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12 PAGES | `4.00BHUBANESWAR | THURSDAY, APRIL 22 | 2021

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Actor Yami Gautam says her nine yearsin the film industry has been anincredible journey

SATISFYING STINTJonny Bairstow helps Sunrisers Hyderabad wintheir 1st game in the ongoing edition ofIPL against Punjab Kings

MAIDEN VICTORY

SPORTS | P12LEISURE | P2

President Putin warns the US of swiftretaliation if it provokes Russia in anymanner INTERNATIONAL | P10

RUSSIA WARNS US

VOLUME 11, ISSUE 22 | www.orissapost.com

Situation is grim but why can’t you showsome more patience? After all you’ve 75years’ experience of showing patience!

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AGENCIES

Nashik/Mumbai, April 21: Twenty-four COVID-19 patients, with at least11 of them on ventilator support, suf-focated to death Wednesday whentheir oxygen supply stopped suddenlybecause of a malfunction in the mainstorage at the Dr Zakir HusainMunicipal Hospital in Nashik, officialssaid. The supply was disrupted dueto leakage of the gas from a storageplant, they informed. A senior civicofficial said of the 150 patients ad-mitted to the hospital, 23 were on ven-tilators while the rest were on oxy-gen support. Twenty two of thepatients died in the morning while twoothers succumbed in the evening.

“As per the current information, 24people have died due to the inter-rupted supply of oxygen. The pa-tients were on ventilators as well ason oxygen support, which got dis-rupted after the leakage in supplytank,” District Collector SurajMandhare told reporters. He informedthat the municipal corporation im-mediately shifted dura cylinders fromother facilities in Nashik to helpother patients at the hospital.

According to local officials, oxygenleakage was noticed around 12.30pm,

following which hospital authoritieswere alerted. They in turn contactedmunicipal commissioner Kailash

Jadhav seeking technical help.Mandhare said a private company

looks after the maintenance of the

oxygen storage tank located on thepremises of the hospital. “We havegiven all information to the govern-

ment. As far as oxygen supply is con-cerned, the NMC received dura cylin-ders from places where the consump-tion is less. Oxygen will be supplied tothe patients from these cylinders.Currently, all others undergoing treat-ment are stable,” he said.

Divisional Revenue CommissionerRadhakrishna Game said a 13 KL(kilolitre) oxygen tank was set up onthe premises of the hospital.

“Around 10 am, a socket of the oxy-gen storage tank broke and leakagestarted. When the hospital staff cameto know about it, they deployed jumbocylinders to supply oxygen to the pa-tients and started shifting some ofthem,” Game said. He added that theleakage has stopped, the tank repairedand oxygen supply is being normalised.

Expressing grief, Maharashtra HealthMinister Rajesh Tope said in Mumbaithat all the 24 deceased were infectedby the COVID-19 virus. He said a probehas been ordered into the tragedy.

Leela Shelar, who lost her 60-year-old mother in the tragedy was in-consolable. “My mother was admit-ted in the hospital Tuesday and wasput on ventilator support. I didn’tadmit my mother to the hospital todie in this manner. I feel so helpless,”she lamented.

They shut O2 supply, 24 deadPATIENTS WERE UNDERGOING TREATMENT AT A MUNICIPAL HOSPITAL IN NASHIK FOR CORONAVIRUS

FIGHTING AGAINST ALL ODDS: Technicians trying to repair the oxygen storage plant at the hospital in Nashik PTI PHOTO

A SOCKET IN THE OXYGENTANK BROKE WHICH CAUSED

THE LEAKAGE LEADING TOTHE TRAGEDY

MAHARASHTRAGOVERNMENT ANNOUNCES

`5 LAKH RELIEF FORFAMILIES OF THE DECEASED

150 PATIENTS IN THE HOSPITALWERE ON OXYGEN SUPPORT

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21:A day after hundreds ofmatric students marchedtowards Naveen Niwas de-manding cancellation ofClass X exams, their wisheswere fulfilled. The Odishagovernment announcedWednesday that the matriculation exams sched-uled to start May 3 standscancelled. Along with it,all examinations of theOdisha State Board ofMadrasa Education sched-uled to start May 19 havealso been called off.

“Keeping in mind thesurging number of casesdue to the COVID-19 pan-demic, the matriculationexamination for the year2021 has been cancelled,”School and Mass EducationMinister Samir RanjanDash said.

“As per the directions ofHon’ble Chief Minister on15.04.2021, discussions wereheld with all the stake-holders of School and MassEducation department andkeeping in view of the up-surge of the pandemic sit-uation of COVID-19, the

Class X examinations con-ducted by BSE, scheduledto be held from 03.05.2021and all examinations ofOdisha State Board ofMadrasa Education sched-u l e d t o b e h e l d f ro m19.05.2021 are hereby can-celled,” a notification is-sued by the S&ME de-partment in this regardread.

“The results of Class Xexams will be prepared onthe basis of an objective cri-terion to be developed bythe board. Any candidate,who will not be satisfiedwith the marks awarded tohim/her on this basis, willbe given an opportunity tosit in an examination asand when the conditionsare conducive to hold it,”the notification further said.

The Odisha governmentApril 15 postponed all stateboard examinations in-cluding the Class X and XIItests in the wake of spiral-ing Covid-19 cases. ChiefMinister Naveen Patnaikmade the announcementafter reviewing the coron-avirus situation in Odisha,where active cases have sur-passed the 14,000-mark.

STUDENTS’ DEMAND FULFILLED

GOVT CANCELS MATRIC EXAMS

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, April 21: SerumInstitute of India (SII), the world’slargest vaccine maker, announcedWednesday a price of ̀ 400 per dosefor its COVID-19 vaccine ‘Covishield’for state governments and ̀ 600 perdose for private hospitals. The com-pany also said for the next twomonths, it will address the issue oflimited capacity by scaling up vaccine production.

“Going ahead, 50 per cent of ourcapacities will be served to theGovernment of India’s vaccina-tion programme, and the remain-ing 50 per cent of the capacity willbe for the state governments andprivate hospitals,” SII said in astatement.

Considering the global vaccineprices, ‘we are ensuring that our vac-cines are affordable in compari-son to any other vaccine in theworld’, it said. The American vac-

cines in private markets cost morethan ̀ 1,500 per dose, while the priceof Russian and Chinese vaccines arebeing sold for `750, SII added.

“... Owing to the complexity, andurgency of the situation it is chal-lenging to supply the vaccine in-dependently to each corporate entity. We would urge all corporateand private individuals to access thevaccines through the state-facili-tated machinery and private healthsystems. After 4-5 months, the vac-cines will be made available in re-tail and free trade,” SII added.

‘Covishield’ comprises over 90per cent of the over 13 crore vaccinesadministered across India so far, according to government data released Wednesday.

SERUM INSTITUTE OF INDIA SAYS PRIVATE HOSPITALS TO PAY `600 PER DOSE

Covishield at `400 for states21K TEST POSITIVEAFTER VACCINE JAB NEW DELHI: Approximately 21,000 peo-ple have tested positive for COVID-19after taking the first dose of eitherCovishield or Covaxin, while over 5,500contracted the infection after takingthe second dose, the Centre saidWednesday. Addressing a press confer-ence, ICMR Director General BalramBhargava said 0.04 per cent of 17,37,178individuals, who received the seconddose of Covaxin, were found positivefor COVID-19, while 0.03 per cent of1,57,32,754 people, who took the second dose of Covishield, contractedthe infection. “After vaccination if onegets infection then it is known as break-through infection,” he said.

WASHINGTON: A federalgrand jury has foundDerek Chauvin, a formerMinneapolis policeofficer, guilty on allthree counts of murderof African-AmericanGeorge Floyd May 25,last year. Floyd (46),was killed in a brutal

abuse of police force during an arrest after astore clerk alleged, he had passed acounterfeit USD 20 bill in Minneapolis. Chauvin(45), pinned down Floyd with his knee on thepavement of a south Minneapolis intersectionfor more than nine minutes. “I can’t breathe. Ican’t breathe,” were his last words. The 12-member federal jury Tuesday in Minneapolisfound Chauvin guilty on all three counts:second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degreemanslaughter. He was immediately led awayand could be sent to prison for decades.“Today (Tuesday), we are able to breatheagain,” Floyd's younger brother Philonise saidat a family news conference in Minneapolis.Immediately after the verdict, US PresidentJoe Biden and VP Kamala Harris spoke withFloyd’s family members expressing solidarity.

Chauvin pronounced guilty on3 counts in Floyd murder case

Even vaccine failsto protect Tharoor New Delhi: Congress leadersAdhir Ranjan Chowdhury andShashi Tharoor tested positiveWednesday for the novelcoronavirus infection. Tharoor,MP from Thiruvananthapuramtweeted that along with him,his mother and sister have alsotested positive for the virus.Tharoor informed that he hasalready taken the vaccine jabs.Meanwhile Chowdhury said hewill continue to campaign invirtual mode for the WestBengal polls.

Padma Bhushan poetShankha Ghosh diesKolkata: Noted Bengali poetand academician ShankhaGhosh, a Padma Bhushanawardee, died Wednesdaymorning while he was inisolation at his residence hereafter testing positive forCOVID-19, his family said. Hewas found Covid positive April14 and was stable in homeisolation, but his conditiondeteriorated late Tuesdayevening and he passed away at8.30am Wednesday, hisrelatives informed.

Vax for Puri servitorsto begin from May 1POST NEWS NETWORK

Puri, April 21: Servitors at theJagannath Temple in Puri will gettheir COVID-19 vaccine jabs May1 onwards. All servitors above 18years of age and the family mem-bers will be eligible for vaccination,informed Wednesday, the chief ad-ministrator of the Shree JagannathTemple Administration (SJTA),Krishna Kumar.

“Each servitor’s family will betracked so as to ensure that all ofthem are vaccinated,” Kumar said.He informed that those servitorswho will be involved in construc-tion of the chariot for the Rath Yatrawill be vaccinated on a priority basisalong with their families.

“The servitors, who will be en-gaged in the chariot constructionwork from next month, will bevaccinated on priority basis,”Kumar said.

Kumar informed that so far 32servitors have returned fromKumbh Mela and one has testedpositive for Covid-19.

It is pertinent to mention herethat elaborate arrangements arein place to prevent Covid-19 spreadat the temple. Already RT-PCRnegative report has been mademandatory for outstation devo-tees coming to the temple.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: Withlockdown being implemented inMaharashtra and Delhi, migrantworkers have again started returningto Odisha. In a bid to prevent themfrom spreading Covid-19 in the state,the government is once more reac-tivating the quarantine centres.

“The government is once againsetting up quarantine centres atZilla Parishad (ZP) level in everyblock for migrant workers return-ing home. If the number of re-turnees increase, such centres will

be set up at panchayat level also,”Labour Minister Sushant Singhsaid Wednesday. The district ad-ministrations have been givenpower to open quarantine centresand increase the number of beds,the minister added.

About 10 lakh migrants returnedto Odisha from different stateswhen lockdown was implementedlast year. “Many of them have notgone back to their workplaces sincerestrictions were eased. So we areexpecting lesser number of re-turnees this year,” Singh pointed out.

The government has asked the

municipality, NAC and block ad-ministrations to closely monitorthe return of the migrant work-ers. All returnees will have to spendin isolation at the quarantine cen-tres before they can go back home.

Last year, the Odisha governmenthad paid ̀ 2,000 to each migrant workeras an initial relief from the ChiefMinister’s Relief Fund (CMRF).

Commenting on enforcement oflockdown in some states, Singh said,“Due to it, the situation was under con-trol last year. But, now, it has gone outof control as some states are report-ing more than 1,00,000 active cases.”

Quarantine centres reactivatedISOLATION FOR MIGRANT WORKERS AT ZILLA PARISHAD LEVEL

Migrant workers returning to their native places in Odisha when lockdown was implemented last year OP FILE PHOTO

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: The chiefof Directorate of Medical Educationand Training (DMET), CBKMohanty said Wednesday that thesecond wave of COVID-19 pandemicmight hit the peak between end ofApril and first week of May, this year.

“The peak has already started inMaharashtra while Delhi and otherstates might see the climax by lastweek of April. In some states itwill extend to May. In Odisha too,the peak might come between theend of April and first week of May.After that, cases will decrease nat-urally at the same pace it is in-creasing now,” Mohanty informed.

The Odisha government is pre-pared to the fullest possible extentto meet the eventualities that mayhappen due COVID-19 second wave.There is no shortage of oxygenstock for the infected in Odisha sofar, Mohanty assured.

“Among the available beds at 70dedicated COVID-care hospitals inthe state, only 26 per cent generalbeds have been used. Similarly, 14.18per cent intensive care units (ICUs)and 10 per cent ventilators, are inuse now,” the DMET director stated.

“Last time during the first wave,the consumption of oxygen was28 to 30 metric tonne per day.. Thestate has adequate medical oxy-gen suppliers who can meet therequirement easily. “We do not seeany shortage of oxygen supply tilldate,” Mohanty added.

Cluster level temporary med-ical camps (TMC) have been createdin blocks of districts for isolationof migrant workers who are returning back home.

2nd Covid peak to hitOdisha soon: DMET

AIIMS SUSPENDSOPD FROM APR 25BHUBANESWAR: With the rapid spikein COVID-19 cases in the state, AIIMSBhubaneswar decided Wednesday tosuspend its walk-in OPD (out-patientdepartment) from April 25 for a tem-porary period. OPD patients can availof the telemedicine facility or use the‘Swasthya App’ created by the hospi-tal for doctor consultation. “Therehas been a rapid rise in the numberof COVID cases. Some of our ownstaff have contracted the disease orare in quarantine. So in this circum-stance, we have been forced to sus-pend work at the OPD,” the institutesaid in a statement.

IRREGULAR by MANJUL

GEORGE FLOYD

Mumbai: Actress Yami Gautam, who debuted in Hindi filmswith the 2012 hit Vicky Donor, looks back proudly at hernine years in Hindi film industry, calling the time surreal.

“The feeling is surreal and it can’t really be articulatedin words. It was an incredible journey. I have had the bestof opportunities to work with some phenomenal directors,actors and of being a part of some amazing projects. It wasa dream to tell stories that I believe, to entertain people,and I just wish to continue doing that,” says the actress,who recently finished the shoot of her upcoming filmDasvi.

Earlier she said, “I will always have respect for all thefilms I have done because at that point of time that waswhat gave me work. I will never be disrespectful to any-body or any film, even the ones that didn't do well orweren’t good films. In your heart you know that it's not goingto be a good film. Knowing that and still signing it comesfrom a sense of fear. Now I am back to being the same Yamiwho does not have fear.”

Last week, Yami had posted a picture on Instagramstories, where she is seen wearing a hair mask and urgedher fans to go natural. “Homemade pack for hair -- Kindaday #gonatural,” Yami wrote on the image.

Yami, who made a mark with film roles such as Uri, Bala,Badlapur and Kaabil, has a long line-up of films over thenext months. Her upcoming projects include A Thursday,Bhoot Police, and Lapata . IANS

P2 OLIVIA COLMAN SAYS SHE WOULD WORK IN THE FATHER FOR FREE

leisureOlivia Colman, who has been nominated atthe Oscars in the Best Supporting Actresscategory for her role in the AnthonyHopkins-starrer The Father, says working onthe film was a dream come true, so much soshe would do it for free.

Game Of Thrones star Emilia Clarke is infinal stages of talks to join theupcoming series Secret Invasion. Theassignment marks her entry into theMarvel universe, though details of herrole are yet to be revealed.

THURSDAY | APRIL 22 | 2021 | BHUBANESWAR

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AQUARIUSSpirituality takes overyou today! You will surelymake your way to a tem-ple, mosque or churchlater in the day, says Ganesha. That, oryou may simply meditate in seclusion.Shopping too is a good prospect, andyou get your penny's worth if you shop for clothes.

PISCESIt is time to socialise, saysGanesha. Though it isunlikely that you will hitthe casinos at Las Vegastoday, what could be on the agenda is meet-ing up with long-lost school friends, orexchanging pleasantries with relatives sodistant you are unsure if they are related toyou. There are chances of a romance bloom-ing, so it just might be a good day to turn toyour god and ask for it.

SAGITTARIUSVarious things will playon your mind today.From metaphysics to phi-losophy, from weightloss to diet plans — your thoughts mayfind it hard to stay steady. Your handsmay also have some trouble keeping acheck on the outflow of money during ashopping excursion with a loved one.

LIBRAThere are chances thatyou will be in a greatmood to organise thingsyour own way. You willmake a favourable impression on yoursuperiors at work through your problem-solving abilities. Do not discount ascrumptious dinner with your loved one,which will go a long way in intensifyingyour senses, hints Ganesha.

SCORPIOIn all probability, today youwill work on improvingyour personal relations,foresees Ganesha. On thefamily front, your kids may force you tomake hasty choices, after all, that is whattantrums are for. It is highly likely that fam-ily feuds with siblings may erupt today.

LEOIt's just good businessto be on the move andavoid complacency. Infact, it is one of thesecrets to success in business. Keep thisin mind as today, you might have to beon the move constantly, foreseesGanesha. Monetary situations will be amatter of concern and anxiety in theafternoon, but you are of invaluable sup-port to your peers.

VIRGOYou will be a lot moreselfless and givingtoday than most peo-ple have known you tobe, feels Ganesha. Later in the day, youwill reap the profits of the work you mayhave done with a partner or a friend.

GEMINIToday, you will be extracareful about hygiene andcleanliness, predictsGanesha. You may plan towash your car, clean your yard, andarrange household items, only to be fol-lowed by a liberal spray of disinfectants inthe afternoon. You will diffuse all your ten-sions with a light-hearted approach.

CANCERToday, you are likely bea force to reckon with inevery sport you takepart in, predictsGanesha. There may be some speedbreakers in the second half the day, butnothing that you can't overtake. At work,support from your seniors may help youfinish long-pending projects.

ARIESIf you're away fromhome, you might get abit misty-eyed. And whileyou're calling your fami-ly, says Ganesha, it's a good idea to callfriends you're hardly in touch with. It's adifferent high, to know you're loved.

FORTUNE FORECAST

TAURUSThere are chances of youembarking on a frivolousshopping spree today,foretells Ganesha. Puttingtwo and two together, you may end upspending a (not so) small fortune in theafternoon. You will be the last person totolerate if some one tries to dominate you.Your sweetheart will sugar your soul today.

CAPRICORNYour sweetheart mayseem to be difficult tofathom, but he/she willappear a little morereadable today, says Ganesha. If youhave any plans to make the day specialfor your love, taking him/her out forshopping; buying presents will be justthe thing to do.

BREVITY

CALVIN AND HOBBES

PEANUTS CROSSWORDSUDOKU

SOLUTIONS

CRO

SSW

ORD

SUD

OKU

CHECK FOR SOLUTIONS OF THE PUZZLES TOMORROW

post To solve the Sudoku puzzle, fill in the boxes in such amanner that every row, column and 3x3 box containsthe digits 1 to 9, without repeating any.

CLARKE IN FINAL TALKS TO JOINMARVEL’S SECRET INVASION

Now that we’re at the end ofApril, the temperature isgradually starting to rise.

Soon, we’ll all be seeking asy-lum from the scorching heat,and while it might not be feasi-ble to jet-off to the comfort ofcozy hill stations or breezybeaches thanks to the pandemic,one can transform home into asummer-friendly abode.

Here go designer BhawanaBhatnagar’s ideas to get you started.

Keep it light with whiteIf you want your home to look

cool, clean, and classy, you cannotgo wrong with white. From wallsto windows to furniture, painteverything in white.

Go natural There are few things more com-

forting than the lap of MotherNature, and if summer heat is pre-venting you from going outside,you can bring nature inside your

home. Decorate your abode withplants and flowers -- real, painted,or printed.

Add some funk with coloursMix and match different colours

from a colour palette to create a vi-brant, funky scheme. It gives youan energy boost every time youenter through the door.Change the curtains

Gauzy panels not only add pri-vacy and shield you from the sun,but they also keep away mosquitoes

and other insects that breed dur-ing the summer season.

Paint your furnitureSummertime means that you’ll

be sitting outside a lot -- maybe ona porch or a terrace or a veran-dah. If your patio furniture looksworn out, don’t worry. Just grab abrush and a bucket of paint -- andvoila! Make sure to pick out light,cool colours to enjoy the authenticsummer vibe.

Use mirrors to create spaceIf you live in a metropolitan

area and are running short ofspace, try hanging a mirror or twoon your walls. Mirrors create an il-lusion of space and can make thesurroundings feel more open andwelcoming.

You can either use these tips asguidelines or you can embark onan adventure by letting loose yourcreativity. Sky is the limit.

Transform your home into a summer-friendly abodeIf heat prevents one fromgoing outside, nature canbe brought into home bydecorating it with plants

and flowers -- real,painted, or printed,

suggests designerBhawana Bhatnagar

POST NEWS NETWORK

BHUBANESWAR: In order to cre-ate awareness on the challengesfaced by Mother Earth, RegionalScience Centre (RSC), Bhubaneswar,in association with State Councilof Science and Technology,Government of Odisha, will un-dertake several activities digitallyon the occasion of Earth Day,Thursday. The event titled RestoreOur Earth will be celebrated overthe next four days.

The activities include YoungClimate Summit and contest, EarthArt Contest, Virtual EducationalWorkshop and Artists of the Earth.In the climate summit students ofdifferent schools and colleges acrossthe state from Class V to graduatelevel will discuss different climaterelated topics and share their viewpoints. The students will be di-vided into three different groups andtheir views will be judged by the ex-perts. The topics to be talked aboutinclude e-Waste Management,

Plastic Pollution, Remarkable EarthSystem and Speak Up for the Earth.

The experts who will speak andjudge the young climate summit par-ticipants are Jaya Khanna of Schoolof Earth & Planetary Sciences,NISER, Bhubaneswar, Prof. BKParida, Retired HoD Dept ofPhysics, Regional Institute ofEducation, NCERT Bhubaneswar,VB Konkimalla, School of BiologicalSciences NISER, Bhubaneswar.

“We are expecting more than1200 students to participate in theseevents. Our objective is to createawareness on the challenges facedby the Earth and to find their pos-sible solutions,” said Somen Ghosh,project coordinator of RegionalScience Centre.

