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 DAILY FROM: AHMEDABAD, CHANDIGARH, DELHI, JAIPUR, KOLKATA, LUCKNOW, MUMBAI, NAGPUR, PUNE, VADODARA

JOURNALISM OF COURAGE
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020, NEW DELHI, LATE CITY, 18 PAGES SINCE 1932 `6.00 (`8 BIHAR & RAIPUR, `12 SRINAGAR) WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM

Battered by bias ‘CJI AWARE OF NATURE OF ALLEGATIONS, SEIZED OF MATTER’ On table for next
and years of apathy, Timing of Jagan letter suspect, round of LAC talks:
Doms seek change
Mahadalits point to broken promises
but no consent for contempt: AG Thinning of troops
Signal from Beijing on certain friction
Letter followed Justice Ramana order Delisting Kamal Nath: SC asks points as harsh Ladakh winter sets in

E
DIPANKAR GHOSE DECISION
PARBATTA (KHAGARIA), NOV 2
2020 to fast-track cases: Venugopal EC who gave you this power?

THERE IS a pool of water behind
their ramshackle homes on un-
easy stilts in Khagaria's Aguani.
That is where the solitary hand
pump for the community of 200
stands. The water has turned a
poisonous green, with garbage
collected over the years and a
sheet of mosquitoes over its sur-
face. For years, all that the Doms
here have asked from their
politicians is to at least remove
the water and level the land, es-
pecially after a five-year-old fell
and drowned here 10 years ago.
“Once, they came and threw
CONTINUED ON PAGE 2
THE WORLD
ANANTHAKRISHNAN G
B I H A R NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
VOTINGTODAY NOTING THAT the “timing” of
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister
No. of Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy’s letter
seats
PhaseII to Chief Justice of India S A
94 Bobde, complaining against
No.ofvoters Contesting Justice N V Ramana, and the
morethan candidates state’s move to make it public
2.85 cr 1,463 “couldcertainlybesaidtobesus-
pect” in the wake of the latter’s
order to expedite trial in cases
MORE REPORTS against legislators, Attorney
PAGE 6
Nov 3 is here: in Biden AN EXPRESS INVESTIGATION PART THREE
‘Conductof
AndhraCM,
PrincipalSecy
primafacie
contumacious’
General K K Venugopal on
Monday,however,declinedcon-
sent to initiate proceedings
against Reddy for criminal con-
tempt of the Supreme Court.
In a letter to Advocate
CONTINUED ON PAGE 2
ANANTHAKRISHNAN G
& RITIKA CHOPRA
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
THE SUPREME Court Monday
stayed the Election Commission
order revoking former Madhya
Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal
Nath’s name from the list of star
campaigners for the Congress
party in the state Assembly by-
polls — elections to 28 seats will
be held Tuesday.
DEEPTIMAN TIWARY
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
EC had NEGOTIATIONS BETWEEN India
revoked his and China over the situation in
name from eastern Ladakh have not yielded
list of star results so far on troops returning
campaigners totheirAprillocations— thesta-
tus quo ante, before the start of
the standoff in May — but the
“We are staying your order,” Indian establishment is hopeful
Chief Justice of India S A Bobde, of“partialdisengagement”atcer-
headingathree-judgeBench,told tain friction points in the region.
SeniorAdvocateRakeshDwivedi Sources said this is largely
who was appearing for the EC. supposed to translate into thin-
CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 ning of troops massed by the
twosidesonthenorthandsouth
banks of Pangong Tso. Friction
points also remain in Gogra and
Hot Spring areas after some ini-
tial disengagement.
While seven rounds of talks
E X P L A I NE D
Modi,Xi
at three
● meetings
PRIME MINISTER
Narendra Modi and
Chinese President Xi
Jinping are set to meet
each other at three vir-
tual summits this month
— of the BRICS, SCO,
G-20. Ahead of these
meetings, the two sides
will hope to dial down
the tensions somewhat.
since June, movement of troops
and artillery by either side has
only increased in the region.
This move to effect some

home town, nostalgia Fraud went on unchecked even as red

at the level of the Corps thinning of troops by either side
AT LEAST 22 KILLED Commander have taken place CONTINUED ON PAGE 2
AS GUNMEN STORM

and hope line up to vote flags were wavedTinHECentre and state First India-born minister in
KABUL UNIVERSITY
PAGE 14
Have started ABHISHEK ANGAD
EXPLAINED
RANCHI, NOVEMBER 2 SCHOLARSHIP probe: Naqvi New Zealand, her father
BUSINESS AS USUAL RACE FOR GUIDETO TRACKING
ONOCTOBER31,barely48hours SCAM says ‘proud, not surprised’
after The Indian Express told him
BY UNNY THE WHITE THEU.S. RESULTS that official records had listed list of complaints and red flags — ESHA ROY
HOUSE PAGE 13 180beneficiariesfromhisschool from the Central Government to NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
fortheCentre’spre-Matricschol- state anti-corruption officials to SHAJU PHILIP
EXPRESS arship for minority students, the school owners in Jharkhand — UNION MINIS- THIRUVANANTHAPURAM,
NOVEMBER 2 Priyanca
IN THE U.S. whentheBidenfamilymovedout
of Scranton, Pennsylvania. Later
principal of Blue Bells in
Jharkhand’s Ramgarh rushed to
warning of fraud and forgery by a
nexus of middlemen, school and
TER of Minority
Affairs Mukhtar Radhakrishnan
regretting it, the Kearns patched the nearest police station. bankstaff,andstateemployees,to AbbasNaqvisaid ON MONDAY, when India-born
up the wood carving in the bed “We have not applied for any illegally divert funds from the na- Monday that PriyancaRadhakrishnanwasap-
KARISHMA MEHROTRA furniturethatread“Joewashere.” minority scholarship...take swift tionalscholarship. ‘In touch the Central pointed as a Minister in the New Paravur in Kerala's Ernakulam
SCRANTON (PENNSYLVANIA), “Joe may have moved out of action against those involved in Most of them went un- with state’ Governmenthas Zealand Cabinet led by Prime district.
NOVEMBER 2 town but he didn’t shake this fraudulent activity,” wrote heeded. “initiated an in- Minister Jacinda Ardern, it was a But it was hardly a surprise.
Scranton off. You don’t spend Mahendra Verma in his com- Over the last two days, The vestigation” into “proud moment” for her father Foryearsnow,Radhakrishnan
MARTY KEARNS’S family took time in this culture and then plaint at the station in Gola. Indian Express published the disbursal of scholarships for R Radhakrishnan, an IIT-Kanpur had been nudging his daughter
over Joe Biden’s home in 1962, CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 Thiswasjustthelatestinalong CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 CONTINUED ON PAGE 2 alumnus hailing from North CONTINUED ON PAGE 2

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New Delhi
 2 THE SECOND PAGE
FROM PAGE ONE
Fraud went on
the findings of its investigation
that tracked hundreds of appli-
cations from 15 schools in six
districts and showed how mul-
tiple layers of verification, from
the school to the state level,
failed to detect the scam -- de-
spite checks like Aadhaar IDs
and fingerprints, and systems
likeDirectBenefitTransfer(DBT)
and the National Scholarship
Portal (NSP).
On Sunday, Jharkhand Chief
Minister Hemant Soren reacted
to the findings by ordering a
probe and promising to revamp
the verification system. Chief
Secretary Sukhdev Singh said
verification “has been stopped”
till the probe is completed.
And yet, with the Centre
granting Rs 61 crore to
Jharkhandundertheschemefor
2019-2020, the big question be-
ingasked now is this: Whywere
all the warnings ignored?
One of these alerts came on
July 5, 2019, when the Secretary,
Union Ministry of Minority
Affairs, wrote to the then
Jharkhand Chief Secretary D K
Tiwary,warningof “repeatedat-
tempts to subvert” the NSP, es-
pecially at the verification stage
of applications.
Norms for the scheme,
which was launched by the UPA
Government in 2008, state that
applications need to be verified
first by designated nodal heads
in schools who are registered
withdistrictwelfareofficers.The
applicationsarethencheckedby
the district and state nodal offi-
cers before being sent to the
Minority Affairs Ministry, which
verifiesanduploadsthemonthe
NSP before disbursal through
DBT.
On paper, the system is fairly
foolproof. But on the ground,
The Indian Express found the
process being subverted at the
first step itself.
In several cases, middlemen
either convinced school owners
or nodal officers to provide the
NSP login IDs and passwords or
used fake school letter pads to
obtain them. They involved
bankingcorrespondentstoopen
accounts of prospective benefi-
ciariesusingtheirAadhaarcards
andfingerprintsbeforeapplying
for scholarships on their behalf.
Officialspointtoanumberof
reasons why the scam slipped
under the radar -- from con-
nivance at the local level to staff
shortage to difficulties in han-
dling the NSP. Jharkhand's
WelfareDepartment,whichisin
charge of the scheme, has been
without an in-charge of its own
since October 3, when Minister
Haji Hussain Ansari succumbed
to health complications 10 days
after testing positive for Covid.
Chief Secretary Sukhdev
Singh said the “collaborative
connivance of various stake-
holders is a cause of concern”.
“Many schools are not veri-
fiedbythedistrict.Thatiswhere
the problem lies. The forms are
accepted or rejected by the dis-
trict administration. First, the
school owners themselves need
toverify,thenatthedistrictlevel,
and finally it comes to me. I do
random checks but that is not
sufficient. I am also overbur-
dened. We need a more robust
system. We have often alerted
the concerned district but there
is no action,” said Raj Kishore
Xaxa, the state nodal officer.
At the district level, officials
pointed to a staff shortage. “In
Ranchi, there are only two Block
Welfare Officers when there are
16more required.Therestof the
work is seen by the supervisors.
We do check the authenticity
and reject forms when we find
any discrepancies,” said
Sangeeta Saran, District Welfare
Officer, Ranchi.
According to Xaxa, who is
also project manager (adminis-
tration) at the Jharkhand State
Minorities Finance and
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Development Corporation (JS-
MDC), the implementing
agency, “the scholarship portal
is not very robust”.
On September 2, he wrote to
Aditya S Singh, Under Secretary,
Minority Affairs Ministry, about
the “technical” problems of the
NSP that did not allow for cross-
verification at the state level.
“We are not able to see the ac-
count numbers of beneficiaries,
leaving little scope for cross ver-
ification,” Xaxa said.
But there is no answer to
how the red flags were ignored.
‘Checks do not
happen’
Former Chief Secretary
Tiwary did not respond to re-
quests for comment on the ac-
tion taken after the alert from
the Centre last year. BJP leader
and Chief Minister at the time,
RaghubarDas,andthethenstate
Welfare Minister LoiusMarandi,
did not respond to requests for
comment.
Following the NDA's defeat
in the state polls, a JMM-
Congress-RJD government took
over last December. Sources in
the administration said the
Centre's letter was “forwarded
to the Welfare Department”.
On Xaxa's complaint about
the NSP, official sources said the
portal contains the phone num-
bers of applicants. “The verifica-
tionisjustacallaway,”theysaid.
There were other alerts, too.
On July 22, 2019, the Jharkhand
Anti-Corruption Bureau wrote
to the Principal Secretary
(Cabinet Secretariat) and
VigilanceDepartmentonacom-
plaint it had received about
“fake” beneficiaries.
Referring to a letter from au-
thorities at Madrasa Alia Arabia
in Ranchi's Kanke, where teach-
ers found that all 102 students
listed as beneficiaries for 2019-
2020 were “fake”, the letter
stated: “It is requested that the
schooleducationdepartmentdo
the needful.”
“Aninquirywas initiatedbut
nothing came out of it,” said a
senior state government official,
speaking on the condition of
anonymity.
Ranchi Deputy
Commissioner Chhavi Ranjan
said verification happens fre-
quently. “Butif irregularities still
happen, it is a matter of con-
cern,” he said.
JSMDC chairman and
Welfare Department secretary
Amitabh Kaushal said: “I cannot
comment until I see specific
cases.” But JSMDC nominee di-
rector Iqbal Imam acknowl-
edged that “there are various is-
sues”. “Our roles have not been
clearly designated, so checks do
not happen at our level. Since
the coronavirus outbreak, not
much is happening,” he said.
A senior state official
summed up the situation:
“There is just no will to act.”
Ultimately, it's left to a hand-
ful of schools to take action on
their own. Pastor Anil Chakor,
chairman, Assembly of God
Church School in Ranchi's
Hutup, said they have sus-
pended the school in-charge af-
ter authorities came to know
that he allegedly “stole the
school’sletterhead andstampto
get the User ID and password
from the NSP”.
But at the same time, several
schools sent complaints to dis-
trict officials only after The
Indian Express started verifying
thebeneficiaries.“Manyof them
are now desperately trying to
distance themselves from the
scam fearing an investigation,”
said a district official.
In his police complaint, Blue
Bells principal Verma wrote: “I
havegotto knowfrom...reporter
of IndianExpressdaybeforeyes-
terday that total of 180 students
have applied for minority schol-
arship in an unauthorised man-
ner from our school...It is a hum-
ble request to you to please look
EXCLUSIVE
WEB
VIDEO OF THE DAY
Timing of Jagan letter suspect: AG
Ashwini Upadhyay, who had
sought his consent to initiate
criminalcontemptofcourtpro-
ceedingsagainstReddyandthe
Chief Minister’s Principal
Advisor Ajeya Kallam,
Venugopal said since the mat-
ter is pending before the CJI, it
will not be appropriate for him
to deal with it. He did point out
though that the conduct of
Reddy and Kallam is prima fa-
cie “contumacious” – wilfully
disobedient or rebellious.
Writing to Upadhyay,
Venugopal said: “I have care-
fullygonethroughthecontents
of your petition. I find that the
objectionable statements have
been made in a letter dated
06.10.2020writtenbytheChief
SC stays EC order on Kamal Nath, panel says will reply
“Who has given you power
todelistacandidatefrombeing
astarcampaigneroraleaderof
the party (under the law),” the
CJI asked him.
DwiveditoldtheBench,also
comprisingJusticesASBopanna
and V Ramasubramanian, that
hewouldfileareply.Hepointed
outthatthematterhadbecome
infructuous since campaigning
was over.
Having a star campaigner
means that it is the political
party that foots the bill for ex-
penditureincurredduringcan-
vassing, not the candidate.
into this as a matter of serious
concern.”
‘Started probe’
pre-Matric minority students in
Jharkhand after an investigation
by The Indian Express revealed
how the money was being ille-
gallydivertedbyanexusof mid-
dlemen, bank and school staff,
and state employees.
Speaking to The Indian
Express after chairing a high-
level meeting to discuss the is-
sue, Naqvi said: “We have initi-
ated an investigation into the
matterandareinconstanttouch
with the state government.”
Naqvi said the state govern-
ment has been asked to verify
the findings of The Indian
Express investigation and “get
back to us as soon as possible”.
“Once this is done, we will have
a clearer picture,’’ he said.
The Indian Express found
that the scholarships, which are
disbursed from funds sanc-
tioned by the Union Ministry of
Minority Affairs, are being dis-
tributed to students and fake
beneficiaries in Jharkhand by
middlemen who pocket a share
of the money.
On Sunday, reacting to the
findings, Jharkhand Chief
Minister Hemant Soren ordered
a probe into the “big scam’’ and
assured action.
“We had put a number of
safeguards to ensure that the
process is transparent and that
such incidents don’t occur, in-
cluding a system of Direct
Benefit Transfer, stringent veri-
fication of applications, scholar-
ships through the National
Scholarship Portal as well as
linkingof Aadhaarcardstothese
applications. But it seems some
people at a very local level have
found a means to get around
this,” Naqvi said.
“The process of verification
iscarriedoutbythestate.Forthe
2019-2020 scholarship disbur-
sal, the Ministry had sent back
26,000 applications from
Jharkhand on grounds that they
were suspicious. The state gov-
ernment reverified the applica-
tions and sent us back 20 appli-
cations,’’ Naqvi said.
Senior officials in the
Ministry said the scholarship, in
its present form, is operational
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
HOW MORE THAN ONE INSTITUTE TAKE CREDIT FOR JEE, NEET SUCCESS STORIES
FollowingtheJEE,NEETresults,thetoppersintheengineering,medicalentrancetestsarebeingclaimedby
multipleinstitutesastheirstudent.
BIHAR ELECTION
UPDATE
From personal attacks
to Tejashwi’s Indian
Express interview
Minister to the Chief Justice of
India, Hon’ble Mr. Justice S. A.
Bobde. The letter was then re-
leased to the press by Sh. Ajeya
Kallam,PrincipalAdvisortothe
ChiefMinister,atapressconfer-
ence on 10.10.2020. The Chief
Justice is therefore well aware
of the nature of the allegations
contained in the said letter.”
“Iamof theopinionthatthe
timingitselfoftheletter,aswell
as its being placed in the public
domainthroughapressconfer-
ence could certainly be said to
be suspect, in the background
of the order passed by Justice
Ramana dated 16.09.2020, di-
rectingpendingprosecutionsof
elected representatives to be
takenupanddisposedof expe-
Reacting to the develop-
ments in the court, an EC offi-
cialsaid,"TheHon'bleSupreme
Court is supreme. EC has been
givenanopportunitytofileare-
plyinthematter,whichshallbe
filed at the earliest."
TheECofficialsaidNath'sre-
moval as star campaigner dur-
ing the election was not un-
precedented. Earlier this year,
during the Assembly elections
in Delhi, the EC had removed
BJP leader Anurag Thakur and
Parvesh Sahib Singh Verma
fromtheparty'slistofstarcam-
paigners. The decision was
only till 2021. The Ministry is in
the process of re-evaluating the
scheme, which was launched in
2008,andislikelytoconsiderre-
structuring of finances, eligibil-
ity norms and procedure, offi-
cials said.
LAC talks
comes at a time when Prime
Minister Narendra Modi and
Chinese President Xi Jinping are
likely to meet each other thrice
thismonth--overvideo-confer-
ence -- at the BRICS, SCO and G-
20 summits.
“At the moment, China does
notappeartohaveanyintention
toconcedetoIndia’sdemandfor
restoration of status quo ante.
They seem to be confident of
sustaining the redrawing of the
LAC that they have done unilat-
erally.However,therehavebeen
feelers from the other side that
it is willing to thin down troops
at certain friction points. The
next Corps Commander level
talks have not been scheduled
yet.Asandwhenithappens,this
matter will be discussed,” said a
source privy to negotiations be-
tween the sides.
India, the source said, will
continue to push for restoration
of status quo ante and will not
agreetoany“mutualequidistant
withdrawal”. A “partial disen-
gagement”, the source said,
would be in the interest of both
countries for now.
Following the June 15
GalwanValleyclash,inwhich20
Indian soldiers were killed and
the Chinese an unspecified
number, Corps Commander
level talks secured disengage-
ment at the spot of the clash
with forces of the two countries
moving 2 km behind.
Buteversince,nosubstantial
disengagement has been
achieved. As a countermeasure,
Indian forces have occupied
dominatingheightsonthesouth
bank of Pangong Tso and the
Chushul sub-sector.
InearlySeptember,Chinain-
creased troop presence on
Finger 4 of the north bank with
India mirroring the strength.
“The result is that there are
1500-2000soldiersoneachside
at the top of the ridge between
Finger 4 and Finger 3. The situa-
tion is no different on the south
EXPRESS TECH
ditiously. As you yourself have
pointed out, there are 31 crim-
inal cases pending against the
Chief Minister,” he said.
“In this background, prima
facie, the conduct of the said
persons is contumacious.
However, what has to be noted
is, that the entire case of con-
tempt arises out of the letter
dated 6.10.2020 written by the
Chief Minister directly to the
Chief Justice of India and the
subsequent press conference
held by Sh. Kallam. The Chief
Justice of India is therefore
seized of the matter. Hence it
would not be appropriate for
me to deal with the matter. For
thesereasons,Ideclineconsent
toinitiateproceedingsforcrim-
taken after Thakur encouraged
the crowd at a rally to chant
“desh ke gaddaron ko goli
maaro… (gun down traitors)”,
and Singh, in an interview,
claimedthattheShaheenBagh
protesters could “enter homes
andrapesistersanddaughters”.
Appearing for Kamal Nath,
SeniorAdvocateKapilSibalsaid
theCommissionhadnotissued
any notice to the Congress
leaderbeforepassingtheorder.
Inhisplea,Nathsaidthepoll
panel'sOctober30order,"based
on a complaint by Bharatiya
Janata Party against a speech
bank where China has tried to
mirror the Indian strength. This
is a recipe for a clash. Moreover,
in the harsh winter, with tem-
peraturesdivingseveralnotches
below freezing point, sustaining
these positions is a difficult task
for either side,” the source said.
NZ cabinet
towards politics in New Zealand
where she had gone to pursue
her higher studies from
Singapore. In 2017, she went on
to become an MP in Arden's
Labour Party.
“Thepostof Ministerwasnot
totally unexpected. We believed
that she would get some greater
role in the government, and the
Prime Minister had indicated to
her about it,” said
Radhakrishnan,whoissettledin
Chennai.
“Today, I spoke to her after
hearing about her new role. She
is thrilled. She is the first Indian
tobecomeaMinisterintheNew
Zealand Government. But I have
advised her to not forget the
familyevenwhilepursuingaca-
reer in politics,” he said.
Priyanca, 41, has been a
member of the Labour Party
since 2006. “Her husband
Richardson, a New Zealand citi-
zen who works with an IT firm,
joined the party recently. They
met when she was working
with an NGO for women sur-
vivors of domestic violence and
migrant workers. They have de-
cidednottohavechildrenforthe
sake of Priyanca's political ca-
reer,’’ said Radhakrishnan.
Priyanca had last visited
Kerala in July 2019 to take part
in rituals related to the death of
her mother Usha, who died in
February that year.
“When her mother was hos-
pitalised in Chennai, Priyanca
stayed for several days at her
bedside. But she had to return
for a meeting in London, and
could not be present when her
mother breathed her last,’’ said
Radhakrishnan, adding that his
elder daughter Manavi is settled
in Canada and married to a
Canadian management profes-
sional.
Afterpost-graduationincivil
engineering from IIT-Kanpur,
Radakrishnan worked for three
years with Mumbai Port Trust
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
THE NEXT-GEN
CONSOLE GAMING?
The console wars are
back with the PS 5
and Xbox Series X
inal contempt of the Supreme
Court of India,” he said.
Upadhyay,inhisletterseek-
ing consent, had said Reddy’s
letteranditssubsequentrelease
tothemediabyKallamatapress
conference “scandalise the au-
thority of the Supreme Court
and the High Court” apart from
“interfering with the course of
judicialproceedingsandthead-
ministration of justice”.
He contended that “if this
kind of precedent were al-
lowed, political leaders would
start making reckless allega-
tionsagainstjudgeswhodonot
decidecasesintheirfavourand
this trend would soon spell the
death knell of an independent
judiciary”.
delivered on 13.10.2020”, was
passed without any notice,
without hearing from him.
On October 13, he had de-
scribed Chief Minister Shivraj
Singh Chouhan “mafia” and
“milawat khor”.
Nath said the EC had issued
himnoticeonOctober21,aftera
complaint by the BJP, for al-
legedly violating the Model
CodeatarallyinDabra,Gwalior,
onOctober18.Thiswastheday
hehadmadethe“item”remark
againstImartiDevi,astatemin-
ister and the BJP candidate for
the Dabra seat.
before moving to Singapore in
1972 where he worked as a port
engineer. He returned with wife
Usha to settle in Chennai in
1999.
Both their daughters were
born in India, but completed
school in Singapore before
Priyanca moved to Massey
University in New Zealand to
pursueacourseinDevelopment
Studies.
“Priyanca made her debut in
politics when she contested and
got elected as the International
Students’ Officer of the Massey
UniversityStudentsAssociation.
She decided to stay back in New
Zealand, when senior leaders of
theLabourPartyencouragedher
to join the party,” said
Radhakrishnan.
“She is hardworking and has
excellent oratory skills. We en-
couragedandsupportedher de-
cision to join politics in New
Zealand. We allowed her to
move in the direction she
wanted to go,’’ he said.
In New Zealand, Priyanca
will be Minister for Diversity,
Inclusion and Ethnic
Communities; Minister for the
Community and Voluntary
Sector; and Associate Minister
for Social Development and
Employment. The new Cabinet
will be sworn in on Friday.
Nov 3 is here
forget about it,” said Kearns.
“We took care of each other.”
Intermixed with Halloween
decorations, Biden’s neigh-
bourhood now carries mostly
signs for his name but a couple
of yards showcased prominent
Trump paraphernalia, too. In
the final stretch as a nation, split
right down the middle prepares
to vote tomorrow Democratic
Presidential nominee Biden has
made Scranton, where he spent
the first 10 years of his life, the
centrepiece of his campaign.
His tagline: Scranton versus
Park Avenue, referring to the
Trump building.
Multiple advertisements
tout Biden’s Scranton values of
hard work, appealing to the for-
merly Democratic blue-col-
lared base. Last time, union
workers voted for Trump in
droves unknown to
Republicans since the 1980s.
New Delhi
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
Why life won’t go back
to normal even after a
Covid-19 vaccine
NEWEPISODEEVERYDAY
In this episode of The Sandip Roy Show,
virologist Dr Gagandeep Kang talks about
what we’re really looking for in a vaccine,
and addresses some burning concerns
“I learned what honour and
decency and courage and all
those things are about at that
kitchen table,” Biden said of his
childhood home at a virtual
event last week. “Wall Street
didn’t build this country. Hard-
working, decent middle-class
people like the folks here built
this country.”
A straight two-mile drive
from Biden’s former home,
Tarun Shah and Janak Patel,
workers at a distribution site for
a large American department
store TJ Maxx, stand outside the
Scranton Community Center
planning for November 3.
They discuss boxed lunches
of Gujarati food that they will
distribute to their colleagues
when the group volunteers at
the Centre’s polling station.
They are union leaders with
the Pennsylvania Joint Board of
Workers United. Almost half of
their 1,400 colleagues are
Gujarati and in the union. Shah
walks back to his apartment
complex, where he has made
handwritten charts of the 600
Gujarati families who live there,
their citizenship status, and
their voting status. “There are
100 families left that we have to
make sure vote on Tuesday,” he
said in Hindi outside his home.
Shah and Patel’s activism,
after living in the town for 15
years each, shows how much
has changed in Scranton since
Biden moved away.
This area has seen some of
the fastest-growing Hispanic
and Asian growth in the coun-
try, at 376 and 94 per cent be-
tween 2000 and 2010,
Brookings found.
In the 20th century,
Scranton was a collection of
European enclaves, all coming
in for booming coal mines.
Biden’s parents and grandpar-
ents’ generation moved in from
Ireland, Poland, Italy, Lithuania,
Ukraine, and the like — each en-
clave revolving around their
own neighbourhood church.
“When Joe says things like,
that’s a whole lot of malarkey, I
think back to my family in high
school,” said Jay Parini, whose
mother was friends with
Biden’s mother and babysat
Biden. He remembers the death
of a Syrian neighbour. The next
day, a feast from the neighbour-
hood landed on the family’s
front porch, including baklava,
Italian meatballs, and Ukrainian
pancake rolls.
Parini’s father said to him at
the man’s funeral: “Who needs
the United Nations? We do it
right in Scranton.”
“After the ’90s, I watched
my street go from a mix of
Italian and Irish to a mix of
Italian, Irish, Mexican, and
Indian,” said Parini, who is now
an English professor at
Middlebury University.
The town was once at the
cutting edge of technology,
even named the Electric City for
running the nation’s first elec-
tric city trolleys. The new tech-
nologies required robust labour,
and Scranton was prideful of its
working-class grit. Labour
unions, a strong core of
America’s industrial revolution,
gained political and economic
clout, winning foundational
worker protections.
“It was a mark of pride to
have a job even when you were
young,” 50-year-old Kearns said
of his days working in kitchens
or delivering the newspaper.
“The union culture celebrated
the worker.”
Shah said he moved to
Scranton from Vadodara be-
cause his hard work was re-
warded with better jobs for his
children, who are in medical
training and a software com-
pany. “When you work here,
the work is appreciated,” the
62-year-old said. “This country
is good for immigrants and the
Democrats are working for the
immigrants.”
But Parini said his town is
still nostalgic for the “good
days” between the 1950s and
70s. When manufacturing and
mining took a hit, so did the
families in town. Kearns grew
up around conversations of
mine subsidence. Coal compa-
nies had deserted town, taking
the columns holding up the
mines as well. Now, the town
deals with collapsed land and
sinkholes, along with mount-
ing unemployment.
“I remember what it was
like to wait for your father’s pay
check by Friday,” said Parini,
whose parents moved from
Italy drawn by coal. “That’s the
background Joe came from. His
father was struggling.” Biden’s
father moved the family to
Delaware when he lost his job.
Parini said the economic
conditions in the town sank
more in the years to follow.
“These places are hollowed out.
Houses sell for nothing.
Healthcare is hard to get.
There’s no coal left and it’s not
coming back.”
The battle over the union
vote in and around
Pennsylvania will be key to a
White House win this year.
Twelve per cent of the state’s
workers are in a union, the Wall
Street Journal reported.
Scranton leans Democrat
(Barack Obama won by 12 per
cent in 2012), but almost went
Republican in 2016 (Hillary
Clinton won by three per cent).
Its neighbouring county,
Luzerne, is a hot battleground,
flipping from Blue to Red last
time. Vice President nominee
Kamala Harris will visit that
county Monday.
Battered by bias
some earth on the road outside.
We thought it would finally get
done. But they never came in-
side the village. They think we
are untouchable. They don't
want to come near us,” says
Vipin Mallick, a local resident.
The Dom community is one
of the 22 sub-castes among
Dalits in Bihar, categorised as
Mahadalits.Butevenamongthe
Mahadalits, the Doms are
treated as the lowest rung -- at
Aguani village in Parbatta con-
stituency, for instance. Parbatta
is one of 94 seats that goes to
polls in Bihar in the second
phase Tuesday, with the RJD
contesting in 56 seats, the BJP in
46 and the JD(U) in 43.
In the village, there is a nar-
row lane that leads to the
shadedchaupal,withahighwall
on both sides. “The land is
owned by an upper caste family.
They don't like seeing us,”
Mallick says.
Yet, it is not as if the commu-
nity has not made strides it is
proud of. Mallick points to eight
young men standing behind
him. “We fought to put them
through school. They are all ed-
ucated and have either passed
class 10 or 12. They are the first
from our community in Aguani
to study. Even a decade ago, we
usedtocollectwastedfoodfrom
marriages. Without any food,
sometimes even roadkill. But
then, we became aware, and
stopped,” he says.
This “awareness” did not
come from government inter-
vention, but from the work of
BahishkritHitkariSangathan,an
organisation led by Sanjeev
Kumar, an MBA graduate who
returned from Delhi in 2005 to
Khagaria.Kumarisfightingelec-
tions for the first time from the
neighbouring Khagaria seat for
the Plurals Party.
The Plurals Party is headed
by LSE graduate Pushpam Priya
Choudhary, who is the daughter
of JD(U) leader Vinod
Choudhary and is contesting
from Bankipur in Patna.
Launched in March, the party’s
website says it is crowdfunded
and wants to end dirty politics
for a “progressive” Bihar.
FULLREPORTSON
www.indianexpress.com

3 THE CITY
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
4,001 CASES ON MONDAY, POSITIVITY RATE AT 10.91%
On Centre’s plan to stem Covid surge
in Delhi: Testing in markets, salons
EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
TARGETED RT-PCR testing in
restaurants, market places and
barbershops;ensuringavailabil-
ity of enough beds and ventila-
tors; aggressive contact tracing
of those quarantined — these
measuresarepartof theCentre's
elaborate plan to contain the
spread of Covid-19 in the capital
in the coming days, as it ac-
knowledged that the recent
spurt in cases was due to ongo-
ing festivities.
The city reported over 5,000
cases daily for five days in a row.
Monday saw 4,001 cases, with
36,665 tests being conducted —
a daily positivity rate of 10.91%.
In the wake of the challenge
posed by upcoming festivities
and already rising numbers of
Covid cases in Delhi, Home
Secretary Ajay Bhalla Monday
held a high-level meeting with
seniorbureaucratsoftheMinistry
of Health,Delhigovernmentand
NITI Aayog member Dr VK Paul.
“The strategy to contain
spread of Covid-19 in Delhi, es-
9,300 new
Covid cases in
Oct, highest so
far in Gurgaon
SAKSHIDAYAL
GURGAON, NOVEMBER 2
WITH ALMOST 9,300 fresh cases
emerging from close to 95,000
tests, October saw the highest
number of Covid cases in
Gurgaon so far.
As per the district’s health
bulletin, Gurgaon recorded
9,299 fresh cases in October, as
opposed to 9,144 cases in
September and 2,833 cases in
August. The number of tests
conducted during this period
also rose from 61,132 in August
to 92,052 in September, peak-
ing at 94,807 in October.
Fatalities, meanwhile, rose from
10 in August to 41 in September
and dipped to 39 in October.
Indailycases,Gurgaon,forthe
firsttime,recordedover300cases
for10daysinarowfromOctober
21-31. On Sunday, the district
crossedthe500markforthefirst
timeandrecordeditshighestsin-
gle-day jump so far, seeing 529
cases. On Monday, Gurgaon
recorded 398 new cases.
“The positivity rate has in-
creasedaswehavestoppedanti-
gen tests and are only doing RT-
PCR tests now. But there is an
overall surge in cases as well,”
said Chief Medical officer Dr
Virender Yadav. “The fact that it
isnowfestiveseasonandalsothe
viralseasoniscontributingtothe
rise in cases. The health depart-
ment can only test, trace, and
treat,andadvisepeopletofollow
precautions. They must under-
stand the need for this,” he said.
The Deputy Commissioner
Monday also appealed to resi-
dents to follow social distancing
andtakeallprecautions:“People
mustbeextracautious,giventhe
changing weather and the fes-
tive season.”
Testing at Amar Colony, Monday. Praveen Khanna
pecially keeping in view the fes-
tivalseasonanddecreasingtem-
peraturesaccompaniedbyrising
pollution, was discussed at
length with representatives of
MoHFW and health experts
presentinthemeeting,”anMHA
statement said.
According to the MHA, it was
decided during the meeting to
concentrateeffortsincertainkey
areas, such as “targeted RT-PCR
testing in sensitive and critical
AFTER VIOLENCE AT FARIDABAD PROTEST
3 men arrested test
positive, attended
mahapanchayat
SAKSHI DAYAL
GURGAON, NOVEMBER 2
A DAY after a protest demanding
justiceforthe20-year-oldstudent
shot dead outside her college in
Faridabadturnedviolent,officials
Monday said three people ar-
rested for stone pelting and at-
tempting to block the highway
havetestedpositiveforCovid-19.
“The32peoplearrestedforthevi-
olence were tested for Covid;
threewerepositive.Theyhadpar-
ticipated in the mahapanchayat
Sunday morning as well,” said
FaridabadPolicePROSubeSingh.
Police said the mahapan-
chayat, which saw over 500 par-
ticipants, was organised at the
Ballabhgarh Dussehra ground,
followingwhichagroupof “anti-
social elements” attempted to
block NH-2. Around 200 people
from the crowd allegedly pelted
stones, injuring 10 personnel.
Deputy Commissioner,
Faridabad,YashpalYadavsaidan
advisory has been issued to all
thosepartof themahapanchayat
and the protest to follow home
quarantine for 10 days: “Covid
cases have been increasing con-
tinuously for the last 10 days;
The protesters were demanding justice for the 20-year-old
woman who was murdered last week. Express
zones such as restaurants, mar-
ket places, barber shops / salons,
etc; gear up availability of med-
ical resources including beds,
ICUs, and ventilators as a pre-
emptive measure; ensure high
degree of contact tracing and
monitoring of quarantined con-
tacts,soastosuppressandbreak
the chain of transmission”.
It was also decided to en-
hance enforcement selectively,
accompanied by greater aware-
more than 300 cases are emerg-
ing every day. Despite the situa-
tion being so serious, some peo-
ple organised a mahapanchayat
Sunday... All those who tested
positive were mingling with the
crowd and around the stage.
People in the mahapanchayat
were also not following social
distancing or wearing masks,
whichfurtherincreasesthepos-
sibility of more infections.”
PROSingh said,“All thoseex-
posedtothepositivepersonsare
being identified through video
footage and call dump analysis
and asked to home quarantine.”
Commissioner of Police O P
Singhsaid:“FaridabadPolicehas
apositiveattitudetowardsevery-
one but will not tolerate distur-
banceof lawandorderunderany
circumstances...Wewillidentify
all those involved in the stone
pelting and take action.”
Last week, Nikita Tomar, a
third-year B.Com student, was
shot dead by her former class-
mateTauseef andhisfriend.They
have been arrested. “Faridabad
Police stands with the victim’s
family.Theyhavebeenprovided
security.Thevictim’sbrotherwas
granted an arms licence for self-
defense,”saidthecommissioner.
ness creation through targeted
IEC (Information, Education and
Communication) campaigns,
the MHA said.
The Delhi government as-
sured during the meeting that
there were enough beds, with
57% of them still vacant.
It was decided at the meet-
ingthattheadministrationmust
ensureall cases under home iso-
lation were monitored and
shifted to hospitals well in time
before any deterioration in their
medical condition. It was also
emphasised that Metro travel
should be carefully regulated,
strictly in accordance with the
Standard Operating Procedure
(SOP) issued in this regard.
“GNCTD made a presenta-
tion on the present situation of
Covid-19 in Delhi, which is wit-
nessing third surge in cases.
While the new Covid cases and
total active cases are going up,
theadministrationisfocusingon
testing,contacttracingandtreat-
ment. The recent surge in num-
berof activecaseswasattributed
to the festival season, which has
witnessed greater movement of
people,accompaniedbylaxityin
SUITED UP
A woman passenger wearing a protective suit waits for a train at the New Delhi railway
station on Monday. Amit Mehra
Minor assaulted, killed by man his
mother moved in with 2 days ago
JIGNASA SINHA
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
A THREE-YEAR-OLD boy was al-
legedly sexually assaulted and
killed by a man, whom his
mother started living with two
days ago, in North Delhi’s Burari
last Friday. The accused, a taxi
driver, was arrested on Sunday.
Police sources said the ac-
cused strangled the boy though
the exact cause of death is still
being confirmed.
According to the mother’s
statement, the accused took the
boy for a ride in his car around 1
amafterthechildinsistedongo-
ing out. “They returned after
one-and-a-half hours and the
mother found that her child had
CORONAVIRUS
IN THE CAPITAL
adhering to the basic principles
of safe Covid behaviour," the
MHA statement said.
Concluding the meeting, the
Home Secretary, while appreci-
ating the efforts of GNCTD offi-
cials, emphasised that strategies
for containment of spread of the
virus in Delhi should be strictly
enforced and implemented, the
MHA said.
"He stressed the need for
reaching out to residents of
Delhi to sensitise them about
safe Covid behaviour through
RWAs, mohalla and market
committees, public announce-
ment systems, message on po-
lice vehicles, etc. He also in-
formed that the situation in
Delhi would be reviewed again
in the coming week, along with
other districts of the National
Capital Region (NCR)," the MHA
statement said.
The meeting was attended
Secretary,Ministryof Healthand
Family Welfare (MoHFW),
Director General, ICMR, Chief
Secretary and other senior offi-
cersof thegovernmentof NCTof
Delhi (GNCTD) and Delhi
Commissioner of Police.
some injury marks on his body
andwasunconscious.Whenshe
asked the accused about it, he
said the marks on his body were
dueto‘somereaction’of hisdaily
medicines. The woman then
took her daughters and son to
Lok Nayak Hospital, where doc-
torsdeclaredtheboydeadonar-
rival,” said police.
An FIR was registered on the
woman’s complaint against the
accused under sections of mur-
der and the POCSO Act.
According to the FIR, doctors
“foundmanyinjurymarksonthe
boy’s genitals and body”. The
medico-legal case report also
mentions that the boy sustained
“multiple bruises” on his head,
face,arm,chest,backandgenitals.
A police team raided several
At top pvt hospitals, most
ICU beds with vents full
EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
WITH A surge in the number of
daily Covid-19 cases in the na-
tional capital, ICU beds with
ventilators in several top private
hospitals are once again run-
ning full.
DatasharedbytheDelhigov-
ernment on its Corona App
shows there are 1,244 critical
care beds dedicated to Covid-19
patients, of which 845 (almost
68%) are occupied at the mo-
ment.
Top private hospitals in the
capital like Indraprastha Apollo,
Fortis Hospital in Vasant Kunj
Fortis Escorts, BL Kapoor and
Max, Shalimar Bagh have their
ICUfacilitieswithventilatorsup-
port running full.
Thereare82privatehospitals
with ICU beds having ventilator
support,including smallnursing
homes, out of which 38 are run-
ning full.
On Monday, Delhi reported
4,001newcasesof Covid-19and
42 fatalities, taking the total
number of confirmed cases to
3,96,371 and the death toll to
6,604.
The daily positivity rate of
cases is at 10.91% after authori-
ties tested 36,665 people in the
places in North Delhi and ar-
rested the accused from Burari
Sunday. Police said he confessed
to the crime.
The woman got married 11
yearsagoandhastwootherchil-
dren — daughters aged 10 and 6.
Sherunsabeautysalonfromher
house in Outer Delhi while her
husband is a house painter. She
wouldalsoattendweddingsand
events to earn money, said po-
lice. Due to her work, she trav-
elled in taxis, which is when she
met the accused a month ago.
A week before the incident,
the woman fought with her
husband and left home. She and
the accused travelled to UP’s
BulandshahrandonWednesday,
the woman and her children
shifted to his house, said police.
New Delhi
TOTAL CASES HOSPITAL BEDS
3,96,371 VENTILATORS
Daily cases Recoveries
Nov 1
Nov 2
5,664
4,001
4,159
4,824
Total 33,308* 3,56,459
VENTILATOR BEDS
Total: 1,244
ACROSS HOSPITALS
Vacant: 399
Total Vacant
PVT 453 107
GOVT 791 292
Source:Delhi corona app
last 24 hours. There are 33,308
active cases in the city, out of
which 21,364 (64%) are under
home isolation and 6,676 are
admitted to hospitals. There are
15,796 beds dedicated to Covid-
19 patients in the city, of which
9,076 are vacant.
Whilecriticalcarefacilitiesat
private hospitals are occupied,
ICU beds at government hospi-
tals are also running low on va-
cancies.
For instance, the Delhi gov-
ernment’s Lok Nayak hospital,
which has 200 ICU beds with
ventilators,hasonlyeightvacant
beds. Similarly, only one ICU bed
with a ventilator is vacant out of
the 54 beds at the Centre-run
Safdarjung Hospital.
“Our main focus is to keep
Capital to see
first foggy day
today, AQI to dip
EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
TUESDAYMORNINGisexpected
to be the first foggy day in
the city, with the India
Meteorological Department
(IMD)forecastingthevisibilityto
drop in the morning.
With morning temperatures
dipping and high pollution lev-
els, officials said conditions for
fog were ideal on Tuesday
morning. The rest of the week,
however, is expected to see a
clear sky.
On Monday, the minimum
temperature was recorded as
10.8 degrees Celsius, four de-
grees below normal and the
lowest of the season so far. The
maximum was recorded as 30.1
degrees Celsius, normal for this
time of the year.
As per the IMD forecast, the
minimum temperature is ex-
pected to be 10 degrees while
the maximum is expected to be
30 degrees Celsius.
The capital’s air quality,
meanwhile, improved slightly
from the very poor category to
the poor category on Monday,
primarily because of moderate
winds. The relief, however, is
short-lived.
“Marginal deterioration is
forecast for Tuesday and
Wednesday and will take air
quality to the middle of the very
poor category. The SAFAR
synergised stubble fire counts
over Punjab, Haryana, UP,
Uttarakhand, and neighbouring
areas impacting Delhi air stood
at 3,045 on Sunday. The bound-
ary layer wind direction is
North-North-westerly but wind
speed is low, not very favourable
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
Total Vacant
15,796 9,074
1,244 399
*Total active cases
Deaths Tests
51
42
44,623
36,665
6,604 47,61,983
HOSPITAL BEDS
Total:
15,796
Vacant:
9,074
Total Vacant
PVT 6,988 3,066
GOVT 8,808 6,008
the fatality rate low and to en-
sure patients are not facing
shortageof hospitalbeds.Weare
working to strengthen the non-
invasive care also by getting
some of these non-invasive ven-
tilators.Theideaistopreventpa-
tients from turning serious,” a
senior health department offi-
cial said.
On the other hand, at Rajiv
GandhiSuperSpecialityHospital
(RGSSH), 196 of 200 such beds
are vacant at the moment.
“We are also increasing the
number of beds in the hospitals.
The government has asked all
hospitals to stay prepared for a
surge in the number of cases in
the coming days,” said Dr B L
Sherwal, medical director of
RGSSH.
On Monday, the
minimum temperature
was recorded as 10.8
degrees Celsius, four
degrees below normal
and the lowest of the
season so far
for the fire-related intrusion.
Stubble burning share in PM 2.5
has significantly decreased and
is estimated as 16% for Monday.
Increased local surface wind
speed and the decrease in the
strength of night time inversion
have improved the dispersion
conditions,” SAFAR officials said.
Air quality in the city has
dipped considerably over the
past two weeks and almost
touched the severe category
twice last week.
Experts, however, say that as
Diwali and crop stubble burning
season will not coincide this
year, the city can expect to avoid
one pollution peak which is
usual in other years.
“Diwali is much later than
usual this year. This means that
bythetimethefestivalcomes,the
fields will be cleared already. In
otheryears,thefestivalcoincides
with peak stubble burning sea-
son,pushingDelhiandnearbyar-
eas into the severe category of
pollution. Due to the pandemic,
when the number of vehicles on
the road was much lesser than
normalandindustrieswereshut
down,airqualityacrossthecoun-
try improved significantly. In
Delhi, the deterioration over the
past two weeks has been rapid
butthepeakhasbeenavoidedfor
now,” said an IMD expert.

