji and I dubbedTere naam for eight hours and thatmade the song such a hit. Amidstthe new normal, I feel digital is themost direct medium between thesinger and their audience andthat’s where they should reach out to them. Compose 100 songs, 500 songs you might fail 99times but you will get that one hitsong once you’ve hit the rightchord.”

“I love Michael Jackson, he is alegend but he never sang for TomCruise, he has his own identity.This is what I want for all singers,this is the time where we all needto hold hands and succeed togeth-er,” he shared while shooting foran episode of Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Li'lChamps.

10

what’s brewing?Vijayawada Friday July 24 2020

BREAKING THESTIGMA AROUND

PERIODSll women are famil-iar with TVCs andcommercials for san-itary napkins whichdepict menstrualflow with ‘blue liq-

uid’ as a way of discreetlydepicting blood.

Decades later there’s final-ly a brand which showsblood in TV communica-tions as it should be — red.The aim is to bring forth animportant and often neglec-ted topic of “Heavy Flow”during periods; a problemwhich affects almost 25 percent women in India andrequires them to changetheir pads every 2 hours.

RIO Heavy Flow Pads byNobel Hygiene changes theface of Indian Advertising bylaunching their TVC with apan-India campaign. Thefirst phase of the launch inFebruary was paused afterseveral complaints were filedwith ASCI on the usage ofblood shown in the com-mercial. However, afterdeliberations with ASCI andan independent review, RIOPads have been allowed toair the advertisement withminor modifications in thesecond phase of the launch.

Actress Radhika Apte,brand ambassador for RIO

pads features in the TVC.She reiterates, “I have saidthis earlier and I will say itagain. I do not see the issuein showing actual blood.Blood in a fight sequence ina film is fine but not forperiods? Why can’t we justshow what heavy flow isreally like? Why can’t weshow blood? I am glad thatRIO has taken up this chal-lenge and they are standingby it with conviction. Gett-ing a go-ahead on this adv-ertisement is very reassur-ing. If this ad can start evena single conversation, thenthat is a win for all the unhe-ard voices. If we can removeeven an iota of stigma arou-nd periods via this ad andencourage people to acceptit as a normal and naturalphenomenon then it will bea big win for us all. Period.”

Commenting on thelaunch, Kartik Johari, Vice-President, Nobel Hygiene,said, “We are extremelyproud to take this first stepon behalf of all the womenin India. There can be notalk of education, awarenessor equality when the biologi-cal truth of half the popula-tion is censored. Our resolveto continue this conversa-tion has been renewed, start-

ing with the depiction ofblood. To show the unad-dressed problem of HeavyFlow, without showingblood itself, is so absurd aconcept, but it didn’t evenoccur to us. All our commu-nications are deeply inspiredfrom our research, showingthe first true and honest rep-resentation of periods forconsumers. Awareness isneeded, and conversationscan only begin afteracknowledging reality.”

He further added, “Wetook special care to ensureour communicationremained as authentic aspossible. The entire creativewas scripted by a woman,based on real narrativesfrom women, directed andshot by a woman, and isbeing marketed by women.Additionally, 1000s of wo-men have already applaudedour product and messaging;we are proud to havebrought this innovation forIndian ladies who receive norespite from Heavy Flow. Weare sure that other players inthe market are excited bythis new paradigm, and wecall upon everyone to takeadvantage of this excitingshift to educate and recon-nect with their consumers!”

A

ctor Orlando Bloomhas had an ace ofspades inside a heartinked under the nameof his late dog Mighty,on his chest.

A week after his dog wentmissing, Bloom shared onInstagram on Wednesday that hisdog is dead, reports etonline.com.

Paying a tribute to the pet hehad welcomed into the family in2017, he wrote, “Mighty’s on theother side now. After seven days ofsearching from sunrise to sunsetand into the wee hours, today, the7th day — the number of comple-tion — we found his collar.”

“I have wept more this weekthan I thought possible, whichhas been very cathartic and heal-ing.”

Bloom wrote that he “left nostone unturned” in the search for

Mighty, which included himcrawling “thru all the man holes,under the roads, (searching)every back yard and creek bed”.

“I feel so grateful to havelearned from my little Mightyman that love is eternal and thetrue meaning of devotion,” Bloomwrote.