EARTH DAY TODAY

Young climate enthusiaststo brainstorm at RSC

Mumbai: Filmmaker ShekharKapur feels we should not arro-gantly call the Earth ‘our planet’ be-cause it does not belong to us. Kapurtweeted his opinion Wednesday, aday before Earth Day.

“Lessons of Life: All that existsis nature. Nature loves all equally.We arrogantly call Earth ‘OurPlanet’. It does not belong to us.And Nature will survive whateverwe do. Planet Earth will survive. Wemay not. #EarthDay,” Kapur wrote.

The filmmaker also shared a

beautiful photograph of Khajurahotemple on Instagram and stressedthat we need to nurture the idea thatwe are one with nature.

“Earth Day and the Feminine .Beautiful sculpture after sculp-ture. Temples after temples.. wallsadorned with the most beautifulsculptures dedicated to the wor-ship of the Divine feminine. Ofthe ultimate union between themasculine and the feminine withinall of us,” he added.

IANS

‘We arrogantly callEarth our planet’

YAMIshares her

surreal feelings

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THURSDAY | APRIL 22 | 2021 | BHUBANESWARSUMMER-SAULT

Children enjoying a bathat Bindusagar tank inBhubaneswar as the citywitnesses scorching heat,Wednesday

INFECTED RECOVERED DEAD

World 14,38,89,269 12,21,77,845 30,62,707

India 1,56,16,130 1,32,76,039 1,82,553

Odisha 3,82,315 3,51,386 1,958

COVID-19 TRACKER

downtown

LIFE IS PRECIOUS

Security personnel stand guard in front of the Ram Mandir in Bhubaneswar to prevent devotees’ entry into the shrine on the occasion of Ram Navami, Wednesday.The temple has been shut for people as per Covid-19 guidelines OP PHOTO

PNN/AGENCIES

Bhubaneswar, April 21: Odisharecorded 4,851 new Covid-19 casesWednesday, the highest one-daycount so far, a Health departmentofficial said.

Since April 1, there has been anover 10-fold jump in the number ofdaily coronavirus cases in the east-ern state, he said.

On April 1, the coastal state reg-istered 461 new Covid-19 cases.

The coronavirus caseload in thestate now stands at 3,82,315 while thedeath toll has risen to 1,958 withfive fresh fatalities.

Of the new cases detected in allthe 30 districts of the state, 2,814 werereported from quarantine centresand the remaining during contacttracing.

The coastal state Tuesday hadregistered 4,761 new cases.

Khurda district recorded themaximum number of fresh cases at703, followed by Sundargarh (516)and Nuapada (486).

Ten other districts reported morethan 100 new cases. They areBargarh (318), Cuttack (304), Puri(223), Jharsuguda (290), Bolangir(227), Nabarangpur (194), Sambalpur(171), Keonjhar (166), Ganjam (151)and Angul (111).

Khurda has so far registered arecord number of over 60,000 Covidpositive cases while Cuttack re-ported over 31,000 cases followedby both Ganjam and Sundargarh dis-trict registering more than 22,000cases.

“Regret to inform the demise offive numbers of Covid positive pa-tients while under treatment inhospitals,” the Health and FamilyWelfare department tweeted.

Of the five fatalities, two were re-

ported from Nuapada, and one eachfrom Cuttack, Mayurbhanj andSundargarh districts.

The number of active Covid-19cases in the state is 30,927, and 3,49,377 patients have recov-ered so far.

The state has tested over 97.06lakh samples for Covid-19, including38,548 Tuesday, while Odisha’s pos-itivity rate stands at 3.94 per cent.

Meanwhile, Directorate ofMedical Education & Training(DMET) chief CBK Mohanty indi-cated that the second wave of thepandemic might hit the peak be-tween the end of April and first

week of May in Odisha.Mohanty said that the state gov-

ernment is fully prepared to meetany health exigencies and clari-fied that there is no shortage ofoxygen stock for Covid-19 patientsso far in the state.

The state government, he said, isgradually increasing beds for Covid-19 patients. “Temporary MedicalCamps (TMC) have been created atblock level to keep the migrants whoare returning to the state in isolation.Covid Care Homes (CCH) and dedi-cated Covid Hospitals have also be-come operational in almost all the dis-tricts,” official sources said.

10-fold jump in Covid cases since April 1ODISHA REPORTS 4,851 NEW CASES OF CORONAVIRUS, 5 MORE FATALITIES

KHURDA DISTRICT RECORDEDTHE MAXIMUM NUMBER OF

FRESH CASES AT 703, FOLLOWED BY SUNDARGARH (516) ANDNUAPADA (486)

OF THE FIVE FATALITIES, 2WERE REPORTED FROM

NUAPADA, AND 1 EACH FROMCUTTACK, MAYURBHANJ ANDSUNDARGARH DISTRICTS

THE STATE HAS TESTED OVER97.06 LAKH SAMPLES FOR

COVID-19, INCLUDING 38,548TUESDAY

DGP REVIEWSENFORCEMENTDirector general of police

(DGP) Abhay reviewed theongoing enforcement drive andimplementation of night curfew,weekend shutdown, functioningof border check posts andpreparedness to ramp up policeassistance further to tackleCovid-19. Abhay also reviewedthe border sealing arrangementat Sindhi Kaliari Chaka onChhattisgarh border. Twoplatoons force have beendeployed for Covid enforcementduty in the district. The bordercheck point at Sindhi KaliariChaka has been established tocheck interstate movementbetween Odisha andChhattisgarh. Two border checkpoints at Jonk Bridge andKusum Jore have also beenestablished to check interstatemovement between Odisha andChhattisgarh.

POLITICKLE by MANJUL

SWEEPING SECOND WAVE

BHUBANESWAR: The flyingsquad comprising drug inspec-tors, officials of Crime Branch,Special Task Force and local policeconducted inspections at four med-icine stores of Baripada inMayurbhanj district, one drugfir m at Old Colle ge Lane,Nimchoudi in Cuttack and twohospitals in BhubaneswarWednesday.

Inspection was also carried outin Puri, Jajpur, Angul and otherplaces. They verified the recordsand stocks of entry and supply ofCovid-19 medicines and relateditems. They collected the distri-bution details and directed themedical firms/hospitals to sub-mit daily updates on the distri-bution of Covid-19 drugs.

To prevent hoarding and blackmarketing of Covid medicines inthe state, the state level committeecomprising ADGP, Crime asChairman and Joint Secretary,Health department and DrugsController as members, has beenformed by the state government.The committee has constitutedseven flying squads in Cuttack-

Bhubaneswar and 15 in remainingparts of the state.

ADGP, Crime reviewed the en-forcement drive. A sharp vigil hasbeen mounted on the supply chainof essential medical supplies andstrong action under criminal lawswill be taken against anyone in-dulging in hoarding, black mar-keting or any illegal acts.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: With theCovid-19 situation worsening inthe state capital, the BhubaneswarMunicipal Corporation (BMC), asper the state government’s order,is all set to discourage dine-ins atcity restaurants and hotels to avoidcongregations and further spreadof the virus.

Announcing the weekend shut-downs for all urban areas of OdishaApril 19, the Special ReliefCommissioner (SRC) had men-tioned that hotels, restaurants willnot allow outside persons (otherthan their in-house resident guests)to dine-in as part of the Covid-19protocol. Accordingly, the civic au-thorities have decided to enforcethe guideline from this week,sources said.

“Enforcement squads will beformed and raids will be conductedon hotels and restaurants who con-tinue providing dine-in services.However, they can serve takeawaysto customers, buyers and clients.The hotels can take online ordersand deliver takeaway food to the cus-tomers,” said a senior BMC official.

Though the civic body is yet toissue any official order in this re-gard, the officials of the BMC willhold discussions with the ownersof popular hotels and restaurantsand intimate them about the same,said the official.

It can be mentioned here that

the state government had earlier al-lowed restaurants to operate at 50per cent capacity.

Meanwhile, detailing the hos-pital bed strength in the state cap-ital, BMC Commissioner, PremChandra Chaudhary said the cityhas 1,317 beds now. “SUM hospitalis functioning with 771 beds, Hi-techhospital with 246, Aditya Aswinihospital with 200 and Nilachalhospital with 100 beds. Health in-stitutes like Blue Wheel, KIIMS,KIDS and SPARSH are expected toadd more beds to meet the re-quirements,” he added.

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Puri, April 21: The ShreeJagannath Temple Administration(SJTA) Wednesday opened a 120-bedCovid Care Centre (CCC) here fortreatment of coronavirus patientsas 50 people, including 22 servi-tors of the temple, have tested pos-itive for the infection, an official said.

The CCC is being operated fromNilachal Bhakta Niwas campuson Grand Road here and each bedis having oxygen support, SJTAchief Krishan Kumar said.

To start with, 50 infected personslinked to the temple have been ad-mitted to the CCC. They comprise22 servitors and their family mem-bers, 19 staff of shoe stand and ninestaff of SJTA.

Kumar said an ambulance iskept ready at the CCC to shift anypatient to the referral Covid-19hospital in case of exigency. Thisapart, the CCC is stocked with allmedicines and other logistics totreat the patients.

The SJTA chief also said thatapart from the servitors, arrange-ments have been made to vaccinatethe carpenters, painters, tailorsand others to be engaged in mak-ing the wooden chariots of theLords for the annual Rath Yatra.

SJTA opens CovidCare Centre

BMC set to discourage dine-ins at restaurants

Enforcement squads willbe formed and raids willbe conducted on hotelsand restaurants whowould continue the dine-in services

Flying squad inspects drug houses, hosps

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: Criticisingthe state government over Covid-19management, the state unit of BJPWednesday urged the state gov-ernment to enhance the daily test-ing to identify positive cases inearly stage.

Speaking to media persons here,senior BJP leader PrithvirajHarichandan said, “Covid infec-tion rate is rapidly increasing inmany parts of the country and alsoin Odisha. While many states havesubstantially increased the tests,state government is in deep slum-

ber. The rate of testing in Odishahas not gone up as compared tothe last year.”

Due to less testing in rural areas,people remain untreated and theinfection is spreading, he said,adding that people are visiting hos-pitals in critical condition and fac-ing trouble.

Measures similar to the firstwave need to be undertaken at PHC,CHC and other facilities, the BJPleader suggested.

“We hope that the state gov-ernment would realise the gravityof the situation and ramp up test-ing. If the government adopts a

trivial approach on Covid man-agement, people of the state will

suffer,” he warned. On the availability of medical

oxygen, Harichandan said thoughthe state government claims thatthere is adequate stock, it shouldcome up with the details of thestock at present.

Stating that the Centre had pro-vided 567 ventilators to Odisha lastyear, he asked the state governmentto clarify whether these ventila-tors are in use or not.

On opening of isolation facili-ties for Covid patients, the saffronparty leader said the state govern-ment, unlike last year, has notopened many temporary medicalcentres (TMCs). The state govern-ment still advises people to remain

in home isolation which is not pos-sible for a poor family as they do nothave adequate rooms, he added.

BJD spokesperson Sulata Deo,in her reaction, said, “The PrimeMinister and Chief Minister arewilling to work together to containthe spread of the virus. However, thestate BJP leaders are indulged inpetty politics.”

Instead of giving proper sug-gestions to the state governmentand engaging themselves in thefight against the pandemic, the BJPleaders are criticising the govern-ment which is grossly unfortunate,she said.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: The cov-erage of Covid-19 vaccine in the stateWednesday crossed the 53 lakhmark with the ongoing inocula-tion drive expanding across thestate.

The state government claimedthat till date a total of 53,59,794people of Odisha have been vacci-nated against the pandemic.

The Health and Family Welfare(H&FW) department was able to vac-cinate a total of 1,02,407 personsWednesday.

The drive was undertakenthrough 889 active vaccine sitesacross the state. The state hasaround 1,500 vaccination centres.

The government said the statewas left with a stock of 2,63,600Covishield and 1,96,050 Covaxindoses by 8pm, Wednesday. Accordingto the government’s announcement

for Thursday’s vaccination drive, theexercise will be carried out at 714centres across the state which isaround 47 per cent of the total ca-pacity of vaccination centres.

According to the Health de-partment data, till now altogether69,663 persons above the age of 45years have received their first dosewhile 29,669 persons have takentheir second dose.

In the vaccination drive un-dertaken Wednesday, the stategovernment administered a totalof 94,780 Covishield and 7,627Covaxin shots.

According to the government,a total of 93.9 per cent of the healthcare workers in the state have re-ceived their first dose and 95.9per cent got their second dose.

Similarly, 96 per cent of frontlineworkers have received their firstdose and 88.8 per cent receivedtheir second dosage.

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Bhubaneswar, April 21: Thestate government Wednesdaywarned the doctors, who are re-luctant to join Covid duty, of dis-ciplinary action if they fail tocomply with the orders of theirposting at Covid facilities.

Issued by the Directorate ofMedical Education and Training(DMET), a notification in thisregard said that ‘erring’ doctorscould be punished under the pro-visions of Disaster ManagementAct, 2005 and the Indian MedicalCouncil (Professional Conduct,E t i q u e t t e a n d E t h i c s )Regulations, 2002.

“It is seen that in the presentCovid-19 pandemic, which hasbeen declared as a national disaster,a number of doctors who havebeen temporarily posted for man-agement of Covid-19 in differentdistricts are not joining theirplaces of posting, putting hard-ship on the part of district ad-ministration in the latter’s pre-paredness and fight against theCovid-19,” the DMET order read.

The notification further read,“Under the circumstances, alldoctors who have been issueddeployment order under differ-ent CDMOs and PHOs are di-rected to join their places of de-ployment immediately in publicinterest, failing which action asdeemed proper under the DisasterManagement Act, 2005 andSection 7 of Indian MedicalCouncil (Professional Conduct.Etiquette and Ethics) Regulations,2002 will be taken.”

53.59 lakh inoculatedagainst deadly virus

BJP URGES GOVT TO RAMP UP TESTING IN STATE

Join nCoV dutyor face music,govt warns docs

Inspection was carried out in Puri, Jajpur,Angul and other places.They verified the records and stocks ofentry and supply ofCovid-19 medicines

The saffronparty seeksclarificationabout use of

567 ventilatorsthe Centre had

provided to Odisha

last year

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Bhubaneswar, April 21: TheWomen and Child Development(W&CD) department has directedall district child protection officers(DCPOs) to sensitise people aboutprotection of child rights by pre-venting child marriages.

In a letter, W&CD joint secretaryGeetanjali Patnaik said that the de-partment has recently received a let-ter from National Commission forProtection of Child Rights (NCPCR)saying that this year Akshaya Tritiyawill be celebrated May 14, 2021.“They have requested us to pre-vent the occurrence of child mar-riages on this day and protect thechild rights in a proactive man-ner,” said Patnaik.

The department directed theDCPOs to organise meetings andconferences in compliance withCovid-19 norms at village levels

from May 1 to 15 to spread awarenessabout prevention of child marriages.

The child welfare committeesmay be kept vigilant during thisperiod.

The DCPOs should utilise fundsreceived under Beti Bachao Beti

Padhao (BBBP) and Biju KanyaRatna (BKR) schemes for this pur-pose to safeguard rights of the chil-dren and submit utilisation cer-tificates to the department.

The NCPCR is a statutory bodyconstituted under the provisions

of the Commission for Protectionof Child Rights (CPCR) Act, 2005 forthe protection of child rights andother related matters.

The NCPCR had observed thatAkshaya Tritiya is celebrated invarious parts of India as a day ofgood fortune to establish new busi-nesses, new partnerships and newmarriages. “Solemnisation of childmarriages and mass marriages ona large scale on auspicious occa-sion of AkshayaTritiya has been acommon practice in past years. Itis a matter of concern that despitestrict legal provisions in place, childmarriages are being solemnisedon Akshaya Tritiya every year,”the apex child rights body observed.

The commission requested thestate government to direct all DistrictMagistrates or Collectors, DeputyInspectors General/SPs, sarpanches,civil society organisations and childmarriage prohibition officers andchild welfare committee of the re-spective states/UTs to take proac-tive steps and preventive measuresto stop child marriages.

DCPOs asked to prevent child marriages

Solemnisation of childmarriages and mass

marriages on a large scale onauspicious occasion of

AkshayaTritiya has been acommon practice in past

years. It is a matter ofconcern that despite strictlegal provisions in place,child marriages are beingsolemnised on Akshaya

Tritiya every yearNCPCR OBSERVATION

The W&CD dept directed theDCPOs to organise meetings

and conferences in compliancewith Covid-19 norms at villagelevels from May 1 to 15 to spreadawareness about prevention ofchild marriages

The DCPOs should utilisefunds received under Beti

Bachao Beti Padhao (BBBP) andBiju Kanya Ratna (BKR) schemesfor this purpose to safeguardrights of the children and submitutilisation certificates to thedepartment

RATH YATRA AHEAD

A priest consecrates three logs meant for construction of chariots ahead of the world-famous Rath Yatra in Puri at the state-run sawmill in Cuttack’s Khapuria, Wednesday OP PHOTO

TOWARDS THE DESTINATION

The Rukuna Rath of Lord Lingaraj being pulled to the Mausi Maa temple in Bhubaneswar, Wednesday. The chariotpulling was halted midway, Tuesday, as the night set in OP PHOTO

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: Learninga lesson from the last kharif pro-curement season, the state gov-ernment has directed the Collectorsof various bordering districts tocheck entry of paddy fromChhattisgarh and other neigh-bouring states into Odisha.

Food Supplies and ConsumerWelfare (FS&CW) secretary VVYadav has recently written to theCollectors of 17 districts, wherepaddy procurement for rabi seasonwould begin from first week of May.

The districts are: Balasore,Bargarh, Bolangir, Boudh, Cuttack,Jajpur, Jharsuguda, Kalahandi,Khurda, Koraput, Mayurbhanj,Nabarangpur, Nuapada, Puri,Rayagada, Sambalpur and Sonepur.

The Collectors were asked toconduct patrolling in the borderingareas regularly so that paddy fromChhattisgarh and other neigh-bouring states does not enter Odisha.

Paddy procurement activitieswill be conducted through 830 so-cieties in the 17 districts. The paddywill be procured from 7am to 1pmevery day while lifting of paddywill be done in the second half.

In view of the prevailing Covid-19 situation, the Collectors wereasked to take steps to ensure stag-gered procurement, opening of ad-equate procurement centres to dis-perse the procurement operations,social distancing, and maintain-ing hygiene at procurement centres.

The web-based SMS system, whichwas already implemented in previ-ous procurement seasons, will con-tinue during the Rabi season too.

The government has asked the of-ficials concerned to disallow morethan 35 farmers to the premises ofpaddy procurement centres (PPCs)in a day. The farmers will be han-

dled in a lot of 10-12 each and timeframe will be given accordingly. Incase of more number of farmerscoming to the mandis, more num-ber of PPCs will be opened.

The Collectors were asked tomaintain social distancing, properhygiene and enforcement of allCovid-19 norms at the mandis.

During kharif season, the stategovernment faced severe criticismsand was blamed for failing to pro-cure the entire paddy from the man-dis. The issue dominated the lastBudget session of the Assembly.Even, a BJP member tried to drinksanitiser in the House over the issue.

Check entry ofpaddy from otherstates, DMs told

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: Congressleader Suresh Routray Wednesdaytold the media persons that thefamily members of late Congressleader Ajit Mangaraj have decidednot to contest the Pipli bypoll cit-ing the recent deaths of their kin.

“We had hoped that the wife ofAjit could have been a good can-didate for the Pipli bypoll. But hisbereaved family has informed thatthey do not want any of his familymembers nominated for the by-election. We are now thinking aboutthe candidature of other persons.We also do not want them to forcethem,” he said.

The Congress leader said thatMangaraj’s wife was not meetingpeople. “His brother has told usabout the decision of the family.There were high chances of the

Congress party winning the elec-tion if she could have fought the elec-tion. But now there will not be anylooking back and the new candidateinterested to fight the poll would getthe ticket,” he said.

“Moreover, nomination is also notan easy process and the Congressticket is available very easily for anycandidate. After proper scrutinyanother candidate will be giventhe party ticket and the nominationwill be filed by Monday,” the Jatnilegislator added.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: Daysafter the Leader of OppositionPradipta Naik tested positive forCovid-19, senior Congress leaderNarasingha Mishra was Wednesdaytested positive for the virus.

Taking to Twitter, the formerLeader of Opposition in the stateAssembly Wednesday said thathe tested positive for the virusand asked persons who came in hiscontact to get themselves tested.

“Tested positive for COVID-19today. Anyone in close contact inthe past few days please get tested,”he said on Twitter.

Earlier, his party senior leaderRahul Gandhi tested positivewhom Mishra had wished speedyrecovery. The party’s Pipli candidate Ajit Mangaraj had also tested positive for the deadlyvirus and succumbed to the infection recently.

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Pipli, April 21: Biju Janata Dal(BJD) candidate for Pipli bypoll,Rudra Pratap Maharathy,Wednesday carried out door-to-door campaign at several villagesof the Assembly segment.

The BJD nominee carried outthe campaign in strict adherence toCovid-19 norms. Earlier, BJDsupremo and Chief Minister NaveenPatnaik had announced that theregional party would not hold anymega public meeting or rally for thebypoll in the wake of recent surgein Covid-19 cases in state.

The BJD nominee carried outdoor-to-door campaign atBaulachowka, Gandasahi, Kajisahi,Chakasolan, Jopana and a few othervillages of Pipli.

“The Chief Minister has saidthat every life is precious for us. Wecannot organise public meetingsand rallies by putting the lives of peo-ple in danger. Today, I carried outdoor-to-door campaign by main-taining social distance and otherCovid norms. I also urged people tofollow the guidelines laid down bythe government to defeat the deadlyvirus,” Rudra said.

It is worth mentioning here thatPipli Assembly seat has been lyingvacant after the death of BJD MLAPradeep Maharathy last year. TheBJD has fielded Pradeep’s son Rudrafor the bypoll.

The byelection was scheduledto be held April 17. However, it wasrescheduled for May 13 following thedeath of Congress nominee AjitMangaraj due to Covid-19.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: TheCentral University of Odisha(CUO) felicitated the Comptrollerand Auditor General (CAG) ofIndia and former first LieutenantGovernor of Union Territory ofJammu and Kashmir, GirishChandra Murmu at his New Delhioffice Wednesday.