4 THE CITY
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
AT NAND NAGRI POLICE STATION
A year after custodial death,
murder FIR against 4 cops
MAHENDERSINGH
MANRAL&
JIGNASASINHA
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
DELHI POLICE have named four
police personnel in an FIR in a
murdercase,filedoverayearafter
a 25-year-old man died in police
custodyatNortheastDelhi'sNand
Nagri police station. The FIR was
registered after a magisterial en-
quiryfoundthatthemandiedofa
head injury, caused “possibly by
blunt force impact”.
On June 6 last year, Govinda
Yadavwasarrestedforpickingup
illicitliquoralongwithhisaccom-
plice Nayeem (30) from Sunder
Nagri. The men were taken to
NandNagripolicestation,where
Yadavdiedlaterthatnight.Atthe
time, his family had alleged po-
licehadbeatenhimupincustody.
OnMonday,aseniorpoliceof-
ficer told The Indian Express, "We
registered a case under sections
BRIEFLY
BSES scheme
topromote
solarpower
New Delhi: BSES on
Monday launched a pilot
scheme to promote
rooftop solar plants in
Safdarjung and
Karkardooma. Under the
‘Solarise Safdarjung’ and
‘Solarise Karkardooma’
schemes, consumers will
be offered premium, cus-
tomised and non-sub-
sidised (non-Central
Financial Assistance) so-
lar solutions, including
imported components,
with easy financing op-
tions, extended warranty
under the CAPEX model,
in which the customer
foots the installation
costs.
ISBTsto
reopentoday
New Delhi: Inter-state bus
terminals in Delhi will re-
open on Tuesday. The ter-
minalswereshutinMarch
after the implementation
of the lockdown. There
will be thermal screening
of passengers and bus
crew, and those showing
symptomswillbemadeto
undergo tests, the Delhi
government said.
Copshoots
selfinWest
Delhihome
New Delhi: A 26-year-old
DelhiPolicesub-inspector
allegedly shot himself
with his service pistol in-
side his house in West
Delhi’s Mohan Garden on
Monday. The deceased, SI
Rituraj, was posted at
Paschim Vihar police sta-
tion. Though the police
have not found a suicide
note from the spot, it is
suspected that the SI al-
legedlycommittedsuicide
because of financial crisis.
Coupleheld
forniece’s
murder
New Delhi: A week after
the decomposing body of
a girl was recovered from
inside a bed box in a
house in northeast Delhi,
police arrested the vic-
tim's maternal aunt and
her husband for allegedly
killing her. DCP (north-
east) Ved Prakash Surya
said that the minor girl
livedwiththecouple.Her
uncle “harboured ill-feel-
ing against her as she re-
sisted his attempts to
make physical relations".
The DCP said that the
couple fought over the
girl often, and her mater-
nal aunt asked her hus-
band to kill her. ENS
A magisterial enquiry
found that the man
died due to a head
injury caused ‘possibly
by blunt force impact’
of murder on Thursday. The role
of four policemen who were in-
volved in Yadav’s arrest at the
timewillbeinvestigated.Thecase
was registered after we found he
hadsustainedabluntforceinjury
on his head.”
Threepolicemen—headcon-
stable Abhishek and constables
Udham Singh and Vishal — were
suspended last year. The FIR also
mentionsassistantsub-inspector
Devender,whoseallegedrole,the
officersaid,isyettobeascertained.
It was around 10.30 pm on
June 6 last year that Yadav was
rushed to GTB hospital after he
complained of uneasiness. He
wasdeclareddeadonarrival.The
ICE OR FROTH?
Fishermen pass through a polluted stretch on the Yamuna, Monday. Praveen Khanna
HC acquits 2 in murder case,
says cop planted as witness
SOFIAHSAN
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
ACQUITTING TWO convicts in a
2011murdercase,theDelhiHigh
Court Monday asked the Police
Commissioner to look into the
conduct and manner of investi-
gationundertakenbypoliceoffi-
cers and take appropriate action
against them.
Thedivisionbenchof Justices
Vipin Sanghi and Rajnish
Bhatnagar said a constable pro-
jectedbypoliceasaneyewitness
wasplantedto“solve”thecase.It
alsosaidithasfoundtestimonies
of the police officers hard to be-
lieveintheabsenceof corrobora-
tionfromanypublicwitness.“We
are pained to say that because of
lackadaisical approach of IO and
SHOof thiscase,theentireinves-
tigationhasbeenbotched.PW11
Ct. Kuldeep has been cited as an
eyewitnessbyIOandSHObutno
actionhasbeentakenagainsthim
in not reporting the matter im-
mediately... in such a serious of-
fence.Theyevenfailtotakeorrec-
ommendanyactionagainsthim.
Rather, they shielded him when
questioned...,” said the order.
NOIDA SECTOR 50
At ‘pride’ Metro station, transgenders find welcoming workplace
ASHNABUTANI
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
EVER SINCE Kunal Mahore (28)
began sex reassignment in 2018,
he has been unable to secure a
job.Hisjobasadriverforacabag-
gregator ended as the company
was unwilling to renew his con-
tract until he completed the
process.
But his fortunes changed this
year when he heard about the
Metro station dedicated to the
transgendercommunityandde-
cided to apply.
investigation into his death was
undertaken by a Metropolitan
Magistrate. At the time, the then
Additional DCP (Northeast) R P
Meena had told The Indian
Express, "We have not found the
officersindulginginviolence.The
MM will look into the matter."
Yadav's father, Ram Gulam
Yadav (55), had alleged his son's
body bore bruises: “Police must
have beaten him up because we
weren'ttoldabouttheillnessand
were only called after he died."
During the inquiry, at first,
headconstableAbhishektoldthe
magistrate that he "released the
deceased(Yadav)togohomeand
no legal proceedings were con-
ductedagainsthimbuthestarted
feelingill."Lateron,theheadcon-
stablechangedhisstatementand
claimed that "no arrestee was
handedovertohimonJune6and
he never met Govinda”.
As per the FIR, doctors who
didthepost-mortemopinedthat
the "cause of death was head in-
The case pertains to the mur-
der of Laxmi Nagar resident Atul
Jain on March 6, 2011, following
which Rs 8.5 lakh was allegedly
stolen from him at Mangal Bazar.
PolicearrestedMustakeemBhura,
Arshad, Zaki Anwar and Nadeem
in the case. The HC Monday ac-
quittedBhura,whowasconvicted
for murder and robbery, and
Arshad, who was convicted for
robbery in February 2018.
In his testimony, beat consta-
ble Kuldeep Singh had said he
was posted with Shakurpur po-
lice station on the day of murder
andheardthesoundof abulletat
8 pm in Mangal Bazar. He
claimed to have chased the ac-
cused, who fled on a motorcycle.
He had then come back to the
crime scene without informing
the SHO or local police station
throughhisphoneorwirelessset,
aspertheorder,whichalsonotes
thathefailedtoinformthepolice
team that reached the spot later.
“Stony silence on the part of
PW11furthermakesusbelieveit
wasablindmurdercase,notwit-
nessedbyPW11.Hiskeepingquiet
for more than a day and waiting
for SHO only suggests he, along
with SHO, wanted to deliberate
TheSector50NoidaMetrosta-
tion was rechristened as ‘Pride
Station’, the first initiative of its
kindinNorthernIndia,onOctober
27.Afterthreeroundsofselection,
Kunal and five others were em-
ployed by the Noida Metro Rail
Corporation (NMRC) on October
5.Whiletwohavebeenemployed
as housekeeping staff, four are
employed as ticket operators.
Kunal, who now works as a
housekeepingstaff atthestation,
said he often received positive
comments from commuters.
“This job is very important to me
asIhaveapartnerandchildrenat
0-50 Good
jury produced possibly by blunt
forceimpact”.Themagistratealso
spoke to Nayeem, who said that
he was apprehended by the po-
lice along with Yadav. “He stated
that he was kept separate from
Yadav on the first floor and later
on he came to know that he was
taken to hospital,” said the FIR.
On Monday, Yadav’s father
told The Indian Express: "Police
tortured my son and asked us to
give them Rs 15,000 for his bail.
They didn’t let any of us meet
him... Later , when Govinda’s sis-
terwenttomeethim,policemen
demanded money... He wasn’t
suffering from any disease."
Yadav’s family said he was a
daily wager. His father said, "The
lockdown has been difficult; he
was the only earning member.
We attended a court session in
July this year and told the MM
aboutthecase—howthepolice-
men harassed us and tried to ex-
tort money. We hope justice will
be done."
upon the incident and look for
waystocrack(it),”readstheorder.
ACPRavinderKumarSharma,
the then SHO, had said in his
statement that he came to know
of the assailants’ identity at the
police station from constable
Kuldeep around lunch time the
next day. Regarding his conduct,
thebenchsaid,“Wefailtounder-
stand why this identity was not
mentionedbyPW11Ct.Kuldeep
inhisstatementgiventoIO...later
intheevening.PW47SHOisalso
silentaboutidentityof assailants
given by constable Kuldeep...
strangely enough, SHO does not
call for a sketch artist to get
sketches of assailants prepared.
Thisshowshowinvestigationhas
beenbotchedupandSHOandIO
hadmanagedto‘solve’thiscase.”
“Weareawarethereisnorule
of law or evidence which lays
down that unless... testimony of
police official is corroborated by
independentevidence,thesame
cannotbebelieved.Butitisarule
of prudence that a more careful
scrutiny of evidence of police of-
ficials is required, since they can
be said to be interested in the re-
sult of the case projected by
them,” said the order.
Mahi Gupta at the ticket counter. Gajendra Yadav
ANAND VIHAR
Very Poor
340
AQI
PM: 2.5
0 500
51-100 Satisfactory
No manufacturing units in city’s new
industrial areas, Centre amends rules
EXPRESSNEWSSERVICE
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
NEW INDUSTRIAL areas in Delhi
will only have service-based and
hi-tech industrial units, with the
Union government amending
rules to disallow setting up of
manufacturing units in these ar-
eas to curb pollution. Delhi Chief
Minister Arvind Kejriwal wel-
comed the Centre's decision and
thanked Union Minister for
Housing and Urban Affairs
Hardeep Singh Puri.
Stating that the decision will
make the city's industrial areas
neat, clean and green, Kejriwal,
addressing a webcast, said: "The
face of the industrial areas will
change. Until now, majorly man-
ufacturingactivitieswereallowed
intheseindustrialareas.Thereare
many types of industrial areas,
such as iron, steel, plastic, etc,
whicharemajorsourcesofpollu-
tion.Asperthenewdecision,only
hi-techandserviceindustrieswill
beallowedfromnowoninallnew
industrialareasinDelhi.Noman-
ufacturing activities will be al-
lowedinnewindustrialareas.The
HC sets aside bail to Rajdhani
school owner in NE riots case
‘Those tarnishing nation’s secular fabric need to be punished’
SOFIAHSAN
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
ALLOWING A petition of Delhi
Police against the grant of bail to
Rajdhani Public School owner
FaisalFarooqinaNortheastDelhi
riots case, the Delhi High Court
Monday said the entire country
is “aggrieved” by the “action of
suchoffenders”,who“tarnishthe
basicsecularfabricofthenation”,
andobservedthattheyneedtobe
punished severely. “Personal lib-
ertyof anindividual,thoughpre-
cious,isof littlevalueif thelarger
interest of the people and nation
are at stake,” said Justice Suresh
Kumar Kait, while setting aside
the trial court order by which
Farooq was granted bail.
Though Farooq was granted
bailbythelowercourtonJune20,
thesamewasstayedbytheHCon
June22inapetitionfiledbyDelhi
Police against it. When the stay
order was vacated by the HC on
July 2, Farooq’s release was again
stayed by the Supreme Court. He
continues to remain in judicial
custody since March 9.
Farooq is accused by the po-
liceofallowingrioterstoenterhis
school and using its terrace to
cause damage to the nearby DRP
Public and other surrounding
structures. A huge quantity of
stones, bricks, petrol bombs,
ropes and a large catapult was
found“alreadystored”ontheter-
race of Farooq’s Rajdhani Public
Assam man arrested for
harassing teen in Delhi
New Delhi: A 24-year-old man,
who worked at a mobile shop in
Assam'sDarrangdistrict,wasar-
rested by Delhi Police for al-
legedlyharassingan18-year-old
girl in Delhi.
On September 30, the girl
submitted a complaint at the
Malviya Nagar police station, al-
leging that she was being ha-
rassed over WhatsApp chat and
video calls by an unknown per-
son. DCP (South) Atul Kumar
SIRIFORT
Poor
284
AQI
PM: 2.5
0 500
101-200 Moderate
CM said this will make industrial areas neat, clean and green
oldindustriesalsohavetheoption
to switch to the service sector
from the manufacturing sector."
He also said it will stop the
flight of such units to neighbour-
ingNoidaandGurgaon:"Now,of-
fice owners will not have to shift
todifferentcitiesandtheywillbe
able to avail cheap and spacious
locations in these industrial
spaces in Delhi itself."
The contribution of the serv-
icesectortoDelhi'seconomywas
85.19%(atcurrentprices)in2019-
20. Before the rules were
amended, while hi-tech indus-
tries could be set up in industrial
areas, service-based industries
The school was damaged in
the riots. Archive
School, as per the prosecution.
However, Farooq argued he
was not at the school at the time
of violence and left an hour be-
fore3pm—theviolenceissaidto
havetakenplacemuchafterthat.
He had called six times to police
for help and made complaints
about the damage caused to his
school, as per his counsel.
On perusal of the record,
JusticeKaitintheordersaidthere
is “evidence” the “rioters entered
the school” on February 24 in the
afternoon and continued “un-
abated” till February 25. It also
noted DVRs at the premises of
Farooq’s school were made non-
functional around 6 pm on
February 24 and witnesses and
CCTV footage “established” that
Farooqisclearlyseenaround1.24
pmintheschool.CCTValsoshows
Farooq in front of the school till
2.08 pm, as per the order.
“It seems the riots were car-
ried out in such an organised
Thakur said, "The complainant
said that the person was threat-
ening to share her photographs
on social media." He said that
with the help of technical sur-
veillance, the number of the ac-
cused was tracked down to vil-
lage Mangaldoi in Assam's
Darrang district. The DCP said
that a team was sent to the vil-
lage and Nath was arrested.
"During questioning, he con-
fessed," said Thakur. ENS
home. Further, the sex reassign-
ment is a long and expensive
process. I am still undergoing
treatmentandyettoundergothe
surgery,” he said. Sex reassign-
mentprocesscantakeuptothree
years and cost Rs 1.5-4 lakh.
Preeti Batra (27), also em-
ployed in housekeeping, said, "I
amalsosavingupforthesexreas-
signmentsurgery.Ihavesavedup
Rs 1 lakh in the last few years."
Preeti used to work at an NGO
previously where she earned Rs
10,000.Nowshedrawsasalaryof
Rs 14,000. She also wants to
changethemindsetof peoplere-
New Delhi
SHADIPUR
Poor
270
AQI
PM: 10
0 500
201-300 Poor 301-400 Very Poor
werecategorisedunderthecate-
gory of offices and could be
openedonlyincommercialareas
— a costly affair. Consequently,
business owners shifted base to
Noida or Gurgaon.
TheCMsaidtheDelhigovern-
ment had proposed the changes.
According to the notification,
"certainmodifications,whichthe
Centralgovernmentproposedto
makeintheMasterPlanforDelhi
2021, were published in the
Gazette of India".
Thechangesbroughtaboutin
theDelhiMasterPlan-2021were
notified by the ministry on
October 29. "New industrial ac-
mannerthatalarge-sizeironcat-
apult was manufactured and in-
stalled at rooftop of the school of
respondent (Farooq) for pelting
stones and petrol bombs down-
wards,thissortofinstrumentcan
never be made in a spur of mo-
ment,"thecourtsaid,addingthat
Farooq'sCDRanalysisalsoreveals
he was in continuous contact
with “various members of other
groups involved in other of-
fences”.
Observing that the trial court
hasfailedtoappreciatethatwhile
decidinganapplicationofbail,the
“interest of society” is also to be
safeguarded, Justice Kait said the
factsrecordedinthebailorderun-
der challenge are contrary to the
record. The court also noted that
Farooqiswealthyandhasarepu-
tation as well as roots in society.
“Since investigation in the
present FIR is pending and pros-
ecution is likely to file supple-
mentary chargesheet, therefore,
the respondent/accused may in-
fluencewitnessesandhamperin-
vestigation and trial,” the single
bench said in the order.
Itsaidbailhasbeengrantedto
Farooqataprematurestagewhile
ignoring relevant material on
record.ItalsonotedthatFarooq’s
absence from the spot does not
absolve him of his liability in the
caseashehasbeenchargedwith
criminal conspiracy, and that in-
vestigation regarding the “larger
conspiracy”behindtheriotsisstill
being conducted.
HC pulls up Delhi govt
over DU teachers’ salaries
New Delhi: The Delhi High Court
Monday said teachers cannot be
allowed to suffer on account of
the blame game between the
Delhi government and colleges,
even as it declined to vacate the
stay on Delhi government order
asking the Delhi University-af-
filiated colleges to utilise their
Students Society Fund for pay-
ment of salaries to the staff.
"Delhi government has its
own stand on the aid. The
garding transgenders: “When
people think of transgenders,
theythinkofthoseonstreetsask-
ing for money. But that is not the
reality…wewanttorisetohigher
positions from here,” she said.
Praveen Mishra, Executive
Director, NMRC, said that break-
ing stereotypes was one of the
motivesbehindtheinitiative."The
community has been facing dis-
crimination for long. We wanted
to provide them with a platform
wherewecouldprotecttheirdig-
nityandupliftthem,"saidMishra.
Mahi Gupta (27), who works
attheticketcounter,saidthatpeo-
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
DWARKA- SECTOR 8
Poor
299
AQI
PM: 2.5 500
0
401-500 Severe
tivity in the NCT of Delhi should
be restricted to hi-tech areas and
service-based industries. These
activities shall be permissible in
existing industrial areas subject
to the payment of infrastructure
upgradation charges to be de-
cided and recovered by
Authority/ local body con-
cerned…," said the notification.
These were approved after
they were considered by the
BoardofEnquiryandHearing,set
up by the Delhi Development
Authority (DDA) which comes
under the Centre. The city has 29
plannedindustrialareasinplaces
such as Bawana, Narela, Okhla,
Wazirpur, Patparganj and
Shahdara among others. The
Delhi Statistical Handbook 2019
puts the number of factories in
Delhi at 9,121, employing 4.19
lakh workers.
Theindustrialareascomeun-
der the Delhi State Industrial and
Infrastructure Development
Corporation (DSIIDC). DSIIDC's
plan to set up a new multi-level
industrial estate at Rani Khera, a
newindustrialareaatKanjhawala
and a knowledge hub at Baprola
has been stuck over the years.
Police pulled
up over delay
in giving
chargesheets
EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
A DELHI court refused to grant
time to police to obtain sanction
for funds from the Delhi govern-
ment to provide to the accused
hard copies of the over 17,000-
page chargesheet filed in a UAPA
case related to the Northeast
Delhi riots, stating that police
was supposed to act promptly.
On October 9, the court had
directedpolicetofilefreshcopies
of the chargesheet, after it was
informed that police “inadver-
tently” put a document in it
which containeddetails of some
protected witnesses and its
copies were supplied to the ac-
cused. It had directed police to
filefreshcopies,redactingdetails
of protected witnesses, and sup-
ply it to the 15 persons
chargesheeted in the case and
their counsel.
Additional Sessions Judge
Amitabh Rawat directed the ac-
cused and their counsel to be
provided hard and soft copies of
the fresh chargesheet. When the
IO sought 15days’timetoobtain
funds from Delhi government,
the court said it was not “im-
pressed” by his submissions.
“...provide the physical copy of
the chargesheet and the accom-
panying documents to every ac-
cusedbynextdate,withoutfail,”
it said.
University says we have noth-
ing to do, and the colleges say
we have no money and yet will
not share our accounts for au-
diting purposes… Where
should the teachers go? So the
teachers should also start say-
ing we are not working then?"
observed Justice Jyoti Singh
during the hearing of a petition
filed by DU Students Union
(DUSU) against the Delhi gov-
ernment order. ENS
ple greet her with respect while
some stop to congratulate her. “I
was subjected to a lot of bullying
whilegrowingup.Nowwearefi-
nally being given respect. But we
are far from our goals, there are
many others in our community
searching for jobs,” she said.
On Monday afternoon, Kirti
(19),another transgender,visited
theMetrostationtoenquireabout
job opportunities, only to be in-
formed that all the vacancies had
beenfilledup."Peoplecometoin-
quire about jobs everyday. I hope
that DMRC and other organisa-
tions will follow suit,” said Mahi.
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020 5
ADVERTORIAL

New Delhi
 WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM

6 DECISION
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020

2020
BIHAR
SECOND PHASE PATNA CONFIDENTIAL

In 94 seats today, RJD bets Left In Bhagalpur, a JDU-BJP snag

AHEAD OF Phase-2 polling in Bhagalpur,
local channel Voice of Bihar played a clip
fromaconversationbetweenJD(U)worker
Mandal says in the clip. The RJD tweeted
theclip,saying,“NDAisnopoliticalalliance,
it’saconspiracy”,andadvisedBiharistonot

proves right; BJP hopes 2015 does

ChandanKumarandsittingpartyMPAjay touchthis“madhumakkhikachhatta(bee-
Mandal about the latter “quietly” visiting hive)”.Later,Mandaltoldreportersthatthe
Bhagalpur’sPirpaintiandcampaigningfor conversationwasreported“tod-madod-ke
Independent candidate Aman Paswan. (twisted)”. BJP MP Nishikant Dubey told
“JD(U)shouldn’tsupportBJPunderanycir- Voice of Bihar, only meeting people mat-
cumstance...Wedon’tcareif theRJDwins, ters,“notaudio/video,Facebook,Twitter....”
Contest tough, but Mahagathbandhan feels it has an edge with alliance workers ‘in sync’ on the ground
RAGHOPUR
DIPANKAR GHOSE &
SANTOSH SINGH PHASE II KEY CONTESTS Phase2 Phase3 PHASE-2: PARTY & SEATS
PATNA, NOVEMBER 2
1. HASANPUR
56 52
IN THE 2015 Assembly elections, when the 3 7 Patna 43 46 36
TejPratapYadav,RJD;
7

Mahagathbandhan had won against the BJP 24

6 8

LaluPrasad’sson 102
14
13

28

in Bihar at the peak of the Narendra Modi

103 18
101 30
16 22 29

6 3 4
100 15 37

RajKumarRai,JD(U);
104 17

94
99

wave,NorthBiharhadgiventhesaffronparty
39
105 90 36
106 110 96
111 38
98
82

SittingMLA
95
107 112 9
109 116 81

half of its 43 seats. Most of the 94 seats vot- 4

97 80
108
115

seats
113 79
125
117 120

RJD
JD(U)
BJP
Congress
LJP
RLSP
CPI(ML)

CPI
CPI(M)
114

ing on Tuesday are in North Bihar. As part of

121 124 139
78
118 119
122 123 129 140
138

6
186 127

the NDA, the BJP is contesting 46 of them,

187 181 182 141 148

2. BANKIPUR
183 184 142
128 137 147
149
185 146
188 180 150
143

and the JD(U) 43.

145
177 144 151 152
153 154

LuvSinha,Congress;
175 172
156

2
171

The contest is likely to be tough, with the

158

2015 ASSEMBLY POLLS

174 176

1
173 171

NDAbankingonEBCandwomenvoters,and Actor-turned-politician
the Mahagathbandhanon the combined so- ShatrughanSinha’sson RJD JD(U) BJP INC
cial base of the Congress and Left. The dark PushpamPriyaChoudhary,PluralsParty;
4. RAGHOPUR 31 30 22 7
horses could be the LJP, that has put up can- TejashwiPrasadYadav,RJD;
DaughterofJD(U)leaderVinodChoudhary LJP
didates in 52 seats, and the RLSP, with 36 LaluPrasad’ssonand
nominees in the fray — both of which could NitinNavin,BJP; CMnomineeofGrandAlliance 2
end up hurting the NDA combine. Sitting MLA Others Tejashwi’sbiggestbetisa long-awaitedbridgeover theGanga. Dipankar Ghose
SatishKumar,BJP;
In the 2015 Assembly elections, 31 of sittingMLA,defeatedRabrionJD(U)ticket 2
these 94 seats had been won by the RJD, 30 3.GOPALGANJ
by the JD(U) and 22 by the BJP, while the
Congress and LJP had won seven and two
seats respectively.
SadhuYadav, BSP;
RabriDevi’sbrother
5. PARSA
ChandrikaRai,JD(U);
6. MANER
BhaiBirendra,RJD;
7. MADHUBAN
RanaRandhirSingh,BJP;
Lalu family bastion has
had CMs, what it wants
The JD(U) might be out of the SubhashSingh,BJP; Formerministerandfather-in- Two-timesittingMLA SittingMLA
Mahagathbandhan, but the RJD-led alliance Sitting MLA lawofLaluPrasad’selderson NikhilAnand,BJP; MadanPrasadSahu,RJD
is confident its new Left partners will fill the AsifGafoor,Congress; TejPratapYadav Formerjournalist
gap. The RJD set aside as many as 29 seats for ShivjeeRai,Independent

from Tejashwi is vikas

the Left — six for the CPI, four for the CPM
and 19 for the CPI (M-L), counting on the lat-
ter’s“veryhighstrikerate”.Of the29seats,13
are in this phase.
Despite how late the partnership was
stitched, it is seen as working well on the
ground, with the RJD confident that its gam-
ble on the transferability of Left votes will
pay off. Though the Left vote share has de-
clinedfrom5.04%in2005to3.51%in2015,its
voters comprise a committed cadre. This is
one reason the RJD pushed for an alliance
with them and chose to let go of the HAM
and VIP, though the Congress had wanted a
larger gathbandhan. “Further, in a post-poll
scenario,theLeftpartiesaretheleastlikelyto
break away,” says an RJD leader, speaking
from experience of the bitter parting
with the JD(U).
Both the CPI (M-L) and RJD leaders say
their workers are in sync, as opposed to “the
fractured NDA coalition”. “There is trust, as
well as the recognition of a desire for change
in government. People have aspirations, are
tired of Nitish Kumar and are looking for a
viable alternative,” says a CPI (M-L) leader,
claiming they are not flustered by the BJP
throwing allegations of Naxal and extremist
links at them.
According to the leader, they are even
morepositiveafterthefirstphase, wherethe
CPI (M-L) contested eight seats (it is in the
fray in six in this phase). “We have a winning
chanceinallof them,includingArrah,where
we came from behind... In many seats, the
RJD contesting alone is not viable. The CPI
FOR MORE LOG ON TO INDIANEXPRESS.COM/ELECTIONS
grandsonofex-CMAbdulGafoor
Rahul Gandhi, Tejashwi Yadav at a rally. The Mahagathbandhan is confident that
the Left parties, contesting on 13 seats in Phase 2, will fill the gap left by JD(U). PTI
(M-L) gives a cushion.”
The CPI (M-L) leader gives the example
of Aurai, where the party went in with a
weak organisation. With two Yadav candi-
dates in the race, it believes its Muslim nom-
inee is ahead, with the help of the RJD.
“Muslimsarethelargestblockhere,butsince
Independence, only Yadavs have been win-
ning,” the leader says, adding that in many
urban areas, the poor hit hard by the lock-
ChoteLalRai,RJD
phase, is counting on a resurgence in
Begusarai. It was once known as “mini
Moscow” or “Leningrad”, with the CPI win-
ning from Begusarai North for the first time
back in 1957 (its first win in North India).
This time, as part of the
Mahagathbandhan, it is contesting from
Teghra, Bakhri (SC), Bachhwara, as well as
two seats in Madhubani, and one in Purnea.
Teghra seat is home to the CPI’s new icon,
Kanhaiya Kumar, and is set to see a triangu-
lar contest among the party’s Ram Ratan
Singh, sitting JD(U) MLA Virendra Kumar
Singh (son of former advocate general Ram
Balak Mahto), and the LJP’s Lalan Kuwar (a
BJP rebel). The latter two are fighting for the
same Bhumihar votes.
Pointing out that it was here that Nitish
recently madehisremark “baap se poochho”,
telling the crowd to ask their fathers what
thestatehadbeforehistime,BhaveshKumar
says, “Virendra Kumar Singh seldom visited
theconstituencyafterbecominganMLAand
is facing strong anti-incumbency.” He be-
down and ASHA workers involved in Covid lieves the CPI is ahead, though adding point-
work are supporting the alliance. edly, “There has been hardly any demandfor
Says Dipankar Bhattacharya, the CPI (M- Kanhaiya to campaign here.”
L) general secretary, “We are very encour- The CPM, the weakest amongst the three
aged by the first phase and the momentum Left parties with no win in 15 years, is con-
is only growing. All these comments (by the testing from Bibhutipur, Matihani, Pipra and
BJP) are not making a difference on the Majhi, three of which vote on Tuesday.
ground. The need for change is such that However, even the party is aiming high, says
none of this matters.” a leader, due to “the winds of change and the
The CPI, four of whose six seats are in this support of other alliance partners”.
SANTOSHSINGH&DIPANKARGHOSE
PATNA,RAGHOPUR,NOVEMBER2
“RAGHOPURPEOPLEdonotjustelectanMLA,
theyelectthechiefMinister”—TejashwiYadav
underlinedashefiledhisnominationfromthe
constituency, represented by Lalu Prasad in
1995 and 2000, and Rabri Devi in 2005.
However, located by the banks of the
Ganga,Raghopurhaslittletoshowforthisas-
sociation with successive CMs, except for un-
interruptedpowersupply.In2010,theYadav-
dominated Lalu stronghold chose the JD(U)’s
SatishKumar,alsoaYadav,overRabri.Tejashwi
wonin2015,andisupagainstKumarthistime.
Apartfromthefamilyname,Tejashwi,who
is hoping to expand the RJD’s appeal beyond
castetodevelopment,iscountingongoodwill
arisingoutofaproject
to build a 9.6-km
bridge between
Kachchi Dargah
(Patna) and Bidupur Phase2
Hajipur
(Hajipur). Work on it
began in 2015, when Patna
Tejashwi was the
deputy CM and held RAGHOPUR
the Road Cons-
truction portfolio.
The bridge is a
godsend for an area where people have long
gotbyonboats,oratemporarypontoonbridge.
“I take the boat to go to Patna to sell milk.
Hundreds of vegetable sellers do the same,”
says Awadhesh Rai, adding that the few in
Raghopurwhoownfour-wheelersalsohaveto
But while the Yadavs see the crowds at
Tejashwi’s rallies as a sign of return of “our”
rule,thedesirefor“development”ispalpable.
Having just struggled across the rickety pon-
toon bridge, Satish Yadav says, “Whenever I
have to cross this bridge, my heart sinks. I fear
that it might fall any time. Maybe, if Tejashwi
becomes CM, some work will be done.”
The Raghopur Assembly seat is estimated
to have around 1.25 lakh Yadavs, with other
castes way behind — there are 40,000-odd
Rajputs, and around 20,000 SCs and 10,000
non-Yadav OBCs. The LJP has put up a candi-
date,RakeshRoshan,whichmightendupben-
efiting the RJD.
Thegiant-killerofthe2010election,Satish
Kumar, has been canvassing hard in the seat
evenasTejashwicriss-crossesthestateshoul-
dering the RJD campaign. A BJP worker out-
side a rally by senior
leader Nityanand Rai
says, “The seat is diffi-
cult but Satishji is a
maati putra (son of the
Phase3
soil). He will emerge
victorious again.” In
2010, Kumar had de-
Phase1 feated Rabri by over
1,300 votes.
At Rustampur vil-
lage, Lalit Kumar, 30, a
Kurmi like CM Nitish, says it would be sad if
Tejashwi wins despite Raghopur’s state. “We
are only 40 km from Patna, but there is no de-
velopmenthere.LookatNitishKumar’svillage
in Nalanda and see what he has done there.”
However,inthissentimentfor“vikas”,there

COVID -19 UPDATE oftenloadthemontoboats.