“I feel sure he was lookingdown on me whistling in everyback yard and knowing that I wasdoing all I possibly could torespect our bond. He was morethan a companion. It was a soulconnection for sure.”

“I’m sorry. I love you,” he con-tinued. “Thank you. RIP myMIGHTY HEART”.

Bloom concluded his post bythanking his community for itssupport, which allowed him to“see the best of people even in theworst of times”.

Orlando Bloom gets tattooin honour of dead pet dogA

C

HIMESH RESHAMMIYA:

TODAY'S SINGERS SHOULD

COMPOSE THEIR OWN SONGS

FUN

Rules

ARCHIE

GARFIELD

SUDOKU

REALITY CHECK SPEED BUMP CROSSWORD

GINGER MEGGS

NANCY

CALVIN AND HOBBES

l Each row and column cancontain each number (1 to 9)exactly once.

l The sum of all numbers inany row or column mustequal 45.

Yesterday’s solution

11VIJAYAWADA | FRIDAY | JULY 24, 2020

AFP n LIVERPOOL

Liverpool manager Jurgen Kloppsaid having the opportunity tolift the Premier League trophy

at Anfield meant the world to himdespite having to do so in an emptystadium with fans shutout due to coronavirus.

The Reds sealed afirst top-flight title for30 years last month,but had to wait untilafter a thrilling 5-3win over Chelsea intheir final home game of the seasonto lift the Premier League trophy forthe first time.

“You make the best of what youcan,” Klopp told Sky Sports. “Todayour families are allowed to be therewhich is incredible. It means theworld to me. Everything would bebetter with fans but for months weknew that would be impossible. Afew months ago I thought it wasimpossible that we play football.

“I couldn’t be happier to behonest, it would be perfect if the sta-dium would be full but we cannotchange it. What we tried to do ismake it clear to the people that wereally do it for them. It’s an absolute-ly great moment.”

Despite pleas for fans to stayaway on the night Liverpool finallygot their hands on the trophy, sup-porters crowded around the stadiumeven prior to kick-off, while the sec-ond half was accompanied by the

constant crackling of fireworks lit byfans outside the ground.

On the field, Klopp’s menensured a memorable night wasaccompanied by a positive result afterjust two wins in five previous gamessince they clinched the title. And theGerman again promised the fans aproper party with a parade plannedthrough the city once restrictions are

lifted.“You have to prepare for a party,”

he added. “When I don’t know,when this virus is gone then we willhave a party all together.”

The result had far bigger conse-quences for Chelsea as they slip tofourth and leaves Frank Lampard’smen still needing a point at home toWolves at Stamford Bridge on

Sunday to secure a place in theChampions League.

‘IN OUR HANDS’“It’s huge, we know the situa-

tion,” said Lampard. “It’s in ourhands to get a result against a verygood Wolves team.”

Chelsea have already bolsteredtheir attacking options for next sea-son with the signings of Timo

Werner and Hakim Ziyech, whilethey are reportedly closing in on adeal for the 90-million euro ($103million, £81 million) rated KaiHavertz of Bayer Leverkusen.

But it is at the other endLampard clearly has to find solu-tions as they completed an entireleague season with just one cleansheet away from home and havenow conceded 54 times in thePremier League this season.

Liverpool were 3-0 up inside 43minutes as sweet strikes from NabyKeita, Trent Alexander-Arnold andGeorginio Wijnaldum gave Chelseaa mountain to climb.

They nearly did so even afterRoberto Firmino scored his firstleague goal at Anfield all seasonrestored Liverpool’s three-goalcushion to cancel out OlivierGiroud’s strike just before half-timefor the visitors.

Christian Pulisic was surpris-ingly left on the bench by Lampardfrom the start and he changed thecame after he was introducedalongside Tammy Abraham andCallum Hudson-Odoi.

The American skipped pastfour challenges before squaringfor Abraham and then fired pow-erfully into the roof of the net withthe Liverpool defence all over theplace.

But Chelsea were undone againat the other end as a blisteringbreak from inside their own boxsaw Liverpool surge forward and

B'DESH TO RESCHEDULE SL TEST TOUR New Delhi: Bangladesh is planning to tour Sri Lanka inOctober for their rescheduled three-Test series, followingthe postponement of this year's T20 World Cup. Accordingto a report in ESPNcricinfo, BCB are currently in talks withits Sri Lankan counterparts (SLC) and if everything fallsinto place “Bangladesh men's pending three-Test seriesagainst hosts Sri Lanka could be rescheduled to October.”