CUO officials Asst. EngineerPadmalochan Swain and PS toVC Jitendra Panda, on behalf uni-versity Vice-Chancellor IRamabrahmam, visited the officeof the CAG and felicitated him.During the visit, they highlightedvarious development activities ofthe university. The CAG, whileappreciating the academic en-deavors of the university, assuredall-round support to the develop-ment of the CUO.

The government had appointedMurmu as the new CAG a dayafter he resigned as the Lt Governorof Jammu and Kashmir.

Mur mu succeeded RajivMehrishi, a 1978-batch IAS offi-cer of Rajasthan cadre who com-pleted his term August 7, 2020.

Murmu was recently given hon-orary doctorate degree (honoriscausa) at the 50th convocation cer-emony of Utkla University by VicePresident Venkaiah Naidu.Murmu, who is also the chairmanof the panel of external auditorsof the United Nations, has com-pleted his post-graduation in po-litical science from Utkal University.

NARASINGHATESTS POSITIVE

None from Mangaraj familykeen to fight bypoll: Sura

After proper scrutiny, acandidate will be giventhe party ticket and thenomination will be filedby Monday, says JatniMLA Sura Routray

Rudra starts door-to-doorcampaign for Pipli byelection

Central Universityfelicitates CAG

FS&CW secretary VV Yadav hasrecently written to the Collectors

of 17 districts, where paddy pro-curement for rabi season wouldbegin from first week of May

The districts are: Balasore,Bargarh, Bolangir, Boudh,

Cuttack, Jajpur, Jharsuguda,Kalahandi, Khurda, Koraput,Mayurbhanj, Nabarangpur,Nuapada, Puri, Rayagada,Sambalpur and Sonepur

The Collectors were asked to con-duct patrolling in the bordering

areas regularly so that paddy fromChhattisgarh and other neighbour-ing states does not enter Odisha

PROCUREMENTBLUES

Central University ofOdisha officials—assistant engineerPadmalochan Swain andPS to VC Jitendra Panda,on behalf universityVice-Chancellor IRamabrahmam—visitedthe office of the CAGand felicitated him

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: A casehas been registered against anIndian Administrative Service(IAS) officer for allegedly abus-ing and thrashing a pet owner inBhubaneswar following a quar-rel over dog walking Wednesday.

The incident reportedly tookplace at Anandbazar lane of SahidNag ar area here. VictimKalucharan Parida lodged an FIRin this regard against IAS officerVV Yadav at Sahid Nagar policestation, sources said.

In his complaint, Parida, a ClassIV employee in the Public Healthdepartment, alleged that the IASofficer lost his cool when the for-mer was taking his pet for a walkin front of the latter’s residence inthe morning.

“I always take my pet for a walkon that route. Today, when I waswalking with my pet, all of a sud-den Yadav yelled at me. He told menot to walk my pet in front of hisgate,” Parida alleged.

“He unleashed his pet dog atme when I questioned if my pet hadcaused any loss to him. As I strug-gled to protect myself from thedog attack, Yadav kicked me andI fell down and sustained injuries,”Parida added.

Bhubaneswar DCP UmashankarDash said, “We are looking into thematter.” The IAS officer was un-available for comments on the al-legations against him.

FIR lodged againstIAS officer over pet walking in City

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21:Recordinga maximum temperature of 42 de-grees Celsius, Boudh town in west-ern Odisha became the hottestplace of the state Wednesday.

As per data provided by theBhubaneswar MeteorologicalCentre, at least six places includingBoudh witnessed a maximum daytemperature of 40 degrees or above.

The other places which recorded40 degrees or above are: Angul (41.7degrees), Sonepur (41 degrees),Talcher (40.1 degrees), Titlagarh(40 degrees) and Baripada (40 de-grees).

Twin city of Bhubaneswar andCuttack recorded 39.2 degrees and37.6 degrees respectively.

The Met Centre said the pre-vailing weather condition will con-

tinue in the state for next four to fivedays. Light to moderate rain mayoccur at a few places till April 26,said the weatherman.

Boudh hottest distwith 42 degrees C

At least six places including Boudh witnessed a maximumday temperature of 40degrees or above

He unleashed his petdog at me when I

questioned if my pet hadcaused any loss to him.As I struggled to protect

myself from the dogattack, Yadav kicked me

and I fell down andsustained injuries

KALUCHARAN PARIDA I COMPLAINANT

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bargarh/Bolangir, April 21: Atleast four persons were killedWednesday in separate incidents ofjumbo attacks in the state. All weretrampled to death by wild tuskers,a source said.

In the first incident, three per-sons including an elderly man werekilled by the pachyderms whilethe former were attending the callof nature in the wee hours ofWednesday at Umarad village underGaisilet block of Bargarh district.

According to forest departmentsources, the deceased were identi-fied as Mala Seth, 50, BiranchiKumbhar, 60, and Natha Pali, 70, allof whom belonged to Umarad village.

On being informed by local vil-lagers, a team of police and forestofficials immediately rushed to thespot. Police have registered a casein this connection and launched a

probe, a police official said.Tension has gripped the village

following the three tragic incidents.Local villagers have demanded ad-equate compensation for the kinof the deceased persons.

In the second incident, a localfarmer was trampled to death atDarlipali village under Loisingha

police limits in Bolangir district.The deceased was identified asBiranchi Sahu, 42.

Biranchi had gone to his farm-land early in the morning. Ashe was watching a herd of ele-phants who were wandering inthe area, he was attacked andtrampled to death.

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Sonepur, April 21: Large-scale ir-regularities are being allegedlycommitted in rural housing andMGNREGS projects inBir maharajpur block ofSubarnapur district thanks to lackof administrative monitoring.Officials at the grassroots level areinvolved in the irregularities, lead-ing to failure in successful imple-mentation of welfare and devel-opmental schemes.

Owing to irregularities in PMAY(Rural) and MGNREGS, the dis-trict administration has servednotices on six officials including

the BDO.According to reports, PD (DRDA)

Dolamani Patel got evidence of ir-regularities in the PMAY and MGN-REGS at Sangrampur village.

Patel has issued show cause no-tices to the Birmaharajpur BDO,the block executive engineer, APO,panchayat executive officer, GPTAand GRS.

These officials have been askedto clarify within seven days. The PDhas warned of stern action if repliesare not sent within a week.

Some villagers had drawn at-tention of the district administra-tion towards irregularities in thePMAY and the MGNREGS.

APD (DRDA) Alok RashmiMishra had investigated the ir-regularities April 12.

Some beneficiaries of the ruralhousing scheme alleged that theGPTA had been harassing them inthe matter of geo-tagging of hous-ing units.

Lachhman Mahakur, a villager,alleged that his name was in theSECC priority waiting list for ahousing unit, but the GTPA ex-cluded his name from the list. Asa result, he was deprived of thehousing unit. His family is livingin a shanty.

In some cases, housing units havenot been completed, but the tag-ging officer has shown in docu-ments that work has been com-pleted.

A group of job card holderssuch as Premananda Mahakur,Babaji Mahakur, Harihar Gaigaria,Duryodhan Mahakur andNetrananda Pradhan alleged thatthey had worked in MGNREGSprojects for 59 days, but their wageshave not been cleared.

During the probe, it was learnt thatShergad-Budulibahal road has beenincluded in Pradhan Mantri SadakYojana, but the project has been in-cluded in MGNREGS. Villagerspointed out that funds sanctioned forthe road project under MGNREGShave been misappropriated throughfalse bills twice.

It was also alleged that funds al-located for pond excavation atHariamunda village in Tamkiadadpanchayat have been embezzled.

IRREGULARITIES IN PMAY AND MGNREGS

Six officials including BDO served show-cause notices

FILE PHOTO

During the probe, it was learnt thatShergad-Budulibahal road has been

included in Pradhan Mantri SadakYojana, but the project has beenincluded in MGNREGS. Villagers

pointed out that funds sanctioned forthe road project under MGNREGS

have been misappropriated through false bills twice

A group of job card holders such as Premananda Mahakur, BabajiMahakur, Harihar Gaigaria,Duryodhan Mahakur andNetrananda Pradhan allegedthat they had worked inMGNREGS projects for 59 days,but their wages havenot been cleared

IN DEEP WATER

Fake certificates: 5 more teachers sacked

POST NEWS NETWORK

Kendrapara, April 21: Illegalhoney business in BhitarkanikaNational Park has resulted in for-est fire and destruction of hun-dreds of acres of forest land, casu-rina and mangrove forests in lastfour years, a report said.

Forest fires have been reportedfrom 11 places in Bhitarkanika overlast four years. The matter came tothe fore after extinguished firebrands, sacks and match boxes wererecovered by officials while theywere carrying out investigation.

Destruction of four acre of for-est land in Barunei jungle in April2018 is a case in point. Even as thisarea is a completely deserted land,match boxes, fire brands and sackswere lying in the forest.

Locals alleged that two forestfires that occurred in parts of the

forests under Mahakalapara blockare due to illegal honey harvest-ing. Moreover, use of fire brandsin honey harvesting has led to adecline in honeybee populationwhich if not checked might spell dan-ger for the eco-system.

Reports said people engaged in il-legal honey business regularly visitjungles in Bhitarkanika and harvesthoney by showing fire brands nearbeehives.

The collection takes place be-tween April and May when hun-

dreds of honey traders flock theforest for honey harvesting.Environmentalists Hemant KumarRout, Ashok Kumar Swain, PrabhuPrasad Mohapatra and Sk Chandclaimed that the leftover fire brandsare used by these traders in honey

harvesting.The Bhitarkanika National Park

is spread over 672 sqkm and isknown worldwide for its rich bio-di-versity. Out of this, 145 sqkm is cov-ered by dense forest which is a pro-hibited zone for common people.

This dense forest is filled with nat-ural bounties. The area is famousfor wild honey and boasts of arecord 480 quintals of honey in a sin-gle year. The craze for honey har-vesting among traders is the reasonbehind destruction of large tractsof forest in Bhitarkanika.

These traders engage local peo-ple who without abiding by normsenter the forest to collect honey.They use fire brands to driveaway bees.

The smoke and the razing firefrighten the bees driving them to flyaway. Later, they pull down the hivesand collect the honey. They leave the

fire brands and other inflamma-bles in the forest which later de-stroys the forest land.

This has been going on for sev-eral years without the knowledgeof the forest department.

Locals claimed that the forest de-partment should train interestedresidents in honey harvesting andprotection of honey bees. This willhelp people get wild honey ofBhitarkanika at a reasonable pricewhile the forest department willreceive revenue. Over 5000 resi-dents can become self-reliantthrough honey harvesting, theyclaimed.

When contacted, DFO BikashRanjan Dash said no one has beengiven permission for honey har-vesting in the prohibitory zone. He,however, said he would examinethe proposal to train people in honeycollection.

Honey harvesting hums threat to Bhitarkanika forest land

4 killed in jumbo attacks n Tension flared up at Umard

village under Gaisilet blockfollowing the three tragicincidents. Villagers demandedadequate compensation for thekin of the deceased persons

n In the second incident, a localfarmer was trampled to deathat Darlipali village underLoisingha police limits inBolangir district. The deceasedwas identified as 42-year-oldBiranchi Sahu

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhawanipatna, April 21: Thesecond wave of Covid-19 has beenplaying havoc in Kalahandi dis-trict. As infection cases due to thesecond strain have been spiraling,five people have reportedly diedin five days in the district. A spurtin Covid cases and casualties hasleft people and the administrationworried.

According to reports, from March18 to April 18, the district hasrecorded deaths of 17 Covid-in-fected people.

However, unofficial sources saidthe number of Covid casualties asofficially shown could be more.

Various outfits have demandedthat there is a need for a special in-vestigation in the Covid casualtiesthat have happened in variousCovid hospitals and in home iso-lations.

On the other hand, violation ofCovid safety guidelines by peoplehas hastened the rate of infectionsin some areas.

A dozen of people died due to

Covid-19 April 14 while a 49-year oldresident of Laxmipur under thisblock died April 15. Two peopledied April 17 at Junagarh Covidhospital.

A 45-year old of Kamathana vil-lage succumbed to Covid. In thelast three days, the district has lostfour people in different areas.

However, CDMO Pratap Beherasaid seven people have died due tothe second wave at Kalahandi Covidhospital.

Reports said, people are pan-icked in the areas where Coviddeaths have been reported. The ad-ministration has intensified stepsto enforce Covid safety guidelinesamid imposition of night curfew inurban areas.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Koraput, April 21:To ensure qual-ity education to the students, thestate government has launched aschool transformation programmein Koraput.

In the first phases, 17 high schoolsin 12 blocks and three urban areaswill be equipped with smart class-rooms.

By October, 2021, the school trans-formation programme will be com-pleted in the district. Consequently,students in the tribal-dominatedareas will receive education in ahigh-tech atmosphere, said CollectorAbdal Mohammed Akhtar.

The classes will have high-speedInternet, interactive screen, Webcameras, digital podium, 3-D ani-mation, graphs, interactive topo-graphical sheets, animated videos,and virtual laboratories for science.

All vacant posts of teachers willbe filled up. All these schools willhave train students in music and

yoga, the Collector added.The schools which will have

smart classrooms are Kotapad NACHigh School, Koraput UrbanGovernment Girls’ High School,Semiliguda Government HighSchool, Pottangi Government HighSchool, Hataguda GovernmentUpgraded High School, PaduaGover nment High School ,Nandapur Government HighSchool, Lamtaput GovernmentHigh school, Podagad High School(Dasmatnhpur), KakirigumaGover nment high School(Laxmipur), Government Highschool(Narayanpatana),Bandhugaon Government HighSchool, Ambaguda GovernmentHigh School, Kusumi GovernmentHigh School, Sri Arabinda SikhyaNuketan (Kundura), NariganGovernment High School andKusumi Gover nment NodalGnadadhar High School.

A vision document for each highschool has also been prepared.

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bolangir/Bhawanipatna, April21: DGP Abhay visited variousparts of Bolangir and Kalahandi dis-tricts Wednesday. Apart from tak-ing stock of the ongoing anti-Maoistoperations, the DGP reviewed var-ious measures and arrangementsmade for strict enforcement ofCovid-19 norms in the region amida spurt in the pandemic in westernOdisha districts.

He held a review meeting with SPShravani Vivek M, Collector GavaliParag Harshad and senior police of-ficials at Bhawanipatna reserve police.

Talking to reporters, the DGPsaid he held a discussion with the

district SP and other senior policeofficials over enforcement of thenorms with the cooperation of thepublic.

Besides, there were discussionsabout Maoists and other law andorder situations in the two districts.

“Police are reinforcing the night

curfew and weekend curfew for thesafety of the public. It is the re-sponsibility of the police and theyare receiving cooperation from thepublic throughout Odisha,” headded..

The DGP urged people to followsafety guidelines, maintain social

distance, wear masks and cooper-ate with the government and localadministration to check the spreadof Covid-19.

He also said that Maoists have nofuture. He urged the ultras to sur-render themselves and return tothe social mainstream.

Covid-19 playinghavoc in Kalahandi5 die in as many days; rate of infection is fast increasing

Door-to-door screening begins in GanjamChhatrapur: As Covid-19 cases are fast increasing in Ganjam, theadministration has lunched door-to-door screening of people, a report said.A total of 112 teams, comprising ANM, Anganwadi and ASHA workers havebeen formed for the screening. They have started visiting houses to carryout thermal screening, check oxygen level in body and other symptoms ofthe virus. “The screening will continue for 10 days. We are also preparing adatabase of migrants and keeping a check on their health,” said an official.The district administration has sought cooperation of people for smoothconduct of the drive. The administration also requested people not to hideif they have symptoms and follow all Covid-19 norms. Notably, the districtadministration had conducted door-to-door screening of residents inBerhampur seven times during the first wave of the pandemic.

2 held in crusher unit blast deathsPOST NEWS NETWORK

Berhampur, April 21: Two daysafter a blast at a crusher unitclaimed the lives of two personsand rendered three critical inKukudakhandi in Ganjam dis-trict, police arrested its propri-etor and the manager, Wednesday.

The accused was identified asproprietor Susant Kumar Rout ofDaluasahi under Sadar police lim-its and manager AmitabacchanBisoyi of Raghunathpur underBadagad police limits.

The two were produced in courtwhich remanded them to judicialcustody, SI Jyoti Prakash Behera,the investigating officer fromSadar police station said.

Rout was running the unit in thename of wife Anupama Rout.Anupama and two explosive sup-pliers Rama Krushna and ShankarPrasad Sahu, both siblings, areabsconding.

Earlier, police had registered acase over a complaint filed byKukudakhandi tehsildar IpsitaPriyadarshini Mishra.

DGP reviews anti-Mao op in W OdishaDGP also urged people tofollow safety guidelines,maintain social distance,wear masks and cooperatewith local administration to check the spread of Covid-19

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhawanipatna, April 21: Casesof teachers having got jobs onthe basis of forged documentsare being increasingly detectedin Kalahandi district. Followinga High Court order, five teach-ers have been dismissed fromjobs.

Following a directive fromCollector D Gavali Parag Harsad,district education officer SushantChopdar had earlier dismissed 25

teachers who had grabbed jobs onthe basis of fake documents and cer-tificates.

“Again five more teachers werecaught with forged certificates.They were sacked from service,”said the DEO.

It may be noted here that teach-ers were recruited in the district

in 2003-04. However, many of themhad furnished fake certificates.

The jobs of three of the fiveteachers (who were sacked fromjobs now) had been regularizedwhile two were on contractualbasis. The education department hasfiled FIRs against the five teachers.

It is said that more teachers are

likely to be caught with fake cer-tificates as certificates of 121 teach-ers have been sent to the educationdepartment for verification. Variousoutfits have demanded an impar-tial into illegalities in teachers’recruitment.

A few days ago, 25 physical ed-ucation instructors and arts in-structors were caught with forgedcertificates. Nine of the fake teach-ers were detected in Junagarhblock amid allegations about ille-galities in the recruitment.

CERTIFICATES OF 121 TEACHERS SENT TO EDUCATION DEPARTMENT FOR VERIFICATION

Koraput to have 17 ‘smart’ high schools

A large tract of farmlands was sandcast and houses of some locals inundated following a breach in the Tamasaleft canal embankment under Poteru irrigation project in MV-2 village of Malkangiri district, Wednesday OP PHOTO

Dense forest spread over145 sqkm in Bhitarkanikais famous for wild honeyand boasts of a record480 quintals of honey collection in a year. The craze for honey harvesting is the reasonbehind destruction of forest land

T here is a school for 400 children in Solan, Himachal, called Southvale:The World School. The school is run by young MBAs. The owner is RishabhChopra and the technical operations are under Snigdha Parihar. It em-

phasises on education, but more than that, a moral social code with compassiontowards all. “We believe in raising a league of future generations that is so-cially, morally and intellectually awake.”

During the Covid lockdown they experimented by asking each one oftheir children to feed and foster street animals. Now they have made itmandatory for each child and staff member in the school to foster a stray an-imal, be it a dog, cow, cat or even birds. Their debates, elocution, research-station projects are centred around animals. The children are taught to savea little from their food and kitchen waste and keep the fostered animal fed.“To make this act sustainable and institutionalised, we have developed the‘Log Book’ activity which is drawn from Charles Duhigg’s book ‘The Powerof Habit’. It works on the basic principle of cue, routine and reward. The cueis a stray animal, the routine is feeding and logging the activity in a book.The reward is a mention of the student in the circular for parents, and a Facebookpost with the picture of the child carrying out the deed.” The aim is to addlove and compassion in society, to add meaning to human life and to pass onvirtue to the kids who become the flag bearers of kindness.

The Yellow Train School in Coimbatore teaches organic farming andhow to coexist with wild animals. Situated among green fields, orchardgroves, cows and peacocks, the focus is more on the development of a childas part of a natural world, rather than on textbook lessons. The MarudamFarm School in Thiruvannamalai, founded in 2009, has the same approach.The students are involved in afforestation, organic farming, and in build-ing an intimate relationship with nature. A lot of importance is given to artsand crafts, and sports as well. An education to bring about sensitive and in-telligent human beings.

The Chirag School is in the village of Simayal in the Nainital district,Uttarakhand. Founded in 2006 by Kanai Lal, the teachers are college grad-uates from local communities, and the emphasis is on how to preserve thelocal culture and heritage of the Himalayas. Sumit Arora, the principal, takeschildren on field trips to understand nature, and importance of naturalsprings in the Himalayas. The children learn how to dispose of waste with-out burning it.

SECMOL was founded in 1988 near the village of Phey in the Indus Valleyby Sonam Wangchuk, (on whom the film Three Idiots’ character, played byAamir Khan, is based) with an entirely new education system. The SECMOLCampus is an eco-village where students, staff, and volunteers live, work andlearn practical, environmental, social and traditional knowledge, values, andskills together. The campus is solar powered and solar heated; studentslearn ancient Ladakhi songs, dance and history,alongside modern academic knowledge.

In June 2016, Parmira Sarma and MazinMukhtar founded the Akshar School in Pamohi,Guwahati. From gardening skills, taking care ofanimals, understanding renewable energy, toutilising the power of technology, this school showsus the kind of education we need now. AksharSchool believes in the complete development ofan individual, so that they can be citizens the worldneeds now. The school has a unique system of pay-ment: those parents that have a problem with thefees can hand over plastic polythene bags and plas-tic waste as an equivalent. The school makes stu-dents pledge that they will not burn plastic.

Normal schools are now producing childrenthat have lost all ties with nature. That meansunhappy children who seek their whole livesfor something that might make them happy – jobs,promotion, bigger cars and houses – only to re-alise that nothing works. We are producing chil-dren that are afraid of all other species, thatrely on violence to get their way, that believe thatthe only good tree is the one that makes tooth picks.That is why our country is so unhappy, and eachgeneration is getting unhappier.