There is discontent on other issues too,
is no patience for Nitish even among others
gathered around him. “Work did not happen
● WHO’S WHERE TODAY ● RALLY WATCH CASES IN 24 HRS*: giventhatRaghopurhasstoodbytheRJDfirst herebecauseNitishdidnotletithappen.When
family for years. Ravi Mahto complains of a Tejashwi is CM, of course he will have to de-
PM MODI IN SAHARSA, BEHIND 577 flourishing illicit liquor business. “Even police
are afraid of venturing into this area,” he says.
velop Raghopur... The government must
change.AndifTejashwidoesnotwork,wewill
FORBESGANJ; TEJASHWI DEATHS: 4 PraveenSingh,astudent,remindsTejashwi throwhimoutlikeRabriDevi,”saysSanjaySah.
RAHUL GANDHI IN KATIHAR, WHAT IS LAKADSUNGHA, PACE, PLAN of his promise once to live in Raghopur. Ramesh Singh, a Bhumihar and usually a
THE TERM USED BY PM TO PROJECT TOTAL CASES: 2,18,118 “Instead,hewashardlyhereduringthefloods BJP supporter, says that Tejashwi might rally
KISHANGANJ;
TEJASHWI YADAV IN MODI DURING CAMPAIGN? ‘YOUTH, TOTAL DEATHS: 1,101 ortheCovidcrisis.”SinghgrantsthatTejashwi the Yadavs behind him but that doesn’t dis-
ACTIVE CASES: 7,036 mightstillwinfromtheseatbutsaysthatwill count desire for someone new. “I will decide
BIHARIGANJ ENERGY’ be only due to the caste combination. “If he is onthelastday,butmaybeitwillbegoodtosee
* Bihar HealthDepartment (as of 6 pm on Nov 2) so sure of his development plank, why did he change.Whoknows,ifTejashwibecomesCM,
not contest from any other constituency?” Raghopur might finally see development.”

Urea to dairy, an old industrial capital scripts a revival story

HARISH DAMODARAN
BARAUNI, NOVEMBER 2
BIHAR, FOR long, has been a graveyard of in-
dustry. Those searching for a glimmer of
hope, though, needn’t look beyond Barauni
town in Begusarai district. Billed as Bihar’s
“industrial capital” — voting for the state
Assembly polls here is on November 3 — it is
actually witnessing a resurgence of sorts.
There’s no better symbol of that than
Hindustan Fertilizer Corporation Ltd’s (HFCL)
ammonia-urea complex at Barauni, which
shut down in 1999 and is now being revived
—throughabrandnewplantonthesame480
acres land that housed the earlier project. At
Rs 7,043.26 crore capital cost, it would be
Bihar’s biggest industrial investment.
“Construction is more than 70 per
cent complete. Machinery orders are
already placed, and we will begin pre-com-
missioningandcommissioningactivityfrom
February,” says Sunil Kumar Sinha, general
manager of Hindustan Urvarak & Rasayan
Ltd (HURL) in charge of the project site
thatcurrentlyhas5,000-plusworkers,along-
side Sarens, Sanghvi and Escorts
Hydra cranes, JCB excavators and
Putzmeister boom placers.
The new plant — which can produce
2,200 metric tonnes per day (mtpd) of am-
monia and 3,850 mtpd urea, as against the
600mtpdand1,000mtpdcapacityof thede-
functunit—wasearliersupposedtobeready
by May 2021, 36 months from the date of in-
vestment approval. That schedule has been
somewhat upset, thanks to the disruptions
from Covid-19 and the lockdown.
“TillMarch21, we had about4,000 work-
ers. Once the lockdown was imposed, all
work stopped. The administration gave us
permission to restart on April 26, but most
workers (75% from Bihar and the rest from
WestBengal,Jharkhandandotherstates)had
already left. We could resume only on May 4
with the 600-700 who had stayed back in
the labour camps here. As the lockdown
eased, the worker strength rose to 1,900 in
early-June, 3,500 in July, 4,000 in August and
5,000 since September,” adds Sinha.
Arun KumarGupta, managingdirectorof
HURL, is hopeful of the project being com-
missioned by December 2021. The company
— a joint venture of Coal India Ltd, NTPC,
Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), HFCL and
Fertilizer Corporation of India — is also put-
ting up two other similar-sized ammonia-
plants in locations that previously had units
runningonnaphthaandfueloil,respectively,
and lying closed for two decades or more.
“The commercial operation date for
GorakhpurwasoriginallyFebruary2021.But
due to Covid, that will now be August, while
it is November-December for Barauni and
Sindri,” Gupta says.
Urea from these plants would, thus, be
available to farmers from next year’s rabi
croppingseason.HURLhasevenstartedmar-
keting its ‘Apna’ urea brand in Bihar since
February,bysourcingmaterialfromthepub-
licsectorRashtriyaChemicalsandFertilizers.
For Bihar, the Barauni project’s revival is
no small thing. Its annual production capac-
ity, at 12.7 lakh tonnes (lt), can meet a major
partof thestate’sconsumption/salesof 22.64
lt in 2019-20. Neither Bihar nor Jharkhand
has any urea plants; the closest one at
Phulpur in Uttar Pradesh is 490 km from
Barauni and 550 km from Sindri. Both proj-
Work is on in full swing at the Barauni ects will get gas from GAIL (India) Ltd’s
urea project site. Harish Damodaran Jagdishpur-Phulpur-Haldia pipeline. A spur
line, from Dobhi in Gaya, has already been
laid till Barauni.
urea complexes at Gorakhpur (Uttar But Begusarai’s revival story — whose
Pradesh) and Sindri (Jharkhand). These, like fruits would accrue to whichever govern-
Barauni, are greenfield natural gas-based ment comes next — isn’t confined to urea.
IOC’s oil refinery at Barauni was India’s
second after Assam’s Digboi. It came on
stream in July 1964 with 1 million tonnes
(mt) annual crude processing capacity, aug-
mented to 3 mt in 1969 and 6 mt by 2002.
On January 30, after nearly 18 years, the IOC
board approved a further expansion to 9 mt
at an estimated cost of Rs 13,779 crore. This
project — entailing the setting up of a new 9
mtatmosphericandvacuumdistillationunit,
the contract for which was awarded to L&T
Hydrocarbon Engineering in April — is to be
commissioned by April 2023.
EquallysignificantistheBarauniThermal
Power Station (BTPS). This coal-fired project,
too, came up in the early-Sixties, with five
units of 145 megawatt (MW) aggregate gen-
eration capacity being made operational be-
tween January 1963 and December 1971. All
of them were retired by 1995-96. Units 6
and 7, of 110 MW each established in 1984-
85, were taken up for renovation and
modernisation.
On December 15, 2018, NTPC acquired
BTPS from the Bihar State Power Generation
Company.Today,notonlyareUnits6&7run-
ning, a new 250 MW plant was declared op-
erational on March 1, this year. Another 250
MW unit is expected to be added by 2021,
taking the total to 720 MW.
Last but not least is the Barauni Dairy.
With a turnover of Rs 755.36 crore, it is not
just Bihar’s, but also eastern India’s, largest
cooperative dairy union. In 2019-20, the
Deshratna Dr Rajendra Prasad Dugdh
Utpadak Sahkari Sangh, as it is called, made
Rs 499.03 crore payments to 1.32 lakh farm-
ersandprocured4.55lakhkgperdayof milk
on an average.
BarauniDairyisplanningtoinvestRs95.5
crore in what will be the country’s biggest
plant for making indigenous milk products.
The proposed plant will consume 2 lakh
litres per day of milk to exclusively produce
rasagulla, gulab jamun, peda, cham cham,
kalakand, misti dahi, raskadam, milk cake,
khoa, paneer, lassi and plain dahi. The dairy
union is already using 70,000-80,000 litres
daily now for producing indigenous milk
sweets under the ‘Sudha’ brand.
“We are in discussions with the National
Dairy Development Board for a Rs 70 crore
loan at 6.5% concessional interest rate for 10
years under the Centre’s Dairy Processing &
Infrastructure Fund. Since the land for the
project is available here, we can expect the
plant to be ready in two-three years,” stated
a Barauni Union official.

New Delhi
 WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM

7 GOVT & POLITICS

THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020

Organisationvssympathyover
DELHI CONFIDENTIAL ‘gaddari’inMP’s28seatstoday
E

IRAM SIDDIQUE
GWALIOR, NOVEMBER 2
INArecentvideo,BJPRajyaSabha
memberJyotiyadityaScindiawas
seen urging voters to press the
‘panja’ — the Congress’s electoral
symbol — while campaigning in
Dabra constituency of Madhya
Pradesh.Hecorrectedhimselfim-
CELEBRATING A RIVER
mediately, asking voters to press
the button for ‘kamal’ — the BJP
symbol — but that moment cap-
THE JAL Shakti Ministry under Gajendra Singh Shekhawat on
Monday launched a three-day ‘Ganga Utsav’ to celebrate the
“glory of the holy Ganga”. As a part of the event, actor Rajeev
tured the predicament faced by
bothsidesinthe28seatsgoingto
the bypolls on Tuesday.
Khandelwal will launch the second season of ‘Rag Rag mein With Scindia, who joined BJP
Ganga’, a show that traces various stories related to the river. after 20 years in the Congress
The first season of the show was aired last year. The event will alongwith25ex-CongressMLAs,
feature a host of programmes, including debates and dia- bringing down the Kamal Nath
logues, story-telling sessions, and performances by the likes government,theoppositionparty
of KailashKher,classicalsingerRevatiSakalkar,Kathakdancer has been seen as being fumbling
Vaswati Mishra, and Kabir cafe, apart from release of 13 short slightlyinraisingissuesotherthan
films related to the Ganga — all to be done virtually. “gaddari”—betrayal—byScindia
and his team of legislators.
While that line of betrayal —
GOING GLOBAL set out by the party — is seen as
having created an undercurrent
TAKING A step towards enhancing its focus on international ofsympathyfortheCongress,but
news,DoordarshanIndiahasplanneddedicatedprogramming it is unlikely to be enough for the
of 14 hours in the run-up to the US Presidential elections. party. The party has 87 MLAs in
Doordarshanhasropedin24experts,includingformerIndian the current House, and will have
ambassadorstotheUS,domainexpertsandmembersof think- to win all 28 seats to get to the
tankstodiscussvariousaspectsof theAmericanelectionsand halfway mark of 115.
theimpactof theoutcomeonIndia’srelationswiththeUS,also The BJP, with 107 seats, needs
alsowhatitwillmeanglobally.Theprogrammeswillstartfrom only eight.
6 pm India time on Tuesday, the day America votes. Nathhasrepeatedlyreminded
votersintheGwalior-Chambalre-
GOOD GOING
gion, which accounts for 16 of
these 28 seats, that “Chambal’s
bloodishot—anditwillneverfor-
THE EFFICIENCY of the eight Department-Related get people who have betrayed
Parliamentary Standing Committees of Rajya Sabha has been them”. This exhortation was fol-
increasing.AccordingtoananalysisbytheRSSecretariat,each lowed by a reminder that the
meeting of the eight committees lasted 2 hours 10 minutes Scindia family had purportedly
on average in 2019- 20. This is the first time that the average
Government employees with election material for polling
booths on the eve of polls, in Indore. ANI
sided with the British, leaving
“JhansikiraniLaxmiBai”alonefol-
lowing the Revolt of 1857, which
eventually led to her death.
Butevenwiththeheavy-duty
round of campaign by Nath,
Congress, which looks strong in
about six seats, is facing a tough
fightfromtheBJPinaregioncon-
sideredaScindiastronghold.With
Congress seen as being ahead in
reserved(SC)seatssuchasGohad
and Ambha, Satish Shikarwar, its
candidate from Gwalior-East, is
likely to give a tough fight to
MunnalalGoyal,oneoftheformer
Congress MLAs who switched
sides. Notably, the SC-ST popula-
tion is about 21 to 28 percent of
the electorate in at least 21 con-
stituencies, including Gwalior-
East.Inwhatcouldqueerthepitch
for Congress, the BSP has fielded
27 candidates, making it a trian-
gular contest on many seats.
Among the seats facing a
three-way contest in Dabra,
where Imarti Devi, initially seen
astrailing,haswonsupportofthe
business community following
someaggressivecampaigningby
BJP. But a “strong” BSP candidate
inSantoshGaudislikelytoeatinto
Congress votes in a seat that has
traditionally been with the party.
Aiming to woo Dalit voters,
Nath has emphasised that the
ConstitutionofBRAmbedkarhad
provisionsforbypollsintheevent
of death of a sitting MP or MLA,
“but these bypolls have been
forced on us due to betrayal”.
Inalateattemptto sway Dalit
votes, BJP released a pamphlet
withapictureofShikharwarshar-
ing the dais with Rishabh
Bhadoriya, main accused in the
2018casteviolenceinGwaliorfol-
lowing the Bharat bandh – three
members from Dalit community
werekilledintheviolence.Acon-
troversy soon arose, with family
membersof thedeceasedstating
thatthepicturewasusedwithout
E X P L A I NE D
Aggressive
campaign may
● give BJP edge
WHAT MIGHT work for the
ruling party in these MP by-
polls is the aggressive cam-
paigning by senior BJP lead-
ers — from Union minister
Narendra Singh Tomar to
CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan,
and former CM Uma Bharati
to incumbent state Home
Minister Narottam Mishra.
They all held several meet-
ings with influential caste
groups. While Chouhan re-
frained from sharing a dais
with Jyotiraditya Scindia, he
has announced a slew of
schemes — CM Kisan
Samman Nidhi, Ladli Laxmi,
and Kanyadan yojna, among
others — which the BJP ex-
pects will help it in close
contests.
their knowledge, and that they
had received little help from BJP,
which was then in power.
Meanwhile,counteringNath’s
“gaddar” narrative, Scindia, for
whom the bypolls would deter-
minehispositioninhisnewparty,
haspointedoutthatthe25MLAs
hadlittleoptionbuttomovetoBJP,
as their demands for various de-
velopment works in their con-
stituencies went unheard under
the “corrupt” Congress govern-
ment. Scindia has emphasised
thatheisa“dog”loyaltohis“mas-
ters”, who are the voters.
Newly-elected BJP Rajya Sabha MPs in Lucknow. Express
BJP wins 9 of 11 RS
seats; Cong strength
set to dip below 40
EXPRESSNEWSSERVICE
NEWDELHI,NOVEMBER2
WITHTHEBJPwinningnineofthe
11 Rajya Sabha seats on Monday,
the ruling party’s strength in the
Upper House has gone up to 92
while the main opposition
Congressissettodipbelow40for
the first time.
The BJP on its own is still 31
short of the halfway mark of 123
in the Upper House, but with al-
lies JD(U), which has five mem-
bers,andRamdasAthawaleofthe
RepublicanPartyofIndia,theNDA
tally stands at 98. Adding the
AIADMK, which has nine MPs,
and some parties from the
Northeast, the NDA tally easily
crosses 110.
Meanwhile, the Election
Commission on Monday an-
nounced a bypoll to the lone va-
cant seat in Karnataka on
December 1, necessitated by the
death of BJP MP Ashok Gasti. The
BJP, which is in power in
Karnataka,willwintheseatwhich
Varanasi lawyer
told to approach
Allahabad HC
New Delhi: The Supreme
Court on Monday asked
Varanasi-based lawyer
Prakash Bajaj, who ques-
tionedtherejectionof his
SP-backednominationfor
the Rajya Sabha elections
from Uttar Pradesh alleg-
ingaconspiracybythere-
turning officer to favour
the BSP, to approach the
Allahabad High Court for
redressalof hisgrievance.
A bench headed by Chief
Justice of India S A Bobde
allowedhimtowithdraw
ENS
his plea.
UP and one from Uttarakhand —
are retiring on November 25, in-
cluding Congress members P L
Punia and Raj Babbar.
Consequently,theCongress’stally

‘My calling is not photos,

time of these meetings has crossed the 2-hour mark. As per willtaketheparty’stallyto93be- will come down to 38 from 40.
the analysis, it is an improvement of 55 per cent over 2018-19,
and an increase of 25 per centcompared to the average of two
Cong MLA who fore the Winter Session.
TheBJPstrengthwentupto92
Besides Puri, those elected
unopposed in UP are BJP's
previous years. In 2017- 18, the average time for each meeting defected to BJP afternineofitscandidates–eight Neeraj Shekhar, Arun Singh,
was 1 hour 51 minutes, and for 2018-19, it had dropped to 1
hour 25 minutes.
titles... I am an ordinary BJP will be made
in UP and one in Uttarakhand –
were elected unopposed on
Monday. In UP, one candidate
Geeta Shakya, Haridwar Dubey,
Brijlal, B L Varma and Seema
Dwivedi; Samajwadi Party's
minister if
worker and content with that’
each of the Samajwadi Party and Ram Gopal Yadav; and BSP's
BSP were elected unopposed. Ramji Gautam.

Will give 10 lakh RAJYA SABHA MP JYOTIRADIYA This is a party, in a way,

elected: BSY Among those elected unop-
posed from UP include Union
minister Hardeep Singh Puri and
In Uttarakhand, senior BJP
leader Naresh Bansal was de-
clared elected unopposed.

jobs even if it means SCINDIA speaks to IRAM

SIDDIQUE on why he considers
himself a BJP worker, his experi-
founded by my grandmother.
There is a saying, “matbhed (dif-
ferenceofopinion)honabohotza-
EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
BENGALURU, NOVEMBER 2
SP leader Ram Gopal Yadav.
Eleven members — 10 from
FULLREPORTON
www.indianexpress.com

withholding MLAs’ ence in the Kamal Nath govern-

ment and his switch from the
Congress to the BJP. Excerpts:
roorihaiparmanbhed(difference
ofhearts)nahihonachahiye.”...To
me,it’sironicthatthepartymyfa-
A CONGRESS MLA whodefected
to the BJP in July 2019 will be
made a minister if elected again Ideologies opposite,
salaries: Tejashwi
ther spent 30 years in and the in the November 3 bypolls,
Whatisthemostimportant
agendaforMadhyaPradeshin
thesebypolls?
party I spent 20 years in, how
cometheydidn’tspeakallthelan-
guage they are speaking now...
Karnataka Chief Minister B S
Yediyurappa has said.
The CM
BSP-BJP alliance not
PRESS TRUST OF INDIA
PATNA, NOVEMBER 2
This is an election for the fu-
ture of Madhya Pradesh and its
people. A Congress government
Isthisinreferencetoyoubeing
termeda ‘gaddar’?
had earlier
promised
ministerialpo-
possible: Mayawati
RJD LEADER Tejashwi Yadav on
wasputinplace18monthsago,it
hadaChiefMinisterwhowasself-
THE EXPRESS Not only that, many more
barbs and taunts... It just shows
sitions to all 17
Congress and MAULSHREE SETH
Monday said he will implement
hispollpromiseof giving10lakh
centredandranacorruptgovern-
ment. Mr Kamal Nath achieved
INTERVIEW their duplicity... JD(S) rebels
who helped
LUCKNOW, NOVEMBER 2

jobs even if it means withhold- the impossible task of losing 30

ing the salaries of the chief min- Yadav, Nadda
ister, ministers and MLAs.
Referring
tothecriticism repeatinghehasgiven6lakhjobs
the RJD has during his 15-year rule. But he
faced over its neversaysallthesewerecontrac-
performance tual jobs, not permanent ones,”
during its 15- Tejashwi told the ‘Naukri
DECISION year rule, he Samwad’ programme.
2020 said that some ReferringtoTejashwi'sprom-
BIHAR people are ise, BJP president J P Nadda on
“stuckonthestale Monday said that “25-30 lakh”
pages of history, but we care for peoplemigratedoutofBihardur-
Bihar’s future”, and appealed to ingthepreviousRJDgovernments
people to give him “one chance” and he should first answer that.
to govern. Addressing a poll rally at
Speaking at on online event Sitamarhi, Nadda said, “These
of his party, he questioned Chief days our Tejashwi babu keeps
MinisterNitishKumar’sassertion saying he will give 10 lakh jobs.
thatheprovided6lakhjobsdur- You have forced 25-25 lakh peo-
ing his 15-year rule compared to ple to migrate out of Bihar. Who
RJD’s 95,000. “He (Nitish) keeps will answer that?”
per cent of his lawmakers within
15 months...
Yourpictureshavebeen
missingfromhoardingsand
thepartymanifesto.How
oftendoyouinteractwith
Chauhanoverpollstrategies?
Wehavedecentralisedthesys-
tem among all BJP leaders and
cadres. But Shivraj Singh ji and I
make it a point to talk everyday...
My calling is not about photos, ti-
tles and lists but to earn a place in
the hearts of the people. I was a
ministerintheCentralgovernment
for eight years and did not have a
lal-batti on my car. Today I am an
ordinaryBJPworkerandIamvery
happyandcontentwiththat.
Youcallyourself acommon
BJPworker,isthathowyousee
WITH
JYOTIRADITYA
SCINDIA
BJP RAJYA SABHA MP
yourself fromearlierbeing
calledMaharaj?
All these sobriquets are a part
of my illustrious past that I am
proud of... Our family started in a
small village in Satara called
Kanerkhe and my forefathers
werethe‘Patil’ofthatvillage.Patil
is essentially the sarpanch... That
wasourbeginning.Eventodaywe
areconnectedtothesoil...Itisless
about royalty and title, more
aboutbeingonewiththesoil.The
Maharaj bit is only 200 years old.
IsitdifficulttoadjusttotheBJP
ideologyandtheRSSafter
about20yearswithCongress?
Willyourvoters,who
identifiedwithyoursecular
image,beabletoconnect?
Why am I not secular if I am
withtheBJP?Whyistalkingabout
Hinduism not being secular? If
you are talking about the aspira-
tionof themajorityof Indians,in-
cluding a number of Muslims
who have supported the con-
struction of the Ram Mandir,
what’s wrong with that?
Isn’titawaytoappeasea
majoritycommunity?
No, it’s not. If you talk about
something.. the path for which
has been paved by the Prime
Minister and the Supreme Court
which connects with the aspira-
tion of 99 per cent of all Indians,
what is wrong with that?
FULLINTERVIEWON
www.indianexpress.com
Karnataka the BJP form
CM the govern-
ment in 2019.
Thebypollsfor
15 seats were held in December
2019, in which 13 rebels were
fielded, and all but two won
again. The bypolls for the re-
maining two seats — R R Nagar
seat in Bengaluru and Sira in
Tumkur — are scheduled for
November 3.
CampaigningforMunirathna
Naidu, a civil contractor-turned-
film producer contesting from R
R Nagar, Yediyurappa said that
he had already sanctioned huge
funds for the RR Nagar con-
stituency which will be utilised
by Naidu as a minister to carry
out development work.
All the rebels who won the
elections have been inducted
into the cabinet so far.
DAYS AFTER stating that her
party could even support the
BJP to ensure the defeat of
Samajwadi Party's candidate in
Uttar Pradesh Legislative
Council and Rajya Sabha elec-
tions, BSP chief Mayawati on
Monday asserted that her party
would never form an alliance
with the saffron party as long as
she is alive, as the two parties’
ideologies are in complete
contrast.
“BSP’s ideology is based on
themottobenefitforallreligions
and secularism, while BJP’s ide-
ology is completely its opposite.
In such a scenario, BSP cannot
enter into alliance with BJP in
any election anywhere in the
country,” Mayawati said. The
statement comes a day before
sevenAssemblyseatsinthestate
go to the bypolls, as both
Mayawati
Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and
Samajwadi Party (SP) tried to
project themselves as the
stronger alternative to ruling BJP
in the state.
Speaking at an event to wel-
comeformerCongressMPAnnu
Tandon to his party, SP chief
Akhilesh Yadav questioned how
both BSP and BJP have the same
desire — of defeating the SP — to
indicate that the two parties are
coming together. He said: “Both
BSP and BJP want Samajwadi
Party to lose — their desire is
matching somewhere...

Manjhi seeks probe into

Paswan’s death, Chirag CHHATTISGARH BYPOLL

claims Nitish ‘plot’
PRESSTRUSTOFINDIA
PATNA,NOVEMBER2
NDA ALLY HAM created a flutter
on Monday with its leader Jitan
RamManjhidemandingajudicial
inquiry into the death of Union
ministerRamVilasPaswantoun-
ravel the “dubious role” of Chirag
Paswan. This prompted the LJP
chieftoclaimitwasa“plot”byCM
Nitish Kumar to discredit him
throughanemotionalissuewhen
election was under way.
Chirag, in an angry retort to
Manjhi, said the former CM
should ask PM Narendra Modi
abouttheissue.PaswansaidModi
used to call him up every day to
inquire after his late father when
Chirag Paswan, Jitan Manjhi
he was sick and hospitalised,
sometimes to even inform him
abouttheLJPfounder’scondition
after talking to doctors.
Manjhi wanted to know who
ordered the hospital to not issue
regularhealthbulletinsofPaswan.
Manjhialsoclaimedpeoplewere
preventedfrommeetingtheDalit
leaderwhenhewashospitalised.
BJP buoyed by JCC support in Jogi ‘family bastion’
GARGIVERMA
RAIPUR,NOVEMBER2
THE BYPOLL in Chhattisgarh’s
Marwahi on Tuesday will see
manyfirsts—thefirstelectionin
thestateamidthepandemic,the
first since the formation of
Gaurella-Pendra-Marwahi dis-
trict, and the first without any
memberof theJogifamily,which
has held the seat since 2001, be-
ing allowed to contest the “fam-
ily bastion”.
The bypoll in the reserved ST
constituencywasnecessitatedaf-
ter the death of former CM and
Janta Congress Chhattisgarh
founder Ajit Jogi. It is expected to
beaclosecontestbetweentheop-
position BJP and ruling Congress
after the nomination papers of
Jogi’s son and daughter-in-law,
Amit and Richa Jogi, were can-
celled following revocation of
their caste certificates.
However,justaheadoftheby-
poll,theBJPhasreceivedashotin
thearmwithAmitJogiextending
his party’s support to the saffron
party in a statement on October
31, increasing the supporter base
oftheBJPwhichhadalreadybeen
making inroads in villages on a
booth level.
“The Congress chief minister
andhispartymembershavebeen
continuously insulting my father
Ajit Jogi that goes against the tra-
dition of the country and basic
morality...Iappealtothepeopleof
Appeal to
people of
Marwahi to
vote against
Congress:
Amit Jogi
Marwahi to vote against the
Congress and teach them a les-
son,” he said.
But some in the JCC are un-
comfortablewithsidingwiththe
BJP. Two of the four party MLAs,
Devwrat Singh and Pramod
Sharma,onSundayextendedsup-
porttotheCongress,callingJogi’s
decision “ridiculous”. “After the
demiseof(Ajit)Jogi,wedon’thave
any reason to be with the party
wherethedecisionof supporting
the BJP was taken without any
core group meetings,” the duo
saidinajointstatement.However,
theJCCsaidthetwowerenotpart
of the core committee.
While support from the Jogis
may fetch the BJP many sympa-
thyvotes,expertsbelieveitwillbe
a tough contest with top leaders
of the Congress throwing their
weight behind the party candi-
dateintheconstituency.Nineral-
lies by Chief Minister Bhupesh
Baghelunderscoretheamountof
effort the Congress is putting in
thebypollstocounterthechance
of sympathy votes.
On the JCC’s decision, the
Congress has been quick to call it
aresultofadealwiththeBJP.“The
BJP raised the question on Jogi’s
tribalstatus.Peoplehavetheright
toknowwhatBJPisofferinginlieu
of thesupport,”partyspokesper-
son R P Singh said.
TheBJP,ontheotherhand,has
welcomed Jogi’s support and ac-
cused the Congress of being in-
sensitive towards the family.
“Renu Jogi (Ajit Jogi’s wife) has
been hurt by these actions, and
hencesheisaskingpeopletofight
for her 'aatmasamman' (self-re-
spect),” said former CM and BJP
leader Raman Singh.
While the Congress has
fielded K K Dhruw, an “outsider”
whoservedasthemedicalofficer
intheareaformanyyears,theBJP
has nominated local tribal sur-
geon Gambhir Singh.
Politicalanalystsbelievethatin-
fighting in Congress over holding
ralliesandchoiceofcandidatemight
alienatethevoters,andeventhough
BJP does not have a solid base, the
supportfromtheJogismightmean
alotonthedayofelection.Whoever
wins, experts believe, will not be
withahugemargin.
The district will have 286
polling centers where trenches
have been dug for people to dis-
pose of their gloves after voting.
“We have been preparing for
nearlyamonth.Wehavehadflag
and foot marches across the re-
gion and despite the pandemic
are expecting for a peaceful and
safe election,” SP Suraj Singh
Parihar said.