CARLSEN BEAT ANAND IN LEGENDS OF CHESS Chennai: India's Viswanathan Anand suffered his secondconsecutive loss, going down to world No 1 MagnusCarlsen in the second round of the $150,000 chess24Legends of Chess online tournament. The former worldchampion had kept the Norwegian ace in check in threegames of the best-of-four contest before slipping 1.5-2.5by in the final game late on Wednesday.

EMERY TO COACH VILLARREAL FOR 3 SEASONS Villarreal: Spanish club Villarreal on Thursdayannounced Unai Emery as manager for the next threeseasons. Emery was sacked as Arsenal's coach inNovember 2019 after 18 months at helm. Emery, who hascoached Almeria, Valencia and Sevilla in the Spanish top-flight before, will be presented as Villarreal manager at thetheir home ground on Monday.

HALEP SIGNS UP FOR PRAGUE EVENT Prague: World No 2 Simona Halep on Wednesday saidthat she will play the WTA Prague clay court tournament inAugust, adding further doubt to her participation in the USOpen. “Hi everyone. I can't wait to take part in thetournament in the magnificent city of Prague. See you inAugust,” the reigning Wimbledon champ said in a videomessage. The Prague tourney runs from August 10-16.

SINGLES

PTI n NEW DELHI

The Indian 4x400m mixedrelay team’s Silver medal in

the 2018 Asian Games hasbeen upgraded to Gold follow-ing the disqualification of orig-inal winners Bahrain onaccount of a doping ban hand-ed to one of its runners.Bahrain, which had topped the4x400 mixed relay final, wasdisqualified after Kemi

Adekoya was handed a four-year ban by the AthleticsIntegrity Unit (AIU) for failinga dope test. Besides this, AnuRaghavan’s fourth-place finish

in the women’s 400m hurdlesevent has been upgraded toBronze medal after the AIUannulled the results of Adekoya,who originally won the race.

The Indian quartet ofMohammed Anas, MRPoovamma, Hima Das andArokia Rajiv had clocked3:15:71 behind Bahrain(3:11:89). Raghavan hadclocked 56.92 to finish fourth inthe final race in Jakarta.

Liverpool: Chelsea managerFrank Lampard has saidPremier League championsLiverpool should not becometoo arrogant after being leftunimpressed with the behav-iour of their bench duringWednesday’s 5-3 defeat.

Lampard was involved inan exchange with Liverpool’sbench after a free kick wasawarded against Chelsea’sMateo Kovacic. TrentAlexander-Arnold found thenet from the free kick to makeit 2-0.

“For me it wasn’t a foul

from Kovacic,” Lampard toldSky Sports. “There were a lot ofthings that were ongoing andon the bench ... I’ve got noproblem with Jurgen Klopp, he’smanaged this team and it’s fan-tastic.

“Some of the bench, it’s afine line between when you arewinning — and they’ve wonthe league, fair play toLiverpool Football Club — butalso don’t get too arrogantwith it.

“That was my thing, but(it’s) done. In match play you getemotional and that was it.” AP

AFP n MANCHESTER

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer urgedhis Manchester United

stars to seize a “fantasticopportunity” to qualify forthe Champions League afterMason Greenwood rescued a1-1 draw against West Ham onWednesday.

Solskjaer’s side fell behindto Michail Antonio’s penalty inthe first half at Old Trafford.

But teenage for wardGreenwood struck after theinterval to lift United intothird place in the PremierLeague.

They are ahead of fourth-

placed Chelsea on goal differ-ence after the Blues lost 5-3later at champions Liverpool.

United will finish in the

top four if they draw or win intheir decisive showdown withfifth-placed Leicester onSunday.

They are one point aheadof Leicester going into their lastgame of the season at the KingPower Stadium.

Solskjaer’s team were wellbelow their best against WestHam, but they are now unbeat-en in 13 league matches andwill complete an impressivesurge into the ChampionsLeague if they emergeunscathed at Leicester.

They can also qualify forEurope’s elite club competitionif they win the Europa Leaguein August.