If we could just emulate these schools andteach children that the meaning of happiness isto coexist and harmonise with nature, that happiness comes from not want-ing but giving, that compassion is what makes the world go around, we mightsurvive. We have all the technology we need to make children understand theworld. Left to me I would make these things compulsory: 1) No leather in shoesor bags; 2) Each child has to plant 7 trees a year and look after them; 3) Eachchild has to show evidence that they look after animals in their area; 4) Onehour every day watching National Geographic, and a new idea by a studentin the school assembly every day on how to save the planet; 5) Very judicioususe of paper, and certainly no plastic; 6) Common sharing of food without any-one knowing who brought it, so that there is no shaming of any child; 7) Anorganic garden in every school: if there is lack of space it could be in pots onthe terrace. The children should bring in the seeds of all the fruit they eat,and a nursery could be made in the school; 8) An insistence on vegetarian-ism and giving the reasons why; 9) One hour a week on reading all the mainreligious texts of every religion, so that every child is familiar with thePuranas/Vedas/the Mahabharata/Ramayana/the Quran and the Bible, thebooks of the Jains and Buddhists; 10) No exams except the 10th and the 12th.

We teach Biology, but do we teach children to respect animals? Until I stoppedit, Biology included killing frogs and mice in class. We teach Physics and NaturalSciences, but do we teach children how to protect the planet? Isn’t it morecommon to hear, ‘Stay away from the dog, it will bite’ rather than, ‘It’s hot,let’s keep a bowl of water for stray animals and birds?’

How many principals have the sense to adopt stray animals in the cam-pus? Very few. Most of them have Indian dogs picked up by local municipalitiesand thrown away. So children learn that animals can be throwaways – likeold clothes. All we teach children is how to be afraid, how to compete in anugly manner, how to succeed at others’ expense, how to be the same as every-one else, how to get their way with brute strength. How to want, want andwant, and take, take and take. Few children even understand the beauty ofa starry sky, and practically no child has ever wondered where the stars went.

I was brought up with hours of moral science and that included respect-ing the world around me. My school had no exams, so I never learnt orwanted to compete, we never had any pocket money so money is somethingto be given to help others. I was taught to be innovative and independent andhappy, and no matter what life has brought, my education has stood me ingood stead. We should all send our children to Southvale.

To join the animal welfare movement contact gandhim@nic.in,www.peopleforanimalsindia.org

WORDSWORTH

power post P6

T he Amazon Basin is fast ap-proaching an irreversibletipping point. That should

concern everyone, because whathappens in the Amazon has plan-etary implications.

Spanning eight South Americancountries and French Guiana, theAmazon contains over 60 per centof the world’s tropical forests, 20per cent of its fresh water, and about10 per cent of biodiversity. As a re-sult of land speculation and insa-tiable global demand for meat, soy,gold, and other commodities, roughly20 per cent of the world’s largest trop-ical forest has already been razed.A further 5 per cent rise in defor-estation levels could trigger cata-strophic dieback, essentially doom-ing the 2015 Paris climate agreement.

Some fear this process may al-ready have started. The currentprognosis is not good: Amazon de-forestation in Brazil reached a 12-year high in 2020, and over 95 percent of it is illegal. Unless gov-ernments and markets radicallyrevalue the rainforest’s naturalservices, this nightmare scenariomay be unavoidable.

Dieback in the Amazon Basincould release the equivalent of adecade’s worth of global green-house-gas emissions. The forestwould also lose its ability to absorb

billions of tonnes of carbon diox-ide, disrupting hydrological cycles,evapotranspiration, and ocean cur-rents. The agro-industrial sectorcould collapse, and the loss of bio-diversity could be staggering.Hydroelectric facilities would beshuttered, declining water tableswould make cities unlivable, andfisheries would become unviable.

Preventing this outcome requiresachieving zero deforestation in theAmazon by 2030. And that, in turn,requires a clearheaded scientific as-sessment and science-based tar-gets. The Science Panel for theAmazon, a coalition of about 200leading scientists from the region,should become permanent. And,given the extraordinary wealth po-tential of preserving the forest’s bio-diversity, the best way to protect thisresource is by stimulating the emer-gence of a green economy.

For starters, this will require acrackdown on illegal deforestationand the networks that sustain it.Brazil’s environmental enforce-ment agency, Ibama, handed out20 per cent fewer fines in 2020 thanin 2019, owing to funding cuts andreduced sanctions – and less than3 per cent of fines are paid.Reinforcing Ibama, a federal agency,is essential, as is bolstering state-level institutions on the frontlines

of environmental crime, such as po-lice, firefighters, and land regis-tration offices.

Currently, two-thirds of globalsupply chains have no policies onillegal deforestation. Massive in-vestment in high-resolution re-mote sensing and artificial intel-ligence-based alert systems isessential, as is tracking illegally ex-tracted commodities in global sup-ply chains and strengthening in-vestigation and prosecution.

The Reducing Emissions fromDeforestation and ForestDegradation initiative could ac-celerate funding for such efforts.International financing from theAmazon Fund, US President JoeBiden’s administration, and toolssuch as green bonds would help,while local financing also couldplay a significant role. So, too, couldinitiatives such as the GlobalCommons Alliance and 1t.org, alongwith investor activism, includingfrom sovereign wealth and pen-sion funds. In 2019, some 230 globalinvestors, managing a total of morethan $16 trillion in assets, called oncompanies to meet their defor-estation commitments or risk ad-verse economic consequences.

Most important are innovationsto bolster the green economy andsupport the communities that are

the custodians of the Amazon Basin.Such initiatives could be acceleratedby a Brazilian equivalent to US gov-ernment's Defense AdvancedResearch Projects Agency to rampup R&D, as well as related regula-tory frameworks to enable an in-clusive bioeconomy in the Amazon.This approach would include ap-plied research to collect and mapAmazon biodiversity – with scien-tists studying fruits, nuts, plant ex-tracts, and fibers, and using dronesto sample biodiversity in hard-to-reach areas – along with digitalplatforms to secure biological assetsfor public good.

To ensure that indigenous andlocal populations are includedand benefit, clear and enforce-able data-sharing rules and safe-guards to promote local value cre-at i o n a n d re t e n t i o n m u s taccompany these efforts.

Concerted international and re-gional efforts – such as the LeticiaPact – combined with national andsubnational interventions couldcreate a brighter future for theAmazon. The health of the planetdepends on it.

The writer is Co-Founder andPresident of the Igarapé

Institute.©PROJECT SYNDICATE

Getting to zero deforestation in the Amazon

ECONOMICS OF BIODIVERSITYI

n 2019, the treasury depart-ment of the UK governmentcommissioned Prof. Sir ParthaDasgupta of Cambridge

University to carry out a com-prehensive global review of the eco-nomics of biodiversity. Comingon the heels of the IPCC’s ‘SpecialReport: Global Warming of 1.5 ºC’and the onset of the global pan-demic, the review couldn’t havebeen timed any better. With thedelayed UN Biodiversity conferencescheduled for later this year, thereport assumes even greater sig-nificance. It was important that thescope of the review was globaland the mandate was for an eco-nomic review commissioned bythe treasury rather than the en-vironment department. What ecol-ogists and environmentalists havebeen saying since the 1970s finallyhad a willing ear among the econ-omists mandated by policymakersin power worried about the fu-ture risks for global finance. Itcouldn’t have come any sooner!

Eminent persons from diversedomains have praised the reportfor its depth, vision, lucidity andcourage to prescribe some toughyet much-needed action. The greatnaturalist Sir David Attenboroughcaptured the crisis well in his fore-word - “Today, we ourselves, to-gether with the livestock we rearfor food, constitute 96% of themass of all mammals on the planet.Only 4% is everything else – fromelephants to badgers, from mooseto monkeys. We are destroyingbiodiversity, the very characteristicthat until recently enabled thenatural world to flourish so abun-dantly. If we continue this damage,whole ecosystems will collapse.That is now a real risk.” The enor-mity of the crisis is established be-yond doubt diligently and elabo-rately with a mountain of evidencedrawn from the best of recent re-search in the Dasgupta review.

Among the almost near univer-sal appreciation for the report,there were some voices of concern- particularly regarding the idea oftreating nature as capital. It can beargued that this very idea of treat-ing nature as an asset to be ex-ploited was fundamentally the basisof wealth as defined by Adam

Smith, who had conceptualised itwithout coining the term as such.Natural capital is defined as theidea of natural resource productionindependent of human interven-tion. It has been the source for ex-traction as well as the sink fordumping all of our waste to createmuch of our ‘produced’ and ‘human’capital without ever its deprecia-tion accounted for in the ledger.This free ride has been hailed andindeed the efficiency with which hu-mans could exploit the natural cap-ital was considered the hallmarkof progress and civilization.Therefore, treating nature as ‘cap-ital’ at par with other forms of ‘cap-ital’ does raise the concern thatfundamentally it would not help ad-dress the crux of the existentialcrisis faced by humanity.

The Dasgupta review is broadlydivided into two major parts. Thefirst part of the review is about es-tablishing in rigorous yet accessibleterms the journey to the precipice,particularly in the period start-ing 1970. The last 50 years havebeen epoch-making in human his-tory in the way exponential changehas taken place in a very shortperiod. Global GDP per capita hasincreased about four times, aver-age life expectancy from 49 to 76years, absolute poverty has fallenfrom 60% to around 10% and so on.The list of human achievementsis endless in the period we havecome to know as the ‘Anthropocene’- an age where the homo sapiens

have come to dominate nature ina way unprecedented in the historyof life on earth. So much so thatthe ratio of our impact to the sup-ply we take from nature in termsof ecosystem services has gonefrom about 1.0 to 1.6 over the sameperiod. In other words, we cur-rently need 1.6 earths to supportthe prevailing consumerist econ-omy notwithstanding the abject dis-parity that exists among regions.

Articulating ecosystem serv-ices as natural capital, whose de-preciation to be accounted for inthe calculation of an alternative‘green GDP or as some have startedterming it Gross EcosystemProduct or GEP’ measurement iscertainly an important idea. Anyprudent portfolio manager woulddo so in order to mitigate the fu-ture risk of investment and clearly,the mandarins of global capitalsare seriously concerned both onaccount of climate change andbiodiversity loss. However, this isby no means an original or first ofits kind proposition. The secondpart of the report consists of wide-ranging recommendations to ar-rest the rapid slide in the stock ofnatural capital. From the inequalitybetween the human impact on thedemand side and ecosystem serv-ices on the supply side, it is clearthat all steps must be taken to re-duce demand and increase sup-ply. Enforcing new standards forreuse, recycling and disposal, im-posing new taxes on unsustain-

able activity, and mandating globalsupply chains to adhere to envi-ronmental norms would be im-portant to reduce demand. So alsoby boosting investment in women’seducation and empowermentwhich has proven to reduce fertilityrate to reduce population pres-sures. Given that it is far less ex-pensive to conserve rather than re-store natural ecosystems,substantial financial incentivesmust be put in place for commu-nities to preserve life-giving forests,watersheds and mangroves andthe like. Given that the poor aremore directly dependent on na-ture, this will go a long way in ad-dressing the economic disparity be-tween the global north and south.

The world has a very poor recordin meeting self-imposed targets,for example the 20 Aichi biodiver-sity targets agreed in Japan in 2010to protect coral reefs, remove gov-ernment subsidies that damage na-ture, and tackle pollution. It was thesecond consecutive decade that gov-ernments failed to meet targets.The Kunming summit may be hu-manity’s last chance to set ambitiousgoals. The Covid pandemic hasshown that unimaginable actionsuch as the complete shutdown ofeconomies is possible in the face ofimminent calamity as humanityresponded with great alacrity.Hopefully, the Dasgupta reviewmay be a key driver for such a mas-sive response as warranted to wardoff the biodiversity loss disaster.

Tolstoy, Ruskin and especiallyGandhi among others showed apath well before the age of theAnthropocene which holds the keyto the future survival of mankind.The natural next step for human-ity is to consider a spiritual ap-proach towards our treatment of na-ture. Our treatment of nature musttranscend an asset-centric mindsetto realise the true sanctity as thesource of our very being, all life, liv-ing, consumption and well being.

The author, a CivilEngineer, academician

and technologist, is currently serving as

Technical Director in RaSpect IntelligenceInspection Limited,

Hong Kong.

FOCUS

SPECTRUM

We currently need 1.6 earths to support the prevailing consumerist economy notwithstandingthe abject disparity that exists among regions

Our Unhappy Schools

THURSDAY | APRIL 22 | 2021 | BHUBANESWAR

True knowledge is not attained bythinking. It is what you are; it iswhat you become.

SRI AUROBINDO

EARTH

TOLSTOY,RUSKIN ANDESPECIALLY

GANDHI AMONGOTHERS

SHOWED A PATHWELL BEFORE

THE AGE OF THEANTHROPOCENE

WHICH HOLDSTHE KEY TO THE

FUTURE SURVIVAL OF

MANKIND

Dhanada K Mishra

SUSTAINABILITY

Readers of Orissa POSTare most welcome to contribute letters(200 words), articles andcolumns (between 750-1250words). Contributors arerequested to send theircontact numbers and fullpostal address/email ID. They may alsosend in their valuable comments, opinionand suggestions, preferably by email, to: edit@orissapost.com

B-15, Rasulgarh Industrial Estate,Bhubaneswar-751010

LettersTO THE EDITOR

DIEBACK IN THEAMAZON BASINCOULD RELEASE

THE EQUIVALENTOF A DECADE’S

WORTH OF GLOBALGREENHOUSE-GAS

EMISSIONS

Ilona Szabó

Disaster management

Sir, The recent avalanche borne disaster in the river Dhauli Ganga,a branch of the Ganga, led to a huge loss to lives and property. Thecause behind the accident may be the sudden surge of meltingwater due to rise in temperature in post-winter season. In addition,the factors such as cloud-burst during the monsoon are also evidentin the Himalayan region that cause flash floods. Another incidentof 2013 at Chorabari lake in northern India too was catastrophic whichhad brought a tragic end to more than 5000 lives. However tracingthese sudden incidents become difficult. Therefore, at the latest,the Ministry of Science and Technology, Govt. of India along withIIT Kanpur has ventured for a satellite-based real time monitoringof glacial activities in the Himalayan region. The aim is to recog-nise and understand the nature of disaster in advance and ensurealarm for any threat that can cause catastrophe. The difficult ter-rain in the Himalayas and lack of communication networks had leftmany incidents unresolved in the past. But the innovative approachof satellite-linked communication and surveillance system of thescientists in the region would certainly help in avoiding threats.

Santosh Kumar Satapathy, PARALAKHEMUNDI

Compensate migrants

Sir, Migrant workers, specifically from the unorganised sector, are flee-ing metro cities due to curfews and lockdowns. Insecurity, stemmed fromanxiety, created confusion in the minds of the migrants. Admittedly, thereis no gush of outward flow as it was last time but the movement has begun.This time around the curbs are imposed by specific states whereas in2020 the entire nation was locked down by the Centre. It may safely besaid that everyone, including labourers in the unorganised sector, knowsomething about Covid now as compared to last year when it was truly‘novel’. Why do migrants rush back to their places? Is the situation bet-ter at their native places? Unlikely, but the poor migrants do not wantto suffer elsewhere but their roots. A democratically elected governmentshould be pro-poor. Transparency, accountability and the ability to learnlessons from the past are not commodities that can be compromised. In2020, the Centre and the States woke up late; hopefully, they will do bet-ter this time with the possibility of total lockdown looming large in manystates. The key is perfect coordination without animosity and bitterness.Out of work migrants should be compensated. Things are likely to turnworse in the coming days and the interests of the migrants should betaken care of. Ganapathi Bhat, AKOLA (MAHARASHTRA)

cmyk

cmyk

Mooreeffoc

This word is rare and is almost never used in its ostensible sense —relating to things suddenly seen in a new and different way — but only as

a keyword to initiate discussion. But it has been keeping illustrious company,since its few appearances in print have been in works by GK Chesterton, JRRTolkien and Charles Dickens. Dickens invented it, if that’s the right word. Hementions it in a fragment of his abandoned autobiography, when hedescribes his poverty-stricken youth: In the door there was an oval glassplate, with COFFEE-ROOM painted on it, addressed towards the street. If Iever find myself in a very different kind of coffee-room now, but where thereis such an inscription on glass, and read it backward on the wrong sideMOOR-EEFFOC a shock goes through my blood.

All we teach childrenis how to be afraid,how to compete in

an ugly manner, howto succeed at others’

expense, how to be the same as

everyone else, how to get their way with

brute strength

Maneka Gandhi

cmyk

cmyk

THURSDAY | APRIL 22 | 2021 | BHUBANESWAR

P7UTTARPRADESH

REUTERS

Lucknow, April 21: As SushilKumar Srivastava’s breathlessnessworsened, his family bundled the 70-year-old into a car and drove himto a hospital in the capital of UttarPradesh, where he tested positivefor the coronavirus.

After the private hospital turnedthe retired government officialaway because it didn't have any va-cant beds, his son Ashish broughttwo oxygen cylinders and drove hisfather on a hunt for a hospital thatcould admit him.

“All the hospitals asked for a re-ferral letter from the chief med-ical officer’s (CMO) office,” Ashishsaid, referring to the top health-care official of the city of some 3.5million people.

At the office, Ashish said nobodyhelped him. “I was shooed away bythe police,” he said, when he triedto meet the CMO.

Three days later, Ashish saidsomeone from the governmentcalled him offering a bed for his fa-ther - a day after Srivastava hadpassed away at a private clinic.

The family's ordeal reflects the

worsening crisis in UP, where peo-ple are battling bureaucracy alongwith the disease.

To get a COVID-19 bed inLucknow, families say they needto show the result of an RT-PCRtest, which are already in shortsupply.

Next, patients are required toregister with the CMO's office,which then forwards the request

to the Integrated Command ControlCentre for COVID managementthat makes the final bed allocation,a government official said.

A state government spokesmanWednesday told Reuters that au-thorities were planning to endthe CMO referral system thisweek, and instead appoint offi-cials at every COVID-19 hospitalto assess whether a patient needed

to be admitted.The cumbersome process has

come under criticism, includingfrom the state's Human RightsCommission that has asked the gov-ernment to ditch the referral rule.

"There are expert doctors in hos-pitals who can decide if the patientneeds to be admitted or not," the com-mission said Tuesday. "This refer-ral letter system is not required."

In UP, home to 200 million people,infections are rising by more than22,000 cases daily, severely strainingits creaky healthcare system.

The state government has said itis turning several hospitals intoCOVID-only facilities and addingmore beds. It did not respond toquestions from Reuters.

BEGGING FOR HELPAt Lucknow's CMO office, adja-

cent to two large hospitals, dozensof people line up daily, requesting,begging and sometimes crying fora referral letter required for hospitaladmissions.

This week, local TV news chan-nels aired footage of a young manlying on the road to block the CMO'scar in his desperation to get a let-

ter for an ailing relative.Patients need to show an RT-PCR

test confirming infection beforebeing given a referral letter.

But these tests are increasinglyhard to access for most patients,with long queues outside hospitalsand clinics over-burdened due tothe surge in infections.

"Getting an RT-PCR done in UPis next to impossible," said jour-nalist Shreya Jai, whose familymembers had to wait for a week toget a rapid antigen test.

Many Lucknow labs are work-ing with less than half their staff,the rest sickened by the virus, alab worker said, asking not to benamed. The state government hassaid that nearly 230 private andstate-run labs were being used forcoronavirus testing.

Monday, the state governmentled by Yogi Adityanath, who him-self is currently down with COVID-19, was pilloried for its handlingof the crisis by a regional court.

“It is a shame that while the gov-ernment knew of the magnitudeof the second wave it never plannedthings in advance,” the state'sAllahabad High Court said.

Bureaucratic barriers leave patients begging for beds Patients are required to register with the CMO’s office, which then forwards requestto the Integrated Command Control Centre that makes the final bed allocation

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

New Delhi, April 21: While sev-eral states claimed a shortage ofCovid vaccine, it has been learnt thatmany states have wasted hugequantities of it. Tamil Nadu,Haryana and Punjab are three topstates that reported the highestwastage of vaccines. While Kerala,West Bengal, Himachal Pradeshwere the states which reportedzero wastage of Covid vaccine.

As data shared by the union gov-ernment in an RTI reply, till April11, Tamil Nadu reported highestvaccine wastage at 12.10 per cent,followed by Haryana (9.74 per cent),Punjab (8.12 per cent), Manipur(7.80 per cent) and Telangana (7.55per cent). Assam has reported 7.69per cent wastage, Bihar (6.99 percent), Chandigarh (6.93 per cent),Delhi (6.15 per cent) and Rajasthan(six per cent). Eight states that havereported 'zero wastage' of vaccineare Kerala, West Bengal, HimachalPradesh, Mizoram, Goa, Damanand Diu, Andaman and NicobarIslands and Lakshadweep. Over 10crore doses of Covid vaccine havebeen administered by states andunion territories till April 11.

Tamil Nadu, which is seeingCovid cases mounting, is now hitby a shortage of vaccines. Severalpeople who have taken their firstshots are being sent back from hos-pitals when they reach for theirsecond shot after four weeks.

C. Rajeev, Director, of Chennaithink tank Centre for Policy andDevelopment Studies, told IANS: "Ihad taken the first shot of the vac-cine and was planning to take thesecond shot this week... when I en-quired at the hospitals, they said that

there is no vaccine in stock andhence I have to wait further. I don'tknow what is happening as far asshortage of vaccine is concerned."

The second wave of Covid hascreated a situation of panic with thepeople worried over the lack ofvaccines in the state. In Chennai,Coimbatore, Madurai, Trichy andother parts of the state, there is ashortage of vaccine.

In Coimbatore, representativesof private hospitals, who reachedthe Regional Vaccine Centre, hadto return empty-handed as the of-ficials pleaded helplessness.

Shanmuganathan, a represen-tative of a private hospital atCoimbatore who reached the RVCon Tuesday, told IANS: "The officialstold us to come back after two daysas fresh stocks would arrive soon.However we are not sure whetherthis will happen... there is an acuteshortage for the people."

In Madurai also, the situation isbleak, with the health officials to-tally unsure of the possibility of pro-viding vaccine stock to private hos-pitals. Manimeghalai, a homemakerat Madurai, told IANS: "I had takena first shot of Covaxin and wasasked to come today but unfortu-nately the Government Rajaji hos-pital turned me down, stating thatthere is no vaccine stock."

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Lucknow, April 21: The three-member inquiry commission prob-ing the encounter killings of gang-ster Vikas Dubey and five of hisalleged associates has given a cleanchit to Uttar Pradesh Police be-cause of lack of evidence, sourcessaid Wednesday.