New Delhi

8 EXPRESS NETWORK
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
BRIEFLY
Balwinder Singh
Sandhu
PUNJAB
ShauryaChakra
recipient’s
murder:8held
Amritsar: The Tarn Taran
policehavearrestedeight
persons in the murder of
Shaurya Chakra recipient
Balwinder Singh Sandhu.
Tight-lippedoverthemo-
tive behind murder,
sourcesinpolicesaidthat
murder is linked to gang-
war. Sandhu (62), who
wasfetedforfightingmil-
itancy in Punjab, was
gunneddownathishome
in Tarn
Bhikhiwind by two
Taran's
unidentified bikers on
October 16. The attack
took place months after
his security cover was re-
moved by the state gov-
ernment. Sandhu's fam-
ily termed the killing a
terror attack, and blamed
it on the decision to re-
move his security. ENS
NEW DELHI
SCnotorequest
byex-judgein
Babricaseto
extendsecurity
New Delhi: The Supreme
CourtonMondayrejected
arequestbyformerspecial
judge S K Yadav, who had
decided the Babri Masjid
demolition case, to con-
tinuehispersonalsecurity
giventhesensitivityof the
matter. “Having perused
the letter, we don't con-
sideritappropriatetopro-
videsecurity,”anSC bench
said,turningdowntheex-
judge’s plea. On
September30,theCBIspe-
cial court in Lucknow had
acquittedall32accusedin
the 1992 Babri Masjid
demolitioncase,citinglack
of evidence to establish
thattheaccusedwerepart
of any conspiracy to bring
down the structure. ENS
KERALA
HCdeferstrialin
actressassault
casetillFriday
Kochi: The Kerala High
CourtonMondaydeferred
till Friday the trial in the
2017actresssexualassault
case following allegations
byherandtheprosecution
that the trial court was
biased,hostileandpartisan
in the conduct of the
proceedings. Justice V G
Arun passed the interim
orderonapleafiledbythe
actress seeking transfer of
the trial in the case, in
which actor Dileep is
among the accused, to
another court and posted
themattertoNovember6
forfurtherhearing. PTI
GUJARAT
Womanraped
inAhmedabad,
3arrested
Ahmedabad: Two days af-
ter a 32-year-old woman
was allegedly gangraped
in Ahmedabad, the
DetectionofCrimeBranch
(DCB) team of
Ahmedabad police ar-
rested three people on
Monday. As per an FIR
lodged on Sunday, one of
the accused called the
womanandtookhertohis
house. There, he and two
others gangraped the
woman. "One of the ac-
cused has been named in
five instances of theft and
two instances of boot leg-
ging while other two ac-
cused have also been
named in bootlegging
cases in the past," said a
DCB official. ENS
SNOWBOUND
After snowfall in Lahaul-Spiti region on Monday. ANI
After UP and
Haryana, MP
considers law
against love jihad
PRESS TRUST OF INDIA
BHOPAL, NOVEMBER 2
THE MADHYA Pradesh govern-
ment will make legal arrange-
ments to curb the alleged prac-
ticeof lovejihadinthestate,Chief
Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan
said Monday. With this, Madhya
Pradesh has become the third
BJP-ruled state to announce its
intention to make legal provi-
sions against “love jihad”.
Earlier, Uttar Pradesh CM
YogiAdityanathandhisHaryana
counterpart M L Khattar had
made simila announcements.
There will be no jihad in the
nameof love,whoeverdoessuch
an act will be set right. Legal
arrangements will be made for
this, Chouhan told reporters.
He was responding to ques-
tionsontheissueafterattending
a meeting at state BJP headquar-
ters here on Monday evening.
“Love jihad” is term used by
right-wing activists to refer to
the alleged campaign of
Muslims forcing Hindu girls to
convert in the guise of love.
MIZORAM ORDERS JUDICIAL ENQUIRY
Assam man dies in Mizoram custody,
CM writes to Shah over border tension
ABHISHEK SAHA
GUWAHATI, NOVEMBER 2
ASSAM CHIEF Minister
Sarbananda Sonowal wrote to
Home Minister Amit Shah on
Mondayafteramanhailingfrom
Cachar district died in the cus-
tody of Mizoram authorities af-
ter he was allegedly abducted
from the inter-state border.
According to Assam officials,
Intazul Laskar was a woodcutter
without any criminal record,
whileMizoramofficialsmaintain
he was involved in peddling
drugs.Hisdeathcomesweeksaf-
GOANS' NIGHT PROTEST AGAINST INFRA PROJECTS
‘This is not the land to destroy…we do not accept pollution’
SMITA NAIR
CHANDOR, NOVEMBER 2
BY 10.30 PM, Nossa Senhora De
Belem church square in Chador,
Goa’sancientcapital,hadacrowd
of more than 3,000 — most had
come to protest against the dou-
ble-trackingofrailwaylineswhich
Goans fear is towards expansion
of coal imports from Mormugao
Port Trust to Karnataka.
A man said on the speaker, “If
this is the pandemic, the urgency
is to stand here to safeguard the
future from a bigger pandemic.”
Earlier this week, the South
Western Railway started laying
tracksatavillageinGoa,leadingto
environmentalists groups calling
themidnightprotest. By11.30pm,
the crowd began its silent march
towardsthetracksoff Chandor.
SandraD’Sa,aPhDscholar,had
her candle wrapped in a rosary.
“The message was to occupy the
Rahul should clarify if
he retracted from 2019
Cong manifesto: Tomar
HARIKISHAN SHARMA
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
UNION MINISTER of Agriculture
and Farmers' Welfare Narendra
SinghTomaronMondayattacked
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi,
asking whether he has retracted
fromhisparty'smanifestoforthe
2019 general elections.
Tomar's remarks came in re-
sponse to a tweet by Rahul, in
which he tagged a news report
which appeared in The Indian
Express on Monday and wrote in
Hindi, "Farmers of the country
asked for market, PM offered a
terrible recession."
Sharply reacting, Tomar said,
"Rahul Gandhi should clarify
whether he has retracted from
the 2019 Congress manifesto."
SpeakingtoTheIndianExpress
over the phone, Tomar said, "The
Congress party had a manifesto
in which it mentioned all these
things, first they should have re-
tracted from their manifesto…
Congress should not mislead
farmers."
StatingthattheModigovern-
ter clashes between residents of
border villages of Assam and
Mizoram.
Sonowal in a statement said
thatLaskarwas"abductedbythe
miscreants from Lailapur Border
Outpost area of Cachar district".
The statement said that "follow-
ing the sequel of boundary rows
along Assam-Mizoram border,
Chief Minister Sonowal sent the
details of the incidents to Union
HomeMinisterAmitShahtoday".
The statement, however, did
not mention the contents of the
letter to Shah.
The CM has also announced
an ex-gratia of Rs 5 lakh to
At the protest in Chandor. Smita Nair
tracksfrommidnightto5am.Iam
here, and hope my prayers hold
methroughthenight.”Thecrowd,
mostly comprising youth and th-
ose who insisted to be called “vil-
lagers”, had a disagreement with
political groups, asking them to
lowerpartyflags.Bymidnight,the
RAJASTHAN PASSES
THREE FARM BILLS
Jaipur: The Rajasthan
Assembly on Monday
passed three Bills to counter
thefarmlawsenactedbythe
Centre.TheBillswerepassed
by voice vote, which took
place after the opposition
BJP staged a walkout.
TheBJPearlierobjectedto
the Bills, saying that the lan-
guage used paints the Centre
government “as if it is the
Pakistani government”. ENS
mentiscommittedtothewelfare
of farmers, Tomar said agrarian
reforms which were pending for
long have been implemented
throughthenewfarmlaws."The
Congress is anti-farmer, due to
which the condition of the farm-
ers could not improve even after
their 50-60 years' rule," he said.
The new laws have given
freedom to farmers to sell their
produce and this will lead to the
end of middlemen, Tomar said.
Laskar's next of kin and asked
Chief SecretaryJishnuBaruaand
DGP Bhaskar Jyoti Mahanta to
visit the border area and take
stock of the situation.
Cachar SP B L Meena told The
Indian Express, "He (Laskar) used
to collect wood from a forest
along the border... As far as we
know, he was in custody of
Mizoram.MizoramPolicehasin-
formedustodaythathehasdied."
HeaddedthatLaskardidnothave
a criminal record in the district.
Meanwhile, Deputy
Commissioner of Mizoram's
Kolasib district, H Lalthangliana,
toldTheIndianExpress,"Ihaveor-
crowdswelled.“Thiscrowdisnota
vote bank. This is history being
made. We do not want our MLAs
to speak for us. We are enough,”
said Arvind Menezes from Aldo-
nha,ashewalkedonthetracks.
Piedade Vaz held a candle.
“Thisisnotthelandtodestroy;we
Cong rebel MLA
seeks probe into
Kamla Nehru
Edu Society
MAULSHREE SETH
LUCKNOW, NOVEMBER 2
CONGRESS REBEL MLA Aditi
Singh has written to the
Economic Offence Wing direc-
tor general, demanding a probe
into the alleged irregularities in
the functioning of the Kamla
Nehru Educational Society.
"The trust was given land in
the1970switha30-yearleasefor
educational purposes in Rae
Bareli city... While they did not
useitforthepurposeitwasgiven,
they are trying to sell it," Singh
toldTheIndianExpress."Myfight
isforbothi.e.againstthefraudu-
lentmethodsofthetrustandalso
for over 100 families who have
been living there for decades."
Rae Bareli Congress chief
Pankaj Tiwari said, "The matter
is under litigation and the High
Court had ordered to vacate the
land,whilewealsowantgovern-
ment to do something about the
families, who have been living
there for ages but we cannot say
much as Party has got nothing to
do with the trust.”
dered a judicial enquiry into the
death. The man was allegedly a
drugpeddlerandwehavefound
a small amount of heroin on his
person. Some locals had appre-
hendedhimontheMizoramside
and handed over to personnel
fromtheExciseandNarcoticsde-
partment. He was admitted to
the hospital because he was
weak. No external inquiry has
been found on the body."
Lalthangliana said the body
will be handed over to Assam on
Tuesday after the completion of
the judicial enquiry and con-
ducting the post-mortem.
--WITHPTIINPUTS
E
EXPLAINED
Protestingto
protect environment
● er be against people. These coal
MORMUGAOPORTTrust’sprojectionsfor2030saytheywant
to import 51.6 million tonnes of coal for Adani Group, JSW
Group and Vedanta. Much of this will be transported through
Goa to other states. Also, Shipping Ministry has identified 17
coal-backed power plants and 22 steel plants as “potential
clients” for the port. The protests are against infrastructure
projects being designed to carry this coal that is expected to
destroy ecological biodiversity. Railways haven’t got permis-
sions for laying tracks in western Ghats and has started laying
them in the state, which is when the Goans protested.
have a culture to protect, we do
not accept pollution,” Vaz said,
pointingtotheinfrastructureproj-
ects at different stages of govern-
ment clearance — four-laning of
NH4A, double-tracking of South
WesternRailwayandapowerline
through the western Ghats, and
‘SOLDIERS WITHOUT UNIFORM’
Chushulcouncillor
seeksmorefacilities
forvillagesalongLAC
NIRUPAMA
SUBRAMANIAN
MUMBAI, NOVEMBER 2
THE NEWLY elected representa-
tive of Chushul constituency in
the Leh-Ladakah Autonomous
Hill Development Council
(LAHDC) has said that the gov-
ernment must prioritise devel-
opment of villages on the Line of
Actual Control (LAC), as the peo-
ple living there are “second
guardian force” of the country
after the armed forces.
The26newmembersof Leh-
LAHDC were sworn in on
Saturday. The BJP, with 15 mem-
bers, heads the council. The
Congresshasninemembers,and
there are two Independents.
Konchok Stanzin, who quit
BJP before the LAHDC election
lastmonthandsuccessfullycon-
tested as an Independent from
Chushul, a forward area on LAC,
on Sunday said there had been
“inadequate attention” to vil-
lages on the LAC in Ladakh, and
the difference between his con-
Poet Munawwar Rana booked
over remarks on France killings
EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
LUCKNOW, NOVEMBER 2
URDU POET Munawwar Rana
has been booked for allegedly
supporting two knife-wielding
assailants who recently killed
four people in France in protest
against caricatures of Prophet
Mohammed.
In an interview to Zee News,
the 67-year-old poet is purport-
edly heard saying that he would
havedonethesameif somebody
drew caricatures of his parents
or deities.
Rana is purportedly heard
telling the channel, “If someone
makes a disgusting cartoon of
my father or mother, I will kill
that person. If someone makes
an objectionable and disgusting
cartoon of Indian Gods and
Goddesses like Mother Sita or
Lord Ram, I will kill that person.
When honour killing has been
considered acceptable in India
for thousands of years and there
is no punishment, then how can
Stir against Macron: Cong MLA, 49
others arrested in MP, released on bail
PRESS TRUST OF INDIA
BHOPAL, NOVEMBER 2
MADHYA PRADESH Congress
leaderandMLAArif Masoodwas
among 50 people who were ar-
rested for staging a protest here
last week against French
President Emmanuel Macron
overacartoonrowinviolationof
restrictions put in place to curb
expansion of cargo jetties off the
state’s two river banks.
By1am,thecrowdhadstarted
singingKonkanisongs.MLasfrom
the Opposition tried to make a
speech but were packed off.
Constancio Fernandes, 45, a
sailorfromLoutolim,stoodonthe
New Delhi
stituency and Moldo, on the
Chinese side, is stark.
Stanzin said: “In Moldo, they
have 5G networks – not one but
two or three networks. There is
5G even in other areas such as
Dumtele, Demchok. We can see
their areas have 24x7 electricity.
They have developed hydel
damsthatprovidepowersupply
tothese areas. Wecanseeall this
from Chushul. The people in
Chushul are making do with a
few hours of supply, and even
our 2G coverage is pathetic.”
He said there is insecurity
among people in the border vil-
lages.“Whenevertensionsflareup
on the LAC, the first thing to go is
telephone connectivity, and peo-
plegetcompletelycutoff,”hesaid.
Thegovernmentneedstode-
velop“smartvillages”ontheLAC,
hesaid.“It(avillage)shouldhave
all facilities – health, education,
roads,telecommunication,elec-
tricity. If the government de-
prives people living on the bor-
der of these things, they are not
going to remain there, and that
willnotbegoodforsafeguarding
Rana says he never
promoted violence, nor
justified the French killings
you call this illegitimate?”
Talking to The Times of India,
the poet had allegedly said cari-
catures of Prophet Mohammed
were intentionally drawn by the
satire magazine Charlie Hebdo
because Frenchmen did not be-
lieve in the Prophet.
The FIR was filed at
Lucknow’s Hazratganj Police
Station on a complaint by Sub-
inspectorDeepakKumarPandey
whoallegedthatRana’sremarks
to the news channel promoted
enmity between groups.
the Covid-19 outbreak, a police
official said. Masood and 49 oth-
erswerearrestedbythepoliceon
Sundayandlaterreleasedonbail
as offences registered against
them were bailable, he said.
They were set free from a po-
lice station after they furnished
bail bonds, Additional Director
Generalof Police(ADG)Upendra
Jain said.
The MLA along with mem-
tracks.“FortyMLAssitintheAsse-
mbly. Not once have they discus-
sed our issues.” His friend Jimmy
Rodriques nodded. “The govern-
menthastolisten.Policycannev-
imports for Adani, Jindal and Ve-
danta overlook our state issues of
heritage and environment. The
burden to the state’s ecology due
to this huge coal corridor is not
evenbeingdiscussed.”
ViennaFernandes,62,thema-
tronfroma500-year-oldheritage
home,stoodwithahelmetonher
head. “This coal directly affects
me. The pollution has spoilt our
living. I am forced to come out,”
shesaid.“Theytellusthesecorpo-
rates are big. Then they do not
know us, we are from Salcette in
Goa. There is a reason they call us
thefightingredde(fightingbulls).
Besides, there is a sense of broth-
erhoodinGoa,wefighttogether.”
By then, slogans of “Go Back
Adani” and “Go Back Jindal” were
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
the territory,” Stanzin said. “We
are the government's eyes and
ears there; our people notice
everything. People living at the
border are the second guardian
forceof thenation–theyaresol-
diers without uniform.”
A resident of Lukung village
in Chushul, on the banks of
PangongTso,Stanzinsaidhehad
on many occasions tried to con-
vey seriousness of the situation
tothepartyleadership.“ButIgot
a call from the BJP headquarters
telling me that the border situa-
tionisbeing handledseparately;
that I should remain silent and
not speak about it at all,” said
Stanzin, who quit BJP after the
party nominated another candi-
date for the election.
He said it is difficult to keep
silent on the issue when people
in the villages in Chushul had
been steadily losing their access
to their winter grazing areas due
to the westward spread of the
Chinesearmy.Thisyear,thatlack
of access has widened, he main-
tained. The Fingers area had also
become out of bounds, he said.
Rana on Monday told The
Indian Express that he had never
promoted violence nor justified
the French killings. “I am not the
one who changes party, and I
don’t change my statements ei-
ther. I might have used some
wrong words as I am old... What
I said is the same thing repeated
by the French President
(Emmanuel Macron) today who
said that making objectionable
cartooniswrong,andmurdering
someisevenworse.Ineverjusti-
fied the killing. When I said that
I would have done the same was
in a different context...,” he said.
Last month, a school teacher
in a Paris suburb was beheaded
for showing Charlie Hebdo car-
toons of Prophet Mohammed
during a class on freedom of ex-
pression. A few days later, three
more were killed in the French
city of Nice by a knife-wielding
assailant.
HazratganjSHOAnjaniKumar
Pandey said they would first un-
dertake a detailed investigation
and take action accordingly.
bers of the Muslim community
had staged the protest at Iqbal
Maidan here against Macron
over the cartoon controversy re-
lated to depictions of Prophet
Muhammad in France.
The protesters violated the
district administration order
banning assembly of people in
thewakeof the coronavirus out-
break, Talaiya police station offi-
cer DP Singh had said earlier.
beingraisedandsomehadstarted
performing the traditional Kunbi
“dancing protest”. Christabelle
Gomes,22,stoodwithherfriends.
“I want to sit at home and study.
Butdisturbinginformationonso-
cialmediathatwearegoingtolose
ourbiodiversitymakesmeangry.”
By1.30am,thedeputycollec-
tor, Jyoti Kumari, reached the site
and appealed to the people to re-
turn. She said there is no permis-
sion for the protest. Her appeals
that the crowd’s demand that no
train “will cross today...has been
accepted” was drowned with the
crowd responding, “Never. Say
they will cross never”. Abhijeet
Prabhudesai,anenvironmentalist,
askedhertogivetheorderinwrit-
ing and “to keep the project in
abeyance”. Till 5 am, no one
budged. The protesters have now
saidtheywantthecollectortostop
givingclearancetolayingoftracks.
FULL REPORT ON
www.indianexpress.com
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
‘OFFENSIVE POSTS’ AGAINST UDDHAV, AADITYA
Arrested by Nagpur
Police, man gets bail,
only to be rearrested
by Mumbai Police
MOHAMED THAVER
MUMBAI, NOVEMBER 2
SAMEETTHAKKAR,whowasar-
restedbyNagpurPolicelastweek
forallegedlypostingdefamatory
content against Maharashtra
ChiefMinisterUddhavThackeray
and his son and cabinet minister
Aaditya, was granted bail by a
Nagpur court on Monday but
wasrearrestedbyMumbaiPolice
minutes later after the same
court granted them his custody
in a similar case.
TheMumbaiPoliceFIRregis-
tered in July is regarding his
tweets in the last week of June
and first week of July, and the
Nagpur Police FIR is based on
tweets put out by him in the last
weekof July.Thetweetsaresim-
ilar in nature whereby the
Thackerays along with other
leaders of Maha Vikas Aghadi
(MVA) in Maharashtra are al-
legedly called objectionable
names. Also, he allegedly had
“abusive communal exchanges”
with members of the minority
community on Twitter.
Thakkar’s lawyer Prakash
JaiswalsaidthatapartfromtheFIR
atVPRoadpolicestationforwhich
Mumbai Police got his custody,
there is another FIR at BKC police
station in Mumbai against Thak-
kar.ThesetwoFIRsareinaddition
to the FIR registered at Nagpur.
“WehavemovedtheSupreme
Court to club these offences.
Offencesforthesameissuecannot
be registered in different parts of
the country,” Jaiswal said. He said
Thakkarwasbroughttocourtwith
his face covered and there was
heavy security cover “as if he was
aterrorist”.
Whenhewasarrested,Jaiswal
had told the court that the case
smackedof“politicalintolerance”
and that “if people were to be ar-
restedforsuchremarksonTwitter,
thenwewillhavetocreatespecial
HC reserves
order in Hathras
case, asks CBI to
file status report
Lucknow: The Lucknow Bench of
the Allahabad High Court on
Monday reserved its order on a
petition alleging administration
and police high handedness fol-
lowingtheHathrasgangrapeand
murder. The court also directed
CBI to file a status report by Nov-
ember 25, the next date of hear-
ing, said senior advocate Jaideep
NarainMathur,whohasbeenap-
pointedamicuscuriaeinthecase.
Additional Director General
(Law & Order) Prashant Kumar,
stateHomeSecretaryTarunGaba
and suspended Hathras SP Vikr-
antVirSinghappearedbeforethe
court as directed in the last hear-
ingonOctober12.HathrasDistrict
MagistratePraveenKumarLaxkar
wasalsopresentinthecourt.“The
state government informed the
court that compensation and se-
curity have been provided to the
victim'sfamilyaspertheSupreme
Court order,” said Additional
Advocate General V K Shahi. ENS
Businessman’s
death: HC rejects
ex-SP’s plea for
quashing FIR
Lucknow: The Allahabad High
Court on Monday dismissed sus-
pended IPS officer Mani Lal
Patidar’s writ petition seeking
quashing of FIR against him and
stay against his arrest in connec-
tion with the death of a Mahoba
businessman.
Patidar, who was SP in
Mahoba before he was sus-
pended,isanaccusedinthedeath
of 44-year-oldIndrakantTripathi.
“The High Court dismissed
Patidar’swritpetitionstatingthat
thereisnogroundforquashingof
the FIR,” Additional Advocate
General Manish Gopal said.
Tripathi died of gunshot in-
juriesonSeptember15,daysafter
heaccusedPatidar,thenSP,of ex-
tortionandcriminalintimidation
in a video that went viral. Patidar
wasearlierbookedformurderbut
after an SIT report indicated that
Tripathi had killed himself, the
murderchargeagainsttheIPSof-
ficerwaschangedtoabetmentto
suicide.PatidarmovedtheHCaf-
ter a court issued non-bailable
warrants against him and two
other accused policemen. ENS
Uddhav, Aaditya Thackeray
Twitterjails.”
Advocate Dharam Mishra
fromShivSena’slegalcell,whois
thecomplainantinthecase,said,
“He insulted persons holding
Constitutional posts by making
derogatory and abusive state-
ments, outraged the modesty of
women by posting obscene ma-
terial and also used abusive lan-
guage against Supreme Court
judges.”
JaiswalopposedtheMumbai
Policeapplicationforcustody,ar-
guing that “Mumbai is a Covid-
prone city... and the police could
beCovidpositive”andthiscould
“adversely impact the health of
the applicant”. The court, how-
ever,gavehiscustodytoMumbai
Policeandaskedittoensurethat
precautions are taken. Thakkar
will be produced before a local
court in Mumbai on Tuesday.
An FIR was lodged against
Thakkar, a businessman, at Sita-
buldipolicestationinNagpuron
August 12 on the basis of a com-
plaint by Manish Tiwari, said to
beanaideof SenaMLCDushyant
Chaturvedi. He was granted re-
lief by the Nagpur bench of
Bombay High Court, which or-
dered the police on August 28 to
refrain from taking coercive ac-
tionagainsthim.Thecourtasked
himtoreporttothepolicestation
daily, which Thakkar didn’t do.
The HC had then dismissed his
petition on October 20, paving
the way for his arrest.
He was then arrested on
October 25 by Nagpur Police
from Rajkot.
AT THE COURT
Actor Rhea Chakraborty outside the sessions court in Mumbai on Monday. Ganesh Shirsekar
Assam builds 119 high
schools in tea gardens
ABHISHEK SAHA
GUWAHATI, NOVEMBER 2
THE ASSAM government has
started construction of 119 high
schools in tea gardens — so far,
theseareashadonlyprimaryand
middle schools. The Tea Tribes
comprise17percentofthestate's
population.
“In more than 70 years after
Independence, it is for the first
time that high schools will be es-
tablished in the tea gardens of
Assam.Itmarksanewbeginning
forthedevelopmentofeducation
and culture in the tea gardens of
Assam,” Education Minister
HimantaBiswaSarmasaidduring
a rally in Dhekiajuli on Monday.
Schools across the state re-
opened on Monday after being
shut for over seven months.
On Sunday, Chief Minister
Sarbananda Sonowal laid the
foundation stone for the new
schools. A statement released by
hisofficesaid,“Teacommunity is
an integral part of greater Assa-
mese society. The community,
which has embraced Assam and
Assameseastheirownandassim-
ilatedintoAssamesesociety,must
be enabled to reap benefits of
equal development.”
According to officials, Rs 1.20
crore would be spent for con-
Amid protests by Oppn, J&K
says old land laws obsolete
ARUN SHARMA
JAMMU, NOVEMBER 2
AMID PROTESTS by opposition
parties and many sections of the
public in Jammu and Kashmir
against the new land laws intro-
duced by the Centre, the Union
Territoryadministration’sspokes-
person Rohit Kansal on Saturday
defended the move, saying that
many of these laws repealed or
modifiedhadbecome“outdated”
and“obsolete’’andwereeven“re-
gressive’’ and “anti-people”.
While National Conference
leader and former J&K chief min-
ister Omar Abdullah has accused
the government of opening J&K
“for sale”, and said that the new
laws try to do away with land re-
forms that had been hallmark of
the erstwhile state, Kansal main-
tained that the reality is “actually
quite to the contrary’’.
Citing an instance, he said
whileAgrarianReformsAct,1976,
had already superseded the Big
Landed Abolition Act, relevant
provisionsofbothlawshavebeen
included in the new laws.
According to Kansal, the new
laws were required since the en-
tiregamutofearlierlandlawswas
meant to serve an “old agrarian
rural”,andmanyof thesehadbe-
come “outdated and obsolete”.
TheCentrehadonOctober26
amended and notified land laws
for the UT and explicitly omitted
the protection earlier available to
Four booked for ‘defiling’ Mathura temple, 1 held
AVANEESH MISHRA
LUCKNOW, NOVEMBER 2
FOURYOUTHSbelongingtoKhu-
daiKhidmatgar,aDelhi-basedor-
ganisation which claims to pro-
mote communal harmony, were
booked on Sunday after two of
them allegedly offered namaz at
NandMahaltempleinUP’sMath-
ura district last month. One of
Assam Education Minister
Himanta Biswa Sarma at the
foundation laying ceremony
of a school. Twitter
structingeachmodelhighschool.
TheTeaTribesformanimpor-
tantvoterbaseinthestateandthe
BJP-led government’s push for
schoolscomesaheadofstateelec-
tions early next year.
GS Barhoi, Golaghat district
secretaryofAssamChahMazdoor
Sangha, welcomed the move. “It
willhelpshiftthefocus...towards
the need of education for an eco-
nomicallybackwardcommunity,”
Barhoi said. However, he said,
workers’ problems with mini-
mumwagescontinue.“Currently,
wagesareRs167perday.Howcan
a worker sustain with that? So
when a boy in the family reaches
a certain age, the family wants
him to earn rather than study.”
Members of Civil Society Forum being detained during
a protest against new land laws in Srinagar on Monday. PTI
its‘permanentresidents’.Theam-
endedlawsopenupurbanornon-
agricultural land for purchase by
outsiders,permitcontractfarming
on agricultural lands, provide for
settingupofanindustrialdevelop-
mentcorporation,amongothers.
Ineffect,adozenland-related
laws have been repealed: Big
Landed Estates Abolition Act,
1950; Common Lands (Regul-
ation)Act,1956;Consolidationof
HoldingAct,1962;LandImprov-
ement Scheme Act, 1972; Preve-
ntion of Fragmentation of
Agricultural Holdings Act, 1960;
Alienation of Land Act, 1995;
Rightof PriorPurchaseAct,1936;
J&K Flood Plain (Regulation and
Development) Act, 2005; J&K
Underground Public Utilities
(Acquisition Of Rights Of User In
them, Faisal Khan, was arrested
from Delhi on Monday.
The others have been identi-
fied as Chand Mohammed, Alok
RatanandNileshGupta.Theyhave
been booked for promoting en-
mitybetweendifferentgroupson
groundsofreligion,defilingaplace
of worshipandpublicmischief.
Onacomplaintbythetemple
caretaker, an FIR was lodged at
BarsanapolicestationinMathura
Annu Tandon with SP chief
Akhilesh Yadav. Vishal Srivastav
Former Cong
MP Annu
Tandon joins SP
ENS & PTI
LUCKNOW, NOVEMBER 2
FORMER CONGRESS MP Annu
Tandon on Monday joined SP,
days after she sent her resigna-
tion to Congress president
Sonia Gandhi.
Tandon joined the SP at a
small function at the party head-
quarters with SP chief Akhilesh
Yadav welcoming her. Shashank
Shekhar Shukla, who once
planned the campaign for the
Congress among reserved con-
stituencies, and Ankit Parihar,
who contested from Bhagwant
NagarseatinUnnaoonaCongress
ticket earlier, also joined the SP.
Tandon praised Akhilesh
Yadav, terming him as a “young,
progressive and visionary” leader
having all the qualities expected
fromaleader.
EXPRESS NETWORK 9
Land)Act,2014;Tenancy(StayOf
Ejectment Proceedings) Act,
1966; J&K Utilization of Lands
Act; and Prohibition of
Conversion of Land and Alien-
ation of Orchards Act, 1975. The
government has also modified
four major existing laws: Agr-
arian Reforms Act, 1976; Land
RevenueAct,1939;LandsGrants
Act,1960;andJ&KDevelopment
Act, 1970.
Calling the new laws “mod-
ernandprogressive”,andafford-
ing“adequateprotectionagainst
alienation of land to outsiders’’,
Kansal said several protections
have been introduced on similar
lines,as enacted in states such as
Himachal Pradesh and Uttarak-
hand.Hesaidthatnoagricultural
land can be transferred to any
Sunday night.
“Wehavebeeninformedthat
on October 29, four persons
came from Delhi. Two of them
were Muslims. The Muslim
youthsofferedafternoonnamaz
inside the temple. On Sunday,
somesharedphotosonFacebook
calling it an act of harmony. The
temple staff lodged a complaint
and an FIR has been registered,”
said SSP Gaurav Grover.
OBITUARY
Corps of Signals salutes its following Signallers who left us for
their heavenly abode during the month of Oct 2020.
(a) 15671026H Nk
(b) 15696682P Nk
(c) 15743264N Sigmn
(d) 15668363M Hav
(e) 15671270H Sigmn
(f) 15726680F LNk
(g) 15746122F Sigmn
(h) 15700466F LNk
(i) 15722932L Sigmn
On behalf of the Corps, we sincerely pray to Almighty for
peace to the departed souls & strength to the bereaved
families to bear this irreparable loss.
person from outside J&K but can
only be sold to an agriculturist
from within the UT. He said
“agriculturist’’ in the new law
has been defined as a person
who himself/ herself cultivates
land in the UT. Kansal also said
thatnolandusedforagricultural
purposecanbeusedforanynon-
agricultural purpose, and that
theterms“agriculturalland”and
“agriculturist” have been unam-
biguously defined in the new
laws to include not just agricul-
ture but also horticulture and al-
lied agro-activities. The safe-
guard on agricultural land alone
would ensure that more than 90
per cent land in J&K —which is
agricultural land — remains pro-
tected and with the people of
J&K, he added.
ButCongress’schief spokesp-
ersonRavinderSharma,saidthat
peopleareopposingnotamend-
ments or amalgamation of old
land laws into new laws, but the
“openentryof outsiderswithout
anyrestrictionsinrespecttoland
andjobswithoutanysafeguards
likedomicileetc,tolocalpeople’’.
He said, “They (Centre) have al-
ready assured people of Ladakh
safeguardsinrespecttolandand
jobs,andthelatterareonlywait-
ingforaformalnotificationinthe
matter. The law that is good and
is required in Ladakh...why
is it not made applicable to J&K
(as well)?”
FULLREPORTON
www.indianexpress.com
Khudai Khidmatgar spokes-
personPawanYadavclaimedthat
a few temple staff allowed the
youthstooffernamaz,buttemple
authoritiesdeniedthis.Yadavsaid
Khanhadofferedanapologyifhe
hurt religious sentiments.
Temple caretaker Mukesh
Goswami said Khan had claimed
to be a Hindu and recited several
shlokasfromreligioustextsonthe
day they visited the temple.
Jaswant Singh
Arbind Kumar Mishra
Vel K
Th Jiban Singha
Kuldeep Singh
Chaudhari Anmol Ramanlal
Abhishek Kumar
KK Jha
Pushpendra Kumar
New Delhi
Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla (right) with
German Secretary of State, Federal Foreign Office Berlin,
Miguel Berger in Berlin on Monday. Twitter/@MiguelBergerAA
In Germany, foreign
secy raises LAC
stand-off, terrorism
SHUBHAJIT ROY
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
WITH AN eye on China and Paki-
stan, Foreign Secretary Harsh
Vardhan Shringla on Monday tal-
ked to his German interlocutors
about the multiple challenges
Indiaisfacingduetothepandemic,
“tensionsonournorthernborder”
and the “ever-present menace of
terrorismonourwesternborder”,
sourcessaidonMonday.Shringla,
whoisonavisittoGermanyaspa-
rtofhisEuropetour,discussedthe
standoff along the India-China
Lineof ActualControl,itislearnt.
In Berlin, he met German
FederalForeignOffice’sministerof
stateNielsAnnenonMondayand
Jan Hecker, the Foreign and Secu-
rity Policy Advisor to the German
Chancellor Angela Merkel. The
twosides,itislearnt,hadaconver-
sation on the Indo-Pacific where
Chinese aggression has been evi-
dentintherecentmonths.Accor-
dingtosources,hetoldGermanof-
ficials, “We are happy to note that
Germany’sIndo-Pacificguidelines
recognisetheneedforGermanyto
diversifyitssupplychainsasIndia
andGermanyhaveaclearconver-
gence of interest in this area.” On
the strategic plane, he is learnt to
have said, “We have common in-
terestswithEuropeandGermany
in terms of combatting terrorism
and extremism, ensuring climate
actionandsupportingmultilater-
alism with a view to strengthen-
ingarules-basedorder.”
Recalling the terror attacks in
France, he is learnt to have said,
“My visit to Europe at the time of
the pandemic is also at a time
when we witness manifestation
of radicalism and extremism in
Europe”.HehadvisitedFranceear-
lier,andisheadedtotheUKnow.
“We are all stunned by the re-
centtragicterrorattacksinFrance
andthreattoourcommondemo-
cratic values and freedom of ex-
pression,” a source quoted him as
saying.“Unfortunatelytheterror-
ists are united in purpose and ac-
tion while we the victims are yet
tobeso.Ironicallysomecountries
who are the fountainhead of ter-
ror are practising dissimulation
andclaimingtobevictimsofterror
to gain international sympathy.
We should be aware of these
moves and learn to call a spade a
spade,” he told officials in Berlin,
accordingtosources.
Accordingtosources,inanin-
teraction with German think
tanks, he took a swipe at Beijing
andsaid,“Threatstonationstates
and sovereignty can also come in
otherforms.Theworldisincreas-
ingly witnessing debt trap diplo-
macyinthegarbofimprovingin-
frastructure and connectivity
without heeding financial viabil-
ity or environmental concerns.
While there is no doubt that con-
nectivityamongnationsneedsto
be improved, we have to be cau-
tious about the terms of engage-
ment.”ThisisincontextofChina’s
Belt and Road Initiative, which
NewDelhihasopposed.
 WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM

10
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
WORDLY WISE

THE EDITORIAL PAGE

It is vain to expect virtue from women till
they are in some degree independent of men.
— MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT

After Charlie Hebdo

FOUNDED BY
§

§
RAMNATH GOENKA
Cartoons in our times need not be blunt
BECAUSE THE TRUTH INVOLVES US ALL
instruments. The message has to be clear, not loud

GUARDED OPTIMISM E P Unny

Economic indicators suggest normalisation of economic TO TWEAK AN Einstein quote, cartoons media war between two newspaper barons minced words. The way things are going, it
should be made as simple as possible, but —JosephPulitzer,whopioneereditspublica- won’t be long before many parts of Europe
activities. But durability of the rebound is a matter of concern not simpler. Charlie Hebdo cartoons are look- tion in 1895 in his New York World, and his have considerable migrant populations. The

S
ingincreasinglysimplerinaworldthatisget-
EEN AGAINST THE depths to which economic activity had plummeted in the ini- ting thoroughly complicated. Since the sim-
tialphaseof thenationallockdown,thesequentialimprovementineconomicin- plest solution on offer these days is simpler
dicators over the past few months suggests that the process of normalisation of than the simplest of cartoons — single-
economicactivitiesiswellunderway.Asindicatedbyleadingindicators,bothag- minded terror — cartoonists must wonder
gregate demand and supply have witnessed an improvement with the easing of lockdown how they got themselves into this mess. And
rethink not in terms of pulling punches but
restrictions.However,onemustbecautiouswhileinterpretingthesenumbers.Forinstance,
in terms of a new perspective.
large parts of the high-contact services sector such as airlines, hospitality and tourism con- The Hebdo cartoon was a ready excuse, a
tinue to lag the industrial sector,and their revivalinpart depends on the success in contain- trigger for the killings, not the cause.
ing the virus. Provocation could have come from cinema,
On the production side, signalling a continuing pickup in the supply side, the Nikkei’s writing, music, fashion or food. Organised
terror waits for a context and the cartoon
manufacturing purchasing managers index, released on Monday, rose to 58.9 in October —
could easily provide it because it is the car-
indicating the fastest expansion in factory output in over a decade. Similarly, the index of
toonist’s job to provoke, ridicule and offend.
eight core industries in September was almost at the same level as last year, with coal, elec- But is that all a cartoon can do?
tricity,andsteelswingingintopositiveterritory.Ontheconsumptionside,indicatingapickup TheFrenchweeklythatseesitself aspolit-
indemand,thegoodsandservicestaxcollectionsforthemonthof Octoberrosetoaneight- icallyleftshouldhavenothingagainstimmi-
grants, but it has hurt them with the cartoon
month highof Rs1.05lakhcrore— 10per cent higher thancollectionsoverthe sameperiod
last year. While part of this rise could be attributed to the September 30 deadline for claim- asabluntinstrument.Francehasasignificant
inginputtaxcreditandthereconciliationforbusinessesfor2019-20,thecontinuedriseine-
Muslim population, most of them immi-
grants. A good many are believers and new
waybillgenerationalsopointstowardsimprovementinactivity.Recentreportsalsosuggest tothehostculture,whichisusedtohandling
that demand for both four-wheelers and two-wheelers appears to be firming up. Sales for suchexcessesinacartoonwithashrugof the
MarutiSuzuki,forinstance,stoodat1,63,656unitsinthedomesticmarket,up18percentover shoulder, a pungent letter to the editor or a
thesameperiodlastmonth.Similarly,HeroMotoCorpreportedaspikeindemandfromur- searing counter-cartoon. The settlers would
banandsemi-urbanareas.RailwayfreightrevenuewasupinthefirsthalfofOctoberaswere takeawhiletoacquiresuchskills.Meanwhile,
diesel sales, which reportedly witnessed the first year-on-year growth since February. This theartformwouldgetsufficientlydemonised
intheireyes.Historically,thisisasadbetrayal
sequential improvement in economic activity is also reflected in preliminary results of cor-
of the abiding bond between the immigrant
porates for the second quarter of the current financial year, which indicate a turnaround in and cartoon art. The Hebdo cartoonist is an-
performance after the collapse in the first quarter. tagonising a willing natural readership.
Yet, this optimism needs to be tempered. For one, part of the recovery in economic ac- At the close of 19th century, the advent
tivities can be traced to the ongoing festive season. Whether this momentum sustains, or of the comics coincided with the rise of the
theextenttowhichitsustains,beyondthemonthsofOctoberandNovemberremainstobe big American cities built by waves of immi-
gration.Distinguishedcartoonhistorianslike
seen. Then, there is the possibility of a surge in COVID-19 infections during the festive sea-
JudithO’Sullivanhavedweltatlengthonthis.
son,whichcouldheightenriskaversion.Thiscoupledwithcontinuingincomeuncertainty Those who came in were struggling to pick
could adversely impact the growth trajectory going forward, though its impact will be vis- upAmericanEnglishandtheyfoundtheeas-
ible with a lag. iest learning device — the comics in the
newspapers, printed big and in colour. The
very first comic character, Yellow Kid, cre-
ated by Richard Outcault, was a sensation
The French weekly that sees
itself as politically left
should have nothing against
immigrants, but it has hurt
them with the cartoon as a
blunt instrument. France has
a significant Muslim
population, most of them
immigrants. A good many
are believers and new to the
host culture, which is used to
handling such excesses in a
cartoon with a shrug of the
shoulder, a pungent letter to
the editor or a searing
counter-cartoon. The settlers
would take a while to acquire
such skills. Meanwhile, the
art form would get
sufficiently demonised in
their eyes. Historically, this
is a sad betrayal of the
abiding bond between the
immigrant and the cartoon
art. The Hebdo cartoonist is
antagonising a willing
rival, William Randolph Hearst, who ac-
quired it after three years for his New York
Journal. The bulk of the comics readership
was the growing migrant population.
Theexpatstooktothecomics,thencalled
funnies, where hand-drawn cartoon charac-
tersspokepithycolloquialEnglish,handwrit-
ten into speech balloons. The look and feel
was informal and non-intimidating, alto-
gether inviting. Kids mimicked, parents read
out and families started speaking imperfect
English. The newspaper’s comics page be-
came an early facilitator of the migrant’s
journey in the Land of Opportunity.
True, these are sequential comics and not
political cartoons of the kind Charlie Hebdo
features. Get closer home and you’ll find that
thepoliticalcartoonworksforthemigrantno
less.India’scorecartooninghasbeenpolitical
and our cartoons have grown in and around
citiesbackedbyjob-seekingmigrants,includ-
ing the cartoonists themselves. Most of our
prominent practitioners from Shankar to RK
Laxman andAbuAbrahamtoSudhirDarwere
expats. And they handled a bigger, more un-
certain democracy than the post-war
European ones in France or West Germany. It
wouldn’t have been easy to cartoon through
the Partition of the subcontinent that came
withthebirthof thenation.And,whenfinally
thepolitylookedlikesettlingdown,camethe
Emergency and press censorship. At the best
of times, cartoonists and their editors dealt
with a much-layered, multi-ethnic, often
touchyreadership.InneighbouringSriLanka,
cartoonists have faced tougher times. To cut
thestoryshort,outsidethestructureddemoc-
racies of the West, the art practice has coped.
This is not to suggest that cartoonists
must function under a Damocles’ sword and
turnoutsuitablyevasiveandsafestuff,which
the reader somehow figures out. This is not
the way our predecessors functioned. The
cartoon readerships there would increas-
ingly begin to look like India’s or Sri Lanka’s
— mixed, varied, young. Even then, Charlie
Hebdo might merrily carry on but not many
will look up to it, just because it is European.
Younger cartoonists the world over
wouldlookelsewhere.Theyfacethepredica-
ment of having to make impossible choices
andsharpdistinctions—saybetweenacom-
passionate religion and those who wield the
sword in its name. They would love Mike
Luckovich for his classic on the 9/11 attack
on the World Trade Centre. Luckovich drew
the Holy Quran standing like a tower and
showed a tiny airplane labelled “Islamic
Terrorists” about to crash into it
AmidstthesoaringIslamophobiathatfol-
lowed the terror strike, the message came
across,anythingbutloudbutcrystalclear,on
how untrue these bigots were to the religion
they swore by. In the same vein, Art
Spiegelman did In the Shadow of No Towers
(2004), a graphic novel that treats al Qaeda
andthePentagonwithequalscorn.Themas-
ter refused to make a choice between terror
and a state that exploited it to undermine its
own proclaimed democracy.
Charlie Hebdo has no such hesitation. It
takes sides without a second thought. It has
a legacy advantage: The mood of Western
Europe that breathed easy after the defeat of
the Nazis. Founded in 1970, Charlie Hebdo’s
art practice celebrates that WorldWar II mo-
ment which chose unbridled freedom over
all else. The choice is no longer that simple
— between an evil Hitler and liberating
armies. Right now, the world’s most power-
ful electorate isn’t making half as clear a
choice — between a Trump and his chal-
lenger.AndnoWorldWarIIIisinsight tosort
out matters and bring the much-needed
clarity to the cartoonist.