West Ham’s point ensuredthey are mathematically cer-tain to avoid relegation.

PTI n NEW DELHI

New Zealand Cricket(NZC) will issue No

Objection Certificates(NOCs) to all its six interna-tionals set to compete in theIPL but said the “due dili-gence” on health safety proto-cols will have to be done bythe players themselves.

The six New Zealandplayers who are set to play inthe IPL are Jimmy Neesham(Kings XI Punjab), LockieFerguson (Kolkata KnightRiders), Mitchell

McClenaghan and TrentBoult (Mumbai Indians),Kane Williamson (SunrisersHyderabad) and MitchellSantner (Chennai SuperKings).

“Regarding the IPL,NZC will be issuing NOCsto the relevant players andit’s up to them to decide,”NZC spokesperson RichardBoock said.

While the NZC will beupdating its players aboutthe health safety protocolsand latest Covid-19 relat-ed developments, the

onus will be on the six indi-viduals to do due diligence.

“Well, yes, the issuingof NOCs is considered ona case-by-case basis andit’s rare that they are everrefused. However, the

due diligence is some-thing for the respective

players to shoulder —although we are happy topass on as much info as wecan to assist in these mat-ters,” Boock added.

Recently, New Zealandskipper Williamson, whoplays for Sunrisers

Hyderabad, spoke aboutwanting to know more aboutthe safety protocols that willbe employed considering thatthe event is likely to be shift-ed to the UAE, which has alesser Covid-19 case load thanIndia.

Boock also confirmedthat New Zealand A team’stour of India has been can-celled. “My information isthat the A tour of India willnot be happening. It was deci-sion taken by mutual agree-ment between both theboards,” Boock said.

PTI n KARACHI

Pakistan left-arm pacer Mohammad Amir onThursday was cleared to join the national side

in England after his second test also returned neg-ative for coronavirus.

“The PCB will now be making arrangementsto send Amir and masseur, Mohammad Imranto England as soon as possible so that they canjoin the training camp in Derbyshire,” thePakistan Cricket Board (PCB) said in a release.

Amir, 28, left many people disappointedincluding the national team’s head coach and chiefselector, Misbah-ul-Haq when he announced hissudden retirement from Test cricket last year.

Former players are of the opinion that if Amiris available and fit, then he should also be con-sidered for the Test series against England.

Amir in a recent interview had said that hehad made a mistake playing all three formats afterhis comeback after a five-year ban for spot-fix-ing. “I should have first played one or two for-mats and checked to see how my body is doingand whether I could take the strain.

I erred in playing immediatelyin all three formats and it led toinjury and fitness problems. “At leastnow I am confident that I can nowcarry on playing for anotherfour to six years if I take careof myself,” he had said.

Lahore: Former Pakistanspeedster Shoaib Akhtar hasslammed the BCCI, allegingthat the Indian cricket boardplayed a role in the ICCpostponing the T20 WorldCup later this year to makeroom for the Indian PremierLeague. Akhtar also felt thatthe Asia Cup could have

taken place.“Asia Cup could have

definitely happened, it wouldhave been a great chance forIndia and Pakistan to playagainst each other. There aremany reasons behind this. Idon’t want to get into that,”Akhtar said while speaking toGeo Cricket on YouTube.

Manchester: West BromwichAlbion won promotion back tothe Premier League after a two-year absence, joining LeedsUnited in the top flight next sea-son after a 2-2 home draw withQueens Park Rangers in a dra-matic finale to theChampionship season onWednesday.

The point for Slaven Bilic’sside was enough to ensure sec-ond place in England’s secondtier after Brentford blew theirchance by losing 2-1 at home tolowly Barnsley.

A win for Brentford wouldhave sent them into the top divi-sion for the first time since 1947.

Brentford will go into the play-offs along with Fulham andCardiff City but in a huge swingin fortunes, Nottingham Forestmissed out on goal differencewith Swansea City grabbing thelast slot in astonishing fashion.

At the bottom, Hull Cityand Charlton were relegatedalong with Wigan Athletic.

On Klopp of the world!Dreams turn into reality as Jurgen’s Liverpool lift Premier League trophy at the Kop

AFP n LIVERPOOL

Liverpool manager Jurgen Kloppbelieves his side will need to

keep improving to hold off thechasing pack next season after lift-ing the Premier League trophy.