The commission is headed by for-mer Supreme Court judge BSChauhan. The other two membersare former Allahabad High Courtjudge Sashi Kant Agrawal and for-mer UP Director General of PoliceKL Gupta.

The panel submitted its re-ported to the state governmentMonday, eight months after it wasset up. “Yes the commission hassubmitted its report to the stategovernment Monday. A copy ofthe report will be submitted inthe Supreme court also,” Guptatold PTI.

He, however, did not elaborate on

the contents of the report. Askedabout it, Additional Chief Secretary,Home, Awanish Kumar Awasthisaid, “I would not like to commenton it.”

According to the sources, theinquiry commission has found noevidence of wrongdoing by thestate police.

Speaking to PTI, a senior policeofficial said, "No witnesses cameforward to challenge the policeclaims even after advertisementsin newspapers and media. Also,no one from the media came for-ward to get their versions recorded."

There were, however, witnessessupporting the police version, headded. July 3 last year, eight po-licemen were killed in an ambushin Bikru village in Chaubeypurarea of Kanpur when they weregoing to arrest Vikas Dubey.

Police later killed Prem PrakashPandey (55) and Atul Dubey (35) inan encounter in Kanpur July 3.

July 8, Amar Dubey (30), who car-ried a reward of Rs 50,000 on him,was killed in an encounter inMaudaha village in Hamirpur dis-trict.

July 9, Praveen Dubey, aliasBauwa (48), and Prabhat, aliasKartikeya (28), were killed in sep-arate encounters in Etawah andKanpur districts.

Six PILs were filed in theSupreme Court after this to seeka court-monitored probe into theencounter killings.

The apex court had then on July22, 2020 approved the Uttar Pradeshgovernment's decision to institutethe inquiry commission.

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

Chennai, April 21: With nearly50 per cent of the business gonesince the outbreak of coronavirusand the lockdown last year, thenight curfew and ban on tourists vis-iting hill stations will further wipeout the restaurant business, saidhoteliers in Tamil Nadu.

They also said the migrant labourgoing back to their homes is not amajor problem as many of themwho had left last year have not re-turned and further business hasnot improved.

“Normally business in vegetar-ian hotels pick up from 7.30 p.m.and in non-vegetarian outlets at 8p.m. The night curfew between 10p.m. and 4 a.m. announced by theTamil Nadu government from April20 will hit the business hard. Alreadyrestaurants are near empty after7.30 p.m,” R. Srinivasan, Secretary,Tamil Nadu Hotels Association toldIANS.

With Covid-19 second wave hittingTamil Nadu and increasing thenumber of active patients, the stategovernment recently tightened therestrictions like night curfew, restau-rants to operate with 50 per cent

capacity, ban on tourists visitinghill stations and others.

"Already business is down by 50per cent since last year Covid-19lockdown. The ban on tourists vis-iting hill stations during the sum-mer season sounds the death knellfor the hoteliers there. The busi-ness done during the four monthssustains them for the remainingpart of the year," M. Venkada Subbu,

President told IANS.Continuing further, Subbu said

nearly 25 per cent restaurants on thehighways and 10 per cent of thecity outlets have shut down businesssince the first lockdown.

The highway hotels may see somebrisk business as long distancebusiness that usually run at nightare now operated during the day dueto night curfew.

The Federation of Hotel &Restaurant Associations of India(FH&RAI) had earlier written tothe Tamil Nadu government statingthe prevailing restrictions and workfrom home arrangements, restau-rants have no significant businessduring the day time and the impo-sition of night curfews is tanta-mount to closure of business forthe sector.

On the issue of migrant workersgoing back to their home state withthe imposition of recent restric-tions and impacting the operationsSrinivasan said: "Those who hadgone back last year have not re-turned. As the business came downhotels managed with remaininghands."

The hotels trained their re-maining staff on multitasking inorder to be sustainable.

Subbu who runs the three starDarling Residency hotel in Velloreand several restaurants said theroom bookings which went up to 30per cent since October/November2020 has come down to 10 per cent

Hotels across the categories inorder keep their gas burners burn-ing roped in Swiggy and Zomatoonline food aggregators last year.

In addition big star hotels had de-veloped their own food orderingApp and delivered their dishes at cus-tomer homes.

"The online food aggregators de-mand 20 per cent as commissionwhich eats into our margins and isnot remunerative. But in order tomeet the fixed overheads outlets havesigned up with them," Subbu said.

Hoteliers -- including four/five

stars -- said they were seeing slightimprovement in their business sinceNovember 2020 with room occu-pancy going up to about 30 per centprior to the recent restrictions.

The room booking window whichused to be several days prior to 2020lockdown came down to 36 hours andnow it is 24 hours, hoteliers toldIANS.

"We are continuing with ourarrangement with players likeSwiggy and Zomato. We also haveour own App. This enabled us toserve many new customers withour specialised offerings," ZubinSongadwala, General Manager, ITCGrand Chola and Area Manager,ITC Hotels, South.

"We will continue our associa-tion with Swiggy and Zomato. Theone issue is that the per bill sizehas come down as compared to thesize of dine-in bill," T. Nataraajan,CEO, GRT Hotels & Resorts hadtold IANS.

According to Songadwala, thebill size will be higher at restau-rants as in most of the cases the cor-porate guests would go for beverages.

"In the case of home deliveries,the orders will be mainly for food,"Songadwala remarked.

TN to take up oxygendiversion issue withCentre: Health SecyPRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Chennai, Apr 21:The Tamil Nadugovernment Wednesday said itwould take up with the Centre,diversion of about 45 metric tonnesof medical oxygen from a cityplant to Andhra Pradesh andTelangana, while asserting thatthe state had adequate stocks ofoxygen.

Wondering what the need wasfor the central government to di-vert the oxygen manufactured bya supplier at nearbySriperumbudur, Health SecretaryDr J Radhakrishnan said thateven during the pandemic times,the state has been supplying oxy-gen to others.

"Even now the state is provid-ing oxygen to its neighboringstates who are in deficit for med-ical oxygen. We have not imposedany restrictions," he told PTI.

"The availability situation iscurrently adequate, but this di-version has been done by theGovernment of India.

While Tamil Nadu can alwayssupply to others, this mandatorydiversion should not create prob-lems in the future and we are tak-ing up the issue to ensure thatour situation is comfortable inthe future too," he added.

Tamil Nadu's liquid medicaloxygen manufacturing capacityis around 400 metric tonnes a dayand the state has a storage ca-pacity of around 1,200 tonnes.

Currently, the daily medicalconsumption is around 240 tonnesper day, the health secretary saidand asserted that the state is in acomfortable position now.

The private manufacturer inthe city, who has a pan Indiapresence, contributes to about50 per cent of the medical oxy-gen market in India, sourcessaid and added that there is nosupply-side bottleneck in thestate.

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Lucknow, April 21: Uttar PradeshChief Minister Yogi AdityanathWednesday directed officials to con-duct raids on those involved inblack-marketing of medicines likeremdesivir and book offenders underthe National Security Act (NSA).

Chairing a review meeting withhis core team of 11 top officialshere, Adityanath reiterated thatthere was no plan to impose a lock-down in the state.

He also directed the officials toinstall GPS devices on oxygentankers and provide adequate se-curity to oxygen plants.

“The director general of policeshould constitute special teams to con-duct raids on those involved in black-marketing of medicines like remde-sivir and Fabiflu. NSA and GangsterAct should be invoked against thoseinvolved in such practice,” the chiefminister said, according to an offi-cial spokesperson.

“At all oxygen plants/refillingcentres, officers should be deployed,and it should be ensured that oxy-gen is given in a transparent man-ner,” he said.

Adityanath said producers ofremdesivir drug should be effec-tively monitored to ensure a con-tinuous supply of the medicine. The

chief minister said it was good to notethat over 14,000 patients have re-covered from the disease in the statesince Tuesday, and appealed to peo-ple to take all precautions.

“There is no shortage of medi-cines and oxygen in the state,” he

asserted. Adityanath said hospi-tals should put information of avail-able beds in the public domain andupdate it regularly. They shouldalso audit their medical oxygenstock, he added.

“There should be a backup of atleast 36 hours of oxygen in hospi-tals. The state will get 10,000 remde-sivir vials by Thursday and de-mand of 50,000 more vials per dayshould be sent,” he said.

The chief minister directed theofficials to increase the number ofbeds in every district by at least200 and asked them to quarantinemigrants coming from other statesfor two weeks.

Book those black-marketing medicines under NSA: Yogi

Night curfew chokes Tamil Nadu’s hotel business

Probe panel’s ‘cleanchit’ to UP cops inDubey encounter

TN reported highest wastage of vaccines

I had taken a firstshot of Covaxin and was asked to come today

but unfortunately theGovernment Rajaji hospitalturned me down, stating thatthere is no vaccine stock MANIMEGHALAI I A HOMEMAKER

OXYGEN SHORTAGE

Family members of COVID-19 patients wait to fill their empty cylinders with medical oxygen outside an oxygenfilling centre, as demand for the gas rises due to spike in coronavirus cases, in Kanpur, Wednesday. PTI PHOTO

TAM

IL NADU

To get a bed in Lucknow, families say they need to show theresult of an RT-PCR test, which are already in short supply

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It is ourcommitmentto ensure with

all the resources atour disposal thatpeople don't sufferany inconvenienceat this moment of crisis

TIRATH SINGH RAWAT |UTTARAKHAND CHIEF MINISTER

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There is noscarcity ofRemdesivir in

the state. Morevaccination centreswill be set up if theneed arises

E RAJENDER | TELANGANA HEALTH MINISTER

I amdistressed tohear the news

of the accident ofoxygen leak in ahospital in Nashik. Iexpress my deepestcondolences to those who have losttheir loved ones in this accident. Ipray to God for the speedy recoveryof all the other patients

AMIT SHAH | UNION HOME MINISTER

Nishank testsCovid positive New Delhi: Union EducationMinister Ramesh PokhriyalNishank Wednesday testedpositive for coronavirus. Atpresent, he is in homequarantine and following theCovid protocols. After testingpositive, Nishank appealed toall those people who hadcome in contact with him inthe last few days to getthemselves tested.

Two priestsbeheaded Madhubani: The bodies oftwo priests were found inDharohar Mahadev templein Khirhar police stationarea of Madhubani district,the police said Wednesday.Both the priests werebeheaded by unidentifiedcriminals and the motive forthe crime could not beascertained so far. Theincident took place Tuesdaynight. Khirhar police stationin-charge Anjesh Kumar saidthat the priests were killedwith a sharp object and theirheads were separated fromthe bodies.

Fresh Covidcurbs in MahaMumbai: The Maharashtragovernment Wednesdayimposed several newrestrictions including a banon inter-city and inter-districttravel and curbs on officeattendance in an attempt tobring the spirallingcoronavirus infections under control.

Five killed inroad mishapYadgir (Karnataka): Fivewomen were killed when a tumtum (a longautorickshaw) collided head-on with a truck at ShahapurTaluk Wednesday, police said.The number of the injured inthe mishap was not knownimmediately.

Remdesivir vialsstolen from hospIndore: Over 130 vials ofremdesivir, an anti-viral drug used in the treatmentof COVID-19, were allegedlystolen from a privatehospital in MadhyaPradesh's Indore city, policesaid Wednesday.

Naxals kidnap SIBijapur: Naxals Wednesdaykidnapped a police sub-inspector in Bijapur districtof Chhattisgarh, a seniorofficial said. Murli Tati hadcome to his home at Palnarwhen he was kidnapped,Bijapur Superintendent of PoliceKamlochan Kashyap told PTI.

SHORT TAKES

After Nagaland, anotherNortheastern state ArunachalPradesh is determined to provideprotection and sanctuary to thebirds and wild animals even asthe tribals traditionally huntthem for centuries

NOBLE STEPOn the call of the SKM,farmers in large

numbers have started comingtowards Delhi. The farmers arecoming back after harvesting, tostrengthen the protest atSinghu, Tikri, Ghazipur andShahjahanpur bordersDARSHAN PAL | SKM LEADER

New Delhi: A new report from a US-based digital forensics companyhas said a hacker planted 22 “in-criminating” files in activist RonaWilson’s computer, days after vio-lence in the Maharashtra town ofBhima-Koregaon in January 2018.

These fi les have, since 15November 2018, been cited, initiallyby the Pune Police and then by theNIA, as key evidence. This evi-dence led to Wilson and 15 others—including lawyers, academics andartistes—being arrested and jailedwithout bail (except poet VaravaraRao who is now on bail) or trial formore than two years on charges ofconspiring against the State.

The files were never created,opened or used by anyone who di-rectly handled Wilson’s computer, butthe hacker used software to plantthem, said the new report fromArsenal Consulting. They analysedan electronic copy of Wilson’s com-puter on a request from his lawyers,who got it from the police inNovember 2019 after court orders.

The new report is a follow-up ofArsenal’s first report in February2021. That report concluded the com-puter was hacked using malicioussoftware to plant 10 files, mostly“incriminating” letters, and it facedsustained electronic spying.

The second report, yet to be madepublic, but reviewed by Article 14,states: “There is no evidence of le-gitimate interaction with the addi-tional files of interest on Mr. Wilson’scomputer, and that 22 of the 24 filesare directly connected to the at-tacker identified in Report I”.

The additional 24 files largely con-tain purported correspondence be-tween members of the banned CPI(Maoist), discussions on fund trans-fers, how to improve women’s rep-resentation in organisations, diffi-culties party members face in

communicating with each other, con-cerns over state crackdown and somephotographs of Maoist guerillas.

Article 14 emailed detailed queriesto Jaya Roy, NIA spokesperson andSP. The queries included specificquestions related to Arsenal’s find-ings and reports submitted by gov-ernment’s forensic labs.

Roy did not reply to the email. But,speaking to Article 14 on the phone,she said, “We do not take cogni-sance of reports from private labs.”

The case against the 16 activistscentres around Elgaar Parishad,an event held December 31, 2017 inBhima-Koregaon, a town of roughly9,000 inhabitants, 28 km northeastof Pune, to commemorate the 200thanniversary of the victory of alargely Dalit-staffed British armyover the upper-caste Peshwa army.Violence and arson followed theevent, as Dalits clashed with Hinduright-wingers irked by the cele-bration of a valorous Dalit past.

Soon, a Pune police investiga-

tion into the violence changed tackto a Maoist conspiracy and focusedon “urban naxals”, a term popu-larised around the same time byright-wing supporters and leadersto deride urban intellectuals and ac-tivists. Police raided activists andorganisers of the event and seizedlaptops, hard disks and other devices.According to the chargesheet, thepolice raided the premises of RonaWilson and advocate SurendraGadling because of their allegedcommunication with SudhirDhawale, one of the main organisersof Bhima Koregaon event.

The files found on Wilson’s com-puter were among the evidence sub-mitted against him, lawyer-activistSudha Bharadwaj, poet Rao andothers.

After the NIA took over the probefrom the state police, they filed anadditional chargesheet, namingJesuit priest Stan Swany, HanybabuTarayil, a professor of linguisticsat the Department of English at

Delhi University, Anand Teltumbde,a professor of the Goa Institute ofManagement and journalist GautamNavlakha. They were accused ofconspiring with a banned Maoistgroup against the Indian govern-ment and face charges under UAPA.

The new report traced a chain ofelectronic actions — known as a“process tree”— used to plant in-criminating documents and trackedthe digital footprints to the samehacker who had planted the 10 files.Arsenal found instances where thehacker renamed files and, in onecase, even made a mistake that waslater corrected.

Arsenal’s president Mark Spencerexplained to Article 14 the signifi-cance of the new report: “Theprocess tree involving “mohila meet-ing jan.pdf” is the most compellingfinding in Report II. While thereare many “smoking guns” relatedto the attacker’s activity in ReportsI and II, this process tree is one ofthe most significant”.

The mohila meeting file thatSpencer referred to contains theminutes of a purported mohila(women) meeting on January 2,2018. It lists other co-accused ac-tivists—Bharadwaj, SusanAbraham, Shoma Sen—and othersas members of mass organisations.

The process tree that Spencerreferred to tracks how and when theattacker hacked and planted files ona victim’s computer. The reportsaid these 22 files were plantedusing NetWire, malicious softwarethat opens the door to the device forhackers. The hacker then remotelychanged, added or deleted contentsand viewed computer activity. Thesecond report detailed how this re-mote-access electronic Trojan horsewas used to deliver multiple files toWilson’s laptop, in addition to thosementioned in the first report, laterused by investigators to incrimi-nate him and others.

The process tree for the ‘mohilameeting document’ showed NetWirebeing launched automaticallyJanuary 11, 2018, 11 days after theBhima-Koregaon violence, at 5:04 pmafter a login.

The attacker opened a commandprompt and unpacked three filesbetween 5:10 and 5:12 pm — one ofwhich contained “mohila meetingjan.pdf”. These files were then un-packed into a hidden folder usinga temporarily deployed UnRAR, afile archiver like WinZip, renamedto “Adobe.exe”. The report explainedhow the attacker erred while writ-ing the command to plant a file,and subsequently corrected it.

Besides laptop, files in hard disksand pen drives too, were helpful intightening the screws on Wilsonand others. The attacker ensured thatfiles were automatically transferredfrom Wilson’s computer to the ex-ternal hard drive when hooked up.

“Please keep in mind that ulti-mately you do not need to take ourword for anything we have sharedin Reports I or II, as our findings canbe replicated by competent digitalforensics practitioners with accessto the same electronic evidence,” saidSpencer.

“The process tree has effectivelycaught the attacker red-handed,”said Spencer. “It very clearly demon-strates how the attacker deliveredincriminating files to Rona Wilson’scomputer.”

“It's the kind of finding thatshould make technical people leanback in their chairs and say, whoa,”said Spencer, who has examinedcomputers related to the 2013 bomb-ing of the Boston Marathon and aTurkish journalist falsely framedfor terrorism in 2014.

The NIA, in a special court, in re-sponse to a bail plea moved byAnand Teltumbde’s lawyers basedon the first report by Arsenal saidthat the findings cannot be reliedupon since it’s ‘not authenticated’.Multiple chargesheets filed by thestate police and NIA running intohundreds of pages hinge on the ev-idence recovered from the elec-tronic devices of Wilson and others,the credibility of which has nowbeen debunked by the independ-ent forensic expert.

In a statement February 10, theNIA had indirectly discreditedArsenal’s first report.

“The forensics reports that arecited in the chargesheet filed in thecourt are from an accredited lab, ac-cepted by the Indian courts. In thiscase, it was done by the RegionalForensic Science Laboratory inPune. According to their report nosuch malware was found,” NIAspokesperson Roy said. “Rest all(sic) is distortion of facts.”

The Reporters’ Collective

Bhima-Koregaon case: More signs of planted evidence

AGENCIES

Chanchal/Harirampur/Balurghat(WB), April 21: West Bengal ChiefMinister Mamata Baner jeeWednesday sharpened her attack onthe Prime Minister over the resur-gence of Covid-19, terming it a"Modi-made disaster" and demandedthat he quit if unable to provide ad-equate medical supplies to combatthe disease.

She also ruled out the possibil-ity of a lockdown in the state amidspurting COVID-19 cases and saida universal vaccination drive forpeople aged 18 years and abovewill start from May 5. She allegedthat 65 per cent of the drugs man-ufactured in the country for tack-ling the pandemic have alreadybeen exported.

"The Covid-19 pandemic had sub-sided in the country but has surgedin a second wave owing to the mon-umental failure of the central gov-ernment and negligence and totalincompetence on its part," she saidaddressing public meetings atChanchal in Malda and atHarirampur in Dakshin Dinajpurdistricts. As the ElectionCommission did not accede toTrinamool Congress' request tohold the last three of the eight-

phase election in West Bengal on asingle day, Banerjee said she isforced to combat the sharp rise ininfections in the state as its chiefminister as well campaign forTrinamool Congress, her party.

Later, addressing a press con-ference in Malda, she said a lock-down will not be imposed but un-derscored the need for followingCOVID-appropriate behaviour.

"We are not in favour of a lock-down. We want everyone to adhereto COVID norms such as wearing

masks, social distancing and usingsanitisers. We don't want people togo back to those days of stayingback at home. Lockdown is not a so-lution as it takes a heavy toll onpeople, jobs and economy," she said.She also said she will write a "strongletter" to Modi over "discrimina-tory" prices of COVID vaccines tobe supplied by manufacturers tothe Centre and states.

The Chief Minister said aroundone crore people have so far beenvaccinated against COVID in thestate. Hitt ing out at PrimeMinister Narendra Modi at herelection rallies, Banerjee said,"The country is facing a Modi-made disaster. Modi Babu willhave to take responsibility . Why medicines to treat COVID-19 are not available? You have toprovide medicines or leave thechair. Either you control Coronaor move out."

"The second Covid wave is moreintense. There are no injectionsor oxygen. Vaccines and medi-cines are being shipped abroadeven as there is a scarcity of theseitems in the country," she earliertold a rally at Balurghat inDakshin Dinajpur district. "It isnot a man-made disaster, it isModi made." she added.

Hindu devotees immerse ‘Saakh’, in the Tawi River on the occasion of Ram Navami in Jammu PTI PHOTO

DEVOTION AMID PANDEMIC

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

New Delhi, April 21: Indigenouslydeveloped COVID-19 vaccine,Covaxin, neutralises multiple vari-ants of SARS-CoV-2 and effectivelyworks against the double mutantstrain as well, the Indian Councilof Medical Research (ICMR) saidWednesday.

ICMR cited the find-ings of a study carriedout by them. Covaxin isdeveloped locally byHyderabad-based BharatBiotech InternationalLtd. in collaborationwith the ICMR -- the apexbody in India for the for-mulation, coordinationand promotion of bio-medical research. ICMR-National Institute ofVirology has success-fully isolated and cultured multi-ple variants of concern of SARS-CoV-2 virus: B.1.1.7 (the UK variant),B.1.1.28 (Brazil variant ) and B.1.351(South Africa variant), said theapex health research body.

"ICMR study shows Covaxin

neutralises against multiple vari-ants of SARS-CoV-2 and effectivelyneutralises the double mutantstrain as well," the ICMR said in atweet. They have also demonstratedthe neutralisation potential ofCovaxin against the UK variantand Brazil variant.