SCRAP THE INDEMNITY and got pricey enough to set off a legendary natural readership. bestof themneithertrimmedthepicturenor ep.unny@expressindia.com

Kerala Congress chief must pay

for his rank misogyny

S AN AMERICAN STORY
EXIST FOUL-TALK — of the kind that belongs in locker-rooms — continues to en-
joy indemnity in Indian politics. Nothing else explains why Mullappally
Ramachandran, aveteranleaderof the Congress in Kerala, aformer Union minis-
ternoless,wouldwanttocounterawoman’stestimonybyshamingherasa“pros-
titute”. It is this impunity that also emboldened him to discredit the charge that she was
rapedbyseveralministersintheformerUDFgovernmentbyinsinuatingthatawomanwith
“self-respect” would have died rather than be assaulted several times over. Ramachandran
forked out an apology after an uproar, but there is more than a whiff of insincerity to it. But Bryan Monroe
his remarks, undeniably, put the Congress national leadership on test. Last month, former
WE CLAIM her as our own. We share her
chief minister of Madhya Pradesh Kamal Nath had gotten away with a murmur of disap-
with you. But her story is an American story
provalfromRahulGandhi,evenwhenhecalledImartiDevi,aDalitleaderandaformerparty — of struggle, change and hope.
colleague, an “item”. No doubt. Kamala Harris is a Black
ThequestionfortheCongressisthis:If leaderslikeNathandRamachandrancontinueto woman. TheUS senator who is,perhaps, less
incur zero political cost for rank sexist abuse, for using language that demeans and dehu- than a day away from being elected as the
maniseswomen,forwieldingdecayingnotionsofhonourandrespectagainstvictimsofsex- first female vice-president of the United
States, was born in Oakland and raised in
ual assault, what is its credibility when it campaigns for justice for a Dalit teen raped and
Berkeley. She went to Howard University, a
murderedinHathras?ThatisnottosaythatthisbrandofcoarsenessislimitedonlytoCongress. historicallyBlack collegeinWashington,D.C.
ItisendemictoIndianpolitics,andusedthoughtlesslyagainstwomen,especiallyfrommar- She is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha
ginalisedcommunities.Ramachandran’splatitudesaboutrapevictimstapintoalargercon- Sorority, one of the “Divine Nine” US Black
sensus—fashionedbysociety,cultureandpolitics—thatsaysthatacagedsexuality—owned sororities and fraternities. In America, you
by men and protected from other men — is what gives women worth. don’t get much Blacker than that.
Theregularitywithwhichmenstooptosuchrhetoricisadirectoutcomeofgenderinequal- Butsheisalsoachildof India.Hermother,
Shyamala Gopalan Harris, was born in
ityinIndianpolitics.Withappallinglevelsofrepresentationofwomen,acrosslevelsandpar-
Chennai and met her father, Donald J Harris,
ties,thepublicspherehasbecome,bydefault,amaleturf,wheretoxicspeechgoeslargelyun- animmigrantfromJamaica, during a protest
punished and where pieties of sexual dishonour go uncontested. But till a critical mass of attheUniversityof California,Berkeley,inthe
women politicians pushes back against this cheap misogyny, national parties cannot afford early ’60s.
to sleep on their watch. It is incumbent on them to detoxify the public space. The Congress Kamala and her younger sister Maya had
a middle-class upbringing in northern
must make sure that there are political consequences for Ramachandran’s florid loose talk
California but were not sheltered from the
— and that should be an example for other parties to follow.
racialcomplexitiesof Americainthe’70s,es-
pecially as someone who shared multiple
cultures — Black and Indian.
DIAMOND FOREVER
But even in the Bay Area, one of the most
raciallydiverseregionsofAmerica— thepop-
ulationtodayismorenon-whitethanwhitein
most of its major counties — the voices of
Sean Connery survived the Bond persona to become those of colour struggle to be heard over the
pain of past injustices. Berkeley, for instance,
an all-time great actor
Multiracial citizens like Kamala Harris will vote for a recognition of their America
A 2015 Pew Research Center
survey of multiracial
American adults showed
that while 59 per cent felt
their backgrounds made
them more open to other
cultures, 55 per cent said
they have been subject to
racial slurs or jokes. About
one in four (24 per cent)
have also felt annoyed
because people have
bourhoods. It was hard to be of both worlds.
Still, in America, our diversity is our
strength, even though there are many today
trying to widen the cracks between us. For
those who grew up with multicultural back-
grounds, with feet in both worlds, they see
themselves as America, the embodiment of
what actually makes this country great.
And that’s the America voters will be
choosing.A2015PewResearchCentersurvey
of multiracial American adults showed that
while59percentfelttheirbackgroundsmade
themmoreopentoothercultures,55percent
said they have been subject to racial slurs or
jokes.Aboutoneinfour(24percent)havealso
felt annoyed because people have made as-
sumptionsabouttheirracialbackground,the
“where-are-you-really-from” question.
I’veknownKamalaformorethan20years
— we both lived and worked in the San
Francisco Bay Area in the 1990s. I was an ed-
itorattheSanJoseMercuryNews,andshewas
atalentedprosecutoranddistrictattorneyfor
the city and county of San Francisco, later to
become the state’s first attorney-general of
African-American (and Indian) heritage.
We are about the same age, with similar
circumstances as young Black kids in
America. Both of our parents had graduate
degrees. This, too, was normal among many
of theBlackfamilieswegrewuparound.Like
Kamala and Maya, my older sister and I
theweekendsandgetintroubleforsneaking
out of the house in high school.
Wewouldjokethatweknewmoreabout
the customs, tastes and practices of white
America than theyknew aboutours. We had
to listen to their Led Zeppelin and eat their
under-seasoned chicken at the soccer team
potluck. We had to learn their traditions, but
they knew little about our lives, our habits,
our world. We’d go to the same schools and
wear the same clothes, but we’d still be seen
through an unfamiliar lens.
It didn’t seem fair. Our normal should
havebeenjustas validas thewhite kids’nor-
mal. Still, we were the ones, in the eyes of
many white American adults with limited
expectations of Black people, who were un-
usual, or exceptional.
We’re in this country, we’re of this coun-
try,butstill,in2020,wedon’tfeelothersthink
thatwearethiscountry.This,despitethefact
that, by 2045, the US Census predicts that
America will more non-white than white.
It’s true that Kamala Harris identifies as
Black. And she identifies as Indian. But she
first identifies as American. As American as
dosas and fried chicken. That’s the America
that we live in now. On November 3, that’s
all that should matter.
Inhermemoir,TheTruthsWeHold(2019),
Kamala recalled her mother’s words to her:
“Don’t let anybody tell you who you are. You

F
hadahistoryofracialsegregation,withredlin- would often be the only or one of just a few tell them who you are.”
UNNY THEY SAID, you only live twice. Sean Connery showed you could have as ing — the practice of banks refusing to write made assumptions about Black children in our classes, or on our sports
mortgages in predominantly Black neigh- their racial background, teams, or in one of many extracurricular ac- The writer is an associate professor at Temple
many lives as you wanted — as James Bond, as a returning James Bond, as a
bourhoods — dating back to 1933 and many tivities. In the ’70s and ’80s, we’d wear University in Philadelphia, and was formerly
sworn Scotsman, as “the man’s man” in a kilt, as a star who chose his own re- areas having restrictive covenants that pro- the ‘where-are-you-really- Brittania jeans and watch Soul Train on the editor-in-chief of Ebony magazine and
tirement, and as the world’s most famous secret agent whose suit actors strug- hibitedminoritiesfromlivingincertainneigh- from’ question. Saturday mornings. We’d go to cookouts on the editor of CNN Politics digital
gled to fill out till two decades later. Even Ian Fleming, who created Bond, gave it a new
life — one starting from Scotland — impressed by Connery.
Did the many lives the actor had led till the point he blazed onto the screen in svelte
suits and skimpy swimwear, conquering villains and women alike with panther-like
grace and a licence to kill, inform the actor he would be? Connery didn’t like to talk about NOVEMBER 3, 1980, FORTY YEARS AGO
it — either his humble beginnings, or his journey from being a milkman, a Navy man, a
labourer and a coffin polisher, to a bodybuilder, leading to a Mr Universe No. 3 finish, and ARMY PUMPS OIL Narengi, until their demands were fulfilled. ABADAN BATTLE
films.However,partof theConnerycharm,thatwouldbecomeinseparablefrom hisBond THE ARMY WAS firmly on the Assam scene, IRAQI FORCES MOUNTED new assaults on
character, was to not really lead life — that word again — by other people’s rules. When facilitatingthe flowof blockedcrudeoilfrom JANATA’S CALL Abadan’seasterngates,asdefendersof Iran’s
he decided he had had enough of playing 007, across three decades, he moved on to roles Upper Assam wells to the Gauhati refinery THEJANATAPARTYurgedoppositionparties largest oil refining city “fought with all their
and taking over the maintenance of law and and individuals “sharing its perception” to might to stop the enemy’s advances”, war
withmoreshadesof grey.Inanensemblecastof unmatchablesinTheUntouchables(1987),
order in the Dispur MLAs’ hostel area. cooperate with it in resisting the “anti-dem- communiques from Tehran reported.
he won himself an Oscar. Pumping commenced after a 11-month halt ocratic policies” of Prime Minister Indira
But even diamonds are not forever, and Connery’s alpha male charm, his love-them- forced by the agitation on the foreigners’ is- Gandhi’sgovernment.Initsresolutiononthe NAM PANEL MEET
and-leave-them Bond, and its Pussy Galore women, may not have done as well in the sue. While the resumption of oil flow will political situation, the national executive of THENON-ALIGNEDCOUNTRIES’committee
#MeToo era. Connery had to spend years accounting for advocating hitting women, save the 750-km-long Gauhati-Barauni the party regretted that Mrs Gandhi’s gov- of “good offices” on the Iran-Iraq war met in
though with an “open-handed slap”, in a 1975 interview. He approved, though, of Daniel pipeline from the gelling of crude in winter, ernment had “nearly destroyed the material Belgrade. The meeting was attended by four
it might take a few days for the Barauni re- and moral fibre of the nation”. It noted that foreign ministers — PV Narasimha Rao of
Craig, whose Bond is more emotional. Craig is up next in his fifth, and overall the 25th,
finery to be fed, according to Oil India offi- the people had given a massive mandate to India, Isidoro Malmierca of Cuba, Wilson
Bond. He has promised No Time To Die is his last. Connery, perhaps agreeing that 90 is a cials.However,theAllAssamStudents’Union the Congress-I hoping to get a “government Chakouli of Zambia and Josip Vrhovec of
good age to call it a wrap on a life lived well, would perhaps be swirling that Martini and and the All Assam Gana Parishad decided to that works”. But all their hopes had been be- Yugoslavia. The meeting came to an end un-
smiling that smile.His last, after all,was propitiously named Never Say Never Again (1983). resist any attempt at crude oil flow beyond lied by the Indira Gandhi regime. expectedly, for reasons that are still unclear.

New Delhi

11
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
THE IDEAS PAGE
Outside the Quad
Bipartisan agreement in US for overhaul of global order could see creation of a new league of democracies,
with consequences for India’s economic prosperity and technological future
RAJA MANDALA
by C Raja Mohan
AUSTRALIA’S PARTICIPATION IN the annual
Malabar exercises, kicking off this week in
the Bay of Bengal, marks the emergence of
the Quad as a new feature of the Indo-
Pacific geopolitics. Although the recent de-
cisions on its consolidation have all come
in the final weeks of President Donald
Trump’s first term, the Quad is likely to en-
dure, thanks to the strong institutional com-
mitment in all four capitals — Canberra,
Delhi, Tokyo and Washington.
ThequestionisnolongerabouttheQuad’s
sustainability, but India’s ability to take full
advantage of the possibilities after the US
electionstoconstructawiderangeof newin-
ternationalcoalitions.Despitemanyideolog-
icalcontentionsbetweenthem,Republicans
andDemocratsagreeontheneedforanover-
haul of global structures to cope with the
emerging challenges.
The likely changes could envelop a range
of old institutions like the Five Eyes — the
Anglo-American alliance for sharing intelli-
gencebetween the US, UK,Canada,Australia
and New Zealand — and the G-7 grouping
that coordinates Western policies on global
economic management. We could also see
the creation of a new League of Democracies
that will address a wide range of issues, in-
cluding the defence of shared values, com-
merce, corruption, taxation, climate change
and digital governance.
Theconsolidationof theQuadreflectsthe
political will in Delhi to break free from old
shibboleths and respond to security impera-
tives. The post-Quad era opens a new phase
in which India, for the first time, can help
shape global institutions.
Changing the world was indeed a major
theme of newly independent India’s aspira-
tioninthemiddleof the20thcentury.Butthe
gap between Delhi’s ambition and impact
was large. If idealism was the hallmark of
India’s internationalism in the 1950s, the
harsh politics of the Cold War quickly damp-
enedit.Inthe1970s,Indiaembracedtherad-
icalagendaof aNewInternationalEconomic
Order, as the leader of the Non-Aligned
Movement and the Group of 77. The results
were meagre.
Thethirdphasebeganwiththeendof the
ColdWar,thecollapseof theSovietUnion,the
emergence of the unipolar moment and the
WashingtonConsensusinfavourofglobalisa-
tion.AndasIndia’sowneconomicmodelcol-
lapsed, Delhi had no option but to temper its
politicalambitions,putitspoliticalheaddown,
focus on economic reform and prevent the
world from intruding too much into its inter-
nalaffairs.Whiletheimperativeofgrowthde-
mandedagreaterengagementwiththeWest,
thefearoftheUSactivismonKashmirandnu-
clearissuessawDelhiturntoRussiaandChina
in search of a “multipolar world” that could
constrain American power. The BRICS forum
withRussia,China,BrazilandSouthAfricabe-
came emblematic of this strategy.
Delhisoonfoundthatdifferenceswiththe
US on Kashmir and nuclear issues were eas-
ing, thanks to George W Bush’s policies. But
Kashmir and the nuclear question became
Purushottam Agrawal
GOING BY REPORTS from Bihar, the dissatis-
faction with the Nitish Kumar government
seems quite palpable. Putting the blame on
LaluPrasad’srule,invokingmemoriesof“jun-
gleraj”doesn’tseemtobeworkingfortherul-
ing combine. On the other hand, according to
recentsurveys,atleast70percentrespondents
were satisfied with the Narendra Modi gov-
ernment’shandlingofCOVID-19,includingthe
forced migration caused by the lockdown.
Thisreflectsthesuccessof theBJP’smedia
management. It will be wise to face the fact
thatModihasbeenabletoconvincepeople—
mainlyHindus,but,mindyou,notmerelythe
upper-casteones—thataprocessofredesign-
ing the nation is under way. The basic “mal-
adies”,secularism—inwhatevermannerone
defines it — and liberalism are “being taken
care of”. Derisive worlds like “sickular” have
been put in circulation in a systematic way.
Whilemostliberalanddemocraticvoiceshave
discardedtheideaofagrandnarrativeandem-
bracedpoliticsofidentity,Modihasgoneback
to the idea of nation in a big way, convincing
many that India as a nation is under grave
threat.“Insuchasituation,‘wethenationalis-
ticIndians’mustnotcribaboutdifficultieslike
price rise, mismanagement of COVID-19 and
otherdisasters.LetusstandbythePM instead
ofsupportinghiscritics,”arguehissupporters.
Herein lies the secret of Modi’s hold on
people’s imagination. All his faults, blunders
part of India’s deepening territorial and po-
litical disputes with China. Delhi also figured
out that it was not possible for BRICS to con-
strainBeijing,sinceChinawassomuchbigger
thantheotherfourmembersputtogether.As
India’s focus inevitably shifted to the con-
structionof a“multipolarAsia”,theQuadand
its central role in constructing a stable bal-
ance of power in Asia became apparent.
That brings us into the fourth phase in
India’smultilateralismthatismarkedbythree
features — the relative rise in Delhi’s interna-
tional standing, the breakdown of the great
powerconsensusoneconomicglobalisation,
and the breakout of the US-China rivalry.
Shaken by the aggressive Chinese strat-
egytoweakentheUS-ledpost-Wararchitec-
ture,bothRepublicansandDemocratsareea-
ger to reorder international institutions. The
Trump administration has already sought to
imagine the Quad’s possibilities beyond the
defencedomain.TheinvitationtoIndiatojoin
a Five Eyes meeting earlier this month in
Tokyo on communications security came
amidstthebipartisancallsintheUSCongress
fortheexpansionof theforumandtheinclu-
sionof India.Whileanearlyexpansionof the
forumisnotonthecards,itappearsinterested
in developing wider circles of intelligence
sharing and cooperation.
The “Quad Plus” dialogue, which began
this spring at the initiative of the Trump
Administration,hasvariouslydrawninBrazil,
Israel, New Zealand, South Korea, and
Vietnam for consultations with the Quad
members on coordinating the responses to
the pandemic. Variations on this theme are
of considerable interest to the Democrats.
IndiaisalsoengagedwithJapanandAustralia
in developing resilient supply chains to re-
duce the reliance on China.
Both Republicans and Democrats are
veering around to ideas of the “free world”
coming together to set up new international
coalitionstoaddresstheemergingchallenges
from China. President Trump has proposed
the expansion of G-7 grouping to include
Australia, India, Russia and South Korea. The
Democrats are opposed to the inclusion of
Russia, and Joe Biden has promised to con-
veneasummitof majordemocraciessoonaf-
ter he takes charge.
The last few months has seen the Trump
Needed: Reinventing Nehru
Congress must work on its inability to frame issues in context of strong nation
and missteps, including demonetisation and
the abject surrender to China, are either for-
gottenorforgivenas“themanissincerelytry-
ing to save and, in fact, rebuild the nation”.
Under Modi, the BJP has perfected the RSS’s
traditionally effective communication strat-
egy.ApartfromWhatsApp,thesupposedlyre-
spectableandreliablemedialikeTVhavebeen
put in service to construct a regime of violent
“debates” and shape a “low information” and
a“low-expectationvoter”.TheCongressisnot
able to make a serious dent in Modi’s popular
appeal,despiteRahulGandhiconsistentlytalk-
ing sense, arguing rationally on issues of gov-
ernance, economy and national security.
The fundamental reason for this failure is
the inability to put issues in a framework of
preserving and strengthening the Indian na-
tion. Even the humblest and most disadvan-
taged Indian, at some level of consciousness,
is concerned with the security and future of
India. Contrary to the dominant liberal wis-
dom, the days of the “nation” are not over. In
fact,duetotheliberalobsessionwithpoliticsof
culturalidentitiesatthecostof economicand
common social issues, questions around the
nationhavecomebackwithabangalloverthe
world.Ithasbeentheoreticallyarguedthatthe
nation is just an “imagined community”.
Indeeditis,andthatiswhyitisdisastroustoig-
nore the social and moral orientation of this
imagination. A modern nation evolves out of
The consolidation of the
Quad reflects the political
will in Delhi to break free
from old shibboleths and
respond to security
imperatives. The post-Quad
era opens a new phase in
which India, for the first
time, can help shape
global institutions.
historicalmemories,whichareultimatelyne-
gotiatedinaccordancewiththekindof future
vision, the “imagination” it is built upon.
JawaharlalNehruwasoneIndian,whore-
flecteddeeplyonthesequestions.Hewasara-
tionalist,butneverdismissedemotions,senti-
ments and images associated with cultural
memories.Hedidnotdoawaywiththeimage
of Bharat Mata, but infused it with a vision of
ademocraticandinclusiveIndia.Hewasclear
that while you cannot “live in the past”, you
cannot ignore it either. Multi-level plurality is
themostbasicfactoflifeinIndiaandanyfuture
imaginedbyerasingthatpluralityisgoingtobe
a disaster. Pakistan was “taught” this lesson
within 10 years of its existence, though it re-
fusestolearn.Ironically,weseemeagertofol-
low the same path now.
“PluralityisadefiningfeatureofIndianna-
tion,butitcannotbeanexcusetotamperwith
the integrity of the nation”: This was the gist
ofthemessagethatNehruandPatelconveyed
unambiguously in the fraught years from
1947-1950.TheyrefusedtosendIndiantroops
to Kashmir unless the Maharaja signed the
InstrumentofAccessionandnippedinthebud
the designs of the Nizam, while also putting
down a communist insurgency with a firm
hand.Nehruneverlostsightof whathecalled
“India’sdestiny”—amajorroleinshapingthe
future of the world.
TheCongressseemstohavelosttouchwith
C R Sasikumar
administration promote a “Clean Network”
thateliminatesuntrustworthyvendorsfrom
telecom systems, digital apps, trans-oceanic
cables and cloud infrastructure. While it be-
gan with the targeting of Chinese suppliers
likeHuawei,CleanNetworkisnowabroader
efforttobuildsecuretechnologyecosystems
among like-minded countries.
Britain is said to be developing plans to
conveneacoalitionof10democracies,includ-
ingIndia,thatcancontributetotheconstruc-
tion of secure 5G networks and reduce the
current dependence on China. France and
Canada have invited India to join the Global
Partnershiponartificialintelligencethatnow
includes15countries.Theobjectiveistopro-
mote responsible development of AI that is
consistent with shared democratic values.
One of the most consequential develop-
ments after the US elections will be the de-
mandtoreformtheglobaltradingsystemthat
has been distorted by Chinese success in sub-
verting it. If Trump wins, his assault on the
WorldTradeOrganisationcouldbefiercerthan
now. To be sure, Biden has been supportive of
multilateralism in general. But pressure from
Trump as well as the working classes and the
progressivesinhisownpartyhavecompelled
Biden to promise there will beno return to an
ideologically driven free trade policy.
Biden has also joined Trump in empha-
sisingthecaseforanAmericanindustrialpol-
icy and “Buy American” strategy that could
run counter to the WTO rules. As Delhi em-
phasises a similar agenda for itself in build-
ing an “Atmanirbhar India”, it becomes im-
portant to engage the US on rewriting the
global trade rules.
LookingaheadtothenextUSadministra-
tion, the Quad could soon become routine
andboring.Therealexcitementwillbeabout
Delhi’s participation in the sweeping re-
arrangementof theglobalstructuresthatwill
have major consequences for India’s eco-
nomic prosperity and technological future.
Unlike in the past, Delhi now has the re-
sources, leverage and political will to make a
difference to the global order.
The writer is director, Institute of South Asian
Studies, National University of Singapore and
contributing editor on international affairs
for The Indian Express
Nehruvian nationalism. The Nehruvian “idea
of India” was not merely a tribute to the plu-
ralityanddiversityofIndiantraditionandcul-
ture;moreimportantly,itwasavisionofasen-
sitive,inclusive,justand,of course,strongand
assertivenation.ThisiswhatNehruevocatively
termed as the “discovery of India”. Whatever
the votaries of identity politics might say, the
ideaofanation,andimaginedorrealthreatsto
it, continues to haunt popular consciousness
even in post-industrial societies, not to talk of
apost-colonialsocietylikeIndia.Atstake,then,
is the core content of the idea of India as a na-
tion. To save and strengthen that content, it is
necessarytoreinventtheNehruvianapproach
to nation-building. Itcertainly does notimply
mimicry — that would turn history into
tragedy, maybe even a farce.
The point is to “reinvent” the sense of the
historical destiny of India that is so strong in
Nehru’s worldview. This idea has to live up to
the challenges of the present moment. It has
to be more inclusive in nature, more accom-
modative in approach and, at the same time,
more assertive. If India has to survive as a sec-
ulardemocracywithvibrantinstitutions,there
is no other way but to take the Nehruvian ap-
proach to nation-rebuilding.
Agrawal is a writer, historian and author of
Who is BharatMata?, an edited
collection of writings on Jawaharlal Nehru
WHAT THE OTHERS SAY
“Killed, maimed, jailed, sued, bullied and harassed in various other ways,
journalists are under growing pressure across the world. With the addition of
‘virtual violence’, threats facing the fourth estate are profound and many.”
The plural saffron
Every spoken or written word masked with
‘Hindutva’ is not the view of the RSS, which is the
civilisational concept of Hinduness
Rakesh Sinha
THEVIJAYADASHAMIFUNCTIONoftheRSS
is not just a custom — it is ideologically sig-
nificant.TheSarsanghachalakcandidlycon-
textualises the organisation’s worldview.
ThetraditionisasoldastheRSSitself.Mohan
Bhagwat’sVijayadashamispeechwillaugur
afreshdebateonvitalissuesofbeingHindu,
theHindunationandHindutva.Earlierdef-
initions and interpretations of all three cat-
egories fell prey to discursive political de-
bates which lacked historical perspective.
Hindu Mahasabha (HMS) leader V D
Savarkar’s work, Hindutva (1923) was the
first theoretical proposition on the issue. It
monopolised successive debates on these
three categories since the colonial era.
Savarkardrewthegeo-culturalboundaryof
Hindutvaobjectively.Contextually,itwasan
attempttosafeguardHindusfrombecoming
definitionally orphaned given the commu-
nal challenges posed through conversions
andbubblesofreligiousnationalities.While
abrillianttext,Hindutvaisnotthesoledeter-
minantofpastandpresentHindutvaworld-
view. The likes of Bipin Chandra Pal,
Rabindranath Tagore and S Radhakrishnan
as thinkers, and the RSS as a movement,
havetheirownimaginationofHindutvaand
the Hindu nation. The secularist discourse
disparaged this, which is intellectually im-
moral and a fraud on their part.
SecularistspaintedHindutvaasamono-
lithandacceptedsemanticvariationswithin
it,notphilosophicalones.Thishelpedthem
to impose an imaginary objective on it —
majoritarian political exclusivism. They
drew parallels between Hindutva and dis-
credited concepts like racial purity and mi-
nority subjugation. Concomitantly, they
treatedtheRSSasanappendageofthe(now
dead organisation) HMS. In this context,
Bhagwat’sspeechisaremarkableinterven-
tion to correct both sides of the contempo-
rary debate.
The RSS has never been a votary of a
theocratic state. Its founder, K B Hedgewar,
delineated a civilisational concept. Hence,
it has continued to evolve and assimilate.
Hedgewar’s perspective was informed not
by the events of his time but the long civil-
isational and spiritual arc of Hindus. His
conceptof theHindunationwas,asaresult,
not essentialist. Bhagwat contextualised
this with substantive philosophical argu-
ments. He aptly said that the identity of a
Hinduiscommensuratewiththeuniversal
virtues of humanity and it accommodates
andswallowsdiversitiesatthemicro-level.
Bhagwat stated that Hindu identity is not
derived from particularism: “‘Hindu’ is not
the name of some sect or denomination, it
is not a provincial conceptualisation, it is
neitherasinglecaste’slineagenorthepriv-
ilegeof aspecificlanguage.Itisthatpsycho-
logical common denominator whose vast
courtyard cradled human civilisation, that
whichhonoursandencompassesinnumer-
able distinct identities.” Earlier M S
Golwalkar, in an interview to the RSS daily
Motherland (1973), echoed a similar idea—
“nature abhors uniformity”.
More importantly, Bhagwat clarified
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
A FRAUD
THIS REFERS TO the report, ‘Many ways
to dupe a poor student: steal IDs, lie
aboutsourceof funds,pocketmostof it-
allofficially'’(IE,November2).Scamsare
a hallmark of a corrupt system. But for
theIndianExpressinvestigationthecon-
spiracybytouts,schoolandbankofficials
and government officials to siphon off
crores of scholarship money from
Jharkhand students would not have
come to light. It also reflects digital di-
vide in the society, where a supposedly
better system of direct digital transfer
could be easily manipulated for fraud.
L R Murmu, Delhi
WORK FOR PEOPLE
THIS REFERS TO the editorial, ‘Hand and
sickle’(IE,November2).BoththeCPI(M)
and the Congress appear to be facing an
existential crisis in West Bengal. An al-
liancethatwasnota“politicaloptionbut
a necessity” needs to emerge as a viable
alternative to both the ruling TMC and
the BJP by launching a joint movement
on a host of issues and shifting its focus
andconcentrateonissuesthataffectthe
lives of common people.
S S Paul, Nadia
SYSTEM NEEDED
THISREFERSTOthearticle,‘Officesatwar’
(IE, November 2). The enormous faith of
thepeopleofIndiainthequality,integrity,
New Delhi
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
— DAILY STAR, BANGLADESH
what seem like semantic variations in the
ideological lexicon. For example, many be-
lieve that “Hindu” is a synonym for
“Bhartiya”. He states that “there may be
some who have an objection in accepting
this term. We do not object to they using
other words if the content in their mind is
the same”. The content is more important
than the container.
Secularists have intellectually coerced
the historical nuances of Hindus and
Hindutva. This is evident from colonial-era
census reports, which show a serious en-
deavour by scholars to understand what it
meanstobeaHindu.Inthesecondall-India
censusin1881,JamesAustinBourdillon,the
census superintendent, asked, “What is a
Hindu?” In 1911, L S S O’Malley, census su-
perintendent of Bengal and Orissa, found
suchexercisesfutile.The1921censusreport
of Punjab and Patiala mentioned Rev. W W
Wilkins’ understanding of being a Hindu:
“In fact, Hinduism is not a religion but a
groupof religionsinwhichdiversereligious
beliefsarecompoundedtogether.Nosingle
mancanbeascribedastheoriginatorof this
religion.Whateverreligionwasprevalentin
pre-historic time in India and whatever
changes wrought with the tide of civilisa-
tion… should be considered as Hinduism.”
Bhagwat conceptualised Hindu Rashtra
as an adjective for the collective of Hindus.
Hesaid:“HinduRashtraisnotapoliticalcon-
cept.”Buthealsoleavesanunsaidquestion:
Do the followers of Islam and Christianity,
twomajorfaithsinIndia,accommodatethe
cultural and civilisational journey of India
from time immemorial or does their exclu-
sivism not allow their secularisation?
Exclusivism is incompatible with diversity
andassimilation.Wehaveinstancesofforce-
fullyconvertedpeoplenotabandoningtheir
culturalandspiritualtraditions.However,ex-
clusivists considered such traits as violating
“religiouspurity”.CELuard,superintendent
of Census Operation in Central India, 1901,
wrote: “It is notatfirst sight always possible
to distinguish between a Hindu and a
Mohammedanwedding.”Thecensusreport
of1921givesanotherinstanceofthemerger
of tradition and religious practices: The
Dudekula—acommunitynumbering71,612
people — performed shastra puja on Bakrid,
as many do on Dussehra, and adopted both
Hindu and Mohammedan names.
Hindutvaisapolitico-culturalresponse
toSemiticpejorativesandtheirprogramme
toimpactthereligiousdemographyandun-
brokenhistoricaljourneyofIndia.Savarkar’s
work is a part of this, but the ideological re-
sponsehasmanystrands.TheRSS,inthisre-
gard, has acquired hegemony.
Contemporary scholars of the history of
ideas err in taking the definitions of the pe-
riphery as the core of the ideology.
Bhagwat has a message for the other
side too: Every spoken or written word
masked with “Hindutva” is not the view of
the RSS, which is the civilisational concept
of Hinduness. And while the organisation
is prepared to safeguard its plurality of
ideas and practices, it cannot fall prey to
narrow ideological battles. The RSS em-
bracesthinkersandorganisationswhosig-
nificantly contribute to the discourse but
it is not the appendix of any organisation,
living or dead. Our challenge multiplies
with the growing shadow of the organisa-
tion on policies, politics and the public. But
political discourse cannot confine the RSS
to its narrow lane.
The writer is BJP Rajya Sabha MP
IDEAS
ONLINE
ONLY IN THE EXPRESS
● BENARASI THUGS
AND PAKISTANI
POLITICS:
RAHUL TRIPATHI
● THE LONGWINTER
OF AMERICANDISCONTENT:
PRAVINPRAKASH
www.indianexpress.com
andefficiencyofthejudiciaryasaninsti-
tution has remained unshattered since
Independence. Our learned judges’ im-
peccable character and conduct have
beenbeyondquestion.Indiahasbeenfor-
tunatetohavescholarlyandenlightened
minds adoring the title of justices in this
country.Indiacannotwaitforanappoint-
ment to go wrong before initiating the
processofinstitutionalisationofthesys-
tem of appointment of judges to the
higher judiciary and continue with its
glorious tradition of elevating the best
and the brightest in the country to the
high offices in the judiciary.
Sudip Kumar Dey, Kolkata
 12 EXPRESS NETWORK WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020

‘Centralagenciesexceeding
Bengal madrasa
teacher held for
Violin maestro T N Krishnan dies

jurisdictiontomalignstategovt’
‘raising funds,
bid to recruit for
Al-Qaeda’: NIA
EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
THE NATIONAL Investigation
Agency (NIA) has arrested a
madrasa teacher from
Murshidabad in West Bengal for
allegedly being part of an Al-
Qaeda module operating out of
the state and Kerala. Abdul
MominMondal,32,wasarrested
by the agency on Sunday for al-
legedly “trying to recruit new
membersforthegroup”andrais-
ing funds.
“Investigation
revealed that ac-
cused, Abdul
Momin Mondal,
was working as a
teacher in Raipur
Abdul Darul Huda
Momin Islamia Madrassa
Mondal in Murshidabad
district... and was
found to be in-
volved in a series of conspirator-
ial meetings convened by the
members of the Al-Qaeda mod-
ule. He was also trying to recruit
newmembersforthegroupand
was raising funds for furthering
its terrorist activities. The resi-
dential premises of the accused
person were searched and digi-
tal devices were seized,” an NIA
statement said.
Thisistheeleventh arrest the
agency has made since
September when it first appre-
hended nine members of the al-
leged module based on intelli-
gence inputs. According to NIA,
thecase“pertainstoanti-national
activities by a group of jihadi ter-
roristsconsistingof morethan10
members inspired by globally
proscribed terrorist organisation
Al-Qaeda, who were planning to
carryoutanti-nationalandterror-
ist activities at different locations
inIndia,including,butnotlimited
toWestBengal,DelhiandKerala.”
The agency had arrested the
nine accused — who were al-
SHAJU PHILIP
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM,
NOVEMBER 2
WITH A few key projects of the
CPI(M)-led LDF government in
KeralaunderthescanneroftheED
and other central agencies, Chief
Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on
Monday said that central investi-
gating agencies probing the gold
smuggling case are “exceeding
their jurisdiction to malign and
destabilise an elected state gov-
ernment.’’
Vijayan told the media that
these agencies have exceeded
their authority and their actions
are a clear violation of the federal
norms of the country.
Hesaid:“Idon’twanttoblame
Goa college stands by prof,
tells ABVP will not sack her
SMITA NAIR
PANAJI, NOVEMEBR 2
FOLLOWING an inquiry on a
complaint by ABVP against a po-
litical science teacher of a law
college in Panaji, the college has
sent a written response to the
students' outfit, stating that it
does not have a “locus standi” to
raisesuchobjections,andthatno
termination order will be issued
against the teacher concerned.
Prof Shabir Ali, principal of
VM Salgaocar College of Law in
Panaji, said the response was
mailedthrougharegisteredpost
on Saturday.
“This is a law college. We
havetheresponsibilitytoensure
that we follow rules. Legally, too,
Raise issue of violence against Hindus
Pinarayi
Vijayan
any agency or any official. But I
wanttomakeclearcertainthings
whenprofessionalstandardsgen-
erally accepted by investigative
agenciesarebeingsubvertedand
investigations are being diverted
to suit certain vested interests.’’
After Vijayan’s former princi-
palsecretaryMSivasankarwasar-
restedinthegoldsmugglingcase,
theEDhasbroughtunderitsscan-
ner Kerala-Fiber Optic Network
(K-Fon) project and e-mobility
project, earlier handled by
SivasankarasthestateITsecretary
it is not possible to accept their
representation,” he stated.
Last week, the ABVP had
complained against Prof Shilpa
Singh,statingthatshe“promotes
socially hateful thoughts about
aparticularreligion, community
and group of people” and had
asked the college to terminate
her services.
Ali said an internal grievance
committeetooknoteof thecom-
plaint and sought Singh's re-
sponse. Singh replied that she
feels“threatenedandalarmedat
this insistence of intimidation
against my person through this
representation, which seems
barelyanydifferentfromaveiled
threat...”
“For any enquiry there is a
probeintotheevidence.Hereev-
for the last four years. Besides, fi-
nancial transactions in a housing
projectofthegovernment,imple-
mented with the funding of
EmiratesRedCrescent,isalsobe-
ing probed by central agencies.
Vijayan said a situation has
arisenwherecentralprobeagen-
cies are responsible for analysing
policies and programmes of the
state government, which is in no
way acceptable to those who be-
lieveindemocraticvaluesandre-
spect the Constitution. Some of
these agencies are encroaching
intoexecutivepowersofthestate
government and the scrutiny of
constitutionalinstitutions,hesaid.
“It is a violation of their own
jurisdiction and thereby an en-
croachment on the Constitution.
This is undemocratic and uncon-
idence is missing. They say they
have problems with her teach-
ing and have not shared any ev-
idence with us. Where is the
clip.... The committee has de-
cided no action can be taken
based on an allegation not
backed by evidence,” Ali said.
Hesaid,“She(Singh)isanex-
cellent teacher and her students
have always been happy with
herteaching.Ourcommitteehas
come to the conclusion that no
one outside this college has any
locus stand to raise such objec-
tions.” The letter by ABVP was
signed by its Konkan unit joint
secretary Prabha Naik, who Ali
said is "not a student of the col-
lege".
FULLREPORTON
www.indianexpress.com
stitutional and it cannot be al-
lowed.Thestategovernmentwill
make necessary interventions
within the existing legal frame-
work,” he said.
Vijayan said when the state
urged the Centre for a concerted
and comprehensive probe into
thegoldsmugglingcase,thestate
government had a legitimate ex-
pectation that the investigation
would go through proper legal
channels.“Someinterventionson
part of these agencies have cast
doubt on whether our expecta-
tionsweremisplaced.Itlookslike
theinvestigatingagenciesarefol-
lowing a predetermined path
scriptedbyfewpeopleoutsidethe
agency. This is a serious situation
wheresuchactionswouldunder-
mine their credibility.’’
Tying rakhi as
bail condition:
AG for gender
sensitisation
EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
ATTORNEY GENERAL K K
Venugopal on Monday ex-
pressed his disapproval of the
bail condition in a Madhya
PradeshHighCourtorder,asking
anaccusedinacaseof attemptto
outragethemodestyof awoman
to visit the home of the alleged
victim with his wife and request
her to tie him a rakhi.
“So far as present case is con-
cerned,onthefaceof it,thecourt
seemstohavebeencarriedaway.
Courts must restrict themselves
toconditionsundersections437
and 438 (of the Code is Criminal
Procedure).Allthisdrama...needs
to be condemned,” Venugopal
tolda bench,headedbyJusticeA
M Khanwilkar and comprising
ARUN JANARDHANAN
CHENNAI, NOVEMBER 2
LEGENDARY VIOLINIST T N
Krishnan died at the age of 92 in
Chennai on Monday evening.
Though he was in good
health, Krishnan felt sudden un-
easinessintheeveninganddied,
said Ramanathan Iyer, a
Chennai-based music event or-
ganiser who is close to
Krishnan’s family. T N Krishnan taught at the Chennai Music College and was
Iyer said they celebrated his later the Dean at Delhi University’s School of Music and Fine
birthday last month. “He was Arts. Ramanathan Iyer
healthy. Even in recent days, he
was seen watching videos of
rasikas and his discipleswishing Chennai since 1942. He is sur- performanceoneveryChristmas
him a happy birthday,” Iyer said. vived by his wife Kamala, and morningforseveralyears,where
Honoured with several daughter Viji and son Sriram — he used to play “wish you a
awards,includingtheSangeetha both are violinists. merry Christmas” and “jingle
Kalanidhi, Padma Bhushan and “There was nobody who bells,jinglebells”topackedaudi-
Padma Vibhushan, Krishnan could match his experience, he ences. After his death, his fans
started out as a child prodigy was lucky to play with every were seen sharing videos of his
with help from his father and other legend since the 1940s. It Christmas performance on so-
was later seen as a veteran as he was a remarkable life,” said Iyer. cial media.
began accompanying legendary Krishnan’s death is a huge Besideshavingprominentvi-
musicians, including Ariyakudi loss even for ordinary music olinists as disciples, who fondly
Ramanuja Iyengar, Alathur lovers in Chennai, who used to remember him as a “guru” who
brothers, Chembai Vaidyanatha waitfornotjusthisclassicalcon- was kind enough to ensure ca-
Bhagavatar, M D Ramanathan
and Maharajapuram
Viswanatha Iyer, to perform-
certsbut also the mandatory an-
nual Christmas performance. To
the surprise of many puritans in
reer opportunities for them,
Krishnan also had an academic
stint — he taught at the Chennai
ances.
Born in 1928 in Tripunithura
in Kerala, he had been living in
Chennai, the morning slot of
Chennai Music Academy was
booked by default for Krishnan’s
Music College and was later the
DeanatDelhiUniversity’sSchool
of Music and Fine Arts.
Assam ex-CM
TRACKING INDIA’S COVID CURVE
Tarun Gogoi in
245 CASES: RECOVERED: 75,44,798
hospital again
DAYS SINCE
PANDEMIC
82,29,313 DEATHS: 1,22,607
BEGAN TESTS: 11,07,43,103 | DOUBLING RATE: 127.00** Guwahati: A week after his dis-
charge from a hospital post-
COVID-19 recovery, former
Assam Chief Minister Tarun
Gogoi has been admitted to a
state-run facility again and put
on ventilator support as his
health condition has deterio-
rated, a doctor treating him said
KEYSTATES TOTAL SURGEIN 7-DAYAVG DOUBLING on Monday.
TOWATCH CASES 24HOURS GROWTH* TIME** The 86-year-old Congress
■ Maharashtra 16,83,775 5,369 0.33% 216.08 politician complained of rest-
■ Karnataka 8,27,064 3,652 0.43% 169.02 lessness on Sunday night, fol-
■ Andhra 8,25,966 2,618 0.33% 216.87 lowing which he was taken to
the intensive care unit (ICU) of
■ Tamil Nadu 7,27,026 2,504 0.36% 200.44 Gauhati Medical College and
■ Kerala 4,40,130
* Compounded Daily Growth Rate over last 7 days
7,025 1.63% 44.07
** Calculated over 7-day growth
Hospital (GMCH), superinten-
dent of the health facility Abhijit