Chelsea have already strength-ened ahead of next season with thesignings of a long-term Liverpooltarget Timo Werner and HakimZiyech.

Klopp also expectsManchester City and ManchesterUnited to bolster their squads. Butthe German believes there is stillimprovement for his players tomake despite becoming English,European and world championsover the past 14 months.

“We should not stop, we haveinternal challenges to improve,”said Klopp. “We have the chanceto make another step, but we haveto because the others will not sleep.Chelsea is such a talented team, wehad to bring everything on thepitch tonight. Man Utd, Man City(will contend), there are no guar-antees for anything, but we willtry.”

Liverpool also beat Chelsea tolift the Uefa Super Cup at the startof the season to go with thePremier League, ChampionsLeague and Club World Cup andKlopp admitted he will take timefor a special momento after anincredible run of success.

“We are champions ofEngland, Europe and the world.We won four trophies, really bigones, so I couldn’t be more proud,”

he added. “I’m usually not a per-son who needs pictures but I willhave a picture with all four trophiesbecause it doesn’t happen often, sowe should.”

Jordan Henderson had thehonour of becoming the firstLiverpool player to lift the PremierLeague trophy and the Reds’ cap-tain believes the manner of victo-ry over a Chelsea side, who need-ed a result to confirm their placein the Champions League next sea-son, bodes well for what can beachieved next season.

“It’s been a journey and to fin-ish it off like this is really special,”said Henderson. “After this, nextseason is going to be a big chal-lenge for us. But I thought tonightwe showed the mentality to comeand perform again and get theresult we did.”

Man Utd just a point away from CLLampard tells Liverpoolnot to get ‘too arrogant’

West Brom promoted as

Brentford blow chance

Japanese swimmer Ikee Rikakoholding the lantern containing Olympicflame poses during a photo session atthe Olympic Stadium in Tokyo AP

NZC leave decision to join IPL on playersAmir cleared tojoin side in Eng

Indian mixed relay team’s Asiad Silver upgraded to GoldAkhtar blames BCCI forT20 WC postponement

We should not stop becauseothers will not sleep: Klopp

Liverpool players celebrate with the Premier League trophy after they beat Chelsea 5-3 in the final home game of the 2019-2020 season AP

The India League, a UK-based diaspora group which dates backto 1916, on Thursday announced the launch of a first-ever

British Indian Census to collate data around Britain's estimated1.5 million Indian-origin population. The census will beconducted online in collaboration with the University of Oxfordand will culminate in a British Indian Report later this year,reflective of the true make-up of Britain's Indian diaspora andtheir concerns in 2020. "The British Indian community haschanged greatlyover the years andthis survey willprovide ourcommunity withmuch needed datathat will help us tounderstand thekey issues ofconcern andimportantly onhow best toaddress them," said CB Patel, a veteran media personality andChairman of India League. "The India League has been workingfor decades to champion Indians in the UK," he said.The survey, available online from the Indian League website,intends to explore the diversity of heritage, identity, beliefs andbehaviour of the Indian community based in the UK, whilstidentifying key issues of concern to British Indians.

BB season 14 taglinelikely to be ‘Lockdown’

Trump touts 5-WordMemory Test D

onald Trump has divulged details of a cognitive test he "aced" -- including a five-word memory challenge he said proved he

had the "mental stamina" to lead the US. "Person. Woman. ManCamera. TV," the US president recited as he revealed details of themuch-discussed test to Fox TV on Wednesday. "The lastquestions are much more difficult," he said in an interview on"Tucker CarlsonTonight", in which herepeatedlyquestioned themental capacity ofhis Democratic rivalJoe Biden. "Like amemory question.It's like, you'll go:Person. Woman.Man. Camera. TV,"the president said."So they say, 'Couldyou repeat that?' So Isaid, 'Yeah. It's:Person. Woman.Man. Camera. TV.'" "Then, ten minutes, 15, 20 minutes later theysay, 'Remember that first question... Give us that again." "And yougo: 'Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV.'" "And they say 'that'samazing. How did you do that?'" "I do it because I have, like, agood memory," Trump continued. "Because I'm cognitively there."