"Covaxin has been found to ef-fectively neutralisethe double mutantstrain as well," itsaid.

The study waspublished in theJournal for TravelMedicine in Marchwhere it high-lighted thatCovaxin is effec-tive against the UKvariants as well asother strains ofCovid-19. "It was

reassuring from the PRNT50 datagenerated in our laboratory that theindigenous BBV152/ COVAXIN,following its roll out in vaccina-tion program, could be expectedto work against the new UK-vari-ant," the study said.

‘Covaxin neutralisesdouble mutant strain’

AGENCIES

New Delhi, April 21: To scaleup production of its Covishieldvaccine, the Serum Institute ofIndia (SII) had borrowed moneyfrom banks instead of waiting forthe government's aid to arrive.

The company assumed that thefunding from the government willreach them very soon, probably bythis week.

Covishield has been developedby the Oxford University andAstraZeneca, and manufacturedby the Pune-based SII.

To boost India's vaccine pro-duction in wake of the huge surgein Covid-19 caseload, the govern-ment on Monday announced thatit has given in-principle approvalfor credit to vaccine manufactur-ers, SII and Hyderabad-basedBharat Biotech.

SII BORROWS FROMBANKS TO SCALE UPVAX PRODUCTION

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, April 21: Chief ofAir Staff Air Chief Marshal RKSBhadauria Wednesday flaggedoff four Rafale fighter jets forIndia from a military airbase inFrance, people familiar with thedevelopment said.

Air Chief Marshal Bhadauriavisited a Rafale aircraft trainingfacility on the third day of hisfive-day visit to France. He alsothanked the French aerospace in-dustry for ensuring timely deliv-ery of the jets.

"Air Chief Mshl RKS Bhadauriaon an official tour to France laudspilots and sees off the next batchof Rafales on a non stop flight toIndia with mid air refueling byFrench Air force and UAE.

"Thanks France especiallyFASF and French Industry fortimely delivery & pilot trainingon schedule despite COVID," theIndian embassy in France tweeted.

The Indian embassy did notmention the number of aircraftflagged off by the IAF Chief butpeople associated with the eventsaid four jets formed the newbatch that left from France'sMerignac airbase. In his brief re-marks, the IAF Chief said someof the Rafale aircraft have beendelivered a "little bit" ahead oftime and it has contributed tothe overall combat potential ofthe Indian Air Force (IAF).

IAF CHIEF IN FRANCE:FLAGS OFF 4 RAFALEAIRCRAFT FOR INDIA

BSF DEMANDS FIRAGAINST PAK PIGEONA small piece of paper

with a ‘contact number’was wrapped around

the pigeon’s leg, an official said

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Amritsar, April 21: The BSFhas sought registration of anFIR against an intruder fromPakistan that happens to be apigeon.

The Punjab Police are seek-ing legal opinion on this. Thepigeon perched itself on theshoulder of a Border SecurityForce jawan at the Rorawala posthere last Saturday, apparentlyafter flying across the border, anofficial said. The BSF personnel

handed over the bird to the po-lice with a demand in writingfor taking legal action.

Senior Superintendent ofPolice Dhruv Dahiya said theBSF demanded registration ofan FIR against the pigeon. “As thepigeon is a bird, I don't think anFIR can be registered against it.But we have referred the mat-ter to our legal experts for theiropinion,” he said Wednesday.

Mamata dubs second wave ofCovid a ‘Modi-made disaster’ The double mutant strain - labelled B.1.617 - is a

possibly more infectious variety that was first detected in Maharashtra late last year, and which

experts have linked to the spike in Covid cases

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On civil services day, mygreetings to civil servantspast and present! Our

bureaucracy is rightly called the SteelFrame, and you’ve been the backboneof our fight against COVID-19. You’veraised the bar of professionalexcellence and dedication in publicservice. All the best!RAM NATH KOVIND | PRESIDENT OF IONDIA

India took only 95 days to administer 13crore doses of COVID-19 vaccine, thefastest country to do so, the UnionHealth Ministry said Wednesday. The UStook 101 days, while China took 109 daysto cross the same number

INDIA FASTEST COUNTRY TOADMINISTER 13 CR DOSES

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Rhino poached inKaziranga NPGolaghat (Assam): Thecarcass of an adult malerhino with its horn missingwas found near a waterbodyinside the Kaziranga NationalPark in Assam, officials saidWednesday. Poachers shotthe animal dead three to fourdays ago but the carcass wasnoticed Tuesday. A bulletmark was found on the bodyduring post-mortemexamination, pointingtowards poaching, theofficials said. This is the firstpoaching incident of thecurrent year in the KazirangaNational Park, known for itspopulation of one-hornedrhinoceros.

Cops attacked;10 arrestedMathura: Five policepersonnel, including an SHO,were injured in an attack bysupporters of a panchayatpoll candidate when theytried to stop a party whichwas organised in Mudaliyavillage in this district to seekthe favour of voters, officialssaid Wednesday. Ten peoplehave been arrested inconnection with the incidentthat occurred Tuesday, saidSuperintendent of Police(City) Srish Chandra. A policeteam, led by InspectorLokesh Bhati, was attackedwhen it tried to stop theparty hosted by supporters ofa panchayat poll candidate inviolation of the poll code andCOVID protocol, he said.

5 undertrialsescape prisonBikaner: Five undertrialsescaped from the Nokha subjail in Rajasthan’s Bikanerdistrict in the early hours ofWednesday, officials said.This is the second suchincident of jail break in thestate this month. DG, Prisons,Rajiv Dasot, told PTI that thefive escaped after making ahole in the wall of the barracknear a window. Prima facie,the inmates managed toescape due to laxity of thejail staff, he said, addingaction against the guilty willbe taken after inquiry.

Tigress poisonedto death; 2 held Udhagamandalam(TN): Twopersons were arrestedWednesday and a search is onfor their two accomplices forallegedly poisoning a tigress todeath a few months ago inSingara forest range in Nilgirisdistrict. Acting on tip-off, forestdepartment officials arrestedthe duo for poisoning thetigress in Singara range comingunder Masinagudi in MudumalTiger Reserve November 20 lastyear, police said.

SHORT TAKES

An election is tohold thegovernment

accountable. The BJPis solely responsiblefor the medicalcatastrophe that hasfallen on the country. The hopes of theentire nation are in the hands of thevoters of West Bengal

P CHIDAMBARAM | SENIOR CONG LEADER

The directorgeneral ofpolice should

constitute specialteams to conductraids on thoseinvolved in black-marketing of medicines like remdesivirand Fabiflu. NSA and Gangster Actshould be invoked against thoseinvolved in such practice

YOGI ADITYANATH | CM, UTTAR PRADESH

REUTERS

New Delhi, April 21: After spend-ing hours fruitlessly calling gov-ernment helplines in a search fora hospital bed for a critically illCOVID-19 patient, Indian lawyerJeevika Shiv posted an SOS re-quest on Twitter.

“Serious #covid19 patient in#Delhi with oxygen level 62 needsimmediate hospital bed,” Shiv,part of a 350-member COVID-19volunteer Medical Support Group,said on Twitter late last week.

Help came quickly. The patientfound a bed and was soon showingsigns of recovery.

“Finally, it was help online thatworked as people responded withinformation,” Shiv said.

India is reporting more than250,000 new COVID-19 cases a dayin its worst phase of the pandemic.Hospitals are turning away pa-tients and supplies of oxygen and

medication are running short.In response, people are bypass-

ing the conventional lines of com-munication and turning to Twitterto crowdsource help for oxygen

cylinders, hospital beds and otherrequirements.

People in need and those with in-formation or resources share tele-phone numbers of volunteers, ven-dors who have oxygen cylinders ordrugs, and details of which med-ical facility can take patients usinghashtags like #COVIDSOS.

Some users have offered to helpwith home-cooked meals for COVIDpatients quarantining at homeand to meet a host of other needslike arranging to feed pets.

“Twitter is having to do what thegovernment helpline numbersshould be doing,” wrote Twitteruser Karanbir Singh.

“We are on our own folks.”Twitter is not as widely used in

India as Facebook or WhatsApp but

it is proving a more valuable toolto get pleas for help out in the coro-navirus crisis, largely because ofits “re-tweet” function that canquickly amplify a message throughusers’ networks of contacts.

A Google spreadsheet drawn upby a volunteer group that collatesinformation on hospital beds, oxy-gen supplies, blood plasma and am-bulance helplines in various statesis being rapidly shared on Twitterand runs into dozens of pages.

Bengaluru-based software de-veloper Umang Galaiya, 25, hascreated a website that allows usersto select the name of the city andthe requirement - be it oxygen orthe antiviral drug remdesivir -and then directs them to results onTwitter using its advance search

feature.His website has received more

than 110,000 hits.“Every other tweet on my feed

has been about COVID,” Galaiyasaid.

“I’m glad people are finding thishelpful.”

But for some, help comes toolate.

Monday, journalist Sweta Dashposted a plea for help on Twitterto find bed with a ventilator for apregnant woman in New Delhi.Her message spread quicklythrough more than 100 retweetsand a Delhi government officialsoon suggested a hospital.

But a few hours later, Dashposted another message.

“The patient passed away”.

Twitter: Platform of hope amid the despair of COVID crisis

RAM DEVOTEES TAKE UP SENSITISATION DRIVE

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

Bengaluru, April 21: In thewake of Bengaluru witnessing anunprecedented surge in Covidcases since the last one month,devotees of Lord Ram wore cos-tumes of Ram, Lakshman andHanuman with the message ofmaintaining social distancingand wearing a mask as part of theRam Navami celebrations acrossBengaluru Wednesday.

Several temple trusts and SriRam Seva Mandalis in Bengaluruhit upon this idea after it becameamply clear that Karnataka will cer-tainly ban religious congregations.

As part of this plan, severaldevotees wore costumes of LordRam, Lakshman and his chiefdevotee, Lord Hanuman re-questing people to wear masks

and use hand sanitisers.Ram Navami celebrates the

birth of Lord Rama on the ninthday of the Chaitra Masa month(April). Generally Ram Navamiis celebrated with much pomp inseveral parts of Bengaluru.

The celebrations in Karnatakabegin with a ceremonial mar-riage of Lord Ram and Sitaknown as Kalyanam. It is thetemple priest who performs thisceremony with the idols of theGod and Goddess. In the evening,there is a procession with theidols for the people to see whogather around and sing, danceand make merry. But for the lasttwo years, Rama Navami cele-brations have been restricted totemple premises due to the pan-demic since March 2020 inKarnataka.

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, April 21: The CongressWednesday slammed the Centreover the differential pricing forCOVID vaccines, saying it was dis-criminatory and will benefit onlya “few big industrialists” whilecommon people will suffer.

Congress leader Rahul Gandhitook to Twitter to alleged injustice onthe part of the central governmentand compared the new vaccine pol-icy to demonetisation. “Disaster of thecountry, opportunity for friends ofModi. Injustice of the central gov-ernment,” he said in a tweet using thehashtag “#VaccineDiscrimination”and shared the statement of SerumInstitute announcing a price of ̀ 400per vaccine dose to states and ̀ 600 toprivate hospitals,” he said.

“The central government’s vac-cine strategy is no less than the de-monetisation. The common people willstand in queues, will suffer loss ofwealth, health and life and in the endonly a few big industrialists will ben-

efit,” Gandhi said in another tweet.Earlier in the day, Serum Institute

of India announced a price of ̀ 400 perdose for its COVID-19 vaccine‘Covishield’ for state governmentsand `600 per dose for private hospi-tals. The Centre had Monday madeall adults above 18 years of age eligiblefor getting vaccination from May 1.

Addressing a press conference,Congress’s senior spokesperson AjayMaken said it is unfortunate that theCentre is getting the vaccine at ̀ 150,but it is not being made available atthe same price to states. “This is veryunfortunate and we have asked for onenation, one price for vaccine. Thereshould be same price for vaccines to

central and state governments,” hesaid noting that state governmentswould be put under huge financial bur-den due to this differential pricing.“This is something that is going to putour youth and poor in a disadvanta-geous position. This is discriminatory.The Centre should ensure that vac-cine manufacturers are adequatelycompensated,” Maken said. He fearedthere would be chaos in the countryfrom May 1, in the wake of non plan-ning on the part of the Centre forproviding vaccines to the youth andpoor.

Citing examples, he said ifRajasthan has to vaccinate half its pop-ulation of 4 crore people, it will haveto shell out ` 3,200 crore. “How willstates bring the finances,” he asked.Senior Congress leader JairamRamesh criticised the government say-ing the Centre getting the vaccine at`150 per dose and states at ̀ 400 is notcooperative federalism. He demandedthe Centre and state governmentspay the same price for the COVID-19vaccine.

Cong wants ‘1 nation, 1 price’ for vax

Social worker Ashok Kurmi, dressed as fictional superhero Spider-Man, sanitizes the area around Chhatrapati Shivaji MaharajTerminus, during a COVID-induced lockdown to curb the spread of coronavirus, in Mumbai, Wednesday PTI PHOTO

SUPER SANITISERPRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, April 21: The healthministry Wednesday released aslew of comparative data, show-ing that the severity, virulence anddemography of the victims in theongoing second wave of COVID-19are about the same as the first wave.

Addressing a press conference,Union Health Secretary RajeshBhushan said 146 districts reportedCOVID-19 positivity rate of morethan 15 per cent, while 274 districtsreported case positivity between 5and 15 per cent.

The release of the statistics fol-lows growing panic in the coun-try over concerns that the secondwave is somehow more powerfuland could cause greater havoc.

According to the figures sharedby Bhushan, 4.03 per cent COVID-19 cases were reported in the firstwave in those below 10 years, while2.97 per cent cases were registeredin the second wave.

“In the age group 10-20 years,8.07 per cent COVID-19 cases werereported in the first wave, while 8.50per cent cases were registered in thesecond wave. In the age group 20-30 years, 20.41 per cent cases werereported in the first wave, while 19.35per cent cases were registered in thesecond wave,” he said.

On being asked “how did wemiss such a huge impending sec-ond wave and why it has caught usunawares”, Bhushan said, “Todayis not the time to go into why didwe miss or did we miss, did we pre-pare. Today is the time to jointly face

the pandemic and once we emergefrom it successfully, then proba-bly with the advantage of hind-sight sitting with you and otherexperts we would be able to delib-erate on this.” “Today all the en-ergies of the Union and the stategovernment are focused in a col-laborative manner to tackle this,save precious lives and to ensureour health system is strengthened,”he added.

In the age group 30-40 years, 21.05per cent COVID-19 cases were re-ported in the first wave, while 21.15per cent cases were registered in thesecond wave. While 17.16 per centcases were reported in the firstwave in the 40-50 years age group,17.50 per cent cases were regis-tered in the second wave. In the agegroup 50-60 years, 14.80 per centcases were reported in the firstwave and 15.07 per cent cases in thesecond wave. In the 60-70 yearsage group, 9.01 per cent cases werereported in the first wave and 9.99per cent cases in the second.

At least 4.17 per cent cases werereported in the 70-80 years agegroup in the first wave, while 4.19per cent cases were registered in thesecond wave. In the age group ofabove 80 years, 1.31 per cent caseswere reported in the first wave,while 1.28 per cent cases were reg-istered in the second wave. Age-wisecomparison of deaths in 2020 and2021 showed that 0.27 per centCOVID-19 deaths were reported inthe first wave in those below 10years, while 0.34 per cent fatalitieswere registered in the second wave.

‘Demography andseverity of victimssame as 1st wave’

COVID RESURGE

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Chandigarh, April 21: PunjabWednesday announced a policyof rewarding those who provideinformation that lead to the re-covery of drugs, with ChiefMinister Amarinder Singh say-ing it will motivate people to playa proactive role in helping thegovernment crackdown on smug-glers.

The policy will recognise gov-ernment servants, informers andsources for their role in provid-ing inputs leading to the recoveryof a substantial quantity of drugsand in the successful implemen-tation of various provisions of theNarcotic Drugs and PsychotropicSubstances (NDPS) Act, said thestate police chief Dinkar Gupta.

The quantum of reward for suc-cessful investigation, prosecution,forfeiture of illegally acquiredproperty, preventive detention andother significant anti-drug workshall be decided on a case-to-casebasis, he wa quoted as said in anofficial statement.

Underlining his government’szero-tolerance policy towards drugs,Chief Minister Amarinder Singh,who gave a go-ahead to the policy,said it is an important step to-wards motivating people to play aproactive role in helping the gov-ernment in cracking down on drugsmugglers and traffickers.

Punjab to rewardinformants leadingto drugs recovery

INDO-ASIAN NEWS SERVICE

Kolkata, April 21: West Bengalis reeling under an acute shortageof Covid-19 vaccines amidst adreary long eight-phase assem-bly election, but leaders cam-paigning here have already spent`100 crore to fly around to pitch forvotes.

At least 90 per cent of this spend-ing can be traced to BJP becausetheir star campaigners like PM Modi,Home Minister Amit Shah, BJPpresident J P Nadda and ministerSmriti Irani are from outside thestate.

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjeeand a select few in TrinamoolCongress have flown around, spe-cially to North Bengal.

“But this is mainly because Didiis injured and long travels by roadimpacts on her leg. We don't have thekind of funds the BJP has mobilised,so we have used helicopters spar-ingly,” said Trinamool MP KakoliGhosh Dastidar.

BJP leaders justify the expenseson air travel as ‘unavoidable’ in afierce election battle like West Bengal.

“Tagra larai me goli jyada lagtahai”, (you need more ammunition ina fierce battle) said a BJP state unitoffice bearer on condition ofanonymity as he was not authorisedto speak to media.

`100 crore up inBengal poll air

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi/Chandigarh, April 21:Amid reports of oxygen shortagein the country, the Centre Wednesdaysaid of the total 7,500 metric tonnesof oxygen being produced in Indiaper day, 6,600 metric tonnes, as on date,is being allocated to states for med-ical use and assured that efforts arebeing made to increase its suppliesin the coming days.

At a press conference, NITI Aayogmember (Health) Dr V K Paul ap-pealed to the states, hospitals andnursing homes to ensure rational useof oxygen as it was a “life-saving”drug for coronavirus infected pa-tients.

Union Health Secretary RajeshBhushan said, “We are producing7,500 metric tonnes of oxygen perday of which 6,600 metric tonnes isbeing allocated to the states for med-ical purposes.” “Presently, we have

issued instructions that, leaving afew industries, the supply to in-dustries will be restricted so thatmore and more oxygen can be madeavailable for medical use,” he said.

Bhushan further said that a 24x7control room has been set up wherestate governments can raise theproblems bring faced by them likeif their truck is stuck somewhere orthe if movement is being hindered.“When you deal with such a huge

challenge, such a big pandemic andmultiple stakeholders, then at timesthere is panic and confusion, and the

onus and responsibility is on theUnion and state governments towork together and respond promptlyso these challenges are addressed,”Bhushan said.

The officials said they are also eval-uating applications from suppliersabroad for import of oxygen.

In view of the increasing demandfor medical oxygen, the Centrefloated a tender for import of 50,000MT of medical oxygen and a pre-bid-ding meeting was held Tuesday, ac-cording to official sources.

The Health Ministry has been di-rected to finalise the tender for thesame and also explore possiblesources for import identified by themissions of MEA. Besides, the HealthMinistry Sunday said that 162Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA)plants sanctioned by Government ofIndia for installation in public healthfacilities in all states will augmentoxygen capacity by 154.19 MT.

6,600 MT O2 allocated to states daily: CentreWhy didn’t thegovernmentprioritise Indians

first? Why did theprime minister placeself-promotion abovethe nation? In a statelike UP with a 22 crore population, only 1crore doses have been administered

PRIYANKA GANDHI VADRA |CONGRESS LEADER

We are producing7,500 metric tonnes ofoxygen per day of

which 6,600 metric tonnes isbeing allocated to the statesfor medical purposesRAJESH BHUSHAN | UNION HEALTH SECY

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Moscow, April 21: PresidentVladimir Putin Wednesday sternlywarned the West against further en-croachment on Russia’s securityinterests, saying Moscow’s responsewill be “quick and tough.”

Putin’s warning during his an-nual state-of-the-nation addresscame amid a massive Russian mil-itary buildup near Ukraine, wherecease-fire violations in the seven-year conflict between Russia-backedseparatists and Ukrainian forceshave escalated in recent weeks.The United States and its allieshave urged the Kremlin to pull thetroops back.

“I hope that no one dares to crossthe red line in respect to Russia, andwe will determine where it is ineach specific case,” Putin said.

“Those who organise any provo-cations threatening the core secu-rity interests of Russia will feelsorry for their deeds as never before.”

The Kremlin also has warnedUkrainian authorities againsttrying to use force to retake con-trol of the rebel-held east, say-ing that Russia could be forced tointervene to protect civilians inthe region.

“We really don’t want to burnthe bridges,” Putin said. “But ifsome mistake our good intentionsfor indifference or weakness and in-tend to burn or even blow up thosebridges themselves, Russia’s re-

sponse will be asymmetrical, quickand tough.”

Putin pointed to Russia’s movesto modernise its nuclear arsenalsand said the military would continueto procure a growing number ofstate-of-the-art hypersonic missilesand other new weapons. He addedthat development of the nuclear-armed Poseidon underwater droneand the Burevestnik nuclear-pow-ered cruise missile is continuing suc-cessfully.

Without singling out a specificcountry, the Russian leader de-nounced, a foreign governmentthat imposes “unlawful, politicallymotivated economic sanctions andcrude attempts to enforce its will onothers.”

He said Russia has shown re-straint and often refrained fromresponding to “openly boorish” ac-tions by others.

The Biden administration lastweek imposed an array of newsanctions on Russia for interfer-ing in the 2020 US presidential elec-tion and for involvement in theSolarWind hack of federal agen-cies - activities Moscow has denied.The US ordered 10 Russian diplo-mats expelled, targeted dozens ofcompanies and individuals, andimposed new curbs on Russia'sability to borrow money.

Russia retaliated by ordering10 US diplomats to leave, black-listing eight current and formerU.S. Officials, and tightening re-quirements for U.S. Embassyoperations.