in Bangladesh, Adhir urges Centre

legedly operating out of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Sarma told reporters here.
MurshidabadinWestBengaland Dinesh Maheshwari. CASE FATALITY RATIO POSITIVITY RATE DAILY IN, DAILY OUT Gogoihadfirsttestedpositive
Ernakulam in Kerala — on Venugopalsuggestedthatpro- for COVID-19 on August 25 and
7 DAYS EARLIER: 7 DAYS EARLIER: DETECTED TODAY
September19andhadrecovered Brahmanbarhia district in grammesoftheNationalandstate was admitted to the hospital the
country-made pistols, rudimen- ENS & PTI Bangladesh were vandalised on judicial Academy must have ses- 1.50 7.65 47,231 next day. His health condition
tary body armour, batteries, KOLKATA, NOVEMBER 2 Adhir Ranjan Sunday and over 100 houses be- sions on gender sensitisation. NOW: NOW: RECOVERED TODAY: had deteriorated on August 31
switches and firecrackers, litera- Chowdhury longing to Hindus were looted. Lecturesshouldalsobeorganised 1.49 7.43 53,285 with a sudden fall in oxygen sat-
ture on home-made IEDs and CONGRESS LEADER in the Lok “ItisreportedthatHindufam- for the judges by the SC’s gender Deaths as a ratio of Positives against Becoming sick vs uration level. He was adminis-
other “incriminating material”. Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury iliesinBangladeshhavebeentar- sensitisation committee, he said. positive cases (in %); number tested recovering; more tered plasma therapy and be-
Barring two, all the accused on Monday urged the Centre to ples were allegedly vandalised geted... as a reprisal of the stand Thebenchsaidtheexerciseof indicator of progress (in %); indicator of recoveries for 14 days came stable later. He was
in averting deaths the spread of disease may signal the peak
areeitherdailywagelabourersor takeupwithBangladeshtheissue andHindufamiliesinBangladesh taken by our government. The discretion about conditions for discharged on October 25 after
DataasonNovember1,releasedbyUnionMinistryofHealth,ICMRandstates.Oftendailynumbers
low wage earners. One of the ac- of alleged “violence against became“victimsofarsonandloot Indian government should take bail in such cases needs to be de- includedatafrompreviousdays.Assuch,trendsbasedondailynumbersareindicative,notdefinitive undergoing treatment and was
cusedisacomputersciencegrad- Hindus” in that country. by fundamentalist forces.” uptheissuewithBangladeshgov- liberated. The court, it said, can under observation. PTI
uate while another is pursuing Chowdhury referred to recent According to media reports, ernment immediately so as to then define what is permissible,
graduation in Arts. media reports that claimed tem- temples at Nasirnagar in prevent further escalation,” what is not or where discretion
Chowdhury said in a statement.
After the violence, two tem-
can be exercised.
Thebenchwashearinganap-
Rlys considers restarting Bengal local trains
ples in adjacent Madhabpur in pealbyninewomenlawyerswho Kolkata: Railways authorities are centofthenormalserviceswhich andthenumberof trainswasbe-
ysu ua0 &1] r:.k fogkj] eksFkjksokyk jksM] nsgjknwu& 248001 Phone no/fax: 0135-2671940 Mail id : eemdujs@rediffmail.com Habigunjalsocameunderattack, said“itreflectsthetrivialisationof keenonresuminglocaltrainserv- willbeslowlyincreasedto25per ing worked out and a final deci-
ia=kd 3072@bZ&fufonk@2020&21 fnukad% 02-11-2020 the report said. Six people were a heinous crime through a sim- icesinWestBengalat50percent cent,theysaid.Afinaldecisionwill siononresumptionoftheservices
bZ& fufonk lwpuk arrested for alleged involvement plistic stereotypical solution”. passenger strength, officials said be taken at a meeting with the andthedatewouldbetakenafter
eq[; egkizcU/kd] mÙkjk[k.M ty laLFkku] nsgjknwu dh vksj ls fuEufyf[kr dk;ksZa gsrq bZ&fufonk] Vw&fcM flLVe (rduhdh fcM ,oa andsecurityforcesweredeployed Fixing the matter for hearing on Monday after a meeting with state government on November a meeting with the state govern-
dkWef'kZ;y fcM) ds vk/kkj ij fuEukuqlkj vkefU=r dh tkrh gS%& at Nasirnagar and Madhabpur onNovember27,thecourtasked top state government officials. 5. Chief Secretary Alapan ment. On Sunday, the Railways
fufonk dk;Z fooj.k /kjksgj fufonk izi= bZ&fufonk izi= rduhdh fcM fufonk Upazilaheadquarterstomaintain theAGandotherstosubmittheir Initially,theyweretargetingtore- Bandyopadhyaysaidplanningre- alsowrotealettertothestateand
la0 /kujkf'k MkmuyksM viyksM [kksys tkus dh dh law and order, the report said. suggestions. sume operations with 10-20 per garding ticketing, route selection expressed its readiness. ENS
djus dh frfFk djus dh vafre frfFk ,oa le; oS/krk
,oa le; frfFk ,oa le;
1- 2- 3- 4- 5- 6- 7- GOVERNMENT OF MANIPUR HARYANA
1- fodkl[k.M jk;iqj dh /kksj.k is;ty 60000.00 06.11.2020 19.11.2020 20.11.2020 90 DIRECTORATE OF TOURISM
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From
11:00 a.m.
Upto
5:00 p.m.
From
11:00 a.m.
Days
NOTICE INVITING TENDER Second sero survey finds Covid
Imphal, the 2nd November, 2020
vgZrk%& fufonk gsrq 'kk[kkesaMh Js.kh vFkok blls mPp Js.kh esa iathd`r Bsdsnkj@QeZ gh fufonk esa izfrHkkx djus gsrq ik= gksxk A
uksV& bZ&fufonk ls lEcfU/kr leLr tkudkfj;ka o 'krsZ mRRkjk[k.M jkT; dh osclkbZV www.uktenders.gov.in ij vkWuykbZu
No. 4/566/2020-DTSM: In pursuance of the approval conveyed by the Government vide antibodies in 14.8% population
letter No. 29/1/2020-TSM (Mega) dated 26.10.2020, the Directorate of Tourism,
ns[kh@izkIr dh tk ldrh gSA
vf/k'kklh vfHk;ark Goverment of Manipur invites e-bids from intending reputed Firms/ Agency/ Company for districts were found to have
selection of Project, Management Consultant for “Loktak Lake Eco-Tourism Project” EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE highest positivity rate of 25.5
Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences (INMAS) under EAP funding. CHANDIGARH, NOVEMBER 2 per cent. Urban areas of
(Defence Research and Development Organisation; DRDO) Sl.No. Name of RFP Faridabad, Yamunanagar and
THE SECOND Sero Survey in Panipat districts had the highest
Brig SK Mazumdar Marg, Timarpur, Delhi-110054 1 Selection of Project Management Consultant for “Loktak Lake Eco-Tourism Project” Haryana, results of which were sero-positivity rates, i.e. 40.2%,
Ph: 011-23905216 Fax: 011-2391 9509 Detailed, Request for Proposal (RFP) documents containing information on eligibility, declared Monday, has found 37.1% and 36.3%, respectively.”
Supply of Print & Electronic Journals for 3 years (2021-2023) dates and timelines, required formats etc shall be available in our website Covid-19 antibodies in 14.8 per The second survey was con-
Defence eProcurement Portal Tender ID: 2020_DRDO_389023_1 cent of the population. ductedinOctober,whilethefirst
www.manipurtourism.gov.in and the Government website www.manipur.gov.in,
F. No. INMAS/TIRC/1774/Journals-2021 Dated 22/10/2020 Dr Usha Gupta, DHS (IDSP), happened in August. NCR dis-
www.manipurtenders.gov.in from 03.11.2020 onwards. said, “A total of 16,512 samples tricts had high Sero-postivity —
The Director, INMAS on behalf of the President of India hereby invites e- Further, the bidding shall be online and all interested firms/Organizations and were collected from across the 25.8 per cent in Faridabad, 20.3
tenders from eligible bidders through e-procurement for entering into rate Companies etc shall apply the bid through online at www.manipurtenders.gov.in. state following all safety meas- per cent in Nuh, 13.3 per cent in
contract of Indian Agent for the supply of Foreign and Indian periodicals in print Sd/- ures and other lab standards. Sonipat and 10.8 per cent in
and electronic format for INMAS Library-TIRC from reputed vendors for a three- (W. Ibohal Singh) Seroprevalencefoundinthesec- Gurugram.
Director (Tourism), Manipur ond round of Sero survey shows Health Minister Anil Vij said,
year term (2021-2023). A complete set of bidding documents in English may be
that overall Sero positivity of “This second round was carried
downloaded from website: https://defproc.gov.in/nicgep/app (Defence SARSCoV-2 in the state is 14.8 out with the aim to identify the
eProcurement Portal Tender ID: 2020_DRDO_389023_1). The Director INMAS per cent, while in the first round further penetration of Covid-19
reserves the right to reject any or all tender without assigning any reason what it was 8 per cent. The SARSCoV- at the community level and
so ever. 2 Sero positivity observed in ur- monitor its transmission trends
For any clarification/difficulty regarding e-tendering process flow, please ban areas is 19.8%, while in ru- so that proper measures can be
ral areas it was 11.4%. The same taken to control its spread.”
contact on 011-23905159. Important dates are: was 9.6 per cent and 6.9 per cent “Surveywasconductedinall
1. Last date and time for uploading the Proposals: On 25/11/2020 respectively in the first round. 22 districtsin collaboration with
(dd/mm/yyyy) at 1200 Hrs. Ruralareasof FaridabadandJind PGIMS, Rohtak,” he added.
The Online Bid (both Techno-Commercial and Price bid, in case two bids are
called for) should be submitted online by the due date and time only at
Defence eProcurement Portal website: https://defproc.gov.in/nicgep/app. ''IMPORTANT'' Assam: Family
The responsibility to ensure this lies with the Bidder. Manual bids shall not Whilst care is taken prior to
acceptance of advertising of 5 found dead,
be accepted.
2. Location of the Tender Box for submitting Original documents i.e.
copy, it is not possible to verify
its contents. The Indian police say suicide
Express (P) Limited cannot be
Tender Fee, EMD, Literature etc.: Main Gate Reception, INMAS, DRDO, held responsible for such Guwahati:A45-year-oldman,his
Ministry of Defence, Brig SK Majumdar Road, Timarpur, Delhi-110054 contents, nor for any loss or wife and three daughters were
3. Time and Date for Opening of Bids: On 26/11/2020 (dd/mm/yyyy) at 1200 damage incurred as a result of
found hanging in Assam’s
transactions with companies,
Hrs. If due to any exigency, the due date for opening of the bids is declared associations or individuals Kokrajhar district on Monday.
a closed holiday, the bids wilt be opened on the next working day at the same advertising in its newspapers Police have said the family com-
time or on any other day/time. or Publications. We therefore mittedsuicideduetoalargedebt
recommend that readers incurred by the man but locals
4. Place of opening of the online submitted Proposals: Tender Opening make necessary inquiries suspect they were murdered.
Room, MMG, INMAS, Delhi. before sending any monies or Police said Nirmal Paul (45),
(Officer-in-Charge, Library-TIRC) entering into any agreements
with advertisers or otherwise
his wife Mallika (40) and their
For Director acting on an advertisement in daughterswerefoundhangingat
davp 10301/11/0086/2021 For & On behalf of President of India any manner whatsoever. theirhomeinTulsibil.Paulwasa
sub-dealerof anLPGagency. ENS

New Delhi
 E EXPLAINED
13
On Election Day and Night in the United States, watch
the battleground states that will decide the next
incumbent of the White House. But barring a landslide
for one of the candidates, do not expect an early result.
SHUBHAJITROY
NEWDELHI,NOVEMBER2
THE ELECTION of the President of the United
States is considered the world’s most conse-
quentialdemocraticexercise.Thisisespecially
true of Election 2020 — as the US is more di-
vided than at any other time in its recent his-
tory,theplanetfacesanexistentialthreatfrom
catastrophicclimatechange,newgeopolitical
forcesarethreateningtoupendthebalanceof
global power, and a once-in-a-century pan-
demic has delivered a shock to economies.
Tomorrow, November 3, is a momentous
day — for the US and the world.
AsElectionDayandNightunfolds,thebat-
tleforthe270ElectoralCollegevotesneededto
win the White House will boil down to how
President Donald Trump and his Democratic
challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden,
performinwhatarecalledthe“battleground”
or“swing”states.Butthereisarealpossibility
that the result of the election may be delayed
— and that there is no clear winner until late
onElectionNight.Along-drawn-outlegalbat-
tlemayfollowand,intheworstcasescenario,
potential violence and unrest in the streets.
Asyouwatchtheelection,lookoutforwhat
happensinthebattlegroundstates—andkeep
in mind that the drama you see may actually
last longer than just one night.
Whyarebattlegroundstatesimportant?
Battleground or swing states hold the key
to a candidate’s fate. These are called swing
statesbecausetheyhaveahistoryofswinging
back and forth between the two main politi-
calparties,theRepublicansandtheDemocrats.
To use an example from India, an American
swingstatewouldbelikethestateofKerala—
which has swung between the Left and the
Congress in elections.
Swing states have populations that are al-
most equally divided politically. Presidential
candidates often focus all their energies on
these states, sometimes skipping altogether
thesolidblue(Democratic)orred(Republican)
states that are expected to inevitably go one
way or the other. Both Trump and Biden have
targeted these states during their campaigns.
Americans do not vote directly for the
President. They choose members of the
ElectoralCollegewhothenmeetinDecember
and cast their votes based on how the major-
ityofvotersintheirstatehadvoted.Thenum-
berofElectoralCollegevotesforeachstateare
fixed on the basis of its population. There are
538 Electoral College votes, and a candidate
needs at least 270 to enter the White House.
Analysts identify 10-12 states as battle-
grounds in US Presidential Elections. For the
election of November 3, the toughest battles
arelikelytobefoughtinsixof these.TheCook
PoliticalReportidentifiesArizona(11Electoral
College votes), Florida (29), Michigan (16),
Pennsylvania(20),andWisconsin(10),astoss-
ups. Most analysts also throw North Carolina
(15 Electoral College votes) into the mix.
ThebiggestswingstateisFlorida—itisalso
among the most sharply politically divided
CORONAVIRUS DASHBOARD
Impact of school closure on
student learning, quantified
HOW MUCH has the clo-
sure of schools induced by
the Covid-19 pandemic
impacted student learn-
ing? A study by American
researchers,publishedlast
week, has quantified the
PAPER
impact, projected to the
end of the academic year. CLIP
Whiletheprojectionshave
been made for US schools, NEW RESEARCH
which have reopened in
somestatesduringtheautumn,concerns Formathematics,theyestimatedthatthe
around setbacks to learning are univer- studentsstartedtheautumnclasseswith
sal. In India, a number of states have be- 37% to 50% of the typical annual learning
gun to reopen or announced dates for re- gains. This reduced learning was not uni-
opening school for senior classes. versal;theresearchersestimatedthatthe
The US study is published in top one-third of students potentially
Educational Researcher, a journal of the made gains in reading.
American Educational Research
Association. It uses a model that assumes imply that educators and policymakers
that school closures in spring 2020 func- will need to address that many students
tionedasanextendedsummerbreak,and are substantially behind academically as
providespreliminaryprojectionsoftheim- a result of extended school closures.
pactof theseclosuresonstudentlearning.
The takeaway: Compared to a typical
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
Sleepless tonight:
Guide to tracking the results
states in the US. Florida swings between the
major parties — Democrat Bill Clinton carried
the state in 1996, Republican George W Bush
in2000and2004,DemocratBarackObamain
2008and2012,andRepublicanDonaldTrump
in2016.The‘SunshineState’isspecialalsobe-
cause it is seen as a bellwether state — except
for1992,whenitsidedwithincumbentGeorge
HWBush,Floridahasvotedwiththewinning
candidateineveryelectionfrom1964(Lyndon
B Johnson) to 2016 (Trump).
InbeatingHillaryClinton,Trumpalsowon
Pennsylvania,Michigan,andWisconsin,albeit
with small margins. This time, analysts feel
Pennsylvania will be the “tipping point”.
Thecomplicationisthis:threeofthebattle-
ground states — Pennsylvania, Michigan, and
Wisconsin — will not begin counting early
votesuntilElectionDay,whichmeansitislikely
that final results and projections will not be
possible that night. But North Carolina and
Arizonahavebeguncountingballots,andthese
states are likely to be called on Election Night.
Whyistheresuchuncertaintyaroundthe
election?
Muchoftheuncertaintystemsfromthefact
that the election is taking place in the middle
ofthepandemic,whichhaskilledover231,000
Americans, and fundamentally altered voting
behaviourandthecontextof theelection.
Alargenumberofvoters—over96million
until Monday night in India — have voted
through mail-in ballots and early voting (to
avoidthecrowdsonNovember3).Becauseof
the time taken in receiving, processing and
countingthelargenumbersofpostalvotes(see
FAQs),andthefactthatprojectionsmaynotbe
possibleinseveralbattlegroundstates,aclear
winner may not emerge on Election Night.
Election officials in swing states like
Pennsylvania and Michigan have said they
hope to finish counting within three days.
The one way one can hope for a quick re-
sult on Election Night is if one side wins by a
landslide — racing to 270, and making the
countingofvotesinindividualstatesirrelevant.
Butitthatdoesnothappen,andTrumpde-
cides to contest the outcome — his campaign
has already prepared legal teams to fight in
case of a close call and he loses by a slim mar-
gin — the courts will come into play.
Trumphasalreadysaidthathewouldwant
the Supreme Court to play a proactive role in
caseofadisputedelection.Thehurriedconfir-
mation of Justice Amy Coney Barrett to the
Supreme Court literally days before Election
Daywasaimedatafullnine-justicecourtwith
aclearconservativebias,whichTrumpwould
be hoping would adjudicate in his favour.
IfElectionNightdragsintodaysandweeks
—followinglitigation—thesituationcouldbe-
come messier, and apprehensions have been
expressed about a law and order situation.
There is been no precedent of a President
refusingtoconcedetheelection.ButTrumpis
different — he has never confirmed he would
accepttheelectionresultifheloses,andthatis
the reason many fear the transfer of power,
should the contest be tight and Trump loses
narrowly, may not be peaceful.
year, students likely did not
gain as much academically
during the truncated 2019–20
school year, and likely lost
more of those gains due to the
extended time out of school.
Theauthorsestimatedthat
returning students likely
started school this fall (au-
tumn) with approximately
63% to 68% of the typical an-
nual learning gains in reading.
Theresearcherssaidtheseprojections
ENS & American Educational
Research Association
RACE FOR THE WHITE HOUSE
During the early voting stage, campaign signs near a polling station in
Pinellas County in Largo, Florida. Reuters
TOTAL ELECTORAL COLLEGE VOTES: 538
212
SOLIDORLIKELY
DEMOCRATIC
BATTLEGROUND STATES
WHAT THE POLLS ARE SAYING
TEXAS
COULD BE CALLED ON NOV 3
FLORIDA
GEORGIA
NORTH
CAROLINA
ARIZONA
MINNESOTA*
NEVADA*
PENNSYLVANIA
COULD BE DELAYED
OHIO
MICHIGAN
WISCONSIN
IOWA
■ E l e c t o r a l C o l l e g e Vo t e s ■ B i d e n ■ T r u m p
CNNPOLLOFPOLLSTRACKINGAVERAGEPOLLRESULTSOFALLLARGE,MOST
RECENTPOLLSINTHEUS.POLLRESULTSFROMNOVEMBER1ANDOCTOBER31
Solid/likely assessments by The New York Times
Malabar Navy Exercise: purpose, participants
KRISHN KAUSHIK
NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2
PHASE1of theMalabarNavalExercisekicks
off on Tuesday, with participation of
Australiannavyforthe first time since 2007.
Alookatwhattheexerciseisabout,andwhy
it is particularly significant this year.
What is Malabar Exercise?
It is a multilateral naval exercise that in-
cludes simulated war games and combat
manoeuvres. It started in 1992 as a bilateral
exercise between the Indian and US navies.
Japan joined in 2015. This year the exercise
will be held in two phases, the first from
Tuesday off the coast near Visakhapatnam,
and the second in the Arabian Sea in mid-
November. Last year it was held in early
September off the coast of Japan.
This year’s Malabar Exercise has been
planned on a “non-contact-at sea” format
keeping Covid-19 protocols in mind.
What is the difference this year?
For the first time in over a decade, the
exercise will see the participation of all four
Quad countries. In a statement last month,
the Defence Ministry had said that “as India
seeks to increase cooperation with other
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
@ieExplained
#ExpressExplained
If there are questions of current or contemporary relevance that you would like
explained, please write to explained@indianexpress.com
FAQs: Essential
Election Day knowledge
state polls, and is widely favoured to win. But
EXPRESSNEWSSERVICE nopollhaspredictedthatTrumpwilldefinitely
NEWDELHI,NOVEMBER2 lose. Nate Silver, perhaps the most influential
of forecasters, reminded everyone on Sunday
When do the polls open and close? that in his projection, the President has a 10%
IT VARIES from state to state. The earliest they chanceofretainingtheWhiteHouse,notzero.
open is 6 am, and the latest the close is 9 pm He could have a 2016 moment again in the
local time on November 3. India is between ElectoralCollege.Biden’sleadinPennsylvania,
10½ and 13½ hours ahead, depending on which according to some forecasts is the tip-
whereintheUSyou’relooking.However,early ping-point state, is 5 points — “solid but not
votinghasbeenopensincemid-September— spectacular”,accordingtoSilver.Pennsylvania
and by Monday night India time, over 96 mil- and Florida will together give Trump 49
lionAmericanshadalreadycasttheirvotes,ei- Electoral College votes, a tally Biden can over-
ther in person or by returned mail ballots, ac- takeonlyifhewinsalloftheremaining4toss-
cording to the US Elections Project. ups — Michigan, North Carolina, Arizona,
Wisconsin—anddoeswellinotherstates,too.
Whenwillthevotesbecounted? Also, polling errors do happen — all fore-
Unlike India’s Election Commission, there
isnofederalbodyintheUSthatrunstheelec-
casterswerewrongin2016.Andnooneisrul-
ing out the possibility that Trump may seek
270 125 tion or tallies the results. Each state runs the
election according to its own rules. Although
moststatesallowelectronic
some sort of “illegitimate” path to victory, al-
though that scenario has many mind-bog-
gling unknowns.
VOTESNEEDEDTO SOLIDORLIKELY
REACHWHITEHOUSE REPUBLICAN methods, paper ballots are
the norm across the coun- So,isfraudexpected?
try. Ahead of counting
comes a stage called pro-
Trumphasforlong,and
repeatedly, accused the
cessing, which involves Democratic Party of fraud.
checkingsignatures,verify- WHERE TO WATCH Buthehasneverpresented
38
46%
48%
ing documentation, and
perhapsevenscanningthe
THE RESULTS anyevidence,andnearlyall
commentators agree elec-
YOUTUBE: Most US news
ballots. Counting votes is a tionfraudisextremelyrare
48% separate,andlater,process. organisations will run a in the US. Democrats and
29 46% Each state has its own live stream. These otherTrumpcriticsarecon-
date for starting in-person include NBC, CBS, and vincedthatheisraisingthe
49% the nonprofit public
16 46%
or mail-in voting, deadline
for receiving the mail-in broadcaster C-SPAN.
bogey of fraud to prepare
the ground to contest the
ballots, processing the bal- CABLE: International electionresultifheappears
50%
15 46%
lots,andtabulatingvotes.To
take two examples: In
networks such as CNN
and BBC will run live
tobelosing;indeed,Trump
hasrefusedtocommitthat
50% Arizona, mailing of ballots shows. he would accept the result
11 45%
started on October 7, they
will be accepted until
OTT: If you have a if he does not win.
OntheDemocraticside,
Disney+HotStar
50% Election Day, and counting premium account, you fears have been expressed
10 41% has been on since October can watch Fox News Live. of voter intimidation and
20; in Ohio, processing attemptsatmaking itdiffi-
started on October 6, mail- TWITTER: Will run a live cult for some groups to
48%
6 42% inballotscanbereceivedup stream on its platform. vote. These include at-
to November 13 but they LOG ON TO temptsatreducingtheeffi-
must be postmarked by INDIANEXPRESS.COM ciency of the US Postal
50% November 2, and counting FOR ROLLING UPDATES Service by Postmaster
20 44% will start on November 3. General Louis DeJoy, a
Trump acolyte; making
46% Howandwhenwillweknowthewinner? ballot drop boxes scarce in some states, etc.
18 46% Thecountisnotofficiallyfinalisedforweeks
— in 2016, it took until December. What hap- Aren’tsomeelectionsforseatsinCongress
51% pens on Election Night is that major TV net- happeningaswell?
16 42% worksandtheAssociatedPress“call”theelec- Yes. Thirty-five seats are up for re-election
tion in favour of one of the candidates — a in the Senate, where the Republicans have a
52%
10 42%
projectionbasedonexitpolls,interviewswith 53-47majority.TheDemocratsthinktheyhave
voters, and trends — a legitimate exercise,and agoodchanceoftakingcontrolofthechamber,
a necessity in the US system. The projections but most media organisations have been de-
45%
6 47%
are not usually contested, and the candidate scribingthesituationasatoss-up.Electionsto
projectedtohavelostconcedestheelection. theHouseofRepresentativeswillbeheldinall
Thisyear,giventhepandemicandthehuge 50 states, and the Democrats are widely ex-
volumesofmail-inballots,thereiswidespread pected to hold on to their majority. The ideal
apprehension that a clear winner will not situation for the Democrats will, of course, be
emerge on November 3 or even the day after to win both Congress and the Presidency, but
—unlessanyonecandidatewinsinalandslide. even if Trump gets another four years, a dou-
ble majority for the Democrats in both the
*New York Times/Siena poll Whatarethepollssayingsofar? House and Senate will allow them to put sig-
Bidenhasbeenleadinginbothnationaland nificant checks on the President’s powers.
Why is Australia’s participation
important?
On October 27, following the 2+2 dia-
is necessary keeping China in mind”. He said
“the Quad need not be NATO in its formality,
in its political congruence and as a post-war
loguewiththeUS,DefenceMinisterRajnath response” but it can “deter nonetheless”.
Singh said: “We… agreed that upholding At a webinar on September 3, Chief of
therules-basedinternationalorder,respect- Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat had said
ing the rule of law and freedom of naviga- Quadis“agoodarrangement”,which“willen-
tion in the international seas and uphold- sure,thattheIndianOceanRegionandallother
ing the territorial integrity and sovereignty
of all states are essential. Our defence coop-
oceans around there is complete freedom of
navigation, without fear of any other nation
Last year’s Malabar Exercise off the
coast of Japan. Indian Navy
eration is intended to further these objec-
tives. Both sides welcomed Australia join-
singularlytryingtodominatetheoceans”.
ing the forthcoming Malabar Exercise.” Does India conduct any other naval
As the standoff in eastern Ladakh contin- exercises with these countries?
countries in the maritime security domain ues,theparticipationoffourlargenaviesfrom Overthelastfewmonths,theIndianNavy
and in the light of increased defence coop- theIndo-Pacificregionwillsendamessageto hasconductedanumberofPassageExercises
eration with Australia, Malabar 2020 will China.Sourceshavementionedthatearlier,it (PASSEX) with navies from Japan, Australia
seetheparticipationof theAustralianNavy”. wasthepossibilityofrilingupChinathathad and the US. But those were basic exercises to
ThiswillbethesecondtimeAustraliawill preventedIndiafromexpandingtheMalabar increaseoperabilitybetweenthenavies,while
participate.In2007,thereweretwoMalabar Exercise, and from Australia joining it. Malabarinvolvessimulatedwargames.Inlate
Exercises. The first was held off Okinawa is- RearAdmiralSudarshanShrikhande,who September, the Indian Navy conducted PAS-
land of Japan in the Western Pacific — the retired in 2016 and had headed Naval intelli- SEX with the Royal Australian Navy.
first time the exercise was held away from gence earlier, and had served as the Defence InJuly,IndiaconductedaPASSEXwiththe
Indian shores — and the second in Advisor at the Indian High Commission in UScarrierstrikegroupledbyoneofthelargest
September 2007, off Visakhapatnam, with Canberra (2005-08), said that “with the warships in the world, USS Nimitz. The car-
the Indian, Japanese, US, Australian and clearerenunciationoftheQuadinrecentfor- rier strike group had been passing through
Singapore navies. eign ministers' meet in Japan, it would have the Indian Ocean Region after completing a
The following year, Australia stopped been counterproductive to the objectives of freedom of navigation exercise in the South
participating. Japan became a regular par- statecraft not to invite Australia”. He said the China Sea, which China is quite sensitive
ticipant only in 2015, making it a trilateral Quad “must, among other things, contribute about.Asimilarexercisewasconductedwith
annual exercise since then. to being a key instrument of deterrence that Japan Maritime Self Defence Force in June.
New Delhi

14 THE WORLD
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
TOPOFTHE
WORLD
Hassell was 30
USA
ActorEddie
Hassellkilledin
Texasshooting
THEACTOREddieHassell,
known for his roles in the
NBCshowSurfaceandthe
2010 film The Kids Are All
Right, has died after a
shooting in Texas, police
said. He was 30. The
shooting happened early
Sunday in the Dallas sub-
urbofGrandPrairie,police
said. A police statement
said officers responded to
a report of a shooting and
found Hassell suffering
fromgunshotwounds.He
was taken to a hospital
where he was pro-
nounceddead,policesaid.
A representative for
Hassell told Variety that
the shooting appeared to
beconnectedtoacarjack-
ing.Policesaidthemotive
remained under investi-
gation, but that a car had
beentakenfromthescene
of the shooting. AP
SWITZERLAND
WHOchiefto
quarantineafter
contactgetsCovid
THE HEAD of the World
HealthOrganisationsayshe
will self-quarantine after
beingidentifiedasacontact
ofapersonwhotestedpos-
itive for Covid-19. Tedros
Adhanom Ghebreyesus
wrote on Twitter late
Sunday that he is “well and
without symptoms” but
will self-quarantine in
“coming days, in line with
WHO protocols, and work
from home.” On Monday,
the UN health agency’s
sought to dispel misinfor-
mation about Tedros’ self-
isolation,writingonTwitter
that “contrary to some in-
correct reports,” he has not
testedpositivehimself.The
WHO is based in Geneva,
where cases are rising. AP
PHILIPPINES
Typhoondeath
tollrisesto16
AT LEAST 16 people were
killed as Typhoon Goni
lashed the Philippines over
the weekend, and about
13,000shantiesandhouses
were damaged or swept
away in the eastern island
provincethatwasfirsthitby
theferociousstorm,officials
said Monday. Goni blasted
into Catanduanes province
at dawn Sunday as a super
typhoon with sustained
windsof225kilometresper
hour and gusts of 280 kph.
But the storm weakened
considerably after making
landfall and shifted direc-
tion to spare the capital,
Manila, before blowing out
intotheSouthChinaSea. AP
THE BRITISH JOURNALIST WAS BEST KNOWN FOR HIS REPORTING FROM THE MIDDLE EAST
Robert Fisk, veteran foreign correspondent, dies in Dublin at 74
ZEINA KARAM
BEIRUT, NOVEMBER 2
VETERAN BRITISH journalist
Robert Fisk, one of the best-
known Middle East correspon-
dents who spent his career re-
portingfromthetroubledregion
and won accolades for challeng-
ing mainstream narratives has
died after a short illness, his em-
ployer said Monday. He was 74.
Fisk, whose reporting often
sparked controversy, died
Sunday at a hospital in Dublin,
shortly after he was taken there
after falling ill at his home in the
Irish capital. The Independent,
where he had worked since
US votes today: Uncertainty hangs
heavy as campaign draws to a close
‘Goinginwithourlawyers’assoonasvotingends:Trump;Presidentnotgoingtosteal election:Biden
RACE FOR
THE WHITE
HOUSE
ADAM NAGOURNEY
NOVEMBER 2
ELECTION DAY is usually a mo-
ment of tension and release, of
anger and some bitterness, but
also the closure that comes with
watching Americans choose
their next president.
But this campaign is in-
evitably ending on a far more
disturbing note. These dyspep-
tic final days have been marked
by threats of violent skirmishes
and street demonstrations in
places like Beverly Hills. Store
owners are putting plywood on
theirwindows,anticipatingare-
turn of this summer’s unrest.
President Donald Trump has
made it clear that he will not
concede even if he appears to be
losing — if, for example, Florida
tilts to Joe Biden, the Democratic
presidential nominee.
SpeakingtoreportersSunday
evening,Trumpvowedtomount
alegalchallengeinPennsylvania
even before all votes were
counted, which could take days
as mail-in ballots continue to ar-
rive after the election.
“We’re going to go in the
night of, as soon as that election
is over, we’re going in with our
lawyers,” Trump said.
ThePresident,whohasspent
monthsunderminingpubliccon-
fidence in the election system,
said that he would also probably
mount legal challenges in other
states,includingNevada,because
thegovernorthereisaDemocrat.
Trump repeated his desire
Trump suggests he will try to fire Fauci post-election
REUTERS
OPA-LOCKA, NOVEMBER 2
US PRESIDENT Donald Trump
suggested early on Monday that
he might seek to fire a highly re-
spected member of his coron-
avirus task force, Anthony Fauci,
after Fauci further criticised
Trump’s handling of the virus.
Turkey pulls 2 girls out of
rubble 3 days after quake
ASSOCIATED PRESS
IZMIR, NOVEMBER 2
IN WHAT one rescue worker
called “a miracle,” extraction
teams brought two girls out alive
Monday from the wreckage of
their collapsed apartment build-
ings in the Turkish city of Izmir,
threedaysafteranearthquakehit
Turkey and Greece, killing 85.
Onlookers applauded in joy
and wept with relief as ambu-
lances carrying the girls rushed
to hospitals immediately after
their rescues.
1989, described him as the most
celebrated journalist of his era.
“Fearless, uncompromising,
determined and utterly commit-
tedtouncoveringthetruthandre-
alityatallcosts,RobertFiskwasthe
greatest journalist of his genera-
tion,” said Christian Broughton,
managingdirectorofthenewspa-
per. “The fire he lit at The
Independentwillburnon,”hesaid.
Born in Kent, in the United
Kingdom,Fiskbeganhiscareeron
FleetStreetattheSundayExpress.
HewentontoworkforTheTimes,
where he was based in Northern
Ireland, Portugal and the Middle
East. He moved to Beirut in 1976,
ayearafterthecountry’scivilwar
brokeout,andcontinuedtowork
Results maybe
delayed, but that
is not unusual
TRUMPHASsaidtheonlyway
hewouldloseisif theelection
was“rigged”,andthatit
wouldbe“terrible”if votes
werestillbeingcountedfor“a
longperiodof time”afterthe
election.However,nopresi-
dentialelectioninrecentyears
hasseenallvotesbeing
countedonthedayof the
electionitself,andtheresults
areofficiallydeclareddays
later.OnElectionDay,media
organisationsusuallycallthe
electioninfavourof acandi-
dateafteracertainnumberof
votesarecounted,buteven
thatcouldbedelayedinvery
tightcontests.Themuch
largernumberof mailed-in
ballotsthisyearduetothe
pandemicarealsolikelytode-
laytheresultsbecausethey
takelongertocount.
that all the votes be counted on
Election Day. “I don’t think it is
fair that we have to wait a long
period of time,” he said.
‘Plan to declare victory’
Trump has reportedly said
that he plans to declare victory
on election night if early returns
show him in the lead. But while
voters who turn out on Election
Day tend to skew Republican,
the majority of mail-in ballots
have been cast by Democrats,
meaning early returns may not
accurately reflect the full vote.
Askedtocommentonthere-
port in Philadelphia on Sunday,
Biden said, “The President is not
going to steal this election.” NYT
Fauci is the US’ leading
infectious-disease expert
IdilSirin,
14,was
rescued.
AP
Rescue workers clapped in
unison Monday as 14-year-old
Idil Sirin was removed from the
rubble,afterbeingtrappedfor58
hours.Sevenhourslater,rescuers
working on another toppled
building extricated three-year-
old Elif Perincek, whose mother
andtwosistershadbeenrescued
two days earlier.
Fisk in a suburb of Damascus, Syria, in 2018. He has spent his
entire career reporting from the Middle East and has won
accolades for challenging mainstream narratives. AP
and live from an apartment lo-
cated on the Lebanese capital’s
famed Mediterranean corniche
Hundreds of vehicles gather at Tropical Park in Miami ahead of a car caravan in support of
Trump, on Sunday. AP
Trump supporters block highways
as tensions play out in the streets
RICK ROJAS,
JENNIFER STEINHAUER
& EMMA G FITZSIMMONS
NOVEMBER 2
VEHICLES WITH Trump flags
halted traffic on Sunday on the
Garden State Parkway in New
Jersey and jammed the Mario
Cuomo Bridge between
TarrytownandNyack,NewYork.
Another pro-Trump convoy in
Virginia ended in a tense shout-
ing match with protesters as it
approached a statue of Robert E
Lee in Richmond.
In Georgia, a rally for
Democratswascancelledshortly
before it was scheduled to begin
on Sunday, with organisers wor-
ried about what they feared
would be a “large militia pres-
Fauci, the country’s leading
infectious-disease expert who is
director of the National Institute
of Allergy and Infectious
Diseases, has taken issue with
Trump’srepeatedassertionsthat
theUSfightagainsttheviruswas
“roundingtheturn”wheninfact
tens of thousands of people are
being infected daily.
“We’re in for a whole lot of
Hindu homes attacked in Bangladesh after
rumours of alleged FB post ‘slandering’ Islam
PRESS TRUST OF INDIA
DHAKA, NOVEMBER 2
THE HOUSES of several Hindu
families have been vandalised
and burned in Bangladesh’s
Comilla district over rumours
about an alleged Facebook post
slandering Islam, according to a
media report on Monday.
The households were van-
dalised and later set on fire on
SundayafteraBangladeshiman,
who lives in France, allegedly
praised President Emmanuel
until his death.
From his base in Beirut, Fisk
travelled across the Mideast and
Bidenhaspreviouslycriticised
Trumpfornotcondemning
hissupporters’actions. Reuters
ence”drawnbyPresidentDonald
Trump’s own event nearby.
As the nation races toward
Election Day, the tensions and
acrimony surrounding an ex-
traordinarily divisive campaign,
coming on the heels of a sum-
merof protestsandracialunrest,
are bleeding into everyday life
and adding further uncertainty
to an electoral process in which
hurt. It’s not a good situation,”
FaucitoldTheWashingtonPoston
Friday.“Allthestarsarealignedin
thewrongplaceasyougointothe
fall and winter season, with peo-
ple congregating at home in-
doors. You could not possibly be
positioned more poorly.”
When Trump defended his
handling of the virus at a late-
night campaign rally at Opa-
Macron for taking steps against
“inhumane ideologies” after a
teacher in Paris was decapitated
for showing caricatures of the
Prophet Muhammad,
bdnews24.com reported.
The headmaster of a kinder-
garten school in Purbo Dhour
welcomed Macron’s action in a
comment on the post.
As the rumours about the
Facebook post spread, tension
mounted in the area on
Saturday, the report said.
Thepolicearrestedtwopeople
on charges of hurting religious
beyond, covering almost every
big story in the region, including
the Iran-Iraq war, the Arab-
Israeliconflict,thewarinAlgeria,
the conflict in Afghanistan,
Saddam Hussein’s invasion of
Kuwait, the US invasion and oc-
cupation of Iraq, the Arab Spring
and Syria’s civil war. His report-
ing earned him awards, but also
invited controversy, particularly
his coverage of the Syria conflict.
A fearless, bespectacled and
cheerful personality bristling
with energy, Fisk was often the
first reporter to arrive at the
scene of a story.
In1982,hewasoneof thefirst
journalistsattheSabraandShatila
camp in Beirut, where Israeli-
MEANWHILE
PRINCE WILLIAM HAD COVID IN APRIL: REPORT
Britain’s Prince William tested positive for the coronavirus in April, around the same
time as his father Prince Charles, BBC reported. The report cited unidentified palace
sources and The Sun newspaper, which said William kept his telephone and video en-
gagements without revealing his diagnosis because he didn’t want to worry anyone.
Trump has not committed to a
peaceful transfer of power.
Sunday’s incidents came two
days after a group of Trump sup-
porters in Texas, driving trucks
and waving Trump flags, sur-
rounded and slowed a Biden-
Harriscampaignbusasitdroveon
Interstate 35, leading to the can-
cellation of two planned rallies.
TheFBIconfirmedonSundaythat
it was investigating the incident.
On Saturday, Trump tweeted
a video of the incident with a
message, “I love Texas!”
In North Carolina, a get-out-
the-voterallyonSaturdayended
with the police using pepper
spray on some participants, in-
cluding young children, and
making numerous arrests.
Organisers of the rally called it
flagrant voter suppression. NYT
Locka airport in the Miami area,
a “Fire Fauci” chant broke out.
In response to the chant,
Trump said: “Don’t tell anybody,
but let me wait until a little bit
after the election.”
Fauci is one of the most pop-
ular health experts in the United
States, a fact that Trump has
cited in the past to avoid getting
into tangles with him.
sentiments on Sunday, the report
quoted Qamruzzaman Talukder,
officer-in-charge of Bangra Bazar
PoliceStation,assaying.
The headmaster of the
kindergarten and a resident of
nearby Andikot village were the
two to be arrested.
“The situation is under con-
trol now,” Md Abul Fazal Mir,
deputycommissionerof Cumilla
district, told bdnews24.com af-
ter visiting the area. Syed Nurul
Islam, Superintendent of Police,
has also visited the scene.
Thedeputycommissionersaid
backed Christian militiamen
slaughtered hundreds of
Palestinian refugees. Earlier that
year, he was also the first foreign
journalisttoreport onthe scale of
theHamamassacrein1982,when
then-SyrianPresidentHafezAssad
launched a withering assault on
therebelliouscityincentralSyria,
levelling entire neighbourhoods
andkillingthousandsinoneofthe
most notorious massacres in the
modernMiddleEast.
“So sad to lose a true friend
andagreatjournalist.Thetemple
of truth is gone,” said Marwan
Chukri, director of the Foreign
Press Centre at the Information
Ministry in Beirut.
Fisk gained particular fame
New Delhi
Afghan police at Kabul University on Monday. AP
22killedafterIS
gunmenstorm
KabulUniversity
Attack took place as campus hosted
a bookfair attended by Iranian envoy
RAHIM FAIEZ &
KATHY GANNON
KABUL, NOVEMBER 2
ISLAMIC STATE militants in
Afghanistan stormed Kabul
University on Monday as it
hosted a book fair attended by
the Iranian ambassador, spark-
inganhours-longgunbattleand
leaving at least 22 dead and 22
wounded at the war-torn coun-
try’s largest university.
Most of the casualties were
students and there were fears
thedeathtollcouldclimbfurther
with some of the wounded said
to be in critical condition.
It was the second attack on
an educational institution in
Kabul in as many weeks.
The Taliban promptly issued
a statement denying they took
part in the assault, which came
astheinsurgentscontinuepeace
talks with representatives of
Kabul’s US-backed government,
with the aim to help the United
States finally withdraw from
Afghanistan. Later in the day, the
Islamic State group claimed re-
sponsibility for the attack.
As the attack unfolded, stu-
dentsandteacherswereseenflee-
ingthepartof thecampuswhere
lawandjournalismschoolsarelo-
cated, while hand grenades ex-
ploded and automatic rifle fire
could be heard. Scores of Afghan
special forces surrounded the
campus, shepherding teachers
and students to safety.
The chaos subsided as the
sun set over the Afghan capital
and the Interior Ministry’s
spokesman, Tariq Arian, said all
three attackers involved in the
assault were killed.
The Islamic State group said
it targeted newly graduated
“judges and investigators be-
longing to the apostate Afghan
local residents carried out arson
attacksonhomes,includingthose
of thetwowhowerearrested.
Askedwhatmeasurestheau-
thoritieshavetakenagainsttheat-
tackers, Mir said the administra-
tion has swung into action.
Qamruzzaman said the
process to file a case over the at-
tack was underway.
Demonstrations against
France over caricatures of the
Prophet Muhammad have been
takingplaceindifferentMuslim-
majority countries, including
Bangladesh, for several days.
andpopularityintheregionforhis
oppositiontotheIraqwar—chal-
lengingtheofficialUSgovernment
narrative of weapons of mass de-
structionasitlaidthegroundwork
for the 2003 invasion — and dis-
putingUSandIsraelipolicies.
Hewasoneofthefewjournal-
ists who interviewed Osama bin
Ladenseveraltimes.AftertheSept
11, 2011 attacks and the subse-
quentUSinvasionof Iraq,hetrav-
elled to the Pakistan-Afghan bor-
der, where he was attacked by a
groupof Afghanrefugees.
He later wrote about the inci-
dent from the refugees’ perspec-
tive, describing his beating by
refugeesasa“symbolofthehatred
andfuryof thisfilthywar”. AP
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
Mostof thecasualties
werestudentsandthere
werefearsthetollcould
climbfurtherwith some
of thewoundedsaidto
beincriticalcondition
government” gathered at the
campus, according to the SITE
Intelligence Group, which mon-
itors terror online messaging.
TheISstatementclaimedonly
two of its fighters were involved,
and posted their photographs,
whichconflictedwiththeAfghan
authorities’reportofthreeattack-
ers.Theclaimdidnotindicatethe
IS intended to target the Iranian
envoy or the book fair.
Last week, IS also claimed a
brutal assault on a tutoring cen-
terintheAfghancapital’smostly
Shia neighbourhood of Dasht-e-
Barchi that killed at least 24 stu-
dents and wounded more than
100 others on October 24.
The peace negotiations be-
tween the Taliban and the Kabul
government, known as intra-
Afghan talks, were part of a deal
Washington signed with the in-
surgents in February. They are
taking place in the Gulf Arab
state of Qatar, and are seen as
Afghanistan’s best chance at
peace— though daily bloodshed
has continued.
Afghan media reported that
abookexhibitionwasbeingheld
attheuniversityandattendedby
a number of dignitaries at the
timeof theshooting.Noneof the
dignitaries were reported hurt.
Iran’s semiofficial ISNA news
agency had reported Sunday
that Iranian Ambassador
Bahador Aminian and cultural
attachéMojtabaNorooziwereto
inaugurate the fair. AP
Johnny Depp
Depp loses libel
case in UK over
‘wife-beater’
claims in tabloid
PAN PYLAS
LONDON, NOVEMBER 2
JOHNNYDEPPlosthishigh-stakes
libelcaseMondayagainsttheSun
tabloid newspaper for labelling
him a “wife beater,” as a British
judgepointedtoseveralepisodes
thathesaidshowedtheactor’sex-
wife had feared for her life.
JusticeAndrewNicolsaidthat
the defendants had proved that
what they published was “sub-
stantially true” during a trial in
Londonoverthesummerthatin-
cluded lurid accounts from Depp
and Amber Heard in which each
accusedtheotherofabuse.Depp’s
lawyers said they would appeal.
Depp sued News Group
Newspapers,publisherofTheSun,
and the newspaper’s executive
editor,DanWootton,overanApril
2018 article that accused him of
assaulting fellow actor Heard.
For now, the ruling deals a big
blow to Depp’s reputation that
could damage a lucrative movie
career, which has seen the actor
take the lead in several popular
familymovies. AP
 WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM

15 ECONOMY
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020

GOLD RUPEE OIL SILVER

`51,286 `74.42 $38.58 `62,155
Note: Gold, silver rates at Delhi spot market; gold per 10 g, silver per 1 kg; Brent crude as of 0030 IST

SENSEX: 39,757.58 ▲ 143.51 NIFTY: 11,669.15 ▲ 26.75 NIKKEI: 23,295.48 ▲ 318.35 HANG SENG: 24,460.01 ▲ 352.59 FTSE: 5,642.79 ▲ 65.52 DAX: 11,772.25 ▲ 215.77
International market data till 1900 IST

ECONOMY WATCH ARBITRARY,HIGHLEVYBREEDSINEFFICIENCIES: FINANCESECY AUCTIONS FOR COMMERCIAL COAL MINING

OCTOBER DATA
‘Customsduty:Needjudicious Strong competition on
Day 1: Vedanta bid for
Indicators hint at
demand revival; use,hastobephasedoutslowly’ A closer look at the regression juicestomobilephones.InBudget
Odisha mine highest
ENSECONOMICBUREAU TOP BIDDERS
caution prevails AANCHALMAGAZINE
NEWDELHI,NOVEMBER2
dataof India’simportsof rawma-
terials, intermediate goods, capi-
tal and consumer goods in the
2020-21, the government had
hiked import duties on over 100
categories of products across sec-
NEWDELHI,NOVEMBER2

THE FIRST auction of coal blocks

AND THE MINES
THE GOVERNMENT proposes to weightedaverageofimporttariffs tors, including certain food items, for commercial mining was kick- VEDANTARESOURCES:
Manufacturing PMI India Biz Resumption Index
58.9 slowly phase out the hike in during1990-2017showsthatwith furniture,footwear,householdap- started on Monday, with five Odisha’sRadhikapur
60
82.2
82.1

Customs duties levied earlier for even 1 per cent increase in tariff, pliances, parts of mobile phones, mines going under the hammer. Westcoalmine.
81.6

84.4
81.2

80.8

83.3
80.3

40 51.4 protectionof domesticmanufac- the imports decline by around andtoys.Morerecently,inOctober, VedantaResourcesemergedasthe

turing. High, arbitrary Customs $2billiononanaverage,thusmak- a5percentCustomsdutywasin- highest bidder for Odisha’s AURBINDO REALITY
79

20
duty rates breed inefficiencies ingacaseforimprovingtheman- troduced on open cell — a RadhikapurWestcoalmine,offer- and Infrastructure:
0 and there is a need to have “judi- ufacturing base of the country, it key component in TV panel ing 21 per cent revenue share for Takli Jena Bellora North
Nov 01
Sept 06
Sept 13
Sept 20
Sept 27

Sept 2019 Oct 2020

Oct 04
Oct 11
Oct 18
Oct 25

Note: Reading below 50 suggests contraction cious use” of Customs duty, AJAY BHUSHAN PANDEY said.Intheexportbasket,thehigh- manufacturing. themine,whichhasestimatedre- and Takli Jena Bellora
and above it indicates expansion
Source: IHS Markit Source: Nomura Finance Secretary Ajay Bhushan Finance Secretary est share is of consumer goods, TheFinanceSecretaryalsosaid servesof312milliontonnesofcoal South coal mines in
Pandey said. whicharemanufacturedproducts, the government has moved to- withapeakcapacityof6.0million Maharashtra.
Power demand Petrol/diesel sales
(% change, y-o-y, 2020) (in thousand tonnes) “... we will ensure that on the followed by intermediate goods wards plugging the loopholes for tonnesperannum.
20 8,000 Customsdutyfront,wehaveavery itemsrangingfromapplesandal- and these two attract highest tar- misuse in rules of origin for im- The auctions will include 14 HINDALCO: Chakla
12.1 Diesel 6,790 judicious use of Customs duty. mondstocellphoneparts. iffsintheimportbasket,thusmak- ports. The earlier rules of origin more coal blocks and are set to coal mine in Jharkhand.
10 6,000
6,942 Having arbitrary high Customs In its research report on ing a case against the fact that would result in a lot of misuse as continuetillNovember9,withthe
0 4,000
3.9 dutybreedsinefficienciesandthe Monday, State Bank of India also higher tariffs have not protected unscrupulouselementswouldtry successful bidders to be an- YAZDANI
-10 2,000
2,456 2,629 consumersaswelldomesticman- statedthatthecountryneedstofo- theseindustries.“Othercountries tobypasstherules,whichinturn, nouncedbyNovember11. INTERNATIONAL:
-20 Petrol
-23.2 0 ufacturing suffer. So, what is re- cusmoreonincreasingproductiv- with much lower tariff structures wouldimpactdomesticmanufac- “Thefirstdayofauctionofcoal MarkiMangliIImine
-30 Jan Oct*
Jan Apr Oct *extrapolated from PSU retail sales
quired is a reasonable amount of ity and less on import tariffs in its have built manufacturing bases, turing. “In the last budget, we mines for sale of coal saw strong inMaharashtra.
Customs duty for a level playing quest for Atmanirbhar Bharat. which have helped them in their amended the Customs Act, new and healthy competition among
Oct sales in units (Mumbai) On track field, and it has to also be phased “After2004,Indiasawrapidreduc- exports,”itsaid. rules of origin have come which thebidders,”saidagovernmentre- JMSMINING: Urtan
No. of sale documents registered Freight loading Freight revenue
7,929

outslowlyonceasectorhasdevel- tioninAHSWeighted Average(%) The government had levied a have become effective from lease, noting that the auction mineinMadhyaPradesh.
6,377

(million tonne) (` crore, RHS)

6,068

5,811
5,668
5,225
4,902

oped,” Pandey told The across all product categories. 10percentbasicCustomsdutyfor Septemberthisyearandnowim- process for some of the mines
4,483

12,500
2,619

125 10,405
10,728
100 10,000 IndianExpress. Despite the reduced tariffs, India smartphones effective July 2017 portersareboundtospecifywhat lastedfor“3-4hours”.
75 7,500 This marks a departure from has one of the highest weighted oncoveredcellularmobilephones, isthevalueadditionishappening Aurbindo Reality and Jharkhand, offering a 14.25 per
Oct ‘12
Oct ‘13
Oct ‘14
Oct ‘15
Oct ‘16
Oct ‘17
Oct ‘18
Oct ‘19
Oct ‘20

5,000 the earlier stance as the govern- averagetariffsintheworldofman- andpartslikecharger,battery,key- so that they have taken Customs Infrastructurewasthehighestbid- centrevenuesharetothegovern-
108.07

50
106.5

25 2,500 menthasprogressivelyraisedim- ufacturers, comprising both con- pad, USB cable, which was later dutyexemptions.So,suchmisuse derfortheTakliJenaBelloraNorth ment for rights to mine. With re-
Source: Department of registrations and 0 0
stamps, Government of Maharashtra, Feb Oct portdutiesforanumberofmanu- sumer and capital goods,” the SBI raisedto15percentinDecember. usedtohappen,whichusedtoaf- and Takli Jena Bellora South coal gard to MarkiMangli II mine in
2020 2020
Knight Frank Research
factured products including reportsaid. The duty on TV sets was raised to fectdomesticmanufacturing,de- minesinMaharashtra,offeringthe Maharashtra, Yazdani Intern-
television,mobilesandhousehold During 2004-2017, India’s 20 per cent from 15 per cent in prive the domestic manufacturer government a revenue share of ationalbidthehighestat30.75per
13-yearhigh,whilesales,too, appliances over the last six years. shareinglobalmanufacturingin- December2017.InFebruary2018, from a level playing field. So with 30.75percentforthemineswhich centrevenuesharing. JMSMining
ENSECONOMICBUREAU improved dramatically. In its previous tenure, the NDA creased by 1.5 percentage points, Customsdutieswerehikedacross these things, domestic manufac- have reserves of 117.26 metric Pvt Ltd bid the highest for Urtan
NEWDELHI,NOVEMBER2 Electricity generation, a governmenthadengagedinatar- while China gained a 18 per cent 46 items spanning imported turing, economy will move for- tonnes. Hindalco was the highest mine in Madhya Pradesh at 10.50
closeproxyforeconomicactiv- iff hiking spree covering over 400 share,thereportsaid. brandedgoodsrangingfromfruit ward,”hesaid. bidderfortheChaklacoalminein percentrevenuesharing.
A REVIVAL of demand seen in ities,roseforasecondstraight
September apparently gath- month in October, registering
ered more steam in October, a12.1 percentyear-on-year(y- GST COMPENSATION SHORTFALL
US ELECTIONS
2nd tranche: Centre to transfer
with a surge in certain early o-y)rise,against4.6percentin
high-frequencyindicators,like the previous month. Diesel
manufacturing PMI, power consumption in October rose WITH BIDEN BETS AND TRUMP HEDGES, INVESTORS GET READY
`6,000 cr to 16 states and 3 UTs
generation, auto sales and rail 6.6percent.
freight,andevenfuelsales. Auto sales, too, zoomed in Four years after Donald Trump’s surprise Presidential victory roiled markets,
This lends some credence October, driven by festive de- investors are prepared for short-term trading turmoil and major long-term
tothenotionthattheeconomy mand.Mirroringtheimprove- policy shifts, according to a Reuters report cialwindowtilldateandtheloans
maybehealingfasterfromthe ment in leading gauges, the
BIGGEST WORRY HOW THE MARKETS
ENSECONOMICBUREAU BORROWING raised by the Centre would be re-
Covid-inducedshockthanan-
ticipated earlier. But analysts
Nomura India Business
Resumption Index improved FOR MARKETS: REACTED?
NEWDELHI,NOVEMBER2 DONE AT 4.42% leased on a back-to-back basis to
states/UTs.
warnthatthedurabilityofthis to 82.4 in October, a rise of 2.6 Theoutcomemostlikelyto ■ Asof02:04p.m.EST,the THE FINANCE Ministry on ■Thisroundof borro- This second round of borrow-
rebound, seemingly aided by pointsfrom80.3inSeptember shakemarkets—atleastinthe DowJonesIndustrialAverage Monday said it will transfer the wingwasdoneatan ingwasdoneataninterestof4.42
spillover of pent-up demand and73.6inAugust. nearterm—isnoimmediate wasup225.46points,or0.85 second tranche of borrowing interestof 4.42percent, per cent, which is lower than the
post-lockdown, can be estab- “However,itremainstobe outcomeatall.Marketsfeara percent,at26,727.06 worthRs6,000croreforcompen- whichislowerthanthe cost of borrowings for the states
lished only if the momentum seenwhetherthismomentum contestedelection ■ EuropeansharesMonday sation shortfall to 16 states and 3 costof borrowingsfor andUTs,thusbenefitingthem,the
outlaststhefestiveseason. outlives the festival-led activ- recoveredfrom1-monthlows UnionTerritoriesincludingAndh- thestatesandUTs,thus Finance Ministry said. The first
WHAT WOULD BE
TheNikkeiManufacturing itysurge.Wealsoremaincau- ra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Bihar, benefitingthem,the tranchelastmonthwasborrowed
Purchasing Managers' Index tious on the potential reversal
GOOD NEWS? ■ TheSensexsettled143.51 Karnataka,PuducherryandDelhi. FinanceMinistrysaid. at5.19percent.
(PMI), compiled by IHS of pandemic gains in Nove- Adecisivevictoryofeither points,or0.36percent,higher TheCentrehadonOctober23 The Finance Ministry had last
Markit,roseto58.9inOctober mber-December,asthefestive TrumporDemocratic at39,757.58.Brentcrude transferred Rs 6,000 crore to 16 monthsaidtheCentrewouldbor-
from September's 56.8. A season draws down,” Sonal JoeBiden,wouldbe pricesfelltoalowof$35.74 states and 2 UTs of Delhi and latest to opt for borrowing under rowfromthemarketandthenact
readingover50indicateseco- VarmaandAurodeepNandiof goodnewsforstocks perbarrel,alevelnotseensince Jammu and Kashmir, taking the the special window and has been as an intermediary to arrange
nomic expansion. Man- Nomura said in a report on lateMay,laterrecoveringto totalborrowedamountunderthe included in the second tranche. back-to-backloanstopaytheGST
ufacturing output touched a Monday. FE Source: Reuters tradeup1.69%at$38.58 specialwindowtoRs12,000crore. With this, 21 states and 3 Union compensation shortfall of Rs 1.1
Puducherry has become the Territorieshaveoptedforthespe- lakhcroretostategovernments.

What led to the 8.6% fall in RIL shares? HDFC Q2 net falls 27.5%
September and stole all the lime- tail arm in the wake of the Covid Expertssaywhenshareprices Sept,Octseestrongestrecoverysinceoutbreak
SANDEEPSINGH light with record fund-raising of pandemicandlockdown. had hit over Rs 2,300 per share,
&GEORGEMATHEW over Rs 1.5 lakh crore from global manyfelttheyhadmissedtheop-
NEWDELHI/MUMBAI,NOV2 investors into its telecom and re- Whatisthewayforward? portunity to buy its shares and so ENSECONOMICBUREAU PNB profit
SHARE PRICE of Reliance
tail arms over last six months,the
sharp fall comes both as a damp-
IsthesharpfallonMondaythe
end of the fairytale run of the
for them the current fall provides
theopportunity to enter thestock
MUMBAI,NOVEMBER2
jumps 22%
Industries — India’s largest com- ener for some and op- scrip?Brokeragehouses for long term gains. While some HOME MORTGAGE firm HDFC New Delhi: Punjab National
pany by profitability and market portunityforothers. don’tfeelso.Fundman- global investment firms like Ltd has reported a 27.56 per cent Bank(PNB)onMondaysaidit
capitalisation—fellsharplyby8.6 agers and analysts feel Macquariehavetalkedabouta42 declineinnetprofitforthequarter witnessed a 22 per cent in-
per cent on Monday, bringing its Whatledtothesharp thatsincethestockwas per cent further downside in RIL ended September 2020 (Q2) at crease in net profit to Rs
total market cap down by Rs 1.23 fallonMonday? richly valued, the weak shares, there are some who feel Rs 2,870 crore as against Rs 3,962 620.81 crore for the quarter
lakh crore (taking into account The sell-off was trig- quarterly results gave a since there is no fresh trigger for crore in the year-ago period. endedSeptember30oneas-
both fully and partly paid shares), gered by the weak sec- reasonformanytobook priceriseasmostoftheinvestment HDFC Vice Chairman and ingof badloans. PTI
or$16.6billion,fromRs14.37lakh ond quarter results by the com- profits and that resulted into fur- deals have been announced, the CEO Keki Mistry said individual
crore on Friday to Rs 13.14 lakh pany with the net profit falling 15 ther decline of the share price as scripmayremainrangeboundand disbursements during the quar-
croreonMonday. per cent to Rs 9,567 crore in the thedayproceeded. itcouldbeagoodtimeforinvestors ter ended September 2020 were and October 2020 have seen the
For a stock that rose 170 per Septemberquarterduetoasharp toaccumulateitsshares. at 95 per cent levels of the previ- strongest recovery since the out-
centfromlowsofRs875inMarch declineinrefiningmarginsto$5.7 Doesitthrowopenan Full report on ous year. break of the pandemic,” Mistry
to hit a high of Rs 2,368 in perbarrelandweaknessinthere- opportunitytoinvest? www.indianexpress.com “The months of September said in a conference call.

BRIEFLY Expert committee rejects Dr Reddy’s

Lastdatefor proposal for remdesivir’s full approval
ECLGS:Nov30 cepted by the Central Drugs
NewDelhi:Thegovernment ENSECONOMICBUREAU The panel’s suggestions Standard Control Organisation
on Monday extended the NEWDELHI,NOVEMBER2 come nearly two weeks (CDSCO), would mean that India
EmergencyCreditLineGua- wouldnotfollowtheUSdrugreg-
rantee Scheme (ECLGS) for A SUBJECT expert committee after the US Food and Drug ulator’sleadingrantingremdesivir
MSMEstillNovember30,as (SEC) under the nation’s top drug Administration approved fullmarketingapproval.“Afterde-
the scheme has failed to regulatorybodyhasrejectedapro- the drug as a recognised taileddeliberation,thecommittee
reach the target Rs 3 lakh posal by Hyderabad-headquar- did not recommend for grant of
treatment for Covid-19
crore of sanctions. tered Dr Reddy’s Laboratories to full marketing authorisation and
grantfullmarketingauthorisation opinedthatapprovalforrestricted
AdityaPurito forantiviralremdesivir.
Theexpertpanel’srecommen-
nearly two weeks after the US
FoodandDrugAdministrationap-
emergencyuseofthedrugshould
continue,”statedtheSECinitsrec-
joinCarlyle dations, which suggest that India
should continue with restricted
proved the drug as a recognised
treatmentforCovid-19.
ommendations on October 29.
The minutes of the panel’s meet-
New Delhi: Former HDFC emergency use of the drug, come The recommendations, if ac- ingweremadepubliconMonday.
Bank MD & CEO Aditya Puri
will join private equity ma-
jor Carlyle on investment
opportunitiesacrossAsiaas UPI transactions cross 2 bn/month in Oct
a senior advisor. PTI Corporation of India (NPCI). The cash has forced users and busi-
ENS ECONOMIC BUREAU total value of these transactions nesses to shift priorities to on-
‘Octjoblessrate NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 2 stood at Rs 3.8 trillion, up from
Rs 3.2 trillion in September, the
line payments nearly overnight.
For example, in May, which
risesto6.98%’ THE TOTAL number of transac-
tions conducted on the Bharat
data showed.
As of October, as many as 189
saw complete lockdown, the
number of transactions done
New Delhi: Unemployment Interface for Money-Unified banks were using the UPI plat- throughUPIstoodat1,234.5mil-
rate in October rose to 6.98 Payments Interface (BHIM-UPI), form developed by the NPCI, lion transaction, while in June
per cent from 6.67 per cent known more simply as the UPI compared to 141 in the corre- and July, when lockdown meas-
in September, as per the crossed the 2 billion transac- sponding month a year ago. The ures were relaxed a little, the
Centre for Monitoring tions count a month in October, platform has seen tremendous number of transactions stood at
Indian Economy. REUTERS according to the data released growth over the last eight 1,336.9 million and 1,497.3 mil-
by National Payments months as the limited use of lion, respectively.