The upcoming season of the reality show Bigg Boss willreportedly have a lockdown theme, stated a report in

Pinkvilla. According to the publication, the makers of the realityshow have also decided to use the tagline - Bigg Boss 14Hoga Rocking - for the fourteenth season. Last year, themakers of the show finalized Bigg Boss 13 Tedha as thetagline. A source close to the development told Pinkvilla: "Likelast year, it was Bigg Boss 13 Tedha, the 14th season will becalledRocking. Thetaglineconsidered is,'Bigg Boss 14HogaRocking'." TheexclusivePinkvillareport is thelatest additionto severalmedia reportsabout Bigg Boss 14 that have been doing the rounds on theInternet. While some reports have stated that Salman Khan willshoot the reality show from his Panvel farmhouse, where hehas been living since before the nationwide lockdown wasimposed, others have shared lists of probable contestants ofthe show.

Doc dies, Covid +ve, turnedaway by three hospitals

first-ever British-Indiancensus to be held in UK

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government doctor in Karnataka who was turned away by threeprivate hospitals because he could not produce a coronavirus

test result died today in Bengaluru. Dr Manjunath, who was afrontline COVID-19 doctor, was allegedly turned away by hospitalswhen he was extremely ill and struggling to breathe.Dr Manjunath worked in the state Health and Family Welfaredepartment and was based in Ramanagara district, around 50 kmfrom Bengaluru. D Randeep, a Special Officer with the Bengalurumunicipalbody BBMP,told NDTV thatthe hospitalsthat hadrefused toadmit DrManjunathwould bereported to thehealthdepartment. InJune-end, Dr Manjunath went to Rajashekhar Hospital in JP Nagar,BGS Global Hospital in Kengeri and Sagar hospital inKumaraswamy Layout. All three demanded to see his COVID-19test result but those were still not in at the time, according to hisfamily. His brother-in-law Nagendra is also a doctor with BBMPand in charge of allotting hospital beds, yet he was completelyhelpless when it came to his own relative.

outhern star SamanthaAkkineni has doledout tips on self-care.

With a black-and-white picture ofherself she posted

on Instagram, Samanthawrote, “We wake up early.Meditate. Positive thoughts.Take that apple cider vinegar.Cleanse both body andmind. Pamper self with longskin care routine. Exercise.Hydrate. More positivethoughts and game face on yo.”

The image currently has 1million likes. Samantha recent-ly shared that she and her petpuppy Hash currently have a caseof Covid-19 blues.

On an Instagram picture of Hashsleeping by the staircase, she wrote,“We are having a case of the #covid-blues. How are you guys doing ? I just want toremind you to remind yourself that you're awe-some and you’re doing just great and it will allbe okay #stayhome #staysafe.”

Samantha is known for her perfor-mances in films such as Ye MaayaChesave, Neethaane En Ponvasantham,Eega, Mersal and Rangasthalam. Sheimpressed all with her role in SuperDeluxe last year.

She will next be seen inKaathuvaakula RenduKaadhal, starring VijaySethupathi. The film alsostars Nayanthara. It isdirected by VigneshShivan.

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Vijayawada Friday July 24 2020tollywood

n abode for pos-itive vibes andmore, ManishaKoirala’sInstagram postsare something

her followers look for-ward to and share too.The yesteryear actresswho bravely fought can-cer years ago shares herstruggles, victories, andmore, with her familyof followers onInstagram.

Wednesday’s postwas one of those thathas the actress sharingpictures from her lifewith some philosophi-cal bits to offer.

“Regaining strength”,the 49-year-old actresscaptioned a bunch ofphotos from a walkingtrail through a forest.Remembering authorRobert Frost’s wordswhile sharing the pho-tos and videos from herlatest adventure shequoted, “The woods arelovely, dark and deep.But I have promises tokeep, and miles to gobefore I sleep.”

Manisha Koiralashared her no make-up,no-filter pictures thatshowed her greystrands of hair andbindi in her close-up

selfie to which her fansreplied with much love.Many even asked herwhere she clicked thepicture and some oth-ers, gave her theirwarmth and hug in thistime of the pandemic.

Manisha Koirala,who was diagnosedwith ovarian cancer in2012, which she foughta tough battle with andconquered. Koirala waslast seen in Netflix filmMaska, ahead of whichshe also featured infilms such asPrassthanam, Sanju,and in a segment inNetflix’s Lust Stories.