I hope that no onedares to cross thered line in respectto Russia, and we

will determine where it is ineach specific case. Thosewho organise anyprovocations threateningthe core security interests ofRussia will feel sorry fortheir deeds as never before.VLADIMIR PUTIN | PRESIDENT, RUSSIA

P10THURSDAY | APRIL 22 | 2021 | BHUBANESWAR

President (Joe) Biden,Secretary (of State Tony)

Blinken, they are deeply focusedon the issue of expanding globalvaccination, manufacturing, anddelivery – all of which will becritical to ending the pandemicNED PRICE | STATE DEPARTMENTSPOKESPERSON, US

Kate Schneider from Ireland hasbeen named the new Mrs. Worldafter the reigning titleholderresigned following an on-stagefracas in which she pulled the crownoff the head of the winner of theMrs. Sri Lanka beauty pageant c

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It is essentialwe positionAustralia to

succeed byinvesting now in thetechnologies thatwill support ourindustries into the future, withlower emissions energy that cansupport Australian jobs

SCOTT MORRISON | PM, AUSTRALIA

of theday uote

MadamSpeaker,today I rise to

recognise the monthof April as ‘Sikhappreciation andawareness month’in my home state of Illinois

RAJA KRISHNAMOORTHI | INDIAN-AMERICAN

CONGRESSMAN, US

Our politicalcommitmentto becoming

the first climateneutral continent by2050 is now also alegal commitment.The Climate Law sets the EU on agreen path for a generation

URSULA VON DER LEYEN |EU COMMISSION PRESIDENT

Chad rebels threatento depose prez’s sonN’djamena (Chad): Rebels inChad threatened to deposethe son of the country’sslain president after he wasnamed interim leader of thecentral African nation,raising the specterWednesday of a potentiallyviolent power struggle.Uncertainty prevailed earlyWednesday over how far therebel column was fromN’Djamena, a city of 1million people, and whetherthe military would remainloyal to Mahamat Deby Itnoin the aftermath of hisfather’s death after threedecades in power.

Sub missing with 53 on boardJakarta: Indonesia’s military says a navysubmarine is missing near the resort island of Baliwith 53 people on board.Military chief Hadi Tjahjantosays the KRI Nanggala 402was participating in atraining exercise onWednesday when it missed ascheduled reporting call. Hesays the submarine isbelieved to have disappeared in waters about60 miles (95 kilometers)north of Bali.

Xi to participate inBiden’s summitBeijing: Chinese President XiJinping will take part inPresident Joe Biden’s climate summit this week,the government announced Wednesday. Xiwill participate in the online event by video linkfrom Beijing and “deliver an importantspeech,” the official XinhuaNews Agency said. China and the United States are the biggestemitters of climate-changing carbonpollution.

Cargo ship runsaground; 4 deadPhilippines: Four crewmembers from a cargo shipthat ran aground off thesouthern Philippines havedied, while seven have been rescued and asearch is continuing for nine others, the PhilippineCoast Guard (PCG) saidWednesday. The crew of LCTCebu Great Oceanabandoned the vessel, whichwas carrying nickel ore and 2,000 litres of diesel, before it ran aground in Surigao delNorte province Monday, the coast guard said.

SHORT TAKES

internationalMRS IRELAND NAMED NEWMRS WORLD AFTER FRACAS

DOMINANCE GAME

A satellite view of Russian military aircraft at Saki Airbase, Crimea. Satellite imagery captured in recent weeks showsincreased Russian military activity in Crimea and on the Ukraine-Russia border REUTERS

Kremlin warns West of harsh responseMoscow has rejected Ukrainian and Western concerns about the troop buildup, saying

it doesn’t threaten anyone and Russia is free to deploy its forces on its territory

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

London, April 21: Britain’s QueenElizabeth II thanked people aroundthe world for their messages of “sup-port and kindness” as she markeda low-key 95th bir thday onWednesday, days after husbandPrince Philip’s funeral Saturday.

The monarch reflected on the“great sadness” she and the royalfamily has been coping with andsaid that the tributes paid to herlate husband from across the UKand Commonwealth were a “com-fort” to the entire family.

"I have, on the occasion of my95th birthday today, received manymessages of good wishes, which Ivery much appreciate,” said theQueen, in a message released bythe official Buckingham Palace so-cial media account.

“While as a family we are in aperiod of great sadness, it has beena comfort to us all to see and to hearthe tributes paid to my husband,

from those within the UnitedKingdom, the Commonwealth andaround the world,” she said.

“My family and I would like tothank you for all the support andkindness shown to us in recent days.We have been deeply touched, andcontinue to be reminded that Philiphad such an extraordinary impact

on countless people throughout hislife,” she added. While the nationalmourning period in memory of theDuke of Edinburgh officially con-cluded Sunday, the monarch re-mains in mourning until Fridayand there is unlikely to be any of theusual birthday markers such as therelease of an official photograph

by Buckingham Palace. The Queen is expected to spend the

day privately at Windsor Castle,where she will be joined by some closemembers of the royal family.

“I would like to send my warmwishes to Her Majesty The Queen onher 95th birthday,” UK PrimeMinister Boris Johnson said in aTwitter statement.

“I have always had the highestadmiration for Her Majesty and herservice to this country and the

Commonwealth. I am proud to serveas her Prime Minister,” he said.

Prince Philip, the longest-serv-ing consort to a British monarch,died April 9, just under two monthsaway from his 100th birthday, whichwas due to be the focus of royalcelebrations this year – with theQueen’s 95th already set to be alower-key affair.

Thousands of well-wishers usu-ally fill central London to watch theQueen and members of the royalfamily for the event, which stemsfrom the traditional preparationsfor battle, when colours (or flags)were carried ("trooped") down therank to be seen and recognised bythe soldiers.

The full ceremony traditionallytakes place at Horse Guards Paradein London and involves more than1,400 soldiers and 200 horses. Theevent attracts thousands of specta-tors – largely friends and family ofthe soldiers taking part in the mil-itary spectacle.

Queen marks 95th birthday with thanks for ‘support and kindness’THE MONARCH

REFLECTED ON THE“GREAT SADNESS”

SHE AND THEROYAL FAMILY HAS

BEEN COPING WITH AND SAID

THAT THE TRIBUTES PAID TO

HER LATE HUSBAND FROM

ACROSS THE UK AND

COMMONWEALTHWERE A

“COMFORT” TOTHE ENTIRE FAMILY

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Wellington, April 21: NewZealand announced Wednesday itwill consolidate its fragmentedhealthcare system into a nationalservice similar to the one reveredby many in Britain.

New Zealand’s government-run system is currently dividedinto 20 district health boards,each with their own budget. Somedescribe the system as a “post-code lottery” of different treat-ment depending on where peo-ple live.

Health Minister Andrew Littlesaid that over three years, the dis-trict boards will be replaced by asingle new body called HealthNew Zealand. He promised an in-creased focus on public healthand treating people early so theydon’t end up in hospitals.

He said the coronavirus pan-demic had forced the system intoa rare and welcomed collaborationbut it wasn’t how it usually worked.

The overhaul also includes anew Indigenous Maori HealthAuthority.

“Our system has become overly

complex. It is far too complicatedfor a small nation,” Little said.“We simply do not need 20 dif-ferent sets of decision-makers.”

The extent of the overhaulcame as a surprise to many andwent beyond the recommenda-tions of a review panel. It wascautiously welcomed by severalgroups representing doctors andhealthcare workers.

But opposition healthspokesman Dr. Shane Reti saidthe restructure was “reckless”and would see regions and smallcommunities lose their voices.He said the government had an ide-ology of centralised control.

“Health New Zealand will likelyend up as just another bureau-cracy that governments will haveto fund, instead of investing themoney where it’s needed most,”Reti said.

NZ to consolidate healthcare into national service

Italy starts J&J vaxfor those over 60PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Rome, April 21: Italy is distrib-uting 184,000 doses of Johnson &Johnson coronavirus shots to re-gional vaccination centres andrecommending it for people agedover 60 following the latest eval-uation from the European drugregulatory agency.

Italy’s health ministry andpharmaceutical agency gave thegreen light for the shot after a pre-cautional suspension followingreports the shot might be linkedto very rare blood clots.

The EMA Tuesday found a pos-sible link between the vaccinesand very rare blood clots but saidthe benefits outweighed the risks.

After the ruling, the Italian gov-ernment decided to recommendthe shot for people over 60, a sim-ilar recommendation it made forAstraZeneca shots that also werelinked to possible clots.

Italy’s virus commissioner saidin a statement that startingWednesday, the initial 184,000 dosesof J&J shots that were waiting instorage pending the EMA reviewwill be distributed to Italy regions.

While López Obrador soughtto set an example with the vac-cine, he has expressed disdain formasks. He’s refused to make themmandatory in public spaces.

KEEP BORDER ISSUEAT ITS POSITION: CHINAPRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Beijing, April 21: China saidWednesday that it was committedto maintain peace and stabilityalong the Line of Actual Control(LAC) as it urged India to put theboundary issue at an “appropriateposition” and meet it “halfway”for the long-term development of thebilateral ties.

Chinese Foreign Ministryspokesman Wang Wenbin said thisat his media briefing as he parriedquestions on India's assertion thatconsensus reached by the leaders onmaintaining peace along the bordercannot be swept under the carpet.

Indian Ambassador to China,Vikram Misri in his recent addressto the India-China dialogue forum,said that the significance of theconsensus reached between leadersof the two countries to maintainpeace along the LAC cannot be“swept under the carpet” and calledfor the complete disengagement oftroops in Eastern Ladakh to re-build bilateral ties strained by the“serious incidents”.

Asked for his reaction, Wang saidthat both sides held in-depth and can-

did talks on resolving the disen-gagement from the remaining areasof Eastern Ladakh after the with-drawal from Pangong Tso lake area.

“On the issue of China-Indiaboundary situation, China’s posi-tion is consistent and clear. We arecommitted to maintaining peaceand stability in the border areasand we are firmly determined tosafeguard our territorial sover-eignty and security,” Wang said.

“Recently, the two sides have main-tained communications throughdiplomatic and military channels.On the basis of disengagement in theGalwan Valley and the Pangong Tsoregions, the two sides exchangedin depth and in a candid manner,opinions on resolving the remain-ing issue in the Western section ofthe boundary,” he said.

“We hope India will meet Chinahalfway and will focus on the big-ger picture of long term develop-ment of bilateral relations, put theboundary at an appropriate positionand work to bring relations back tothe track of steady and sound de-velopment,” he said.

China’s positionis consistentand clear. Weare committed tomaintainingpeace and

stability in the border areasand we are firmly determinedto safeguard our territorialsovereignty and securityWANG WENBIN | FOREIGN MINISTRYSPOKESMAN, CHINA

LAC DISENGAGEMENT

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Kabul, April 21: An upcoming in-ternational peace conference thatwas meant to move Afghanistan’swarring sides to a power-sharingdeal and ensure an orderly U.S.Exit from the country has beenpostponed, its sponsors announcedWednesday. They cited a lack ofprospects for meaningful progress.

As peace ef for ts stalled,Germany’s Defense Ministry sug-gested NATO military plannerswere contemplating a possible with-drawal of international troops fromAfghanistan as early as July 4.That’s more than two months aheadof the planned Sept. 11 pullout date.

“The Resolute Support head-quarters in Kabul are currentlyconsidering whether to shortenthe withdrawal period,” saidGer man Defense Ministryspokesman David Helmbold.

“The 4th of July is now beingconsidered as a pullout date. Theministry informed the (Germanparliament’s) defense committeeabout this today.”

Still, the latest delay in gettingAfghanistan’s warring sides tohammer out a peace deal under-scored the difficulties the Bidenadministration and NATO are fac-ing in orchestrating an orderly exitfrom conflict-scarred Afghanistan.

Both have said they would beginwithdrawing their remaining troops— a total of close to 13,000 — fromthe country May 1 and complete thepullout by Sept. 11, no matter what.

The decision to delay the con-ference came several days afterTaliban insurgents, who are keyto peace efforts, dismissed the U.S.-promoted conference in Istanbulas a political spectacle servingAmerican interests.

Afghan peace meet postponed as Taliban balk

P11

businessTHURSDAY | APRIL 22 | 2021 | BHUBANESWAR

We invest inbusinesses

that offer scalable andcommercially viableproducts focused onsolutions for theplanet and peopleLEENA DANDEKAR | FOUNDER, RAINTREE

India has removed import duty on Remdesivir,an anti-viral drug which is currently used totreat Covid-19 patients. The Ministry of Finance,in a notification issued late Tuesday night,removed the duty on import of pharmaceuticalingredients used to manufacture of the drug

INDIA REMOVES IMPORTDUTY ON REMDESIVIR

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Ratan Tatainvests in MailitNew Delhi: Veteranindustrialist Ratan Tata hasinvested in Mailit, atechnology-driven mailroommanagement and logisticscompany. While the financialdetails of the investmentwere not disclosed, Mailitsaid it plans to launch 500mailrooms across India inaddition to establishing fullymechanised warehouse anddistribution centres in thenext five years. Mailit offerscourier, cargo, 3PL, mailroom management digitalsolutions and postal servicesto leading corporates andseveral blue chip companies

MCL conductsvaccination drive Sambalpur: Anand ViharHospital at the headquartersof Mahanadi CoalfieldsLimited (MCL), in associationwith Sambalpur districtmedical authority, organiseda Covid-19 vaccination campfor its employees, contractedworkers and peripheralworkforce. In the programme,all the staff aged above 45 received the vaccine.

DCB acquiresstake in TCPLBangalore: DCB Bank Limitedannounced Wednesday thatit has acquired a minorityequity stake ofapproximately nine per centin Bangalore-based non-banking financial companyTechfino Capital PrivateLimited (TCPL). Techfinoprovides customisedconsumer loans in educationand healthcare sectors, andis present in key metros andtier II cities across India, theprivate sector bank said.

FICCI FLO getsnew Chairperson Bhubaneswar: SunitaMohanty, a fellow member ofthe Institute of CompanySecretaries of India (ICSI), hasbeen appointed as the newChairperson of FICCI FLOBhubaneswar Chapter for theyear 2021-2022. FICCI FLO isthe women’s wing ofFederation of Indian Chamberof Commerce and Industry(FICCI) which has itsheadquarters in New Delhi and17 chapters pan-Indiarepresenting over 8,000 womenentrepreneurs across thecountry. FLO Bhubaneswar isthe 17th chapter launched thatwas launched in April 2020.

SHORT TAKES

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, April 21: As the dev-astating second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic sweeps across India,leading FMCG companies are wit-nessing a strong surge in demandfor their health and hygiene prod-ucts, including hand sanitiser, handwash, disinfectant spray and germprotection wipes.

Companies such as ITC, HimalayaDrug Company and Patanjali saidthey have ramped up their pro-duction capacity to address spurt indemand, assuring that their hy-giene products are available to theconsumers.

The companies had witnessed aslowdown in the consumption pat-tern of these items in the past 2-3months. Now, they have reviewedtheir production plans as per the cur-rent situation and are rapidly scal-ing up and have streamlined theirproduction capacities.

"We are witnessing a strong uptick

in demand for our hygiene portfo-lio across some geographies. The ro-bustness and agility of our supplychains provide the flexibility and en-able us to address the emerging de-mand trends," ITC Divisional CEO(Personal Care Products) SameerSatpathy said.

Similarly, Himalaya DrugCompany Business Director(Consumer Products Division)Rajesh Krishnamurthy said, "Wehave shored up our logistics, salespriorities and capabilities to caterto the COVID-19-induced businessenvironment."

At Himalaya, he said "produc-tion planning is done almost twomonths in advance hence we didn'tanticipate a surge in cases duringlate March and early April. We haveaccordingly reviewed the productionplans as per current situation".

Krishnamurthy further said, "Wewill continue to ensure that productcategories like hand wash, hygienecategory, home care and sanitisersare made available to the consumers."

Haridwar-based PatanjaliAyurved also said a sudden spike indemand has created supply con-straints but it is temporary and thecompany has streamlined its pro-duction capacities. "We are gear-ing up and soon everywhere theseproducts will be available," Patanjalispokesperson SK Tijarawala said.

The second wave is so sponta-neous that none thought of suchmassive and mass spread withspeed, he added.

"We have focused and stream-lined all our production capacitiesto cater the demand of cononil,Shwasari Vati, Anu Tel, Giloy GhanVati, Tulsi Ghanvati, Chavyanprashand Immunogrit, etc, immunitybooster, sanitisers, handwash andmedications," Tijarawala added.

Edelweiss Financial ServicesExecutive Vice-President AbneeshRoy said that due to the secondwave of the pandemic, the homehygiene category will witness en-hanced demand.

FMCG cos see spike in demand of essential goods

Weare witnessing a

strong uptick in demandfor our hygiene portfolio

across some geographies. Therobustness and agility of our

supply chains provide theflexibility and enable us to

address the emerging demand trends

SAMEER SATPATHY I DIVISIONAL CEO(PERSONAL CARE PRODUCTS), ITC

AGENCIES

Mumbai, April 21:With economicactivities getting affected acrossthe country due to curbs imposedby states amid surge in Covid-19cases, Care Ratings has reviseddown its forecast for GDP growthto 10.2% in 2021-22 from earlierprojection of 10.7-10.9%.

This is the third revision by therating agency in the last one month.

“We have revised our forecastfor GDP growth for FY22 as theunderlying conditions have changedrapidly in the last 30 days or so. Itstands now at 10.2%,” Care Ratingssaid in a report.

On March 24, 2021, the agency hadprojected GDP growth between 11-11.2% based on GVA (gross valueadded) growth of 10.2%.

The spread of the virus inMaharashtra had led to the an-nouncement of a "lockdown" bythe state government which beganin a less stringent manner fromthe first week of April, it said.

Factoring the potential loss of eco-nomic output due to the restric-tions in the state, the agency, April5, lowered its GDP forecast for thecurrent fiscal year to 10.7-10.9%.

But the "lockdown" was mademore obtrusive to business activ-ity by April 20, with more strin-gency expected for the forthcomingfortnight, it added.

Further, the spread of the virusto other states has caused similaractions by governments whichhave ranged from night curfewsand weekend lockdowns to fulllockdowns.

The report said two events in

the country -- state elections andKumbh Mela -- have seen mil-lions of people coming togetherwith social distancing norms notbeing followed.

This has potential to spread thevirus at an exponential rate through-out the country and several stateshave announced measures to testpeople returning from the pil-grimage, it said.

The agency said the post-elec-tion lockdowns in five states/UT--Assam, West Bengal, TamilNadu, Kerala and Puducherry --can be expected once polling iscompleted and more people aretested for Covid-19.

The rating agency had projectedGVA (gross value added) to in-crease from `124.11 lakh crore(FY21) to ̀ 136.82 lakh crore (FY22)which was an increase of 10.2%.

With a potential fall in output of`1.13 lakh crore, GVA will be ̀ 135.69lakh crore and growth will be9.3%. As tax collections too wouldbe affected, there would be an im-pact on GDP growth which is nowplaced at 10.2%.

Care Ratings revisesGDP growth forecastto 10.2% for FY’22

DENTED NUMBERS

The agency, in March hadprojected GDP growth between

11-11.2% based on gross valueadded growth of 10.2%

Factoring the potential loss ofeconomic output due to the

restrictions in the state, theagency, April 5, lowered its GDPforecast for the current fiscal yearto 10.7-10.9%

AGENCIES

Mumbai, April 21:Reallocating oxy-gen for medical purposes to take careof the rising Covid cases will havean adverse impact on small busi-nesses in some sectors, domesticrating agency Crisil said Wednesday.It said the “hiccup” seems tempo-rary for now, and it is unlikely to im-pact the credit quality of the af-fected businesses.

The impact will be greater forcompanies in Maharashtra, NewDelhi, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradeshand Gujarat, where medical oxy-gen demand has increased multipletimes due to high Covid-19 case-loads, the agency added.

The central government has

barred industrial use of oxygenexcept in nine designated sectorsfrom Thursday onwards to divertthe available stocks for life-savingmedicinal use.

Demand for medical oxygen is es-timated to have rocketed five-fold inthe second week of April versuspre-pandemic levels as Covid-19 in-

fections took off, Crisil Ratingssaid. "The disruption in the sup-ply of oxygen for industrial usewould temporarily impact the rev-enues of small and mid-sized com-panies into metal fabrication, au-tomotive components, ship-breaking,paper, and engineering," its direc-tor Gautam Shahi said.

These sectors typically do nothave captive oxygen plants ands o u r c e t h e i r r e q u i r e m e n tthrough merchant suppliers foroperations such as welding, cut-ting, cleaning and chemicalprocesses, he added.

Setting up an air-separation plantor importing oxygen is not a vi-able option because it requires sig-nificant lead time and involves rel-

atively prohibitive costs, the agencysaid. Oxygen is consumed by in-dustry in two ways – on-site andmerchant sales. On-site is throughcaptive plants for process-drivenindustries (including the nine sec-tors exempted by the government),which account for 75-80% of oxygenmanufactured in India, the ratingagency said.

The balance 20-25% is suppliedthrough merchant sales (called liq-uid oxygen) through cryogenictanks and cylinders, it said, addingthe healthcare sector consumesonly 10% of merchant sales.

Its associate director SushantSarode said the disruption in oxy-gen supplies for industrial use willlast for six to eight weeks as of now.

‘Oxygen reallocation to impact small biz’

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, April 21: India wit-nessed 22 initial public offers (IPOs)worth over $2.5 billion in the firstthree months of 2021 amid “high mo-mentum” in the country’s capitalmarkets and the trend is likely tostay bullish in the current quar-ter also, according to a report.

Leading consultancy EY India’sIPO report released Wednesdayshowed that consumer productsand retail, diversified industrialproducts, automotive and trans-portation were the most active sec-tors in terms of the number ofIPOs in the 2021 first quarter. TheIPOs include both in the main as wellas SME (Small and MediumEnterprise) markets.

"With a robust Q1, IPO marketlikely to stay bullish in Q2 2021," itsaid, adding that India ranks ninthglobally in terms of the numberof IPOs Year-To-Date (YTD) 2021.

There were 22 IPOs that moppedup $2,570.44 million in the firstquarter of this year, including fivein the SME space.

During the first quarter, IndianRailway Finance Corp’s IPO -- withan issue size of $634 million -- wasthe largest.