New Delhi
 16 CLASSIFIEDS & TENDERS
Classifieds
PERSONAL
I Adya Srivastava D/O, Abhinav
Kamal Srivastava R/o 3/237 B
Nawab Ganj Kanpur 208002
have changed my name to
Aadvika Srivastava for all
purposes. 0040553430-1
I Ankur Goel S/o Sushil Goel R/o
B-32, Amarpali Leisure Valley,
Greater Noida West, GB Nagar
(U.P) have changed my minor
daughter’s name from Himani
to Himani Goel for all purposes
0040553417-1
I Anuj Tiwari S/o Sh. Prem
Prakash Tiwari R/o J-1107,
Jaipuriya Sunrise Greens,
Indirapuram, Ghaziabad, Uttar
Pradesh-201010 have changed
my name to Anuuj P Tiwari for
all purposes. 0040553425-1
I Rajesh Kumar S/O Dwarka
Prasad, R/O 25A, Gali no.4,
Sainik Enclave,Sec 3, Mohan
Garden, Uttam Nagar, New
Delhi-110059, have changed my
name to Rajesh.
0040553435-1
I am Narendra Singh Sirohi Vill +
Post Nisurkha, Tehsil- Siyana
Distt. Bulandshahr, My Son’s
name Man Sirohi was wrongly
published. While the correct
name of my Son is MAAN
SIROHI. Affidavit
No.17AE182582 Before notary
bulandshahr 9758896013
0040553418-1
I, Bineeta Kumari W/O Pradeep
Ghildiyal R/O Flat No-64, DDA-
Flats Pocket-5, Sector-
12,Dwarika Delhi-110078,
changed my name to Bineeta
Ghildiyal. 0040553456-1
I, Deepak Kumar Aggarwal S/o
Om Prakash Aggarwal, R/o FK-
10, Shastri Nagar, Delhi-110052
have changed my name from
Deepak Kumar Aggarwal &
Deepak Agarwal to DEEPAK
AGGARWAL for all purposes.
0040553248-1
I, Dushyant Sinha S/o Rajeev
Sinha R/o 703, Hazelnut
Apartment, Hiranandani
Meadows, Thane West Thane
Maharashtra-400601, declare
that name of father has been
wrongly written as Rajesh
Sinha in my Birth Certificate.
The actual name of father is
Rajeev Sinha, which may be
amended accordingly.
0070719289-1
I, Hari Sharn S/o Umrao Singh
R/o G-15/56, Sector-15, Rohini,
Delhi-110085 have changed my
name to Hari Sharan Dahiya.
0040553468-6
I, Hasta Devi , W/o late Banwari
Lal, R/o B- 355, Hari Nagar new
delhi - 110064, affirm that
Hansta Devi and Hasta Devi
both are one and the same
person 0040553423-1
I, MOHD AHMAD,S/O-MOHD
MOIDDIN,R/o-R-5,GAFFAR
MANZIL,PART-2,HAJI
COLONY,JAMIA-NAGAR,OKHLA,
DELHI-110025,have changed
my minor daughter name from
ILMA to ILMA AHMAD,for all
purposes. 0040553465-3
I,Virender S/O Satbir Singh,R/O
F-90, G/F Block-F, Pocket-
2,Sector-15, Rohini Delhi-
110089,have changed my name
to Virender Singh.
0040553456-2
I,Vina Kumari W/o,Lt. Satish
Kumar Tandon R/o,BG-6/340 D,
Paschim Vihar,Delhi-
110063,have changed my name
to Veena Tandon all purposes.
0040553474-2
I,Vasantha Kumari
W/o.Sh.P.H.Pillai R/o.LIG-
Flat.140-D Pocket-
E,G.T.B.Enclave Nand-
Nagri,Delhi-110093,have
changed my name to Vasantha
H.Pillai. 0040553465-5
I,Prashant
Vashistha,S/o,Lokendra Dutt
Sharma,R/o-E-10,Gali.No.13,
33,Futa Road,Dayalpur,Delhi-
94,have declare name,of
mine,my father name wrongly-
mentioned in,my 10thclass-
certificate &,12th class-
certificate Prashant
Vashishtha,Lokender Dutt
Sharma.The actual name,of
mine,and my,father Prashant
Vashistha,Lokendra Dutt
Sharma.
0040553474-1
I,Prableen Kaur Taneja,W/o
Ravinderpal Singh Taneja R/o
C-97,Fateh Nagar Tilak-Nagar
New Delhi-110018,have
changed my name to Prubleen
Kaur Taneja.
0040553468-3
I,PRASHANTH SURESH
VISHWANATHAN S/o Suresh
Vishwanathan, R/o-388, IInd-
Floor, Narmada-Apartments,
Alaknanda,Delhi–110019,have
changed my name to
PRASHANTH VISHWANATHAN
0040553468-4
I,Manish ARORA,S/0 Dharam
Pal ARORA,R/o-B-5/25,
Safdarjung-Enclave Delhi-
110029,have changed my name
to Manish Pal ARORA,in all
purpose. 0040553456-5
I,Jatinder Pal Singh S/o
Shamsher Singh, Address-
229,Sukhdev Vihar,New Delhi-
110025,changed my name to
Jitinder Pal Singh.
0040553456-4
I,Gagan Jain,R/o-B-202, Palam-
Extension Sector-7,Dwarka-
Bagdola,Delhi-110077,have
changed my minor son`s
name,from Pratham Jain to Avi
Jain permanently.
0040553460-1
I,Farheen Khan,D/o-Tahir
Khan,W/o-Anas Ahmad
Ansari,R/o-C-39/1/688,Gali
No.2,D-Block,Chauhan
Bangar,Delhi-110053,have
changed my name to Farheen
Ansari,for all future purpose.
0040553468-2
I,Dinesh alias Dinesh Singh
Rawat and My wife Manju
both,R/o House.No.474,Chirag
Delhi,Malviya-Nagar,New
Delhi-110017,declare that in my
son’s school-records our name
wrongly-mentioned as Dinesh
Singh Rawat and Manju that
our/my correct-name is Dinesh
Rawat and my wife correct-
name is Manju Rawat.
0040553474-4
I,BALJINDER SINGH BRAR,S/O-
BALJEET SINGH,H.NO.17 TYPE-3
SCHEDULE’B RASHTRAPATI
BHAWAN,NEW DELHI-
110004,changed my name to
BALJINDER SINGH,
permanently. 0040553456-6
I,DIPINDER KAUR,W/O
PARMINDER SINGH,R/O-B-
125,MIG FLATS,PHASE-4,ASHOK
VIHAR,DELHI-110052.CHANGED
MY NAME TO DEEPINDER KAUR.
0040553465-2
I,Ajay Pal S/o Shyamasunder
R/o-B-150,2nd-Floor,Ali
Vihar,Sarita-Vihar, Delhi-
110076.have changed my name
to Bablu Singh. 0040553465-4
I,AMIT GUPTA, ADDRESS-D-6,
MANSAROVER-PARK,
SHAHDARA,DELHI-
110032.Changed my MINOR Son
name AARYAN to AARYAN
GUPTA, permanently.
0040553456-7
I, Vikrant Vashisht,S/o,Lokendra
Dutt Sharma,R/o,E-10,Gali.no.-
13,33,Futa
Road,Dayalpur,Delhi-
110094,have declare that,name
of my Father wrongly-
mentioned as Lokender Dutt
Sharma in my,10th and 12th-
Class,certificate and
Graduation.The actual,name of
my,Father Lokendra Dutt
Sharma. 0040553468-1
I, Vijay Singh Sharma, S/O Ram
Niwas Sharma, R/O 13-D/2, Gali
No.2, Shree Ram Marg,
Maujpur, near Central Bank of
India, Delhi-110053, have
changed my name to Vijay
Kumar Sharma. 0070719258-1
I, Shikha Goel W/o Davinder Goel
R/o-C-66 Milansar Appartment
Sector-14 Rohini Delhi-
110085,changed my name to
Deepshikha Goel.
0040553456-3
I, Robin alias Robin Kapoor, D/o
Des Raj, W/o Rupesh Pandey,
R/o A-88, Gali No-6, Block A,
Jagat Puri, Krishna Nagar,
Delhi-110051, have changed my
name and shall hereafter be
known as Vanshika Robin
Pandey. 0070719288-1
I, RITU SHARMA,W/o Late
Kulbhushan Chaturvedi,R/o-
2521/193, Onkar Nagar-A,Tri
Nagar, Delhi-110035,have
changed my name to RITU
CHATURVEDI for all future
purposes. 0040553447-1
I, Priyank, S/o Anil Kumar
Sharma, R/o R-25, Nandini Kunj,
Nandgram, Ghaziabad 201001,
U.P., have changed my name to
Priyank Sharma.
0070719256-1
I, PARDEEP KUMAR.S/O-VED
PRAKASH TYAGI.,ADDRESS-10
DAKSHINESHWAR, 10 HAILEY
ROAD, NEW DELHI-110001.
Changed my name to PRADEEP
KUMAR, permanently.
0040553468-7
I, PRAVEEN s/o SURESH KUMAR
r/o H-322, Jahangir Puri, Delhi-
110033 have changed my name
to PARVEEN. 0040553398-1
I, Naseem Khatoon W/o-
Mohammad Akram R/o-4384-
A,Third Floor, Old No.B-14/H,
Gali No.18, Shanti Mohalla,
Delhi-110031,have changed my
name to Naseema Khatoon.
0040553468-5
I, NEEMA W/o Kishore Kumar R/o
6-C, Kalpana Vihar, Sec-5,
Vaishali, Ghaziabad, Uttar
Pradesh-201010 declare that
name of mine has been
wrongly written as Mrs. Neha
in my minor daughter Anushka
aged 14 years in her School
Records. The actual name of
mine is Neema. 0040553399-1
I, Pawan Kumar S/O, Dan Singh
Rawat R/o 75b Gyan Khand 4,
Indirapuram, Ghaziabad, Uttar
Pradesh, 201014 have changed
my name to Pawan Rawat for
all purposes. 0040553465-1
I, Renu Bala W/o JC669553Y
SUB/SKT Sunil Kumar Rana R/o
VPO-DAN-GOH, TEH-
AMB(GHANARI), DISTT-UNA,
H.P, in my husband’s service
record my date of birth
wrongly mentioned as
28/07/1978 instead of my
correct date of birth as
22/10/1978. 0040553463-1
PUBLIC NOTICE
Be it known to General Public that
my client Gurmeet Singh Modi S/o
Late Gurmukh Singh Modi R/o 2/9
Jangpura Extension New Delhi-
110014 has disowned and debarred
his Son namely Prabjeet Singh
Modi and his Daughter-in-Law
namely Amarpreet Kaur Modi and
his Grand-son namely Gursahib
Singh Modi from severed his all
relations and his all moveable,
immoveable properties and also
severed all his relations with them
due being them disobedient,
disloyal, immoral attitude & 9999026220. Any person claiming any
behavior towards my client. My
client shall not be responsible for
any their acts deeds done by them
anyone dealing with them shall be
on their risk and consequences.
FIROZ AHMED (Advocate)
Chamber No.619, Patiala House
Court, New Delhi-110001
LOST & FOUND
Lost of Original Sale Deed duly
Regd. as document No-9980, in
Book No-1, Volume No-4293 on
Pages 131 to 136 DT. 22-08-2012
in the office of Sub-Registrar,
Delhi on 29-09-2020 In Respect
Of Entire Built-UP Second Floor
Without Roof Rights Of Built-UP
Property Bearing No-WZ-
3128/C-1, Built On Land Area
Measuring 37.5 SQ, Yards,
Situated At Mahindra Park,
Shakur Basti, Delhi-110034,
Excuted by Shri Sudhir Mishra
S/o Shri Maya Kant Mishra In
Favour Of Shri Harish Kumar
S/o Shri Radhey Lal.
0040553460-10
I,Vikrant kapoor,S/o-Vijay
kapoor,R/o.h.no-112,The
national-media centre
shankar-chowk Nathupur(67)
Gurgaon,HR-122002,have lost
my original/Duplicate-
certificate class-10th(2000)
Rollno-6155275,class-12th
(2002)Rollno-6248015 CBSE-
Delhi. 0040553465-6
I,VIPIN KUMAR,S/o shri.Jagdish
kumar R/o-96/144,DDA-
flats.Ambedkar-nagar
,Dakshinpuri,Delhi,have Lost
my DDA original-Demand
letter-DDA file.no-J/5
(96)/82/DP,property-DDA-Janta
flat.no-96,G/F,cat-
Janta,Dakshinpuri,Delhi-62.
0040553460-6
I,Suresh Saini,S/o Late.Rattan
Lal,R/o-
151,Shahbad,Daulatpur,Delhi-
110042,have lost my Original-
Documents and Aadhar-card of
property Plot.No.90(100) Sq.yd
Khasra.No.51/18 in the area of
Village-Shahabad,
Daulatpur,Delhi-42,Finder
Contact:-9654535378.
0040553460-7
Lost of Original Notary File
Which Includes GPA, Sale
Agreement, Aff, Rect, SPA, I.
Bond and Other Relevant
Documents, DT. 21-01-2019. At
Ashok Vihar on 07-10-2020 in
Respect of Entire Built-UP
Industrial Property Bearing No-
250, Built On Land Area
Measuring 250 SQ, Meters, In
Block-H, Sector-I, Situated In
The Layout Plan Of Bawana
Industrial Complex, Bawana,
Delhi, executed by Shri Prem
Kumar Madan S/o Shri L.D.
Madan In Favour Of Smt.
Meena Keswani W/o Shri Kiran
Kumar. 0040553460-9
I,Naseema Begum,W/o Late
Umed Khan,have lost my
Original-Documents
G.P.A,Agreement to sell Etc.On
Dt.27.10.2020 of property No.59
Block-10 on.Nallaha-
Madalgir,Dakshinpuri,N.Delhi-
110062 Finder contact-
9650776228. 0040553460-8
I, Mahendra Poddar S/o Lt. H.N.
Poddar Accounts Manager
M/s Saya Automobiles Ltd.
Address A-21-22, G.T. Karnal
Road Industrial Area Azadpur
Delhi-110033 have Lost Some
Important documents,
company-stock Register Bank
Financial File, Books of
Accounts, Ledger Book,
External Hard Disk, Audit File,
ROC File, and others during
shifting office from Connaught
Place Delhi If Found Contact
9643303072.
0040553428-1
I, Ayush Kumar Mall,S/O
Rajkumar Mall R/O-C-22,ITI
Township-Mankapur Gonda-
271308.M-6388329504, have lost
my original CBSE marksheet
and certificate of class-
10th(2014) Roll.no.5198772;
12th(2017)Roll.no.5651050.
0040553460-3
I Gurdeep Singh R/o A-18/4 Rana
Pratap Bagh,New Delhi-110007,
have lost my Share Certificates
of Company-Jamna Auto
Industries Ltd, Address- Jai
Spring Road, Yamuna Nagar
Haryana 135001, Certificate No-
67372, Distinctive No 21148104,
folio No 31761, lost 50 shares. If
anyone found please contact
at - 9871985411. 0040553437-1
I,RAJ S/o Dhooram,R/o J-1/48
chankya place part-1 N.D-
59,have lost my original
certificate/marksheet class-
10th year-2018 Rollno-8707764
CBSE-DELHI.
0040553460-4
I,Supra Mall,D/O-Rajkumar
Mall,R/O.C-22 ITI Township-
Mankapur,Gonda-271308.M-
9450968281,have lost my CBSE
original-marksheet and
certificate of class-10th(2005)
Roll no 5204991;
12th(2007)Roll.no.5686726 and
LU B.com degree(2007-
09)Roll.no.8710694.
0040553460-2
Lost and Found
I, VIPIN KUMAR S/o shri
Jagdish kumar R/o
96/144 DDA flats,
Ambedkar nagar,
Dakshinpuri Delhi, have
Lost my DDA original
Demand letter - DDA file
no-J/5 (96)/82/DP,
property - DDA Janta flat
no- 96, G/F, cat-Janta,
Dakshinpuri, Delhi-62.
SITUATION VACANT
PUBLIC NOTICE
Know all men by these presents that my
clients Rajinder Singh Ahuja S/o Late
Shri Dayal Singh and Inder Kaur Ahuja
W/o Rajinder Singh Ahuja R/o C-6B/69,
Janakpuri, New Delhi-58, have
debarred their daughter-in-law Mita
Ahuja, Andrea Ahuja and Grand
Daughter Sonya Ahuja @ Sonia Ahuja
from all movable and immovable
properties and severed all relations with
them. Any person/s dealing with them
shall be doing so at their own risk and
responsibilities.
Sd/- H. K. BABBAR, ADVOCATE
Office:C3/266,Janakpuri, New Delhi-58
PUBLIC NOTICE
It is informed to the general public that the
Original Title Deed bearing Registratin
No.5340 dated 23.02.2007 regstered in the
office of Sub Registrar Nuh is misplaced
from me. The said title deed belongs to the
land bearing Rect. No.46, Kila No. 21/2(0-9)
situated at Village Kiranj, Tehsil Nuh, District
Nuh (Mewat). I am the owner in possession
of the said land. If anyone finds the above
sale deed they are requested to
contact/send the same at the below address
within the 7 days.
Raj Kala W/o Sh. Ishwar Singh R/o Village
KiranjTehsil&DistrictNuh,Haryana
Sd/- Raj Kumar Goyal, Advocate :
Ch.No.93 Block- B, Distt. Courts, Gurgaon
PUBLIC NOTICE
Be it Known that my client SH. ASHOK
KUMAR GUPTA S/o SH. BHICHCHA LAL
GUPTA R/O A-801, Sukhsagar Apartment,
Sector 9, Dwarka, New Delhi have sold the
Property at LP26A, Maurya Enclave,
Pitampura, Delhi-110034, presently mutated
in the name of his mother, late SMT.
DROPATI DEVI GUPTA on the basis of
Relinquish Deed signed by Raj Kumar Gupta,
Naresh Kumar Gupta, Vijay Kumar Gupta &
Shyam Sunder Gupta (all her sons) and
Pushpa & Rashmi Gupta (daughters) in his
favour being her only heirs. Any person, other
than the aforesaid 6 persons, claiming to be
the legal heir of late Mrs. Dropati Gupta may
lodge the objection, if any, with the
undersigned within 2 weeks of publication of
this notice at the address hereinbefore.
S.K.Taank (Sheenu) (Advocate)
Enrl.No.D/063/2008.
PUBLIC NOTICE
This is to inform General Public that at my
client Sudesh W/o Late Shri Virender, House
no. 1149 Village Bawana North Delhi, Delhi
110009 have purchased a plot bearing no.
296 measuring 32 sq. meter, pocket 07,
Sector 24 in Rohini Delhi Vide File no. 24
(361) 1991 / LAB/ Rohni in the name of her
husband Late Shri Viender and unfortunately
she forget her bag in Kanjawala Sub-
Registrar office on date 26.10.2020 at 1.35
p.m. My client have lodge FIR on date
29.10.2020 Vide LR No. 696482/2020.
Misplaced / lost documents are that:- Original
DDA Demand letter, DDA possession letter,
site possession letter and property purchased
Ordinal document from Shakuntla Devi GPA
Sell agreement receipt of to Shri Avinash Kaur
and Avinash Kaur to my client’s Husband Late
Shri Virender.
Sd/- AAKRITI SAXENA (Advocate)
D/2563/2010
PUBLIC NOTICE
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Sd./-
VIKASH TRIVEDI
ADVOCATE
PUBLIC NOTICE
To be known to all that I Arjun Gulati S/o
Late Shri Sunil Gulati R/o Flat No. E-901,
Himachali CGHS Ltd., Plot No. 8, Sector-
3, Dwarka New Delhi-110078, Presently
Residing at Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Purchaser/ mutatee of Property Bearing
No. DDA BUILTUP Free Hold MIG Flat
NO. H-352, Second Floor, Block-H,
Along With Scooter Garrage No. UNB-
11, Situated at Naraina Residential
Scheme, Now Known as Naraina Vihar,
Delhi.
That original documents i.e.
POSSESSION LETTER, POSSESSION
SLIP AND NOC FOR WATER AND
ELECTRICITY AND DEMAND LETTER
of the above said property has been lost.
An FIR to this effect has been lodged in
Police Station vide FIR No. 662079/2020
Dated 16.10.2020.
Any person(s) claiming any right,
interest, having any objection or found in
possession of original documents, may
write/contact with above named person
at above address/ phone No.
right, interest, objections with respect to
this property can personally inform within
15 days from the date of publication of
this notice.
Sd/- JASWANT RAI AGGARWAL
Advocate
Head Office 6, Prem Nagar Market,
Tyagraj Nagar, (Near Gate No. 2
Tyagraj Stadium), New Delhi-110003
Mobile: 9810542066
PUBLIC NOTICE
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
LOST & FOUND
I, Poonam respondent No. 3 of
the case title of Negolice India
Ltd vs Prabhat Bhasker & Ors.
Pending before the Hon'ble
Court of Sh. Harvinder Singh
vide CC 21/2019 have
personally apologized to the
above said company as I have
no intention to harm the
reputation of the Negolice India
Ltd and I further declare that as
per my personal knowledge that
the said company has not
encroached/occupied any piece
of public land. Rest assured that
the incident will not be reapeted.
SALUTE THE SOLDIER
Maj P Purushottam
In proud memory of Maj P Purushottam,
(4 BIHAR). While serving as the Defence
Spokesperson at Srinagar his office faced a
Fidayeen attack. Although unarmed , he engaged
the terrorists in a hand to hand fight, thereby
saving the lives of journalists present in the office.
In the process, he made the supreme sacrifice. His
gallantry serves as an inspiration to us. We, the
fraternity of the Veer Biharis, salute him.
The Bihar Regiment Association
MAHARSHI DAYANAND SARASWATI UNIVERSITY,
AJMER
No. F.20 (10)/Degree/MDSU/2020/22808 Dated: 29.10.2020
NOTICE FOR CANCELLATION OF E.BID - 08
E-bids invited vide E.Bid Notice No. F.20(10)/Degree/MDSU/2020/14173 dt. 28.07.2020
and subsequent Corrigendum No. F.20(10)/Degree/MDSU/2020/616 dt. 17.08.2020 for
the SUPPLY OF HIGH TEAR RESISTANT SECURITY FEATURE ENABLED DEGREE
SHEETS, PRINTING OF DATA ON DEGREE SHEETS USING LASER PRINTER AND
SUPPLY OF THE PRINTED DEGREES FOR THE YEAR 2018 & 2019 ON F.O.R. BASIS
TO M.D.S. University, Ajmer is hereby cancelled. (U.B.N. No. MDU2021GLOB00002)
Sd/- REGISTRAR
BEFORE DEBTS RECOVERY TRIBUNAL - III Delhi
4th Floor Jeevan Tara Building Parliament Street, New Delhi : 110001
Notice under Section 19(4) of the Recovery of Debts Due to Banks and Financial
Institutions Act. 1993 read with Rule 12 & 13 of the Debts Recovery Tribunal (Procedure
Rules) 1993).
In the matter of
OA 1074/2019
BANK OF BARODA SH. PALWINDER SINGH & ANR.
Vs.
Applicant Defendants
To,
D-1. SH PALWINDER SINGH, S/O SH. RANJEET SINGH,
R/O PLOT NO. 48AND 49, KHASRANO. 8/21,
PRIVATE FLAT, SECOND FLOOR, OLD BLOCK-B
FRONGT SIDE, B-1 KIRARI GARDEN, UTTAM NAAGR, DELHI - 110059
D-2. BALBIR KAUR, W/O PALWINDER SINGH,
R/O PLOT NO. 48AND 49, KHASRANO. 8/21,
PRIVATE FLAT, SECOND FLOOR, OLD BLOCK-B
FRONT SIDE, B-1, KIRAN GARDEN, UTTAM NAGAR, DELHI-110059
Whereas the above named applicant has instituted a case against you and whereas it has
been shown to the satisfaction of the Tribunal that it is not possible to serve you in ordinary
way. Therefore, this notice is given by advertisement you to make appearance in this
Tribunal 07.11.2020 at 10.30A.M.
Take notice that in case of your failure to appear on the above mentioned day before this
Tribunal, the case will be heard and decided in your absence.
Due to ongoing Pandemic situation, all the matters will be taken up through Video
Conferencing and for that purpose:-
(i)All theAdvocates/Litigants shall download the Cisco Webex application/software;
(ii) Meeting ID and Password for the next date of hearing qua cases to be taken by
Registrar/Recovery Officer-I/and Recovery Officer-II shall be available one day prior to the
next date at DRT Official Portal i.e. drt.gov.in under the Public Notice Head.
(iii) In any exigency qua that, the Advocates/Litigants can contact the concerned official at
Ph.No. 23748469
Given under my hand and seal of this Tribunal on this the 21st day of Sept., 2020.
By Order of the Tribunal,
Assistant Registrar, DRT-III, New Delhi
U.P.R.V.U.N.L. E- TENDER NOTICE
HARDUAGANJ THERMAL POWER
STATION, KASIMPUR (ALIGARH)
SUPERINTENDING ENGINEER,
OPERATION & MAINTENANCE
CIRCLE-IV, ‘D’TPS, KASIMPUR 1.
Short Term E-Tender Notice No.
STET- 43/O&MC-IV/DTPS/EMD-
II/DT.P.S./2020-21 Online e-bids are
invited for the “Erection &
Commissioning of Lighting & Lighting
fixture work in Control Room of Unit-8 &
9 at 2x250MW HTPS, Kasimpur, Aligarh”
E- tender has been uploaded on
05.11.2020 at 18:00 hrs. on
http://etender.up.nic.in, Estimated
Cost of Work Rs. 495950 only Time
Period : Three Months, E.M.D. cost Rs.
9920, Last date of tender 23.11.2020 up
to 14:00 Hrs, Note- Total quantity of
work, tender specification and other
terms & condition is as per tender
documents available on the e-portal.
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any shall be uploaded only on the above
website. Bidders are advised to visit the
website regularly for updated
information from time to time. Part- I
shall contain Tender Cost/Earnest
money and other necessary documents
as per pre-qualifying conditions and
Part-II will contain price bid as per bill of
quantity. Tender specification may be
downloaded from the website
(http://etender.up.nic.in) and other
specification details can be seen on
Nigam website www.uprvunl.org. The
contactors have to submit the hard copy
before the schedule date/time in the
concern office in sealed envelope
containing details of the tender
mentioned on the envelope. Tenders are
advised to send their hard copy directly
to the concerned tendering authority of
the Circles/ Division. Who reserve the
right to unaccept/cancel any or all the
tenders without assigning any reason
thereof. “Save Electricity Enhance
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Superintending Engineer (H.Q) ´fÂffaI
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New Delhi
WWW.INDIANEXPRESS.COM
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020 CALENDAR 17
OVER THE HEDGE by Michael Fry & T Lewis
CROSSWORD 4266 DAY TODAY BY PETER VIDAL
ARIES (Mar 21 - Apr 20) LIBRA (Sep 24 - Oct 23)
I don’t think you’ll There still seems to
have any choice but be a lot, perhaps too
to listen to what much, going on
other people are behind the scenes.
saying over the next month. The planets show little
You may even have to do what indication of any threat, so we
they are doing, belying your can hopefully discount the
natural reputation as a go- possibility of conspiracies and
getter. And, for today, I’d advise plots. Instead we may expect
a huge dose of compromise — selfless, charitable endeavours
and resilience. to flourish.
TAURUS (Apr 21 - May 21) SCORPIO (Oct 24 - Nov 23)
Short as well as It’s not often you
long-term cycles have a time as
emphasise financial packed with punchy,
conditions. From planetary
CALVIN & HOBBES by Bill Watterson pensions and major alignments as over the next two
procurements down to minor weeks. What is at stake is your
points of monetary etiquette, freedom of movement and your
you must keep a very ability to change your life and
close eye on your cash-flow. circumstances as you see fit.
However, that’s only part of It’s all a question of how far you
the picture on a day which are prepared to curb your
ACROSS DOWN sees massive changes wilder instincts.
1 Knocked out so no cup tickets 1 Hiding place many yearn to in mood.
required (7) find (5) SAGITTARIUS (Nov 24 - Dec 22)
5 You may find them by the sea 2 Employee who gains nothing GEMINI (May 22 - June 21) Symbolically
and on board ship by waiting? (6,7) Hopefully, the speaking the Moon
(5) 3 Apparent but not in a hospital toughest planetary is under your
8 I for one would make a fine room (7) aspect of the day will control today. This
landlord (7,6) 4 Soda water display (6) occur while you’re means that as far as home and
9 I care about a growing girl 5 Cultivated Scandinavian occupied elsewhere. And if all family affairs are concerned,
(5) (5) goes well, by the time you get you may receive the credit, but
10 Cooked me instead! 6 Very busy explaining what the involved, major problems you can’t escape your
(7) Reign of Terror was? should be past, leaving you to obligations to children and
11 Edison devised a legal position (2,4,2,5) cope with minor outbreaks of loved ones. It also, by the way,
in play (6) 7 Takes good steps not to have to hysteria from someone who means that partners may have
12 I shut a new opening
(6)
walk in the streets
(7)
MARVIN by Tom Armstrong should know better. to come first.
CANCER (June 22 - July 23) CAPRICORN (Dec 23 - Jan 20)
15 Wildly angered (7) 11 Prospect following land
Don’t worry about In the ancient art of
17 What the viewer sees in TV is clearance (4,3)
being passed by or political astrology,
a puzzle (5) 13 Was an unwanted visitor from
passed over. the Sun is the
19 Made fearfully late? abroad (7)
Nobody with any symbol of the
(6,2,5) 14 Elite type found in newspaper
sensitivity can ignore reigning monarch. The fact
20 New cadet deputised production (6)
someone like you for very that this brilliant star is
(5) 16 Consented to give up a vice
long. Only a mix of the weird traversing a prosperous and
21 Provide new gear as (5)
and wonderful with the colourful region of your
compensation 18 Chase around wanting
utterly down-to-earth and horoscope means that you must
(7) treatment? (5)
ordinary, will satisfy you from now aim for the very top or
now until the end of the year. miss a grand opportunity.
SolutionsCrossword4265:Across: 1Stage,8Sidedrum,9Piled,10Iterates,11
Puton,12Emu,16Wallet,17Sandra,18Age,23Stick,24Resented,25Snows,26 LEO (July 24 - Aug 23) AQUARIUS (Jan 21- Feb 19)
Executed,27Genre.Down:2Tribunal,3Grenoble,4Victim,5Weird,6Write,7 Lunar alignments Don’t feel left out.
Amuse,12ETA,13Use,14Instance,15Pricewar,19Geezer,20Greek,21Aspen, maintain a There’ll be time
22Incur.
benevolent sway enough soon to strut
over your earthly around in the
affairs. If the evidence is to be limelight and, in the meantime,
believed, the Moon’s current you might be advised to take
JUMBLED WORDS DifficultyLevel5s
alignment should benefit your advantage of each and every
SOLUTION SUDOKU 4281

material resources as well as chance to put your feet up. The

Instructions your mind and emotions. You only problem is that, first of all,
Givenbelowarefourjumbledwords.Solvethejumblestomakeproperwordsandmovethemto TosolveaSudokupuzzle, might find that difficult to you have to explain why you’re
therespectivesquaresbelow.Selectthelettersintheshadedsquaresandjumblethemtoget everydigitfrom1to9 believe, today. not prepared to continue with
SUDOKU 4282

theanswerforthegivenquip. mustappearineachofthe your commitments.

Youcanpretendtobe____;youcan’tpretendtobe___-SachaGuitry(7,..,5) VIRGO (Aug 24 - Sep 23)
nineverticalcolumns,in The Moon is PISCES (Feb 20 - Mar 20)
eachoftheninehorizontal undoubtedly Mercury and Venus
SUEOR TESTED rowsandineachofthe contributing to a are two planets
nineboxes. spot of background which are vital if you
tension, but then there would are to put your point
be no change without across successfully. When
FNIIS ABSUWY DifficultyLevel
challenge, would there? you’re making phone calls,
Take a fresh look at various writing letters or merely joining
1s=Veryeasy;2s=Easy; domestic assumptions and in a heated debate, please have
3s=Medium;4s=Hard; family agreements which may your facts straight. Otherwise I
5s=VeryHard;6s= have gone unquestioned for have a feeling that partners will
Answer: You can pretend to be serious; you can’t pretend to be witty - Sacha Guitry Genius too long. soon notice.
SOLUTION: ROUSE, FINIS, DETEST, SUBWAY

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18 SPORT
THE INDIAN EXPRESS, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2020
WATSON LIKELY TO QUIT
Top Australian all-rounder Shane Watson has decided to call time on his competitive
cricket career after Chennai Super Kings' exit from the Indian Premier League. While
Watson has not made any official announcement, it has been learnt that after CSK ended
their IPL campaign on Sunday with a win over Kings XI Punjab, the senior player told his
teammates about the decision to retire from all forms of cricket. PTI

BRIEFLY
Sindhu‘retires’,
clarifiesnotfrom
badminton
World cham-
pion P V
Sindhu cre-
ated a stir on
Monday by
posting "I
Retire" on so-
cial media
only to follow
it up with a lengthy statement declar-
ing that she would actually be saying
goodbye to "the negativity, fear, and
uncertainty" triggered by the COVID-
19 pandemic.The Olympic silver-
medallist, who is currently in London
to work on her nutrition and recovery
needs at the Gatorade Sports Science
Institute, started her rather stunning
postbysayingthatthe"DenmarkOpen
was the final straw. I Retire". She was
referringtoherpulloutfromtheevent
duetothepandemic."...I'mwritingto-
day to tell you that I'm done...Not be-
ing able to represent India in the
Denmark Open was the last straw,"
Sindhu's note stated. "Today, I choose
to retire from this current sense of un-
rest. I retire from this negativity, the
constant fear, uncertainty. I choose to
retire from a complete lack of control
over the unknown," she said.
2DDCAemployees
contractcoronavirus
The Feroz Shah Kotla premises is un-
dergoinganotherroundofsanitisation
driveaftertwoDelhi&DistrictsCricket
Association (DDCA) employees have
tested positive for COVID-19, days be-
forethestateunit'selections. However,
the elections for the post of treasurer
and four directors will be held as per
schedule from November 5 to 8 at the
Kotlapremises."TwoemployeesNeeraj
Sharma and Pradeep Banerjee have
tested COVID-19 positive and have
beenadvised18daysof homequaran-
tine.Theirofficeshavebeenshutdown
Delhi bounce back after 4 losses in a row to beat RCB and take 2nd spot; Kohli’s team qualifies too
SYNOPSIS
Rahane returns to form after DC
show bowling discipline
SHAMIK CHAKRABARTY
NOVEMBER 2
RIDING ON a fine partnership between
Shikhar Dhawan and Ajinkya Rahane, Delhi
Capitals ended their four-match losing
streak to finish second in the points table.
It gives them the leeway of an extra game
in the playoffs, as they beat Royal
Challengers Bangalore by six wickets in Abu
Dhabi on Monday. RCB, too, qualified,
thanks to their better net run rate than
Kolkata Knight Riders.
After posting 152/7, RCB had to take the
game deep to ensure that they go through.
They stay put on 14 points but as DC sur-
passed their total in 19 overs, RCB’s net run
rate remained above KKR’s.
Rahane returns to form
For a player of his pedigree, Rahane had
been going through a lengthy form slump.
Exclusion from India’s white-ball set-up af-
fected his confidence and this year, after
making the switch from Rajasthan Royals
wherehewasthecaptainlastterm,Rahane’s
game time had been limited. In the previous
five matches, he barely made any contribu-
tion with the bat. His footwork looked ten-
tative, his approach cagey.
Today, coming in at No. 3 after Prithvi
Shaw yet again fell cheaply, Rahane played
assertive cricket. He showed intent with two
fours in an over against Isuru Udana. He
swept beautifully against Yuzvendra Chahal
and came down the track against Shahbaz
Ahmed to hit a six. Rahane scored 60 off 46
balls, playing orthodox cricket. When he
tried to play an uncharacteristic reverse
sweep, he got out.
Huge credit also goes to Dhawan, who
scored a 41-ball 54. He took the attack to the
A DC marvel POINTS TABLE
Team Matches
MI
DC
RCB
13
14
14
Won
9
8
7
Lost
4
6
7
Pts
18
16
14
NRR
1.296
-0.109
-0.172
KKR
SRH
14
13
7
6
7
7
14
12
-0.214
0.555
KXIP 14 6 8 12 -0.162
Huge credit goes to Shikhar CSK 14 6 8 12 -0.455
Dhawan, who scored a 41-ball RR 14 6 8 12 -0.569
54. He took the attack to the Orange Cap KL Rahul (670 runs)
opposition upfront, allowing Purple Cap K Rabada (25 wkts)
Rahane to settle down. The two
India stalwarts added 88 runs FINALPLAYOFFSPOT:SRHORKKR?
● Delhi Capitals sealed second spot
and DC were home and dry. in the points table. They will face
Mumbai Indians in Qualifier 1 and
even if they lose that game, will get a
process of cutting loose. He hit a fabulous second chance to make the final as
loftedcoverdriveoff KagisoRabadaforafour they will play Qualifier 2.
before lifting Patel over long-on. Ashwin
made a timely intervention. As for Nortje, he ● Royal Challengers Bangalore have
came back brilliantly to make a serious im- also made it to the playoffs and will
pact with the ball. The wickets of a well-set be one of the teams contesting the
Devdutt Padikkal and the dangerous Chris Eliminator.
MorrisinsidethreedeliveriesthwartedRCB’s ● The identity of their opponents
progress in the slog overs. will be decided by Tuesday’s final
Padikkal scored a fine half-century but league game between MI and
there’s one aspect of his game he would like Sunrisers Hyderabad. If the latter
to look into. The left-hander occasionally ex- emerge victorious, they will make it,
poseshisoff stumpwhilefacingfastbowlers. or else Kolkata Knight Riders will go
Speedsters like to see the stumps, for they through..
believe if they can see them, they can hit
them. On Monday, Padikkal made room and ●LIVE
tried to hit a 152kph delivery from Nortje
TUESDAY: SRH vs MI 7:30pm
over cover.
He was beaten for pace and castled. Qualifier 1
Morris was done in by extra bounce. NOV 5: DC vs MI 7:30pm
Nortje returned with three wickets, but
it was a collective effort by DC bowlers.
Delhi’s Ajinkya Rahane scored 60 off 46 balls, playing orthodox cricket. BCCI/IPL Rabada was excellent for his 2/30. Ashwin
teased the batsmen and Daniel Sams, too, Chuffed with the
was prettytightupfrontbefore conceding17 performance. We knew it was
opposition upfront, allowing Rahane to set- start with. When he stepped out to an Axar runs in his final over. a do or die and we just
tle down. The two India stalwarts added 88 Patel delivery, he didn’t time it properly. It Untilthe15thover,RCBweregoingatun- focused on the win, not NRR.
runs and DC were home and dry. wasasimplecatchatlong-on,butNortjelost der seven runs per over. AB de Villiers and The teams who won in the
his footing and dropped it. Shivam Dube upped the ante, but de Villiers
DC show bowling discipline But Ashwin ensured that Nortje’s blem- was run out in the final over, trying to go for
latter half completely
Earlier Anrich Nortje might well have ish didn’t prove costly. Kohli was dropped on animprobablesecond.Together, DC bowlers changed the scenario. It's a
dropped the match, had Ravichandran 13,Ashwinremovedhimon29.Theoff-spin- restricted RCB to a very chaseable total. really competitive
Ashwin and Marcus Stoinis not bailed him ner was taking pace off the ball and one such BRIEF SCORES: Delhi Capitals 154 for 4 tournament for sure.”
out. In a must-win game to secure a top-two delivery forced Kohli to mistime again. The (Rahane 60, Dhawan 54, Ahmed 2-26) beat
spot for the playoffs, dropping Virat Kohli skierwenttoStoinisatdeepmid-wicketwho Royal Challengers Bangalore 152 for 7 SHREYAS IYER
couldhavebeencostly.TheRoyalChallengers grabbed it with both hands. (Padikkal 50, de Villiers 35, Nortje 3-33) by DELHI CAPITALS’ SKIPPER
Bangalore captain had been circumspect to Following the reprieve, Kohli was in the six wickets.

Why Charlton’s dementia puts focus back on headers

and entire premises will be sanitised,"
DDCAjointsecretaryRajanManchanda
told PTI on Monday. He informed that
elections will be held as per schedule.
"The elections are on as per schedule
and all kinds of health safety protocols
are in place," Manchanda said.
Balebacktowinning
waysatTottenham
first,Shearerwasmadetoheadaball–which
MIHIR VASAVDA weighs close to 500gm – 20 times.
DELHI, NOVEMBER 2 Immediately after, he had to take the same
ALMOST ONE-fifth of the 260 career goals
tests again. The result post heading showed
changes in the way the brain communicated
Alan Shearer scored – the most in English with muscles and impulses took a little
tia. The four others are Ray Wilson (died in
2018), Martin Peters (died last year), Nobby
Stiles and Charlton’s brother Jack, both of
whom died this year. The team’s manager,
Alf Ramsey, also had dementia.
Cardiff Universitypointedtosixcasesof play-
ersin60sdevelopingdementiahavingplayed
foranaverageof 26years.Fourshowedsigns
of CTE adding that the risk was ‘extremely
low’ from playing recreational football.

Gareth Bale soared into the air, con-
nected with the ball and powered it
into the net. It's taken more than
E
Premier League history – came from head- longer to travel down the nerves.
ers, a skill he practiced over 100 times a day This, a University of British Columbia re-
in training for more than 20 years. search in 2018 said, happens
Threeyearsago,Shearer,50,underwenta becausethebloodlevelsof pro-
EXPLAINED
Is there any evidence to suggest headers How did the football world respond to
increased dementia risk? these studies?
The first link was made in In November 2015, the USA became the
2014. In 2002, former England in- first country to ban headers for children

sevenyearsbutBalewas Tottenham's
match-winner again. And it had only
requiredthreeminutesonthefieldfor
the substitute to clinch a 2-1 victory
over Brighton on Sunday. Apart from
the empty stadium, due to ongoing
pandemic restrictions, this was the
type of moment Bale imagined pro-
ducing on his return to Tottenham af-
ter seven years. While Arsenal cele-
brated its first league win at Old
Trafford in 14 years, thanks to Pierre-
Emerick Aubameyang's penalty,
Manchester United is reeling from its
worst start to a season in 48 years.
Onlysevenpointshavebeencollected
from its first six games of the league
season, with no wins at home for Ole
Gunnar Solskjaer's 15th-place side
“First half we never turned up,”
Solskjaer said after his 100th match
in charge of United. AGENCIES
raft of tests – including an MRI – to check if
heading the ball had caused any damage to
his brain. The tests were a part of BBC docu-
mentaryAlanShearer:Dementia,Footballand
Me,inwhichheinvestigatesthelinkbetween
the sport and the syndrome. The one-hour
feature dug deep into growing fears world-
widethatheadingafootballincreasestherisk
of dementia and dying because of it. On
Sunday came the news that England World
Cup winner Bobby Charlton, regarded
England’s greatest, had developed dementia.
But as Shearer had learnt, the arguments
aren’t as black and white as his stripes at
Newcastle United, for whom he scored more
than half of his goals.
Can playing football lead to dementia?
Last year, the Guardian quoted a land-
markstudybyUniversityof Glasgow,reveal-
ing that “former professional footballers are
three-and-a-half times more likely to suffer
from dementia… five-fold increase in the
One of England’s greatest footballers
Sir Bobby Charlton has been diagnosed
with dementia. Reuters
risk of Alzheimer’s, a four-fold increase in
motor neurone disease and a two-fold in-
crease in Parkinson’s”.
This, the researchers concluded, was be-
cause of the damage to the brain due to re-
peated heading of the football over a period
of time. But it was not conclusive. It is argued
that physical contact during a match – like
an elbow to players’ head – can also be a fac-
tor along with a combination of lifestyle and
genetic factors.
How does heading the ball affect the
brain?
Scientists at Scotland’s University for
Sporting Excellence conducted various cog-
nitive tests on Shearer in two parts. After the
teins associated with damage
to nerve cells increase after
heading the ball. Scientists say
more than in a match, it is the
repeated practice drills that
cause greater harm. The risk
was greater among players
from the older generations
since the balls used then were a lot heavier.
What made those balls heavier?
The inner bladders were made of strong
rubber while the outer layer was formed of
leather, with stitches cut out. These balls
were particularly uncomfortable to play –
and especially head – in wet-weather con-
ditions as the leather would absorb the rain
water, thus becoming heavier. The new type
was introduced 1970 World Cup onwards.
Incidentally, Charlton is the fifth player from
England’s 1966 World Cup-winning cam-
paign, the last major tournament with the
old-style balls, to be diagnosed with demen-
ternational Jeff Astle, diagnosed
with dementia, died aged 59.
Medical experts told the coroner,
as per reports, that the damage to
Astle’s brain was a result of re-
● peated minor trauma, ‘probably
causedbyheadingaheavyleather
football’. In 2014, there was a re-
examination of Astle’s brain and it was re-
vealed he had died from Chronic Traumatic
Encephalopathy (CTE).
What is CTE?
Itisadiseasethatcausesseveredamageto
the brain because of repeated head injuries
andislinkedtomemoryloss,depressionand
dementia. Former boxers are most com-
monlydiagnosedwithit,however,therehave
been instances of CTE in many other contact
sports like pro wrestling, mixed martial arts,
ice hockey, rugby, baseball, Australian rules
football and, of course, football.A 2017 re-
search by University College London and
under-11 to help reduce concussion. The
move also helped in reducing injuries;
since heading was not allowed, the ball was
not lofted in the air and thus, chances of
heads colliding or elbows being smashed
significantly reduced.
In February this year, England, Scotland
and Ireland also barred players aged under-
12 from heading the ball during training. But
they can still do that in games. Coaches use
soft balls in training to develop a player’s
heading technique. Experts in Turkey, too,
have recommended the same.
However, with no conclusive evidence
linkingheadingtodementia,nouniformrule
by FIFA exists.
Have players in India suffered from this?
LegendaryIndianstrikerPKBanerjeewas
diagnosed with dementia before he passed
awaythisyear.Thereare,however,norestric-
tions on players across all age groups head-
ing the ball, in matches or during training.

WOMEN’S T20 CHALLENGE

No access to cricket on TV, now ready to play ‘live’: Chantam advances

DEVENDRAPANDEY
MUMBAI, NOVEMBER 2
NOT MANY cricket careers would stutter for
wantofaTVset-topbox-anadditionalsecond
one in the family. For Natthakan Chantam
(pronounced: na-taa-kaan chan-taam),
Thailand'sright-handopeningbatandpacer,
trying to capture the signal of a cricket relay-
ing-channelinBangkokbecamecrucialwhen
she felt the need to watch what authentic
cricket at the topmost level looked like.
The Associate Nation player’s only win-
dow into the game were highlights on
YouTube and Facebook, which she soon
outgrew. This week, the exuberant Thai will
be on TV herself as part of BCCI’s Women's
T20ChallengertournamentinUAE,ahistoric
firstforthesouth-eastAsiannation.Suleeporn
LaomiwasthefirstThaitoturnoutforSydney
ThunderintheWomen’sBigBashinAustralia.
The Indian tournament will welcome the
easy-smiling speedster with the disarming
folded-hands greeting, common to several
Thai international athletes, as the 4-match
event takes off on Wednesday. For the 24-
year-old first-timer in the big league, things
taken for granted in countries where cricket
is a mainstream sport - like a turf pitch - have
notbeeneasilyavailable.Improvinghergame
by switching on the TV too proved difficult.
“InThailand,channelsshowinglivecricket
are not available. We needed to buy an extra
TVboxtoreceivethesignal.Otherwise,itwas
just highlights on social media platforms,”
Chantam told The Indian Express.
Every piece of playing gear too needed to
be imported - from India, Australia or
Malaysia.“Weneededtoplaninadvanceifwe
had to buy cricket equipment,” she added.
True calling
Chantam started playing cricket with
her school team in her third grade. “I did-
n’t know cricket back then. As a sportsper-
son, I was keen to try new games and was
also in the basketball club. However, at
some point, I needed to choose and I knew
cricket was simply the one,” says the 38-
games-old Thai international. Talkingtothe
ICC’s official YouTube channel last year,
Chantam described how the Thai team lived
thewholeyearroundinamassivehousewith
three bedrooms and trained together, solidi-
fying the bond among the players.
Allthiswhile,herparentswouldstayalit-
tle boggled about this new sport, even when
she set off for Dubai to play the BCCI tourna-
ment. Her father is a teacher and mother a
hairdresser,andbothearnestlysharedheren-
thusiasm when she announced she was
picked for the event.
“They were confused because they don’t
know much about cricket or what this
Women’sT20Leaguemeanstocricketplayers.
I told them this is big, so they are excited for
In Thailand, channels showing live
cricket are not available. We
needed to buy an extra TV box to
receive the signal. Otherwise, it
was just highlights on social
media platforms. They (family)
were confused because they don’t
know much about cricket or what
this Women’s T20 League means
to cricket players. I told them this
is big, so they are excited for me”
NATTHAKAN CHANTAM
TRAILBLAZERS’ PLAYER
me,”Chantamsaid.“Myfriendswereverycu-
rious. When I tried a simple explanation that
youuseathinflatwoodbattohittheball,most
of them thought it was hockey!” she laughs.
She came up on the Indian board’s radar
because of her batting performances against
India and Pakistan. Playing for Thailand A as
part of a quadrangular series in Patna,
Chantam had scored 80 against the Indian
bowlingattackandlateranotherhalf-century
againstastrongPakistanline-upatlastyear’s
T20 World Cup. Thailand’s coach is Harshal
Pathak, a former cricketer from Pune. He in-
forms her nickname is Jean and describes
Chantamasanopenerwithasharpmindwho
can bat at any position.
“Hergamesenseisimmenseandshereads
match situations much better than others. At
the same time, her strokes are world-class.
The fifty she scored against Pakistan bowling
broughtherinthelimelight,”Pathaksaid.The
coach would ensure the Thai team spent an
extended stint at Pune's Cadence Academy,
soaking in the skills.
Smart cricketer
Chantam’s far from the impetuous crick-
eter who’ll use aggressive batting as the best
recourseandperishifthebighitdoesn’tcome
off.Chantamrespectsthecricketingsingle,ro-
tating strike and finding the gaps - signs of a
wise and evolving cricketer.
She told the ICC earlier, “In Powerplay,
everyone(isfielding)inside,onlytwooutside.
Soeverywhere,(thereis)spaceforme.Biggap
for me.” She'd view the open spaces with a
glint in her eye, though she’s known to send
some soaring as well.
“My mentality is (to) hit for one run
through the gap. Our (hers and her batting
partner’s)approachisdifferent,myplanis(to)
hit through the gap and give her the strike,”
Chantam added. Which explains her choice
of Mithali Raj and Virat Kohli as favourite
Indian cricketers.
She loves a good challenge though: like
English batter Danni Wyatt in full flow. “I
wanna see how aggressive she can bat
against us,” the pacer told ICC, adding South
African Lizelle Li’s quick bowling is another
source of inspiration.
She admits to being pleasantly surprised
when chosen for the Challenger. “I could not
believe it because I did not expect to be cho-
sen. It was a lot of emotions when I first
heard the news. I was shocked, delighted,
excited and nervous. As soon as I realised
that I would be joining IPL (Women’s
Challenger), I planned for mental and phys-
ical training just to be ready for the tourna-
ment,” she said.
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