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Regaining strength

in nature's lap

oming soon is a suspensethriller love story basedon real events that tookplace in Telangana calledAsalem Jarigindi?Producer King Johnson is

confident that the film will do well,thanks to how the recently releasedsongs from the film has received.The songs sung by famous singerslike Vijay Yesudas, Vijay Prakash,Yazin Nizar, Malvikan, Ranky,Bhargavi Pillai, and composed byYelendra Mahaveer have receivedrave reviews from OTT platformslike Amazon Music, Spotify,Geosavone and Apple Music.

The film has received its clearancefrom the Censor board and willsoon be released, but will it hit thesilver screen or settle for an OTTplatform is the big question. “We arediscussing the matter internally. The

film has come out better than whatwe’ve expected,” said Johnson.“This film is based on real inci-dents that took place inTelangana. Shot with an 8Kresolution camera, the film’sfamous background score byS. Chinna gave life to thefilm, and Sethu’s specialeffects are what will makethe audience feel the situ-ation,” Johnson tells us.

He also said that actorSriram who plays theprotagonist in the filmhad brought more hypeto the story which hadscope for good perfor-mance and is confidentthat the film would bewell received by theaudience after seeing histalent.

MAKERS OF ASALEM

JARIGINDI? CONFIDENTOF GOOD RESPONSE

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Actress Tamannaah Bhatiais an ardent animal loverand says there is no love

like puppy love. Tamannaahtook to Instagram, where sheposted a motley of pictures ofherself along with straypuppies. She captioned theimage, which currently has349K likes on the photo-sharing website: “There's nolove like puppy love#DogsAreTheBest#furryfriends #doglover#pawfect.”

Meanwhile, Tamannaah isexcited about the Teluguremake of the Kannadasuperhit Love Mocktail.

Director Nagashekar hasroped in the actress alongwith Satya Dev asprotagonists of the untitledremake. The makers arehoping that the film will go onfloors in mid-September andwill be shot in Visakhapatnamand Hyderabad.

The original film was releasedin January, 2020. Directed byKrishna, Love Mocktailfollows the story of Aadi andhis quest for love.

Tamannaah's

‘pawfect'

PUPPY

LOVE Samantha sharesself-care secrets

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Sai Dharam Tej and‘Return of the weights'

ctor Sai Dharam Tej is back toworking out. On Instagram, theactor shared a picture of hishome gym, with dumbbells andother exercise equipment allaround. On the image, he wrote,

“Return of the weights.”The actor had earlier shared a picture of

himself running.“Run Your Own Race. It’s YOU Vs YOU.

Be a BEAST,” he wrote on the photo-sharingwebsite. Sai made his acting debut with PillaNuvvu Leni Jeevitham. He was then seen infilms like Rey, Subramanyam for Sale,Supreme, Thikka, Winner, Tej, I Love Youand Prati Roju Pandage, among many others.

He will next be seen in Solo Brathuke SoBetter directed by Subbu. It also stars NabhaNatesh. The film’s release got postponed dueto the coronavirus pandemic.

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ith domestic flight operations resuming,southern actress Lavanya Tripathi travelled

back to her hometown Dehradun to meet herparents.

The actress shared a video on Intagram sto-ries where she can be seen at the airport,dressed in PPE suit and wearing protec-

tive eye gear and mask.“Ok can’t breathe,” she wrote on

the image.She then shared a picture col-

lage of things that made her day“happier”, on her “Day 2” of

homecoming.Lavanya shared pictures ofthe greenery surrounding

an empty road and themountain ranges.

“Finally coming toDoon and meeting my

family made me ahappy girl,” she

wrote.Lavanya rose to

fame with roles infilms like Andala

RakshashiDoosukeltha,

Bramman, BhaleBhale Magadivoy,

Srirastu Subhamastu,Yuddham Sharanam

and Antariksham9000 KMPH.

The actress willnext be seen in the

Telugu film, A1Express, co-starring

Sundeep Kishan. The film,which is reportedly a remake of

the 2019 Tamil film NatpeThunai, is directed by Dennis

Jeevan Kanukolanu.

Lavanya ‘a happygirl' on returning tohometown Dehradun

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