"In the main markets (BSE andNSE), there were 17 IPOs in Q1 2021

versus 1 IPO in Q1 2020 and 10 IPOsin Q4 2020, representing an increaseof 1,600% compared to Q1 2020 andan increase of 70% compared toQ4 2020," the report said.

In the SME segment, there were5 IPOs in the first quarter of thisyear versus 11 and 9 IPOs in the firstquarter of 2020 and fourth quarterof last year, respectively. This rep-resents a decrease of 55% com-pared to Q1 2020 and a decline of 44%compared to Q4 2020.

"We are witnessing high mo-mentum in the Indian capital mar-kets. Significant amount of activ-ity is driven by huge dry powderawaiting investment and compa-nies exploring a listing in India oroverseas.

"The markets continue to reward

companies with robust, scalableand technology-led business mod-els," Sandip Khetan, Partner andNational Leader of FinancialAccounting Advisory Services(FAAS) at EY India said.

As per the report, the IPO pipelinehas over 20 companies that havefiled their Draft Red HerringProspectus (DRHPs) and more than30 PE-backed companies are plan-ning exits. InvITs worth almost $5billion are in the pipeline.

However, the report also notedthat there are reasons for cautionin the near-term, given the slowstart to vaccinations in India rela-tive to the size of the population, re-newed spike in Covid infectionswith the second wave and threatsfrom new variants of the virus.

India records 22 IPOs worthover $2.5bn in Jan-Mar period

As per the report, the IPO pipeline has over 20 companies that have filed their DraftRed Herring Prospectus and more than 30 PE-backed companies are planning exits

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: JindalSteel & Power Ltd (JSPL) assuredAngul District Administration tosupply medical oxygen for treat-ment of Covid-19 affected peoplein the state. JSPL’s ExecutiveDirector and Angul Unit Head in aletter to Collector and DistrictMagistrate Angul said, “JSPL iscommitted for the well-being of thepeople of Odisha, and always withthe district administration to addressthe emergency situation arised dueto the pandemic”.

Responding to JSPL’s noble ges-ture, Collector Angul has alsothanked the company and its so-cial arm JSPL Foundation in histweet. JSPL’s Chairman Naveen

Jindal already announced that JSPLwill supply 50 to 100 tonnes of med-ical oxygen every day from its Odishaand Chhattisgarh Unit. Jindal said,“JSPL has been always standingwith the country and countrymenduring calamities and emergencies

and will continue to do so during thispandemic. I am sure, together, weshall defeat the pandemic.”

“We can compromise steel pro-duction for a while to supply oxy-gen to the government to save pre-cious lives. Our priority is people

first,” JSPL’s Managing DirectorVR Sharma on Twitter.

“We can compromise steel pro-duction for a while to supply oxy-gen to the government to save pre-cious lives. Our priority is peoplefirst,” Sharma said on twitter.

The company had supplied 725tonnes of liquid oxygen in Odishalast year to save human lives fromthe clutches of the deadly Covid-19 pandemic. JSPL has also takenmulti-pronged initiatives to fightthe second wave of Covid-19 acrossall its operational locations, in-cluding Odisha. The company hasinstituted Covid Care Centres ineach of its business locations andis taking every measure to pro-vide a healthy environment inJSPL’s workplace.

JSPL vows to provide O2 to hospitals in stateJSPL has been alwaysstanding with thecountry andcountrymen duringcalamities and

emergencies and willcontinue to do soduring this pandemic. I am sure, together, we shall defeat the pandemicNAVEEN JINDAL I CHAIRMAN JSPL

POST NEWS NETWORK

Bhubaneswar, April 21: ChiefMinister Naveen PatnaikWednesday inaugurated an iconic4-star hotel ‘Lemon Tree Premier’in the City. The inauguration cer-emony took place via virtual mode.

OTDC Chairperson ShreemayeeMishra, Director Tourism &Culture Department SachinRamachandra Jadhav,Bhubaneswar North MLA SusantKumar Rout and Vice President(Operation), Lemon Tree MaheshS Aiyer were present at the inau-gural ceremony. The founderRashmi Ranjan Routray, HardhikRoutray and Umang Routray werealso present. The hotel is repletewith ultimate luxury, comfort andambience.

Lemon Tree Premier has a ban-quet area of 22,000 sq ft on its 6thfloor. The hotel also possesses aswimming pool, a bar, two restau-rants (Thai & Chinese) and 5,000sq ft of decked area on the 7thfloor. It also provides spa and gymservices on the 8th Floor.

Moreover, Lemon Tree’s 9th to12th floor guest areas exhibit 76deluxe rooms and suites designedto offer unparalleled hospitality andunmatched service and economyto its valued guests, visiting the her-itage city (Bhubaneswar).

It was said that the hotel will pro-vide an opportunity of employ-ment to over 150 skilled and un-skilled youth of Odisha. The hotelauthorities said, “We share thevision of our Hon’ble ChiefMinister to make Bhubaneswar acity of dreams.”

CM UNVEILS 4-STARLEMON TREEPREMIER IN CITY

Lemon Tree Premierhas a banquet area of22,000 sq ft on its 6thfloor. The hotel alsopossesses a bar,swimming pool, tworestaurants (Thai &Chinese) and 5,000 sqft of decked area onthe 7th floor. It alsoprovides spa and gym services on the 8th Floor

PNN/AGENCIES

Bhubaneswar, April 21:The coun-try’s largest life insurer LIC has saidthat it has collected the highest-ever new business premium of`1.84 lakh crore in the fiscal endedMarch 31, 2021. The state-run in-surer said the number is provi-sional. Its market share stood at81.04% in number of policies forMarch 2021 and 74.58% for the fullyear, LIC said in a release.

During the fiscal 2020-21, the in-surer achieved first year premiumincome of `56,406 crore under in-dividual assurance business, agrowth of 10.11% over FY’20. It

procured 2.10 crore policies, out ofwhich 46.72 lakh were procured inMarch alone, registering a growthof 298.82% over FY’20 for the cor-responding month, the release said.

Its market share in the first yearpremium stood at 64.74% for Marchand 66.18% for the entire fiscal.The insurer’s pension and groupschemes vertical also created a newrecord by clocking its highest-evernew business premium income of`1.27 lakh crore over a huge base of`1.26 lakh crore in the previousyear ended March 31, 2020.

The number of new schemessold also saw a new record of 31,795,the release said.

LIC collects highest-ever new premium of ̀ 1.84L cr

Printed and published by Tathagata Satpathy on behalf of Navajat Printers and Media Pvt. Ltd. and printed at Navajat Printers, B-15 Industrial Estate, Rasulgarh, Bhubaneswar -751010, Odisha;Phone:7894447142(Marketing). Editor: Tathagata Satpathy, RNI No. ORIENG/2011/37159

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PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Mumbai, April 21: Off to the best pos-sible start with three wins on the trot, aconfident Royal Challengers Bangalorewill hope to keep the juggernaut rollingwhen they take on Rajasthan Royals inan IPL match here, Thursday.

Both sides have endured contrastingcampaigns so far. RCB head in to thegame after three morale-boosting vic-tories. The Virat Kohli-led side edgedpast defending champions MumbaiIndians in the tournament opener beforegetting the better of Sunrisers Hyderabadand Kolkata Knight Riders to jump to thetop of the points table.

On the other hand, the Royals havemanaged to win only one of their threefixtures. They lost to Chennai SuperKings in their previous match to slipdown to the sixth spot. Sanju Samson and

his men will be eyeing a second win.The Royals have struggled to perform as

a cohesive batting unit. While Samson ledthe team to within touching distance ofvictory with his sensational century againstPunjab Kings, it was the South Africanduo of David Miller and Chris Morris thatpulled off a win against the Delhi Capitals.

Against CSK, opener Jos Buttler lookeddangerous but the other batsmen failedto provide any valuable contributions.For the former champions to do well,the side must click as a batting unit withSamson and the Englishman playingkey roles.

The Royals bowling unit has been un-derwhelming to say the least, apart fromthe game against Delhi Capitals, thebowlers have leaked runs. Pacer JaydevUnadkat shone against the Rishabh Pant-led side, registering the impressive fig-ures of 3/15, while young Chetan Sakariyahas shown promise.

In the absence of Jofra Archer, morewill be expected out of the likes of Morrisand Bangladesh speedster MustafizurRahman.

For RCB, AB de Villiers and new-re-cruit Glenn Maxwell have been the stand-out players with the willow. While the

South African continues to deliver sea-son after season, the Australian all-rounder is proving to be a valuable ad-dition to the middle order.

Kohli has got decent starts in a cou-ple of games but the talismanic skip-per will be itching to play a big innings.Young Devdutt Padikkal, who impressedeveryone last season, has also lookedrusty and is yet to perform to his full po-tential. After two failures Rajat Patidarwill, too, look to make amends.

The RCB bowling department hasbeen impressive with pacers HarshalPatel and Mohammed Siraj boastingeconomy rate of 5.75 and 5.81 respec-tively. The former pulled the rabbit outof the hat with a five-wicket haul againstMI while left-arm spinner ShahbazAhmed (3/7) changed the complexionof the match in just one over againstthe Sunrisers.

RCB FACE RR IN ROYAL ENCOUNTERTODA’S MATCH

RRRCB

TIME 7.30 PM

Telecast: Star Sports channels

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Madrid, April 21: Atletico Madrid,Inter Milan, AC Milan and Juventusall dropped out of the Super LeagueWednesday, leaving the new com-petition essentially extinct beforeit even started. Only Spanish clubsReal Madrid and Barcelona arestill officially involved.

The moves by Atletico, Inter, ACMilan and Juventus came a dayafter the six Premier League clubsinvolved in the project gave up onthe controversial breakaway com-petition.

English clubs Arsenal, Chelsea,Liverpool, Manchester United,Manchester City and Tottenhamdeserted the plans for the largely-closed competition amid an esca-lating backlash from their sup-porters and warnings from thegovernment that legislation couldbe introduced to thwart them.

The Super League project wasoverseen by Real Madrid presidentFlorentino Perez, who promotedit as a way to “save soccer” and theclubs struggling financially amidthe coronavirus pandemic.

UEFA threatened to ban playersfrom the participating teams fromplaying in this year’s EuropeanChampionship and next year’sWorld Cup. But a Madrid courtlater issued a preliminary rulingstopping UEFA, FIFA and its mem-bers from acting against the creationof the new league.

AC Milan signalled it was leav-ing a few hours after Atletico andInter Milan made their announce-ments. Juventus followed momentslater, but didn’t completely abandonplans for a future Super League.

Atletico said the decision wasmade after its board of directors met

Wednesday. The Spanish club saidit “decided to formally communi-cate the Super League and the restof the founding clubs its decisionnot to formalize its participation inthe project.”

The English clubs heeded theappeals from UEFA PresidentAleksander Ceferin to remain partof the Champions League, whichhas a qualification criteria based ona team’s performance in the do-mestic league.

As it became clear Chelsea andCity were quitting the Super LeagueTuesday evening, Liverpool cap-tain Jordan Henderson and histeammates posted a message ad-vocating staying within the openEuropean competitions.

Liverpool, which is owned by theBoston Red Sox investment group,eventually issued a statement thank-ing those inside and outside theclub for “valuable contributions” be-

fore making the decision to stickwithin existing structures.

Manchester United defenderLuke Shaw also went against hisclub by tweeting his backing of theexisting Champions League minutesbefore his club’s about-turn.

Tottenham also gave a detailed ex-planation for why it signed up beforebacking away. Chelsea, which isowned by Russian billionaire RomanAbramovich, said it only joined theSuper League group last week.

The Premier League threatenedto sanction the six rebel clubs andPrime Minister Boris Johnson con-sidered introducing laws to stopthem forming a new European com-petition he called a “cartel.”

The Premier League had threat-ened the six clubs with expulsionif they tried to go it alone in Europe.The other 14 clubs met Tuesdayand ‘unanimously and vigorously’rejected the Super League plans.

6 ENGLISH CLUBS WITHDRAW; ATLETICO, ITALIAN CLUBS DROP OUT

Super League plan collapses

Real Madrid presidentFlorentino Perez overseesthe Super League project

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

New Delhi, April 21: Eight Indianboxers, including seven women,stormed into the finals of the youthworld championships in Kielce,Poland, an unprecedented achieve-ment for the country in the marqueeage group event.

Apart from the eight finalists,three others settled for bronzemedals at the tournament, a per-formance which betters the 10medals that India won in its best evershow not too long back in the 2018edition in Hungary.

The ones who made the finals, tobe held Thursday after a rest day

Wednesday, were Gitika (48kg),Babyrojisana Chanu (51kg), Vinka(60kg), Arundhati Choudhary (69kg),Poonam (57kg), ThokchomSanamachu Chanu (75kg) and AlfiyaPathan (+81kg) among women.Among men, only Sachin (56kg)made the summit clash while threeothers signed off with bronzemedals.

Gitika defeated Italy’s ErikaPrisciandaro 5-0 to set up a clashwith Poland’s Natalia Dominika,while Vinka prevailed 4-1 againstCzech Republic’s Veronika Gajdova.Vinka will next take on Kazakhstan’sZhuldyz Shayakhmetova.

Arundhati had little trouble get-

ting past Uzbekistan’s KhadichabonuAbdullaeva in a unanimous 5-0 ver-dict and she will be up againstPoland’s Barbara Marcinkowska inher summit showdown.Babyrojisanaalso notched up a similar resultagainst Italy’s Elen Ayari. She hasRussia’s Valeriia Linkova to con-tend with in the finals. Manipur’sBabyrojisana is the reigning Asianyouth champion.

Poonam sailed past Uzbekistan’sSitora Turdibekova 5-0, and France’sSthelyne Grosy awaits her in the goldmedal bout. Sanamacha clinched a4-1 triumph over Poland’s DariaParada. She will square off againstKazakhstan’s Dana Diday in her

last bout of the event. Alfiya had a tough one against

Poland’s Oliwia Toborek but theIndian did enough to prevail 3-2.Moldova’s Daria Kozorez will beher final challenge.

In the evening session, Sachinwas the lone Indian to triumph,beating Italy’s Michele Baldassi.He will fight it out with Kazakhstan’sYerbolat Sabyr for the top honourson Friday.

Asian youth silver-winner AnkitaNarwal (64kg), BishwamitaChongthom (49kg) and Vishal Gupta(91kg) ended their campaigns withthird-place finishes following semi-final losses.

8 Indian boxers in Youth Worlds finals

FC Goa go down to Persepolis

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Margao, April 20: FC Goa put upa spirited fight before going down

1-2 to Group E leaders Persepolis FC,bringing to an end the Indian club’sunbeaten run in the AFCChampions League here, Tuesday.

Quite remarkably, FC Goagrabbed the lead when Edu Bediaheaded in to the bottom right cor-ner from the centre of the box in the14th minute. Bedia was assisted byBrandon Fernandes following a setpiece situation.

But the Indian club’s joy wasshort-lived as Persepolis FC foughtback strongly to not just equalisebut also go ahead in the high-octanecontest. Persepolis FC, last sea-son’s runners-up in the ChampionsLeague, drew parity when MahdiTorabi converted a penalty in the18th minute.

Soon enough, from a cross byTorabi following a corner, SeyedJalal Hosseini unleashed a headerfrom close range to put the fan-cied visitors ahead in the 24thminute at the Jawaharlal NehruStadium.

The Goans were forced to makean early substitution as AmarjitSingh replaced Adil Khan in the 29thminute because of an injury.

FC Goa’s Edu Bediacelebrates his goal

CHENNAI PASS KKR TEST

PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Mumbai, April 21: Superb bat-ting performances from Faf duPlessis (95 n o, 60b, 9x4, 4x6) andRuturaj Gaikwad (64, 42b, 6x4, 4x6),as well as a splendid opening spellfrom Deepak Chahar (4/29) helpedChennai Super Kings beat KolkataKnight Riders by 18 runs in athrilling IPL match here, Wednesday.

Sent into bat, Du Plessis andGaikwad knocked the daylight outof KKR bowlers, adding 115 for theopening wicket to lay the foundation.After Gaikwad was back in the hut,Du Plessis continued his rampage,while Moeen Ali (25) and MS Dhoni(17) also came up with useful cameosas CSK posted a big total of 220/3.

In response, KKR were reduced

to 31/5 in 5.2 overs, but they showedthe ‘never-say-die’ attitude andcame close to winning the gamebefore being bowled out for 202 withfive balls to spare.

Only three of the KKR batsmencould reach double-digit scores asDinesh Karthik (40, 24b, 4x4, 2x6),Andre Russell (54, 22b, 3x4, 6x6)and Pat Cummins (66 n o, 34b, 4x4,6x6) almost pulled off an incrediblewin for their side.

Despite losing half their side,Russell joined Karthik at the mid-dle as the West Indian began counter-attacking. The duo added 81 runs insix overs for the sixth wicket beforeSam Curran got rid of Russell in the12th over. From 31/5, they reached112/6 in 11.2 overs.

However, CSK could hardly breath

a sigh of relief as Karthik andCummins carried the momentumset by Russell. KKR were reducedto 146/7 in the 15th over. Cumminstried his best and take KKR past 200-run mark, but eventually ran out ofpartners.

Earlier, it was Gaikwad who re-turned to form after a string ofpoor outings in his first threematches with a composed knockthat set it up for CSK after KKRopted to field.

Du Plessis came on his own afterGaikwad’s departure in the 13thover as he added 50 runs with MoeenAli (25) off just 26 balls. CSK scored

76 runs in the final five overs withthe South African at his attackingbest in the final five overs. MSDhoni promoted himself to No.4and finally broke his jinx againstSunil Narine, hitting his first bound-ary after 64 balls against the mys-tery spinner.BRIEF SCORES: Chennai SuperKings 220/3 (Faf du Plessis 95 n o,Ruturaj Gaikwad 64; VarunChakravarthy 1/27, Andre Russell1/27) beat Kolkata Knight Riders202 (Pat Cummins 66 n o, AndreRussell 54, Dinesh Karthik 40;Deepak Chahar 4/29, Lungi Ngidi3/28) by 18 runs.

Faf du Plessis goesover long-off for aboundary as DineshKarthik looks on

Rafa through atBarcelona OpenASSOCIATED PRESS

Barcelona, April 21: Rafa Nadalneeded three sets to beat his 111th-ranked opponent in his first matchat the Barcelona Open Wednesday,while Fabio Fognini was dis-qualified for alleged verbal abuse.Nadal defeated Ilya Ivashka ofBelarus 3-6, 6-2, 6-4 at the clay-court tournament.

Fognini was defaulted whiletrailing 0-6, 4-4 against qualifierBernabe Zapata Miralles of Spain,after a line judge told the chairumpire that the ninth-seededItalian had used foul language.

Fognini denied wrongdoing andwas upset as he left the court,breaking his racket after hittingit at the net post on his way out.

Rublev advanced by defeatingFederico Gaio 6-4, 6-3, while second-seeded Stefanos Tsitsipas cruisedpast wild-card entry Jaume Munarof Spain 6-0, 6-2.

Sunrisers maul KingsPRESS TRUST OF INDIA

Chennai, April 21: Fast bowlerKhaleel Ahmed (3/21) led an im-pressive bowling effort beforeJonny Bairstow (63 n o, 56b, 3x4,3x6) smashed an unbeaten fiftyas Sunrisers Hyderabad snappedtheir three-match losing streakwith a convincing nine-wicket winover Punjab Kings in an IPL gamehere, Wednesday.

Asked to bowl first, SunrisersHyderabad’s pace-spin duo ofKhaleel (3/21) and AbhishekSharma (2/24) did bulk of the dam-age to bundle out Punjab Kingsfor a below-par 120 in 19.4 overs.

Senior pacer BhuvneshwarKumar (1/16), star Afghanistanspinner Rashid Khan (1/17) andSiddarth Kaul (1/27) also picked upa wicket each as Punjab nevergained momentum.

Chasing the total, SRH openersBairstow and David Warner (37,37b, 3x4, 1x6) pummelled Punjabinto submission, adding 73 runs off60 balls to set the foundation.Bairstow and Kane Williamson(16 n o) then knocked off the re-maining runs as SRH rompedhome with eight balls to spare.

Warner was holed out to MayankAgarwal off Fabian Allen (1/22),who bowled a wicket maiden, asSRH were 73/1. Bairstow foundan able ally in Williamson, who wasplaying his first match of the sea-son, as they added an unbeaten48 runs to help SRH log their firstwin of the season.

Earlier, Shahrukh Khan (22)and Mayank (22) were the top scor-ers for Punjab Kings, who cameinto the match after two losses.In an innings when clearing theboundary seemed to be a tall task,Khan managed two sixes, whileAgarwal, who was dropped on 0 in

the very first over by Rashid, hittwo fours.

Opting to bat in their first gameat MA Chidambaram Stadium,Punjab lost their in-form skipperKL Rahul (4) early on. Agarwaland Chris Gayle (15) stitched 24-runpartnership. However, at the endof the seventh over, Khaleel got ridof the Indian with Rashid makingno mistakes this time at midwicket.

West Indian Nicholas Pooran(0) was out for a diamond duck asSunrisers skipper Warner effectedhis run out in the eighth over.Gayle followed his compatriot inthe next over as he was adjudgedleg before.

Punjab was reeling at 53/4 atthe halfway mark as wickets con-tinued to tumble at regular in-tervals. Deepak Hooda (13) and

Australian all-rounder MoisesHenriques (14) got starts but wereunable to capitalised on them.Spin all-rounder Allen (6) alsostruggled on his debut.

Local star Khan tried to injectsome hope into the Punjab campbut a slower ball by Khaleel endedhis cameo. Murugan Ashwin (9)hit a boundary but Kaul ac-counted for the spinner in thelast over which was followed bythe dismissal of Shami (3), whowas run out.

BRIEF SCORES: Punjab Kings120 (Shahrukh Khan 22, MayankAgarwal 22; Khaleel Ahmed 3/21,Abhishek Sharma 2/24) lost toSunrisers Hyderabad 121/1 (JonnyBairstow 63 n o, David Warner 37;Fabian Allen 1/22) by 9 wickets.

MATCH-WINNING EFFORTS: Khaleel Ahmed (L) reacts after getting a wicket;Jonny Bairstow plays through the off-side during his innings, Wednesday

Deepak Chahar (R) in jolly mood after dismissing a KKR batsman in Mumbai